The Land After Tomorrow (Completed)

Chapter 10: The Murderer

The morning arose at dawn with people running in all directions. The sun was barely lite into the horizon, but the campsite was fully awake. The house was like a swarm of bees flying from one which way to the other. Food was being packed into bags along with water and weapons. They were being distributed to fighters whom cleaned and checked the gun barrels, and civilians packed their bags trying to awake their children.

Jake gathered his group and set to walking into the distance. Groups slowly began to follow as the time passed. The house, once filled with roaring laughter and busy bodies, was slowly becoming nothing but an abandoned home. Ryder looked upon his group of children, women, and men of all ages. Bags laid underneath their eyes and dirt shadowed on their faces. Ryder sat on the edge of the house stairs waiting for everyone to finish packing. He looked out into the plot of land once filled with tents now bare. The sun was beginning to fall and the howling of the wind whistled into his ear. He watched as time swept by him and the sun was slowly hiding behind the horizon. He looked up into the sky, holding onto the steel chain around his neck connected to a cross. He wondered if God would forgive his sins, or if anyone would once they knew. He looked down at the puddle underneath his feet and stared back at the reflection that haunted him. He considered the eyes of a stranger he could hardly recognize. The once pure eyes, hid a secret lie that engulfed inside him. He was no more innocent then the savages and he knew deep down inside that it would haunt him forever. Karma would take its revenge eventually. He closed his eyes and felt the push of the wind brush up against his face. The night air entrapped him as the winds whispered his name. They knew, they knew what he had done.

It had been a year since the day of destruction, the day he watched his family die. He saw the eyes of a freighted child no more than six. Ryder grabbed the boy by his arms and threw him into the herded round of people like a rag doll. A family of eight were shaking in fear on their knees pleading and begging them to stop. They paid no mind to the crying pleads. Ryder could hear his boss screaming over the cries as he screamed, "Shoot them!" The others, prepared their guns, aiming them at the family. A mother and daughter held one another in their arms, praying, crying. Ryder's heart stopped as he stood paralyzed. Over the noise once again, he could hear a faint voice calling out to him.

"Ryder! Ryder!" the boss screamed. Ryder awoke from his paralyzed stance and looked at the frail man. "It's your time to prove your worth," he said. The boss said something to him once again, but the words would not comprehend. He repeated it, but still, he could not understand.

Ryder got out a small and faint "What?"

"Shoot the boy," he said once again.

Ryder looked down at the boy, whose eyes glistened with tears and clung onto his father desperately. Ryder shook his head as a voice screamed inside him shouting "No!" but no words came out.

The family cried and screamed over top of the man's voice who raged in screaming "Shoot him! Shoot him!"

The next thing Ryder knew, his arm was rising and pointing the gun at the boy. The boy kneeled in shock and his crying had subsided. The voices of the family still rang throughout his mind begging him to stop. He cocked back the pistol in his hand as his finger was held on the trigger. He stared into the boy's eyes, full of fear but he could see himself looking through them, a monster. The boy let out a tear that ran down his face onto the ground before a shot rang throughout the room. Silence. He watched as the bullet smashed into the boy's head and his knees collapsed onto the floor. Blood poured out from the boy's head streaming onto the floor. The eyes, once full of fear were now cold and black. Ryder looked back at the man, who contained a smirk looking upon the dead body of the boy.

The father held onto his dead son crying in vain. He looked at Ryder with hatred upon his eyes, "God will know of this day, he doesn't forget."

"Then, you can be with your God. Shoot the rest of them," the man said leaving the room as echoes of shots rang throughout Ryder's ears. He stared helpless at the sin he just committed as the dead bodies lay flattened on the floor and blood smeared onto the walls. Ryder looked back at the boy's eyes once again seeing the reflection of a monster he had become.

Ryder opened his eyes to the blackness of the night and the voices rang throughout his mind. He looked back down at the puddle, the monster hidden inside him. He cupped his hands looking down at them, the hands of a killer, a monster.