Dusk

Chapter Six

"He's becoming more distant with me," the woman to my left says, brushing a few stray strands of her copper-coloured hair beneath her veil. "He's really giving this his all."

"So he is," I find myself saying. My voice is different, somehow, but not entirely dissimilar to how it normally sounds. "I didn't think he'd take so quickly to the job."

The woman shrugs. She's so clear compared to our surroundings- I can only make out the outlines of what look like furniture silhouetted from sunlight. I feel anchored to her, like she's the only thing holding me to my position. I catch a glimpse of freckles on her face.

"I worry for him, sometimes."

"I don't think that's all you worry about, Renata."

Her smile is bitter. "You see right through me, as always. Are my feelings that obvious?"

"Only when you talk about him."

The woman- Renata- bows her head, and continues to talk, but her words fade until they're unintelligible. Everything swirls, and not even the faint silhouettes from earlier are visible anymore. It's all one big blur.

Suddenly, a voice echoes in my ears, muffled as though by water. I make no move to pay attention to it; I want to get back to my dream, my memory, Renata. I finally have a name for her, after all this time of mere glimpses.

Again, the voice comes, but more insistent. It slips through my concentration, the tone urgent.

"Wake up!"

I shake it away. I'm not waking up. Not yet.

"Deva, please! Wake up!"

I can already feel sleep easing out of my body. Awareness grows in my limbs.

"We have to go, Deva. It's me, it's Blake." There's a tugging sensation of my left hand. "Please!"

Irritation floods through me, and I resign myself to wakefulness, my eyes opening.

There's smoke all around me. I take a deep breath in, and immediately regret it. My lungs sting. I cough and promptly retch over the side of the bed. I feel Blake's warm hands cupping my cheeks, and I see him through the smoke.

"We need to get out of here," he says urgently, coughing. "Are you okay? Here."

He gives me a bit of cloth, which I notice has been ripped from his shirt. I hold it to my face, covering my nose and mouth. Eyes stinging and holding Blake's hand with my free one, we manoeuvre through the smoke. I can barely see anything apart from what's directly in front of me; even in this small room, I can't make out where the walls should be because I'm so dizzy.

I hear footsteps, and feel a rush of air beside me. Blake's hand is wrenched from my grasp.

"Blake!" I call out, waving my free hand frantically in all directions. "Blake, where are you?"

I hear a grunt of pain to my left and the voice of a man that is not my brother, deep to the point of exaggeration. "You thought you could run away, huh?" I hear the thud of something hard, presumably a foot or fist, against soft flesh.

"Blake!"

"Deva, stay where you are!" Blake shouts, and then he cries out as I hear another thud. I'm fighting with myself internally, trying to decide whether to obey or disobey. In the end, I choose the latter.

Creeping quietly and quickly through the smoke, the same voice says, "I suppose I can't bruise you up too much, though. Maybe just one more kick..."

I move in the direction of the speaker. As soon as I can see his brawny back, I act on impulse, lashing out with a kick in the back of the knee. He almost falls over- I hear him let out a hiss- before he turns to throw a punch at me. I notice, vaguely, that he's wearing a gas mask, his face unknowable to me. Fluidly, I duck under his punch and elbow him hard in the ribs. He doubles over, and, panicking, I search for Blake, my eyes scanning the ground.

This can't be happening. It can't. Are we getting robbed? But that wouldn't make sense- we have nothing of value here, no heirlooms and no tech.

The man laughs lowly. I turn around, ready to knock him out, when he raises something small and black. I squint at it through the smoke, my mind still on finding Blake and the reason for this attack.

I register what the thing is far too late.

An earth-shattering crack pierces my ears, and pain shoots through me. I fall to the floor, the cloth over my face dropping from my hand. I run my fingers over my abdomen, shaking, and I feel blood rapidly soaking into my clothing. I lie there for a moment, too shocked to even begin to process what's just happened. The realization comes anyway: I've been shot.

Trembling and breathing shallowly, I try desperately to stand up. I can no longer see the man. I attempt to call out Blake's name, but blood rises from my throat like bile and drips from my open mouth. I get on my feet once, but I fall to my knees. Pressing one hand firmly over my wound and using the other to push me forward, I crawl in what I think is the direction of the door. Shivering, I see the rusted handle only about a foot away, the door half ajar. Has the man left with my brother? I reach for the handle, shaking.

It's no use.

I fall onto my back on the hard floor, blood spilling from my body until everything around me is hot and only my insides are cold. A dark vignette begins to fill my field of vision. I'm going to die here.

My eyes are about to shut when shining golden orbs appear. They float around me, disappearing and reappearing. I think they may be eyes. They look familiar.

That's my last thought before everything fades to black.