RachelEvil

This is something I wrote back when I was in high school, and have re-written and updated for my current style of writing. Be warned, it involves a lot of teen angst horridness.

It was when of those times where life thrusts upon you the need to quickly make a decision. The sort of decision that can alter your entire path in life. All I was doing was standing outside of the store when it happened.
I had been in the mall only to go to the music store. Not much else in the gigantic temple of consumerism really interested me at that time. Well, perhaps I'd also go to the food court for something to eat; maybe some bourbon chicken. I was walking past one of those trendy clothing stores when I saw a sterile white bench, one of the many things that make the mall their natural habitat. I had just walked two miles to get to the mall, so it seemed a good idea to have a seat.
While I sat, I took stock of my surroundings. I saw all the people wandering around. Screaming children, preppy kids in their GAPercrombie and Eaglepostale uniforms, distinctly unhappy adults wallowing in their own banality, a few seniors apparently getting some exercise, and, of course, the exhausted mall employees. Quite the menagerie. My attention soon turned to the store behind me. I looked at the mannequins wearing their brightly pre-faded clothes, and noticed just how much like the people who shop there they were. Plastic, fake, without a will or identity of their own, forced to wear what someone else thought would be a good thing for them to wear.What a horrid existance it must be to be one of them! I could never live as someone who had to be like "everybody else". The sheer dullness of it all would prove fatal for me, I was quite sure, unless I just did myself in out of the despair of living a meaningless existence devoid of identity.
I had been pondering this for about ten seconds when they showed up. They were dressed all in black, carrying a wooden crate, a megaphone, big backpacks, and a few large buckets that seemed to be covered. There were five of them. One set the crate down in front of the store, and another stepped onto it. I noticed that the crate had the name of a brand of soap on it... that guy actually just got up on a soapbox! Holy literalism, Batman. Anyway, the guy on the soapbox grabbed the megaphone and started to speak.
"Listen to me!"
A couple passers-by did so.
"I know many of you are enslaved!"
Some people stopped to watch.
"You are enslaved by your own simple desire for acceptance and conformity!"
The audience started to grow.
"These people" he gestured at the store behind him, "Seek to use your need to be liked against you!"
Those watching had now begun to constitute what could be called a crowd.
"You must free yourselves from the grip of the false consumer gods!"
Now everyone was watching him. The atmosphere had become very tense.
"These places have become like unto temples to you, and you must abandon the temples before they bleed you
dry!"
The crowd began to boo and hiss. A few people, myself included, began to cheer. I had begun to cheer on a lunatic on a soapbox in a mall, and I was enjoying it.
"All gods are created by humans! The corporate gods seek to use us for their own ends, but we must not let them!"
Someone threw something at him. Both cheering and jeering became louder.
"We must destroy what we have created! We must rise up against the gods and eliminate them for all time! Let there be no god but man!"
The rest of the group took the buckets into the store, uncovered them, and threw the messy red contents onto the merchandise.
"Pigs' blood for the corporate pigs!"
I will never be able to forget that smell.
The throbbing mass of the booing crowd threw things and tried to get through the human barrier created by the few who agreed with the speaker. I was among the barrier, pushing back the enraged horde, screaming "Down with consumer conformity!" and other slogans. The booing, throwing, pushing, sloganeering, and screaming continued for
about ten minutes. Store employees and customers kept slipping on the blood, their trendy shoes having no traction whatsoever.
Mall security finally arrived, trying to calm things down. They told the crowd to leave and made the rest of us wait for the authorities to arrive. Quickly, twenty men in khakis, long-sleeved t-shirts, and tech vests lowered themselves from the ceiling on hemp cords. Each carried a large gun with a happy face painted on it.
"Hands against the wall!" screamed one of them. The five demonstrators laughed, but the rest of us who were just going along with it began to get frightened. One of the demonstrators handed out gas masks.
"What are you doing?!" demanded the apparent leader of the troops, "Why do you not respect our power and authority?"
"Lo-sers" remarked another of the troopers.
"You're obviously not cool. We'll have to take you in for questioning" said the leader of the prep-squad.
"I doubt it" said the man with the megaphone, now wearing a gas mask. He then reached into his pocket and took out some sort of grenade. He threw it, and a great cloud of noxious smoke came forth. Nothing could be seen. I had my mask on, but I was still so terrified that I had no idea what else to do.
Suddenly, somebody grabbed me and carried me away. When we were away from the smoke, I saw that it was the man with the megaphone. All the demonstrators and people with them were running like hell. Once everyone was outside the mall, he put me down.
"You did very well in there. Thanks." he said.
"You're welcome, I guess."
"If you want to join us, we'd love to have you. We can use all the help we can get, and I have a good feeling about you."
"Thanks, but no thanks."
"Why not?"
"Well, this was great fun and all, and I certainly agree with you, but..."
"But?"
"But I prefer not to be led."

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Rachel Evil McCall
http://www.rachelevil.com

Alys R.

Stuff I don't like:
[quote]one of the many things that make the mall their natural habitat.[quote]
whose?
unhappy adults wallowing

Stuff I do like:
The story

RachelEvil

[quote="Alys R."]Stuff I don't like:
[quote]one of the many things that make the mall their natural habitat.The benches'.

__________________
Rachel Evil McCall
http://www.rachelevil.com

MisterRaziel

Needs formatting. The carriage returns are wrecking the flow of it.

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Grizzled veteran of the console wars.

bobothegoat

Agreed. I couldn't read it because the formatting drove me crazy... Then again, I'm rather Compulsive about that.

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Bobo the Goat

RachelEvil

Reformatted.

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Rachel Evil McCall
http://www.rachelevil.com

Novicewriter

Very interesting...kept me reading Keep up the good work.

Novicewriter

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"There are only two things that scare me...Dr. Evil and Carnies. You know, circus folk. They have small hands and smell like cabbage."

-Collidescope-

Great. I love the twist at the end, although the 'teen angst', as you said, is a bit irritating.

One thing though, personally for me, is I find it rather hard to believe that a 'rebel with a sleep grenade' could take down a squad of specially trained-well armed men.

Maybe it's just because I'm really into studying the Army and things like that, so it's hard for me to believe something like that.

Very well written, though. Keep it up.

Stepping into oncoming traffic,
Collideascope

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They say you can’t be hip,
But I don’t care what they say,
The thing I got’s cold blooded,
And I’m coming from a brand new place,
I’m dealing quick and I don’t miss a lick and I better don’t leave no trace. -James Brown