Two Page Shorts by Nick Venom (top reads .txt) 📕

Jac nodded, agreeing with Liliana. Allison opened her mouth to argue, but she couldn’t think of any valid points. Instead, she turned her back on Niko, pondering to herself. After a few moments, she left the room as a nurse entered. The nurse asked for them to leave the room while Niko rested for the night. They nodded, waving and saying their goodbyes before leaving the room. The nurse lingered to apply a healing potion to Niko before running off to serve another patient. 

While sitting in bed, Niko remarked to himself, “why am I weak. Why can I not protect myself? Why can’t I stop this torture?” He was known as the weakest of Lakeside, something he couldn’t rebuttal. He didn’t have the strength to beat anybody in a fight or outsmart the even dumbest people. His stats were all low.

An hour after he took the potion, he left the hospital without warning. The staff wanted to keep him overnight for additional inspections, but he wouldn’t give them the chance. He ventured through his usual route, passing by a dark and very sketchy apartment that was behind the hospital, remaining almost unused except for the delivery truck that went through every once in a blue moon. 

He reached the alleyway, which was known for having drunk or drug-addicted teens and adults passed out in dumpsters. It wasn’t a nice sight for Niko to bask himself in. A world filled with broken dreams. He promised himself to never enter it, steering away from it whenever he could. However, tonight was different. He had no choice aside from passing through it. On the other side was his house.

He reached the alleyway, peering down the dimly-lit alleyway. In the shadows of the alleyway were two figures, seeming to be fighting against each other. Niko noticed them but disregarded them. He figured that they were drunk adults fighting over a bottle of alcohol, something that Niko witnessed the previous time he was there. He ignored the fighting and took a step forward, standing on uneven ground and collapsing to the ground. He scraped his knees on the concrete, letting out a short-lived yelp. The yelp attracted the attention of the two people fighting. However, a moment later they ignored him and continued fighting. 

He pushed himself off the ground, patting his body and ridding his clothes of dust. He glanced up at the two people fighting and took a step closer to them, not knowing why. He took a step backward, confused at his sudden action. It had taken him by surprise. 

The fighting had calmed down as the two men collapsed. Shouts, curses, and yells could be heard; Niko being unsure if they were still drunk or not. It resembled the sound of somebody dying, something he’d familiarized himself with while at the hospital.

Against his gut feeling, he rushed forward and reached the two dying people. He broke his promise, but for a good reason as the people---two men stained in blood---were bleeding out gallons by the second. One of the men laid face first in a puddle of his blood while the other man laid on his back, staring up at the sky. Unlike the first man, the man laying on his back was still breathing. The first man died within seconds while the second man took his time to meet the Grim Reaper.

The second man’s eyes turned to the side, noticing Niko’s presence. He slowly raised his hand and pointed it at Niko, beckoning him closer. Niko’s gut told him to turn around and run from the man, but his instincts drove him closer. 

The man, seeming to be in his early twenties and wearing the clothes of a greaser---a black leather jacket and ripped light blue jeans. He lurched forward at Niko before returning to his original position of looking up at the sky. His skin was pale, either his natural skin tone or from blood loss, while his green eyes were blurry and searching for something. What they were looking for was unknown.

“W-Who ar-are you?” He muttered.

Niko took a step back and recollected his thoughts. The man was still alive, even for a few fleeting moments, he was still alive. 

“Let me call an ambulance!” He exclaimed, taking out his phone and dialing 9-1-1 on the keypad. 

The man’s hand shot out, at a weird speed for a dying man, and grabbed at Niko’s leg. “D-Don’t,” He croaked, turning his head to look at him.

Niko hesitated to press the call button, hovering his finger over it.

“R-R-Rank-Ranking,” He croaked, his voice becoming dryer. 

“My ranking? I’m a Pawn,” Niko told the man, unsure why he was divulging his information. 

“A-Are you hu-hurt?” He muttered.

“You’re the one bleeding!” Niko exclaimed. Something was off with the man, ignoring him being on his deathbed.

“B-Bullied?” The man asked. Niko softly nodded his head. The dying man pointed at his pocket. “U-Use that! In my po-pocket.” Niko looked down at the man’s pocket and noticed a small pen-like object poking out of it. 

The man urged him to grab the object. However, he hesitated to touch it. He wasn’t sure what the object was; a knife or anything similar.

“Why would I-”

“G-Grab it!” He shouted, his voice weakening.

Niko pulled the object out and inspected it. It didn’t look to be related to drugs, a drug pipe, or a bong.

The man then motioned for him to stab himself with the object. “S-Stab y-y-yo-yourself,” He croaked. The man was choking on his blood and was a few feet from death’s doorstep.

“I’m not going to stab myself with some strange junkie tool,” Niko remarked.

“Y-You wa-want str-strength?” The man croaked. “Sta-Stab your-yourself.” The man was getting closer to death by the passing seconds. 

Niko looked down at the object, hesitating to use it. The prospect of becoming stronger was tempting, but the object was coming from a dying man in a junkie alleyway. How could he trust it? How could he use it?

