2025-06-30 12:06:07The road never came.
They walked and walked for so fucking long, Kael began to feel sorry for Elara. He did not feel fatigue from the long trekk except for the strength sapping from him because of his inner battle. They kept looking forward, walking towards the road that Elara mentioned that never came into view. What came instead was silence. The kind that crawled up your neck and whispered things behind your ears. The kind that didn’t feel like peace, but like something holding its breath. Kael pressed a palm to the bark of a twisted pine tree, letting the cold bite into his skin. He didn’t trust himself to keep moving without breaking into a sprint. Not when his knees ached like he’d been running for hours. Not when the bones in his back were moving. They’d walked for what felt like forever. Elara kept behind him, quiet and watchful. Probably scared. Probably thinking of turning around. Probably realizing she should’ve left him in that cell. Kael wouldn’t blame her. He didn’t even know where they were anymore. “Hey,” she said, breaking the silence. “You okay?” No. He wasn’t. His hands were shaking. His heart was pounding, but it wasn’t fear. It was something else. He turned to her, jaw tight. “Something’s wrong.” Elara scanned the trees. “You hear something?” “I smell something.” The wind shifted and it hit him like a punch. Burned plastic. Oil. Copper. And blood. Not just a drop. Spilled. He jerked his head toward the tree line. “We need to move.” But they didn’t get far. A voice cut through the trees, calm and cold... “Kael.” He turned slowly. A boy stood between the branches. He looked about Kael’s age, maybe older, but he wasn’t normal. His skin was pale and tight, veins crawling just under the surface. His eyes gleamed like silver coins, wide and hungry. He smiled like someone who knew too much and cared too little. “You made it out,” the boy said. “Didn’t think you would.” Kael stepped forward, jaw clenched. “Who the hell are you?” “Like you,” the boy said. “Just… earlier.” His movements were too smooth. No tension. No fear. Like he wasn’t even human anymore. “I remember you,” the boy went on. “The favorite. The quiet one. Always watching. Never asking questions. That made you perfect.” Kael’s blood turned to ice. “You were in the lab.” “I was before the lab.” He tilted his head. “We all were.” Elara stepped forward, tense. “What do you want?” The boy’s grin widened. “To see what he made you into.” Kael didn’t wait. He pushed Elara into the nearby bushes and then lunged. The fight hit like lightning. Kael wasn’t sure who threw the first punch. Maybe it was him. Maybe the other kid. It didn’t matter. One second he was standing, the next he was moving fast, too fast. The forest spun around him. Fists cracked against flesh. Elbows met bone. Blood splattered leaves. Kael had never moved like this. He wasn’t thinking, just reacting. Muscle memory that wasn’t his. Instinct that didn’t belong to him. His body fought like it knew the enemy. He had to admit he kind of liked it. But the other boy was faster, stronger. More precise. He had to be consuming gallons of blood. Or it was just that Kael was new and weak. A blur of motion sent Kael crashing into a tree. He coughed blood. Laughed bitterly. “Still green,” the boy said, circling. “Still holding back.” Kael wiped his mouth, eyes wild. “I don’t know how far I can go.” “Then let me help you find out.” He came at Kael again, claws out this time. Long, sharp, curved like bone daggers. Kael barely dodged. The claw sliced across his shoulder. Pain shot down his arm. Kael grabbed the boy by the neck and slammed him into a tree. Bark exploded behind him. But the boy just laughed, eyes glowing, blood in his teeth. “Feels good, doesn’t it?” he hissed. “The strength. The freedom.” Kael roared, slamming his fist into the kid’s ribs once, twice, until he felt something crack. The boy’s smile never left. And then, from behind Kael, he heard Elara's muffled voice “Kael!!” she screamed. Kael turned. Too slow. The boy kicked him in the side, and Kael went flying. His back slammed into a rock. Bad, blinding pain exploded behind his eyes. Elara was on the ground, wheezing, trying to sit up. The boy stepped toward her. Kael saw her hand go to the scalpel she’d stolen from the lab. He saw the fear in her eyes. He felt the pulse in her chest. Something in Kael’s body snapped. He didn’t just move, he exploded forward. Claws he didn’t know he had extended from his fingers. His back arched. His spine felt molten. He hit the boy like a storm, driving him into the dirt, snarling. This time, he didn’t hold back. Flesh tore. Teeth gnashed. And for the second time, Kael tasted blood that wasn’t his. The boy kicked him off, face half torn. He hissed, fury bleeding into panic. “You’re not ready,” he spat. “But you will be.” Then he vanished. Gone in the blink of an eye. Almost like he has been swallowed by the trees. Kael dropped to his knees. His arms were shaking. His hands, his claws... were stained red. He stared at them like they weren’t his. “Elara…” he said hoarsely. She didn’t speak. Just looked at him, eyes wide, lips parted. Kael’s voice cracked. “Did I...did I hurt you?” She shook her head slowly. “No. You… you stopped him.” He nodded, but there was no relief in his eyes. Only horror. He looked down at his hands again. “I liked it,” he whispered. “What?” “I liked the way it felt.” He said and looked up at her. Showing her his blood stained face. A in his eyes, something new had entered. Something worse than fear. Something he dreaded but could not quite shake the feeling of... Hunger.
