The Man Chapter 4: On The Run E-Book

Wendigo Studios

• Herausgeber: BookRix
• Kategorie: Abenteuer, Thriller, Horror
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Beschreibung

Getting home from a night of smoking can be tough, especially when you're a teenager with friends who manage to get you lost almost everytime you head into a new alleyway. It's even worse when you're alone on the dark, empty city streets with only your friends with the possibility of being stalked.

But that's a ridiculous idea to consider, there's no way you're being stalked by anyone, especially when you're a hardened teenager with knowledge of the city and what to do, is it?

Leseprobe

Wendigo Studios

The Man Chapter 4: On The Run

BookRix GmbH & Co. KG81371 Munich

Waking Up

“Andrew!” Andrew wasn’t entirely sure what the hell was going on as his brain was struggling to wake himself up from his state of unconsciousness or the voices above him that were calling out to him. The boy gave a grunt as he shifted his body on whatever the hell he was lying on, head slowly twisting to one side then the other in some odd sort of headshake. His fingers and toes twitched without his command then his arms responded next. Okay progress, not much but still some progress.“Hey, he’s moving! Sweet mother of God, he’s moving!” Andrew groaned as he shifted his head some more on the ground, something his blurred mind was starting to recognize as his awareness started to kick in more and more with each passing second and the boy’s dizziness slowly began fading. Andrew shifted some more then slowly moved his arms on the ground, scraping them against the hard material that was now cold, hard concrete, till his palms were resting flat against it.Taking a few deep breaths, Andrew slowly and carefully leveled himself into a sitting position, opening both eyes rather wearily only to be met by a blurry mess of colors, darkness and shapes in front of him. The blond boy shut his eyes as quickly as he opened them, blinked, rubbed his eyes then blinked a few more times for good measure. When his vision finally cleared, Andrew took notice of both his friends, Bram and Ronald standing on either side of him, a hand resting on each of his shoulders to help him stay upright and the fact they were in an alleyway, not the same one they had left from obviously, but a completely different one.“Oh thank God, you’re awake!” came the voice of Bram, his normally brash and cocky tone was filled with worry and concern. A little out of character for Bram Andrew admitted both out loud and to himself without any shame. But considering all that’s happening in the last hour or something like that, Andrew couldn’t really blame him completely for worrying about him like he did. “Ronald and I were worried that you would never wake up!” The former in question placed his free hand up against his head in some worried type of face palm, shook his head for a few seconds before his concerned gaze back to Andrew.“How are you feeling?” Ronald asked softly, voice filled with deep concern but the redhead did a much better job at masking his worry and fear then Bram did. Andrew heaved a deep breath in through his nose and out his mouth, shook his head to clear himself of his thoughts before answering. “I’m fine, just simply had a fainting spell upon seeing that man again,” Andrew replied, head bowing like he was ashamed of being afraid in front of his two friends and voice calm, maybe a little bit too calm for both Bram and Ron’s liking.However, upon finishing that sentence, Andrew’s half-opened eyes widened to the size of dinner plates with fear and he whipped his head all around the alleyway, looking for any signs of the man who had, a few minutes or probably an hour, been standing a few feet away from them. Fortunately or rather unfortunately, the man was nowhere in sight, only several trash cans or black bags lining the walls and the darkness that still was layering a thick as hell blanket over the atmosphere of the city. Andrew swallowed harshly as his eyes shrunk till only the whites of his eyes were revealed, knowing full well that he should feel relieved that the man was gone.But he couldn’t, not just because he was a nervous wreck who couldn’t calm down if he ever got himself worked up or found himself in a stressful situation. But also because of the situation he found himself and his friends in and the possibility that the man was still out there, hiding in the shadows and waiting for them to come out of hiding sent chills running down his spine in a way Andrew had never felt before in his life and he sure as hell didn’t like it one bit. Bram and Ronald both watched with worry as they watched their friend almost sprint around the alleyway at a feverish speed that they had never seen from Andrew before in their lives, like he was frantically searching for something or rather for someone, someone who meant worse.Admittedly, despite having seen Andrew freak out or sometimes have nervous breakdowns whenever he was scared and/or stressed to no end. The two boys couldn’t help but feel a little uneasy watching their friend have probably the worst stress attack of his life minus the nervous sweating and trembling so badly like he was standing outside in the middle of winter butt naked. Those two things didn’t always come right away, but either Ronald or Bram knew that it would happen. It didn’t matter how long it took, it would happen one way or another. But they weren’t expecting it to happen so quickly that Andrew nearly fainted again.Bram reacted immediately, much faster than he normally would have reacted on a daily basis and grabbed hold of Andrew by his shoulders then gave him a small slap on his right cheek. It wasn’t a harsh or hard slap to create a bruise or turn the skin red, the only thing it did do was snap the boy out of his panicked-stressing out state. Andrew tensed up for a few seconds, blinked a couple seconds before settling his gaze back on the black and purple streaked haired boy in front of him. His once terrified facial expression shifted into one of mild relief and exhaustion.“Thanks man, I needed that,” Andrew muttered, but still loud enough for Bram to hear as he shut his eyes. Bram nodded in understanding and let go of Andrew’s shoulders as he flashed his friend a quick smile and shrug, not sure what else to say right now. Ronald stared at his two friends for a few seconds, rolled his eyes then walked over to Andrew and Bram, face shifting into one of concern. “Dude, what the hell was that all about?” Andrew blinked as he tilted his gaze toward the redhead. “Sorry, I was worried that the man might’ve been here.” The blond boy heaved a sigh as he lowered his gaze to the ground, his eyes becoming worried which Ronald had expected.“To be honest, we were both worried he would come after us after we ran for Lord knows how long to this alleyway to hide from him right after…” Ronald’s voice trailed off as he turned his face downwards to face the ground, bringing an arm up to rub the back of his neck. “Wait, what the hell happened while I was unconscious?”

