Shattered Relations | Aru Shah AU |

XX

a/n: fair warning, this chapter gets very dark and heavy, and has a character death. if you're not comfortable dealing with that, i totally understand, i just wanted to give you all a heads-up. Also, swearing, blood and guns tw.

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ARU
Aru felt her mind swim in and out of consciousness, as darkness surrounded her.

Her head felt heavy, and her mouth was dry.

"Aru?" a voice groaned, a familiar voice.

"Mini?" Aru asked. Her throat felt as dry as sandpaper.

"Are you okay?"

"Kind of, I can't see anything." she replied. Aru tried to open her eyes, but a rough substance—cloth?—brushed against her eyes.

Blindfolds.

The delayed reaction of panic set in, like her heart was sluggishly pumping acid through her veins, instead of blood.

Bile rose through her throat, as her previously-scrambled thoughts refused to form coherent memories.

This feeling of being cut off from the world, a vulnerability, an exploitable vulnerability made her want to puke.

She tried to move her hands, but she felt her wrists burn against rope. And, obviously her feet were bound to something solid.

It was ironical, the amount of movies she'd seen hadn't prepared her to the realities of actually being kidnapped.

In the distance, Mini was silent too, before she spoke up, her voice miraculously calm.

"We'll be alright," she said, her voice gentle, and to Aru's ears, unconvincing.

"How will we? We're literally kidnapped; Brynne, Aiden and Rudy don't know where we are-"

"That's... not true." Mini said, and just as she was about to continue, they heard a distant clang, and she fell silent.

Aru heard footsteps, and stiffened. Was she going to be shot?

The pressure around her eyelids loosened, and her blindfold fell. Aru blinked, her eyes burning at the sudden exposure to light.

Her vision cleared, and she saw Nate Grant, looking more haggard and pale than before, his hands still shaking, and still holding that revolver.

"You don't have to do this," Mini choked out, her eyes fixed on the gun. She didn't have her glasses, and Aru felt a surge of panic at that detail.

"SHUT UP," Nate snapped, probably louder than he'd intended. Both Aru and Mini flinched.

"I—shit. This wasn't supposed to happen," he muttered.

"What wasn't supposed to happen?" Aru blurted out.

Nate glared at her, his gun-hand shaking.

"I can't screw this up, not after they took her, not after... the Cloversnam debacle." He continued his incoherent muttering, before nervously scratching the back of his head.

The jarring realization hit Aru like a truck. "It was you," she mumbled, "You were the guard at Cloversnam."

He ignored her, and Aru caught Mini's eye.

She tried to wriggle out of her bonds, and Mini mirrored her movements, but both of them sank back, defeated.

Aru scanned her surroundings, which were just dirty white-washed walls, and a narrow, blue metal door from which Nate had come through.

Distantly, from outside the blue door, Aru heard more footsteps, and some grunting and shuffling.

Aru heard an ear-piercing shriek, as somebody stumbled into the room...

Leslie fell to the floor, her face pale and her eyes wide in terror.

Aru was about to call out to her, but Nate beat her to it.

"Oh God—are you okay?" He knelt down, his own eyes wide, as Leslie scooted away from him.

"What are you doing here? Is—is that a gun?"

Her eyes caught sight of Aru and Mini, tied up. "What are they doing here?!"

"Listen, I can explain—" Nate began, but the sharp click of a gun being loaded came from the door.

Aru dragged her eyes up to see Lenguine, as her stomach turned. Nate might have been hesitant to shoot them, but she knew that Lenguine didn't have the moral dilemma Nate had.

Lenguine's gun was pointed right at Leslie, but a crooked grin came onto his face, as he caught sight of Aru and Mini.

"Good job, Nathaniel," he said, his husky voice harsh and metallic to her ears. Aru felt a surge of savage pleasure when she saw that his nose was still deformed.

His gun turned to Mini, who whimpered, her eyes fixed on it.

He clenched his jaw, and said, "I've been fantasizing about shooting you ever since your boyfriend gave me this," before he gestured to his nose.

Aru felt a feeling similar to her chest caving in, as her stomach fell, with another click of the safety being undone...

Mini's going to die, I'm going to die, oh God, oh God-

Reflexively, she shut her eyes, until...

"Nathaniel, we'll need to get your sister out of the way." Lenguine's voice was smooth. Guiltless.

"Wh-what are you talking about?" Nate stammered. He'd helped Leslie up, and was currently supporting her.

"She's seen too much. We can't have her spilling the beans to the other cops now, can we?" Lenguine's voice was quiet, but his tone was razor-sharp, and his lip curled into a sneer of distaste at the mention of his "official" colleagues.

Aru's heart began to beat faster, her eyes following the silver body of the tiny gun, each click echoing a thousand times in her ears.

It was pointed right at Leslie.

Her eyes refused to believe that a shot had been fired until its bang was a ringing echo in her ears.

Her mind refused to believe, but it was real, the dead body on the floor, the pool of blood slowly spreading, Nate's inconsolable howl a distant echo to her.

She refused to believe that an innocent was dead, but the proof was right in front of her, in the form of glassy eyes and blood-spotted skin.

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a/n: i was listening to 'safe and sound' from the hunger games soundtrack while writing this chapter and the IRONY-

✨dead sisters everywhere✨— [gets shot]

on another note, my exams ended today, which is why an early update for you all!

Plus, I've updated the cover and title, you might have noticed.

edit: while i was proofreading this, i hurriedly scrolled up and rewrote a part JUST SO THAT lenguine could call rudy "mini's boyfriend".