24.
I don't bother calling for Copper. He isn't there anymore.
Do they have him too?
Will they take Sofia?
Why is this happening? And why am I not more concerned about myself?
The black bag is still covering my head as I am dragged and dragged, so I can't see where I am being taken to at all. I feel that we are descending into the basement, where the training area is.
I don't go quietly. I kick someone hard in the leg and headbutt another, twisting and straining in their grasp.
My outbursts earn me a clock upside the head from whoever, and I taste my own blood running from my nose.
"What's going on? Why are you doing this?" I demand repeatedly until my throat is hoarse.
I hear the same screams coming from my teammates, but still with no reply.
I am dragged some more, lifted up roughly and shoved down into a hard chair, strong hands restraining me as I feel the chaving burn of rope tighten around my arms and legs.
I writhe in my restraints, howeling in anger, so much so that the chair tips sideways and I smack my already swollen cheek off the concrete floor.
I am whipped back upright and the black bag is snatched off my head finally. I squint against the bright chain light overhead, but there's no mistaking who is all in the room.
Silver with eyes full of ice, Rouge with his cane, Indigo looking awkward, and Stop Watch from when I first came to this building, playing with the object in his hand.
"What the fuck is this?" I snarl through the blood in my mouth.
"Tell us everything, and maybe you'll live," Silver says emotionlessly.
"Tell you what?!"
"You know what we mean, girl," Rouge says in his gravelly voice, eyes peering down at me expectantly.
"You all need to explain this shit!" Al yells from beside me, tied up in his own chair.
Fuisha, Violet, and Beige are in the same predicament.
"Shortly after arriving here, Micheal Benson escaped, and he didn't leave empty handed. He took with him our weapons and half our technology." Silver's brow furrows deeper and deeper as he says this. "Valuable items that are imperative to S.H.A.D.E."
"And what do you think we have to do with it? We were the ones who captured him for you!" Fuisha snaps up at him, struggling against her restraints.
" Exactly. It would have been someone that knew S.H.A.D.E planned on capturing Benson, and I only debriefed the five of you on that plan before you entered the Kenway Hotel." Silver's eyes are trained on me. "Which means that one of you are a Necro Proxy agent."
My Swatch and I all trade looks of disbelief.
"That's ridiculous," Beige says, "We've served you for years. You picked us out!"
Rouge raises one finger, " Yes, four of you have served us for years. Ebony, here, has not."
My heart sinks in my chest. "What?"
"Yes, the newest addition, the most resistant of the group," Silver says.
" But you chose me too!" I protest. "I finally agree to serve you, and now this? Why bother ruining my life if you are just going to kill me?"
Stop Watch moves forward, swinging the the silver pocket watch on its chain. "I was the one who picked her out, and I warned you that she was not an ordinary girl."
"We know, Viridian, but her physicality and endurance seemed like a bonus then, now we see that it was all a ruse," Rouge grumbles. "They may have planted her trying to flush us out."
I have no idea what they are talking about.
"Her chip implantation was hard to insert as well," Indigo spoke up, eyes flitting warily my way. "There were... I wasn't sure, but..."
"Spit it out!" Silver growls.
Indigo jumps a little, but says, "There were indications of possible Psychic activity. She has an irregularly developed pinneal gland."
Everyone is silent for a second, including my Swatch and I.
"And you never thought to report this?" Rouge hollers, causing Indigo to flinch and take a step back.
"Definitely N.P." I hear Viridian whisper to Silver.
His gray eyes find mine, and I feel my skin sizzle under his piercing stare. "So... you bit the hand that fed you?" He pulls out a gun from his suit pocket as he says this and points it directly at me.
Everything that I am turns to mush instantly, and I press my back into my chair as far as possible, my breath a clot of horror blocking my air way.
Is he going to kill me?
"Tell me the truth," Silver says, his voice scarily toneless.
" I-I don't understand what you mean!"
"Tell me the truth."
"I don't know!!!"
Silver directs the gun at Violet and shoots her point blank in the head. The force is so hard that her chair topples over backwards, her brown hair waving to the ground like a falling flag.
My mouth opens wide in a scream, but all that comes out is a strangled sob.
"Oh, fuck! Oh, Vi! No, No!" Fuisha wails, flailing around in her chair. "She didn't know anything!"
Silver ignores her and the boys' curses and screaming, eyes resting solely on me.
"Tell me the truth."
"I don't know!! I don't know anything, I promise! I don't--"
Silver shoots Beige. I hear his pained gasp, hear the way his body slumps in his chair.
"No!" I shriek, " No please! I don't know! I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I don't know! Please stop! I'll do whatever you want!"
"What we want is the truth," Silver says unblinkingly, pointing the gun at me again.
