Benjamin was angry. He ran down the steps of the porch, a determination and strength building up inside of him as he fought back the fear from taking over.

The flashlight provided some guidance, helping him avoid trees, but under the cover of the fallen leaves seemed to lurk copious amounts of roots, determined to make him trip and fall at every turn. The silver kitchen knife was heavy in his hand as he ran, and the moonlight reflected against it as he moved.

I have to find Sadie.

Benjamin ran, he had no goal of where he was running to or what he was hoping to find, all that he knew was that Sadie was somewhere in these woods, and there was no way that he was going to let her die.

‘Sadie!?’ he called out as he ran.

Benjamin stopped for a few seconds, allowing his lungs some much needed air.

Sadie was innocent in all this. Sadie was never involved in the plan with Benjamin, Parker and as it turned out, Deon. Sadie hadn’t done anything to push Rosalie into breaking up with Christopher. Sadie was innocent. Benjamin had seen enough pain and suffering, he wanted this all to be over, but most importantly he was determined to get Sadie out of this alive.

He heard a noise to his left and he quickly moved his flashlight to shine in the direction, but the weak glow didn’t show him anything more than trees.

‘I know you’re out there Chris!’ he screamed, continuing to run in the direction of the noise he heard.

He stopped after a few moments, looking around himself to try and see any sign of Christopher or Sadie.

‘Come on Chris! Sadie didn’t do anything wrong! It’s me you want!’ He screamed into the darkness but got no response.

The sudden silence of the forest was maddening and the anger in Benjamin felt was surging through his veins.

‘Come get me! Leave her alone!’ he screamed, throwing the knife in his hand against a tree. The silver blade hit the tree with force, falling against the forest floor.

Benjamin took a breath, realising that his anger was doing nothing.

He used his flashlight to find the blade again, gripping the end in his fist. Looking around, he realised that he had no clue where he was and how to get back to the cabin, for that matter. Benjamin didn’t care, he wasn’t going to go back to the cabin until he had either found Sadie or killed Christopher.

Benjamin wanted Christopher dead. He wasn’t going to hide it. If he got the chance he would kill him to protect Rosalie, to protect this friends. Even though he hadn’t been there, the image of Christopher killing Deon stuck in Benjamin’s mind. Deon, Benjamin and Parker had been inseparable for many years, and Benjamin wanted revenge for his friend’s death.  

‘Christopher! I know what you’re doing, it was my fault that you thought Rose cheated, not Sadies, please Chris!’

He was greeted again by the deafening silence of the woods around him. He kept walking in the direction he heard the first noises from, gripping the knife tight in his hand.

The realisation that he had left Rosalie and Parker back at the cabin, unprotected, sent more fear through him.

I have to find Sadie, but I need to keep Rose and Parker safe too.

A part of him wanted to run straight back to Rosalie wherever she was, but he couldn’t leave Sadie out here alone.

‘Sadie?!’ he called out again, but this time he heard the crunch of leaves to his side.

He ran for a few moments, the flashlight light swinging around, illuminating the trees around him. Benjamin stopped the flashlight when he saw it.

His breath caught in his throat and he paused, dropping the knife from his hand instantly.

‘Sadie!’ he gasped, lunging towards the girl.

Sadie had been tied to the low overhanging branches of one of the trees, her feet a few inches off the ground and her arms above her head. The girl’s blonde hair was a mess, tangled and full of leaves, her clothes stained with dirt. Benjamin assumed by the look of her, that Chris must have dragged her through the woods.

Benjamin’s first thoughts were that she was dead, the girl completely still.

He placed a hand on her cheek gently, ‘Sadie? Sadie? Wake-up!’

She didn’t show any response so he moved his hand down to her neck, feeling the weak pulse which lay just under her skin.

He breathed a sigh of relief, she was alive.

He raked the light of the flashlight over her body, checking for injury. She didn’t have any open wounds that he could see, other than a few shallow cuts on her neck, legs and arms. He noticed some blood as it dripped down her forehead, and he pulled back the hair on her left side to reveal even more blood, the red liquid covering his fingers. Christopher must have hit her with something to make her pass out.

