The Ivory Swan

Chapter One

Chapter One Ruby

Maine is cold during the winter; however you don't really think of that while running for your life down the twisting hallways of an insane asylum. Right now, all I can really focus on now is surviving the next twenty minutes. I turn to Blake, my partner, beside me and stare at her in annoyance. The footsteps and the shouts of the guard could be heard a few meters away.

"There are at least seventeen ways this could have gone better. Literally, like, I'm counting them right now, you moron." She glares at me and stops dead in her tracks. "What are you doing?" I shout.

"It's not my fault you didn't know your job well enough. You were supposed to kill the guy, I was the distraction."

"I did kill him; you were just a lousy excuse for a diversion." I stopped and found myself stepping towards her as the shouts of the halls echoed nearer and nearer. I could feel my hands form into fists. Three guards come around the corner and stumble at the two girls glaring and shouting in the hall. they race closer but Blake is being immature and completely ignores them. "Came on!"  I pull my fist back and take a swing. She closes her eyes, and shifts to the side allowing me a clear shot to the guard ready to attack her from behind. He backed up holding his now bloody nose. 

"How was I supposed to know the alarms were turned on just," she looks at her watch, "three minutes ago? You were supposed to look into the history of the place." She threw her elbow back into the same guard causing him to double-over. She finished him off with a swift blow to the base of the neck knocking him out cold. the third guy The other guards were soon catching up to us.

"Let's finish this back at the base. We don't have time for this!" She gave me a strange look.

"Oh no, we are dealing with this now! You are not about to give me the cold shoulder for three hours back to base!I can't stand it when you go blaming me and hating me for no reason." I could see the rage and fury hidden deep in her eyes, and I knew there was no avoiding this.

"First off, I did check the alarm system, and secondly I think you should apologize for being so cold."

I sigh knowing that arguing is no good right now. "Fine, I'm sorry, but can we hurry up and head back." More guards turned the corner. "No time for explaining now, we just need to go!" 

Reaching out and grabbing her arm, I practically had to drag Blake all the way out of the institute. Even with that we made it back to the ski boats resting at the docks in record time. Our 'great' plan still pulled through in the end.  I jump on as Blake starts up her engine, and races off into the night, still upset.

"I don't know why I put up with her." I mutter. I start the engine and race to our so called home. "Her stupid shenanigans almost got us killed!" I look ahead into the never ending nighttime environments, thinking of all seventeen ways that could have gone better. Barely visible ahead on the horizon, Blake flew over the water. It took me a good few minutes to catch up to her. 

The rest of the trip was silent, each one of us in our own brooding mindset, blaming the other for the almost life threatening experience. This happens everytime that we have a near death experience so I shouldn't have been surprised.

With less than thirty minutes left in our trip, A thought rushed through my mind, 'What will the boss think?' At that same time, as if we read each other's mind, we look at each other. "We have to figure something out before the boss finds out!" we shout in unison. After a moment of awkward silence she spoke first.

"Did you look into the alarm system, Ruby?"

"Of course I did, I may be blonde, but I'm not an idiot." with my confession She looks at me then grins; I could tell she was going back to her bubbly old self.  With her grin I found myself loosing the anger that had built up the past few hours. 

"Honestly, I checked them too, they weren't supposed to be back on till after midnight." I glared at her a minute for doubting my skill, but it quickly faded. Blake had always been one to double check and it has saved our lives on more than one account.

"Well, if I checked it and you checked it, then what the heck happened?" The small wooden dock approached and we docked at the piers close to where the agency was located. On the docks we were greeted by the boss and a guy close to our age. He had sandy blond hair that covered his eyes, must be the new agent the boss was telling us about. As we walked up I got a bad feeling in my gut and slunk behind Blake. I didn't like this new character, especially not the way he was looking at us