Jacks And Jokers

16: Into the Wilderness

Everyone was speculating what was happening to us. Some thought we were to be going to be in a secret part of the government, others thought we were going to be killed. We'd all been in the train for about thirty minutes before light started to appear. With sunrise I was able to tell which direction we were going, north. What was strange was the tracks only headed east and west. We must've made a strange turn somewhere earlier.

"Hey!" I slightly jumped at the sound of this new voice. "My name is Dakota, what's yours?" Dakota had medium length, dark brown hair. He stood about the same height as me, with a slightly more muscular build.

"John. Let me guess, you got a joker?" He nodded solemnly. 

"Where do you think we're going?" He asked quizzically.

I looked him dead in the eyes and said, "To our deaths."

He started chuckling and asked, "Why?"

"Did you ever notice how all the two's cards had mud? I think that signifies how the people staying in the twos will live dirt poor. My friend got a king card and it was so fancy, which was just to signify the extravagant life ahead of them." 

He nodded, "And?"

"The joker cards are burnt, ripped, and muddy. It's in just as bad of condition as the twos. I don't think they for us to be alive." At those words the train started to slow down quickly.

"Well I guess we're about to find out." He said. There were trees outside the train which slowly started to slow down in speed. The conductor walked into the room most of us stood in and started to speak. "Everyone start getting ready to leave. Single file line out the door and stand in line facing towards the trees." He looked around at everyone then shouted, "NOW!" Everyone started to file out of the train and face towards the trees. Even kids that looked like they were from the kings were there.

The 'leader' of this group walked out in front of us. "All of you are the disgraces of The King's country. You all have led horrible lives, mostly ones by crime," he looked around at the jokers and continued. "some of you even endangered many of your friends that were near you." Now everyone was looking to their left and rights. "So therefore," When he paused the guards walked to the sides of the leader raising their guns. He looked around at us in a surprisingly worse and angry mood.  "The King doesn't see you fit to live. Neither in the sanctuary of his kingdom, or on this earth. Now kneel down, and prepare for your e-" 

At that moment there was a crack of a stick in the woods, and the face of the leader sunk quickly. "Guards! Get in the train," He said while got to the train. "and make sure they don't get on." All of the guards got on the train with their leader. There was another crack as whatever was out there got closer. Everyone quickly started to scatter. Some went towards the train, but they didn't last long with a knife in them. Others went to the woods but quickly came out screaming for their life.

 I looked for Dakota and saw him running along the the rails away from the train, so I decided to follow him. Once I was a short distance away there was a large crash and I barely looked back to see many people getting mauled by a bent card like what I'd seen in the King's caste. This then sent a lot of adrenaline through my veins making me pick up speed. 

I quickly caught up to Dakota causing him to look confused. "Keep going," I said. "There are bent cards back there! We need to find a place to hide!" He nodded and veered off to the left into the trees, so I followed him.

The trees surrounded us and became extremely dense in a matter of seconds. I eventually started to slow down and looked at Dakota. "Where do we need to go? The trees are the only place we have cover. There aren't any other places we can go." 

He looked at me and nodded. "We'll just need to keep going and find something."

So that's what we did. We walked for hours, but in fear both of us rarely stopped. It was getting to the late afternoon before we made a verdict to stop. "We should probably stop. It's gonna be getting dark really soon. Where should we hole up for tonight?" I said.

"Let's just sleep here for tonight. We can head out tomorrow?" He asked.

"Ya that works." We both started to hanker down for the night. 

As it started to get dark we started talking. 

"So where are you from?" Dakota started.

"The twos. How about you?" I returned. 

"I'm from the fives. Who would've guessed that we were going to be in the wilderness and not some other place like a prison?"

"I have no clue, but at least I'm out of that horrible life." I said.

"Well, we'll have to survive those monsters everyone calls bent cards, get food, and avoid people if anyone comes to find us. How is that better?" I looked at him earnestly and smiled.

"The twos aren't really as peachy as people make it out to be. Plus nobody really like me there." I retorted sarcastically.

"Ya, that makes sense." He paused, looking off into the distance. "Do you see that?" I turned around and looked past all of the leaves and saw glowing smoke in the sky a short distance away. Dakota stood up extremely fast and and smile. "That could be the other Jokers!" He looked back at me as I stood up. 

"Let's go then!"

We started to make our way towards the fire and smoke. Without making ourselves known we made it to the same clearing and cautiously looked around the trees at the people making the fires. He was right. It was all of the other Jokers, well, some of them.

"Hey!" Dakota said taking the initiative. All of the Jokers sitting around the fire turned quickly to face us. All of them quickly relaxed at the sight of another human. 

"We thought we were the only ones that escaped! Thanks the lord you survived!" One said standing up.

After this all of us settled down and got ready to sleep. Some people took charge and decided to stay up to keep watch and I volunteered to go first.

Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed that chapter please vote, thanks. If there are any hard to read sentences or grammar mistakes please tell me, thanks! Have a happy holidays!