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*Note from the Author*
This "book" is not a part of any saga or series but was a mythology story based off of Heracles and his 12 labors and mixed with today's issues in high school. This contains and mentions sensitive material relating to mental illnesses/anxiety, several eating disorders, suicide/suicidal thoughts, post-traumatic stress disorder/survivors’ guilt, murder, gore/violence/school shootings, alcoholism/drug abuse, fires/bomb threats on schools, social pressures/stressors and many others. Reader discretion is highly advised for this story is for mature audiences only.
The first day of a new school year at a new place, Melody thought bitterly as she wrote at her desk in that too small of a room to then be called her bedroom. She sighed as she continued, I am one of many socially unacceptable teenagers, the world calls us the ‘outcasts’. We have been shipped from school to school to do only one thing: SURVIVE. Each of the outcasts must outlive at least 12 trials. The closer someone gets to completing 12 the deadlier the damn things get. Of course parents of outcasts don’t even care because outcasts’ are beaten or neglected by their own families so their deaths mean nothing to the folks. For me, I don’t have a family, so it won’t matter if I fail the tests…
As Melody stood at the gate to the school’s courtyard, eyeing the First Gate. The gate rose, forbidding and brutal as if it had been waiting for her to come. Melody stared at the unfamiliar countryside where the school was surrounded by; the hills shot up like knives and the air was crisp, hurting the lungs of the crowd of Outcasts who were also waiting for the gate to open. As the gate slowly opened, Melody walked through, she felt the chills run down her spine. Melody’s dark eyes noticed the cravings in the black wood of the gate, sending warnings into her brain. The carvings of skeletons having smoke come out of their mouths and needles in their arms. Melody saw the silver in the wood, hiding from the other outcasts. The sound of the gate slamming shut behind the students, pulled Melody out of her thoughts as the horrific realization came over her.
“EVERYONE DUCK!” Her voice echoed through the crowded hall as she grabbed two nearby girls and pulled them down with her. Before the pair could argue, the walls began to send needles flying into anyone who was still standing up. Bodies dropped around the trio making it harder to see if the crowd behind or in front of them. Melody pulled the two girls forward as she crawled over corpses. The needles stopped flying through, the girls stood up to look behind them. Melody saw that there was still a good size crowd who had heard her warning. Both girls who were pulled by her started to talk but Melody heard a light hissing.
“Shh, wait. Do you guys hear that?” Her question threw the remaining group off as the holes where the needles once flew out of, slowly started to let out a light colored gas. Melody’s eyes widened as she screamed, “RUN,” and ran forward. Many outcasts tried to outrun the gas, but the corpses of the others kept tripping a handful of them. Melody couldn’t look back due to having to watch her own fittings. She saw the outline of the next gate in front of them. It is only a few yards away and this nightmare will be over, she thought as she ran…
As the remaining 60 or so outcasts reached the gate and forced it open, Melody turned to try to see if the two girls she saved earlier were still behind her. To her surprise only one was.
“Where is the other girl who was with us,” Melody started to ask but before she could finish the girl’s light blue eyes became teary. The realization dawned on Melody as the group moved through the second gate; she tripped and got caught in the gas. As the group paused to catch their breath, Melody tried to force herself to remember the girl’s face but it was a lot more difficult than she thought. The other girl walked next to Melody in silence and held out her hand to her. Melody looked down in the girl’s hand to see a necklace with the name “Alice” on it along with a little white rabbit charm. “That girl was named Alice, and she was my sister,” she said as she gave the necklace to Melody. “Why are you giving me this,” Melody’s voice came off a bit cold but she did take the necklace. “I don’t think I will be able to survive the next gate, so I need to know that there’s someone who could remember us,” she sighed as if a burden was lifted from her shoulders. The girl then reached for the back of her neck and unclipped the necklace she was wearing and gave it to Melody as well. Melody looked down at the chain to see the name, “Madison” along with a tea cup and top hat charm next to it. Melody put both necklaces in her jean pocket and looked up at Madison, “What makes you so sure that you will die?” Madison began to tear up as the hallway’s lights flickered. Melody noticed that Madison and a few other outcasts had started to have a harder time breathing. This is the second test, she thought as the lights went out; leaving the outcasts in utter darkness…
The darkness surrounded the teens causing the handful who had problems breathing to start hyperventilate. The outcasts began to trip over the others who balled up on the floor, making it harder to naivete through the darkness. Melody pressed her hand against the stone wall for support when she called out, “EVERYONE TRY TO FEEL FOR THE WALL! IT MIGHT HELP LEAD TO THE NEXT GATE.” Melody hoped that Madison heard her instructions as she tried to walk through the dark. The air felt thinner due to the amount of heavy and unequal breathing of the anxious outcasts. Several thuds of the outcasts hitting the floor from the light headiness echoed behind Melody. She continued to wander in the darkness until her hand felt the third gate’s cravings…
As the group pushed open the gate, Melody looked around the outcasts as the air and light from the next gate’s hallway flooded onto them. The outcasts sat down on the stone floor trying to gather their breath as Melody noticed at least six of them, including Madison, were no longer with them. Melody couldn’t grieve properly; she felt cold and hungry but she had a bigger breakfast that day so it should be possible. Melody ignored the feeling of hunger and watched the remaining outcasts as some slowly started to stand up. They are probably getting ready for the next test, she thought as a pair of boys started to attack each other, biting and clawing at the other. The outcasts near the two boys then started to bite others and attack. Melody rushed to her feet as two girls nearby started to vomit. The outcasts broke to a mad dash to the end of the hallway to escape. Melody heard the crunch of bones, screams, and the sound of more gags and vomit hitting the pavement floor. She knew that the other outcasts couldn’t bring themselves to look back either as they ran to the next gate.
