[ OT ] Sunday Free Write : Leave A Story , Leave A Comment - The Dark Gift Edition !

Guess I'll post the first chapter of this for critique. Have at it! 
 
 
 “ You ’ re kidding right? Funny joke man. You can put down the knife now. ” A slight smile edged onto Patricia Horro ’ s face. Among her classmates, she was known as ‘ Tack ’, the nickname she had been not so lovingly given, because she had snuck thumbtacks onto approximately half the seats in her homeroom class on the first day of school, of which almost all had been unknowingly sat upon. The culprit had been obvious, as when the class figured out that theirs was not an isolated incident, Tack had burst out into a fit of laughter, crying “ Classic! ” The all too appropriate moniker had stuck with her over the course of two years, and she knew there was no getting rid of it. She didn ’ t particularly mind the nickname, as she didn ’ t care much what others thought of her. So long as she had her fun, Tack was content. 
 
 “ This is no joke, Tack. You ’ re going to die for all the shit you ’ ve done to me, ” The student currently backing Tack into a wall said, with a murderous look in his eye. 
 
 “ Hey hey hey, you wouldn ’ t hurt a girl, would ya? That ’ s not very gentlemanly! ” 
 
 “ Oh yeah Tack? Well let me tell you something! You aren ’ t exactly the epitome of a prim and proper lady! ” At the last word, he lunged forward with the knife, clumsily trying to catch Tack in the stomach. The thrust was weak and misguided, and Tack easily dodged out of the way. Tack would have then retaliated, but she was too deep into her own thoughts to do so. Why was this random guy attacking her? He had said something about Tack doing something to him, but she didn ’ t specifically remember doing anything horrible to the guy. Of course, she might have done something, or a few things, but she simply couldn ’ t remember among all of the pranks she had played. As he swung again, she gave in and asked. 
 
 “ Um, you hate me, I get that, but who are you and what did I- ” She cut off, utterly surprised as the boy in front of her froze. A look of despair crossed his eyes. 
 
 “ You… Don ’ t know who I am? ” He said, with a dumbstruck look on his face. 
 
 “ That ’ s what I said, Sherlock, and I ’ d like to know before you cut me up, so- ” Once again, Tack was cut off in shock as the attacker began shaking, and subsequently fell to his knees. The knife clattered to the floor as it dropped from the hands he could no longer control. 
 
 “ The object of my eternal hatred for two whole years, and you didn ’ t bother to even know who I am? After all you did to me, you never even bother to learn my name? ” The boy began to cry, fat tears dripping from from his eyes. Trembling, he fell to the ground, wracked with the beginnings of sobs 
 
 “ Uhh, yeah, about that… Well I don ’ t really remember doing anything to you either, although I might have. ” The already defeated boy let out an anguished scream. “ Yeah, that didn ’ t help did it? ” Tack muttered, cringing slightly at the sound of the scream. Tack then realized something, and crouched down to face her would-be attacker. 
 
 “ What do you want? ” He blubbered, looking up, a combination of tears and mucus running down his face. 
 
 Tack stepped back, thoroughly perturbed. “ Pathetic, pitiful, painful to watch, ” she said. The boy watched for a second, then put his face back down, going fully limp, absorbing the system shock that Tack had just unintentionally delivered. 
 
 “ Well, I was wondering just where you got this thing from. ” Tack said, toeing the knife away from the prone figure. “ By all reasoning, this thing shouldn ’ t even exist here. ” She was right. The place they were standing now was proof of that. On Island Four of The Archipelago of Education, Tack stood wondering how a knife had not been confiscated on entry, or discovered in the checks of student belongings that happened twice a day. In this day and age, many factors including the checks had brought school violence down to a record low, and serious attacks had become near nonexistent. 
 
 The biggest of these factors was that a large percentage of students in recent years had been sent to a set of seven man-made islands in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, officially called ‘ The Archipelago of Education ’, but more often known as the ‘ Edupelago ’. There, they were sorted by grades into one of the seven islands, the first comprising of only the highest level students, and the last consisting of the future failures and dropouts of life. 
 
 Tack had earned herself a place smack dab in the middle of average, getting in to Island 4. Her grades themselves were excellent, but she had been delegated to the fourth island due to her “ excessive behavioural issues ”. Tack didn ’ t much care that she had been put on the fourth, and decided that average was just fine. It would leave her more time to pull the pranks she loved. She could have talked for hours on what she had put the fellow inhabitants of her small room through. 
 
