To Be Free (9 page)

"Draw for straws?" he
questions, and I scoff at the suggestion - and at how quickly his
optimism left him. It was nice, I'll admit, seeing him happy.

"I'll take a part of the floor
that hasn't been completely destroyed or marked with questionable
chemicals of the natural kind," I state, kicking the leg of the bed
beside me. It groans in protest, crashing to the ground a second
later and making me wince.

The man pushes himself up onto
his hands, scowling at me.

"Care to explain to me why
you're sacrificing yourself, oh knight?" he inquires with an arched
brow and a sarcastic lilt to his voice. His accented English flows
with the carefully selected words of his phrase, a low tone barely
hinting at the horrors of the past its owner has witnessed.

"You've just broken a fever," I
reply, scowling, and the man rolls his eyes, muttering something
unintelligible. "I don't want you getting sick again."

"We've shared
a bed before," he scoffs, shrugging a shoulder. "Sure, it was a bit
bigger, but one night won't kill either of us. Besides, we don't
need
you
catching
a cold, either."

I frown at him, and he grins in
smug satisfaction at me.

"Dick," I hiss, and he bows
shallowly.

With that settled Seb pulls his
pack closer to the bed and I do likewise, pulling out both blankets
we packed and using one to cover the mattress, stretching it over
the sides, and the other to use as an actual blanket. Once two
pillows are thrown into the mix, we settle back-to-back in a
silence that isn't exactly comfortable.

My skin tingles again at the
spots his touched mine, and I snap my eyes shut to push all
thoughts aside and try to will myself to sleep in the next
instant.

Unfortunately, that rarely
works.

Seb clears his throat,
fidgeting slightly, and the strange glow peeking out from under the
blankets whenever either of us shifts - brushing against each other
in the process and helping no imagination - blinds me
momentarily.

"You know," he starts quietly,
his tone sounding slightly regretful at the fact that he managed to
gather enough courage to speak. He forges on, however, "it gets
cold sometimes here - well, it did last time I was here - so... if
you get cold, you can cling a bit, okay?"

I can't even find the heart to
fight the smile tugging at my lips.

I like this side of him - the
kind, sort of shy, yet very happy man who doesn't always look so
haunted and forgotten, alone in the world. The one that reaches out
to hold me because he knows words can't make anything better, words
are just symbols we associate to things and tack empty meanings to;
whereas actions are truer than life, and remain imprinted in your
mind and on your skin.

"Alright," I reply softly, a
breath spoken in the pre-dawn. "If you get scared, you can do the
same."

He doesn't say anything to
that, though I imagine he has a sarcastic remark he's keeping in
check. I do mean it, though. Nine's dreams are anything but
pleasant, riddled with his fears and haunting nightmares, and if my
presence can give him a night of respite, I don't mind at all.

We fall
asleep like that, back to back with the promise of comfort held
within each other, trust being placed in another individual we
barely know but that I wish I knew so much better. An individual
that makes my breath catch sometimes and makes me believe in
hope
again.

And if, in the presence of the
post-dawn light streaming in through the old boards and the grimy
windows, we somehow end up tangled together in our search for
comfort... well, I can't say much to that, can I?

Waking up is a strange process
in itself, especially that afternoon. First, as I slowly pull out
of the first dreamless sleep I've had in years, I gather my
bearings while still clinging to that wonderful warmth wrapped
around me. Then, once I'm satisfied and I remember where I am, I
open my eyes to first see a mess of dark brown hair a few inches
from my nose.

Sleepily, I take inventory of
every little spot there's a small fire burning, where skin meets
skin.

His forehead is pressed against
my neck, a small pressure that offers comfort and allows his breath
to ghost over my collarbones; his hands are curled loosely between
us, trapping my left hand between his hold; I have an arm around
his waist, cradling him slightly; and our legs are tangled
together. He's still asleep, snoring very slightly in his sleep as
he dreams.

