Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-25655620-20141205134352

Now, before you start reading, a quick disclaimer.

1: This is my first story.

2: English is not my first language, so every grammatical correction is appreciated.

3: I would like you to nitpick a bit.

Crows eat children.

That is what kids in my school always told me.

I don't remember when this thing started but I think it was around the 1st year, in middle school, where we were in that strange phase in where you are a kid but you think you know everything about life.

The myth started when a bunch of children were murdered near our  city, they obviously made the first page in the newspaper and the photo they used had some crows in it, they were immediately associated with the murder because of our juvenile mind, and someone started to say that crows kill and eat children.

I remember that especially in my class people always talked about it, it was kinda like the bloody Mary of our school, when someone didn't come to school we said "the crows must have got him".

The strange part is that almost everyone in the school believed this myth, they avoided crows at all costs, which wasn't hard to do, but it looked really stupid from the outside.

I was one the few skeptics in the school, and this was the reason I got picked on, I didn't mind much, considering it was for not believing an urban legend, but when my friends started to call me names too, I had enough.

It happened near the end of the school year, my best friend Jon was talking about them and, as always, I replied with: "yeah whatever"

"Do I hear a hint of skepticism Kyle?"

"You don't really expect me to believe this, do you?"

"But of course, the evidences are right under your nose, how come in every photo for a murder there are crows in it?"

"Crows are just really common in this town.”

"Oh yeah? Than I suppose Mr. Skeptic Mc skeptical wouldn't mind to step a foot in a group of them."

I twitched a little.

"You know that crows are still dangerous, right? I could get hurt"

"Or maybe you just don't want to die, because you know they will kill you, in fact, I double dare you to do it!"

What can I say, I was a kid, barely ten, a double dare had still a mysterious power over me, needless to say, I accepted.

As I said, crows were pretty common in our town, so finding some wasn't a problem.

We went near a church and soon some crows came down, we observed from a bit away as my friend was still terrified, then I started walking towards them,  I was bit scared but nothing would have kept me from winning a double dare.

I stopped near the crows and began tiptoeing to them, making sure not to scare them and make them go away.

My friend looked in shock, I was in the middle of a storm of crows, and I was alright, simply nothing happened.

After standing still with the crows for a while, I slowly came back to my friend, he immediately tried to save himself by saying.

"Whatever, that doesn't prove they don't kill people, I think they kill only at night."

"Who cares, I won the dare, now let's see what you could do for me."

I looked around and noticed that a feather was stuck in my pockets,  I decided that it would be a fun punishment to make Jon hold that feather for a week, seeing as he still believed the myth.

I told him my idea, but we both agreed that a week was too much so we opted for just three days.

Two days later, at school, Jon sat near during break and we started talking like always, I asked him about the crows, just to be a dick I guess,  I wasn't even expecting a response, but he answered anyway.

"Oh yeah, thank god tomorrow is the last day, I don't think I could stand more."

"What do you mean?"

"The feather, it's really messing with me, it gave me a bit of paranoia,  and I mean nothing happened, but I can't sleep with it near me."

"Oh god, that's what you meant? You had me worried."

"Naaa it's cool man, I never really believed the myth, but it still scares me. And speaking of which, do you want to come for a sleep over with me tomorrow? I really need some company"

I gladly accepted and the day went like usual.

The next day I went to Jon's house for the sleep over, we mostly played videogames and watched movies, eating all the junk food we could get.

Around midnight we decided that it was enough, so we went to bed and tried to catch some sleep.

Not long after we laid in bed, Jon called me, he couldn't sleep, so he asked me if he could throw the feather out of the window, seeing as the punishment was over, I didn't mind, so I said yes, he got up, opened the window and threw the feather outside.

He sighted in relief, as he could finally sleep without problems, he looked at me a bit embarrassed, but seemingly happy, he began closing the window to go back to bed, when suddenly we heard a crow chirping, he instinctively closed the window with all his strength.

A crow came flying near the window, Jon screamed and we both ran to his parent's room, I was a bit scared too but mainly because of sudden noise the crow made, once there we woke them up and told them about the crow, we were both impressionable kids, so we overreacted a bit describing what happened, naturally they didn't believed us, but then we heard a window crashing.

We all got out of the room, Jon's father looked at the window and then on floor and nearly vomited, as the window was now completely broken, and on the floor was an enormous pile of dead crows, with a puddle of blood.

Jon's parents looked at each other, they didn't know what to do, it was the first time something like this happened.

We were a little uncertain of what the nature of this thing was, it seemed so strange that a group of crows just casually crashed inside Jon's room. Jon's father walked slowly towards the bloody mess, he was looking at it cryptically, when he noticed that "it" was doing the same thing.

The pile of crows had a big black eye in the middle of his "body", and was staring directly at Jon's dad, who took a slow step back, in fear.

The creature then looked at Jon, then stood up, growing a pair of bird feet.

We were all paralyzed by shock, we didn't knew what was happening or what it would happen, the creature kept looking at Jon, after a few seconds, he grew a giant beak under his eye and screeched.

The creature began shifting, growing an arm made of feathers with beaks for fingers, it extended and hit Jon's father, launching him against the wall.

We quickly run downstairs screaming, we went for the door but the creature extended his arm once again, grabbing Jon's mother by the leg and throwing her behind himself.

Jon opened the door and was about to exit, when the creature jumped downstairs, he hit me before I could get out, making me hit the head on the wall,  then grabbed Jon with a foot, he hit him with his beak in the chest, and preceded to eat him, while I stood there, watching, barely alive, waiting him to kill me too.

Luckily someone called the police due to all the noise, and when the creature heard the sirens, he went out and left, transforming into a cloud of crows and flying away, then I lost consciousness.

I awoke in a hospital room, with Jon's parents with me, I was badly injured but I was alive.

I had several ribs broken, some organs wounded and an internal bleeding, so they had to operate on me, they operated Jon's parents too but they were too injured and didn't make it.

After I got better me and my family moved away, since then I developed a phobia for crows, and I also had reoccurring nightmares of that creature, just staring at me and screeching, so I started to see a therapist.

After some time of the therapy, I started having different dreams, the creature is facing the opposite direction, then loses his feathers, and transforms into a human, with grey clothes and black gloves, he stays still for a while than slowly turns back and looks at me, waving is hand at me.

According to my therapist, this all thing is an auto defense mechanism caused by a trauma, and the creature would be just a person who killed Jon's family. 