Earth's End

Run!

Bam! Bam!

A loud scream shot through the trees and then, a wail.

I shot awake as I heard the sound of gunshots. I was about to let out a scream but a hand had shoved itself over my mouth, silencing any noise that would have escaped. I looked behind me to see who the owner of the hand is and to my relief, if it was Alex. Our eyes made contact and he drew a finger up to his mouth as he took his hand away from my face. He then, turned toward the back of the tent and began unzipping the backdoor as slowly and quietly as he could.

He crawled out carefully and turned back to wave at me to follow him. I crawled after him towards the trees and turned back once the trees hid me from view. Alex helped me up onto my feet and I saw someone lying on the ground, a small pool of blood encompassing a bullet hole in their stomach. A man towered over the body, gun in hand. He looked pleased with himself. My eyes swept to the right, where two other men were restraining someone on their knees with their head down, looking defeated.

After blinking my eyes a few times, I recognized the person being restrained as Kelly and their were tears falling down his face. My eyes swept back to the dead body, whom I now recognized as Allison. My heart clenched. Even after everything she did to me in the past, I still hated the sight of her dead body, even if she wouldn't have felt the same for me. What made it even worse was that she was all Kelly had left, as far as he knew. And she was gone.

The man standing over the body turned his head to the other two, doing the restraining, "What are you two restraining him for? Not only is he not the one we want, but he also doesn't look like he'll be going anywhere anytime soon. This girl must have been someone he really cared about. Now, take a look in that other tent and see if she's in there." A hand tugged on my shoulder.

"We've got to go. They're looking for you. We have to be long gone before they realize that we've escaped," Alex whispered from behind me. I turned around to follow him but then turned back to see Kelly. He was still being heavily watched by the leader of the three men.

"Alex, what about Kelly? What'll happen to him if we just leave him here? Why can't we help him?" I knew we had to help all of the ghosts go on to Eternal Peace, but Kelly had become a friend and you never leave one of those behind. Why didn't Alex want to help him?

He took my hand and with a sad voice he replied, "I hope it won't be too late for him if we come back for him after you fix the gateway." He began pulling me towards the opposite direction of the campsite, but I didn't move. Alex turned back towards me, confused, "Izzy?"

"I can't leave him. He's just lost his sister. It's not right," I told him, letting go of his hand and turning back to the campsite. I began walking around it, towards Kelly. Within seconds, I heard a pattering of footsteps rushing to keep up with me. I turned around to see Alex following me, trying to make as little noise as possible through the thick vegetation.

"You're going to get us both killed," He whispered from behind me.

"I never said you had to follow me, " I replied, coldly. He hissed at me to lower my voice and attempted to grab my hand, but I pulled it away. I heard a shout from behind us. It was one of the men who had been restraining Kelly, and he seemed angry, really angry.

"THEY'RE GONE!!!" He swore left and right as he tore apart the tent.

"Well, they couldn't have gotten far! Search the area, you fools!!" The leader told them.

"Quick, climb that tree," Alex whispered into my ear and pointed at the tree closest to us. It's branches were long, thick, and were jus low enough to the ground that we could easily boost ourselves up without getting a sweat. We climbed until the branches could no longer support our weight. There were enough leaves to hide us from view as we listened for what to do next.

"I see you're friends seem to think that they can escape from me. But they don't know who I am, do they, Kelly?" The man was walking circles around him, like a predator stalking its prey. He held the gun to Kelly's head and began prodding him with the muzzle, finger on the trigger, as if he didn't care that one small slip could end Kelly's life. As if his life didn't matter at all.

There was a crunching of leaves from below, one of the cronies had worked his way around the clearing to us and was looking around the area, gun in hand, trying to find us. I turned toward Alex, who was smirking as he jumped down from the tree, rolled, making the contact with the ground virtually soundless, went up behind the guy, and quickly jerked his head to the left. I heard a crack, telling me that Alex had effectively snapped this guy's neck and I gasped in shock, not realizing that he had that in him.

I carefully climbed down from the tree as Alex grabbed the gun out of the guy's hand. We hid behind the tree trunk, waiting for a good shot, "Have you ever shot a gun before?" I whispered to him as I noticed he was holding the barrel wrong. He shook his head and extended my hand for him to give it to me, which he did hesitantly. I looked back behind the tree.

The man standing before Kelly was getting frustrated by the minute. He was beginning to pace, no longer his cocky self when he was threatening Kelly's life. Finally, he turned to Kelly, and announced as loud he could carry his voice that if anybody didn't come out of the shadows within the next five minutes, he would kill Kelly. My shot would have to be soon.

"They're long gone by now," Kelly spat in his face. "I gave them express orders. They're gone and you're never going to find them, at this point, so you might as well just kill me now." He looked up at him, almost pleadingly, asking the guy to put him out of his misery. Out of spite, the man shot the gun in Kelly's direction, just narrowly missing him by a few inches.

Now's my chance, it was now or never. I took a step out from behind the trunk and held my arms steady as I pulled the trigger. The man heard the shot and had just enough time to move, shifting the bullet from its original target, in the heart and ended up going through the shoulder blade. Blood and a curdling scream escaped from the man's body. It was just enough to slow him down. Kelly, surprised, looked around at where the shot had come from.

"Quick, Kelly! RUN!!" Alex shouted at him. He had just run out from behind the trunk and waving his hands to try and get his attention. Kelly shot up from the ground and ran as fast as he could. The guy attempted to shoot at him, to prevent Kelly from escaping, but his arm was immobilized.

As soon as Kelly got close, Alex and I took off running too. The three of us ran and ran until we felt all of the air leave our bodies. Then, we ran some more.