I close my eyes again and just
relish that warmth, taking comfort in his presence and allowing
myself to relax in a way I haven't done with another person in a
long, long time.

My mind tries bringing back up
the memory of that night, but I stubbornly push it away and focus
on the warm, breathing body of the man who life has broken beyond
repair.

He shifts slightly, leaving my
hand free to roam as he turns his head up enough for the afternoon
light to catch his profile. Propping myself up on my elbow now,
right hand resting casually on his hip, I brush aside a stray lock
of hair from his face and lean against my arm afterwards, watching
him sleep peacefully.

This expression suits him far
better than the one of anger and solitude; it's free of worry and
pain, of anger and sorrow. He's smiling slightly in his sleep,
even, and the expression suits him.

I would've been more than happy
to continue watching him sleep and listen to his even breaths, but
a sound at the very edge of my perception forces me from this
moment of respite, forces me to tear my eyes away from the man
beside me to the dirty window allowing the sunlight to stream
through, straining my ears.

For a moment I feel as if it
was my imagination, but then I hear it again: barking. Faint voices
following afterwards and the distant sound of footsteps. Somehow,
as my fear escalates and I realize the danger, these footsteps echo
through my skin, getting ever louder with the passage of time.

We have scant minutes at most.
Five if we're lucky.

"Seb," I whisper, sitting up
fully and leaving the warmth behind - not without hesitation, mind
you. With my right hand I shake him, and his expression contorts
into one of irritation as I manage to drag him from sleep.

"What?" he hisses, blinking
blearily. He doesn't comment on the placement of my hand on his
stomach, so thin I can feel his bones and organs.

That touch reminds me of the
pain he's endured, and makes my blood boil at the thought. I
secretly vow to myself to do whatever I can to change time's
doings.

"They're close," I inform him,
and that's all it takes for the man to wake up fully - he doesn't
ask how I know, trusting my judgement and pausing only briefly as
he sits up to look at me, and take note of how close we're
positioned.

Something changes in his eyes,
his lips thinning into a hard line as his mind relays him a message
not intended for me, and there's fear in that expression as he
turns his eyes away, pushing himself back to his feet and shaking
slightly.

He does his best to hide that
fact, but I notice how much his hands shake as he takes a quick
swig of his canteen. What I can't figure out, while we're packing
again, is what he's afraid of.

Recon One, or me?

With a very
clipped
let's go
thrown my way over his shoulder he leads the way back out
into the woods, and as I follow in his wake I wonder exactly what
it was that made him pull away from me like that so suddenly, when
he'd finally begun opening up. I'm left to follow his retreating
back, none the wiser with the dogs on our tails and a million
questions bouncing in my skull.

The most
obvious one being
what the hell happened
to this man to make him this way?

For a while there's silence as
we run through the trail, our pace almost doubled from the one of
yesterday thanks to the not-so-friendly incisive at our backs. The
barks fade in and out of existence, getting louder and fainter
throughout the afternoon.

We don't talk for a solid hour
or so, though I'd be quicker to say it was about three hours,
before Seb stops dead in his tracks and steps into the bushes
without a single word, leaving me to follow him or remain there
like a sitting duck. Of course, I follow the man into the bushes
and he immediately signals for me to crouch down in the foliage,
creeping forward and hissing at me to be quiet.

Heart pumping
adrenaline through my veins as I follow carefully behind him, I
watch his tense posture and his movements that are precise and
calculated, leaving no room for the macromite to shine from beyond
the protection of the cloak.
He's done
this before
, I realize as I pause behind
him, heart beating in my throat as I strain my ears for the hints
of life.

It's faint. Very faint, and as
I hold my breath and wait for something to happen, I hear it:
voices. When I realize they're here, my blood chills and it feels
as if the temperature around us drops an extra five degrees.

I
can't
see
the
men, but somehow that doesn't reassure me. I know they're there,
and the fact alone that we can hear them is proof of how close we
actually are to them.

