Alex
It is said that when a destructive man harbors love for a girl, he can stir disaster like non other when it comes to her safety.
But what about the same persons hate towards someone who tried to harm the only thing he lives for?
He begins to possess lethal tendencies that were too far gone even for his own comprehension.
"Thomas" I reach out for Elzinas hand, her small frame though she did her best to mask the tremble, Freezes. I pull her tighter in embrace. My gaze latching on to the heel clad leg that stood in front of us.
"You've grown up so well" my ice cold eyes raised at the slick, breezy tone. When it met the blue pair of keira's, I realized that I could never be able to detest a colour so much than those. Despite I had them myself.
In that moment, the tension rose.
The air became denser as the silhouette of Nathan ascended until he came and stood right next to her.
Elzina shifted, for a brief minute she looked like she could just kill Nathan with the glare. She was so fragile in my arms, yet so bold in her will.
She hasn't given up.
Good.
I was not going to either.
On the floor, surrounded by people who were ready to act any minute under the spell of commands. Two traitors and us.
What were the odds?
The ugly odds that i decided, cruelly states that no matter what happens tonight. I was ready to do whatever it takes to keep her safe. Even if it meant the end of me.
I would rather die knowing that she's free and unscathed than live with the regret that her scars were not just the one's on her body, but something that broke her from inside.
You think she'll be able to live if something happened to you?
She has to.
I closed my eyes, memorizing the dependent hold she had on my shoulder.
Then I wasn't able to answer my own question.
"Look at you both, so in love" toxic. Her voice was toxic. Contaminating the room. I used to believe, an analogy of why keira had a smooth low tone. I wondered if it was because of her insecurities and timidness. But now, I know better. It was the sound of a ruinous curse. She was a curse.
As for Nathan.
His eyes held an uncanny envy as he raked us.
But it was no match for what I felt towards him. There was no coherence, absence of limit to how much I wanted to see him wither in pain. But I was torn in between protecting Elzina and bruising those longing eyes that were on hers to blindness.
"Get up Thomas. I don't want to see you like this. And what were you thinking? Stepping on this forbidden territory for a girl." she smiles, her hands crossed across her chest as she stood sophisticatedly tall. I haven't uttered a word since I saw her. This must have irked the deranged woman as she clicks her tongue, flips her hair back trying to appear nonchalant to the situation as she adds "This world is dangerous son"
Dangerous?
I would've have laughed at that if it weren't for how true it was.
How true it was for Elzina because I barely cared about myself now.
The lack of response irks her, it multiplies when I help Elzina to her feet, simultaneously standing up. Stringently my hand falls to her waist as Keira takes a step forward. Her posture morphing stiffer and stiffer.
"Say something Thomas" she hisses. Her aura crumbling. Her breath hitching. Her nerve straining.
Keira white still cared.
Silence exerts as I will my mouth to speak out the two desperate words.
"Screw. You"
Her eyes stalls a bit wide before she composes into an ice queen. Clearing her throat she steps away. Providing enough space as with the motion of her eyes she gestures to Nathan and the other two men.
They take no offense at being ignored for so long as now they finally carried on with the duty. Striding to where we stood.
My free hand automatically loops by the holster, years of practice and a gun In hand. A simple click and a loud bang. The man I shot on leg falls down, while the other with him swatches his own rifle out.
That's where the equity ended as I interlaced my finger with frozen pair of Elzina's who stared at the groaning man with wide eyes. I melt her shock with one jolt of word.
"Run"
And she does. With me.
Chaos erupts from behind us, people pooling in from corners that weren't visible till now. I had left the yard door ajar when I had sneaked in, but right before we could dash through it Elzina stumbles, I tried to yank her when I saw that Nathan had a hold on her shirt.
I would have gladly punched his jaw square if it wasn't for the way Elzina hustled her wrist out of my grasp. I stood there confused as she acts on impulse, grabbing the nearest vase and hurling it upon Nathan's head.
It bursts into countless pieces as Nathan's swears, losing his clutch on her.
