The Feral Sentence- Complete Box Set

by Shade Owens

  Rocket was the first to step forward, which seemed to frighten the girl because she quickly stepped back and jumped behind the protruding root of a tree, prepared to make a run for it. I knew that trying to outrun Rocket was a silly idea, but I didn’t blame the kid for being afraid.

  “It’s okay,” Rocket said softly. She knelt on one knee and playfully tilted her head. “What’s your name?”

  “Sandy… Sandy Macintosh,” the little girl said.

  “Sandy,” Rocket repeated. “I’m Rocket.” She pressed a hand against her chest and smiled. “That right there is Trim.” She pointed at Trim, who was standing farther back with the rest of us, and pointed at each of us individually. “That’s Fisher, that’s Brone, that’s Biggie, and that’s Flander.”

  Sandy nodded but didn’t speak.

  “If you could be anyone, Sandy, who would it be?”

  Sandy’s leaf-colored eyes stretched open big as if in disbelief that it was even acceptable to dream of being someone else. “Anyone?”

  Rocket smiled. “Anyone.”

  “I’d be Elektra!” She jumped out from behind the tree and began kicking her legs up into the air and throwing tight fists at invisible enemies.

  Rocket laughed. “The superhero?”

  But Sandy didn’t hear her. She made fighting noises while stabbing enemies with her imaginary sword.

  “Sandy?” Rocket said.

  The young girl dropped her weapons and stared at Rocket.

  “How would you like us to call you Elektra from now on?” Rocket asked.

  Sandy grinned from ear to ear and puffed her chest out. It was apparent that the name change alone made her feel like the actual superhero.

  “Elektra, can we chat for a few minutes? Would that be okay?” Rocket asked.

  I’d never imagined Rocket as the motherly type—nurturing and patient. She’d always been so playful and impulsive. In my eyes, she was just a kid herself, even though she was probably in her late twenties or early thirties.

  Elektra nodded and moved in slowly. There were scabbed cuts across her arms and legs, and her hair was matted everywhere. How had this young girl survived all by herself in the jungle?

  “How old are you, Elektra?” Rocket asked.

  Elektra shot a shy glance at the rest of us, before focusing her attention on Rocket and whispering, “Nine.”

  There was a heavy silence, but Rocket forced a smile. “Wow, nine. You’re a big girl.”

  Elektra’s pale chapped lips curved into a smile.

  “How long have you been out here?” Rocket dropped into a seated position with both legs crossed out in front of her.

  Elektra mimicked her and sat on the ground beside a bush of purple-colored flowers.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “A while.”

  “A few nights, you think?” Rocket asked.

  “Lots of nights. I stopped counting.”

  “When did you stop counting?” Rocket asked. “At how many nights?”

  Elektra played with her fingers and bit into her lip. “Two hundred and four,” she said. “That was my foster parents’ address before they got rid of me. I didn’t wanna lose the number in my head, so I stopped there.”

  Rocket quickly shot a glance at Trim. “And how did you get here, Elektra?”

  Elektra pointed up at the sky. “Helicopter.”

  I felt my stomach sink. How could they have dropped a nine-year-old onto Kormace Island? She was just a kid, and Kormace was a death sentence.

  Biggie stepped forward. “We can’t just leave her here.”

  “Whoa…” Elektra said, tilting her head back to see Biggie. “You’re big.”

  Biggie grinned, revealing pearly white teeth. Given that there was no toothpaste on the island, it was a mystery how she’d maintained such a nice smile. The majority of teeth I’d seen on Kormace were either yellow and brown, coated with plaque, chipped, or missing entirely.

  I licked the front of my teeth, suddenly feeling repulsed by my own dental hygiene. I’d learned to scratch at the plaque build-up with my fingernails and to chew the occasional peppermint leaf for freshness, but it wasn’t enough. I’d heard a few women talk about turmeric as an all-natural decalcifying ingredient; it was cultivated in the Working Grounds, but I never got around to buying some. I was too busy trying to survive.

  “S’why they call me Biggie.” Biggie pressed her chubby hand over her chest.

