Evolve: IL Chapters 1 & 2

Chapter 1

 

 

An ear splitting screech filled the foggy air, like fingernails against a chalk board. Walter turned, a black, shrouded figure appeared behind him. He pushed himself to run faster through the thick brush of forest. His heart hammered in his chest.

 

 

The figure’s screeching spread through the night; he dodged left and right, zigzagging through the trees, trying to gain some distance. His lungs were on fire and every breath fed the flames; He wasn't sure how long he’d been running; it felt like forever.

 

 

Walter gained some ground, but it continued to follow, its mass seeming to float across the ground after him. Walter pivoted and darted up a small knoll to a giant ash tree that sat like a sentinel at its peak. Panting with sweat streaming down his face and muscles burning Walter leaned on the tree for support. As he turned the dark figure floated up the hill after him. Its sharp cruel voice continued to screech. 

 

 

Walter jumped and grabbed one of the tree’s lower branches, hoisting himself up.

 

 

Without waiting to see if it would follow, Walter kept climbing. He was agile and bounded up the wide branches of the old tree.

 

 

The burning in his lungs lessened as he moved up and he no longer heard the screeching in his ears. He didn't stop, but he slowed a little as the branches grew thinner.

 

 

When he reached the top, he poked his head through the thick canopy of leaves and a bright moon shined above him. It was so crisp and, clean, and he gazed at the big white light in the sky. His heart slowed down and a sense of safety washed over him like the twinkle of the moonlight would protect him.

 

 

Then he felt it - the slight sound of air exhaling from a set of lungs pushed through the narrow passageways of the nose and out to the open air, landing on the back of his neck.

 

 

He knew he shouldn’t look, that he should flee instead, jump out of the tree, something, anything. But he needed to know. He needed to find out what it was.

 

 

With one hand the tree, Walter turned. His breath caught in his chest as he unconsciously held it.

 

 

Nothing was there.

 

 

His breath cascaded out of his lungs in a sigh of relief. 

 

 

He turned back towards the moon and it was there, the darkness under its hood inches from his face. A tall figure hovered just before him shrouded in thick black smoke like a reaper come to claim his soul. 

 

 

Walter stood frozen, his eyes transfixed on the empty void under its cowl. His flesh sprouted goosebumps and a cold sweat swept through his body as terror enveloped him.

 

 

The thing’s wispy black hand darted out towards Walter plunging deep into his chest. Walter could feel the tendrils of the hand spreading through him bringing his blood to a boil with searing pain. 

 

 

Walter screamed in agony. The burning spread like acid through his veins. He tried to move, but he couldn't. He was paralyzed, staring into the dark void where the figure's face should have been. The emptiness churned under its deep hood and Walter could see his pitiful life flashing before his eyes. Tears ran down his face and he knew there was no way out. 

 

 

Then the moon got brighter behind the black figure. Light crept around its shoulder until Walter saw a petite feminine figure of pure white light hovering just behind the dark one. The sight gave Walter a sense of calm and subdued the acid burn coursing through his veins long enough to make out that the figure was pointing to something behind him.

 

 

The brief calm vanished, and the burning intensified as Walter craned his neck to look behind him. A lake sprawled across the ground below him. He glanced up at the white figure who nodded her approval as if it new what he was thinking.

 

 

The burn was back in full force. The pain was so intense it was intoxicating, like he was being cleansed of something. 

 

 

No! he thought, I need to move. 

 

 

Walter focused all of his attention on what needed to be done until an almost imperceptible shutter swept through his body allowing him to move.

 

 

Without another thought, he bent his knees and launched backwards pushing off the group of branches he stood on with everything he had. He watched in relief and horror as his body separated from the smoky shadow hand, leaving the creature up in the tree.

 

 

A horrible screech filled the air and a moment later Walter hit the water with a thunderous splash and felt the cool water easing the burn of his insides. The deep water was black as night and sight was impossible while submerged. He swam up scissor kicking his legs, hoping it hadn't followed. Walter broached the surface and starred up at the enormous tree; it looked a thousand feet high from here. 

 

 

White light flickered off to Walter’s left, catching his attention. He turned and kicked his feet back and forth to stay afloat in the cold water. The white glow of the feminine figure hovered inches above the surface on the opposite side of the lake. She beckoned him over. Without thinking twice, he dove under and swam as fast as he could.

 

The bottom of the lake sloped upwards and his feet touched the bottom. The woman was now in front of him. She extended her hand to help him out of the water. Walter stretched his hand to grasp hers, for hers. The warmth emanating from her body like the last rays of sun on a cold winter day. 

 

 

He made it. He was free!