But she doesn't stop at that, gritting her teeth she lifts her knees up. A greater groan resounds from him as he falls shielding the area between his legs.
"Asshole" Elzina mutters as she picks up where we left, entwining our fingers it was her who pulled me out from the proud trance.
Proud.
I indeed was of her.
I was proud of what she has become, the survivor. The fire that gave warmth to her loved ones while it burned the enemy around her. I was proud of so many things about her that counting it would be futile.
And so was futile to try and locate where we exactly ran.
Into the woods.
Damp soil soaking the sole of our shoes. Cold drying our skin. The rough edges of ill branches grazing and trailing and marking us.
But we don't stop.
Angry yells and warning kept rising manifold despite my speed, I know Elzina was succumbing to her weak metabolism. That one healthy subsistence she had, taken from her after the accident years ago.
Her breathing irregular, her palms moist under my hold.
A distinct, faded noise fills in as we headed in a direction so clueless.
It sounded like the flow, harsh thrush and flow of water falling upon the surface.
When the woods line gave way to an open clear land ahead. One peak at what lay ahead was enough to make us turn for the other way-
A dead end.
It was a water fall.
An end with land dipping into a river slide.
My feet cements to the ground.
"Alex" it must've been of some relief to hear Elzina call my name after all that had happened. But her voice gave away her fear as she stepped back with me following her.
They started to weave in. Three men with Keira's walk graceful as ever as she lines from behind to front. Her hair on place, her breath on track and her chin on point. A smile stretches her pale lips, the full moon in open sky making everything about her much more clear than in the house.
She was a curse.
She had always been the curse in my life and now when I had found a cure, she was here to take her away from me.
And i- cannot have that.
"Such stupid move Thomas" her vile sound mixes with the pelts of hissing water. But still clear and accentuated. "I know there was a reason Leo wanted to teach you so much. You indeed act on impulse. Look where it bought you-" she spans her arms as if introducing us to our dire condition with a raised mocking brow "-to a lionesses den. All for what Thomas? Such a fool aren't you?"
I don't answer her.
But my straight face must be of some reliability for what she saw as her confident brow furrows.
As if on cue the chaotic forest doesn't feel like it was all deserted as before. The slow but powerful sirens whiffs pasts by. Though low it was evident that we were not alone anymore.
"What's that?" she growls. Her lips twitches. Dots of lights ignites far away, more joins by the period. still far away. But still here.
Finally I decide to look at her. My eyes piercing through her soul just like how hers were on mine.
We have the same eyes.
Pathetically I realized.
"You thought I don't have a backup? Not as much fool as you thought am I keira?" I might have drove here with a sole intention in mine. But there was no way to succeed this solely. Ian was the one person I had relied on. He had been so against the idea that he even went as far to tell me that I have an intelligence of a rabbit. I accepted. If my love was crazy enough, then I was a rabbit. I don't regret it.
I had been on time.
I had been there when she had her escape planned. I helped her. I was there on time.
It was fate.
But I gave credit to fate way too early as Keira plucks out a gun from the nearest man.
"Tell them to go. Now" she orders, the weapon pointed at us. Then she shifts it more precisely at Elzina "now"
My body froze, temperature felt as if it dropped swiftly in the moment as I retreated a step back, one of my arm going back to deviated where Elzina stood. Shifting her behind me.
Keira chuckles, it brimmed with madness.
"You think I won't be able to target her? I am a white Alex. I have the eyes of an eagle. If you are anything good at this-" she flicks her wrist and the object within it as if to emphasize "-is because it runs in our blood"
"You will do nothing like that. You hear me?" I was not ashamed that how much of plea it resembled despite my try to stay strong for Elzina. keira knew she had the upper hand as a chortle of trigger being riled intimidated the atmosphere.
The men who was with her left slowly ,began retreating with delusioned glances being traded with one another. The help was here. But not near.
Soon they disappeared into the woods counting on their own life.
But keira made no effort to stop her people, she was well acquainted by the fact that there was no way out. Except-
"I am so sorry Thomas- you left me no choice" my eyes goes wide as a tear trails down from hers.
