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Chapter 5
§ Ciя¢us A¢t §
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His head made contact with the wall and the air whooshed out of Ezio’s lungs, which felt like a deflated balloon. His nerve receptors, quick and responsive, made him cry in agony. The deluge of sharp, acute stabs of pain almost caused him to pass out, but he held on. His body didn’t lie; he had broken a few ribs. With him being stiff and stark, there was no way he could just spring up and run. Even if he was fine, Ezio wasn’t the type of person who left his friends behind. He decided to wait and see what was going on.
Through his blurry vision, he saw two boys who paced back and forth.
One of them smirked, “See, Chase. Ezio has to be in this group. Finding their little hideout was a piece of cake.” The name ‘Chase’ rung a bell, but Ezio’s mind was too muddled to think straight.
Chase strode over to the weakened Lance and shouted, “Are you Ezio?! Which one of you…?” Lance mimed zipping his lips and throwing the keys away. It warmed Ezio’s heart to see the amount of strength it must have took for him to even make a simple gesture.
What worried Ezio, though, was that they were looking for him. Were they sent to recapture him? It didn’t matter; he was going to give himself up, not wanting to endanger the others any further. He slid his fingers carefully and probed under his shirt until he located the ribcage area. Clueless on how his power worked, Ezio simply laid his hand there and concentrated on slow, rhythmic breathing. An electric shock and the pain washed away. Whatever he did mended him and it took much less time than previously.
“It’s me,” Ezio managed to utter.
“You’re coming with us,” Chase declared.
Ezio looked at Chase’s crazed eyes; they were a peculiar shade of blue. All the pieces fell into place and Ezio took a moment to skim the piece of paper.
“Chase Whitford?” Chase was taken aback.
He stuttered, “Y-yes? How’d you know?”
“To make a long story short, we need to stick together. That’s why you were looking for me, right?”
“No, someone took my girlfriend and they wanted me to bring you…I found Alexx and he helped me find you. We had a hunch and somehow stumbled across this building.”
Ezio healed his friends and helped them up.
“I’ll go willingly, but first, we have some business to take care of.”
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The bell tied onto the door tinkled as the six of them walked into the small, cluttered shop for casual clothes and no, they were not on a shopping spree. Hayden, who was still in his prison outfit, needed some new clothing to blend in. The single person behind the counter, a young girl about seventeen, stared openly at the group. She probably didn’t get many customers.
Hayden browsed the racks of clothing, while the others pretended to. A button-down shirt with floral print. Something you would wear to Hawaii. Another shirt. The swirling tie-dye patterns were too vibrant. Finally, he picked out a gray, nondescript hoodie, some sweats, and jeans. The only problem now was that the sizes were too large.
Hayden signaled to let his friends know he was ready. They walked up and he asked if the items came in a medium size instead of extra-large. The girl was jumpy and looked uncomfortable; her eyes shifted from side to side.
“Um, let me check in the back, okay? We don’t stock our inventory that often.”
She disappeared through a door. Ezio heard the dial tone of a phone, but didn’t think much of it. The girl came back and shook her head.
“I’m sorry to say there are no more in that size. If you like the style, I can just get a form for you to fill out. You can still pay and we’ll deliver it to your home address.”
Hayden replied, “No thanks. These are fine, I guess.” Ezio pulled out a fifty dollar bill and paid.
Just as they were about to leave, she blurted, “Hey, I don’t mean to pry, but are those your real hair and eye colors?” Ezio wasn’t sure whether she was just curious or if she knew much more than she should. Either way, he wasn’t taking any chances.
“No,” he lied through his teeth, “we just wear contacts and dye our hair.”
“Oh, it sure looks natural to me. I mean, I can’t even see your natural hair color in the roots. Hm…Anyway, I haven’t seen you around. You guys from out of state?”
Violet said, “Sort of. We’re actually part of a traveling circus. Extreme, uh, it’s—”
“—don’t laugh. What she meant to say was Extreme Flying Colors. I know, horrible name, but we couldn’t come up with anything better.” Lance saved her fumble; he deserved an Oscar.
“Really? Cool. Where can I get tickets?”
Lance spoke, “Oh, our next show is not for another six months, but we’re prepping and trying out new items. It takes some time to get used to contacts, you know. I’ll personally tell you when the box office is open.”
She gushed, “Oh, thank you! That would be great.”
They headed out and the hoodie and sweats were so baggy that Hayden was able to slip it on over the prison uniform. Ezio glanced back to see the girl frantically punching buttons on her cell phone.
“We need a place to stay,” he stated.
Lance pointed to a staggering, immense building in the distance that appeared to spiral upward into the sky.
“How about over there?”
A/N: Maybe I'll update again today.
YOU ARE READING
Jigsaw (Undergoing major editing)
RandomEzio has always been different, so different that people don’t believe that he’s related to his family. Even Ezio doubts that he’s their biological son. His grey hair and mismatched eyes turns others away. Also dealing with amnesia, he doesn’t remem...
