012
1560 Words
And then, finally, Mom spoke.
“There are very bad men after us,” she said. Her voice didn’t shake. “And we must not let them find you.”
My hands balled into fists. “What kind of men? What do they want with me?”
From the back seat, Kaia leaned forward between us. “Why are we running? Why not go to the police?”
Alia’s hand was on Kaia’s shoulder. It trembled slightly. “Because this isn’t something the police can stop,” she said. “And it can’t be fought… not the way you think.”
I stared at my mom’s profile. Her jaw clenched tight. Her eyes stayed on the road.
“Then why can’t they find me?” I asked again, more desperate this time.
Still nothing.
Silence stretched thick across the car. Outside, forest trees blurred past us. The road narrowed, winding into unfamiliar turns. My pulse wouldn’t settle.
I turned toward Kaia. Her face was pale, her lips pressed together. Scared. Just like me.
Something was wrong. Deeply, irreversibly wrong.
And the worst part?
We were still being kept in the dark.
Just when I thought the quiet couldn’t stretch any tighter, I heard it.
A low hum. Distant. Mechanical.
My heart kicked. I glanced over my shoulder and froze.
Two dark motorcars had emerged from the bend behind us, just beyond the dust we left in our wake. They weren’t drifting. They were locked onto us. Purposeful.
Fast.
“Mom,” I whispered. Then louder “Mom. Are we being followed?”
Kaia’s voice was sharper: “Mom, look behind us. Are they, are they after us?”
Alia twisted to look. Her breath caught.
My mother didn’t answer.
She just pushed the pedal to the floor, cursing under her breath and veered sharply onto a narrow dirt path that disappeared beneath a curtain of thickets. The car jolted violently, tires skidding. Mud slapped against the windows like claws. The city’s outskirts vanished behind us, no more cobblestones or clean-cut lanes. Only wild earth now.
Kaia’s mother unfurled a tattered map across her lap, hands trembling. I saw this with her before.
“Left at the next fork Isolde, no. wait. Right! You’ll need to cut through the quarry line—”
“We’ll sink the wheels in the quarry,” mom bit back, jaw tight. “Hold on.”
We hurtled forward, the jungle car groaning beneath us as it tore through the underbrush. Branches whipped at the glass. Shadows thickened.
I couldn’t swallow the lump in my throat. My whole world was closing in, air thinner, every breath tighter. My voice scraped out, barely audible.
“But there’s no way out. Not by road.” Our city was flanked on all sides, forests thick as tar, hills too steep for passage. Roads ended. Trails vanished. It was said you could only leave by flight or by water. So what were we doing? Where are we going?
Mom didn’t answer.
I clutched my bag tighter to my chest, its weight too deliberate, too wrong. There had to be something else, something mom hadn’t told me. Because she wasn’t panicking. Not like me. Neither was Alia. Their hands were steady. Their movements were too clean, too prepared. They’d planned for this. And that was perhaps the most terrifying thing of all.
Alia leaned forward, bracing a hand against my seat. Her eyes scanned the map again, mouth tight.
“They’ve blocked the coast road… but not the old mill lane. Isolde, take the incline, now!”
Another jolt. The car climbed sharply, the engine whining. Gravel scattered behind them in a violent spray.
I twisted to look.
Three black cars now.
Not two.
They tore through the woods like hounds on a scent. Unrelenting.
The tension in the car thickened, pressing down like a storm cloud ready to break. The motorcars behind us hadn’t let up. Three now. Still gaining. Kaia clutched the seatbelt, knuckles pale. “Why aren’t they stopping?” she whispered, eyes locked on the bouncing glow of headlights in the rear window.
“They’re not trying to scare us,” Mom said, her voice low and grim. “They’re hunting us.”
My stomach turned. “Then why haven’t they—?”
A crack split the air.
Sharp. Metallic.
The rear windshield exploded.
Kaia screamed.
“Down!” Mom barked, her arm shooting across the seat to shove me beneath the dashboard. The car swerved violently, tires shrieking against the path’s edge.
Bullets.
They were shooting at us.
Another shot tore through the side panel, slicing with a high-pitched whine.
