More Diomedes

The evening was chilled, icy wind blowing through the trees above young Diomedes.  The sun had just begun to dwindle behind the slight mountains behind him, the sky's purpling light the only source of brightness in the growing shadows.  The orphan faced a creek with jagged rocks protruding from the velvety silt in the bed of the stream, his bare toes in the lapping water.  With a decisive tuck of his hair behind one ear, he plunged a callused foot into the frosty stream.  His face scrunched up in distaste at the numbness taking over his shin, but he continued to plod along, his pace moving as quickly as he dared in the current of the miniature river.  A stone hidden beneath the mud cut in the heel of his foot, making him falter in his steps and fall face-first into the arctic liquid.  The boy's head popped back up.  He glanced over his shoulder before standing, eyes skimming the forest for any movement.  He was gasping now, his lungs hungry for the bitter air around him, the child's raw throat stinging as the air passed through it.  He spotted the beam of a flashlight and ducked under the water, instantly losing feeling in his extremities as he did so.  An Enemy was after him, only his black outline visible in the dying light.  Dio held his breath, his tiny hands clasped over his mouth to prevent any air bubbles from escaping.  His savvy eyes stared at the soot below him, ears listening for any sound indicating that the Enemy was coming his way.  The crackle of leaves crunching away from him informed him that he was in the clear.  He emerged, taking in a swallow of fresh air and ambling to the opposite bank, where he commenced to hobble along, the watery blood oozing from his heel becoming littered with crumbled bits of last Fall's leaves.  The forest stretched on before him, seeming to have no end.
His damp clothes clung to his skin, the sweatshirt he'd been wearing no longer providing him anything even remotely close to warmth.  The oversized jeans around his thin waist sagged as he lurched along, one of his trembling hands constantly holding the pants' waistline to try to keep them up.  
The matted hair on his head dripped pregnant drops, the beads trickling down the length of his neck.  Somewhere far off in the distance an owl let out a who and took flight, the sound of its feathered wings rubbing against each other sounding like the wind blowing through the trees.  Something else, presumably a fox, got itself caught in a trap, a metallic clapping instantly followed ear-piercing scream exploding from the belly of the woods.  Surprisingly enough, this did not disturb the boy as he limped to the edge of the woods.  The pain in his foot was provoked as he stepped onto the asphalt of a highway.  Dio didn't like to be as vulnerable as he was on a road.  Especially when the Enemies were so close behind him.  
Weary, he forced himself to take a seat at the side of the road, the shy moon above him just now creeping out from its hiding place in the east.  He watched it for a moment, panting and listening for any Enemies.  Eventually, he was convinced that the person (or people) had taken the wrong route to find him.  He stood shakily, following the degenerating road in hopes of finding a town.
As he walked, his mind wandered.  Would he get away from the Enemies?  How many Enemies were tracking him?  He didn't really know, but his hopes were that only one of the men following him.  He thought of the family he had left and of how he left them, his glimmering eyes tracing the beads of white in the blue sky above him.  The child pondered where he'd go next, his mind returning back to the events that had occurred just before he had fled home.  His adoptive father had been grasping the knife, while his wife held onto his tiny arms.  Their son had just finished wailing on him, causing purple bruises to coat his body.  His father had moved in at him, aiming for the throat.  Then, miraculously, he got away.  
Being lost in his thoughts, the boy did not hear the approaching car.

The Sanders merrily drove down the snaking highway.  The family of four was on their way back to their home in Charlotte from a trip to visit family in Kentucky.  They were currently in Marion, North Carolina, around two hours away from their destination.  In the backseat of the van was a youth Diomedes' age and a girl a year older.  The younger of the two, a boy named Enoch, was dozing in his seat, the smooth movements of the car having lulled him into a catnap.  His thick brown hair was angled upwards where his head contacted the cushion of the seat, his eyes closed peacefully, breath coming in relaxed intervals.
The teen seated next to him was his sister, older by only a year and named Maxine, her fingers busy typing in a text message to one of her old friends in Charleston.  She heaved a sigh as the phone slid back into her pocket, allowing tufts of hair to hang in her eyes.  The black haired girl corrected the direction of her bangs after a moment and said, "Are we almost back?  I'm getting bored."
Her mother replied, looking back at Max from the GPS. "I think we have another hour or two.  Just try to relax, all right Maxi?" Her daughter nodded calmly, considering the option of sleep when something caught her eye in front of them.
"Look out!" she yelled, pointing forward.  In the road, Dio stared up at the stars, a lost expression on his petite face.  Max's father slammed on the brakes, causing the tires to scream.  Enoch jerked awake with a sharp gasp, his seatbelt preventing him from flying forward into the back of his father's seat as well as knocking the wind out of him.  Max was yanked back, her cell phone vibrating to indicate an incoming text message as her head clanked into the back of the seat.  The car came to a complete stop.
Diomedes shrieked in terror and stared at the car from the side of the road, his chest inflating and deflating from shallow pants, eyes alive with pure horror, hands gripping the grass beneath him.  The heat emitting from the vehicle felt amazing on his cheek although the smell of exhaust nauseated him—as the past month had already succeeded in doing.
The car doors came flying open.  Dio slouched in the grass further, watching them from over the top of the wild foliage.  The man shuffled about, his work boots kicking gravel pebbles on the asphalt.  
They began to speak with one another, asking what they had seen, where it had been and where it was now.  Dio shifted uncomfortably, the bruises on his body crying out in protest over his current sprawled position on the sloped hill.  When he budged, something solid and blunt pressed into a splotch of purpled skin on his belly.  Without meaning to, he let out a noisy whimper, all of the pain finally taking him over as one hand released the grass and rubbed the offended area on his stomach.  Enoch had heard him and was the first to look down at him. "Look," Enoch said, a chipper grin on his face, "a boy!"
       And that was when Dio blacked out from exhaustion and pain.