Inside or Out?

Asher and Shawn.

 "Asher!" Shawn yelled.

I turned in the direction she yelled. A gigantic, gray beast with it's teeth bared, was bounding towards me. I tugged my knife from it's brown sheath making a satisfying sound. As the wolf jumped at me, I brought my blade up into the thick meat of the animal.

Sticky, warm blood oozed down my arm as I heaved the wolf off of me.

"That was a close one Ash." Shawn panted beside me.

"Think we have enough food for a while?" I said, pointing to the birds, bunnies and other assorted animals strapped onto her back.

"Well, with the wolf, we definitely will." She pulled the knife out of the animal and helped me get it on my shoulders.

We walked through the maze of trees that were dancing in the wind. Every day we hunt, we have to go farther and farther from camp. Occasionally, we find a lone wolf or boar, which usually can feed the whole camp for several days. We mostly live off of birds or rabbits. Of course there is a little farm we have, but vegetables aren't as filling as protein.

I glanced at my sister from the corner of my eye. Because I am basically the leader of the camp, I have taken the opportunity to train her. Ever since we started, she has developed quite a lot. In more ways than one. Her small, petite body now has more defined muscle and I usually catch a lot of the guys scanning her body. They stop when I glare at them. Thankfully, Shawnny, never really notices. She's a little blonde. By that I mean she is a small person with blonde hair.

We don't look too much alike even though we are siblings. She's short and I'm tall, blonde hair and brown hair, girl and boy... we do have our eyes in common though. They are as green as seaweed usually is.

The camp wall came into view and I could see a guard sitting up on a chair.

"Names!" He yelled out.

"Asher and Shawn."

"Last name?"

"Tony, we grew up together."

"I'm still supposed to ask for it, Ash."

"It's Pace." I said, rolling my eyes.

"Thanks." Tony smiled and pressed a button making the doors swing open. Tony must have ran down the stairs to meet us because when he appeared, he was breathless. He took off his helmet and glanced at the animals.

"Good haul this time?" Something that always entertained me was that he was squeamish around blood. I put my arm around his shoulder.

"Oh yeah."

I could tell he was trying not to breathe in the sickly sweet smell of the blood left on my arm from earlier.

"Asher... you know I don't like... blood." Tony said, pulling my arm off of him with two fingers. It was a good thing too, because the wolf started slipping off my shoulder. Even though it didn't look big it still felt heavy.

Shawnny and I headed to the kitchen. I wouldn't call a tent a kitchen but hey, you live with what you have. I've never been inside it before, though it always fascinated me how Randa managed to make even the nastiest looking animal into a delectable meal that everyone enjoyed.

"Hey darling! What do you have for me today?" Randa said. We dropped the meat on the table and she picked up one of the ducks. Instead of saying 'thank you', she winked at me. All of the old ladies around camp thought I was amazing. They would do anything for me if I asked. 

Randa shuffled off to start cooking and Shawnny turned to me.

"Ash you look like hell, go change and clean up." I rolled my eyes but headed towards our house.

We didn't live far from the kitchen, which was lucky cause I was really tired. As I walked along the muddy path, everyone waved to me. There were kids playing a bunch of games while parents watched or hung laundry. Honestly, seeing things so calm was very comforting.

I walked in the door and was greeted with the familiar scent of home. The piney woods around camp made everything smell amazing but home.... nothing could beat the soothing smell of home.

Because I felt really dirty, I decided a quick shower would be a good start.

When I got out, I looked at myself in the mirror. My hair was dripping from the warm shower. Because it was wet, it looked straighter than it usually was. My hair had this small, natural wave to it that sometimes made it really hard to handle. Well that's what Shawnny says anyway. I don't care too much about my hair. 

I could still see the faint scars on my face from previous excursions. The most recent ones, were from a few weeks ago. They weren't quite scars yet but I could tell they were going to be. Shawnny and I were out hunting again and I found a small rabbit caught in a barbed wire fence. We hadn't found anything else all day and we really needed some warm food for the sick and elderly. I thought I could crawl underneath the fence but when I tried, I got stuck and Shawnny had to help me out, my face getting sliced in a few places in the process. We decided that she fit better so she started under, but when she got halfway, a wild boar appeared and jumped on top of the fence. It buckled under the pigs weight and almost crushed Shawnny. Luckily, she threw her arm up to save her. She now has a long scar on her forearm from the fence.

I grabbed a green shirt off of the floor and smelled it to see if it was clean. It smelled fine, so I threw it over my head and walked out the door to go find some food.

But as I tried to leave, something was blocking my way. 

"Ashie! I've missed you!" The Devil said.

Okay, so maybe it wasn't the devil but she wasn't my favorite person in the world.

"That color looks so good on you! It brings out your beautiful green eyes!" She said, throwing her arms around my neck.

"Hanna, you need to stop." I pulled her arms off of me. " I'm not interested and haven't been in weeks." She stuck her bottom lip out and pushed her arms together, making her cleavage become more prominent.

"You'll love me soon, Ashie." She sang, and bounded off. We were a thing about a month ago and ever since I told her I didn't want to be in a relationship anymore, she has been stalking me. A lot.

I spotted Shawnny's blonde ponytail at the table and sat down next to her. Randa came hobbling over and plopped bowls of steaming, hot soup in from of us.

"There you go sweetie, something warm for a chilly day." She's basically been my mother since I was twelve. My real mother went hunting one day and a group of people with these eye pieces attacked her. She only took my dad and her closest friend, Riker, with her. After a few days of not seeing her our camp sent a party of a few men to find her. 

Which, they did. Kind of. 

Her body was half eaten by an animal and she had an eyepiece in her hand with a note in her hand that said, "He's a liar."

My dad and my moms friend haven't been seen since. There was a lot of blood around my moms body too, so I think that those men murdered my family. I've been asking around but no one knows exactly what happened that day.

The soup tasted heavenly. Randa had made duck soup and I had forgotten how hungry I was. I slurped the soup and Shawnny made a face.

"Ash, you're disgusting." She said, grabbing her bowl and walking over to her friends. I wiped my mouth and headed over to Randa for more soup.

After I had finished my third bowl, I decided to go see Tony.