The Last Wars by Bianca Gray (reading women TXT) 📕

the almost invisible patterns, and it all lead to that nail in the roof. Nick watched me. I nodded my head at him.
“She’s right,” I whispered. Venus stared at the both of us, a look of confusion on her face.
“How?” she asked. I pointed at the force field.
“There are little patterns on it that when the moonlight hits it, you can see, and all the patterns lead to the nail in the roof,” I said.
“I don’t see them,” she said staring really hard at it. Fayre nodded.
“I see,” she said following the patterns to the nail in the roof.
“I don’t,” said Snow White and Ida. Bambi had fallen asleep in Snow White’s arms but Fawn was staring at us with wide brown eyes.
“Hmm… Seems like only the people who were raised by animals can see it,” mused Daniel. Seemed like none of the guys could see it either though. Odd, I thought.
“So, let’s smash the nail in the roof,” one of the guys said not seeing the problem.
“It might have some alarm on it,” I said getting a closer look on it.
“If it does, we’ll just run really fast,” said another guy. I just looked at him. I heard someone say, “idiot,” under his or her breath.
“Not with Ida and Snow carrying the twins we can’t,” I pointed out. Venus nodded.
“We have to do this carefully and silently. No one can wake up and catch us. Once they do, we’re dead for sure,” said Venus. Zanita looked at the nail and pressed on it. All of a sudden a hologram of a women came up.
“Hello. Do you want to shut down the force field?” she asked. Zanita just stared at it scared. I moved her and stood in front of the hologram.
“Yes,” I said.
“And what authority do you have?” she asked.
“I am Jane, a mentor,” I said.
“Who told you to shut down the force field?” she asked.
“Johnny…” I said slowly.
“What is the pass code?” she asked, not missing a beat. That’s when Zanita took over.
“513J890A1245N781E,” said Zanita.
“Force field disabled,” said the hologram. And then she and the force field went away.
“How did you know the pass code?” I asked.
“You said you were Jane. I saw her name card on the back. That was her code for everything,” Zanita said. Nick nodded.
“I heard her say J-A-N-E with a mixture of numbers,” he said. Fayre tapped her foot.
“Are we just going to stand around talking about what just happened? Or can we save that for later?” she asked in an almost sarcastic tone.
“Let’s go,” I said rolling my eyes. Daniel took the twins and jumped off the building, doing somersaults and landing silently on his feet. Snow and Ida jumped off next, quickly taking the twins out of Daniel’s hands. Fayre sort of flew to a nearby tree, the small dark boy following after. Venus just jumped, and landed like a cat. The rest of the guys jumped down. Zanita waved good-bye at me and then fell off the building; she landed on her hands and then did a flip onto her feet, silently. Nick grabbed my hand and we jumped down together. I landed more silently than he, but we hardly made a sound. Venus looked at our linked hands with a mixture of awe and disapproval. I quickly let go of Nick’s hand. Caring for one another wasn’t permitted…but then I thought, didn’t we all care for Valora? Don’t we all care for each other? So, we were breaking the rules whether we knew it or not. That’s why they let Valora die… they wanted to teach us a lesson that when you care for someone, they’re going to die sometime in the near future. Then Fayre jumped down in front of me, startling me out of my thoughts.
“Let’s go,” she hissed. Then we ran into the woods and kept running until we couldn’t see the horrid building anymore.

