Battle Journal

DeMar ascended the gun to eye level of Tidus, "What you gonna, do? Huh punk, come on!" I could feel the increasing pressure of the gun being jarred into my cheeks. "Come on, Tidus, say something!" DeMar was now parallel with the gun and in my dreary eyes. 

"Listen DeMar, I don't want trouble, and you don't want trouble, so please, I'm asking you to put the gun away and get off of me, alright?" I squirmed as I continued to fight the pressure of the gun on my cheek. 

"Haha, give me one reason I should let you go, nobody wants your punk ass here!" 

"Great, I'll leave, alright, now get off of me!" I shoved DeMar's hand off my cheek and the gun slipped to the ground. The fury in DeMar's eyes grew as we lunged to the floor in a scuffle for the gun. The hallway was empty as we scrambled for the gun, throwing ourselves on top of one another. DeMar reached for the gun as I clinched his opposite arm to pull him away. He got his fingers on the tip of the gun and pulled it in, "Haha, I got you now bitch!" DeMar flipped over and pointed the gun at me, "Tidus look out!" In the flash of an eye I saw Brody, my only companion, tackle DeMar just as he pulled the trigger. I dove to the floor as the bullet pelted the lockers behind me. 

The Opposite Sex

You know, I'm not sure I like this look? I feel fat when I wear tight clothes, especially jeans that are like spandex. Maybe I'm being to self conscious? Ah, that's not even possible. Should I do green or pink for my top today? Either goes well with blue bottoms...I think I'll go pink. Alright, just a little makeup for my face and another day in the life of a high school girl begins. If boys ever knew how much maintenance goes into what girls do to look their best, they'd never get married; its insane, makeups, hair brushes, nail polishers, curlers, wax kits, and on and on. Not to mention the amount of money spent on shopping for clothes every month. Basically, we girls are high maintenance and thats the way I like it. I want my better half to treat me like he would his favorite car, keeping me new and shiny, his pride and joy. Oh wow, I'm going to miss the bus, I gotta go.

Bear at the Door

"Jim, can you come here a sec?" Kate groaned from the foyer. 

"Sure, honey, what's wrong?" 

"Well, is it just me or are those people hauling a dead body out of their car?"

"Oh my God! What the hell are they doing with that thing?" Jim excitedly squeeled.

"Well what should we do, Jim? Kate covered her mouth in fear and disgust.

Jim grabbed his hunting rifle from the entryway closet, loaded it with 4 rounds, and pushed Kate behind, "Honey, just stay right there." 

"Where are you going, Jim? What are you going to do?" Kate worriedly asked.

"Honey, just stay there, you here me?" Jim demanded.

Jim ripped open the screen door and stomped across the driveway, facing the man and woman who had pulled the dead body out of their car. He cocked his rifle and yelled, "Hey, you two, what are you doing with that body?" 

"None of your business, pal. Get that gone away from us." The man retorted angrily.

"It is my business, not everyday you see a dead body being hauled around here."

"Hey body, listen, this body is my son, and he was just hit by a car on his bike, so would you shut up so we can get him help while he maybe has a chance!?" 

Jim looked closer and could see the child was still breathing as the father carried the body in his folded arms. 

Jim went back inside, put his rifle away, looked at Kate and simply said "Its just you, honey."

Early Wants

"Jack, I need you to get to Bethesda Heights right away," his father began, "and please, Jack, be careful out there or you'll get yourself killed."

"I'm on it pop, aint no way I'm gonna let those creatures kill me," Jack filled his chest with air and stuck his chin out, "aint happening, no way!" 

"I'll see you soon son."

Jack need not speak anymore before he left, he wasn't about words but action. His suave style, cocky strut, and smooth complexion make him look like a lady's man, but Jack is as hard-nosed as they come. He knew getting to Bethesda Heights to find his brother wouldn't be easy, but this was no time to be hesitant.

He opened the lab vault door to the outer post-nuclear world and the sun gazed down into Jack's sharp black Oakleys. He armed his rifle and smirked as the journey to Bethesda Heights began. 

The eerie ruins of Washington seeped with ambient noises of the mutations that remained, waiting to prey on Jack and his human flesh. Jack kept thinking to himself, "These punk slugs can't touch me," but in reality his hard-ass attitude was beginning to feel penetrated by the horror of what Jack had gotten himself into. 