  Elektra giggled and stretched her lips into a buck-tooth smile. But without warning, her brows came together and she began frantically pounding her fists against the soil beneath her.

  “Elektra?” Rocket asked.

  There was no getting through to her. Elektra grimaced, her eyes fixed on the ground. She continued pounding, her face darkening a deeper shade of red with every swing she took. She released short, growl-like sounds, but nothing more.

  “Elektra?” Rocket asked again.

  “What’s wrong with her?” Fisher asked.

  Trim stepped forward, but it was apparent that dealing with children was not her strong suit. “I don’t know… Is she having a tantrum?”

  “That ain’t no tantrum,” Flander said. “Girl’s clearly got issues, and I reckon that’s why she’s ’ere in the first place.”

  Rocket quickly stood with both fists clenched and faced Flander. “That’s not good enough. Why would they drop her off here because she’s got a few problems? It’s called medical care. It’s called medicine!”

  “How should I know?” Flander said. “I ain’t the government. Maybe she did somethin’ real bad. Maybe…”

  Rocket threw an open hand in my direction. “Doesn’t matter what she did! Eighteen is the youngest they’re supposed to drop!”

  “Rocket’s right,” Fisher interjected. “Law says minors don’t get dropped on the island.”

  Biggie scoffed. “Law also states they come back to pick us up after our sentence. Ain’t nobody comin’ back for us.”

  Trim stepped inside the circle we’d created. “No one’s right or wrong here. The law does state that minors aren’t being subjected to banishment, but it also wouldn’t be the first time the government lies about something.”

  Rocket’s bright eyes bulged from their sockets. “This doesn’t make any sense!”

  “Rocket!” Fisher growled, but the sound of laughter interrupted her.

  Elektra was back on her feet, twirling in all directions with her hands above her head as if preparing for a ballet competition.

  “We can’t leave her here…” Rocket said.

  Fisher crossed her arms and cocked an eyebrow. “You gonna be the one to babysit?”

  “Enough,” Trim ordered. “It isn’t up to us—it’s up to Murk.”

  “Only if Murk has a choice to make in the first place,” Fisher said.

  Trim bit her lip and scrunched her nose, contemplating Fisher’s words. After all, what did we even know about this kid? Was she worth the risk? The old me felt guilty for even toying with the idea of leaving her behind, but the new me—the one who lived only to survive—realized that this young girl could potentially pose a threat, not only to us as individuals, but also, to the entire Village as a whole. She was too young to understand the importance of regulations, and from what I could gather, too unstable to follow them even if she did understand them.

  And what would she do, anyways? Cultivate? Sew clothing together? She certainly wouldn’t be a Battlewoman, regardless of her passion for fighting.

  “Pull out an arrow, Brone,” Rocket said, but her gaze was fixed on Trim.

  Was this some sort of joke? I stared at Trim, but she offered no guidance.

  “Go on,” Rocket said, “and aim for her heart because leaving her here is the same thing as killi—”

  “Enough,” Trim said. She turned away and began marching into the open field. “This isn’t my decision,” she said, her voice fading. “It’s Murk’s.”

  “You heard the boss,” Rocket said, glaring at Fisher. �
��Girl comes with us.”

  She turned to face Elektra, who’d stopped moving altogether. She was gazing out into the field, watching Trim cut through tall grass with her blade.

  “She’s brave,” Elektra said, her eyes round as if she’d seen a ghost.

  “Who is, sweetheart?” Rocket asked.

  Elektra pointed toward Trim. “That’s where Shere Khan always hides.”

  “Shere Khan? As in, from The Jungle Book?” I asked, stepping forward.

  She nodded.

  “Ain’t that the tiger—” Flander started.

  “Trim!” Fisher said in a panic.

  I whipped out an arrow and bolted toward the field by Fisher’s side. The others quickly followed, except for Rocket, who wrapped her arms around Elektra to comfort her.

  I wanted to shout Trim’s name—warn her to get out of the field, but I knew that shouting would only capture the tiger’s attention if it was anywhere nearby.

  Trim continued to aggressively swing her blade from side to side, dicing bits of dead grass into hundreds of pieces. My eyes shifted in every direction and my heart raced as if I were actually being chased myself.

