How hard could it be? • LM / SS

Chapter 122

"And did the thought ever cross your mind about what it would do to us?" his face twisted, hands clenched by his side. He had made every excuse in the book for why his mother would do this, convincing himself that there was a logical reason behind it all. That maybe, just maybe, there was another side to the story, something that had been lost in translation or something that Deaton had gotten wrong. "This has made our lives a living hell! It's a curse, did you know that? Because it's most definitely not a fucking blessing."

"I know and I'm so incredibly sorry—"

"You don't know!! Do you have any idea what we've been through the last few months? Jade KILLED people, mom. She took seven people's lives, people who had families! Your daughter has had to live through hell for what she has done. Do you know Mel threatened to kick her out? Nobody's talking to her, apart from me and Lilith. I can't go a day without having a vision anymore! And that's on you. It's all on fucking you."

"I'm sorry."

                                            ~

"What about him?" Noshiko Yukimura asked, biting a hangnail off her thumb. Her neck was craned to the side, trying to see out of the wing mirror located on the opposite side of her car. Well, she said her car, but it was Melissa McCall's.

"No. He's in here every week with a new self-diagnosis," Melissa sighed as she sat back in her chair, arms tightly folded across her chest. Their set task was to keep watch on who went in and out of the hospital, trying to catch out anyone who looked suspicious or wasn't regulars. Basically, anyone that could potentially be the Benefactor. So far it wasn't proving successful, the closest they'd gotten being an old man who had been acting shifty, but had just sprained his ankle.

It was starting to feel like time wasn't in their favour today, the minutes dwindling faster when she glanced at the clock on her screen. Counting down the seconds until her only son and nephew would be ripped away. For good, this time. Not in some hoax or some game or anything to that effect; for good.

"Hypochondriac?"

"Prescription drug addict."

"Maybe we should send him Cathál's way," Nathan muttered under his breath, not loud enough for the two adults in the front seats to hear, but loud enough to earn a quiet shush from his sister. Okay, he knew how Blair felt about drug jokes, but she also knew that it was his way of coping. He had to make the occasional 'my dad's sorta, kinda a drug dealer' joke, otherwise he would go completely insane.

"Why are we doing this?" Melissa threw her hands up in exasperation, the severity of what was happening starting to hit with every taunting second that ticked by. "Why are we asking them to fight these kinds of fights?"

It wasn't fair. They were teenagers, all from the ages of fifteen to seventeen. They shouldn't have to deal with this. Instead of worrying about who would be killed next, they should have been anxious over whether or not they failed that maths exam. Or what their next outfit would be for a party that would without a doubt have underage drinking involved.

They most definitely shouldn't be this careless with their lives; it wasn't some joke! It was precious, and someday, one of them would push the barriers of fate too far. One day, one of them weren't going to come back from this.

Noshiko answered almost straight away, her solution being memorised since the day she learnt what she was. The golden rule that she had passed down to Kira, that she hoped Kira would pass down to her own children. "Otherwise we would be asking them to run and hide."

The lights in the hospital went out, enveloping the car park in pure darkness, as well as anything within eye distance of the building.

Blair had a firm hold on Nathan's sleeve, not wanting to be put in a situation like the one they had seen yesterday. Her fingers tapped away noisily on her phone as she tried to figure out where exactly Liberty was. Emergency lights flickered on and off, not sure whether they were meant to kick into action or not as the group of four walked quickly through the corridors.