Volume VI: And Introducing Harley Morrow As - Herself

17. Redrawing Boundaries

        I got out to the hallway when Pandora caught up with me. Where she’d been during the entire episode, I’m not sure. Whether she cared or not, I’m not sure. Times were rough, there was a lot going on. If she wasn’t careful, she could have found herself next in line. And I knew it. She grabbed me from behind and walked me out, leading me back to the bar. Who the hell ran it in her absence I might want to check into.

        She led me to the back and started fixing things up. Where she learned this, I didn’t ask. Draven was legendary. And you learn all the big stuff from your parents. You are where you come from. She had me patched up in no time flat, with barely a word uttered.

        “Why didn’t you stop him?” I muttered when she was done. She glared at me.

        “If there was ever anything I learned from my father, it was to know when to act and when to observe. Understanding the difference could keep you alive.”

        “And what about the people you care about? You’re supposed to let them die?”

        She shook her head nonchalantly. “He wouldn’t have killed you.”

        “You were willing to bet my life?” I coughed.

        She merely smiled. “Family.”

        And she got up and walked away. I sat there for a while, getting used to the new pain, pain that would ultimately heal. It was merely physical. But the emotional pain, the forfeit of my trust...that would be impossible to replace. What’s done is done. I had proof - I would have a scar. Family. Cute. What family shoots its members? Or kills its elders? I needed to talk to Serkis. Direct. No more interference. But I was too tired to find her tonight. Enough had gone on, I was in enough pain. Update on everyone’s location later.

        For lack of better words, I went home and slept. Home being above the bar somewhere. Or so I think. I went to sleep because the world had stopped making sense. I went to sleep because I had enough of this madness. I went to sleep because logic and reason were dead. I went to sleep to dream. I went to sleep to hope. I went to sleep to lose myself. I went to sleep to lose this nightmare. I went to sleep to pretend. I went to sleep to sleep. I went to sleep to start again. Renewal, tradition, continuation - that is the only unbreakable source.

        And its primary agents?

        Life. And death.

        I slept soundly. Not without guilt or pain, but as soundly as one might expect. I woke up and changed. I couldn’t use my arm it hurt that badly. I would learn to deal. Do or die, right? There’s not much you can do to change the present. It’s always too late.

        I swear, nobody in this crew knocks or uses doors like normal people. Serkis was hanging out at the table with a cup of coffee, browsing the newspaper idly. I don’t think I get the news - she must have brought it herself. She had a cup set out for me across from her. I sat down after I’d changed, feeling very...out of place. How I could feel out of place in my own home, I don’t know. Life’s weird as all hell.

        “Hey kid, how’s the arm?” She didn’t even have to look up from the paper.

        “I might ask the same of you.”

        She shrugged, although the gesture was uneven, she didn’t care. She was in pain. There was no sling, nothing to hold her arm where it should have been. She turned the pages idly.

        “We have to talk,” I muttered. She looked up at me, taking only a moment’s glance.

        “What about?” she replied. Her voice was very sing-song, as if she honestly didn’t have a clue. Like a child pretending that they weren’t home when the vase broke. That clueless gaze.