What the hell is wrong with these trials, Melody thought as she felt a hand grab her ankle, tripping her. Melody turned to this smaller boy holding her ankle, thinking he was trying to bite at her calf. Melody grabbed the boy’s longer hair and pulled him off of her, and continued to drag him to the gate while he made animal-like noises in refusal. He tried to fight Melody as she pulled him away from the other outcasts. The outcasts nearby watched her pull him through the next gate. After slamming the door behind them, the outcasts looked at each other then to Melody and the boy. The boy was badly bleeding from the multiple bites and open wounds on him, yet he still continued to bite himself instead of the others…
Melody removed her long sleeve shirt to wrap around the boy who slowly started to calm down. He laid on his back as Melody and another boy started to apply the first aid; the second boy had brought a small bag of things like bandages, ice packs, and food bars in case of an emergency. The boy who Melody dragged slowly moaned as he looked up, “Why didn’t you bite me too?” Melody then realized that he was trying to let the others attack him to get some of the outcasts the chance to run. She smiled weakly, “I wasn’t hungry but I thought you were trying to bite me.” The boy chuckled meekly as he watched the second boy apply more bandages to his arms, “Who are you two?” he asked as he noticed the other outcasts watching the trio carefully. Melody noticed it too but remained silent as the other boy just smiled oblivious to the danger, “I’m Rayman. The last name doesn’t matter considering where we are.” Melody didn’t want to be rude but the eyes of the other outcasts started to freak her out. She pulled Rayman to whisper as she then helped the boy so he was now in a seated position on the ground. The boy looked up at Rayman with a blank expression, “Jayden.” Both boys turned to Melody who was watching the crowd slowly moved into smaller groups and started to watch everyone else like something would break the silence. “Everyone is scared of us because I brought you in,” Melody started as a few girls in the corner began to whisper, “This is the next test.” Just as she said that the girls started to run at Jayden who was still on the ground. Rayman pushed the pair of girls back as Melody moved her legs, tripping the third girl.
Just then other groups started to attack each other. Melody and Rayman each grabbed Jayden’s arms and started to help him move forward. The group ran through fists and kicks passing a handful of outcasts who were trying to avoid getting hit. Other outcasts started to follow after the three, tripping or getting pulled into other fights. As Melody continued to pull the runners forward, Jayden’s voice called out behind them, “YOU ALL ARE GOING MAD! THAT’S WHAT THEY WANT FROM US!” Rayman nodded as he looked ahead, “There must be a drug of some kind in the air making us more irritable.” Melody thought back to the holes in the walls from the first gate. Each gate has something carved into the wood but as they run it gets harder to see everything in the warnings. The last one had skeletons breaking each other, Melody thought as the next gate came into view. The gate stood taller than the previous ones, and at the top of the frame the numbers 5 and 6 were engraved into the wood. So the next gate is two trials? The Government is definitely trying hard to control the population this year, Melody thought as the next gate stood in front of them…
Melody looked closely at the gate, trying to find a warning in the engravings. Rayman held Jayden as she looked tentatively at the wood, “What’s wrong? The gates say what’s going to happen next?” The other outcasts who had run after them pushed through the trio, not stopping. This gate had a severed head holding its ears and opened mouth. Melody turned to Rayman, “Do you have anything like tape in your bag?” Rayman nodded in confusion but slowly reached into the bag, holding Jayden up with half his strength. Melody started to move Jayden to her arms as Rayman pulled out the roll of duct tape.
“Why do we need this?” he asked as she started to take some and apply it to Jayden’s mouth. Melody pointed at the opened gate and took another step towards the gate, “Something has to happen involving communication, I think. If we know that it’s not us talking we can trust each other more.” Jayden nodded as Melody continued to cover her own mouth. Rayman did the same before the pair let Jayden slowly step by himself forward. The trio slowly made their way into the gate.
Melody counted about forty outcasts left as they slowly watched the walls for any vents, the others if they started to act weird, or anything out of place. Rayman took both Melody’s and Jayden’s hands as the trio walked, hearing chaos around them. Voices of the outcasts, both dead and alive, came from everywhere, even though some of the outcasts were not even talking. Melody heard her own voice among the others even though she had duck taped her mouth, “You will die next.” Both boys turned to Melody just as a boy ran at her, in a rage. He didn’t see the tape over their mouths. Rayman and Melody pulled away from Jayden as the boy pulled out a small blade. As the boy continued to try to slash at Melody, she saw other outcasts trying to cut open the mouths of others. Jayden and Rayman tackled the boy as he charged at Melody a second time. The boys held him down, forcing the knife out of his hands, and giving Melody the chance to duck tape the boy’s waists together.
The other outcasts were chasing each other and running towards the next gate, as the trio picked up the boy who tried to attack them and carried him to the next gate. Despite his swearing in refusal. The group watched as the outcasts' numbers decreased even more…
to be continued later due to it is too long here
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