I awake. My eyes. My teeth. My muscles. My head. My entire body. I let out a shriek so loud it hurts my own hears. I thrash around and writhe in pain, toppling off my bed. My face is covered in sweat, dripping off my chin, tears joining the mix.
If someone were to take a brick to my head, this is what it would feel like. My arms and legs contract and expand internally. I try to rip off the skin to let them out, but it just makes blood. I'm vaguely aware of time, it seems to drift past without notice. This pain that could tear apart any being with a glance. When it seems like I may stay on the floor in acute throbbing forever, it stops.
I lay still to make sure moving wont trigger it again. I allow the sweat to dry from my body, and with it the fog in my mind that seems like a lifetime of background noise. I need to do one thing and one thing only. I need to kill my parents.
I rise from the ground on two abnormally balanced feet. I look at the mirror above my bed. My face is clear of all blemishes, my auburn hair an exaggeration of its past self. I walk past the doorway to my parent's room. How are they both still sleeping? I could have been dying, it felt like I was. As I walk into the room, both of them have earphones in and Adam is snoring.
I have never wanted anything like I wanted them ended. I approach my mum's side of the bed. She is facing me, blissfully unaware. The throbbing is back. I grip her firmly by the neck and rip her upwards. My other hand grows nails inches long that are clean, soon to be crimson. Her eyes open and it is written in the grooves of her face as she understands what's about to happen. She sees her daughter Rising, about to complete half of her compulsive initiation.
"Please" The words leave her lips as less than a whisper.
My gut drops. I just stare in an intense internal debate. It's so easy, she's right here, I want this. But a part of me screams I don't. Then I do the hardest thing that I would ever do, not murdering my parents.
"Arghh" I yell and throw her across the room.
I sprint for the window and leap out it, glass littering my skin like a thousand diamonds against the moonlight. I have to run, get away. Threadwood. The forest. I jump off the house. I have to avoid the light. The City Sentries will kill any Risen they spot by any means necessary. I make for the north, for Threadwood. My feet carry my like a light breeze across the fields.
I run and I run until I come within distance of the wall, taking cover behind a house. I look left and then right, ironic as I'm no longer avoiding vehicles and now avoiding getting gunned down on sight. Down the wall a couple hundred meters I spot a child. The child must be a few years younger than me. Bang.
The child walks out of her cover and is instantly shot by the sentries. Torn to shreds instantly. My heart accelerates. I better go now or I will see the same end. Without thinking, I push off the wall hard and run up the wall. The sentries are still looking at the pieces of child, and I can climb up the wall without notice. One of them, the closest one, spots me and is about to shout.
He gets off little more than a whisper before I am at him within a flash, and covering his trembling lips. The throbbing is back. His neck is pounding, asking for exposure. Nope. Grabbing his gun, I knock him unconscious. The throbbing settles lower. I keep the gun and leap off the other side. The wind passing through my face is perfect. I hear gunfire tearing up the ground at my feet, but it subsides soon. Threadwood engulfs my every scent.
Moss covered wood, crickets being annoying, the dense smell of approaching rain in the air perpetually. I continue to run, nothing but a shadow amongst the trees. I must be getting close to the middle after sometime running. A large opening presents itself.
The trees have been cleared and what looks to be a big camp covers the area. People are running in from all sides, I count at least 4. The throbbing comes back. The blood rushes to my head and my legs struggle to hold me. The grass catches me softly.
