Daddy Next Door

by Tina Lee

  I thought about what they had been doing at that very moment. Probably home watching The Late Show, which they watched every night. My dad was on the couch with my mother’s feet in his hand; massaging them and talking about their day at work. In about thirty minutes, my dad would fall asleep, and my mom would wake him and take him to bed. It was a hilarious sight. Mother, father, I love you. You are not to be blamed for me.

  “Shhh!” Jennifer said. I was not talking, I supposed she was telling the insects to hush. “I hear something, listen.” She said, holding one finger in the air.

  I did hear something, it sounded like sticks breaking. “You think it could be them?” I asked.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Should we check it out?”

  “I don’t know.” She replied.

  “Fine, let us turn around and go back to our rooms.”

  “Wait… let’s check it out.”

  Jennifer looked nervous, and that made me nervous. Jennifer was always easy to read, she wasn’t the type to bother to hide her emotions or keep stuff bottled up inside. what you saw was what you got. I think that was what made us really good friends. She was always honest to me, never hesitating to tell me the truth. The grumpiest blond girl I had ever met, but she had the sweetest heart.

  We walked in the direction of the crackling, hoping to find the guys. As we got closer to the sound, we saw a light peeking through the trees, that’s when we realized that the crackling sound was a fire, and soon we could hear chattering and laughter. We found them.

  Jennifer was more excited than I was. They had me walking through the woods, I was in no mood to speak to any of them. Fuck them, I think Jennifer would agree with me if I said that, although she would take it a bit too literal.

  “They are here!” A voice came from the crowd. I’m surprised that they actually remembered that we were coming. There were about fifty persons there, about twenty were guys and the rest were girls. They dressed in really short jeans and tank top. How were they not chilly? I was in my usual ‘Hello Kitty’ shirt (Don’t judge me), skinny jeans and converse shoes.

  “You had us searching the woods for thirty minutes.” I said, angrily.

  “It’s a secret party, you are not supposed to find it that easily.”

  “Oh.” I mumbled. Maybe it was because his answer was a valid one or because he was really hot that had shut me up. Wait, I was supposed to be angry. “Whatever, this is stupid.” I scowled at him.

  “Lighten up, have a beer.” He threw a beer at me and I barely caught it. I wasn’t much of a drinker, but this was peer pressure playing its role. “I’m Josh.”

  “I’m Kitara.”

  Jennifer stood where the light from the fire had barely reached, fading into the dark. Her crush; the reason I’m here, whispered in her ear, and I could tell it was something really cheesy by the way she blushed. I scoffed. I just wanted all of this to be over. To be in my bed and reading a novel.

  After thirty minutes and couple beers later, I was bored. Jennifer slipped off in the woods and I’m sure she was doing something she shouldn’t have been doing. Half the other girls also disappeared into the woods, and pretty boy Josh was here trying his luck; using his flirty words to woe me. He would have no luck there.

  Maybe I was too much of a nerd, but I never understood why anyone would come this far off into the woods just to party. Then again, I never really understood parties, just people doing the same thing over and over. Jennifer said I should go out more, now that I was out, I wanted to go in.

  The beer was flowing right through me. “Hey, be right back, I’m going to pee.” I told him. It sounded really awkward; I cringed, turned around and quickly walked away.

  I constantly looked around to see if anyone was watching me pee. I felt so creeped out, like there were eyes on me. Like in those scary movies where the monster watches the oblivious female from behind the bushes. Think happy thoughts. Think happy thoughts.

  The woods seemed calmer, or maybe it was me who was calmer. It was quiet and so peaceful, and it was then I realized that I preferred it here than back there. I sat on an old fallen tree, looking out into the darkness, listening the trees in the wind. If something was out there then let it watch. I was liking the idea of a monster eating me than to go back there and have Josh flirt with me. I looked at the time, it was 1:27AM, I bet my dad was knocked out by then.

