October 22

The news reporters kept on repeating the same lines over and over like a CD with significant scratches on its shiny underside. They kept repeating, “Horror at Ciat Central High School,” and “Nate Matthews, Student at Ciat Central High School found dead after jumping from the top of the roof….”

All of the other reports just rang in my head as I planted my body face down on my pillow top mattress, my face pressed deeply into my pillows surface. Inside my head, I was screaming so loud as if to block out what my voice of reason had to say.

Every single reporter in town was asking me about the situation and wanted to know the true reason why he did it. But why would I know? Why ask a kid who didn’t know anything about him besides his name and how he greeted? I couldn’t even interpret the situation myself let alone tell them about it, so I decided to hold back my anger and willed myself not to lash out. I walked back and forth from school taking back roads and short cuts that one of the kids in my class had informed me about.

Thanks Gene.

Everything didn’t make sense, no matter how hard I tried I couldn’t even begin to understand why he would say that “I will cause the end,” with such malice and frustration on his face and in his heart. But why call me up to the roof to tell me this? I felt after roughly three days I should check the roof again to look for a single shred of this insanity that he could have left for me. So after most of the students left for the day with all their friends, I quietly made my way towards that dreaded stairwell.

Luckily I just followed the same pattern in which I easily passed it the day before. My knuckles didn’t tighten almost at all, not from the lack of nerves but from the draining of my confidence as I made my way up that darkened, concrete stairway. I actually made my way relatively quickly up the stairway as if I had never had a problem with them, I started feeling better. Now ahead of me, the dreaded door to the roof.

I quickly took a single deep breath as to attempt to calm my nerves. I plunged shoulder first into the now tinted mixture of orange and red afternoon sky, the sun was discretely saying good night to this part of the world.

As my eyes started to adjust again, I swear I started to see something in the corner of my left eye. Relatively close actually, as if it was coming in for a sneak attack. Instinctively I jumped back and turned towards the fleeting image. Nothing was there.

Was it just my imagination? I proceeded to call out as if hoping for a response, “Is anyone there? If you are, don’t mess with me, I am not in the best mood today. Just come on out.” I realized almost instantly that what I said was a typical saying of a main character in most of my action/supernatural stories. I chuckled to myself at how stupid my thoughts could be when my whole being is in a serious situation.

I started to see the entity coming from my left. The being started to come into focus. It seemed to be about six foot maybe even a few more inches and was taking the same color as the sky to attempt to camouflage itself. It didn’t try that hard to reach me because I decided it was my turn to strike. I clenched my right fist tighter than I thought I ever could to prepare myself.

I lowered my right shoulder and tensed my forearm as I proceeded to pick my shoulder back up and swing my fist as if to get the highest score on the BOXer arcade game that I used to love to play as a kid. My fist definitely connected but it didn’t feel as if it hit anything that even resembled a face, chest, or anything. There was almost no impact, my fist just stopped as if a wall of air had halted the motion. I was in shock at how this “thing” stopped my attack almost effortlessly.

The fact that he had stopped me as if I hadn’t even tried sent chills down my spine. His hand, if I could call it that, draped over my fist. I slowly looked up, as if in a trance, and all I saw was this WWII type gas mask that seemed as if it hadn’t been in use since then, cracked between the two jet black eye holes and its main decaying brown color. As soon as I was able to show shock on my face, the enemy started to bear down on my hand. My body started to instinctively drop lower and lower to the now soft concrete even though I felt nothing.

The crushing slowly started to affect me, I was pretty sure the entity wouldn’t let go, so I attempted the best action I could with the options I had left. I attempted to blind side him with a quick sweep to his legs just to throw him off balance. Luckily I managed to loosen his grip enough to get away and jump back a few feet. The most disturbing part was that the mask didn’t move his eye holes away from me at any point during that confrontation. I could feel the murderous intent in the air even though the space between us was a good few meters.

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

He started to pick up jogging, almost near sprint in my direction, still keeping a steadfast gaze on my face. I noticed that he had a limp on his right side as he started to move. Did I do that to him or was he already like that? Also how is he moving so quickly with that limp? Albeit being a barely noticeable limp, but he is basically almost running at full speed.

I started running at full speed towards the bench on the west side of the rooftop to get something, anything to protect myself with. I was almost half way there when my ears picked up on something that could be noticed as heavy clanking and choking-like sounds coming from behind me. I heard the clanking, almost scraping, getting closer and closer, and if by some miracle instinct, I ducked.

I don’t know how I managed to do it, but I am not going to question it. He caught up to me quicker than I had thought, and swung what seemed to look like a steel pipe. Not the one from the school, it looked almost brand new. Was he carrying that the whole time? It didn’t really matter; I really needed to get something to protect myself from the next attack. I started sprinting in the direction of the accident from the other day, the emotions didn’t matter, and it became even more of a fight-or-flight situation.

I was right next to the opening in the rusted fence when I heard the heavy choking right behind me again. All I felt next was a clank and my head went numb as my body fell against the gate. I put my hand on the spot of impact and all I saw on my hand was a brown-like liquid. It was most likely blood but my vision was growing weaker as the seconds pass. The thing was standing right over me waiting for me to fall, and against my best wishes I did. I felt my right arm lie up against the cold, now solid, cement as I rocked back and forth between brightness and darkness.

I frantically attempted to grab the nearest object to throw at it so I could crawl away. I managed to feel something familiar, I didn’t care what it was, with a good amount of force that was left in my arm, I threw it. The good part is that the object managed to be a piece of cement and managed to stagger him for a good thirty seconds or so. The bad part is that it was only thirty seconds of escape time, which at the pace I was going wasn’t enough to escape. I tried my best to move closer to the edge of the building to yell out for help, even though I knew that everyone was gone, I tried.

“SOMEONE…. ANYONE… I NEED HELP….” My voice was coarse and seemed as if it didn’t even make it past the second floor, ten seconds wasted. I grabbed the nearest piece of concrete before attempting to pull myself up as it drew closer. I managed to get one-foot flat on the ground and the other resting on the fence as I took a defensive stance. He stopped as if amused, standing perfectly still as a statue.

“He is mocking me.” I said under my breath. As my blood boiled, I quickly felt the adrenaline course through my veins as I went on the offensive, sprinting in his direction. “Don’t you dare mock me!” I yelled as I cocked my arm back, concrete in hand, ready to bash its head in.

I ran, foot after foot, angered yell after angered yell, full speed at the masked figure. I did lose my balance a little but it didn’t matter at this point. As our distances grew shorter my thoughts grew more calculating. Where should I hit first? Will he counter? It didn’t matter though, I only saw red.

At the moment I had reached him, I threw all my weight into my arm and drove the cement piece directly into the right side of his neck.

I felt victorious until I saw the entity before me. He didn’t even move an inch and was still staring at me, deadlocked on my angered expression. I stepped back slowly with my expression now resembling one of helplessness.

“Why won’t you go down?! Why are you still here?” I wanted to say to him but the words weren’t coming out.

I felt all over my body to make sure he didn’t retaliate. My heart stopped, my mind went blank, my hands stopped. I felt the handle of some small object protruding from my stomach. I lifted my hand six inches in front of my face only to see blood slowly making its way down every part of my palm and wrist. It was mine, and only mine.

I started to grow faint and my breathing started to become labored. I only saw the entity before me stare as I dropped to the ground gasping for air. Right before Death’s hand started to reach for me, a voice that sounded oddly female in essence but male in tone called out, “You are mine now.”