Panic

A While Ago

“Andrew!” Bram hadn’t once thought he would freak out to the point of following in Andrew’s footsteps, fainting onto the cold sidewalk and probably also cracking his skull open if he was that unlucky, if not for Ronald grabbing hold of his shoulders, nearly squeezing them so tight that the older boy almost dropped Andrew onto the sidewalk from being startled. In one second, Bram lifted his gaze from his unconscious blond friend to the redhead whose normally calm facial expression was now filled with terror and anxiety. This was quite the most surprising thing for Bram to see on his usually calm friend’s face, but it was an understandable reaction given the current circumstances.

Hell, Bram himself was feeling the exact same emotions his friend was expressing even though he wouldn’t go out of his way to say it out loud. However unlike Ronald, Bram was doing a much better job at masking or more accurately, controlling his fear and adrenaline as much as he could as he knew that panicking and stressing out much like Andrew did a minute ago, wouldn’t help him nor Ronald get Andrew woken up or get them out of here any faster. Thankfully for him, the black and purple haired boy was surprisingly doing a good job at doing that and he was grateful for it as he needed to keep Ronald under control and get Andrew back to their car safely.

They would’ve tried to wake Andrew up from where they were, but this wasn’t exactly the best place to wake up an unconscious person, especially with a possibly dangerous man standing a few feet away from them on the same sidewalk as them. Speaking of that man, Bram whipped his head away from Ronald to glance down the street to see where the man was, but everything was now dark as ink since the boy had dropped it along with his knife when his fast-thinking and reckless reflexes made his body move with speed Bram himself had never thought he possessed to catch Andrew before he impacted hard and cracked his skull open on the cement sidewalk.

Bram moved like a goddamn cheetah as one of his hands shot away from Andrew and headed toward the spot where he dropped both his blade and phone. Thank the lords above that both of his required items were still in reach. Ronald watched his friend struggle for a few seconds in confusion, unsure as to why Bram was searching around in the dark till he remembered about his knife and phone when tending to Andrew. Turning his head to the place he had dropped them, the redhead reached out with his left hand and felt around till he found what he was looking for and pulled his phone toward him.

With more force than what was necessary, Bram raised his iPhone into the air, the flashlight still on and the screen thankfully not cracked thanks to the case that surrounded it. As relieved as Bram was to know that he hadn’t accidentally broken his phone in his panic, however that wasn’t his primary focus at the moment. The first one was his other friend, Ronald, who had also found his phone and was shining the light in the same direction as him. He shot him a quick glance of uncertainty and some attempt at confidence before a sound from in front of them caught the pair of teenagers’ attention.

The second thing was the appearance of the man Andrew had seen before and despite Bram never seeing the man the first time like Andrew had, there was no doubt that this was the same person from before because who else would be out there besides the three of them? The third thing Bram noticed was the man was now charging at Bram, Ronald, and Andrew. He wasn’t walking or running, but full on sprinting toward the three teenagers in an uncomfortably threatening manner, something that neither Bram and Ron had seen from another person before and they sure as hell didn't like it.

Bram felt his eyes widened to the size of dinner plates with fear that he’d never admit to feeling as he took an involuntary step backwards, his heart pounding nearly fifty miles per hour and his body tensing almost to the point of becoming a statue that is if he was Andrew who was now lying in Ronald’s arms, still unconscious but every now and then, his body gave little twitches and shifts as if he was starting to wake up from the dark abyss he had willingly gone to instead of continuing to go through the nightmare he found himself in unwillingly.

Ronald noticed this as well as his facial expression shifted from concerned to brick-shitting fear he’d expected to feel when watching horror movies but rarely did even when Bram chose the scariest horror movies that had ever existed. But now that he was stuck in the middle of the city with almost no people in sight in the darkest hours of the night and one man charging at him and his friends with one of them unconscious and the other almost frozen like a statue, his head probably empty of ideas and what to do, not the best situation to find himself in.

With everything considered, Ronald only needed one look at the situation to know what to do and that was to run as fast as he could even if he had to carry Andrew and the combined weight of the other boy would slow him down. But Ronald felt like with the sudden adrenaline rush, he could pull off anything with no trouble at all. To his surprise, Andrew wasn’t as heavy as he had once thought so he was able to lift the boy up off the ground much like he was carrying his bride or something before preparing his legs in an attempt to flee.