Flesh: Chapter 1 by Nicola Collings (best novel books to read txt) 📕

Part 1: Athens

                “They’re all dead!”

                The policeman sat at the small wooden table concealed in the corner of the tavern, on a balcony overlooking the stage where a dozen dancers dressed in the traditional bright waist coats and flowered dresses frolicked before tourists. The policeman’s hands were clasping the table top as he locked eyes with the teenage girl who sat, leaning back in the chair opposite him.

                “I know.” She replied, calmly, slightly distracted by the dancers. The beat of the brightly coloured melody rose around them. She wore a leather, studded jacket and apparel that made it obvious she was part of a biker gang. Her hair was big and fluffy, as though she’d just woken up and not brushed the mess of deep black.

                “Well, what are you going to do?”

                The girl looked at him. “Nothing. I can’t.”

                The policeman leaned back, going red with stress and a certain underlying fear.

                “It can’t go on like this.” He took a sip of his water. “You’re going to be found out. They reckon their getting closer to suspects, or arresting people. Innocent people are going to get blamed for your actions! Innocent people!”

                The girl suddenly leaned forwards, her voice an urgent hiss. “I can’t do anything! We have been asleep since before your blasted Acropolis was even an idea in someone’s tiny mind! They need to feed. They have a certain lust for life that hasn’t been quenched for eons and you expect me to deprive them of things that they can so easily have?”

                “You said yourself! You want no part in this! You’re their leader! Tell them!”

                “Tell them what? That they have to go back to sleep? That they must wait even longer! This is in their blood! My blood! It’s our nature. I know my feelings about this, but I would be a smouldering wreck right now if I didn’t feed!”

                She leaned back. The policeman found it strange, listening to someone who had such a thick British accent. He wondered why that was.

                “I want to leave them, so badly! I do! But if I do, they will turn on me and kill me. I don’t want to die. I can’t lie in the shadows anymore.”

                The policeman raised an eyebrow. “I thought you couldn’t die.”

                “Dying for us is different. We wait as shadows until we are born again. We are darkness. Death is not part of us. We are not human. For me, however, because of my age you will find I can be very resilient. Even if you do manage to kill me, I don’t stay down for long.”

                “Well,” the policeman paused. “You need to do something, because more innocent people are getting killed. All those girls in that dorm! Those kids from that hospital! I see that going back to sleep is not an option for you anymore, but please! I love you, but this can’t go on.”

                The girl looked at him. He loved her. She still didn’t know whether her feelings were mutual. Despite the shadows being awake for around 6 months now, she still felt it too early. This was just the lust in her speaking. Was it? She’d been asleep for so long, it was hard to think straight sometimes. She indeed felt what the others felt: a freedom so intense, a longing for life that had so recently burst free.

                “I will try, but I’m not promising. They’re a pack of monsters. If I try to leave, they will do anything to keep me there and re-educate me, brainwash me, anything to keep things the way they are- as they like them. If you don’t hear from me for a long while, you will know why.” And with that, the girl melted into the shadows, whips of darkness falling from her, until she had completely disappeared into the dark corners of the tavern.

                “Sorry sir,” the policeman turned to see a waiter. “I didn’t realise you were alone, I thought I saw someone sitting opposite.”

                “No, just me.” The policeman had his order taken and then put his head in his hands as the waiter shuffled away.

                The dancers below danced on, freely and happily.

                                                                                                *

                The streets of the Plaka weren’t exactly packed with tourists as they usually were. Luna tucked her hands through the loopholes of her skinny jeans. It didn’t strike her how her clothing stood out against the foreign style of the Greek. Her studded biker boots clomped against the hard marble slates, her intimidating figure moving through the narrow streets like the shadow she was. The policeman had been right, she needed to do something.

                But what?

                People couldn’t keep dying. She should have anticipated this. What was worse, she was even getting messages from other settlements of Darklings across Europe inviting her to meetings. She knew what that meant.

                War was on the jagged line of the horizon.

                She hated them! The shadows had no morals. No sense of right or wrong. She’d been born into this, however, which made her feel even more trapped. But, if she escaped, would they take her in? Probably not. They didn’t take kindly to her kind. So even if she ran, she’d have nowhere to go.

                She imagined herself living as a human. That option was out of the window. They’d tried to do that, already, but they weren’t part of that world. They never would be.

                And then there was the risk of exposure...

                Breathing through her nose, Luna let the cold night air fill her. She hadn’t smelt it in eons. It was so glorious! When she first woke, she remembered letting the cold air wash over her, the sensations, the smell of wet soil, the sound of traffic...