CHAPTER 6

I don’t remember falling asleep, but here we were, all sleeping underneath a huge willow tree. Bambi and Fawn were both curled up next to Snow White. Ida was sitting up holding some notebook thing and a writing utensil. Fayre was sleeping up in the tree, same with the small dark boy. Nick looked dead, but I seeing the rise and fall of his chest told me otherwise. Daniel was sprawled across the grass. Venus was curled up next to him. Huh, I thought smugly. Zanita was sleeping like a cat. Once she heard a twig snap or the rustle of leaves, her head would snap up and then she’d go back to sleep. I would laugh at her but I probably was doing the same thing. The rest of the boys were everywhere. I woke up Zanita, knowing she’d be useful and pointed away from the willow tree. She carefully got up, prying herself from a guy who carelessly threw an arm over her while he was sleeping, and followed me.
“You’re good at hunting right?” I asked. She nodded.
“Well, let’s go get some breakfast, shall we?” I asked smiling slyly. She smiled back, thrilled to be hunting again. Finally we saw a deer. He was a huge buck. Zanita’s copper eyes looked at it hungrily. I figured she should take it down. I watched her as she came up to it. Then she pounced like a tigress and sunk her teeth into the buck’s neck. The buck tried to throw her off. Then she ripped, a chunk of the buck came off with her teeth. It was bleeding profusely. This was barbaric, I thought to myself trying to keep my stomach acid in my stomach. She took her hands and dug them into the buck’s chest, puncturing its heart. The buck looked at me, helpless, as I decided to kill him more quickly. I threw a crudely made spear square into its head. Finally, it was dead. Zanita glared at me after she saw my spear protruding from the buck’s forehead.
“It was already dying,” she said looking at me with blood dripping from her mouth and hands. She brushed her hair back with her hand, leaving a trail of blood on her face and now, in her hair.
“Not fast enough,” I said. We carried the buck back by its antlers, to the willow tree. I made sure to stop by a river and make Zanita wash herself down because honestly, I think she would be enough to frighten the twins. Everyone was up when we got there, and looked hungry too. Snow and Ida took over the buck, skinning it and then cooking it. Daniel and the boys took the buck’s antlers, shaping it into weapons. When the buck was cooked, we all ate it sitting around in a circle. Snow was putting Bambi’s hair into a complicated braid twist thing. Snow told me it was a French Braid. Who’s French, was all I could think. Bambi and Fawn were hungrily eating the buck like there was no tomorrow. Then Daniel looked at all of us and grinned.
“Hey, who’s Scarlet over there and Bright Eyes over here?” he asked nodding over at Zanita and then me.
“Zanita and Annika,” answered Venus.
“Annika? The girl who beat Nick to a pulp?” Daniel asked. Then he burst into hysterics. The other guys were laughing their heads off too while Nick looked like he wanted to stab someone.
“Yeah,” Fayre answered.
“Who are all of you?” I asked looking at all the guys.
“Well, you already know Nick,” said Daniel pointing over at him. The other guys started another round of laughter. Nick just glared at Daniel. Then Daniel pointed at himself.
“I’m Daniel,” he said giving me a sincere smile. Venus just rolled her eyes when Daniel winked at me. He pointed over at the small dark boy.
“That’s Terryn,” Daniel said. Terryn waved. Daniel pointed to a boy with gold eyes and light brown hair.
“That’s Aiden,” said Daniel. Aiden just nodded at me.
“That’s Cedric,” Daniel said. I looked over to see a boy with dark brown hair and dark brown eyes.
“And that’s Prince,” said Daniel practically rolling his eyes as I looked at Prince. Prince had blonde hair and gray-blue eyes. He was very handsome with a nice complexion. I noticed that Snow White couldn’t stop staring at him.
“Derived from Prince Charming,” said Prince. His voice was like melted butter. All of us were hanging on his every word. Well, all of us girls were.
“Ahem!” coughed Daniel looking angrily at Venus who was also mesmerized by Prince.
“He’s new,” said Terryn, pointedly looking at Prince. Prince shrugged and continued to eat his venison. When all of our bellies were big and round, Venus gulped down a large amount of water and then looked at everyone straight in the eye as she swallowed. I noticed she sort of took over Valora’s position of staring everyone down. My face started to feel hot, and my eyes were stinging as I tried to hold back a flood of tears.
“So, they’re going to notice that we’re gone and then start looking for us,” said Venus finally. We all nodded, knowing she voiced what everyone was thinking.
“Well, what are we going to do? Keep running?” asked Cedric, his dark eyebrows knitted in thought.
“Or we can fight back,” Daniel said leaning back onto the tree. All the boys voiced their agreement. The girls just stared at them like they were crazy.
“A war? Twelve to hundreds? Are you crazy?” asked Ida.
“Actually fourteen, including the little ones,” said Daniel.
“No,” said Venus declining Daniel’s suggestion. I’ve never seen that boy sad in the little time I’ve known him, but at the moment, he was pretty sad.
“So, what then?” asked Nick, pushing his red-blonde hair out of his eyes.
“If they try to hurt us in any way, we will defend ourselves and each other by fighting back. We can’t let this keep going on. Having our own kids taken away from us to be raised by wild animals for entertainment? No. I will not stand for it anymore,” said Daniel sounding determined, his face looking grim.
“What?” I voiced out my confusion. A lot of us looked confused like Prince, Zanita, Fayre, and I.
“Haven’t you ever wondered why your own parents left you? In the woods? By yourself? You could’ve died, and you don’t think they cared?” asked Daniel. Venus, Snow White, and Ida just sat in silence when I looked over at them. Zanita and Fayre looked at me in confusion as well.
“No…” I said slowly.
“What did your mentor tell you anyway?” asked Nick.
“Jane said that no one cares in this place. No one cares for one another. I assumed it was lonely, I could tell by her eyes,” I said. Nick shook his head.
“About your birth parents. The human ones,” he said pressing me for information. I thought hard. I shook my head slowly.
“It never came up. I’ve never thought about my human parents. All I know is that they gave me this,” I said pulling out my necklace and showing them the pendulant. Daniel’s eyes were wide with excitement.
“Let me see,” he said bounding over at me so quickly that I blinked and then he was in my face. He examined the pendulant, turning it over and over. He waved Aiden over. Aiden examined my pendulant. Nick sighed.
“I already looked at it. It’s the one,” he said. What? I thought completely and totally confused. Everyone looked at me in a mixture of awe