Chapter 3

Nobody's P.O.V

Large crowds of survivors gathered up to the large stage that had been set up by rushed soldiers. These soldiers were not from the camp. It was believed that they had barged in last night, but nobody could confirm it until now. There was an old microphone set up for whoever was going to speak. Cross pushed through the crowd of humans and monsters to the front, where he found his husband, Dream. He too was a skeleton, a golden crown on his head and a serious look on his face.

"What's going on?" Cross asked.

"I don't know." Dream answered. "I wasn't told anything about this."

A soldier ran up to the microphone and tapped it twice to test it.

"Testing, testing." They said. "Could everyone please remain silent."

The crowd, as ordered, went silent. No sooner had that happened, the sound of footsteps from a giant monster came. The beast was wearing a dark blanket that shielded them from the view of everyone. The monster walked up to the microphone and smiled under his covers.

"Good morning, residents of survivor camp 53. I am the leader of these soldiers. I'm going to get right into the point."

There remained an unsure silence.

"From this day forward, I am the new leader of this camp."

"Who gave you the right to the camp?" Cross asked.

The monster let out a short, croaky chuckle. "You're original leader retired recently. Let night in fact. I wish I could say it was voluntary, but..."

The monster threw something that he had been hiding under his cloak. The audience parted quickly the it hit the ground with a hard thud. It was a body. The body of a blue, furry, cat-like monster. There was a bloody hole that went right through it's stomach. This body belonged to the original leader, Alex. He was very much dead. Some of the crowd screamed, other's covered the eyes of children, and more let out insults towards the massive monster in front of them.

"SILENCE!" The monster ordered. And everyone turned silent. "Good. If you don't want to end up like our little friend here, then you'll be sure to obey my every order."

The next silence was interrupted by steady footsteps. Those footsteps belonged to Error, who walked up the stairs to the stage. He approached the towering monster with a serious look on his face.

"You have no right to come here, kill our leader and assume that you get to take over everything." Error raised his voice. "We survivors fought for our freedom and we're not letting anybody take it away again!"

The crowds raised their fists to the sky and cheered for Error. The monster under the cloak was not happy about this. He turned to Error and straightened his posture. He was much, much bigger then initially thought. The cloak slid right off his back, revealing the beast underneath. He was a massive, slightly hunched over crocodile. His green scales looked impenetrable, yet he was covered in scars from past battles. Error's eye sockets widened in disbelief. This was not just any crocodile, this was King. The general who ordered the attack on him and all his friends just before they could reach the surviver camp.

"Looks like my first prey." King licked his lips. "You're that glitch that stole Ink from me."

"He's not a piece of property," Error hissed. "he chose me over you because I'm not a murderer."

"Oh, but we both know that's not true."

Error suddenly lashed out, grabbing dark-blue strings from the tear marks under his eye sockets and trusting his hands at King. The strings thrashed out, but King played the same trick he did last time and grabbed the strings, then tugged hard and pulled Error to the ground.

There was a yell from the audience. "Dad!"

King quickly turned his head toward Gradient and PJ, who stood near the front. A wide, evil grin spread across King's face. He grabbed Error by his shirt and held him in the air, so that their eyes met at an equal level.

"So, you and Inky had kids, eh?"

Error glared at King. "If you even think about touching them, I'll kill you."

"Oh, I don't plan on touching them. I have something much worse planned."

King threw Error to the ground and stamped on his back so he wouldn't get up.

"Everybody listen here!" King yelled. "Everyone between the ages on ten and eighteen will be sent off in two hours to another surviver camp!"

The crowd yelled their rebellious words, but that was but to an end quickly when King stomped his other foot on the stage. That stamp sent waves of energy through the ground. The ground reacted and long spikes of earth shot out of the ground, only narrowly missing the crowd.

"You will all obey my command! Or else some executions will have to take place! And I'm sure none of you want that, now do you?"

Nobody answered.

"Good...Gather the children!"

King picked Error up again and threw him into the crowd. He was caught by Dream and Cross. PJ and Gradient tried running to Error, but they were grabbed by two soldiers. They tried to struggle, but they had never gone up against anybody this strong. In truth, most of the children had never even needed to defend themselves. They were all grabbed and taken away, while their parents were held back by a wall of earth spikes.

The soldiers had lists of everyone between the ages of ten and eighteen. With that knowledge, they took all of them away, loading them all into dark, metal trucks. Certain children fought back, like Moon. Moon attacked every soldier daring to come near him his his goopy arms that formed into various sharp weapons. He waved them frantically and roared angrily. But a soldier wielding water magic shot Moon to the ground with a jet of the cold element. In mare moments, Moon was bound by magic-proof cuffs and shoved into the truck.

Lucid, being nineteen, was forced to watch his much younger brother, Faith, be thrown against his will into a truck. He yelled at the soldiers to stop, but they simply turned their heads and blocked out the cries.

More chaos was created when one of the parents broke threw the wall of earth and rammed into the soldiers taking away Goth and Raven. This parent wore a black cloak and held a sharp scythe, giving him the appearance of the Grim Reaper.

"Stand down, warrior!" Ordered a soldier.

"Leave my children alone!" the skeleton yelled.

"Orders must be followed. Stand down or we'll be forced to use lethal force."

He growled and glanced back at his two sons. Goth stood forward.

"I turn nineteen in one month and I am a well valued guard of the wall." Goth explained. "It would be best to let me and my brother stay."

The soldier huffed and looked down at his list, checking if that information was true. Which it was.

"Fine." he said. "But we're taking that boy."

The soldier wielding water caught Raven with a great wave and tossed him into the truck. Goth and his father yelled and ran for the truck, but they were shoved back behind the wall of earth by another wave of water.

Within the hour, all the children had been loaded into the trucks. The survivors, no matter how much they screamed "This isn't fair!", could do nothing to save their children. The great gate opened slowly, the rust of it's old hinges shrieking as it did so. Soldiers kept the crying, yelling and grieving parents away from the trucks as they departed from the safe walls of the camp.