TW: Fire, death mention, threats, cursing
Virgil's POV:
Holy shit, this is cool.
Okay, okay, let me rephrase. What I mean, is that now we're all outside, the burning building looks fucking awesome. It's like watching freedom with your own two eyes, except as well as watching freedom, you're also having to listen to some crying kids and police sirens in the distance.
I snap out of my thoughts when I realise that I probably look like the world's strangest psychopath staring at this burning building while smiling.
"Virgil?" I'm drawn away by Logan's voice from behind me. "Come over here, some government official wants to speak to us."
I turn on my heel and see the man in question, he's tall and does look genuinely nice, standing and having a conversation with Patton as the other 30 or so kids linger around. One runs up to me and tugs at my jacket. "Virgie, I'm scared."
It's Tyler. He's an eight year old boy who I haven't ever spoken to much before, but he seems like he wants my comfort, as most young people do when a big change happens, such as having to escape a burning building. "It's okay, c'mere," I reach down and pick him up, letting his legs wrap around my waist before smiling and ruffling his hair, which makes him giggle.
That's the one thing I got out of my childhood; I'm pretty good at comforting children.
Then, I walk over to where the others are. The man speaking to them is reletively short and stout, with a round face and beard that isn't completely grown out.
"So, you'd call yourself the orchastrator of this, young man?"
I lean against the brick half-wall, adjusting the way that I'm holding Tyler while I speak. "I'd consider myself the orchastrator of protecting these kids, if that's what you mean."
He turns to let his eyes glance over the kids, then he smiles slighty. "You children really don't deserve this, do you?"
Patton looks sympathetically to the group and then to the floor. "I think you're the only adult who seems to think that." At the the end of the sentence he raises the pitch of his voice to make it sound lighthearted in one way or another.
The man reaches out to touch Tyler's hair, and he flinches before relaxing when he realises this man isn't going to hurt him.
"Look, guys. I don't want to send you off somewhere, and quite frankly it would be a lot more paperwork on my part. Having said that, I can't not do anything with you all."
"Hey, Ro, can you take Tyler for a moment? I wanna go for a bit of a walk." He nods and takes the child from my arms as the government official writes something on his clipboard.
Then, I take a moment to step away from the group as the dialect continues, walking across the car park and back up to the building, or as close as I can get realistically.
At this point, the whole thing is engulfed in the same flames that I can sleep at night knowing all those fucking doctors burned in.
It's almost concerning to me that I'm not feeling a single bit of guilt about being the reason they're all dead. I mean, everyone dies. Theirs was just premature.
Well, I say all. Not all.
I completely understand why Logan might have wanted to spare his father's life, but to be honest if it were up to me he wouldn't be breathing right now.
Speaking of, the man in question is standing with a police officer near the gate of the parking lot, looking scared as he'll occasionally glance back to his son.
Coughing while I inhale some smoke, I decide to head over to where he is and see what he has to say. I hope Lo was telling the truth when he assured me Dr Berry would be keeping his mouth shut.
While walking to the other end of the space, I notice out of my peripheral that there are some people with those big proffessional cameras taking pictures of me with the burning builing in the background. I look over to them and wave a two-fingered salute in their direction while smirking.
Never in my life have I been so glad that I'm wearing something vaguely nice. I say that, and it's just overly ripped black jeans and a light purple shirt with one of Remus' black oversized hoodies clinging loosely to my frame, but I think it'll look good in any pictures that come out of this.
I want people to know about this - about us. All this shit that's gone on our whole lives has been covered up so perfectly by the government that it's scary. Sure, the general public know we exist. They know we're illegal, they know we're "dangerous".
But, the only thing I've ever seen the internet say is that we just live seperately from 'normal' members of society. No mention of the fucking years of torture every single one of us who managed to get caught was put through.
So, yeah. I really hope the truth comes out. That would be another small victory, I think.
Dr Berry sees me walking over and gives me the dirtiest look I've ever seen, and - to be honest, it makes me almost laugh.
"Ah! You're the young man I was just being told about." The police offer steps aside so that the three of us are no stood in a triangle for better conversation opportunity.
"Good or bad 'being told about'?" I smile, leaning against the brick wall.
"Good, I'd say. Dr Berry was telling me how you helped get all the kids out just now, weren't you?"
My eyes dart towards him and back to the officer in suspicion. "Yeah, I was." He smirks slightly.
"Such a shame that the people working here didn't make it, don't you think?"
"..Yeah." I reply, looking back over to where everyone else is talking to that same man from earlier.
Then, the policeman walks away to speak to some others.
"You're going to pay for this one way or another, I hope you know that." Dr Berry says, making strong eye contact with me.
I don't respond for a moment.
"The truth always comes out, V. You remember that, hm?"
I'm left standing on the rough concrete as he walks away. I'm sure it's nothing.
Right?
Right.
"Hey, V?" Turning around, I seeing Janus behind me, running a hand through his hair as he speaks.
"Mhm?"
"They, uh- They're gonna put most of the kids in foster care. That's what they said, atleast."
While personally, I would've prefered not to put these kids into the foster system, I suppose that anything is better than the lab.
Actually, I take that back. I don't suppose anything is better, I know anything would be better than what we've been through.
"What about us?" I ask, looking sceptically to the rest of the group on the playground. Janus' hair blows slightly in the wind as he stares up to the building and the excessive flames spilling out of the windows.
"They said we're free to go. Since we're over sixteen, we're too old to be rehomed or anything. The government guy said something or other about giving us a house in exchange for following some rules, but I wasn't really listening if I'm honest. Logan'll tell us later, I'm sure."
"Huh."
For a few minutes of silence, we stand, staring up at the burning building and all that sorrounds us. The kids, smiling. The news crews. The open sky.
At some point during this moment we've shared, the other four have ended up here beside us. The six of us stand alone as police cars drive off and kids file into groups. Remus looks at me and smiles.
"So, what do we do now?" Roman asks, laughing slightly at the end of his sentence as if the idea of doing whatever we want is slightly comical.
"I guess we make the most of what we've gained." I reply.
"And what's that?"
"Freedom."
The End.
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Wow. I guess that's it, huh? Well, of course that isn't really it, since I've got a sequel planned, but this is making me emotional. I started this book almost a year ago, and it's taken me so far. Thank you all so much for that.
I'll be posting the epilogue as soon as I post this, so you should go read that now, since it hints at the sequel!
Once I've posted the sequel, I'll add a chapter to this to let you know.
Finally, I'd like to say thank you to you personally, for reading this. Even if you don't vote or comment, the fact that you're reading this means so much to me.
And so, for the last time of 56 chapters,
Stay safe!