Outlaw

6. Calypso

Day three

I awoke to a splitting pain in the back of my head, it hurt like hell! All the memories came flooding back to me like a tidal wave, I cringed at the thought of not only how vivid the memories were, but also how I was stupid enough to see the tree branch right in front of my fucking face. Like come on. It's a whole damn branch. You would think, with my extensive artillery of survival skills that  I would be able to see a piece of wood directly in front of my face. But no, at this rate I won't last a week. It suddenly occured to me that when I had collapsed, it had been on the forest floor, not on a pile of furs in an abandoned, hollowed out tree trunk. Wait, I had never been in this tree trunk before (no shit Sherlock), heck I hadn't even seen it on my journey and I usually notice most little details.

My host appeared around an abnormally large root, humming to herself as she came round the corner. She suddenly spotted that I had woken up and started to mutter rapidly to herself.

"She's woken up hasn't she children, yes, yes, yes. Strange looking isn't she yes, yes. Does she like tea children? Does she drink it all up, yes? Does she drain it and strain it, drink it and sink it, yes, yes?

This woman was starting to creep me out. Nothing she was saying was making any sense to me in the slightest so I decided that asking her her name would be the best course of action.

"Who are you and where am I?" I asked, my voice beginning to shake towards the end of my sentence. I had asked more that I had originally intended but, in my frantic state, I had lost control over my tongue. I should have been more careful but hey, what harm can one more little question cause?

"Wants to know who we are eh children? Nosy isn't she this one, wants to know everything about us, every little detail of our existence, yes.  Should we tell her or should we make her wait and suffer yes, yes?"

The malice in her voice coupled with the edge of lunacy was enough to scare me to the extreme. This woman was definitely unhinged - more than a little. I reached down to my boot, ignoring the pain in the back of my head when I stretched myself to far and pulled out the hunting knife I kept in a loop there at all times and brandished it at the woman. I wasn't sure what it would accomplish but it made me feel in control of the situation and that was all I needed to feel confident. The old woman let out a high-pitched, earsplitting shriek at the sight of the gleaming point of metal directed at her. It was as though she despised the knife but at the same time feared it more than most people would. It was as though, at the sight of it, she shrank back, withdrawing into herself like a turtle (and old, loony turtle, but a turtle none the less) she started to mutter again to the children she talked to herself about so often:

" MURDER! DEATHS! SO MANY DEATHS! GET IT AWAY FROM US. Sharp point, children, yes, yes. Hated object yes. Caused so many to die to many of them. Blood like fire and ice, death like water and lava. Blades in flesh children, yes, yes, yes. Don't go near them; they cut you into ribbons and dice you into little pieces, yes, pieces like a mouse children, yes, yes. Pieces, like mouses are tiny, blood, like fire is crimson, red hot to touch is human blood, burns the skin like fire. Words, like daggers are sharp, sharp and pointy children, cut through flesh and would bother the soul and the body. Stay away from daggers, little girl"

She was addressing me now, she turned her head to face me, eyes wild and fierce.

"We wouldn't want you to slip, now would we children? No, no. Slip would be bad, you could cut yourself and have the blood run from you like a river, a river like fire and ice. The dagger could cause much harm, yes, yes. Might hurt yourself or others, that would make you a bad person little girl. Are you already a bad person little girl?"

I was frozen, not knowing how to reply, I sat there and vigorously shook my head, a little too vigorously. She took a step closer to me.

"I think your lying to me little girl, I hope your not lying to me, or I might just slip and, whoops! We wouldn't want that would we children, no, no. So, little girl, tell me the truth, are you a bad person, did you hurt someone?"

I had, I had hurt my mother by leaving her in our home back in the village to succumb to hunger, thirst, or some other cause, but regardless, she would die because of me, because of me. I had hurt my father, I hadn't helped him when he needed me the most, I let him go. The old woman was right, I was and awful person. I was about to tell her she was right about me but something stopped me. I had the sense that telling this woman that would be very bad for me, very bad. She took a few more crouched steps closer to me, now she was a mere six feet from the place I sat.

"Come on little girl, tell me I'm right, tell me you are a bad person, tell me you enjoy the crimson rivers of blood, blood like fire and blood like ice. Let me and the children help you yes, yes. Become one of us."

The words seemed to echo throughout the tree trunk like an awful cacophony:

One of us

I kept off the bed and sprinted down the nearest hollow.

One of us

I dodged roots on my way to the exit, any exit I could find would be good enough for me.

ONE OF US!

I hopped onto one of the great roots and took a flying leap out of the hollow trunk, the woman's mad screams acting like a propellor, pushing me father outwards than my normal stride ever could. The whole day I ran, only stopping once to gather my bearings. The only other time I slowed my headlong rush to who knows where was to stop for the night.

That evening I managed to sleep but my dreams were plagued with thoughts of the old woman and the children that didn't seem to exist, all I can say is that, although I managed to get to sleep it was hardly peaceful, I tossed and turned, a combination of my nightmarish thoughts and the uncomfortable terrain on which I slept interrupting the peace I would usually find in rest. The only time my mind was not thinking of the woman was right at the very end, when the scene shifted.

I was stood in the branch of a tall tree, with a bare trunk all the way down to the ground, fifteen feet below. I was overlooking the government building I despised so much where all my troubles began. I felt a presence behind me and turned to see the creepy lady standing face to face with me. She spoke softly into my ear, not in the calm, comforting way a liver would, but in the cold, creepy way you would expect a woman like her to.

"Get ready Calypso, it will be good to see you again soon, you interest me, tomorrow we ride to find you, tomorrow the chase begins, you can't run...

You belong to the purge"

Her cackles and the sound of vehicles roaring and starting faded into black and fitful sleep...