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"KAEL!!!"
Hunger branded Kael like a red hot iron. He wanted more. He needed more. It felt like he was going to die. Like he would fall right there to his death. But he could not let himself look towards Elara.He didn’t even let himself speak to her, afraid of what could happen if the wrong though or movement triggered him. Kael sat with his back against a rock, his knees pulled up, blood drying on his fingers like war paint. His heart had slowed, but the taste was still there, on his tongue, behind his teeth, in his head.He wanted to vomit. But more than that, he wanted more.He hated that.Elara was across from him, crouched by a nearby stream running shallow over roots. She was washing her hands. He wondered if it was her blood or his. Or the boy’s.Kael’s voice cracked the silence. He decided that he needed to hear her voice. It would ground hi.. Keep him tethered to reality. “Do you think I’m one of them now?” She didn’t turn."Like that boy?” he said again, quieter.Elara looked up, dr
The Boy In The Woods
The road never came.They walked and walked for so fucking long, Kael began to feel sorry for Elara. He did not feel fatigue from the long trekk except for the strength sapping from him because of his inner battle.They kept looking forward, walking towards the road that Elara mentioned that never came into view.What came instead was silence.The kind that crawled up your neck and whispered things behind your ears. The kind that didn’t feel like peace, but like something holding its breath.Kael pressed a palm to the bark of a twisted pine tree, letting the cold bite into his skin. He didn’t trust himself to keep moving without breaking into a sprint. Not when his knees ached like he’d been running for hours. Not when the bones in his back were moving.They’d walked for what felt like forever. Elara kept behind him, quiet and watchful. Probably scared. Probably thinking of turning around. Probably realizing she should’ve left him in that cell.Kael wouldn’t blame her.He didn’t even
A Howl In The Distance
Kael and Elara could not stick around the lab for too long so they started their journey away from the lab environs. They could not go back home so their best bet was the forest.For hours, they walked in silence. Both of them tired and exhausted in different ways. The forest too, was deadly silent.Kael’s breath clouded the air in front of him, thick and ragged. His knees were planted in the damp earth, trembling under his own weight. Every part of him hurt. Not the surface-level kind, the ache that lived in the bones. In the marrow.Behind him, he heard Elara stopped walking and stand still, watching him like he might snap in half or explode.He wished he could promise her he wouldn’t.But he wasn’t so sure. Not after what he had just done to the guard. He still did not want to think about it. So he pushed it to the back of his mind a d kept walking.A breeze passed through the trees, rustling the leaves. It should have been calming. Should have sounded like freedom. It didn’t.Ever
Moonlight
Kael ran until his legs buckled under him, his hands slapping the floor to keep from falling face-first into cold steel. His vision twisted.Kale blinked repeatedly, but he could see lines bending where they shouldn’t, shadows twitching like they had breath. Every heartbeat pounded like a drum inside his skull, each thud echoing louder than the last.He tried to blink the haze away. It didn’t go, in fact, it only made his vision worse. Blurry and bleak. Kael had never run like that before. Not from a fight, not from his past, not even from the streets he grew up learning to navigate like a second skin.This was different.He wasn’t running to survive. He was running to protect. From himself. The thought was fucking messed up, but he kept running. His legs carried him through corridors he didn’t recognize, his breath sharp in his chest, too fast, too loud. Every footstep echoed behind him like he was being hunted. But he wasn’t. Not yet.He was the hunter.His skin itched like it was
He Could Smell Colors, He Could Smell Her.
Kael didn’t remember falling asleep.One second he was on the cold metal floor, still breathing too hard, still feeling her eyes on him. The next thing he knew, darkness. He knew he was asleep, he had to be, but he could feel everything. He tried to get himself to wake up, but he felt stuck in his own body. Then all he felt was heat. Eveywhere.Heavy, suffocating heat.Like fire pulsing under his skin.He stood in a hallway like the one in the lab, but the lights were red, and everything dripped. The walls… were pulsing. Breathing. As if the whole place was alive, waiting.He looked down. His hands were covered in blood. Not glowing veins this time. Not a trick of light.Blood, warm, thick, dark, and fresh.He tried to wipe them on his shirt, but the more he scrubbed, the more it smeared, like the blood was coming from inside him. Like he was leaking.He turned a corner and saw someone standing ahead of him.A girl. Small. Pale. Familiar. One of the foster kids.Kael stepped forward.
"You can't survive it"
Immediately Kael could no longer see or smell 34C, Kael burst out if his hiding place, running towards nowhere in particular.But not fast enough.He heard the growl first, low and sharp, like a blade dragged across stone. His nose hurt, his eyes felt like they needed to close for a long while, but Kael fought to keep them open. He needed to be awake and alert if he ever planned to escape from this hell hole. He listened again from the growl straining his ears... Then out of nowhere, he felt he impact of another body colliding with his own. 34C slammed into him from behind and they both went down hard. Kael hit the floor shoulder-first, breath crushed out of him. He rolled, tried to scramble back, but the other boy was already on top of him, pinning him down like a predator that had done this before.“You run like prey,” 34C whispered, grinning. “But you smell like me.”Kael drove his elbow up and luckily caught 34C’s jaw before he bit out a chunk of his arm. The older teen barely
