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smolgloves · 4 years

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A Bad First Meeting

Night had fallen, finally the wretched giants were asleep. Aaron and his wife Elizabeth scurried through the passageways of the walls like they were rats. A cold draft brushed past them, forcing them to shiver. This was no place for a human to be, but giants in the states saw them nothing more than pets. Aaron and Elizabeth were lucky to have escaped before their daughter was born, but the streets were cruel and plagued with disease. Now it was a battle of life and death! If they didn't get the advil soon, Aaron feared he and Elizabeth would lose this battle.

Elizabeth peaked her head out of the entrance to make sure the coast was clear. She looked back at Aaron and gave a soft smile. "Let's go."

They ventured onto the bathroom sink, being very quiet with each step they took, despite it being dark, Aaron hated being out in the open like this. Every time the house creaked he couldn't help but jump. They just needed to get the advil and get the hell out of here!

The couple made it to the medicine bottle, thick plastic sealed their cure away from them, but Aaron pulled a rusty nail from his backpack. He dug in further and clasped onto the familiar steel rectangle.

It was a lighter he had gotten for his eighteenth birthday. He was so lucky he was able to hide the trinket from the giants who captured him and his wife, it was the only thing he had left of his former life. And it had been a lifesaver during these cold months of winter, but lighter fluid was hard to come by as a human. There was probably only enough for this mission. Aaron handed his lighter to his wife and used all of his strength to lift the nail up. Elizabeth flicked the lighter a few times before a little orange flame appeared. She ran it under the point of the nail until it was red hot. Aaron drove the nail into the side of the pill bottle, the smell of burning plastic quickly started to fill the room. Once he was able to cut a small hole, he quickly pulled the nail away and let his wife crawl in.

Elizabeth pulled out a circular orange tablet and quickly shoved it in her bag. "Let's go!"

But before they could run, the lights flickered on. Aaron's green eyes locked onto the door and to his horror he saw the giant that occupied the home. He was a terrifying giant with black hair and piercing blue eyes. Tattoos covered various parts of his body, the most notable was the word forever on his neck. But the most chilling thing about him was that he was staring right at Aaron and Elizabeth.

~~~~

The night had only made Zack's headache worse, he couldn't get any sleep. He thought he could just take some more advil and finally go back to sleep, the last thing Zack expected to see were two humans on his sink. He quickly noticed the hole in the pill bottle and the rusted nail beside it.

"Are you fucking kidding me?!" Zack shouted. The couple started running but he plucked one in the air. It was the woman! She was pale and had black hair tied in a bun, with wide blue eyes looking up at him in terror.

"LET HER GO NOW!" The man shouted as he pointed the rusty nail up at him.

Zack had to stifle a laugh. This tiny man looked so weak and sickly, this guy couldn't even grow a full beard yet he was gonna threaten him? "I don't think you're in a position to be making demands."

"Then get your hands off my wife!"

"Not until you tell me why you're here!"

"P… please, we needed the medicine!" The woman cried out.

Zack practically ripped the backpack off of the tiny woman and dug into it to find a pill that was taken. They went through all this trouble for some cold medicine, how desperate were these humans? He took a closer look at the woman and he could see her eyes were sunken in and bloodshot. The husband didn't look much different, his brown hair was slick with sweat and his arms shook more with each passing minute he had to keep that nail pointed up, whatever illness they had was slowly eating them away. The Advil probably wouldn't even do much except prolonged the inevitable.

"You got what you wanted, boy!" The man growled. "Now let her go!"

Something about that didn't sit quite right with Zack, to let them go would mean to send them on a death march. These humans were scared but helpless to the environment out there. Zack knew what he had to do. "I can't let you two go. You need a vet"

The woman gasped and thrashed in his hand. "Please, you won't ever see us again!"

"I believe you." Zack replied grimly. "But you two need help!"

"The hell we do!" The man growled. "The day I trust a giant is going to be the day I fucking die!"

"I'm doing you a favor! So I don't understand why you're trying to be difficult when there's nothing for you guys out there!"

"M-mom?!"

Zack broke his gaze from the two humans and locked onto the new voice. His eyes widened when he saw a teen girl peeking out through that hole at the end of the sink. Her long greasy black hair draped over her face, nearly hiding her green eyes. Her skin was pale and she looked underweight but other than that, she seemed healthier than her parents. Shit, no wonder why they went through all this trouble for an Advil! If there was any more reason to help them, this was it. But the girl looked up at him with fear, Zack couldn't imagine how this looked from her view.

"Hey, it's okay." Zack said softly. "I'm just trying to help your parents."

"Then why did you grab my mom?"

"Well, I need to take your mom somewhere to get better, your dad too. But I promise I'll bring them back to you, unless…" Zack inched his hand closer to the girl. "You would prefer to come along so you could be with them?"

