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Circus
🕑 Added 2023-01-19 18:03:51 +0000 UTCA.N: Hey guys, how are you doing? I'm currently writing up some chapters for my stories and it's going a bit slow so I've had time to think and I have had an idea. I've been writing a story of my own, but I've not been making real progress yet, so I thought I'd start posting it on here as a way to motivate myself to finish it.
So what I'm going to be posting here is a first draft of the story, I can't promise it'll be great but it is what it is. If anyone wants to read it then please feel free to do so, and I wouldn't mind hearing some opinions on it. And if nobody wants to read it then that's fine.
Plot: This story is about a world where magical people exist, but unlike Harry Potter, the regular people know about it. The number of magical people is incredibly low. The main character is an orphan boy named Connor who finds himself being locked up one day and transported to the magical prison known as 'The Circus', and from there he meets a lot of interesting people including a werewolf. (Side note - The werewolves in this film will be much, much more different than the ones in Harry Potter and most werewolves in general).
The title of the story is called Circus.
(.)
This story starts much like many do, in the middle of a cold and rainy night in England, something that was a typical night for England. Car horns pierced through the air, as the street lamps and car lights prevented total darkness.
The bright rays of the moon tore through the night sky, shining a bright light onto the collection of buildings below. The buildings included a superstore, a garage, a steel factory and a bread-making factory. At this time of night, there were barely any cars driving by at this time of night, the streets were silent with the exception of the very few cars that drove by.
Standing in-between the steel and bread factory was an old two-storey warehouse, one that didn't look impressive in the slightest. It looked like one of those abandoned buildings you'd find in a horror film. The windows were damaged and those that weren't were too dirty to be seen through, the walls were damaged and bird droppings scattered all over the roof and walls. The ground around the warehouse was covered in dust, dirt, stones and animal droppings. The red paint of the roof had chipped away, the grey walls also had various bits of graffiti drawn on them.
Despite its horrible appearance, nothing seemed out of the ordinary as the moon and stars towered over the buildings below. Inside the warehouse, on the second floor, was anything but ordinary.
In one corner of the room was an air mattress big enough to allow two people to rest on it, next to it were two large sleeping bags and a couple of pillows. In the centre of the room under a hanging light bulb was a steel table with a collection of playing cards on top of it. Four chairs were placed around the table, with four very different people occupying those chairs.
At one end of the table was a seemingly ordinary man, dressed in dirty blue jeans, a pair of worn trainers, a green button-up shirt and a brown trench coat. He also had an ascot hat on top of his head, which for the most part succeeded in the purpose of hiding what was on his forehead. Occasionally, though, the man would lean his head back and the hat would slide up to reveal an eye in the middle of his forehead.
On the man's left was a man dressed in second-hand trainers, black trousers, a white T-shirt and a black hoodie. His brown hair was combed to the side with a couple of strands hanging over his head. Opposite this man was a woman, though not an ordinary woman. She was dressed in brown shoes, blue jeans and a woolly grey jumper. The odd thing about this woman was not the way she dressed, or the way she nervously tapped her fingers on the table, no, it was the fact that she was a moving skeleton. She gathered up all of the cards from the table and shuffled them several times before handing them out to the three men with her. Eventually, she finished shuffling the deck before she turned to the final member of this unique group.
He was the tallest of the group and undoubtedly the most muscular, though he was also the hairiest, not surprising given that he was covered in fur. He was dressed only in a pair of black forearm gauntlets and a pair of shorts that stretched from his hips to just below his knees. He was covered from head to toe in dark brown fur, his feet were hooves and the top of his head was not one belonging to a human, rather it was the head of a bull, complete with large horns and a round nose piercing.
"I think it's your turn to go first." The Skeleton woman spoke in a quiet voice. He growled before placing his cards on the table and looking at the other three sitting with him.
"Why?" He grunted. "Why are we doing this? Why are we here playing blackjack?!"
"Because I was outvoted when I suggested we play poker," The man with three eyes drawled.
"I don't think that's what he meant, Douglas." The brown-haired man sighed, rolling his eyes at the Cyclops next to him.
"I know exactly what he meant, Dan," Douglas rolled his eyes. "but he knows that we don't have much else to do. I mean, look at Mary," Douglas gestured to the skeleton woman. "she's been cleaning up for us and hasn't even muttered a damn complaint."
"I don't mind, honest." Mary's voice was heard but ignored.
"And we are all appreciative of that," Dan replied. "but I do understand where he's coming from."
"Me too," Mary nodded before looking towards the minotaur. "I really do, Jake. But Douglas is right, we don't have many options."
"I know that," Jake the minotaur said irritably. "but what we're doing right now is useless, we should be taking the fight to them!"
"And how do you expect to do that?" Douglas rolled all three of his eyes.
"I'm going to run at them!"
"You're going to run at all of them?" Douglas gave him an incredulous look.
"I am really fast," Jake said proudly.
"Even if you're really fast, there are still a lot of them, like, a lot. It'll take you a while," Douglas gave him a flat stare. "That's what? Enough time for them to do that thing."
"What thing?"
