The Swift [Rewrite]

Chapter 1

Be positive. How could I be positive? Would you be positive after being abandoned by your only family? Would you be positive while sitting in a musty pipe, rusted and full of sewer water, the acrid smell stuck in your mud-caked clothes? Would you be positive with your hands covered in blood? Your hair full of dirt? Your conscious full of guilt? No, you wouldn't. 

I was sitting in a dirty, rusty pipe, no cleaner than myself, and this psychopath was telling me to be positive? It must be my brain playing tricks on me. I haven't eaten in days and have been spending my nights in this pipe, so I could very well just be dehydrated and starved. That must be it. What else could describe the aging man in the purple suit with the rainbow dolphin covered tie seemingly patroling the border of a giant academy? That was normal enough until he began to change. His purple suit and pale skin turned beige and furred, and his hands grew inch long claws. His head went beige and his nose turned into a snout and he grew whiskers. I starred at him as he went from a weird old man to a large, ravenous mountain lion. He padded towards me, but I ignored him and sat in my tunnel, because he was obviously my mind playing tricks on me, because what other logical explanation could there be for a perfectly normal man turning into a lion? 

The lion, or what my mind made me think was a lion, had walked closer, and made what it must've thought was a kind smile. Then, in my head, I had heard, hello, little boy. I recognized the voice. It was the voice I heard at night when the owls flew outside. The voice I heard when I walked through the forest. The voice I heard in my head instead of normal noises. For most people, a dog barks, and they hear woof. I hear 'hello' or 'feed me'.  I told my father and his friend about this, but he said I was just imagining it, though he sent a sideways glance at his friend, who shrugged and looked away. I knew I wasn't imagining it. I knew I could hear the animals. But my father didn't listen. Wouldn't listen. So I ignored it. 

But then, hearing the voice again brought a sense of longing. A longing for home. For my family. I longing for forgiveness. The voice somehow made me believe the lion was real, that I wasn't imagining it all those years when the dogs barked, or the owls hooted. Can you hear me? the voice said, and though it seemed impossible this was real, I nodded slightly, and the voice continued. Are you lost?  I shook my head. Where do you live?  I gestured to the tube and watched his face turn from sympathy to disgust at my "home". Come with me to the academy. We teach people like you. We can help you. Trust me. 

"Why would I trust a random guy--a random lion--that I just met? I live here. There is nothing you can do for me. I'm going to sit in this pipe and die. I have no place at your stupid academy," I'd said, though, despite my rage, I couldn't help but smile at the thought of going to a fancy school for spoiled boys with an old man who is actually a lion. 

Be positive, I can help you... he was saying as I slid back into the shadows of my tube.

"No, you can't help me. I'm beyond helping. Beyond saving. Now be merciful and go back to your dumb school for spoiled kids, and leave me to be miserable." I said, and to my surprise and relief, he did. 

Though as I sat in the pipe with cars thundering overhead and the clouds starting to rain, the man's words echoed in my head. We teach people like you. And though I hated that man for everything he did and didn't do, I was curious. Were there really other people like me? And was it still possible for me to be saved?

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That night, I heard the wolves. There weren't words, just howls. Like they weren't speaking, they were just howling to remind me of them. The wolves came every night. They came, and they stalked me from the cover of the woods, glaring like I'd done something wrong. Which is true. I did many things wrong. Tonight, the gray timberwolves were accompanied by someone else, a golden, brown, and white shepherd, pacing and glaring like the rest of the wolves. 

I ran a hand along the back of my neck, still scarred from the wolves on my first encounter. It was only a week ago, but it felt like an eternity. I was scared of the wolves. Their eyes told me everything. They knew what I did. They knew what I did, but they let me live. They could-- they would --tear me to shreds for what I did, but they don't they just haunt me every night, forcing me to stay in the so-called safety of my pipe. 

But tonight, I thought of the man and his words, and as the wolves came to the edge of the forest, I crawled out of my tube and walked towards the academy. And the wolves let me. Like they knew what I was doing. Like they knew what I was going to do. Like the knew everything.