  I thought about how foolish this all was, and how far we would go for someone’s affection. Jennifer thought walking through the woods was worth it if she could see her crush in the end. It was dumb, yet, at the same time I envied her. There was no guy in my life that I would walk through the woods for. Jeniffer was the girl all the guys like. The ‘petite blond,’ and I was just her less attractive best friend. I certainly didn’t need a guy, and I was okay with being single, but that didn’t stop the loneliness from creeping in sometimes.

  There was a bubbling sound coming from below, it sounded like a river, but there was no river in these parts. At the time it seemed like a really bad idea to go check it out, but my name would not be Kitara if I didn’t. It was steep, going down would be the easy part, it was coming up I was worried about; my thighs would pay for my curiosity.

  I took one step down the steep land and immediately took back what I thought about going down being easy. I felt like I was going to roll all the way down. I took my time, right foot, left foot, right foot and my next step changed everything. My left step slid on the soft soil and sent me tumbling down; spinning and desperately trying to hold on to anything I could see. I stretched after flowers growing in the soil to stop my spinning but all I managed to do was uproot them and carry them along with me into my impending peril. I reached the bottom, but it was not as I expected, it wasn’t a river, it was a pond, and I fell right into it.

  What was a pond doing there? I tried swimming my way to the surface, but something was seriously off, there was a current pulling me under. I was sinking, and sinking really fast too, this strange current was taking me along with it. I tried fighting the current; it only made matters worse. My movements were increasing my heart rate and soon I was going to need air.

  Out of all the possible ways to die in the woods; drowning in a pond was the least expected. The moonlight hitting the surface of the water began to dim as I sank deeper into the dark depths, and soon after, I was totally engulfed in darkness. As I sank in the blackness with no idea what is going on, it really hit me; I think I’m going to die.

  Goodbye mother. Goodbye father. I remembered seeing the beach for the first when I was seven years old. The blue horizon blew me away; it was so vast and powerful. I could only stand and watch in awe. My father and I made a sand castle with little castle shaped buckets. I decorated it with sea weeds and small stones and it was ruled by a king called Mr. Waffle. I loved that castle. I was finally able to make a sand castle after all those years of only seeing it on TV. I was truly happy.

  No use fighting it. I’m doomed.

  I saw a light below. Could it be heaven? Was this where the current was taking me? I was falling into it and it got brighter the closer I got. The water lit up and I could see everything. I looked up, there was no surface in sight. The water was illuminated and this strange light had swallowed me whole.

  My feet came out of the water first then the rest of my body, I was pushed out the water upside down, and then fell back into the water, but this time I could stand the right way up. It was trippy.

  I fell into a pond and ended up in another pond of an unfamiliar place. I looked around, trying to find hints as to where I am, all I knew is that I was not back home. It was night time but the sky was brighter than usual. When I looked up, I realized why. There were two full moons in the sky. TWO FULL MOONS IN THE SKY.

  I knew for certain that I was not back in home, but what I was more concerned about was if I was even on planet earth. I had a hard time taking everything in. Where was I? Deep breaths, Kitara. Don’t panic.

  Trying to r
ationalize everything around you is hard when you don’t know what the hell is going on. Surely this must have a logical and sound explanation. A good explanation could be that I was hallucinating due to the lack of oxygen. Yeah, that must be it.

  I moved cautiously on the land, making sure to observe my surrounding and snap mental pictures of things I could use to find my way back to the pond. I came from the pond, i guessed that was my way back, but it was not working so I needed to find help.

  This place was similar to the woods I came from but the trees here were taller, much taller. I could see mountains in the distance; it was so high it seemed to have peaked into the heavens. I walked passed trees and more trees, there was nothing else here, no ruffling of branches by animals or insects or signs of any life. There was a lot of strange looking fruits on the trees (I assume they were fruits), as much as I wanted to pick a few, I didn’t, I was afraid of them possibly being poisonous. I came to that assumption because of the abundance of the fruits on the trees and ground, either there were no animals and humans here to feed off them or they were not eating the fruit for a reason.

