First Chapters: Post the First Chapter of the Piece You're Currently Working on for Feedback
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First Chapter of "Not There" (which I'm hoping to have completed and published by the end of the year).

 

Away.1

Attica floundered towards the darkness—the refuge—mere feet away from Second Street and Muhammad Ali Boulevard. The streetlights, traffic lights, and distant headlights were gyrating in a nauseating fashion. The sky above was black and merciless, the twinkling balls of gas offering no solace, no answer to her situation. The entire top and seat of her cotton pants were drenched now, the scarlet stain consuming the yellow roses embroidered onto the white fabric.

She heard boots on concrete and pulled herself deeper into the cool black. A couple passed, each with a single arm wrapped around the other. Smiling, peaceful, happy, they walked right past her and didn’t seem to notice a thing. Attica struggled to her knees, grasping the damp bricks beside her. In front of her, across four lanes of traffic, the Pendennis Club stood presumably empty. She turned, and behind her saw a school that was surely deserted at this hour though a sprinkling of windows showed brightly lit rooms. If she were to move, she must do so with certainty,
she had to know they would be safe.

She cradled her plump womb, now covered with sweat and blood, her vision tunneling. She couldn’t bear the thought that they weren’t going to make it, that it wasn’t going to be all right. But she knew she still had one hope. She steadied herself, closed her eyes, and called on him with all her strength.

Skobah! Help me, please! Can’t you take over? Please?!

Her concentration was waning as the terror within her built with each passing second of silence, she felt a chill creeping all over her skin, settling into her bones.

Skobah!!

I cannot…help you, Attica. I must release myself.

Attica felt Skobah disconnecting himself from her. It started at her feet and worked its way up—the lessening, the weightiness—until he was looking down at her, floating above her. He was still connected to her hand, still tethered to this world by her in that small way. He watched the tears come freely now, though her eyes had been dry when she was beaten, shot, and stabbed. Now, at being abandoned, her resolve disintegrated. Her tremors made his form waver. Now, outside of her brain, she could not hear him.

It seemed to take forever, but the awareness in her face finally began to decrease. She slumped over, her head landing in a puddle of murky water, ripples running across it as she took her last few, struggling breaths.

Skobah heard the screech of tires nearby, doors closing, and stilettos beating quickly against the sidewalk. He readied himself, hoping Attica could hold on for just a bit longer. When the four women rounded the corner and saw Attica’s nearly defunct body, they cursed. They all wore yellow business suits and sunny Minolo Blanix. Skobah still had a hard time understanding how things worked on this planet. Why a group of women would kill another—with child—to retrieve currency that didn’t even belong to them.

“We’re never going to get the fuckin’ money now. Jo-ni-ca!!” One of the women punched her trigger-happy comrade in the gut. Jonica doubled over as she apologized, her gun sliding from her fingers. Skobah took this opportunity to step over into Jonica’s body.

The woman straightened almost instantly as she realized her body had become lighter, warmer, even in the cool spring wind. Before she could blink, her gun was off the ground and pointed at each of her comrades in succession, the bullets barely glinting in the light of a nearby street lamp before pushing effortlessly past skin, skulls, and brains. The women dropped and Jonica looked at the carnage around her horrified. She jumped when the gun turned to point at her, hot urine running down her legs. Her hand made its way to her temple and a crushing guilt filled her psyche as the sound of one last gunshot spilled into the night air. Skobah quickly made his escape, floating ever higher, leaving the brutal scene behind him—he vowed to himself—once and for all.

 
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