The puppet sat primly in the chair, elegant as she was created to be. Her achroite eyes caught the sparkles from the neon lights, yet they remained dull as they gazed forward.

Life moved around her, but just like the hollow heart in her chest, she remained still.

Until a murmer drifts from the curtain, the surrounding people repeating “it is time, it is time” as if they are the ones who bleed ...

The sound grew louder as Clara dragged her feet through the long hallway of her parent’s house. It was a squawking sort of sound, one distinct to a certain species of people: socialites. Emanating from the backyard, their high-pitched voices rang in her ears. It sickened Clara to hear how fast her parents were able to make a new life here and move on from their old one across the country. The soci...

She dropped her spear, even though her instincts screamed for her to latch on to her weapon. A weapon that had come to know her better than she knew herself. She forced her gaze away from her spear and walked over the body of her opponent, Ogun. He had been quite arrogant and condescending before and during the wrestling match. Now, he laid unconscious on the caked mud ground.

Oba stood face to f...

Guards closed in on the pair, the threatening whir of their trucks growing as they approached. Dust clouded her sight, leaving Eris blindly feeling her way through the sand dunes for her backpack. “Donovan!” She choked, desperately searching. An early warning blast from the speeding guards was all she needed to know this would be far more dangerous than she had anticipated. They should never have...

Any normal person wouldn't sleep for days, weeks, months, years even. Any normal person wouldn't be able to complete simple day-to-day activities without the haunting image of rotting bodies engraved into their corrupted minds. Any normal person wouldn't kill in the first case, no matter the circumstances. In what circumstance would you bash someone's skull into mushy smithereens and come out bein...

Blood stains my face, my loved ones looking at me warily as I stare back at them menacingly.

“This is who I am, and there is no need to be afraid.” I say, stepping forward.

Mother flinches back, father steps forward in front of my family.

“You really think I would hurt you?” I sneer. Guards come around me. My family flinches, sheilding their faces. “Stand up, you cowards. I did it all for you...

Blood stained her face, her loved one looking at her warily as she stared back at them menacingly.

“This is who I am, and there is no need to be afraid.” She said, stepping forward. He took a step back mirroring her. The pain on her face was visible even though she tried to hide it. The rush of adrenaline leaving her.

He looked disgusted and confused, and that broke her heart even more. She did...

When you’re stupid and seven years old, sitting in some molding, mildew, shack of a classroom, and you’re asked what you want to be, you don’t tend to be correct. For example, when my teacher asked me while looking at me with her best attempt at an inspirational gaze, I responded, “A ship captain!” Anyways, I am currently an assassin, and worse, I’m not even an assassin on a ship. Honestly, it’s ...

The crowd stepped back, her family included. Her father warily guiding her mother behind him. Teardrops slid down her cheeks cutting through the blood and gore.

“Mom?”

She went to step forward but her father held up his hands.

“Don’t Melantha.”

She froze looking around for an ally, but found only horror.

Soldiers encircled her as she through up her hands.

“It was an accident!”

She squeeze...

Mercy was the name of the girl who never saw her thirteenth birthday. I stumbled upon her story in a newspaper that had sat on my neighbor's doorstep for three weeks—long before we discovered his body—and I remember almost laughing at the irony.

She was murdered simply for living. You might mistake the monster that killed her as human at first glance, but the eyes don’t lie. They were the eyes of...