How
?

Seb looks like he knows why,
his jaw clenching and his fingers curling into fists as he crouches
behind the shrub, listening to the conversation as acutely as I
am.

"...and I
don't even know
why
we're bothering with the north!" one of them is saying, a
man's voice. I can just about imagine him throwing his arms up
indignantly. "The facility is closer to Mexico - why don't we just
station ourselves at the border and
wait
for them to cross? What's so
fucking special about
these
two Carriers?"

Seb's form is starting to take
on a strange quality. The air around him seems to be thickening
slowly, tinted a light red hue with white and black particles -
very similar to what I saw back at the facility. His eyes, though,
from the pupils to the sclera, looks as if someone openly bled on
them, their colour changing as well to a reddish hue. His brow is
furrowed in concentration, frowning.

I have to step back when it
starts expanding, stepping to the side slightly as he keeps his
eyes rooted to the same spot between the bushes. I peer through the
foliage, and there they are.

Recon One.

I was half-expecting them to
look like the Vigils, but I couldn't have been more wrong. Their
suits cling to their skin very much like ours do, a thin line of
macromite running along their bodies and shining a muted light,
much less perceptible than ours. They have heavy combat boots on
their feet and a utility belt strapped to their waist and looping
around their right shoulder, holding guns, grenades, and ammo
clips. The helmets are the standard, however, with the visor pulled
over their eyes to sort of hide half their face, even though you
can still kind of see it in the right light. It's black, though,
instead of white.

"One of them has something the
big guys want," the shorter of the two announces, each man around
six feet tall. He's holding his gun in his hands, but the barrel is
pointed down to the earth and isn't in any way a threat. "They've
never seen anything like it - and the other's been hiding his all
along somehow, and they want to know how."

"Don't move a
muscle, Quinn, no matter what I do," Seb hisses quietly, his eyes
riveted to the men. I snap my head in his direction, having about
half a dozen problems with that. "I mean it - you can't control
your gift yet, so just
wait
here
. Got it?"

The man doesn't let me finish;
instead he slips off his pack and, in the same movement as the
noise attracts the attention of the soldiers, he disappears.

I can hear the alarm blasting
in their ears the moment he steps through time and space, their
heads turning in the direction I'm still hiding in. My instincts
scream at me to run, to bolt and forget his warning, but a smaller
voice tells me to wait and that he told me to do it for a
reason.

They step towards the bushes,
guns levelled at them, and I hold my breath and count the seconds.
Carefully they step closer, and as the wind makes the red haze
lingering beside me fade, Seb doesn't reappear.

Three.

I shrink back into the shadows,
thinking that it'll help me remain invisible to their eyes, and the
taller man pokes the barrel of his gun through the bushes.

Two.

It hovers scant inches from my
chest, my heart jumping in my throat as I watch the weapon with
wide eyes, biting my lower lip.

One.

Just as he peers into the
bushes, hands still cloaked with the red haze I'm becoming familiar
with reach out and grab his head, snapping it to the side so
quickly his neck snaps and he falls to the earth, lifeless. The
mist clings to his pale skin like tendrils, and as the second man
turns around to face the source of the attack Seb kicks him in the
groin, making me wince as he goes down, clutching his pride. With
another quick flick of the wrist the man is breathing no more.

I'm still pressed against the
tree, breathing hard as I watch the man grab both of their wrists
and disappear into that mist again, leaving behind no trace of any
of them - the wind carries off the remains of his passing.

My heart is jumping in my
chest, promising cardiac arrest soon enough, and with the caution
of a frightened animal I slip off my pack and step out of the brush
back onto the path, alert to the tiniest of movements and ready to
bolt. When Seb appears again at my side, I almost lash out with a
cry of complete surprise, but it quickly fades as he falls to his
knees and bows forward, about to fall to the eager earth below.