Inciting Events

Chapter 20

Getting back up was a pain, but it was when she actually stood that became the problem. It felt like Magnus had set her entire leg on fire with pain. The second she put any real weight on it, she felt like throwing up or passing out or dying or something like that. It was hard to decipher her thoughts, let alone make them cohesive through the feelings of sheer agony that coursed through her.

Cyrus had already run over to help someone else out who had been calling for a medic for a long time. She saw that it might take him a second to finish up with them and she didn’t want to take his mind off the person he was helping as they seemed to be in even more distress than her.

She reminded herself of the promise she had made literally five seconds before about telling Cyrus immediately if she had any thoughts whatsoever about the cut being bad or getting worse. But she swiftly decided that that didn’t really matter in the midst of everything that was happening. She knew that the second he saw her walking, he would know something was up with her. So, she decided to break another promise she had made to him that night and ventured to the next floor without him.

It was the eightieth floor. The final floor, where Cyrus’s lab was. She looked around and realized that quite a few people were already up there, and she was delighted to see that the people from Helt seemed to be gaining an advantage in the battle of the top floor. She knew that claiming the final floor didn’t necessarily mean that they had won by any means, but it would certainly put them ahead.

She looked forward and was frustrated to see that her brother had managed to get himself headlocked by a guard, she fought the urge to smack her hand against her forehead before going over there to help him out.

She helped him out of that and spent a couple of seconds telling him to be more careful, which was probably extremely ironic coming from her at that moment. But she didn’t think about that.

She continued to fight for a few minutes, but after a little while, she was just too tired, and her leg was aching too much for her to continue. She sunk down the wall to the floor with zero remorse for not taking part in the action at that moment. Right then, she was suffering too much to even think about getting back into it with someone. The soreness felt like torture, and each movement had to struggle even more with trying not to let the tears escape her eyes from the torment.

She focussed on deep breaths so as to take her pain off of her leg and what was happening around her. She felt blood begin to seep past the cheap adhesive of the bandage and onto her bare skin. It completely grossed her out as the crimson red liquid seeped down her legs and clothes, making everything sticky. She slowly began to feel a bit light-headed and really woozy.

The room began to spin, and she wasn’t sure what she was doing there anymore. She vaguely recalled that she had a job to do, but for some, her mind said it wasn’t that important. No, that wasn't like her. She wasn’t like that. Was she like that? Her brain kept reeling as she tried to piece together the puzzle pieces of a puzzle that she wasn’t even sure she actually had in the first place.

She saw someone sit down in front of her, or at least she thought she did. A boy with dark curls and nice eyes faded in and out of her view as she blinked. She didn’t really get a great look at him, but she felt like she knew him somehow. She just wasn’t sure how. Nevertheless, she giggled a bit the more she stared at him. He looked sad, but that wasn’t a good look on him. Ha ha, she chuckled once again, seeing his face get hit with another bit of worry as he took her leg in his hands. He was pretty.

She suddenly realized that she was hearing different muffled sounds, and one of them was the sound of his voice. His voice was pretty, too. She couldn’t make out all the words but she heard something about them winning something. She wasn’t sure what they had won or if it was important, but she guessed that it was good they had won. Since she couldn’t hear him very well, she decided to voice her own words to get him to hear her. But she didn’t have anything great to say, so she just said what she was thinking.

“You’re pretty, like really, really pretty.” The boy looked at her oddly, but she thought she saw a little tint of a pinkish hue to his cheeks. Ha, she had won his affection. Maybe that was what he was talking about. When he said they won something, he must’ve been talking about her winning him over.

Yeah, that sounded real good to her. She could get used to that idea. So, she reached her hand up to touch his pretty face, but her hand fell short in exhaustion and just landed on his knee. She kept trying to get to his cheek, but he just kept putting her hand back down. Until she finally mustered up the strength to reach him, and she did a little happy dance in her head at the achievement.

Everything slowly faded to black, and she wasn’t sure of the specifics that had happened before she passed out, but she did remember saying “My pretty boy”.

(Hope yall like it! Bye!)