Smoke, Mirrors and Masks

Act 2: Part 3 - The Pig and the Shadow

Edward was crouched at the hedge-line and spied the creature through the chattering playground crowds. There he was, oblivious and grim-faced, snorting amongst his minions in the heart of the playground. The mighty beast - Sean Moore. Edward's gut swirled with fire upon sight him. He crept down the grassy embankment leading to the playground's concrete, keeping his shoulders low and his sketchbook gripped firmly in one hand.

With great care, and finesse, the boy weaved through the jungle of bodies. Passing by unseen, a shadow within shadow. He slowed his approach as he honed in on the beast, performing a wide crab-side step to remain in its blind spot. An unsteady breath fluttered from his lungs as he lingered in the creature's shadow, its board back standing as a wall against the sun. Edward slipped his sketchbook into both hands, creeping closer, till he could smell the salt in the creatures sweat. He sprang from the floor with the speed of an unrepressed spring. And as he soared to the creature's height as he swung his sketchbook, thwacking it across the side of the creatures head.

Its pages leapt out from the covers like a flock of butterflies as Edward landed and he watched as they were dragged away upon a gust of wind, disappearing into the playground crowds or crunching under the trample of scruffy school shoes. Edward cared not, for the beast now turned to face him. Muscle rippled beneath the folds of fat on his arms as the beast flexed the full breadth of its frame. His shoulders stretched out like a mountain range and his face swelled a furious shade of red.

"You little shit!" The beast howled, throwing out a monstrous claw. Edward weaved under the grapple, switched on his heels and fled. "After him!"

As he zipped through the chattering crowds Edward dared only to cast a glance back once. As he expected the beast pursued, accompanied by his pack of shadows. Edward slipped his way through the maze of children, sliding under arms and legs in a free and fluid motion. His pursuers did not share the same courtesy and instead ploughed straight through the forest of bodies if they did not move out of the way fast enough.

Edward's eyes widened as he slipped through the final wall of children, reaching the far side of the playground where the door in the redbrick wall sat patiently. He charged towards it and leapt up all three steps in a single bound. Though hope abandoned him as he rung the handle. Locked! Edward clawed at it a few more times before giving up, it was no use the door refused to open. He glanced over his shoulder, the beast and shadows were fast approaching, leaving a carved out line in the playground as they went.

Edward hid a frustrated snarl beneath his masks ecstatic grin and leapt from the pedestal and chased the brick wall to a corner. Diving around it, he found a short fence, that no child dared cross, for it signalled the playgrounds end. Both terror and determination pulled at him as he launched himself at the obstacle. He flew over it in a single, awkward bound, crashing into the teacher's garden as a pile of limbs.

The fall knocked the wind from his gut and he clambered back onto his feet with a deep-rooted pain in his stomach. He had landed at the gardens edge, in a bed of dry dirt. To call it a garden was to lie, for the area reeked of abandonment. It was a small circular plot, with a raised bed of earth standing as the garden's centrepiece, encase in a short wall that crumbled from neglect. It was meant to house flowers, but it didn't, home instead to the odd shrivelled weed or ghostly dandelion. Four other flower beds, one of which Edward currently trampled upon, were set between washed-out, wooden benches that faced the barren flower bed.

Edward picked himself up, brushing the dirt from his front as he staggered towards to the wall. He rested upon it in hopes of catching his breath, however the cement between the brickwork crumbled into dust and Edward toppled onto his side, falling with a couple of loose bricks. From the floor he noticed that his pursuers, like him, were undeterred by the picket fence, showing no signs of slowing as they charged towards it. And one by one, each of the shadows slid under the fence with ease. Panicked, Edward threw a glance to his right, where the side of the school's assembly hall proudly stood, it's walls lined with tall, thin windows. Edward glanced back at his pursuers. The great pig was the last to flop over, too large to slip under the fence with the others. Instinct took over. Edward took a loose brick in hand, jumped to his feet, and launched to his right like a shotput. The crumbling block twirled through the air, a comet that smashed through one of the assembly-hall windows, reducing it to a shower of chittering glass. Edward had shot towards the window frame before the brick had land and now jumped through the new opening, knocking a few stubborn shards from the windows metal frame. He dived to his left and the glass crunched beneath him as lay flat against the floor. Outside, he could hear nervous chatter.