‘Sadie, can you hear me?’ he asked desperately, but she was defiantly unconscious.

Benjamin remembered the knife he had with him, so he turned away from Sadie, searching the forest floor for the blade. Eventually he found it, grasping the hilt tight in his blood soaked fingers.

He walked back to the girl, reaching up with the knife and dragging the blade across the rope which bound her hands to the tree branch.

It took a few moments but the rope gave way to the knife, sending Sadies body falling down towards the leaf ridden forest floor. Benjamin managed to catch her, setting her body on the ground slowly and placing the knife next to her body.

‘Sadie, come on, wake up’ he tried to rouse her from unconsciousness, but the girl stayed unresponsive. The only signs that she was still living were her shallow breaths and the slight rise and fall of her chest.

‘Sadie!’

Finally the blonde’s eyelids fluttered open for a few seconds before closing again. Benjamin let out a breath of relief. He needed to get her back to the cabin, they could look after her there until sunrise. Benjamin was about to pick her up when the voice sounded from behind him. The first thing he did was grab the knife which lay besides Sadie.

‘How did I know that good old Ben would come and save the damsel in distress?’

Christopher’s voice was hard, but had a light tone, like he was teasing Benjamin.

Benjamin turned instantly, and stood, shielding Sadie’s body with his own. He brought the flashlight up to shine where he heard the voice, and there he was, Christopher.

He looked awful, his face was full of dark lines, his green eyes seemed to be almost hard, holding no emotion whatsoever. He was wearing a dark hoodie with dark jeans, but Benjamin could see the blood which covered them and the little strips of bare skin that weren’t covered by clothes. His face, however, was void of blood. There was a large blade hanging from the side of Christopher’s jeans.

Benjamin held his knife tighter in his grasp and it was almost like his hand was yearning to stab the blade deep within the man in front of him, making sure that he would never hurt somebody that Benjamin cared about again. Benjamin took his eyes off Christopher, only for a moment, and looked down at Sadie behind him. She was alright, her eyelids were moving slightly and she seemed to be slowly regaining consciousness. Sadie needed to get out of there, she needed to go back to the safety of the cabin with Rosalie and Parker. Benjamin was in no way, shape or form going to let the innocent girl get hurt by Christopher.

Benjamin looked up towards Christopher, who hadn’t moved, but instead was just looking at Benjamin, a slight sadistic smile on his lips and a twinge to his eyes which send a chill down Benjamin’s spine.

‘Let Sadie go Chris, this doesn’t concern her!’ Benjamin tried to make his voice sound forceful and harsh, like he was in control, but even Benjamin knew that he wasn’t the one with control here. He had an injured girl behind him, and even though Benjamin was physically taller and bigger than Christopher, the other man had shown that he was able to take down people bigger than himself, shown by the attack on Deon.

Benjamin wasn’t sure what he had expected Christopher to do or say, but his reaction surprised Benjamin none the less.

In response, Christopher laughed, a fake, condescending sound which caused anger to flow freely through Benjamin. The laugh only reached his mouth, not spreading to his hard eyes, but somehow making them look even harder, more vicious in the low light of the flashlight.

‘You’re so naïve Ben. We are all involved in this now. Each and every single one of you had a hand in what happened, you know that.’

‘They didn’t do anything, it was just me.’ Benjamin told him, keeping all emotion from his voice.

‘Now that is a lie,’ Christopher almost laughed.

‘What do you want?’

‘What do I want?’ Christopher asked casually, ‘well, I want everyone who took Rosy away from me dead. Is that so much to ask?’