  I stopped, I realized something that I should have noticed from the start; my clothes were dry, as if I never fell into the pond. That freaked me out but only briefly, because there was something new for me to be scared about. Couple meters in front of me, behind the shadowy darkness of the trees, were a pair of red piercing eyes looking directly at me. I had never felt chills so strong. Those red eyes were the only thing I could see from the shadows. The night was bright from the two full moons in the sky and it managed to stay hidden, masterfully too, so why was I able to even see it? Because it wanted me to see it.

  “Human, what are you doing here?” It spoke in a grizzly, deep voice.

  My blood went cold. It spoke, it fucking spoke. It called me ‘human’, so what was it?

  “What are you doing here?” it asked again, impatiently.

  I focused and put my words together. “I fell into a pond and I ended up here.”

  “Ahh, I see.”

  I knew it could smell the fear in my voice.

  “They can smell you.” It said.

  “Who?” I was afraid to ask.

  “Lugars.”

  I did not know what a Lugar was but I was not going to stay and find out.

  “Do not move.” It instructed, steadily focusing on me.

  I kept telling my legs to move but it wouldn’t listen. Move, come on, move. I focused all my will on my legs. Come on. MOVE!

  I dashed off in the other direction! I could hear creatures jumping out the woods after me, and by the pounding of their step, I could tell they were really fast. I glanced behind me and saw wolves-like creatures with six legs and two tails, the Lugars looked terrifying and hungry. Everything was going horribly wrong.

  I ran at full speed through the woods, passing trees and jumping over stones. An empty and broken horse carriage lean against a tree. Inside the carriage is jet black. I doubt anyone was inside, and I didn’t want to find out. I could hear their steps getting closer. Their growl grew deeper. They were annoyed at my pitiful attempt to outrun them.

  My adrenaline had done all it could, but it wasn’t good enough. There was no way I could outrun or fend off any of those Lugars. They tactically chased me, some went to the right of me, some went to the left and the other chased from behind. They circled me like I was a sheep, and I was left with nowhere to run.

  I was surrounded by the Lugars. They formed a circle around me, leaving no chance of a breach. They all howled like they were celebrating a victory or they were just happy for some dinner. I ran out of ideas, out of energy, out of everything. Tears filled my eyes. I quickly wiped it out. No use crying at this point.

  They were waiting on something. Their dark eyes all focused on me, yet not one made a move.

  “Please don’t kill me! I’m just lost. I’ll leave, I promise!” I begged. It was in vain for they did not seem to understand a word I said. A LOUD roar came from just outside the circle, the loudest one I have heard all night. The circle opened to let him in and closed behind him.

  He was the leader and they were waiting on him to initiate the kill. He was bigger than the rest and looked the grisliest of them all. He was just as tall as me. What kind of creature was this? We stood inside the circle and I figured I was expected to fight, which wasn’t fair at all. Even if I had won, they would just kill me, didn’t matter, I’d die anyways. He walked closer to me and got in a stance which translated in him about to attack.

  I was not ready! “Wait! Wait!” It pressed forward and I stepped back. “Please. Don’t do this.” I was breathing too hard, in an attempt to catch my fleeing breath. I tried not to panic, however, when you’re about to be eaten by a ravenous beast, it’s pretty hard not to. The place was spinning all of sudden, I saw doubles of the leader as he approached me. I tried to say something but it didn’t leave my lips. I remembered falling before I faded into the blackness.

  Dante

  “Should we attack?” Rio asked.

  “No. We cannot risk the life of the child.” I said. I could tell that Rio was frustrated. We had been watching our target from the trees as they sat around a fire and conversed. They sat, oblivious to the great danger they were in.

  “Sir, if we don’t attack now, they could get away.” Rio raised his voice.

