rising tensions were rapidly becoming common.
especially with all the complicated things going on. zayn knew too much, luke still felt hunted, harry, niall, and louis were clueless, and kris wanted to run away again. the turmoil they put into the atmosphere was enough to worry anyone, even if they didn't know exactly what was going on. ashton feigned ignorance to the situation towards outside parties. calum and michael kept to themselves. ashlyn was hardly ever anywhere to be found. for anyone to keep up with everything, someone would need to start handing out review memoirs every week.
two days after he'd encountered kris, calum was showing his journal to ashton. back in their confinement, ash had been the only one of the group to receive the direct result of the dreams/visions. he was used to being woken up on the nightly and trying to help retain what was typically sounding like pointless chatter. a journal was a welcome replacement.
"what's she saying yes to, exactly?" ashton asked.
calum shrugged. "i didn't write it down, i don't know. all i know is it's going to lead to something really, really bad."
with their limited knowledge, they hardly knew what jacob was capable of planning. and calum had hardly gained any further information from his other visions. but his gut still turned when he thought back to the emotions brought by the vision. anxiety, fear, panic. he didn't know what was to come except for those few named emotions. then again, a small part of him knew he should've been used to the images of onslaught and chaos.
though this was a bit different. the visions he typically had didn't directly involve him. hardly ever involved violent, either, for that matter. well over half of them pertained to bland future events, always vague and murky the further away they were. as a kid, he'd been able to see planned surprises, test dates (sometimes even answers), up until his first nightmare warning of confinement. doom and now violence had slowly leaked in.
"hey, 'm losing you." ashton waved his hand in front of calum's eyes.
calum jumped out of his state and blinked. "sorry."
"is there anything i can do to help you out with," ash gestured to the open journal on the bed between them. "that?"
slightly hesitant, calum shrugged. "i don't even know what's going to happen, geez, how can i do an sort of preparation?"
"i don't know. build a bunker?"
calum rolled his eyes. "how about i'll let you know, alright?"
"alright, let me know if you have another vision. at least a six on the panic-inducing scale.
"i didn't know that was a thing."
ashton grinned sarcastically. "you act like i never make things up."
calum rolled his eyes, and ashton got up and left. after a few minutes, he decided to try and sleep. his visions always came at night, but there was a first time for everything. and lots of firsts had been happening recently.
-
harry was always hard to miss. somehow, though, zayn managed.
zayn had spent at least a half hour redoing sketch after sketch of the override key. something always messed up, whether it be his own feelings of inadequacy or an actual error. being so wrapped up in what he was doing, zayn didn't take notice when the door opened with a slight creak. someone tapped him on the shoulder and he practically lept. he spun around, and exhaled when he looked up and saw harry.
"do you ever consider that just saying "hi" would be helpful? by a lot?"
he grimaced. "sorry."
zayn glanced down at the paper, now marked with a long jagged line of lead, exhaled, and crumpled it into a ball.
"sorry, again."
"i was going to scrap it anyway." he tossed it into the back corner, where a hill of papers were slowly beginning to form. "so, you need something?"
harry nodded, folding his arms loosely. "yeah. i was wondering when you were going to talk to me and louis? about what's going on with jacob?"
zayn's stomach sunk a bit. "i just.. you know, haven't gotten around to it."
"well i can always find louis for you. i'm pretty sure i know where to find him."
another painful turn of the stomach. he had to think of something to say. zayn sat up a little bit straighter. think think think.
"look... can i talk about it with you guys when i'm ready?"
harry raised one eyebrow. "are you gay?"
zayn blinked. "no, why?"
"oh, thought that's the direction you were headed. never mind, continue."
zayn blinked again, then proceeded. "i just want to talk about it when i'm ready and know exactly what i want to say. i don't think it'd be a good idea to force it out, otherwise it'll be coming out in the wrong way and i don't want the conversation to turn into a reenactment of the alamo."
for a moment, he regretted his choice of words. zayn waited for harry to respond somewhere along the lines of "you need to tell me whatever this is before i burn you into a crisp". after a long few moments of silence between the two, harry kept his arms folded and shifted his weight.
"this isn't extremely serious, right? like someone is dying?"
"no-no no one's dying." 'at this rate, anyway, no, but it's sort of an up-in-the-air variable.'
harry nodded. "okay. just, the second your ready, tell us? especially if jacob's involved, we want to make sure you're doing well. but we'll wait if we have to."
he didn't look comfortable with what he'd said at all. but zayn didn't acknowledge it and instead nodded. "thanks."
there was probably much more to be said, but harry left without another word, which was admittedly a little surprising. after a few minutes, zayn stood up and began tearing through to the bottom of the pile of papers. there, he found the first draft of the key, signed it messily, and created it within a matter of seconds. the handle looked a little bent, and a few parts he hadn't fully erased- which resulted in a few pieces of metal sticking out weirdly- but zayn stuck it into his pocket.
before he would say anything, he had to figure out what jacob was hiding. people were already onto him and onto jacob alike; zayn had to do something to redeem himself, and this could easily be his chance.
--
i'm going to start knocking updates down to once a week ok sorry but i want to even the updates out so they aren't so spastic sorry (▰˘◡˘▰)
also i was going to make this one big long chapter but it was taking forever to write and type so i split it up into several parts sorrY
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date- october 17, 2014
words- 1,154
reads- 3,381
comments- 15
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