Story time...

**Nyles** Mon Jan 23, 2012 10:58 pm

I'm entering this story into a contest and want feedback on it! Here goes if you didnt catch it, the name of the story is ! You dont have to read it all if your too lazy but just skim and tell me if you like the idea! Also I'm still looking for a story title so if anyone has suggestions Wink

I shuffled through the black, haunting ashes of a once glorious city. All the tears were gone, I could no longer talk to or see my family. Their bodies were likely lying in the city, abandoned with bullet holes through them.
Ever since World War III had wrecked its havoc across the world and its inhabitants it had been like this, desolate, eerie, and lonely. No more did things such as unity, team work, and friendship exist. In this new world it was every living-breathing thing for themselves.
There were people who tried to rise to power by building armies and promising things that were impossible. But with the human race dwindling on the brink of existence it was hard to get enough people that trusted you to join your cause... People like that disgusted me.
Then there were the psychos who had long since gone mad from the sorrow, war, and deaths. All you could do for them was avoid them and hope you didn't find yourself face to face with one of them.
Only the strong survived here the weak didn't last long. You would find their bodies curled up in a ball hugging their knees, skinny, circles under their eyes, and the flesh rotting away. It was a fact of life and sympathy just wouldn’t do.
In mid thought I stumbled over a blackened doll lying in the ashes. I grimaced and turned away, too many thoughts of what could of happened to the little girl that had once owned the doll that lay half buried in the ashes.
The ruins of a city usually meant that supplies needed to survive probably lie somewhere inside. But with the ruins of a city also came the threat of terrors. Hidden in the nooks of the city were cannibals waiting for a naive wanderer to pass by.
Conversations in my head were a normal happening and sometimes I didn't even realize that I was talking to myself.
Straying from my thoughts and focusing on the task that I was facing I placed a hand on a pistol that rattled in my belt.
The abandoned, blackened buildings were more eerie up close. The torn curtains of a building to my left flapped uselessly in the wind. The noise as the black ash shifted under my feet seemed louder then a blaring horn as each lonely step brought new crunching noises. What I was stepping on under the rubble and ash that littered the streets I did not know.
As I got to the southern side of the city where the bomb had not hit as bad I began to search houses. All that lay in the houses were turned over furniture and dust. As I searched yet another house I heard shuffling noises behind me and felt cold, large hands grasp my neck.
I chocked out and tried to twist around to see my attacker. Uselessly I struggled clawing the hands that held a death grip around my neck. Loud cackling came from the attacker as he held me firmly in place. Red dots blurred my vision and slowly I began to give up the fight. My hands had dropped to my sides and my eyelids where closing shut when I heard a thud as something collided with something else. The hands loosened their grip and slid from my neck. Another thud echoed across the ruined city as whoever had been attacking me fell to the ashen ground. I fell to my knees choking and panting.
“I thought you could use some help..." A deep voice said behind me. My ears rang in surprise, it had been so long since I had heard a human voice. Slowly I regained my breath and turned around facing the man who had saved my life.
A young man stood before me, he was tall, muscular, and was holding a rifle in his hand. I could tell he had used the butt of the rifle to knock out the man who had tried to kill me. I began to say something but all that came out was a croak. Clearing my throat I managed to say "T-thank-you..." The man grunted and squatted examining the person he had just knocked out. He muttered something under his breath then stood and brushed off his hands. He walked to where I was and offered a hand.
I ignored the out held hand and stood up by myself. He shrugged and let his hand drop to his side. "Why aren't you leaving?" I blurted out not thinking if it was rude. The man grinned a wide smile and twisted the rifle in his hands.
"Because..." He said staring into my blue eyes, after a long pause he spoke again, "I want you on my team..."
In surprise I averted my eyes from the strangers face. "Why?" The question slipped from my mouth. I repeated the word in my mind. Why would an expert like him want a scrawny 19-year-old girl who could barely manage to feed herself, in his alliance. He probably had hordes of people listening to his persuading voice, ready to do his will. Why me? My thoughts were interrupted as he shifted his feet and spoke,
