To Belong - Chapter 1

AN: Our English teacher wanted us to write a story about a freak. So here's mine. Enjoy!
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The moon shone high above the town of Gravesend one night, and the wind whipped about grasping at anything that was not held tightly to the earth. The streets of the slums were barren. Nothing was there save for some cars and garbage cans outside of the houses. People had been off the streets for hours. They were all warm and comfortable, protected by the walls of their homes. Everyone was sleeping peacefully, safe and sound in their beds.

Save for one.

A young man was walking through the dark alleys, hands deep in the pockets of his pants. Sunglasses adorned his face despite the darkness of the night. The man walked with a quick swagger, like one on an important mission of great urgency. Reaching the opening of the alleyway, he swiftly glanced around to see if the police were patrolling in the area. Once he was certain he would not be seen, he turned to the left and continued walking.

He was almost to the edge of the city. Just a few more miles and he would be out of the danger zone. Just a little further, and he’d be home. Just a little longer...

CRASH!

As he rounded another corner, the man had walked straight into a garbage can that someone had left out. A cat yowled, furious that its home had been destroyed. The cat’s cries set off the local dogs to add their barking to the madness. Lights all along the street began flicking on, and angry voices could be heard from inside of the houses.

“It’s the damn devil child!”

The man swore under breath and broke into a run. He heard the sounds of doors slamming open and voices and then the thumping of feet following him along with the cacophony of the barking dogs that sounded as if they were right behind him. He whirled around the first corner that he saw and pressed himself against the wall. The mob was getting closer. The man quickly looked around the alley for anything he could possibly use as a weapon. He noticed a sturdy looking board next to the dumpster. He snatched it up and held it like the baseball bats he had always used as a child.

“Hey! He’s over---OOOWWWW!”

The man had slammed that board right across his pursuer’s face as it rounded the corner. As the other fell to the ground, the man turned and ran as fast as he possibly could away from the angry mob.

“Freeze you little bastard!”

“Dammit, he’s fast!”

The man continued to run even as his legs screamed out in agony from the overuse. He had to keep going. He couldn’t let them catch him. The man ran faster and faster, pushing his legs to the limits. The crowd of people following him began to fall behind. He looked back quickly to make sure that they weren’t catching up. But because he was not facing forward, even for that briefest moment, he failed to notice the figure that stepped out of the shadows before him.

The man slammed straight into the figure and was sent sprawling across the ground. His landing sent the air rushing out of his lungs. He looked up to see what it was that he had run into and gasped when he saw a man that was in his late twenties. This man was covered in hard, wiry muscle with his arms crossed over his chest and grinning as if he had just been given the greatest opportunity in the world. The man on the ground hoped that it was not who he thought it was.

“Hey great job, Jay! You caught him!”

The man gulped as Jay’s grin got even wider, and he looked down with a predatory stare at his prey. Jay crouched down in front of the man, grabbed the front of his shirt, and pulled him forward as the crowd circled around them, preventing the man’s escape.

“Well, well, well. What do we have here?” Jay tsked mockingly at his captive. “Now what exactly did you think you were doing, devil boy? Were you just out for a night time stroll? Or maybe you were trying to break into our homes?” Jay started shaking the man a little as if trying to rattle a response out of him. “Was that it, devil boy? You tryin’ to steal our stuff?”

The man shook his head furiously and tried to break the grip that Jay had on his shirt. He looked around frantically, trying to find a way out of the predicament, but it was all in vain. Jay’s gang had him surrounded.

“What’s the matter? You think you’re too good to talk to me? Come on, devil boy! What do you think you were up to?”

The man just continued to shake his head, and Jay soon became fed up with his stubbornness. One of his hands let go of the man’s shirt, and he swiftly brought it into his captive’s stomach. The man gasped out in pain but refused to cry out.

“Well?!”

Coughing a bit due to the blow, the man struggled to get out a response. “N-no. I was j-just....trying to ge–get....home.”

Jay laughed out at that and his group of followers quickly joined him. “Was that it, devil boy? You were just trying to go home? You swear that was it?”

The man looked up at Jay through shaggy black locks. “T-that was all...”

Jay just continued to laugh. “Oh that is so sweet! You were just wanted to go home and snuggle up in your bed. Too bad I don’t believe you. A no-good scumbag like you would never tell the truth. Even if you were, you probably just wanted to get home so you could plot all of our deaths with your demon daddy.”

“No! I swear I just wanted to go home! I would never hurt ”

Before the man could even finished, Jay slammed his fist into his face, effectively cutting off his protest. The man could taste the metallic taste of blood in his mouth and had to restrain himself from spitting it at his captor. Showing resistance wasn’t going to help him here.

“Oh shut up, devil boy. No one’s believing any of your lies. You nearly broke Steve’s nose with your little stunt back there. You’d never hurt anyone, yeah right! You’re a disgusting little worm. You’re not even human!”

The man began to protest again, and in response, Jay reached forward and snatched the sunglasses from the man’s face. The man panicked and tried to grab them back, but Jay just tossed them over his shoulder into the deeper parts of the alley. Then he grabbed the man’s chin and forced him to look him in the eye.

“Don’t even try to fool yourself. You’re not human, and the proof is right here, on your very face.”

Even in the dim light of the alley, Jay and his gang could see the bright golden eyes of their captive. The golden eyes seemed to glow in the faint light, and the pupils, not the round pupils that people are so accustomed to, but the slitted pupils of the man were slightly plumb, trying to draw in any possible light in the area.

Jay smirked again and forced the man’s face to the side. “And here.” He brushed away some of the shaggy black hair to reveal the man’s ear, which tapered off to a rounded point and looked almost like an ear that someone would expect to see on an elf.

The man’s face was brought back to face Jay, and his eyes widened at the look of bloodlust in his captor’s eyes.

“This is my town, devil boy. And you don’t belong here. In fact, you don’t belong anywhere. You deserve to be punished for endangering the lives of others with your existence.” Jay’s smirk grew, and he leaned down closer to the man. “And you know what, devil boy? I’m gonna be the one to do it.”

With that said, Jay stood up and brought his prisoner with him, lifting him up into the air so that his feet weren’t even touching the ground.

“N-No! Please don’t! Just let me go, please!”

Jay chuckled. “Awww, so cute. Look at that fellas. He’s already begging, and we haven’t even begun!” He looked around to the spectators surrounding them. “What do you say, guys. How about we teach devil boy a lesson he won’t soon forget?”

Jeers and cries from all around the man sounded off. The man squeezed his eyes shut, praying that it was all just a nightmare. But once the first hit of many slammed into his body, he knew that this was real and that there was no way out of this. No one was coming to save him. Who would? This entire town hated him.

Punches and kicks landed all across his body. Hands turned into claws and tore into his flesh. He cried out, pleading for the pain to stop. But no one answered his cries. Jay’s gang continued to beat all of their hatred and disgust for him into his body. They laughed and jeered at him, spitting out their cruel words of loathing. Everything soon became a blur of pain and torment. The man curled up into a ball on the ground, wanting everything to come to end.

He wasn’t sure when it was that they all got bored with his suffering and left him lying there. He couldn’t even tell if they were still inflicting pain on him or if it was just the pain leftover from their beating. Light began to come up from the horizon as the bright sun rose to start a new day. He winced at the sudden onslaught of light. His mind was completely fogged up and the sounds of people stirring inside their homes along the nearest street just mixed all together. Blackness began to creep into the edges of his vision. The man smiled slightly, hoping that maybe this time, when he lost consciousness, it would be his final passing and that he would be put out of his misery.

He could barely even register the sound of footsteps coming towards him as the darkness finally took him from the world of the living.