THE AIR BUZZED and fizzled with tension, the electricity practically melting into Devora's bones as she raised her gun high, loaded with ammo. Nathan, ever the perfect support, walked just slightly in front of her, his own gun also poised and ready to fire whenever commanded. He had volunteered, rather wordlessly, to act as the lookout, hence his position in front.
Devora knew that she needed it, no matter what her pride told her otherwise. Nathan had been the one that had studied the structure of the safe house at the start of this very mission, so it only made sense that he would be the one leading the way.
Although fear was ringing loudly in her ears, Devora made sure not to show even a sliver of it. Fear was a weakness and had always been her weakness. Nonetheless, now she was a reformed soul and no longer the lost-in-the-headlights deer a year ago. There was no chance in hell she would allow herself to slip back either.
There was a little nagging voice at the back of her head, screaming that the slower she moved, the higher chance there was in Julius Cain lying dead with a bullet hole either straight through his forehead or lodged through his chest. After all, Candice still had the upper hand of surprise and that alone could work miracles in her favor.
"Nathan," Devora whispered softly, a force of habit from her missions. "I don't think Candice is still here in the hallways. From the looks of it, she probably came here alone. We have to move quickly."
Just as her sentence ended, Nathan halted in his steps. Looking down, Devora grimaced slightly when she caught sight of the dead man lying on the ground just a few feet away. Blood splattered all over the walls, depicting a brutal crime scene. There was a hole in his neck, fresh blood still oozing out like a free-flowing river.
At least that proved that they were on the right track. Candice had indeed just passed by. The man's dead body was still warm, having died not too long ago. That meant that Candice hadn't left for long.
"Candice, what have you done?" Nathan muttered, asking the question more to himself than to another person. Urgency filled his irises as he turned to Devora, his lips pressed into a taut, grim line. "You're right," he said. "We have to move. Quickly."
Time was fighting against them. Before the duo had even reached the heavy metal doors that hid Julius Cain, they could hear the sound of gunshots being fired, followed by grunts and curses. The sound of clashing weapons resonated through the walls.
Nathan wasted no time in rushing over, pushing the slightly-gaping door fully open before slipping in. The first sight that greeted him was the shower of bullets everywhere. The small deadly pieces of metal were lodged into the most awkward positions, littering the grounds they stood on and all over the walls. They were wedged into furniture, empty guns were thrown across the room as two figures fought in the center of the chaos.
With the lack of bullets in their empty guns, Candice and Cain had resorted to hand to hand combat. Although Candice was crowned as the undefeatable within the ring and outside on missions, she still wasn't enough to outmatch Julius Cain himself. Even when armed with a knife, the damage she could deal with Cain was no more than petty scratches on the skin, nothing foreign on Cain's body.
Dressed in a suit that looked so tight it would rip at any second, Julius Cain still moved with the near elegance of a dancer, dodging Candice's attacks with ease. He never made an attempt to counter-attack, merely avoiding the slashes, kicks, and punches she brutally threw at him.
"Candice! Stop it!" Devora screamed at the top of her lungs, bursting into the room with a huff.
Her voice successfully gathered both their attention but Cain's gaze lingered a fraction of a second longer than Candice's did. That was enough for her to fight back. Taking hold of the opportunity, she threw out her blade towards her opponent, making use of his diverted attention.
Time seemed to slow down for Nathan. He watched as Candice flung the blade from her hands, aiming for the weapon to hit Julius Cain in his vitals. Unfortunately for her, it was a move Nathan had long calculated before arriving in the room. He knew that they would look over when they realized there were new additions in the room and that Candice would take the opportunity to strike.
If Nathan were a normal human and had followed a typical civilian's instincts, he would've stayed rooted to his spot, simply watching in horror as the knife took a life.
However, Nathan wasn't a mere untrained civilian. He had seen life and death, blood and demise way too many times on the battlefield. His instincts told him differently. Instead of just standing still and watching, he reached for his own gun that was lodged in the back pocket of his pants. His trained fingers made quick work of the safety before pulling the trigger.
It was a neat trick. The bullet of Nathan's simple handgun flew through the air, hitting the blade and throwing it off its momentum. Everything was timed so perfectly that Devora had a hard time believing the bullet would actually hit its mark.
Even so, that wasn't the end of it.