~~~~~~

Aaron's stomach dropped when he heard his daughter's voice. He specifically told Stella not to come along on this mission, now here she was talking to this giant! Rage began filling up when he saw the giant trying to manipulate his daughter into letting him do whatever he wanted with them, the worst part was that it was working. Although her face was twisted with uncertainty, she didn't even flinch when the man got closer to her.

Aaron was ready to charge towards the man and impale his hand with the nail but something shined in his eyes. He looked up to see Elizabeth desperately trying to get it to work one last time, after the tenth try a small flame lit up! Elizabeth quickly ran it under the giant's thumb, it took him a few seconds but when he finally felt the flame he let out a scream and instinctively let go of Elizabeth.

Aaron ran as fast as he could and dove for his falling wife. Thankfully, he caught her before she could fall off the sink, but his lighter continued to fall down to the ground. He turned towards his daughter who stood there frozen. "STELLA RUN!"

Fortunately, Stella snapped out of it and ducked back into the hole. Aaron and Elizabeth used this opportunity to sprint into the hole before the giant could grab them. They emerged into the darkness but didn't stop running, the last thing they could hear was the giant cursing out as he had failed to catch them.

Once they were deep enough in the walls, they stopped. Aaron panted heavily, he felt like he was going to throw up.

"Mom?! Dad?!" Stella began running towards them.

"Stella, stay back!" Elizabeth ordered. "You can't get sick!"

"Are you okay? I was wondering what was taking so long, so I went looking and saw you…." Her voice cracked.

"I'm okay, honey. Just a bit bruised."

Stella sighed in relief. "So did you get the medicine?"

The grim reality sunk in, the giant had taken the medicine and half of their supplies laid scattered on that sink. There was no way they could go back and try to retrieve anything.

Aaron looked his daughter in the eyes. "I'm sorry dear, we couldn't get it."

"But you need it to get better!"

"We know, but we can't stay here."

"You guys aren't in any condition to travel!" Stella racked her brain for a solution. "Maybe that giant was really going to help you!"

"Absolutely not!" Aaron snapped. "That boy looked like trouble."

"But are you sure?" Stella pleaded.

"You know the rules, never trust a giant."

"I know but…" Her voice grew quiet. "I don't want you guys to die."

Elizabeth gave her daughter a soft smile. "Oh Stella, we'll be fine."

"Really?"

"We'll be fine." Aaron reassured. "We've been through tougher situations."

"Now go pack up your things, honey. We need to be out of this place soon."

Stella nodded and ran off, once her footsteps faded away, Aaron and Elizabeth looked at each other. Their smiles were gone.

"What are we going to do now?" Elizabeth cried out.

"We're going to figure it out."

"We won't be able to do this again."

"Maybe we can bear the virus without medicine?"

"Please don't avoid this." Elizabeth's face darkened. "We're going to die."

"No, I'm not giving up… Stella needs us!"

"I know she does, she's so naive." Tears pricked the corners of her eyes. "How is she going to survive without us?"

Aaron looked at his beautiful wife, this sickness was slowly killing them. He pulled Elizabeth in for a hug, unsure what words he could say to comfort her.

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