Running From The Alpha

Chapter Four

Running

Pit-pat. Pit-pat. Pit-pat. My paws created a steady rhythm as they pushed against the earth and propelled me forward. I was running through the forest‒ No, that's not quite right. I wasn't running. I was flying. It didn't feel like I was the one moving so much as it felt like the world was moving beneath me.

The wind ripped at my fur, a thousand little fingers yanking themselves through it. The forest around me was little more than a blur of greens and browns. I never saw any animals but I didn't find that strange. My presence perhaps frightened them off. I didn't dwell upon that, all that mattered was how wonderful it felt. It was so natural, more than second nature. Everything was so serene and peaceful. Everything except me.

A storm brewed inside of me, dark and burning as it shoved me onward. It wanted me to find something. Something I had to reach. I zipped through the forest sure of where I was going though I didn't even know where that actually was. Then I was there. After what felt like an eternity of running my body froze in place. I had reached my destination.

The feeling urge me forward slowly. A tall mirror stood in the forest. It was out of place and yet it felt as though it belong there. I didn't ponder about how it stood on its own or why it was there I only moved towards it.

I was in a trance, not quite in control of my own actions but aware of what I was doing. When I stood directly in front of the mirror the surfaces seemed to shimmer. It was like a ripple moving a across a pond and then I stood reflected in the glass. I flinched though the me in the mirror did not. Staring back at me was harsh cold eyes was a wolf with fur of the blackest shadows. While the fur was strange enough for it didn't reflect even a hint of like it was not what made me flinch for those harsh cold eyes were the only thing that could possibly be darker than the fur. They were pitch black from corner to corner. I search but could find the whites of the eyes or even the irises.

It felt as though if I looked to long they would suck me in and I'd never see day light again. Even now the forest seemed darker, colder than when I was running. I tried to look away, to cringe back from the hatred in those eyes but I was made of ice, held captive by their glare.

The dark feeling in me churned and shifted. Suddenly I was taller, thinner, and human. I looked in the mirror and I stood in my hoodie, jeans, and sneakers but the image was all wrong. Everything had been dipped in shadows. Even my hair was a shade darker as it hung in its loose curls. It made my skin seem ever paler in contrast. Worst of all my eyes had not changed from the wolf's.

They remained pure black and filled with intense hatred. The me that stood in the mirror met my eyes and she gave me a slow, dark smile.

I woke up gasping and covered in a sheet of sweat. My alarm clock blinked at my with its too-bright numbers telling me it was nearly six am. I stood up and hissed in pain. My back protested against the new position and everything was sore from sleeping at my desk. I raised my hand to my cheek and felt the groove my keyboard left in it. Great. I groaned to myself as I walked to my dresser for clean clothes. I needed a shower.

I tried to remember the dream that left me sweating and with a deep fear in the pit of my stomach but unlike most of my nightmare is was elusive and slipped away from me. I sighed and figured that it was probably better that I couldn't remember it.

The warm water of the shower felt wonderful against my sore back and I was reluctant to leave the man-made stream. By the time I forced myself to get out and dressed it was twenty till seven. I almost missed the little green apple on my desk as I moved about my morning routine. Beneath the fruit was a folded piece of lined paper. I moved the apple aside and picked up the note.