"I don’t want to waste any more time here… Lets get out of here and I will explain. I get the feeling that were being watched." He began to turn away facing the dark orange sunset.
I looked down at the hunched man who lay in the ashes. Sighing and turning away from possible food I trudged after someone who could easily rip my throat out if I displeased him. Maybe I should run now and avoid all the mess that could be made out of this. My only goal was survival, and I realized that it was turning dark and soon the city would be alive with hungry mouths... In defeat I watched the blackened ground pass beneath my feet as I traveled forward.
After following the stranger we came upon a rusted, factory that had rubble strewn around it. I studied the man’s features, he looked well fed, black spiky hair topped his head, and dark mysterious emerald green eyes stared back at me. He slipped inside of the old rusted building and motioned for me to follow.
Once inside a dreary site met my eyes. Scrap metal hung from the roofs, old dusty factory belts lined the floor, the building looked as if it could fall at any moment. Small beams of light were all that could squeeze through the walls and roof creating a peculiar appearance. “Who are you?” I asked turning away from the site before me and concentrating on him.
“I’m Torin… That‘s about it.” I stuttered wanting to know more but thought better and kept quiet.
“And you are?” he asked not looking at me and instead watching a movement in the corner of the building.
“Maia” Torin’s face lit up with a familiar expression.
“Warrior…” I raised an eyebrow wanting to know what he meant. “Your name means warrior. It’s a Greek word. Torin means chief.”
Without even thinking about it I spoke , “I was born at the beginning of World War III. They named me Maia hoping it would remind me to stay strong and do what’s necessary to make a better world. Here I am barely managing to do what’s right for myself and with my parents dead I’m barley surviving.” I looked up to see Torin’s expression, instead of sympathy in his eyes he looked back at me with an almost stoic look on his face.
Shrugging he blankly said, “Many have suffered the same as you… I was tortured, saw my parents killed before my eyes, and watched my brother die an agonizingly slow death. There is much more worse cases then mine.” He finished with an exasperated sigh. “I want a better world more than anything, are you in?” I realized what he was saying was true, and suddenly I didn’t feel sorry for myself.
“What’s our first move?” I said with a determined look.
***
“So how do we go about this?” I stumbled over a burnt branch that reached its long spindly fingers towards the sky. We had spent weeks planning, gathering supplies, and stalking up on food. Finally we were taking the first step into the plan.
“Go about what?” I had gotten to know Torin better and he had turned out to be a whole different person then I expected.
“Finding people, it’s not normal to see sane people just walking around.” We each carried a backpack full of food and weapons on our backs.
Torin turned to me with an annoyed look, “You ask too many questions, but if your going to force me to answer it’s not as hard as you think, you just really have to pay attention, and know where the food spots are.” He paused and studied a ghostly town in the distance. “Last I remember there were a couple people hiding out there.” He pointed towards the town and trekked forwards.
“Why isn’t that town in ruins?” I asked with amazement. That was the first time I had seen a city or town that wasn’t lying in ruins.
“Guess the bombers skipped over it…” Torin shifted his backpack to a more comfortable position and lightened his steps so they didn’t make as much noise against the ground.
As we reached the towns dusty buildings vague talking could be heard against the days quit mood. Torin slipped into the shadows of a building and I followed without hesitation. We crept to where the noise came from and as we approached the talking grew louder.
“… More order in the world would benefit us all, but in order to get that we need a leader, I can be that leader…” My eyes widened, but as always Torin’s facial expression didn’t change.
In a low monotone voice Torin whispered “It’s another power crazy man. This is perfect.” He began to rummage through his back pack. Apparently satisfied he shuffled towards the talking.
As we emerged from the shadows the crowd paid us no attention, nor did the speaker. Most of the crowd was skinny, had ragged clothes on, and looked as if they could faint. The speaker was a short man with a plump face, yet he had an air of confidence about him.
“Here it goes…” Torin tapped a man on the shoulder. “Excuse me, who is that speaking up there?” He said it in a confused voice, nothing like his own.
The man glanced away from the speaker, “That’s Ganon Berwick” The man looked back up at Ganon, a misty look in his eyes.
“Hmm doesn’t ring a bell” Torin said with a thoughtful expression. Shrugging he glided towards Ganon’s preaching spot. I followed just as silently.
