Zero Two Three One | John Laurens X Reader [Hamilton]

LXXXVI: Four Allies and a Fire

❝Most people do not pray; they only beg. ❞
—George Bernard Shaw

The sunset is the most beautiful I have ever seen.

The ocean is frozen over, the waves no longer crashing and swaying. The sand is gone, leaving nothing but uneven rocks for me to tread on. I keep walking, my eyes shifting from the blinding sunset to the unset path I am on. Where am I going? I won't make it where I go, that's for sure. My heart will kill me before that.

Snow begins falling. What has happened to this beach? 

Don't turn around, the voice in my head screams. No matter what. Don't look back. You can't. It will kill you.

But this aching in my chest is so profuse, so unbearably agonizing, that I can feel my sanity breaking thin with every pulse of pain that shoots from my heart and ripples throughout every nerve of my body.

And some part of me knows that if I turn around, either the pain will end, or I will die. And I would accept either.

So I ignore the voice in my head, no matter how familiar and powerful the voice is, and twist around to face whatever resides just behind me.

I jerk awake, my breathing unsteady and head spinning. Shit... That dream again. I don't remember falling asleep. I don't remember-

Where is Alexander?

It's early morning. Very early. I doubt anyone else in camp is awake, and for that exact reason, I wouldn't be surprised if Alexander was. Against my better judgment, I slip out of bed — Alexander's bed — and leave his personal quarters in search of him.

The search is surprisingly fast. As I pass Washington's quarters, I hear quick discussion with hushed voices. There's no doubt in my mind that those voices belong to Alexander and Washington.

Alexander... Alexander shouldn't be talking to him.

♙♟♙♟♙

I'm waiting for everything to come crashing down. I don't know when it will happen, but I know it's going to happen, and that's what terrifies me. I can't prepare for it. I can't predict what exactly the reaction from the public will be. I can't get in front of it before it gets in front of me.

As for now, all I can do is wait. Besides, I have something far direr to deal with at the moment, and his name starts with Nikolai.

I'm always hovering between being annoyed by him, to downright terrified of him. Today is a day where I'm terrified.

December 7, 2060.

I'd rather not say how we got in contact with him, only that it was against our will, and in a secluded area apart from Fire Island, back on mainland Alaska.

I had a lot of questions about how he managed to get on American soil, but I've grown to learn that Nikolai has a way to get anywhere he wants.

Besides, I'm far too frightened to question him.

"The absolute stupidity you must have to do that! The absolute insolence! Have you no brain?! No forethought?! No common sense!"

"It wasn't-"

"Did I give you permission to speak?!"

My mouth hangs open for a moment, then I droop and shake my head. "No."