Between Worlds

Chapter 11

Finch had spent about an hour watching over everyone, ready to leap back into action if Tyla's condition started to go downhill, but mostly Tyla had just seemed exhausted.

Finch was pretty drained, too. Eventually he grabbed a cushion, lay down on the floor, and made no particular effort either to fall asleep or stay awake.

It was fully light out when he woke up.

"He's fine," Adin said when Finch quickly sat up to look at Tyla. "I woke him up a few times to check on him. His colour is better and the nausea is gone. He's just tired now."

Malyn wasn't a large man and Tyla was downright petite, but Tyla had still had to lay mostly on top of Malyn to fit them both on the small couch. They were asleep.

Finch rubbed the heels of his hands against his eyes. "What are we going to do?"

"I don't know," Adin admitted. "Together we're strong, though. Don't forget that."

"Not so strong that we don't have to run away and hide to survive this thing."

"Not all strength is about how good you are at punching things."

Finch yawned. "I am very good at punching things, though."

"Unfortunately Katrina may have you beat in that regard, but she has her weaknesses. She's used to being the absolute, uncontested top of the food chain. She's smart enough to be cautious, yes, but she's still extremely arrogant."

"I'd say my self esteem is kinda mediocre. Never knew that was a strength."

"Self confidence and arrogance aren't the same thing. Self confidence doesn't rely on disregarding others."

Finch yawned again. "This is too fucking philosophical for my sleepy boy mind."

Adin offered him a soft smile. "Go back to sleep, Finch."

Finch nodded and lay back down as another yawn overtook him. "Yeah. I might just do that."

Finch napped on and off throughout the day, and in between he formulated a plan. Luther had a bus. They needed to leave town. They could hitch a ride with him and get off wherever he ended up when dawn forced him to stop. A full night of driving could get you far enough away that you could stay missing, given the right precautions.

Everything after that, he was still a little fuzzy on. Finch had been more or less homeless for most of his childhood and he'd been fine, but doing that with four adults while trying to run a business was a different matter. They'd need a place to live without their names attached to it and they'd need a way to run their business incognito despite a couple of them being kinda recognisable.

Those were things he didn't know how to do, and he couldn't just figure them out by thinking about it enough. They didn't exactly have time to prepare and research, though, so they'd probably just have to figure things out as they went.

By late that afternoon, they were all awake and Tyla was feeling much better. Whatever had been going on with him seemed to have passed. Maybe it had just been anxiety or shock or whatever. The mind could do some pretty wild shit to the body sometimes.

None of them had eaten all day, but life had given them lemons, so Adin had found an old jar of sugar and made lemonade. Finch had too much on his mind to stomach much more anyway.

Malyn lay in the middle of the living room on the rug, staring up at the ceiling. "Terrance is dead."

"Terrance?" Finch asked.

"The spider that lived on our windowsill," Tyla explained from where he sat on the couch, leant forward towards Malyn like he wasn't quite sure what to do.