Nirvana

Chapter 6

    Whomever this person was, though, had expected a punch and caught my arm inches before I could connect it to his face. I realized his grip was strong, not like Laurent's strong, but humanly strong. Then, I felt the roughness of the hand and sighed with relief.

    "It's me. Shh..." Husk whispered.

    "Sorry." my eyes must've sharpened finally, because I could make out his face and his green eyes. I was not as surprised as I would expect when I saw that his expression was alarmed and intense. And... scared. I squinted at him, "wait, what's wrong?"

    "Shh..." he put a finger to my lip and guided me to the back, deeper within the shadows of the ruin.

    "Hey-" Husk shot me a glaring look that shut me up immediately.

    We pressed into a dark corner, behind what seemed to be a shelf, but it was a bit too dark to see. Many silent seconds passed filled with my confusion. Suddenly, a loud shout shattered the silence followed by many others. Then, the stomping of shoes on wet mud and cement as many people rushed by the ancient ruin Husk and I hid in. A gun was fired. I could feel Husk stiffen next to me. It rung through the air and I couldn't stifle the horror of finally acknowledging what was going on. Police. And they were after us.

    A whirlwind of questions erupted through my mind. Where was Laurent? Were the police after him? How? Why did they run back here? Why was Husk here? Why wasn't Laurent here? But I couldn't ask any of these, in fear of showing our location. I looked up at Husk, he towered a head taller than me, and gave him a look of confusion. What was going on?

    All he did, though, was give me a tight smile and squeezed my hand, which I noticed, was still held by his. I spent the whole time looking at them, seeing them and Husk's presence next to me reassured me and slowly calmed my pounding heart.

    Seconds, minutes, maybe hours passed before something actually happened. If the interruption hadn't occurred, we'd probably never have moved.

    We were quiet; the sound of the police in the distance was starting to disappear. It echoed elsewhere, and the rain, loud and heavy, was muting out any sounds from us. But, because of the storm, it also muted out the sound of a person approaching us. Husk didn't catch him until the person practically stumbled into our hideout.

    I gave a yelp and Husk was instantly pulling an arm back for a punch. Suddenly, in that second right before Husk threw it, I stopped him. My hand grabbed his and tugged it down. I used so much force that he was wincing, but otherwise his pained expression, he didn't acknowledge the grip much further.

    "Don't." I breathed, and without meaning to, I crept past Husk and towards the stranger. Despite the obvious police uniform he had on, I felt the stranger was not a danger, I didn’t know what caused me to think this. Perhaps it was that he looked familiar. He was not much older than us, probably even the same age as Husk and Laurent, seventeen. And though his face was alive and young, his eyes seemed to glow like Laurent and mine. But instead of glowing burgundy or sapphire, they were … gray. Gray. Wait, gray!

    "It's you," I whispered, not knowing what to say. What to do. It was him. "No, they took you. I saw them. You were. They took you. You're- no it can't be you." my breaths were coming in hiccups, my arms were shaking and I cooled myself, tried to. "You're not supposed to be alive."

    "Wait, it's you!" Husk began, recognition seemed to dawn on him, and though that would be suspicious any other day, I ignored Husk.

    "You shouldn't be here." I practically yelled, gripping his arms so hard I knew it would hurt any human, except, of course, it shouldn't hurt him, but he winced.