Waiting for Amber Skyy

Chapter 21

I couldn't fly far, especially while holding Speck in my arms, but I managed to come to a shaky landing just under some tall pine trees. I stumbled, nearly dropping her, but caught myself by landing on my butt and holding her close. Once I finally skidded to a stop, my wings drooped and my breathing came out even heavier. Speck peeled herself away from me and instantly started looking around, wielding her knife in case something or somebody was there. I closed my eyes and leaned back, ending up flopping against the uneven dirt and feeling rocks dig into my back, but I didn't care. We were free. Gone. Away from those insane freaks.

"Area's clear," she said as she walked back to me. She stuck the knife back in its little sheath and squatted down next to me as I breathed big gulps of air. My body was tingling from the flight, and my wings were incredibly sore. But hey, I flew so many miles while carrying this girl with me. That's an accomplishment.

"Awesome," I breathed while giving an unsteady thumbs up. I shakily sat up and let my wings relax behind me. She looked at me with worry in her eyes, and I shook my head. "I'm fine, just- sore." Plus, I've never really flown that far before.

"Okay..." she kept looking around though, like she was determined to take out the nearest squirrel or something.

Once I pushed myself up to a good position, I stood and used a nearby tree to steady myself as I was a little dizzy. My lips were chapped from the cold atmosphere, and my breaths were shorter than normal. "Where are we?" I asked as I looked around the forest of trees. From what I could determine, pine trees plus desert don't mix, unless it was high desert. That narrowed down the number of states to Colorado or New Mexico.

"Dunno," Speck shrugged, looking up at the sky but having no chance of checking the time since the sky was scattered with stars. "But wherever we are we should start up a fire." She started walking off and I reached to grab the edge of her jacket last minute.

"Wait-" I breathed, finally settling down. "Wouldn't that give us away?"

"We should be fine, looks like we're in some mountains," she glanced around before going to collect some wood. I stayed where I was, trying to keep my eye on her just in case no mountain lions or anything else of the sort would come after us. But... would they? We are mutants after all...

But the biggest thing that I couldn't get out of my mind as we prepared a fire was the fact that Speck was alive. That we were both alive, free, and... well were we? Once Speck found the perfect rocks to make a spark, we had a nice little campfire in front of us. I did my best to fix the horrid shirt I grabbed, finally seeing the stripes alternating in pale pink and bright orange. It was a fire hazard to the eyes. I tied the ripped parts up to the best of my abilities, making the shirt even tighter on me. When I got that done, I looked at Speck out of the corner of my eye as she poked the fire with a tree branch. Something doesn't seem right...

"Okay," I stood up and brushed off the dirt off the skinny jeans I grabbed earlier. Or leggings? Jeggings? Whatever. "You have to tell me."

"Huh?" she asked with those big brown eyes I remembered back in the cages. She was so young, innocent, and here she was, fighting for those... ITex people. But now she saved me from them.

"What's your game?" I gulped while giving her the best death glare I could give.

"What do you mean? I saved you," she replied, a bit of fear in her voice.

"I don't believe it," I bit back.

"What?" she exclaimed, shaking her head. "I saved you! You don't believe that?"

"I don't believe that you saved me for the sake of saving me!" my voice rose to a shout, which in turn made her stand up.

"Of course I did! I didn't ask you to save me!"

"Neither did I!" I screamed, feeling the waterfall coming. "I was going to escape! And then you just so happened to show up and kidnap me, then crash the stupid truck when I clearly had a plan to escape! This is your plan! This all is your stupid plan! To act like you really care about me then throw me to the dogs!" Tears dripped down my face and my fists clenched so hard my nails dug into my skin.

"A-Amber," she started but I cut her off.

"I thought you were dead!" I screamed. The fire flicked my way, sending embers on my bare feet but I dismissed the stinging pain. "All this time, I'm alone, in that damn cage waiting for the day that I die, and you've been out there training with those ITex freaks like some kind of school!" With that said, my anger came in as a punch, but she dodged it last second and ducked under my arm, retreating to the other side of the fire.

"I never meant to!" she exclaimed, her face bright from the fire showing a couple of freckles on her nose. "They brought me up like this! I was born there! Unlike you, you had a perfect life!"

I froze, taking in her words and staring at her across the flames. "H-How did you know that?" She was asleep when my parents came, and she was half her size then too. "You were asleep."

"I-" she paused, looking at me and searching for the right words. Then her face changed to confusion. "I was asleep?"

"Yeah, you were! My parents came in and explained they were working for that freakshow!" I exclaimed. The commotion afterwards woke up everybody there, and Speck woke up crying and hiding in the corner of her cage. I remember. How could she not?

"How am I supposed to know? I was only-" she froze suddenly. "Amber..."

"What?" I nearly screamed.

"How old was I? When you saw me last, I mean," she asked with concern in her voice.

What's that supposed to mean? I struggled to think, "I don't know, like... four? Five?"

"Amber, I'm seven."

My jaw dropped. If she's seven, then...

"You were in there for two years."

Oh my god.

Two years. Two years since I was kidnapped on my birthday. Two years since I started high school. Two years since I was thrown into a cage. Two years since I last lived a normal life. Two years I was stuck in a cage, mutated, and experimented on like a lab rat. Two years I became abnormal, a mutant, a freak. Never in my entire life did I imagine this could happen. But it did. And every day I told myself I would be alive tomorrow, and this was all a dream. But no. It was real, it is real. I'm living it. And it took two years for reality to hit me.

I was never going to be normal ever again.

So I cried.