The way he said Rosalie’s name really got to Benjamin. “Rosy”. Christopher was the only person who ever called Rosalie by that name and at the time she had loved it, it was a sign of their closeness and intimacy, which Benjamin always envied and detested. Each time he had heard “Rosy” while at school he had wanted to close his eyes and shut out the cruel reality that told him the girl he was in love with was actually with another. The same malicious and malevolent reality that reminded him time and time again that she loved Christopher, that the girl he loved was not just with another man, but she loved another man. It got worse, however, when Christopher had turned out not to be Mr Perfect, and that’s when the name angered him, he still detested and loathed the use of the name, but now those emotions were accompanied by an anger, a fury held deep inside which loathed the idea of Rosalie being with someone that could do such things, of Rosalie loving someone who could do such things. Christopher was a bad person, he didn’t deserve to be close to Rosalie, to receive her precious love. However, he had never heard Christopher say the name in abhorrence or in anger, so when he said the name, it sounded different, it represented something else.

Christopher didn’t want Rosalie back. He wanted Rosalie to suffer.

Benjamin knew that for certain now.

Benjamin didn’t say anything in reply, he just stared into Christopher’s cold, hard eyes.

‘You see Ben, we had it all perfect, Rosy and I. Then you and your group of moronic friends decided to mess with our business, and then guess what happened, well’ he laughed, ‘You know what happened. So, now I am just here to get Rosy back, oh and stop you guys from interfering ever again.’

Benjamin knew that he didn’t just want Rosalie back, he wanted her to pay as much as he wanted Benjamin to pay. 

‘I won’t let you hurt her,’ Benjamin told him, holding eye contact. He was talking about Rosalie but the words held the same meaning for Sadie as well.

‘I’m afraid it’s not up to you Ben.’ Christopher shook his head in mock sympathy, the action was condescending and arrogant, which only antagonised Benjamin further.

They both looked at each other, waiting for someone to make a move.

Slowly, Christopher clasped the hilt of his blade, drawing it.

‘You’d better run now Ben, leave Sadie here, I’ll be sure to look after her’ he winked, an evil and sadistic undertone to his voice that conjured up images of Christopher happily slaughtering his friend without so much as a slight hesitation. He imagined the way he would push the knife past her delicate skin, the way Christopher’s hands would be soaked in her blood. He imagined Christopher brazenly smiling that sadistic, crooked grin of his at the death and destruction he had caused as he wiped a bloody knife against his pants. He imagined her breathing out a rough, weak breath that would be her last before her body became nothing but an empty shell, a reminder of the life that was lost, the future gone forever. He imagined the forest floor, how the leaves would be soaked in blood. Sadie’s blood. Innocent blood.

Benjamin lunged forward in an attempt to slash Christopher’s arm with the blade, but Christopher expected the move, grabbing his hand and pushing Benjamin up against a tree.

Benjamin fought back, his arms moving against a strong grip. The knife grazed Christopher’s cheek, leaving a thick trail of blood in its wake. The victory was unfortunately short-lived, Christopher grabbed at his arm with one hand and with the other he forcefully pushed Benjamin up against the tree again, this time Benjamin’s head hitting the hard surface. The knife dropped from Benjamin’s hand, falling with a soft thud into the ground below. Benjamin wasn’t going to give up that easily, bringing his free arm up to punch Christopher square in the jaw.

Christopher wasn’t expecting the blow, he stumbled back, before regaining his balance. Benjamin used Christopher’s surprise at the punch to his advantage, grabbing his wrist and knocking the knife from the other man’s hand.

Benjamin punched Christopher again but as his hand was about to connect with the man’s jaw, Christopher managed to move. Benjamin had been expecting to make contact, so when his fist only hit air, it threw him off balance, his body weight unstable on his feet for a moment. It was only one miniscule moment, but that was all Christopher needed.

Christopher saw this and tackled him into the ground, both of them landing with a hard thud into the ground below. Punches were thrown but Christopher got the upper hand, managing to get on top of Benjamin.

Benjamin watched in horror as Christopher’s fist connected painfully hard with his head, and the metallic taste of blood filled his mouth.

Benjamin’s vision faded to black, and his last lucid thoughts were of Rosalie.

Don't kill me for the ending! *hides in corner*

Nah, I know you beautiful people would never do that, right?

Anyway, hope you enjoyed the chapter or it scared the hell out of you, either way, please leave a vote/comment!

{Oh, and if you were wondering, there's about four more chapters left, but that might get extended to five more, I'll keep you guys updated on that}