 She had once heard a rumor that on the first island, the kids were treated like kings, and on the seventh, the living conditions were akin to a putrid jail cell. Tack didn ’ t quite believe either of these, but she thought that the one about the first island might be possible. The rumor about the seventh island however, would quickly raise complaints about the inhumane treatment and would never happen. 
 
 This was because the schools were very tightly controlled. Anything deemed unsafe for a ‘ productive school environment ’ was confiscated or censored. This was why Tack was so confused on how the boy had obtained the weapon that now lay many feet away from him. The materials that potentially could have been used to make a knife were carefully inventoried, and any inconsistency would have raised red flags. A knife was also made of metal, and should have been found out near instantly if he did manage to get one. 
 
 The boy trembled, and said, “ I can ’ t tell you. ” in a small, fearful voice. Tack scoffed at the declaration. 
 
 “ Of course you can! Here, how about it, if you tell me how you got the knife, we can pretend this whole horrifying ordeal had never occurred! ” Tack didn ’ t know why she wanted to know so badly that she ’ d forgive a potentially deadly assault, but she was curious. 
 
 “ B-b-but if they find out that I told you, they ’ d- ” He cut off, his eyes widening. “ Reward me, ” he finished under his breath. 
 
 “ They ’ d…? What would they do? Who is ‘ they ’? ” Tack asked, now even more curious. A mysterious ‘ they ’, and something would happen to this boy. Just what would this ‘ they ’ do to him? 
 
 “ Never mind about that! ” They boy said quickly, surprising Tack. The boy hoisted himself off the ground, wiping his pants of the dirt that coated them. Barely concealing the wealth of joy behind a calm face. He couldn ’ t keep it completely out of his voice, but Tack was too surprised by the sudden change that she didn ’ t notice. “ Okay, um, so, if you go to the second floor bathroom, wait does this work for the girl ’ s bathroom?... ” 
 
 He trailed off, but was quickly back on the offensive. “ Anywho, if this doesn ’ t work, find me again and I ’ ll figure it out! Anyways, the second floor bathroom on the west side of the school, if you go into the second stall there and tape a piece of paper with your request on it, someone will approach you, okay? That ’ s all you have to do! ” 
 
 Tack was still in a minor state of shock after the sudden mood swing of the boy in front of her. How had the assailant who was dejected and crying not twenty seconds before, turned into a bumbling, delighted fool? 
 
 “ Let me tell you, it was hard getting tape up to the bathroom but… ” He launched into the story of his own experience, but Tack was no longer listening. Request? How would ‘ they ’ know she put it there? There were so many questions, and not enough answers. Her thoughtful reverie was brought to an abrupt end by the boy, whose eyes were now shining with glee, asking “ So, what do you think? ” 
 
 Tack wondered for a moment where all that ‘ object of eternal hatred ’ talk had gone, but soon dismissed it as unimportant. 
 
 “ Well, what I think huh? ” She asked. The boy nodded his head fervently. “ Well I think that since I was never assaulted by an aspiring anti hero just now, I heard you say some naughty words just a few minutes ago. ” Tack said, grinning inwardly. The boy looked confused, and tried to recover the conversation. 
 
 “ Um, well sorry about that. Anyways- ” He broke off as Tack began to speak again. 
 
 “ I think that might just deserve a punishment. Oh don ’ t worry, it ’ s nothing too bad. ” Tack said with a mischievous grin on her face. 
 
 “ And that is? ” The boy said in a scared voice, beginning to sweat. 
 
 “ This! ” Tack said as she quickly upended the boy, flipping him upside down and holding him there. 
 
 “ What are you doing!? ” He spluttered, kicking his legs. 
 
 “ Oh, just what you deserve, ” she said, the grin breaking out fully onto her face now. She removed a length of rope she had stolen from art class, a material that was not meticulously counted, and tied the boy ’ s feet to a nearby door frame. Once she had done that, she popped a large amount of cotton into his screaming mouth. The sound now successfully muffled, she began to walk away. 
 
 “ All those martial arts lessons were so worth it, ” she said under her breath, and then giggled to herself all the way down the hall. 
 
 END CHAPTER 1 