                Then the shouts of other shadows, waking up, in human forms, naked, ecstatic, shocked, exhilarated...

                She’d only wished the happiness had lasted a little longer. They soon wanted their old leader back in action. But the eons of sleeping and watching had changed her...

                At the end of the street, she could make out several dark shapes. As she got closer, she laid eyes on David sat on a Harley, clad in a blue leather jacket, his white hair gelled upwards, a single braid hanging limp at the side of his face. Having watched the 80s go by, he’d clung to the fad. Several other bikers surrounded him, either sat on bikes or leaning on them, or sat on a low wall at the side of the road. All black. All leather. All studs.

                David watched Luna appear from the shadows and the noise of the Plaka in the distance. He stood, made a slight bow and held out his hand. She took it and allowed him to help her onto the back of his Harley.

                “Everything went smoothly with your meeting?” he asked, climbing onto his bike in front of her.

                “Yes, it was most enjoyable.”

                “I will never understand why the Greeks choose to keep these infernal ruins. The amount of trashy tourists they attract!”

                Luna put her hands around David’s waist as he revved his bike. The other around them were mounting and revving. Soon, they were speeding through the streets of Athens, the pale buildings rushing and rising around them like polluted clouds. Eventually, the buildings lessened in size and quantity and the group of bikers rolled into the part of the city where night clubs thrived in narrow streets and dark, orange lanes where neon lights sparked and flashed cheaply. Flocks of girls tottered past in cheap dresses and high heels, followed by dark-skinned Greek boys wearing unbuttoned shirts and metal chains. The group revved down a side street and into a maze of dark back, cobbled streets. They only stopped speeding past the buildings with close precision when they reached a small courtyard in the middle of which grew a pearly white beach tree. The group dismounted; David held onto Luna’s hand with an affection that could have only passed for human love.

                Human emotions. They felt strange. New. She still wasn’t sure whether she wanted to get used to this new awakening. Luna would have rather sank into the shadows, into the warm and watch onwards at the humans, not having the weight of feeling upon her leather-clad shoulders.

                She followed the group into the building in front of them, passing through a small, broken door and into the hallway of an abandoned lobby. The building itself was a club, the two top floors and the floor below the ground floor housing club room space. The two basement levels housed stages that used to be used for rock concerts. They made their way down to the floor below, where the heavy beat of music could be heard reverberating through the old walls that were still covered in old, ripped posters. It was as if the building had been left specifically for the shadows. It was perfect! The only thing that worried Luna was the fact that if any humans were to stumble upon the shadows who hid here, they would either be exposed, or they would have more human bodies on their hands.

                Luna neared the door to where the bulk of the shadows dwelled; as the people before her passed through the downs he could make out flashes of club lighting and a heavy dubstep track pounded the walls. It wasn’t strange for it to be like this, but there was a certain strand of excitement that could be felt in the atmosphere and Luna could feel it, particularly emanating from the shadows in the room beyond. There was shouting. And screaming. Human screaming.

                Entering the room, Luna stood on the balcony immediately past the door and gazed down at the horrific scene below. Shadows swarmed the room, sat on boxes, amps, benches and stood, the crowd thickening towards the circle in the centre. In the middle of the ring of people, two figures. Luna could smell they were human, and when they started to lash out at each other, curl around one another and scratch and punch and kick, she knew she had to stop this immediately.

                The two human girls couldn’t have been more that teenagers, probably plucked from the low income streets of Athens. The iron sharp shouts and jabs form the shadows sent fear sparking through them, causing them to scream, tears and nails and fists. Blood started to spatter the concrete around them, the sound of bones cracking and skin ripping drowned from the joyful cries and laughs of the shadows.

                “You ok?” Luna heard David ask. She felt his hand around hers.

                “You realise this must stop.”

                He sighed. “You’re meeting tonight with the policeman. That wasn’t just for you to feed was it? He’s your friend.”

                Luna nodded. “I need your discretion on this matter, David. There are steps I must take in order for us to stay concealed.”

                David paused. “Did you even feed at all tonight? You look so pale.”

                “Promise me.” She looked at him.

                “What if they don’t want to stay concealed?”

                “We must. It is my responsibility to keep them so.”

                     “You are our leader. You are older than all of us. There is no stopping you from staying in this world and it is our duty to follow you, serve you and protect you. As much as I have a mind of my own, you know what will happen if they are kept from what they want by their leader. And it’s not as if they can just kill you. And I don’t want them to hurt you.”

                     Luna looked at David. “As much as I appreciate your concern, I cannot defy eons of caution and knowledge from my