  Rio knew better than to provoke me. He switched his gaze to our targets and fell silent. I understood why he wanted to attack, we had been trailing one of Queen Alexandra’s Generals for several days. General Chai had been traveling in a carriage from the North Towers to the Eastern Training Camp. His carriage looked that of a common man. No one would look twice at it, and that was his plan. To travel undetected, and it almost worked too.

  He was seen by one of my men from a nearby village, supposedly flirting with a bartender. This was a glorious opportunity to weaken Queen Alexandra’s army, to kill him swiftly and send a loud message, However, our sources didn’t mention that he had his seven year old daughter with him. This complicated everything, for me, while Rio saw nothing wrong.

  “We will find a better way.” I told him.

  “Yes, sir.”

  Sometimes I wondered what is the price of a life. I had killed more men than I could count. It wasn’t something I was proud of, but I did what needed to be done. People depended on me. A nation depended on me. My men depended on me to lead them to victory, and victory could only be achieved with the blood of my enemies.

  All of the Queen’s men were heartless dogs who would slaughter innocent lives for the sake of control. Yet, what I did not understand until that moment, was that these men were loved. They had families; wives, sons, mothers, fathers, daughters. General Chai, a man of great evil, was making silly faces for his daughter’s amusement. She was laughing. She seemed happy. How can one cause such great pain and at the same time such great happiness?

  Where does that leave the man behind the sword? What of his own morals? In the eyes of his daughter, I would be nothing more than the great evil that I had sought out to vanquish. I would take the love from her life, just as General Chai had taken the loves from so many people’s lives.

  That night, a daughter would be fatherless. I carry that weight alone, so my people may not.

  We cornered his carriage and dragged him out. I sent one of my men with his daughter back to the village. She would be safe there. General Chai’s men would find her and take her home. My face, the face of her father’s killer, will be buried in her memory forever. That bothered me more than it should.

  He begged for his life, they always beg. “Please! Please! I have a daughter!”

  “So did many of the people you killed.”

  Tears filled his eyes. He tugged on my coat. “Please, I beg you.”

  “Shut up!” Rio shouted. He was growing impatient. There was hate in him, pumping through his veins. In his eyes, you could see a man who was hungry to kill. I saw myself in him, back then when reveng
e was my fuel.

  He trembled to the sight of my sword. “It’s the Queen’s fault. I was just following orders.”

  “My wife was killed by a man who was just following orders.” Flashbacks of my wife haunt my mind.

  “A man who was just following orders killed my mother.” Rio said. His hands shook with rage. I wanted to tell him that revenge was not the answer, but he would never listen. He would have to see for himself that the road to revenge is a dead end.

  I didn’t do it for revenge. No. The past doesn’t control me. I did it for the future, so that the new seeds will live a proper life, without fear and enslavement. A blink later, his head was gone. I did it quickly so the bastard felt nothing. I could tell Rio was disappointed with my swift kill, he would rather to see him scream in agony.

  We left the body in the carriage for the Lugars to feast on. I sent the head into the village so it could be announced that he was dead. It was also a symbol for anyone who wished to join the rebellion. Proof that we were making ground, and with support, we could take back what was ours.

  The Queen, of course, will dismiss it. It was apart of her propaganda on keeping the right image for the villagers. We were getting stronger, and that was the last thing she wanted the people to know.

  I regrouped with my men. They cheered and feasted on the abundant Sashwa fruit. Its bitter juice quenched the men thirsts. I wasn’t so celebratory. I had other issues to attend, like the hunger that was bubbling inside me.

  I looked up, the Duo moons were calling me—no, it was calling it. I am not the evil that lives inside me. The demon inside slowly eased out of his slumber. The two full moons lit up the dark woods. They were truly a spectacle to behold. When the two moons met, they awake spiritual energy like the pulling of the tides. It was when spirit animals, and demon such as myself, was at our strongest.