A Beast with a Smile {Book 1}

Chapter 25 (Scarlett): The World's Shadow

Archy's face was not doing so hot. When we landed he absorbed the parachute and produced some antibiotic cream some war bandages. The aftermath was that the fourteen year old looked like a mummy with acne spots.

I had to hold him down so that he would let me get the glass shards and splinters out of his face. He tried to say he was fine, but he could barely get the words out without shrieking in agony.

I asked him if he wanted me to get the glass out and of course he cried, "No! It doesn't...hurt...just...forget...it."

I let him have his pride at first; I saw how much he hated his inventions not working correctly and I didn't want to embarrass him in front of Clark.

When I saw the blood begin to drip through his mummy bandages, I tackled him and ripped the white bandages from his face. I began to carefully pull the glass shards out one at a time. He screamed, begged and cried for me to stop until he passed out from the pain.

"Did you kill him?" Clark asked, poking him with the end of his shield.

"No. I'm pretty sure I just saved him."

"Are you sure? He looks pretty dead," he challenged with a look of disconcert.

I smiled at his cute little face.

He is so innocent for being around such tragedy.

The ground where we landed was mostly soot and dead shrubbery. I wasn't sure if it was black sand or massacred soil that spread far out of eyes reach. The dunes of black grime stretched out in every direction, seemingly never ending with the rain.

Clark dragged a small, murky log over to Archy's body and perched over his friend, waiting for him to wake up. He rested his shield over his neck and stretched it over Archy's face.

"Can't have him drown on us," he smiled with a missing front tooth.

"How old are you?" I inquired.

"I turn six in three months," he cheered while showing me his age with his fingers.

"So how does a five year old stow away on a super dangerous mission in a cardboard box?" I asked.

He scratched his chin and looked at me suspiciously.

"It's a secret. Don't want you to tell everyone and keep me from coming," he squinted his eyes distrustfully.

"But it's dangerous. You could get hurt," I nagged.

"If I stay, the other kids call me names."

He stood from the log, accidentally dumping half a gallon of water onto Archy's head and waking him from his eternal slumber.

"When I go on missions I am a hero," his eyes began to water, but he held back the tears and looked at me with a strange sense of courage and heroism.

Archy stood up covered in mud; the brown slime dripped to the ground like clay rain.

"What did I miss?" he extracted water from his ears and wiped his face clean of sludge with a mud covered hand.

"A bath," I answered with a smile.

He looked at me with a non-humored disdain, then rolled his eyes and hinted at a smile. The hint broke away to fear as he looked around the grime area of nothing but death and soot.

"We shouldn't be here. We need to get moving."

"What happened here? This place looks like a plant cemetery," I replied.

"This place is a graveyard. Thousands of people died right here."

The words left his lips like a thousand needles poking the top of my neck. I could see the pain in his eyes. Even with his swollen face, it was sick and green like he was holding back his lunch. Clark looked famished as well, his skin white as snow.