Iratus

Chapter 4

Chapter 4: The Second Stop

            The sun was on the rise, just peeking over the trees, I was groaning just about to wake up, then I heard the sound of leaves crumple. I was startled and stood up quickly, I looked around and saw two squirrels run away and up a tree. I let out a sigh of relief knowing there was no danger, stretched my arms and legs, slowly trying to stay awake. I yawn, "Maybe I should try washing my face." I walked through the parking lot, luckily there was still nobody here, passed the vending machine, went over to the bathroom and it was full of puddles, the tile walls were cracked, one sink was broken and it had a strong smell of pee, "Geez, its like a flood came through here....a pee flood." I walked slowly to the sink, trying not to breathe through my nose a lot, stepping over the puddles. When I got to the sink I washed my face, I looked up and saw myself in the cracked, drawn on and dirty mirror, I looked at my hair and tried to fix it but I made it worse, "I'll just put up my hood." I got out of there as quickly as possible still trying not to step on any of the puddles. I took a deep breath of fresh air and walked over to the vending machine, "I should probably leave soon before anybody gets here," saying that I grabbed some more snacks and stuffed each pocket with food and grabbed some handfuls and continued walking.

                  In the middle of the road I started to talk to myself again, "At least I got an early start, a lot early than I was expecting, it must be around 5:30." I continued walking for about a mile and I decided to open one of my chip bags, " Man, I can't remember the last time I had this much junk food in such a short period." In my house, we always tried to eat as healthy as we could, we rarely went to fast food places, we bought sweets once in a while, it was usually a packet of cookies. It was kind of bad, for my mother, that I was such a picky eater, whenever she would put out a pot of vegetables, I would take out a can of ravioli. My dad, though, was the opposite, he would eat vegetables, salads, and anything else that was healthy. I continued walking. It was now about 9 am, I didn't know how much I traveled already but I knew that I just had to keep walking, but there was something really odd that I noticed, there weren't any cars, no cars had passed by me for over an hour now. I got really suspicious really fast, yet I kept walking, what other choice did I have, walk back? No way. I continued walking, with my guard raised, I started to think of multiple scenarios that could happen, one of them involved a meteor, my mind started to wander a bit. As I walked around a curve in the road, I saw a police blockade! I quickly ran to the tree line on the side of the road, I peeked around the corner and saw 2 police cars that were blocking the road and about three or four cops. "Damn it," I cursed quietly to myself, " How did they know where I was going?" I thought back to where I've been so far, I've only been to a rest stop, maybe it had cameras? I would have probably seen them, maybe it's not for me, maybe they're looking for another guy. A minute passed by of me trying to think if that was a possibility, " Well even if it isn't for me, I can't just walk pass them, its way to risky. Maybe I could use my power.... no, I can't control it so it could get out of hand really fast, plus I can't rely on 'it' happening again. I'm probably going to have to go into the forest again." I resented the idea of going into that forest, too many things can happen, but I knew that it had to be done. I took a deep breath and I walked into the forest.

                     Here I am, back in the forest again, the only difference was that I stuck close enough to the tree line that I could see the police barricade. I was scared though, really scared, what if they saw me? What if 'it' happened? What if I killed them? All these questions and thoughts raced through my head and I got more and more nervous as I got closer to the barricade. My senses heightened with each step, I could hear the crinkle of the leaves as if someone was crunching a chip bag right next to my ear, the sound of my heartbeat getting louder and faster, I could feel the sweat forming on my skin, I could smell nothing but the bark from the trees. As I took each step closer to the barricade, they were slower than the last one in attempt to not make as much noise, until I walked painfully slow but I was making almost no noise and my eyes were fixated on the cops. I was paying no attention to anything in the world except my footsteps and those policemen, which was why I was startled to death when something flew right past my ear, triggering my natural fear of bees, I jumped and swung my hands like crazy trying to swat it away from me, it was only when I stepped on a branch was when I stopped suddenly and crouched as quickly as I could. When I stepped on the branch, it caught the attention of one of the cops and he turned toward the forest it was hard to see far in the forest, I was crouched trying to stay as still as I could, I must have flinched because he then pointed toward me and yelled, "HEY YOU STAY RIGHT THERE!" That is when I made a run for it.