• Word Count: 1,500
Armin points at the ceiling beams above us, "there,"
He runs towards the stacked crates and begins climbing them, "we hide there until we get some help"
My head spins with the possibility of being gunned down at 19, but I still feel my feet carrying me behind Armin, eyes constantly over our shoulders.
We climb very quietly, sweaty palms make swinging over the poles to the beam a Sisyphean task. By the time the sounds of heavy footsteps bubble down to stealthy steps, Armin and I are above, watching their silent filing into the warehouse.
God there's so many of them and only two of us.
They're pouring under us in unbelievable numbers.
An especially plough man comes forward, taking his sunglasses off, "I want this boy and whoever is helping him brought down, now"
Armin clenches his fist in response.
"Search the whole parameter" the man instructs.
Some of the men disperse and the rest remain nearby, poised, ready to trap and inflict pain on their prey.
I nudge Armin, "what's the plan now?"
"Stay alive"
I blink at him. Stay alive, he says.
I'm done with this boy; I'm calling for help. It won't be long until one of them looks up and sees us.
C'mon Aurick please. You're our only hope now.
I patiently wait for a response from Aurick but I get none. It then hits me that I haven't even told him where we are.
I retrieve my phone again, ready to send him our location, but my sweaty palms fail me and my phone slips from my hand. I quickly reach down for it but it's too late, gravity is a lot faster than me.
We watch the phone plummet down, in an excruciatingly slow motion,
"No!" we whisper in horror.
The phone lands in a series of exactly three loud cracks before going silent. Everything goes silent as the men, in succession, look up at the two of us.
We both freeze, blanching.
Very slowly, one by one, the men aim their weapons at us. I gulp.
Armin sits back, dangling his legs, "You do realize if you kills us, you loose that USB, right?"
My heart pounds more rapidly. Has he lost his mind? Taunting an army of fully armed men won't help us in any way.
The man, Theron, chuckles softly, his shoulders shaking in the process, before he shakes his head.
He tucks his hands in his pants' pockets, "Get down before you two kids hurt yourselves,"
I'm frozen to my spot, crouched on the beam, unable to move a joint.
Armin, on the other hand, pushes himself off, and leaps to the ground, landing in a kneeled position before standing. He dusts his pants first, and then dusts his hands.
He then stands tall and puts both his hands on his waist.
The man scoffs at Armin's show of defiance and then motions with his head for one of the men.
A man lifts his foot and shoves Armin on the back, sending him to the ground, face and palms first.
What happens next is too fast for me to even process; in a second Armin is on his feet, aiming the gun he had towards Theron's head.
The next second someone sneaks on him from behind and disarms him.
The third second, a sound of a gun going off has me flinching, almost falling off the beam.
I wait for the sound of screaming or anything, but nothing comes. I peak through the edge of the beam to see that everything and everyone is in place. The bullet was shot into the air.
"Get down little kitty. Now."
This is it. Armin and I die today. This is how we both die, at the hands of the possible murderer of my parents. This is how it ends.
Slowly, shakily and absolutely clumsily, I climb down from the beam, jumping on the floor to land on my feet. Immediately, I come face to face with Armin, whose arms are held behind his back. He looks me straight in the eye, unmoving, not talking, and I wonder if he's trying to tell me some-
"No!" I hear myself screaming.
One of the men punched Armin square on the face, hard enough to send his hair flipping to the opposite side and blood to spray on the floor. I jump forward in panic, attempting to hold Armin, see if he's okay, but I'm quickly held in place. My arms are both held behind my back, but it doesn't stop me from squirming.
A cold, solid metal pressed to my lower back, however, has me freezing in place.
I feel someone's breath on my neck, "Yeah that's right, the less you move, the easier it is for everyone,"
My stomach churns wildly. I'm going sick.
Theron clears his throat and moves forward, tucking his hands into the pockets of his slacks, "Here's how it goes. You give me what I want and I let you two," he points his finger between Armin and me, "walk out of that door," he points towards the exit, "safely,"
He smiles widely at us.
Armin regains his footing and stands tall, flipping his hair back to reveal an actively bleeding and a gruesomely twisted nose.
He chuckles. Armin, who I'm sure must've lost his mind in the last hour, chuckles.
Though right after that, someone lands a punch into his abdomen that has him groaning in pain and doubling over.
Theron looks at his watch and then grips Armin's hair, pulling back vigorously, "Listen kid, you will give me that USB and I might let you walk out of here safely,"
Once again, Armin laughs. He officially lost his mind.
Theron grips Armin's jaw and turns his head towards him, "You dying here or walking out of here doesn't concern me in the slightest; either way, I get what I want,"
Armin smiles through bloody teeth, "Go to hell,"
That's how Theron unleashed his wrath on Armin.
He nods at the men holding Armin; they hold Armin's arms further back, straightening him. Directly, Theron kicks Armin in the abdomen with his knee, sending him a groaning mess towards the floor.
On an impulse, I lunge at Theron, but I'm, again, held place, firmly.
The gun presses further into my back, a reminder of my compliance.
But when the men's feet mercilessly rain on Armin's body, I squirm and kick around, "Armin!"
I shrug against the men's hands in attempts to free myself from their overwhelming grip, "Armin just give him the damn thing,"
But no one listens, and it continues, the brutality continues and Armin is now teetering on the edge of consciousness.
It occurs to me at that second that Armin might pass out any second, "Wait! I know where it is. I know where the flash drive is!"
They all stop. Theron turns to me, smiling diabolically.
He walks towards me, slowly, "I always say, with enough pressure, a bird starts singing,"
My mouth instinctively contorts into a sneer; I'm beyond disgusted by this man.
I cast a glance of concern at Armin, who glares at me through a swollen eye; he shakes his head at me.
Theron holds my chin, "C'mon sweetheart, sing for me,"
I wrench my head away, repulsed. My head is turned away from him, eyes cast to the wall, "It's duct taped to the bottom of the beam,"
In my peripheral vision, I catch Armin shaking his head.
Theron nods at one of his men, who moves toward the beam immediately; then, as if some sort of a realisation strikes him, Theron moves to stand directly in front of me, in my line of vision.
His eyebrows scrunch together, "Where have I seen that face before?"
My heart launches into an erratic beat in response. He knows who I am! He'll soon recognize the connection to my parents.
His eyes narrow, "Now why would two spineless kids like yourselves get into the trouble to blackmail me?"
The moments of silence, his deep thought and his scrutiny of my features seem to help him slowly connect the dots.
He then stiffens; his eyebrows flatten back and his eyes go wide with realisation, "Wait-"
The sound of a gunshot followed by a yell of agony has us all looking towards the source. One of Theron's men drops to the floor, clutching his leg in agony.
"What the-"
A cylindrical canister is thrown into the room, rolling rapidly to stop at our feet.
"A grenade!" someone screams.
In a fraction of a second the bomb goes off in a merciless burst, sending everyone either flying or sliding on the floor, leaving a grating, yet a very familiar buzzing sound in its wake.
Through the haze, it occurs to me that my message actually reached Aurick and he's here for help.
That's all I remember before my head feels heavier than before and a black curtain falls into my eyes.
To be continued...