“F*ck!” Mom hissed, yanking the wheel. Gravel skidded beneath the tires. The car fishtailed, then steadied as she raced toward the thick fringe of trees ahead.
I crouched low, heart slamming against my ribs, ears ringing. “They’re trying to kill us.”
Not capture.
Not warn.
Kill.
From the glovebox, Mom pulled something wrapped in cloth. Her hands trembled but she didn’t unwrap it.
“Turn here. That’s the route,” Alia rasped.
“Are you sure?” Mom’s voice was tight.
“Yes. No more guessing roads.”
Mom didn’t argue.
She veered off the path completely.
The car exploded through the underbrush. Branches scraped the paint. Mud slapped the windows. The jungle swallowed us and the gunfire followed.
Bullets hammered the frame in a barrage of sound and steel. The woods were so thick they blocked out sunlight.
Mom dropped the wrapped in cloth onto my lap. It was a book. My breath came shallow. My lungs clawed for air. The sound of gunfire screamed in my skull.
The way mom fought the wheel, you would think she was a woman possessed.
She wasn’t just driving. She was outrunning death.
I didn’t ask. I stuffed the book into my bag and held on tight.
“We need to get out of here!” she shouted, her voice ragged. In the rear mirror, the headlights slashed through the trees relentlessly, burning like hellfire.
Another shot cracked.
It hit the engine.
A sickening metallic thud.
The car jolted. The engine choked. Power drained like blood from a wound.
“We’re not going to make it!” Alia gasped, clutching the seat. Her voice was cracked and raw.
“We have to,” Mom growled. She slammed the gas, but the car only groaned, then died. The headlights flickered once and blinked out, swallowed by the dark.
“The girls have to,” Alia said back.
Gunfire erupted again. Glass shattered. Metal screamed.
Mom didn’t wait.
She threw the door open. “Out! Now! Run!”
I bolted but Mom grabbed Kaia’s hand and shoved it into mine. I struggled to swing my bag around my shoulder as we ran. The air reeked of oil and gunpowder. Panic clawed at my throat. The forest loomed ahead, vast, black, suffocating.
“Go!” Mom screamed from behind, already moving. “Don’t lose each other!”
Kaia stumbled, sobbing. “Mom? Where’s my mom?!”
There was no time. No time to think.
“Just run,” I said, pulling her harder.
The forest swallowed us whole.
Behind us, gunfire cracked like thunder. Bullets tore through branches, sent bark and splinters raining down.
Then
a scream.
Sharp. Terrible. Final.
I froze. Kaia’s head snapped around.
Alia.
She was falling, her body buckling, jerking. A crimson bloom spread across her chest. She hit the ground with a sickening thud. The trees parted just enough to let a beam of light spill over her face. My mom was behind her in a minute.
“Mom!” Kaia screamed and lunged.
I caught her. “No! Kaia, we can’t. We have to go!”
I pulled her forward. Kaia sobbed, her cries like something torn from bone, but she ran.
We had to.
There was no choice left.
Mom’s voice rose from the trees, ragged and wild. “Don’t stop! Don’t ever stop! If you stop, you die! We’ll be fine!”
My lungs burned. My legs screamed. But I didn’t stop. I was crying hard and so was Kaia.
The trees stretched endlessly, but even they couldn’t protect us forever. With every heartbeat, every ragged breath, I knew we were running out of time. Every step was a war against thorns, roots, the ache devouring my legs. Blood tasted like copper in my mouth, i bit myself. Kaia was crying behind me, but I pulled her. Not when the world behind us was gunfire and death.
Then
Silence.
Not the kind that comes when a threat passes. The kind that falls when something worse notices you. The air shifted. Thickened.
The forest grew too still, like it was holding its breath. My pace slowed. The hairs on my arms stood. Every breath was a whisper in my ears. Kaia stopped beside me, wiping her face. “Do you hear that?”
“A lion,” I whispered. But it wasn’t.
Behind us, nothing stirred. No more shouts. No engines. No gunfire. It was like we had stepped into a different world.
Just… an unnatural calm before a sound cracked through the stillness. Not a bullet. Not a scream. The trees split apart behind us with a roar like the forest itself was being torn open.
Kaia screamed.
- Writer
