The Archetypes

CHAPTER ONE: THE SOULLESS

I am running as fast as I can.

I mean, that's what she told me to do, to get out, anywhere but here. My mother was a brave woman, having raised me on her own with no outside help or support, all she needed was me, and I her.

The last thing I remember before tearing away towards the exit of the building is my mother gripping me tight and fast with her hands, locking her eyes with mine and saying with urgency, "Run Hartler, Run away from this place. Do anything you have to do to survive the Soulless. Just get out of here." I turned to run and halfway through the door I heard her holler after me, "Read it when you're safe."

The ground beneath me gave way to cobblestone that was common to the city of Vinnton, a city almost entirely made from stone. The streets were stone, the houses were stone, even the fucking toilets were stone. But today was different. There was not the usual dull grey tone forced upon every wall in the town, but instead red. Scarlet red was splattered everywhere throughout the cityscape. There is only one thing that could be.

Blood.

Screams came from every direction as I was navigating the streets with speed on my side. I was taking every alleyway and side street I could find to try to avoid an encounter with a Soulless. I am an average seventeen year old boy, average height, average speed and average weight. In all attributes quite ordinary. I could hold my own in a fight and my temper sometimes got the best of me but all that said I was spectacularly normal, so going up against a Soulless was the last thing I wanted to do.

The Soulless were a group of people for all intents and purposes, with a sinister feature.

You guessed it, they have no soul.

About a year ago, there was a scientific research facility called MindCorp. There soul focus was to discover a way to weaponize the human race to fight off the leader of the Redskulls, Graves Montgomery. The only problem was the research went well. Too well. The scientists were able to suppress all empathy, happiness, love and sadness. Essentially turning them into emotionless drones with brute force.

These scientists were afraid of their own inventions so they locked them underground and never spoke of them again...

Until now.

Graves had broken through the gates somehow and released these fowl creatures into the streets to wreak havoc and cause mass panic, and that was definitely working by the state of things at this present moment.

I ran into view of the huge gates that hold in the population of Vinnton. They were part of the group of very few items that were not made from stone. Instead, these gates were created from combination of Steel and wood. The makers of said gate boasted about it being impenetrable when it was connected to the wall. Guess they jinxed it.

As I ran I looked to my left to see what was coming from the intersecting street and that's when my heart stopped. There, running adjacent to me, where a group of three Soulless, all held the gate within their bloodthirsty stare. My only chance was to somehow outrun the soulless and get through the gate before the guards close me in with the monsters. It was a challenge, and evidently it was for my life.

My pace fastened and my strides became longer. I knew that I could do this. The soulless had a lot of muscle and because of that factor, there speed was dramatically affected. I could do this. I could win.

As the two roads intersected, I could feel their gazes switch from the gate to my back. It was no longer about stopping the gate from closing for them, but about hunting their prey, and I had now become their prey.

I could hear them gaining on me. Every second, every moment, I could hear them drawing nearer. I looked up to see a guard waving at me frantically yelling "Hurry the fuck up, come on, you can make it." At that moment the gates began to swing shut. I picked up the pace to try to reach the gates before they locked me inside for what would be the end of my life. With the noise of surrounding screams, cries for me to hurry and my feet slapping on the cobblestone with every step, I couldn't even ponder my own thoughts anymore.

I had almost reached the gates when I started to feel the breathe of the Soulless behind me. His breathe was foul and disgusting. It smelt of death and decay. I tried not to vomit at the smell, because if I did it would be the end of me. I clasped my nose with my hand and soldiered on.

The doors were almost shut and I took a couple more strides and dived. I soared straight through the opening in the gate and landed face first into the mud. I didn't mind. A face full of mud was better than being a mouthful for a Soulless that was for sure.

The force of the impact of the Soulless on the Gate aided to close it the rest of the way. Which was quickly barricaded by the guard. He turned to me and said, "You are one lucky son of a bitch, do you know that? There is no way I could have outrun the Soulless like you just did. That was crazy man." I got up out of the mud and looked at him, He was a boy no older than nineteen, with black straight hair and dark brown eyes. He was of a muscly build which explains why he was a guard. His height was abnormal though, with him sitting on at least six foot eight. Taller than any guard he had ever come across. I noticed his black trench coat with the 'V' stitched onto the front. I had always wanted to join the Vinnton guards when I was of age. It was good pay and the uniforms were awesome. You had to be eighteen to join the guards and I was not even 10 days away from my eighteenth.

"Thanks man, I'm Hartler, and you are?" I asked the boy as I reached my hand out which was received almost immediately by his own, "Andrew Bint, but people just call me Andy."

“So, Andy, How the hell did Graves find his way in?” I said, looking at him with a stern expression on my face. He looked at me with a blank expression on his face, “no one knows man, he kinda just walked straight in through the front gate, no one knows how he got passed security, just that once he made it through, all hell broke loose.” There were a million different scenarios running through my head after hearing that, but the one that made the most sense, he had an inside man.

“Anyway, we gotta get out of here. That gate will only hold the soulless for so long, and you know what will happen to us if they get through.”

Yea, I did, only our bones would be left and the soulless would fashion them into toothpicks. I looked at him, and nodded.

“Indeed we do, do you have anywhere that we can go? Do you know any place that would be safe?”

“I do know of a place, it is where the Archetypes reside, have you heard of them?” he questioned. “Yes I have, but only stories, they are the rebellion aren’t they?” He then looked at me with an excitement within his eyes, “Yes, but more specifically, the rebellion against Graves and the soulless, they have been warning the council of Vinnton for the last year that something like this could happen. Now Greyclaw, the Archetypes home town, it is the only place safe for us now.”

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