Nathan stepped forward to join the fight without missing a beat. He reached for Candice just as she was caught unawares by the redirection of the knife, his hand reaching for the back of her neck before flinging her around and across the room. She landed on the ground with a cry, wincing in pain.
For a second there, Nathan thought he saw hurt fill her eyes. Be that as it may, whatever hallucination he had seen quickly disappeared in the next second.
Rage and vengeance soon overtook her. It barely took her an ounce of effort to hoist herself back onto her feet. She ran across the room, side-jumping onto a nearby chair to toss herself even higher into the air. Once she gained the height advantage, she maneuvered her body towards Nathan, her long hers wrapping around his neck before slamming his body down with the force of her body weight.
In the background safe away from Candice and Nathan's violent exchange, Devora rushed towards Cain, carefully holding him up. When warm liquid touched her fingertips, Devora withdrew her hand, her eyes wide with horror when she found red staining her fingers into the color of the setting sun.
"You're bleeding!" She exclaimed, her jaw hanging agape as Cain staggered a little on his feet.
From a distance, he didn't seem too seriously injured, if at all. However, upon closer examination, there was a wound at the side of his stomach. Crimson blood had long seeped into the fabric of his pricey suit, a red flower blooming there.
"It's just a small wound," the older man said. "Nothing a few stitches can't fix."
Instead of caring more about his injury, Cain turned towards the fight. His eyes lingered on both fingers before he reached for the blade Candice had attempted to throw at him previously. Devora knew about his intentions before he could put it into action. Her hands immediately flew to stop him, holding the knife in place before Julius Cain could throw it.
"No!" She cried out in panic. "You might accidentally hit Nathan instead."
Although they were in the midst of a fight, Julius Cain's eyes still sparkled with the mischief of a five-year-old boy. He seemed younger than his years, a small smile curving the edge of his lips as he raised a single eyebrow.
"You have affections for the boy," he casually remarked.
The words came out sounding like it was a teasing comment rather than a general statement that was expected of Cain. That made Devora blush ten times harder than she normally did. After all, she didn't think her boss was one to make casual jokes. Warmth rushed to her cheeks as all words defied her, leaving her speechless without a retort when she needed them most.
"Ahem," she cleared her throat. "No."
One word. That was all she could muster. It was a feeble and weak attempt at a defense.
Julius Cain knew it too for he smirked, satisfied. He knew he had hit the nail right on the head.
The fight was still raging on and Candice's hatred seemed more directed at Nathan than at Julius Cain at the current moment. Of course, Devora would guess why. After all, Nathan was a friend. The feeling of betrayal would hit the hardest from someone close. They had seen many trials and tribulations together as well as a multitude of successes and joys. In Candice's eyes, they were the ones that had betrayed her to side with Cain.
To have a friend as close as that betray her would hit harder than the betrayal of a stranger.
"Nathaniel can handle himself." Stepping towards the door with Devora's arms still supporting him, Cain urged the latter out of the nearly-destroyed room. "We better get out of here. You do not have the experience needed to fight her in the chance Miss Clair decides to combat with you instead."
"But Nathan..."
"—Can fight his own battles," he finished for her. "We have to leave. I need to see my son."
Devora felt a crunch in her heart the second she chose to step out of the room with Cain. As much as she wanted to stay and help, she knew that he was right. In such a battle of strength, she possessed neither the experience nor the skill to outwit Candice. Furthermore, there were two injured people left in the helicopter, a child, and a lone capable fighter. If Candice were to call for backup, or if time decided to play them all for fools, she would be risking more than just one life.
With a heavy heart and one last longing glance, Devora was out of the room, supporting Julius Cain down the seemingly never-ending corridors and out into the safety of the woods.
♕♕♕
"You just don't know when to give up, do you?" Candice snarled, jumping forward so quickly that Nathan just barely dodged her incoming onslaught by a mere hair's breadth. "Always have to play the hero and save the damsel in distress."
"There was never a damsel in distress for me to save." Gritting his teeth in annoyance, Nathan jumped into the air before kicking.
Candice's hands immediately flew to her front to block two kicks in succession, the boots that Nathan wore hitting against the palms of her hand painfully. She hissed, irritation flashing sharply in her eyes before raising her leg up in an attempt to hit her opponent.
However, that move had already been pre-calculated by Nathan, allowing him to block and dodge easily, maneuvering himself between the different types of furniture in the room so as to accommodate his rather extravagant actions. When she had slammed against the edge of the office desk due to a miscalculated step, Nathan grinned just ever so slightly.
