Simple Talents

Chapter Twelve

"Hey, Danny!" He heard her call through the crowd, though only barely, "I have to tell you something, Ria had a seizure this morning, they don't know yet or not if they'll be able to heal her properly, there could be brain damage." Danny hugged her, unable for words. "What if she becomes a vegetable? Will they take her away like they did with Sara?" He hugged her tighter,

"I sure as hell hope not. I need to tell you something important, but it needs to be in private. Can we go somewhere safe?" he practically laughed inside his head at what he said, like anywhere was safe now.

"No. I want to go catch Rannolia. They'll start the search soon, and they want everyone after her." He held her face after pushing her away slightly to look into her mis-matched eyes,

"It's not about us, it's about Sara and Ria and Rannolia and Benjamin and Theonda and Alexis and Matt, and everybody else here. We are not safe here." Ami pulled away. He had to be lying. There was nowhere safe but here. How could he say something so horrible? She slapped him hard across the face. She knew that he wouldn't lie about something like that, he knew how important safety was to her, but, it couldn't be true... she knew that she only slapped him because she was afraid that it was true, that her world of safety was all a lie... why is everything so damn difficult?

She wanted to storm away, but that wouldn't do anything for her or anybody else. She simply took a deep breath, mumbled an apology and asked quietly,

"What... the fuck... are you talking about." Her eyes could kill.

"It's a long story, let's go to my dorm, I can explain everything there."

Ami followed diligently to his dorm room without a protest. While she walked, she looked at the old battered bricks, the green, lush fields and the shining white goalposts at each end of them. She took in the boundary wood, trees of various species, resting normally, unplaced. She looked to the front buildings, the school she had worked in her whole life. She also looked to the administrative parts of those buildings, and finally, to the walkway. The glorious path that she loved, with its walkways above, benches on the ground, flowers everywhere, and glass roof; a beautiful glass roof. Ami hadn't lived there long, but she had already made it her new home. She loved it there. At the districts, she always knew that she would be safe. She knew she was protected. And as much as she wanted to go out into the world, she had wanted that knowing she could run back if anything happened.

Now, her entire life would be deemed as a sham. They weren't safe there anymore. If they weren't safe here... then, they wouldn't be safe anywhere.

"Okay, Ami... you need to trust me. You know that I can read minds, right?" they sat in his dorm room, Ami hovered, too nervous and upset to sit, while Danny sat in an office chair by his desk, looking up at her as she slowly rose. She gave him a 'No shit Sherlock' look as he pushed on,

"Well," he took a deep breath and collected himself, he cut out the chatter in his skull and focused onto Ami, her newly blond hair, those startling eyes, and spoke without caution, "I was threatened by a man from the TEA, I overheard his thoughts when around the nurse at the hospital, they were worried about being harmed by their superiors, and they were also thinking about Sara, knowing that her 'removal was sloppy', the nurse was just hoping that she wouldn't be taken instead of someone else... I think that they're after Benjamin and me, and maybe even Ria, probably Rannolia too. Then I spoke to a man at the convenience store on campus, he was thinking about a disease going around the districts... he didn't say much, it was almost like he couldn't, like something was forcing him not to say more or even think more. But he thought that we should all get out of here as quickly as possible, because something is 'coming to take us all anyways'." Benjamin turned over in his sleep, bothered by the commotion,