  “Trim!” Fisher hissed as we moved in closer.

  The sound of Trim’s blade must have masked Fisher’s call because she continued deeper into the field. It wasn’t like Trim to walk away from her people—to take off in such a selfish manner. Not only was it dangerous, it was completely foolish. She needed her Hunters, just as her Hunters needed their leader.

  “Trim!” Fisher tried again.

  Trim stood straight and glanced back, her cheeks a bright red and her forehead glistening with sweat.

  “Took you long enough,” she said, but her cocky smile quickly warped into a frown when she saw Fisher’s frantic hand signals.

  I didn’t speak sign language or understand her coded gestures, but the distressed look on her face and the way her hands aggressively tore through the air made it apparent that the gist of her message was danger.

  Trim dropped into a crouched position with her blade up in one hand and a handful of grass in the other. Everyone followed suit, bearing their weapons and repositioning themselves in a strategic manner.

  Biggie backed into all of us with both arms out and away from her body as if her size alone were her weapon. Flander pulled two sharp pointed pieces of bone from her waist holster and held them at eye level.

  I held my arrow against the elastic of my bow, even though I knew that an arrow would prove completely useless in the event of a blind attack—especially one led by several hundred pounds of pure muscle.

  We waited, listening to the sounds of the wind slipping through the meadow, birds crying overhead, and Flander grinding her teeth from side to side—something I’d notice her do during our hunts.

  The silence was torturous. I knew that at any moment, one of us could be dragged into the field by jaws so powerful they could take off an entire leg. And then I thought of the woman who’d been attacked by a panther and lost her leg. I remembered her screams and the way she’d frantically thrown her arms into the air while being dragged to the Hospital because the pain was so excruciating.

  I shook these thoughts away. I couldn’t allow fear to cripple me.

  We pressed our backs together, forming a defensive stance, and stood there for what felt like hours, anticipating a gruesome attack.

  CHAPTER 6

  “Golly, you’re lucky you weren’t eaten alive!” Elektra said, whipping a piece of broken branch from side to side.

  I glared at her, feeling like she was a source of impending chaos. Nothing good would come of having a child live among wild women. Not only was she useless, she was a complete pain in the ass.

  We stepped out from the field, untouched and unharmed. Was Shere Khan even real? Had Elektra just made it up for a good laugh? Don’t get me wrong—I was relieved we’d made it out of the field, but at the same time, I wondered if our panic had all been for nothing. I wasn’t sure what bothered me most: knowing that Elektra would be coming back with us or the thought of being mauled by a wildcat.

  “Let’s go. And stay close,” Rocket said, glancing at Elektra.

  But Elektra didn’t budge. She simply stood there, holding on to two broken branches at her sides.

  “Elektra?” Rocket asked.

  “Where are you going?” Elektra asked.

  Rocket smirked. “Home. And you’re coming with us.”

  Without warning, Elektra threw both branches to the ground and released a high-pitched squeal. She turned around, ran to the tree fort, and lunged at the dangling vine. From a distance, had I not known Elektra was a child, I’d have assumed she was a monkey. With both feet pressed against the massive trunk, she pulled herself upward by quickly alternating her grip on the vine one hand at a time.

  I’d never seen a kid climb anything so fast in my life.

  Fisher scoffed. “Way to go, genius. Did you honestly think she’d leave just like that? Kid’s been living here for God knows how long. Might just be a tree fort to you, but this is her home.”

  “Do you have a better idea?” Rocket asked. “If you’re so smart, why don’t you fix this?”

  Fisher threw her hands in the air. “I don’t want the kid coming with us at all. I sure as hell ain’t helping any of you convince her otherwise.”

  “I don’t care what you want!” Rocket said. “You heard Trim! It’s Murk’s de—”

  But a deep, hoarse roar quieted them both instantly. I slowly turned toward the sound, my heart pounding so hard I thought it might stop.

  It was just standing there, its fierce yellow eyes gazing into us as if trying to determine whether we were a threat, food, or both.