After some more hesitating, he decided to use it. The prospect of becoming stronger was more important than his own life. He was by a hospital, so the nurses could come around and pick him up. With that bit of information in his mind, he stabbed himself with the object, feeling energy surging through his body. His muscles began to tighten and his pupils dilated. He collapsed to his knees and he spat out blood in small amounts. 

The man, who had a sad expression throughout their conversation, finally smiled as Niko’s body started glowing before his body burnt to ashes. He died from his blood loss, his body disintegrating. The other man’s body disintegrated along with his. They both disappeared, their ashes being taken away by the wind.

Niko survived the adrenaline that rushed throughout his body, heading home where he passed out on the couch. He woke up the next day, wearing the same clothes from the previous night. He took a quick shower and changed clothes, putting on a dark green tee-shirt, black jeans, and gray sneakers. He grabbed his bag and took his time to reach school. He passed by the alleyway and peered down it, but there weren’t any traces of the men. It was almost as if they never existed. 

A block away from the school, he met up with Jac and Liliana with Allison appearing a half-block later. They all wore casual clothes. Jac had on a black tee-shirt and black jeans while Liliana wore a dark blue skirt that went past her knees and a white tee-shirt with the words, “life works in mysterious ways” on it. Allison wore the same skirt, but had a red tee-shirt with her parents’ restaurant name on it, being “Adam & Family’s Pizzeria”. 

The four of them walked in silence towards their school, nearly reaching their destination when a mysterious pale-skinned female with a green ponytail and bright light-green eyes appeared out of nowhere. She had a black tee-shirt with the words “Good Die Young” written on it. She wore dark blue jeans and a pair of white Converse sneakers. She approached them with a fierce look, asking to borrow Niko for a second. The woman stared at Niko directly in his eyes. With a better in-depth look at her, he noticed multiple resemblances between her and the dying man; an unnerving resemblance. 

“Who are you?” Allison asked, squinting her eyes at the girl. 

“I need to talk to you,” The girl said, ignoring Allison’s presence.

“I’m sorry, but I don’t know who you are,” Niko told her. 

She leaned in, whispering in his ear. “You may not know who I am, but… you may remember the alleyway.” He froze, staring at the girl. She nodded at him, confirming his thoughts. She knew about what transpired in the alleyway, something even Niko was unsure happened or not. With her presence, it was now confirmed that the events he witnessed yesterday had occurred. 

“The alleyway…” He muttered, his voice trailing off. 

“Follow me and I’ll tell you more about what happened. Don’t follow me and you’ll never figure out the truth.” She whispered. 

“Fine,” He told her. He turned to his friends. “You guys go along without me, I’ll see you later.” The girl motioned for him to follow her, which he did without hesitation. He followed her to the nearby school park, not noticing Allison stalking them. Jac and Liliana didn’t follow them, instead, heading to school. They left the matters concerning the strange girl up to Niko and Allison. 

Niko and the girl then sat down on a park bench, facing each other. The girl glanced over at Allison, who was hiding behind trees, before starting. “His name… His name was Cameron and he had the ranking of a King.” She said.

“Cameron,” Niko repeated. 

“Yeah,” She then pointed at Niko’s pocket. “Do you have the device?”

“The device?” He questioned.

“It’s shaped like a pen.”

“Oh,” Niko took the pen-like object he got from Cameron---which he forgot he grabbed---and handed it to the girl. She quickly inspected the object before shoving it into her pockets. 

“This device is known as the Emergency Transfer of Power, or ETP for short. It’s a device that I created that allows somebody to take their strength and transfer it to somebody else. All you have to do is inject yourself and let it suck you dry before handing it off to the next user, who injects themself with this device and finalizes the transfer.” She explained. 

“Then… I have his strength?” He asked, staring down at his hands.

“Correct. What was your ranking?”

Niko hesitated to answer, forcing the girl to repeat her question. He looked away from her, muttering, “Pawn.”

“Pawn!” She shouted, attracting the attention of passersby. “Ha! It seems like my brother acted on his promise.” Niko tilted his head, unsure of what the promise was. The girl quickly responded to his confusion. “Oh, he wanted to grant a Pawn his near-infinite strength. He used to be a Pawn himself.”

“Your brother used to be a Pawn?” Niko questioned. 

She nodded her head, laying her back against the bench. She glanced over at Allison, who hid from her sight. She softly chuckled to herself. 

“My purpose coming here was to find you. According to my brother’s order, I will be acting as your supervisor.” She told him. 

Niko jerked his head back. “My supervisor?”

She nodded. “You won’t be able to control your newfound strength. Letting you run wild without supervision will end up with you dead.”

“Oh… That makes sense.”

“Well, that’s everything I have to offer. Any questions you have will wait until later.” She then stood up. “Oh, and I’m Evie.”

“Niko, nice to meet you.” He extended his hand.

“Likewise,” She shook his hand. 

Allison watched from afar, unable to pick up on their conversations. She couldn’t hear their conversation but was sure that Evie was dangerous to Niko’s safety. She didn’t trust her because of her past encounters with similar-looking girls. She only trusted her close-knit friends, like Niko, Jac, and Lily, and treated her fake friends like disposable tools. Her fake friends used her for popularity while treating her with envy and spite. 

Meanwhile, Niko and Evie departed