"What did you promise him? What did you do?" He practically yells, his hands on my shoulders as he roughly shakes me. I very carefully do not react to his movements, locking my limbs in place by my sides as every instinct screams for me to incapacitate him and run.
I breathe deeply and, moving swiftly, twisting my body so that his hands fall from my shoulders and I'm closer to the door, I answer him.
"I promised to help him with his... man problems, and the deal was already done. It's over, behind me. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to decide what I want to do with he information - do what you want, and try not to give me any more incentive to keep it to myself." I say with an anger I don't feel, before turning on my heel and storming out of the warehouse again.
---
I turn the paper over in my hands, over and over again. My vision is still red with anger at Harper for what he said earlier, and anger at myself for going to the lengths I did to try and calm down - something that's only complicated this whole thing infinitely more than it needs to be. I exhale heavily, closing my eyes.
The temperature drops as the sun begins to set. I can feel the cold beginning to seep through my jacket, and wrap it tighter around me. Instinctively, my eyes move around, scanning the area for somewhere relatively hidden away for me to sleep. I don't want to go back in the warehouse, not now that everyone will know what I've done, and that I'm not sharing the information that could save their lives, but it's cold, almost too cold for me to sleep out here alone.
Almost.
Giving in to my habits, I stand and pick my way through piles of broken glass and stone that's been chipped off buildings, some of it stained a dark red, and find a dark corner to curl up in, resting my head on my bag as a pillow. This feels more normal, I note - cold, hard concrete beneath me and nothing but my jacket for warmth. Though the window across from me, I can see the sun just starting to cross the horizon, and I watch it until it disappears completely.
Well, I would, if someone didn't stand in my way of the view.
"Chlo!" A familiar voice calls, and I immediately identify who it is that's stopping me from watching the sun. "Chloe, come back, I'm sorry! I didn't mean what I said."
"Sure you didn't," I mutter under my breath, not moving, not giving any sign that I can hear him, that I'm so close to him and he doesn't even know I'm here.
"I know you can hear me, Chlo." Harper says, and I stiffen, my entire body tensing, ready to move and make a speedy getaway. I don't want to be near him right now, I'll only end up hurting him. "I know you can see me, too, which means you've gotta be close. And that means that I can see you, curled up over in that dark corner over there." I still don't move, trying desperately not to do anything to confirm his statement.
I'm a rock, I'm a stone, I'm a pile of rubble, I'm not here- I think. Don't move, stay perfectly still-
I shut my eyes, and a torchlight suddenly waves over me, and I know that I've been revealed, that he can see me, that he's found me. Without thinking, I grab my bag and swing it up onto my back, standing up and running in the same movement. The wall behind me, thankfully, had a hole in it, and now I squeeze through it and take off, throwing everything I have into my escape. My heart races in my chest and the only sounds I can hear are my ragged breathing and two sets of feet running - mine, and his.
My eyes dart around everywhere, looking for somewhere to go, somewhere to hide. I'll double back and then hide somewhere else, maybe even back where I was before - he won't check there again.
But there's nowhere for me to hide, nowhere to go, and I just keep running and running and-
"Gotcha!" A yell from behind me makes my already pounding heart skip a beat, and strong arms wrap around me and I fall, unable to catch myself. A terrified scream tears itself from my throat as I thrash wildly in the person's grip, panic filling me and making my legs kick out at any angle I can. My nails scrabble uselessly at the arms confining me, and as a hand moves to cover my mouth, I bite down on it - hard.
"Ow!" A familiar voice yells, and I realise that Harper must have caught up to me, and that it was him that grabbed me. I haven't been let go yet, though, and I don't stop struggling until he finally releases me. When he does, I get to my feet again, and briefly consider running before I decide against it. Knowing that Harper is faster than I am leaves me with one option.
I shift my weight slightly, preparing myself to knock him out and then leave again, but he obviously recognises the move because he changes his stance to match mine.
"You can't outrun me, so what makes you think you can outfight me?" Harper says with a smirk, before he turns serious. "Where were you going to go?"
"Away from you," I say flatly. "I don't want to be around you right now, so why won't you just leave me alone?"
"Because you're my friend, Chlo, and you owe me - I saved your life by breaking you out of the cells-" here I shudder - "and you're yet to save mine, so-"
"So I'm not allowed to go anywhere until I've paid off my debts?" I laugh. "You're worse than the government, you're no better than them!"
"At least I'm letting you live!" Harper yells back. My vision is turning red again, and I can't think straight.
"Maybe it would be better if you just killed me now! Or if you can't do it, take me to the guys that gave me the notes for breaking into the greenhouses in exchange for sex! Or even the government - take me back to them and let them kill me! Maybe you'd be better off that way, and I wouldn't have to worry about paying you back because it would be like you never saved me in the first place!"
There's a pause, the tension thick enough to cut, and then-
"Well maybe I shouldn't have." Harper's voice is cold, empty of emotion, and I fight the urge to take a step back.
"You know what, Harper? You're right. You should have left me to die. You should have just let me be killed by the people who are hunting us left, right and centre, and then we wouldn't be having this conversation, you wouldn't have to live with the regret, and you'd never find out that, before you decided to act the way you did, I was planning on going back in the morning and giving Thunder the information so that we could try again, so that we can all survive, but I'm not going to now. You don't deserve it! No one else would have done what I did to get this-" I shove the paper in his face -"so without me, you wouldn't even have the possibility of getting it! Maybe you should think about that before following me again."
And with that, I turn on my heel, and head off towards, well, nowhere.
---
I don't sleep well that night and wake up with a stiffness in my limbs that's unfamiliar to me. Maybe it was the cold, pressing in on me from all sides, or maybe it was the lack of company (I desperately don't think of that company's name, all too aware of the sharp ache in my chest), but I'm not sure what caused my sleepless night, so I don't spare it much more thought as I move about during the daylight hours I have open to me, all the while turning over that blasted paper in my hands.