"Are you sure it's her?" Indigo speaks up, his hands shakily adjusting his glasses on the bridge of his nose. "We can't really say for sure that--"
"She is the only change since all this started happening. She asks questions, she resists, and she is Psychic. She is one of the only Shades to know about the plan to get Benson. Who else could it be?" Silver challenges him.
Fuisha is weeping beside me. Not for herself, but for her teammates.
I am crying too. This is on me.
Soon, Silver will kill Al and Fuisha if I don't stop him.
"Fine," I say quietly, but it gets all of their attention.
Silver walks up to me, yanking my head back to look up at him and pointing the barrel of the gun to my throat. "What was that?"
I mold my face into a condescending grin. "I said fine. It was just so easy. S.H.A.D.E is so desperate to defeat us, but with mishaps like these, how could you ever?"
Silver smacks me across the face with his gun, my blood spray hitting Fuisha, who sucks in a petrified breath.
Silver paces around, running fingers through his hair. The others jabber for a good five minutes.
My head hangs down listlessly, blood and spit dangling from my mouth. My cheek and eye throb again, and what progress my left eye was making is all but ruined now.
Al and Fuisha are still and silent, contemplating what will happen next.
Silver breaks from the whispering men, heading back to us.
I see his arm raise, see the flash of the pistol in his hand.
I try to scream, I try to beg, but Fuisha is hit in the head, flying back onto the floor with Violet.
"No!!! Wait! Wa--" is the last I hear of Al before the bullet strikes him dead where he sits, a gargle dying out on his lips.
Silver's face is so detached from what he is doing, it is absolutely frightening. Finally, he raises the gun to me.
I wait for it. I hope for it.
But a shot that doesn't belong to Silver rings out and the light bulb above us shatters, glass falling everywhere so that Silver and the men jerk back, covering their eyes.
A dark ball rolls into the blackened area, and I hear a seething hiss coming from it. The release of gas is immediate, covering the small room in a smoggy haze.
Everyone starts choking in the fog, including me.
The men drop to their knees on the floor, unable to breathe or see.
My own eyes start to sting. I hear Silver shoot off three random shots of his gun, one which clips my shin, a burning pain that makes me scream.
Just then, I feel my binds being cut away from me. I am grabbed under the arm and flown out of the blinding cloud, being pulled up the stairs of the basement by someone in a dark hoodie and gas mask.
At the top of the stairs, there's Scarlet, reaching out her arm to help support me as we run through the tight halls of the old building. Iris comes running backwards from an adjacent hall, shooting a military grade artillery gun as she goes. The sound is maddeningly loud. She joins our sprint, running, running, running, until we are thankfully outside.
There is a rusty pick up truck ready and waiting.
I am carryalled that way, moving without any real sense of what I am doing.
Someone from in the building starts aiming outside at us, a hot bullet whizzing by my head.
We pass by the Impala, and my legs give out. I would fall to the ground if it weren't for the arms supporting me.
"Leave me!" I cry, because I should die with my Swatch. They died for me. For nothing.
"Get moving!" Scarlet trills, shoving me onto the other guy, who throws me over into the bed of the truck.
I hear Scarlet screaming as she fires rotation after rotation of artillery. The person in the building doesn't return fire after that.
"Use that!" The guy instructs, and It takes me a minute to realize that there are heavy guns in the truck bed with me.
My hands are clumsy, grasping at the metal, turning it over to the proper way.
The guy gets into the driver's seat of the truck, waving Scarlet and Iris our way. They climb into the back with me, and as we squeal away put of the alley, I see a blaze of red and blue jetting down the street towards us, sirens blistering the air with their squeals.
Scarlet picks up a large looking thing, a bazooka, and heaves it onto her shoulder with a strained cry. She fires once into the front of a police car, lifting it's back end up for a moment from the impact. We watch as it skids and swerves into the path of the others.
We high tail it out of there, wind and hair slapping at my face, my hands white-knuckled around the sides.
I know that Scarlet and Iris are trying to speak to me, but I curl up into the corner of the truck bed and bury my face in my knees.
My Swatch. Because of me.
The night air is cool for once. It balms the burning of my swollen bruises as it brushes over me. I feel a few tears trail their way down my cheeks, but other than that, I am too sad to do anything.
I don't even care where I'm going now.
By the time I look up, we are driving through a flat land, cool night desert. The stars burst to life as we leave the city lights behind.
Scarlet and Iris are nestled together in the other corner, Scarlet rubbing her girlfriend's back soothingly.
The puttering engine is what keeps me sane, what keeps my mind grounded from floating up and away with the stars forever.
The truck eventually comes to a stop right about when we come around the better part of a hillock.
I look over the dark and barren horizon, I hear forlorn howling in the distance, the rustle of blowing dirt.
"My heart," I say for some reason.
"You and your metaphors," says the guy up front.