All this time, Candice never seemed to slow down. That small disturbance in her flow of movements seemingly ceased to exist the very second she picked herself back up again. Immediately, she returned to her routine of fluid movements, throwing punches with the force of gods, her arms never once slowing down.
"Don't you ever get tired?" Nathan asked, humor tinting his voice ever the slightest.
He had no idea where the small burst of comedy had come from, but he wouldn't dare to question it. After all, the weight of the situation was still pressed rather heavily upon his shoulders and he wanted to try every way possible to ease it. If this could end amicably, that would be the best.
Candice, of course, didn't bother to reply, not that Nathan truly expected her to. She had even resorted to shooting Dallas, her most trusted friend. After she had gone past that point, there perhaps would be no return for her any longer.
Just then, a sudden light bulb brightened on top of Nathan's head, a possible solution far more wise and clever than fighting ever could. After all, words were the best weapons, possibly even having the power to defeat those armed with physical weaponry.
"You know, you nearly killed Dallas. Does he not mean anything to you?"
That was something enough to make Candice falter. She paused for a split second, just enough time for Nathan to quickly glance over to where he had last seen Devora and Cain standing. To his utmost surprise, the two had disappeared, leaving a widely opened door behind them.
Both relief and betrayal stabbed Nathan harshly right smack dab in the middle of his chest. He could feel the air rush out of his lungs in just that one single sight.
On the bright side, the duo's disappearance would mean that they were now safe. Last Nathan had noticed, Julius Cain was still in perfectly capable fighting form. He had not been severely injured from what Nathan's eyes could see and that meant well. If they were to meet any sort of trouble on their way back to the chopper, at least they could still ward their own battles.
Betrayal, on the other hand, stung painfully. He didn't want to believe that Devora had willingly left him all alone to fight the battles before him. He thought that she knew that Candice was, after all without question, the unrivaled champion when it came to hand-to-hand combat. Perhaps Devora had been humoring him, looking up to him and ultimately overestimating his abilities by the long shot.
Still, a word would have been nice.
Candice recovered faster than Nathan had anticipated. While he had still been daydreaming about the possibilities of Devora and Cain's departure, Candice had already begun to move. She hoisted herself over the desk that separated the two of them, landing a sharp blow across Nathan's cheekbone and thus slamming him back to the reality of the situation. In a few mere strides, Candice crossed the room within seconds and headed towards where the weapons were.
She pulled open a drawer, revealing a good number of firepower hidden in the secret compartment. Nathan barely even had time to properly assess the situation before Candice picked a random gun up, clicking all the right settings into place and pointing it at Nathan with ferocity carved into the pupils of her eyes.
All in a second, her hand was raised, the deadly weapon in hand and a mindset long tuned to kill. There was a snarl set upon her pretty lips, now split open due to some blows that Nathan had, fortunately, landed on her when he threw all his morals away about hitting girls.
"You weren't supposed to die today, Nathan. Neither was Dallas. My plan had always been to kill Julius Cain and nothing more. Not even his precious little son. But you've gotten in my way one too many times, and no doubt, the others will too."
With a dramatic flair to her words, she aimed the point of the gun perfectly where she wanted, holding still so that her aim — which was already so practiced and so perfect that she could pin a fly to the wall from a good distance away without killing the poor creature — could be even more precise.
Though he knew that his fate was a sealed one, Nathan darted, running in unpredictable directions in an attempt to reach Candice and disarm before she released the bullet that would no doubt end his life. Yet, he could never predict that Candice would be as heartless as she actually could be.
It took her just about a single second before her grip on the gun's handle tightened, her eyebrows furrowed and set to pure concentration though never breaking a single sweat. She breathed out, calming her heart before her finger hovered over the trigger, aimed to the most precise point of her target before she pulled.
The last in which Nathan could remember before hitting the ground in a resounding thunk was the smoke coming out of the barrel of Candice's gun, her emotionless expression forever imprinted into every crevice of his mind until the very second he breathed his last. Her words would then echo in his mind, the fleeting feeling of betrayal drenching him before his mind went blank.
"I'm sorry it had to be this way, Nate," she had said.
————
social media:
instagram: twelvewonderingstars
twitter: aurorayeo
facebook: twelvewonderingstars