Aha

The nurse opened the lobby door after that eternity of twenty minutes, "Kyle, the doctor will see you now." Hooray for me, I was called to the podium. I followed her back to the lair in which I would wait again for an eternity, but what's the rush to find out my illness? After she performed the check-me-up tasks she reassured me, "The doctor will be with you in a few minutes." In my mind I'm thinking "whatever" but yet I utter, "Thank you, I appreciate it." These offices always have that too-clean feel to them, everything is in perfect order and alignment, everything is new and shiny, but for some reason the damn magazines are three months back issue. The oversized wood door props open and Doctor Klines strolls in, "Kyle, how are ya?" His overpowering hand shake always intimidates me. 

"I've been feeling fairly uneven lately Doctor," I began my empathy oration, "I just have days where I don't feel well and others where I feel fine, and I tend to be moody, it just happened over the past year or so since my parents split up." 

"Mmhmm, well Kyle, I've studied your exams and it appears you have a defect in your cerebellum which is causing your thoughts to strain." 

"How could this happen, I haven't changed anything?"

"It's a side effect of smoking, your parent's smoke?

"Well, yea my dad had been, that's probably what caused this," I raised my voice and turned pale, "That no good bastard, I always despised his habits, I'm glad my mom broke up with that scumbag!"

"Whoa whoa Kyle Kyle, it's okay buddy, settle down."

"Why should I settle down? Huh! I gotta go doc, thanks for the help!" I stormed out of the office and ran to my car and it hit me like a ton of bricks that I deeply hated my father. Not just because of the condition he inflicted on me, but because of his lack of caring for me or ever being their when it mattered. I drove home to my mother and told her the news, her eyes swelled up with tears and she grasped me into her chest. She squealed, "Kyle, I'll always love you, and I'm sorry you've had to grow up with that joke of a father."

"I love you too mom."

I may have lost part of my brain function, but the sacrifice is well worth my mom's love.

A Day in the Life

Most would say a successful day is working the 9 to 5, putting food on the table and a roof overhead; that's a day in the life for the majority. Where I come from, that 9-to-5 is consolidated into a 30 minute sermon, every Sunday morning. My volition as a pastor is to spread the Lord unto others, it is my calling; the beautiful old lady in the white vest, the newborn waiting to be baptized, the blonde adolescent exploring his new found faith, and all the others in my congregation. The chapel is where we meet, with the flush-lined wooden benches, the cross 50 yards above our heads, and my home-the podium. My 30 year old bible with the indexes from undergrad school, my initiation robe, and leather slippers are always with me as I enter this atrium. I look upon the crowd and control them at the tip of my fingers, "All rise," as I raise my hands high, they follow, "Let us pray." That harmonious Lord's prayer illuminates the air with fresh life as I dedicate yet another 30 minutes to my loved ones. It's all in a days work.

Story From a Map

How did I get here? This dreaded ice hole, nothing but white mist for miles in each direction. Snow piles up on my eyebrows, blurring my already limited vision. My blood vessels constrict in a flight or fight response to the shivering cold, limbs are all numb. Does this floating mass of ice have an end? The dry wind impales my face as if I was being pricked by an acupuncturist, shards of sleet follow with the icing on the cake. I scream out, "HEEEELLLLPPPP!!!" staring up at the sky, waiting for the silence of the shale clouds to break with God answering my prayer. Off in the distance I can see a blip of black slowly growing as it moves toward me. How could this be? Was someone out here to really save me? I got down on my knees, weeping for what seemed to be joy. My tears gelled to ice before they had a chance to drip from my chin. The figure came nearer and I could begin to make out characteristics of the person. They donned a ragged parka coat with rugged overalls and hiking boots; it appeared as if the fellow was carrying a rifle on his back also. I reached my hand out as he walked up to me, "Oh thank you, thank you thank you thank you," I cried, "why do you have a rifle?" 

The man, slowly lowered his head and dug his dark eyes into my face, "I hunt," he said in a monotonous tone. 

I inquired, "What is there to hunt out here?"

He pulled the rifle off his back, and wiped down the nozzle with his snow covered palm, "I hunt people like you who invade my territory."

He pointed the gun right down the bridge of my eyebrows, cocked the rifle, and clenched the trigger. I hurried, "Whoa, whoa I swear man, I don't even know how I got here, please I I I I" he interrupted, "Shut up! I'm how you got here and I'm how you will leave here" Click, click, BOOM!