Demonic Regime

Chapter 06: Selfish Bastard (Jed)

Branches scraped at my arms as I led the way through the forest. We should be there. We had to be there. Any longer and the werewolves would catch up. I leaped over a bush and lost my footing for a moment, but I could see it. The creek was just ahead.

A scream sounded behind me. I skidded to a halt to find Maggie kneeling in the dirt with Ricky at her side. I took a moment to breathe as I waited for them to get up. They weren't.

"Come on." I wiped the sweat off my forehead. "The creeks right there. We supposed to follow it downstream, and they'll be waiting for us with a truck. We'll be able to make it the south before the werewolves catch up."

Ricky glared at me. "She's hurt. Give her a moment."

"They're coming." I waved my arm at the forest.

"You," he stood and pointed at me, "can fucking shut up."

I scowled at him. "What's wrong with you?"

"You did this. How did you even get your hands on a gun in the first place, Jed?" He approached me.

Sucking in my lips, I shifted my weight. I could feel the metal against my hip bone where I had tucked the gun into my jeans. "I did what I had to."

"You killed a werewolf!"

Bowing my head, I let out a heated breath. "I didn't want to do it. It was the only way to get us out." I made eye contact with him. "If you had just come when I said the werewolf wouldn't have seen us try to run."

"I didn't want to run." He clenched his fists. "Mom, Dad, and Jax are back there. Being punished for something you did."

"Jax wanted this."

"Don't you dare blame this on him." Ricky went back to help Maggie up. "Jax is the most selfless person out of all us. What did you expect him to say when he found out we had a chance to escape? Of course, he'd tell you to leave him."

"I did what he wanted!" I clenched my jaw. "They were going to send us away. We were going to be entered into the system and shipped to who knows the hell where. That would have been it for us."

Maggie started to cry. Blood was running from a cut on her knee. I pressed my hand to my mouth and paced around the small clearing. Ricky was doing his best to comfort our sister.

"I'm not going to be a werewolf's bitch the rest of my life." I kicked a stone into the trees. "I'd rather die." I peered off into the forest.

"You had your blood test," stated Ricky.

"So what. Werewolf's bitch or slave labor, I'm done with it. I'm going to be my own man. Away from that hell." I pointed back the way we had come.

"When?"

I wiped the side of my face. "A few days ago. Some extra laborer the werewolves brought in had gotten his hands on an out-of-date tester. I wanted to know. I wanted to know before I was standing in front of a werewolf about to be put on the market to be claimed by some mutt. Alright. Wouldn't you want to know too?"

"How do you know it was even right?" Ricky eyed me. "You could've went to all this trouble for nothing. Instead, you destroyed our family off some black market test."

"When everything shows up green and lights start flashing," I waved my hands in the air "it's a pretty good sign there's something there." I put my hands in my pockets. "You should be happy. If mine turns out this way, then I bet your results are similar. If we didn't get out of there, we'd all be turned into werewolves."

Ricky shook his head at me. "So we'd moving up in the world is what you're saying."

My mouth fell open, and I stared at my twin. "What?"