1 Birds and Paranoia

Calem clasped his hands together as the cold wind circulated through his cell. In the cold, dark prison, he was alone, with birds as his only companions. Four days ago, the guards fled with the other prisoners because of some monster that had attacked the prison.

He closed his eyes and tried to get some rest, but his birds were silent. It was one of the signs that the monster was close, which forced the entire prison to escape. How many times did he think about how unfortunate he was to have a cell at the end of the block? He would've gotten away with them that day.

It was another day, and because of the cold wind, he had no rest, and he had nothing other than his ripped coat. His cell door opened, but due to the chains on his ankles, he was unable to get out.

They tweeted once more when Calem opened his eyes to look at the birds, saying the monster was gone so for now. He didn't waste any time, he pulled the ends of the frozen chains as he did for days a few times, hoping it would snap.

The end of the chain broke after a few pulls and a few cuts on his hand. To relax his muscles, Calem shifted his arms and locked his coat behind him. Cold air came through his trousers' holes, making him shake. He knew the birds were not going to survive the cold, but he was worried about the monster, and it was the only thing that could help him escape. He took one of the cages with a trembling hand and Calem was finally out after years of being a prisoner.

He glanced back at the jail, the cries of the prisoners' pain ringing through his ears as the monster invaded. With the thought of the monster, his hands shook, so he hurried away from the prison as quickly as he could.

It would take him days to walk to the nearest town, and it was freezing cold, and he would kick the bucket first before he could even see a sign saying where the town was.

He suddenly thought, 'that's not a bad idea,'. Dying in the cold is better than being eaten by a monster who killed the warden and some of the prisoners.

Calem walked a long way to find a house or a shed, but no matter how far he walked and looked, the forest and the white plains were all he could see. He looked at the birds he hugged inside his coat, the smallest of which was dead, and the others were cooped close to his body to feel even a little heat. Calem thought, 'This is not good,' and walked faster to look for something that could keep him and his birds warm, but his feet were growing weaker.

In the midst of the white fields, Calem 's eyes squinted at a dark, tall figure. When he saw it move away from him, he ran towards it.

"Hey!" the person stopped, as if it had heard him.

When Calam got closer he noticed a thick cloth covering the person's face. Calem could not perceive what the man looked like, but his deep voice sounded elderly when he spoke.

"Are you lost?" the man asked.

"I am. Will you be able to take me to the nearest town? I have nothing with me, but if you took me, I would really appreciate it." The man looked at him for a second, "please," Calem pleaded. He heard the man sigh before he gestured to Calem to follow him.

"We'll be there early in the afternoon tomorrow," he took off his gloves and handed it to Calem. "I could feel you cold with your coat. Come with me."

"Thank you," said Calem, relieved, before tailing him off.

The man placed the dry wood he was carrying at the back of his wagon, and waited for Calem to sit at the back, before he went up to his horse and the wagon moved not long after. There were some crates that had seeds, Calem looked at the man first before he took a handful of it, and fed the remaining four live birds.

Calem felt he could finally take a rest at long last. The second he closed his eyes however, the birds went quiet as well. He opened his eyes and looked to see if he was being tailed by the monster, but the birds started tweeting, claiming that the monster was gone. While still on the lookout, he clasped his shaking hands.

It was tiresome, but Calem tried his best to stay awake, so that if the creature was close, he could keep watch. The man noticed him glancing in every direction, so he checked if there were any wolves or something trailing them, but there was nothing.

"What an odd man," thought the man. The man stopped the wagon near the forest when the sun was setting and took a box that had large covers.

"It is dangerous to keep going at night, help me with the tent," the man said.

With the cage still in his arms, Calem got out of the wagon. The man kept staring at the cage he was carrying, so Calem had to lower his head to avoid the man's gaze. After noticing Calem's reaction, the man turned and placed the cover over the wooden frame he had made.

"Why are you keeping chicks under your arm?" Asked the man. Calem embraced the cage and took some kindling instead from the back of the wagon to start a fire.

"They are not chicks," Calem said.

"What are those, then?"

"Birds," Calem answered. The man never spoke a word and did what he was doing, not asking for more.

When night came, he and the man were sitting in silence by the fire. Calem checked the birds and found that only one was alive, and the others were dead.

"You should release that one," Calem looked at the man who was eating.

"I can't," he almost whispered, "It's all I've got."

"Your birds died under your care. Let go of it. It has the right to fly free rather than you clutching it."

"Under your care, your birds died. Let go of it. Rather than you clutching it, it has the freedom to fly free."

"You don't understand," his voice cracked with the monster in mind, "there has been a monster tailing me for a long time, and this bird tells me if it's closer,". The man snickered like what he said was insane.

'Is that why he had his guard up earlier, then?' The man thought.

"What kind of tales did your mother tell you as a child? There are no monsters, that's just your imagination. Let go of that bird before you kill it, too. Let go, boy."

He glanced at the cage reluctantly and noticed that the bird was staring at him, as if it knew what he was going to do. The man was just watching him decide on his decision.

'Was the monster an imagination? Then who killed the warden and the other prisoners?' Calem asked himself. There were occasions when the prisoners were planning to kill the warden, maybe it wasn't a monster, maybe the man was right, maybe he was paranoid.

Calem opened the cage with a trembling hand and the bird immediately flew out, not bothering to look back at him. He checked to see if the monster was nearby, but instead he felt a hand pat his back.

"See? There's no monster. Get some rest," he said before he went inside the tent, and not long after, Calem followed him.

Calem closed his eyes and tried to hear the birds chirping, but he could only hear the fire crackling. All sounded normal, but he was still alert and checked if everything really was, then he saw the man peacefully sleeping. 'Maybe he was right,' Calem thought, and maybe he was just being paranoid. He closed his eyes with that thought and finally got the rest that he had been missing for a couple of days.

Calem had a good rest without worrying about anything, even stretching his arms with a wide smile, but the second he looked around, he saw the man lying on the ground, bathed in his own blood.

"No," Calem said, looking for the horse, only to see it dead, and the wagon wrecked.

"Has the monster tailed me?" Calem started to panic and went back to the man but his legs weakened when he saw the man's face all beat up.

Calem looked around, his heart raced so rapidly that his hands shook in fear of the monster. His breathing went rigid and just closed his eyes in hopes of calming down. The moment he opened his eyes, he saw a reflection on the man's pool of blood. There he saw the monster that had killed the warden and other prisoners. The monster that he hid from before he was thrown in prison. Calem felt it was at long last the time he confronted the monster that had stolen everyone he loved. The monster was not in his head, it was real.

The monster was him.