I watch as with pale thin finger that she curls by the slot.
From back Elzina pushes me aside, taking me completely off guard as I stumble away.
How stupid was I to think that she'd be just less stupid to let me carry on with my stupidity?
A loud bang.
The delivered shot.
The time stopped, my heart did too as she stood there with her lips parted, eye ahead staring right where keira was. Her feet almost gave away as I encircled my arm by her shoulder.
I don't inspect her for injury.
She buries her head in my shoulder as I run my hand through hair. Comforting her as i hide her from the scene that laid ahead.
Hide her. While I couldn't.
Keira's dead cold eyes wide towards the sky, her white clothes smeared with earth as she falls to the ground, blood soaks by her side, spearing over as she took her last breath.
But It wasn't just her that held my vision captive. Yes she was dead, but there was no better or justifiable end for her. It was the rather the question of who?
Who did this?
Paralyzed and struck, Nathan's placid gaze travels from her to us. The shrill of water behind increased tenfold as the result of silence that dominated us.
"I killed her"
His voice distant, eyes grim and the bruises that mapped his face looked so crazed that he looked like someone who had walked out of his grave. I wasn't able to spot the Nathan I had known.
He was doomed.
And the worse part was he knows it. I know by the look on his face as he watched us.
Sirens.
Warnings.
Lights.
But not here yet. They are trying to locate us. But will they be able to do it in time?
"Everything is over" he smiles sadly at Elzina, and then at me "I really want to kill you so bad, see you dead like your liar of an aunt. She promised that she would never hurt El, but she was ready to kill her tonight for her selfish pathetic self." He spits, anger lights up in his eyes as he spares a glimpse towards her.
"But I can't do that. I can't kill you because I am bound to end up arrested soon. I am a freaking murderer dammit. And I won't be able to live with the image of you both with a happy ending" he smiles crookedly shaking his head, lethargically as he moves forward.
Gravel crunches beneath us as we minus back. He stops right when my feet cements mere an inch from the edge.
The tender and broken girl beside me, I could feel the panic radiate off her as her eyes took in the amount of water that surrounded us. Surrounded her.
And i- I could do nothing about it.
It was the most helpless I have ever felt.
Though my patience was thinner than a shredded thread, my terrified heart kept me bolted. One wrong move- and anything could go wrong.
Nathan was a grenade and by what he implied next was a promise that he would destroy it all if he had too.
"There's just one way to make sure that El would never start a life with someone else. Be it me, you or whoever it is" insanity ripples as he blinks lazily, his head falling to side. "You have to die El. I will give you the freedom from your nightmares. If i can't have you, no one can" her breathing hitches, cold against my neck as I hugged her from side, pulling her closer than I ever thought it was natural.
She slowly bought her hands up to snuggle in, the wind heavier now playing with our hair and emotions.
Voices.
Closer. Hollering our name.
But still too late.
Nathan reaches out for the gun, angling it up as I turn- stealing the little time I had to drink in her features. Memorizing the kind and beautiful girl who taught me how to live. How to love. Her eyes afraid searched for hope in mine.
I smile at her.
She doesn't.
"A-Alex" her voice. So pure, so angelic. Every moment I had spent with her was euphoria and every pain just an excuse to be healed by her. She was my healer, my life and my family.
"I know how to swim- I just panic when they over power me. I learned the fear Alex- it wasn't there always"
Those words, once she told me. I was counting on that.
"Fears can be undone" I cup her cheeks as her stormy grey eyes brims with tears. It can't be her tears the last thing I see- it were her eyes that had drawn me in the first day she had walked into the class. They used to be so brave. I remember.
"No" she whispers with a sob. encrypting the meaning behind what i planned. Smart.
Always the smart one.
"Survive" I say as i cut the protest in her lips by brushing my lips against hers. Then deepening the kiss I engulfed her visage entirely.
I shift in time as the shot goes off.
The last thing i felt was the burning ache in my back.
And then-
We were falling.
***