  “Nobody move…” Trim said slowly. “And don’t break eye contact.”

  We all stood stiff like statues.

  It was hard to maintain eye contact with a beast of such intimidating size. It was bigger than any animal I’d ever seen: its head alone was the size of a Rottweiler, its massive body the size of a Harley Davidson. It had a white chest, a white ruff of fur around its thick neck, and its stripes were dark brown.

  I flinched when the tiger pawed into the air and released another loud growl. Its jaw opened slightly, revealing large canine teeth, and I imagined how painful it would be if they were to sink into my muscles or crack through my bones. Months ago, my biggest fear was the thought of accidentally touching a spider hidden underneath the handles of my recycling bin, and today, I was in a standoff with a real-life tiger.

  It stepped forward and released another powerful roar. Although all I wanted to do was back up or run up into the tree, I’d been instructed to stand still. Surely, Trim knew what she was doing… I hoped.

  Had she ever encountered a tiger before? My eyes shifted from the cat to Trim, who stood still, her fists clenched and shoulders drawn back as if to portray a false image of confidence, of fearlessness and strength.

  I mimicked her stance, even though I was the exact opposite of fearless. The animal stepped closer again and growled, only this time, it swung its paw out at us with its claws extracted.

  I instinctively jumped back, regretting it immediately. The tiger threw its head sideways and stretched its jaw wide open, roaring so loud I felt the sound’s vibration run through the tips of my fingers.

  I’d been about to reach for my bow despite Trim’s orders, thinking it was better to attempt a fight than be attacked, when I heard a bizarre sound come from the thick of the jungle. At first, I thought someone was under attack, but as it drew nearer, I realized that the shrieking and growling were completely intentional.

  It was coming from a woman swinging from a vine—something you’d only expect to see in the movie Tarzan—covered in greenery and hidden behind a tiger mask constructed of black, orange, and white feathers. She threw both arms out on either side of her and released the most demonic of noises—growling, hissing, screeching, and grunting. Underneath her arms hung more feathers and loose pieces
of animal skin, giving her a larger and more daunting appearance.

  She lunged toward the tiger, flailing her arms above her head and barking cacophonous nonsense. Surely this masked woman had done this before, because to everyone’s surprise, the tiger bolted back into the field.

  I caught a glimpse of the woman’s black eyes behind the mask where two holes had been cut out. She stared at me for a moment, before swinging around and sprinting back into the jungle. I watched as the feathers on her back bounced up and down and as the colors of her gear blended with the surrounding trees.

  My legs trembled and my back was drenched in sweat. This woman had saved our lives.

  “What the hell was that?” Fisher gasped to catch her breath.

  “Do you really care?” Rocket asked. “Whatever it was, it just saved our lives.”

  “Well, I think we should care,” I said, and everyone’s eyes turned to me. It wasn’t in my nature to speak up or voice my opinion, so when I did, everyone listened.

  “What’ya sayin’, Brone?” Flander asked.

  I stepped forward. “Well, all I’m trying to say is… How well do you guys know Kormace? I mean, you hunt around the Village and the Working Grounds, for the most part. Have you ever gone farther out? Shouldn’t we know what’s around us? What we’re up against?”

  “Brone’s right,” Fisher said, stepping forward as if prepared to battle anyone who challenged her. “We don’t know anything beyond our comfort zone.”

  “Having a comfort zone keeps us safe,” Trim said.

  “Safe, maybe. But for how long?” Fisher said. “I mean, look at what just happened. Who’s to say there aren’t more women like her? Who’s to say the other ones won’t kill us instead of spare us? What was she, anyway? She didn’t look like an Ogre to me.”

  “That wasn’t no Ogre,” Biggie said.

  I gawked at Biggie.

  Trim shook her head. “Biggie’s right. That was a Rogue.”

  “A Rogue?” I asked.

  “Yeah, something I used to be,” Trim said. “No rules, no civilization, no law. It was nice for a while”—she stared up at the tree fort and grimaced—“but you can’t survive on your own in the wild. You can’t survive away from civilization, away from other human beings. Isolation makes you feral—it makes you begin to think and act like an animal.”