As we stood in front of Ganon the crowd began to grow restless. “You disgust me!” Torin shouted in his face. Ganon sputtered and was about to talk again when Torin continued on yelling. “Admit your lying to all these people! Admit you cant really do what you say! Admit your just a power crazy man!” Torin finished and stood glaring into Ganon’s eyes. Ganon was speechless as Torin turned towards the crowd. He shoved the backpack at me. “Come with us and together we will raise the earth to it’s former glory!” Torin reached towards the opened back pack in my arms and pulled out some food. “With the promise of your loyalty to us we will protect and feed you…” I watched as the fire in Torin’s eyes softened once he saw the hungered looks. “Come…”
More then half the crowd cheered as Torin handed out mere scraps of food. “You think you can march in here and ruin my reputation without any consequences?” Ganon sputtered at us. “I may be helpless now but I will get you back.” He finished and crossed his arms defiantly.
I pulled out my pistol and aimed it at Ganon. “Go now before we have to use force.” I shot at the ground near his feet and he looked up with a shocked expression.
“You’ll regret that!” He stormed off three of his followers scurrying after him.
***
The troops were settled into sleeping bags and mattresses strewn out across the factory floor. I stood leaning against a wall surveying all that was before my eyes. It had turned out Ganon had had more followers then it seemed. We were running scarce on food but the troops had complete faith in Torin and I and believed we could lead them to a better world. These were people who actually cared.
“One step closer…” Torin’s quiet voice rang through my ears. My head flicked to where the noise came from, there was Torin standing with his back to the wall fiddling with a broken gun. He looked over the people that would soon play a part in history. His usual stoic expression was tinged with a bit of sadness.
“One step closer.” I agreed quietly averting my gaze from Torin and back to the dusty factory floors. “Do you think Ganon will really fulfill his threats?” I whispered with a tense voice.
“His threats… are empty threats. I doubt we will ever see him again. If we do he will either be dead, or on the verge of death.” Torin spoke with confidence but a feeling of doubt still gripped me. “You should rest, tomorrow we find a new head quarters.”
I smiled wearily “Good night…” All was well, the plan was working, I had an alley, my stomach was full, and I could finally sleep.
“Night” Torin said lightly as I walked away with silent footsteps.
As I lay down quiet pounding rang across the factory as rain collided with the old building. My thoughts began to dull as the rhythmic lullaby of the rain gently pushed me into sleep
***
BANG! One of the factory’s wall crumbled too pieces as it was pulled from the rest of the building. My eyes snapped open and dizzily I looked around. A cloud of dust pushed its way from underneath the fallen wall. Everything was chaos, gun fire rang out, people were scrambling to get weapons, bodies already lay at my feet blood soaking their clothes. Above it all raucous laughter filled the air.
A bullet whizzed past me and slammed into metal. I stood and frantically searched through my bag. When I didn’t feel the cold touch of metal against my skin I realized my gun was gone. Torin ran through dust towards me, he was holding two guns and blood dripped form a cut on his arm.
“Take this!” He shoved a shotgun into my hand. “Duck!!” A dagger shot past my head as I struck the ground.
“Wha-What’s going on?”
“I was wrong… It’s Ganon, he’s back and wants revenge. I think he’s slowly going mad…” Torin finished off with a sad expression. “Many are dying we have to finish this!” He sprang up and held out a hand. I grabbed the out held hand and followed Torin as he sprinted through the chaos.
Soon we were outside of the factory where we could watch the battle take place. Many lay dead on our side but more lay dead on Ganon’s side. Ganon stood on a rusty jeep shooting a machine gun at every moving thing. He was the one laughing a jagged laugh that sounded like glass being scraped against glass.
Torin and I stood looking over the battle. Screams of pain found there way to my ears and I closed my eyes pushing bad thoughts from my mind.
“Are you sure your ready for this?“ Torin uttered in a hushed voice.
This was the world now, a chunk of land inhabited by blood crazy beings, who would stop at nothing. This was the world I would have to deal with the rest of my life unless I did something about it. I was more then ready…
With my eyes still closed I nodded deliberately “As ready as I can get…”

**Gaara愛** Tue Jan 24, 2012 1:34 am

I like it. i would just read through it again and change somethings if they need to be. This would go under Science Fiction so I would think a great name for it wold be………… World War III or something along those lines.