Nowhere to Run ✓

thirty three | ❝capiche?❞

❝And maybe I am better off alone.❞

☀︎

MARK FLUNG HIS BAG inside the back of the truck, against the wall. It landed with a resounding thud and Jeremy scampered towards the commotion. "Damn, what's gotten into you?"

Instead of replying back, Mark just grunted, pushing himself back into his chair. He had nothing more to say to anyone. He'd tried getting Anna off their backs. She was a sitting duck, waiting to get them all killed, one way or the other.

Mark was still glad that Harry was going through with the plan. You never knew the kind of tomfoolery one might do when they were in love. He had been worried that Harry would give up and manage to turn over a new leaf.

Mark would like that. For both of them to turn. They had had each other's backs all their lives. Mark would love to follow Harry with anything that he cooked up but when it came to life and death, he would have to choose his life first.

Mark felt a growing guilt in his chest. It hurt him to think about his choices. He tried so hard to justify everything he'd done but it was a meek and failed attempt. That same guilt was now wrapping itself around his heart, as stealthy as a snake.

His ears hummed and his breathing slowed. He knew he could never be forgiven but he had to do his best to make sure Harry lived. They'd been through so much together and he was not going to let someone come and take that away from him.

Mark reached out towards his computer, ready to punch in a few codes. His fingers grazed over the keyboard, steady but unsure. There was no turning back now. A red cursor kept blinking, churning in code after code.

Jeremy leaned out of his chair and glanced at Mark's monitor. "Dude, your screen. Is there even supposed to be codes on it? Where are the heat signatures?" Jeremy inquired but it didn't register with Mark.

He'd done something bad. Something really, really bad. It had the potential to cause more harm to Harry than save him. Mark tried to reason with himself. If he did something for Harry, it couldn't be that unforgivable.

Right?

Mark thought back to the night when he was working with Jeremy on one of the wristbands. A loud ping had sounded on his laptop and Mark had checked it immediately, dubious of the message. He had clicked on it to find a string of codes, appearing at an extremely fast rate.

He could read it with ease. This was what he was perfect at. Technology, coding, and invention. He'd been impressed. Someone who could code as fast as him had already died. David Strebor. Harry's father was the one who had taught him how to code.