I step through the door and get suddenly pulled into a dark, eerie room. Luis follows closely behind me, his hand on the hilt of his knife.
"What the hell is this place?" I whisper, fear and confusion gripping me tightly. "I don't know, but we need to be careful," Luis replies in a hushed tone.
The room is dimly lit by a few flickering candles, casting shadows across the walls. In the center of the room is a large, ornate altar, covered in strange symbols and markings. "That doesn't look good..." I say and notice- I can't explain why, but I feel pretty good again. As we cautiously approach the altar, a loud noise echoes through the room, causing us both to jump. "What was that?" I ask, my heart racing.
Luis quickly scans the room, his eyes narrowing as he tries to identify the source of the noise. Suddenly, he grabs my arm and pulls me behind a nearby pillar.
"Stay here," he whispers, his hand on his knife. "I'll go check it out."
I don't answer. Why do I just stay here and watch Luis disappear into the shadows, he could just leave me and go his own way, I don't know him, why do I trust him to make sure I'm safe in here? I should be the one who checks the room, I couldn't explain it. Minutes passes, and I start to feel uneasy. I don't want to be alone in this strange, creepy room any longer when I'm honest.
In the same second I was about to call out to Luis, he suddenly reappears from the darkness, a look of urgency on his face.
"We need to leave, now," he says, grabs my hand and pulls me towards the door, why does he always need to touch me, a simple come with me would be enough. I wrench my hand from his grip, Luis sighs and looks at me with a face if this was really necessary now, and I release that I overact. We leave the dark room, and I still don't know why we have to leave so fast.
༻✦༺
We're running through the church and the blood of the Ganado corpses which floats the floor splashes on my legs and makes me feel nauseous, the church is quiet, too quiet. We enter the end of the church and I ran out of the door but bump into something tall. Luis accidentally runs into me and freezes after he sees what made me stop.
A man stands in front of us, two times that taller than me...or taller. I don't know him, but I have the feeling I saw him before. "Well, well, who do we have here?" the man says. His eyes look odd, not the way like the eyes of the Ganados, but also weird. "Bitores Mendez..." Luis says quiet, steps a few steps back and grabs me with him - of course. Luis knows this man, meanwhile it's becoming more and more clearer to me that I don't know this man, at least a bit. I don't know in which connection he stands with him, I know nothing and that scares me, when I thought of it, I want to go back to Leon... Leon...I almost forgot him because of Luis. "Luis, what are we going to do?" I whisper, fear coursing through my veins. "We need to run," Luis says, his voice low and urgent. "He won't let us leave alive." Run? Is he serious, I don't think we can escape him that fast... We turn to go back the way we came, but Mendez blocks our path. He steps closer, a wicked smile on his face. My heart beats faster. "Leaving so soon?" he taunts. "I was hoping you'd stay for dinner." His eyes were cold and looks like they would directly stare into your soul. Luis steps in front of me, his hand reaching for his gun. "We're not here for your hospitality, Mendez. Let us pass, now. Or you will regret it." Mendez laughs, his hand going to the hilt of his knife. "I don't think so. You two are a threat to my operation. I can't have you wandering around and causing trouble." I don't know what he's talking about, but what I know is that he knows something about the disappear from Ashley.
I take a step back, fear grips me like a vice. I was in many dangerous situations before, but never been in one like this, and I had no idea how to fight off a man like Mendez.
Luis raises his gun, his finger poises on the trigger. "We're not here to cause trouble. We just want to leave." Mendez smirks. "And I just want you dead" he hesitates, "or your little girlfriend or whatever she might is" He says and points his knife in my direction. My heart stops. "Her? Why do you need her" Luis answers confused and pushes me closer behind his back. "She has potential...and something that could be interesting," he smirks. "What the hell, should I have what you want?" I say. "Oh, you don't know? Already better than I thought" Mendez replies. Suddenly he comes closer, Luis pushes me away and with lightning-fast reflexes, Mendez drew his knife and lunges at Luis. I fall into a pile of wood boxes on a smashed oil lamp. I feel the broken glass in my abdomen. The blood runs down my body.
With my eyes still open, I can see their bodies slamming into each other with brutal force, knowing this will have an awful ending for one of them and the chances are high that Mendez isn't the one. Luis is a good fighter, but definitely not made for a melee against someone like Mendez.
I hear gunshots, groaning and knifes crashing on iron, I know I have to do something. I look around for a weapon, anything I could use to help Luis, my gun is still empty, so this isn't a solution.
My eyes land on a metal pipe which is lying on the ground, I grab it with blood smeared hands. My whole body hurts because of the glass, but I slowly stand up and try to get myself together.
Luis struggles against Mendez's onslaught, I run forward and swing the pipe at the Ganado leader's head. It connects with a sickens crunch, and Mendez falls to the ground, I know that this was way too easy. Luis looks at me, his gun still pointed at Mendez's prone form. "Where did you learn to do that?" he asks, his voice filled with admiration. I shrug, and hold the injured place of my body. "I don't know. I just knew I had to do something." "I'm really impressed, but I expected nothing less from someone like you" he smirks and comes closer towards me. "Nevertheless, we have to get out quickly now, that won't keep him forever down." I try to hide the pain from him, but then I could see his injured shoulder.