"The 'killing you thing'," Douglas replied. "you know….where they use their superior numbers and weapons to gut you like a fish and parade your body around like it's still worth something."
"I am a minotaur!" Jake growled. "Descendant of a proud species of warriors, famous throughout the lands!"
"Yeah," Douglas drawled out. "but these days you're mostly known as monsters from Greek mythology, and…that's about it for the majority of people."
"If you keep this up then I will impale you on my horn," Jake warned.
"Enough, please," Dan groaned. "we're all just a little annoyed from being cooped up in here for so long. I know that it's bad but…"
"Bad?!" Jake interrupted. "You're fine, you have pathetic human senses, I on the other hand do not! I have to actively try to stop smelling or risk my senses being assaulted!"
"If we do not be careful then their attack dog will find us," Dan continued as if Jake hadn't spoken at all. "I can't speak for the rest of you, but I definitely do not want that to happen."
"Agreed," Mary's body shivered along with her voice at the very thought. "we need to stay low."
"They'll find us," Jake argued. "they'll find us eventually."
"That's why we're moving every couple of days," Douglas reminded him.
"We should fight, their dogs would fall under my blade!"
"Are you bleeding mental?" Douglas stared at Jake as if he had just burst into song. "You wouldn't stand a chance, none of us would. If we want to survive, then we keep doing as we have been doing." Douglas finished with a finality in his voice, he leaned back in his chair and began examining his cards. He opened his mouth to speak just as the ceiling above him exploded,
The debris from the ceiling was captured by gravity and pulled down until Douglas was crushed underneath it, the other three were no longer in their chairs and were now standing up and staring in shock. Before they could process what had happened, somebody jumped through the hole in the ceiling and landed on top of the debris that Douglas was buried under.
The figure grabbed the table and shoved it into Jake, knocking the minotaur down after sending him a couple of feet back. The new arrival turned towards Dan and rushed forwards, Dan raised his hands to defend himself but was too late as a second later there was a gaping cut on his neck. The figure then turned towards Mary.
"No! No, No!" The woman screamed frightfully before stepping back and jabbing a hand at the attacker, a small bone shot from her hand and towards the attacker who dodged it with ease before rushing forwards. He placed a hand on the top of her head, the hand was covered in fur and had long nails, it was also big enough to cover the top of her head. "Don't!" Mary cried, her begging was ignored as a second later the woman's skull was crushed into pieces, her body dropping like a puppet that had its strings cut.
"No!" Jake got up and charged at the attacker, the attacker growled before leaping over Jake's head and landing behind him. Jake stopped in mid-run and turned to the attacker, his left gauntlet turning into a shield just as his right gauntlet turned into a large broad sword.
The two combatants engaged each other, Jake swinging his sword with plenty of emotion behind each swing, unfortunately, none of his strikes hit their mark as his opponent dodged them all. Though the good news was that his speed and shield was so far successful in helping him dodge and block the vicious assault that was aimed at him, though barely. He cringed at the vibrations shooting up his arm each time the shield blocked the massive clawed hand that was trying to rip into him.
Jake let out a large roar and swung his sword at his opponent's head, intent on ending this now, unfortunately, he failed spectacularly, his eyes widening to almost impossible levels as he saw that his sword had been caught by his opponent who had grabbed it by the blade itself. He didn't let his shock stop him for long as he used his other hand only to slam the shield against his opponent, only for it to be stopped by the attacker's hand. Jake stared at his opponent, the one who stopped his sword with one hand and his shield with the other.
"What do you want?!" Jake growled out, taking a good look at the creature in front of him. Black combat boots along with black combat trousers covered the bottom half while he wore a black shirt and hooded jacket to cover the top. Much like Jake, he was covered in fur, though, unlike the thin brown fur Jake had, the attacker had thick black fur. Sticking out from his head were two triangular ears, much like a wolf's ears. The top row of teeth was just a row of sharp, white canines that would frighten any prey. The bottom half of his jaw was an entirely different thing, it looked as if it was specially made for him, it was sleek, black and definitely not natural. His jaw was not the only thing odd about him, his left eye was a dark brown while his right eye was a bright green.
The wolf-like man stared at him for a couple of seconds before taking in a deep breath, the man opened his mouth and let out an ear-shattering roar that banished Jake's courage like lava would wet paper. Jake struggled to stay standing as the wolf pushed even harder, it wasn't too long before Jake started feeling weak in his knees, the wolf pushed harder and threw him onto his back. The concrete ground below him cracked and a small crater had formed, Jake groaned as he felt pain travel through his entire spine. He looked up just in time to see a horrifying sight, one that would frighten nearly anyone, he had looked up in time to see the wolf jump at him, its teeth coming down towards his neck.
Comments
Christian Jeffress
A very interesting start so far to the story. Your descriptions are very good, and your characters are realistic in this chapter. Though I do think that this chapter sets the world off at a rather dark start, since those of a Non-human nature are being hunted down and killed. Unless this group was responsible for something, particularly heinous that we were yet unaware of. Enjoyable nonetheless, but definitely a darker world.