 

 

Then a shadowy hand smashed through the water’s surface and ripped him under the dark water.

 

Chapter 2

 

Walter woke, sitting straight up and struck the snooze on the alarm clock to the right of his bed. 

 

The room was still. Slight beams of moonlight entered through the blinds of the bay window to the left of his bed. The red LED lights of the clock shined against the dark backdrop of his room reading 3:59 am.

 

He sat there for a moment, the layer of sweat coating his skin drying as he recalled the nightmare he’d just had. It was the same one he’d been suffering almost every night this past year. 

 

He laid back down and wondered what it would feel like to be an ordinary teenager while he drove the dream from his mind.

 

 

He hopped out of bed and set his focus to the task at hand. Walter lived his life like a chess game. “Preparation and positioning are the only things you have command of in this life, Walter,” his grandfather would always tell him. 

 

At five foot eleven, one hundred ninety pounds may seem a little overweight, but Walter was in the finest condition possible. He had a body fat percentage of 7.5% - which from extensive study on the subject he learned to be just enough fat to enhance his performance. He was a perfectionist which his grandfather preferred to believe was his doing. Because of this, and his near photographic memory, Walter did nothing half ass.

 

Walter would never tell his grandfather, but he would have worked out whether his grandfather made him or not. It being one of the few occasions he felt at peace. Walter threw his running garb on, comprising a pair of gym shorts and his old, battered sneakers, heading out into the silent, dark hallway. It had been only him and his grandfather for the last few weeks as his father was away on business. It happened so often now that Walter never really noticed anymore. He became used to it being him and his grandfather. He had never known his mother, whom he was told died in childbirth. Neither his father “Henry” nor grandfather “Harold” would ever speak of her no matter how many times he asked, until one day he stopped asking.  

 

He pondered what his grandfather would have in store for him this summer and headed down the familiar, dark wood stairs which creaked as he descended.

 

“Remember now, you have thirty-five minutes to make it back here. For every minute you are late, you add ten to your active meditation for the day.” His grandfather yelled after Walter, watching him exit through the heavy cherry wood door with a gold colored knocker with the name Mason emblazoned across the bottom.

 

Walter slammed the door behind him, the chilly air hit his flesh, producing a sense of excitement. It was a fresh day full of possibilities. The cool morning air always gave him a sliver of optimism that this day would somehow be different-than the others. 

 

 He shook out his limbs as he walked to the end of the drive, looking around for any sign of life in the neighborhood. He didn’t know why, but he did this every morning as if he would see someone up at this hour. Walter pushed everything out of his mind remembering his grandfather’s words and headed east out of the driveway so when the sun rose it would be at his back for most of the run. Stars still lingered in the early morning sky as night turned to day. 

He turned north on Main Street, passing by Fullerton’s Bookstore which had the new copy of “The Paladin,” Walter’s favorite comic, in which the Paladin uses his keen senses and knowledge of martial arts to police the galaxy and keep the innocent safe. Walter made a mental note to stop by after school and pick it up. Though he'd have to hide it so his grandfather wouldn't find out. The Paladin embodied everything Walter wanted to be but his grandfather would not allow. He always told Walter that they lived in the real world which had no use for silly stories.  His grandfathers rule was if it does not increase your knowledge then it's not worth your time, so non-fiction, encyclopedias, philosophy, history, and reference books were all Walter could read.

Walter turned west down Lincoln Drive, passing the coffee shop whose lights were now on and the first customers of the day pulled up. He thought of the training his grandfather made him do day in and day out and tried once again, as he did every morning, to understand why his grandfather would teach him so much, yet let the skills he learned go to waste. Over the last sixteen years, Walter had learned to separate himself from his feelings and to use his brain as a tool instead of being dominated by what his grandfather called baser instincts or as Freud put it, the ego. His grandfather taught him how to categorize his memories and organize them so he could search through them like files in a filing cabinet and pull them up at will. He could run scenarios and probabilities in his head and view them in his mind like they were happening right in front of him. Though no one, save for his father and grandfather knew he could do these things as he wasn’t allowed to do anything that might draw attention to himself. Which included everything and anything. Sports, academics, relationships, jobs, everything was off limits to Walter. School, train, sleep, repeat, all day, every day.

 

Walter turned east once again on Smith Street, now on the home stretch, conceding once again that he didn't know his grandfather’s motives, but he had to trust that his grandfather was only doing what he thought best. However, that line which Walter had been telling himself over and over was wearing thin, barely holding back the frustration that had been growing every day.

 

Walter glanced up at the sun peeking over the horizon and pushed everything from his mind and sprinted to beat the time his grandfather set.