༻✦༺
We made our way out, trying to sneak out of the village into the forest. An attack of Ganados would be our final end. We made it out of the village and when we stand in the middle of the forest after we left the path, Luis stopped and turned to face me, a look of concern etched on his face.
"What's wrong?" I ask in my normal tone, pretending like always. "Are you okay?" he asks, his eyes scanning my face for any sign of distress. "Yeah, shouldn't I ask you that? Your shoulder doesn't look very good" I reply. "You didn't, so I did" he comes closer. "Looks worse than it is, don't worry señorita...although I think we should take a break here" he says and smiles at me. "Here?" I ask and look around, Luis nods.
We are sitting on the cold forest ground, I lean against a tree. The wound isn't bleeding anymore, at least something because the piece of glass isn't on the place anymore where it supposed to be which was a reason to worry, but I don't want to make everything about me.
༻✦༺
I look at Luis, it looks like he's trying to put his shoulder back in place, and it looks painful. "Mi señora you're so quiet since we left the village, should I worry?" He says and gives up on his shoulder.
"No I'm fine" I answer. Luis nods. Should I ask him about what just happened? I'm not sure about what to do. Luis comes closer and sits exactly next to me now. "You're pale, you know that right" he says and looks into my eyes. "I am?" "Yes. Not in a healthy way" "Oh" I didn't know what to answer. "Well I'll look for material for a fire, stay here okay?" He says and leans against me to get up, unfortunately on the wrong side.
It feels like the glass splitter is cutting my insides... I scream up and startled Luis. "What's wrong?!" he shouts with concern. I can't answer because this time it really hurts way too much. He knees down to me and points to the side of the cut, which I hid with my shirt. "Here?" he asks me and looks into my eyes.
I nod and he pulls up my shirt. "maldito... Why didn't you say something?! How did this even happen?! Do you know how easy a wound like this can get infections?" I stay quiet while he screams at me, I cannot help, but I feel guilty and bad because of the way he screams at me. "I accept that you're not talking to me most of the time, but this time you really should've said something," Luis says while taking out a napkin. He gives a bit of alcohol on it. "This will burn now, but it will fade, yeah?" he looks into my eyes while putting the napkin on my wound. It burns and I would've jumped up if Luis wasn't holding me in place, "pshh, it's okay" he tries to calm me down and grabs my chin, it helps. My heart beats faster while he looks at me like this, it does something with me.
I don't even know him? The pain slowly subsides, I feel Luis's hand gently caressing my back. It's a strange feeling, to get comforted by the person I don't want to trust, don't want to see....don't want to like. But as I look into his eyes, I see a sincerity that I've never noticed before. "Thank you," I whisper, breaking the silence that had settled between us.
I always had problems, I get feelings way too easy, it's because of everything what happened in my life, every time someone cares about me, it starts...I don't want to call it real feelings- I don't want to have feelings for this man, and it already brought me in bad situations, enough bad situations... Luis smiles softly. "Anytime,mi amor. I just wish you would've told me earlier. I don't like seeing you in pain." he says, his voice low and husky. I nod, still feeling guilty of not being more honest with him. "I'm sorry. I just... I don't know how to explain it. I've been keeping my distance because I didn't want to feel anything for you."
This was one of the dumbest things I could've just say, he flirts with me, yes, but that's probably just the way he is, he does that with every girl which crosses his way... Luis's hand pauses on my back, and he looks at me with a mix of confusion and hurt. "What do you mean?"
"I mean..." I sigh" like...I don't want...you know, I met a few people while the outbreak in Raccoon city back then and...nobody of them survived what happened there, I became close with them and they...died. I was only 16... I'm too afraid to lose any more people which are close to me, that's why I distant myself from others, do you understand?" That's probably the dumbest excuse I've ever used. It wasn't a lie, though, but how could I be so stupid? Why should he feel something for me, although he's a grown man, he will just think I'm a freak... .
"Ah yes I see" he answers and surches for a bandage. Now I feel like I've done something wrong, why do I have to be like this. "Luis?..." I say quiet, and he looks up at me, waiting for a response. "The...glass still stuck in...the wound" He sighs and looks at the free part of my body which is still covered in blood. "I can see it, it will hurt for a second now" I gasp cause of the pain but the feeling fades away. Luis bandages the flesh wound, judging by how he did it, he knew what he was doing. He stands up without a single word. I look after him. He walks to the tree in front of me, leans against it and stares into the dark of the forest while taking out his cigarettes. Why doesn't he talk to me anymore, the way he did before... . He lights his cigarette and my mind tells me that he won't smell like his perfume anymore when he comes back and talks with me in the same loving way like he did before...
He will tell me that we should move on while he smells like despair, ash and smoke.