Time away from, well, everyone else, hasn't made my decision any easier to make. But while keeping it to myself would definitely boost my odds of survival, my mind has been moving in a darker direction, towards a large-scale defiance of the government, in an attempt to change the way we live. Not a revolution, not by a long shot - we haven't got the numbers for that, by any means, but some sort of a show for them to prove that even those of us with no money to our names have worth to them. And in order to achieve even a small amount of movement in that direction, I need as many allies on my side as I can.
And this one piece of paper is my ticket to that.
Yet, after what I did to get it, can I face everyone again? Can I stand up against Thunder and his sheer intimidation over everyone, Harper and his anger and disappointment in the face of my actions, Charmaine and the knowing look that I'm almost certain I'm going to get from her when the truth about how I got the paper comes out? Can I go through with the demonstration to the government if I can handle the belittlement from my allies first? Or can I live with the decision to keep the information that could change the way we live to myself, only using it for my benefit, and my survival, and handle the constant weight on my conscience for hiding it, and myself, away?
I find a park bench on a deserted street and sit down heavily on it, burying my face in my hands. I feel as if the weight of the world is on my shoulders, the information I hold in my hands the key to its ongoing survival, and because of what I've done, I now dictate what happens to the world. But do I want this power?
Thinking about it, and all that having that power would entail, I find myself realising that, no, I don't want it. I don't want to have that responsibility on my shoulders. I don't want that sort of a decision to be mine to make, because I know that I'll make the wrong one, in the end.
I uncover my eyes and breath in deeply. My decision is made. Even after what Harper did to me after I left yesterday, and knowing what will and what else might happen to me when I go back, I feel certain that, for once, I've made the right choice.
I stand, a fresh resolve burning through me, and I start to retrace my steps from the day. But the sun begins to set a lot earlier than I'd thought; winter's coming, which probably explains the cold from last night. I don't stop though, even with the oncoming darkness, and before long, I find myself in familiar territory. Despite not being able to see very far, I'm able to navigate my way back to the warehouse that serves as a home base for so many people like me.
Home. It's a strange word. One that is typically associated with safety, protection, friendship or family; close relations with other people that aid in the wellbeing and survival of an individual. But for me, I haven't had a home, somewhere where I felt safe, and loved, with friends and family, since that night when I was three, watching helplessly as my parents were forced to their knees and killed before me, since I went on the run from the monsters who have it out for me, who want to kill me because I didn't die that night with my mum, my dad. I still don't.
But maybe, just maybe, I will.
---
Knocking on the door of the warehouse in the same pattern that Harper used when he first brought me here is no less nerve-wracking than standing behind him and not knowing who was behind the door. As I pull my hand back, it opens to reveal Charmaine there, and I can hear the dead silence inside.
"Chloe!" She gasps out finally, opening the door completely and pulling me through it, crushing me against her. Having had the breath literally knocked from my lungs, it takes me a second to regain my bearings enough to be able to push against her. She releases me and holds me at arms length, looking me up and down.
"Where have you been, I've been worried sick, we both have!" She scolds me. I smile sheepishly at her.
"All in good time," I tell her. "I need to see Thunder first. There's something he needs to see."
I haven't looked at the information on the paper myself, so as Thunder unfolds it in my field of view, I get my first look at what seems to be some sort of plan. I can't make sense of it until Thunder explains it to me.
"It's the layout of the greenhouses," he tells me in by far the gentlest voice I've heard him use. Even if it isn't that much different from how he normally speaks. "Using this, we can determine the best access points and the route to get to them, and how to get out again." Nodding my understanding, I leave him with the paper, glad to be rid of it, and make my way over to the mattress at the back of the warehouse. Fortunately, no one else is there, so I set my bag down on its squashy surface and flop down onto it. It's only then that I realise that the reason I didn't sleep last night was because the ground was too hard. Huh - after two days of sleeping on this thing, I've gotten so used to it that the softness of it has become somewhat of a normality to me.
The sudden dipping of the mattress beside me catches my attention, and I turn my head to see Harper watching me closely. His eyes are guarded, wary, almost as if he's expecting me to take off and run away again. I can't think of anything to say, so I just sit there beside him, turning back to face the wall, staring at the same spot he is. Progressively, he moves slightly closer to me, and, when I don't move away, sits right beside me, so close he's almost touching me.
I realise, then, the magnitude of what I've done, how deeply I've hurt him. I wouldn't change what I did, if I was given the opportunity to, because it's my way of ensuring that everyone here has a better chance of survival, a longer life. Maybe not a better one, but at least they'll have access to some sort of food to use for something. It's my way of ensuring that he has food, and a way to survive.
And as that thought crosses my mind, a sudden warmth rushes through my veins, cracking the ice of my heart and making my mind somehow faster and slower at the same time. My mask slips slightly, and as it does, my head moves to rest on his shoulder, my eyes closing.
"I'm sorry," I tell him.
And as Harper's arms wrap around me, pulling me to him, I turn so that my face is buried in the crook of his neck so that he can't see me cry. My mind is a whirlwind of emotions; relief, fear, anticipation. But, possibly the most terrifying of them all, is a shred of hope, something that I haven't felt for a number of years, something that makes me feel even more afraid.
"Me too," Harper whispers back.
And that's how we stay until the fatigue overcomes me, and I fall asleep, still wrapped in Harper's warm embrace, my face still hidden, and a steady stream of tears falling down my cheeks.
A/N: I meant to update a bit earlier but RL got in the way. I won't make excuses but school has to come first. I'll make an effort to update more but no promises. Thanks for reading! Xx