The Mnemophobic

Chapter 36

Xaviers point of view

Not once did I entertain the thought that she trusted me fully but she was getting accustomed to having me around. However even my presence did not help with the demons of her past. I went on babbling about market values, stock holders and shares only to see her gazing through th window completely spaced out.

In her defence it wasn't really a topic she would have found interesting but still that managed to annoy me. I snapped my fingers in front of her bringing her to break her gaze. "You okay?"

She seemed slightly startled but returned to a casual pose soon enough. "Oh? Umm, yea"

Stupid carnival, the one place that I think for sure is perfectly pain free turns out to be a complete nightmare.

I had to practically drag her home that day, all she wanted to do was go back to the old gypsy and bombard her with questions.  I believed that terrible things had happened to her but it just would not settle in my mind as to how recent events were connected even though I told her quite the opposite.

At lunch Mennigin and I discussed the prospect of target shooting out in the forest when I mentioned the guns I found. The very idea captivated me, not always would you get perfect your aim with a hand gun. Mennigin excused himself from joining us but urged Chase, Ryan and me to go. I was reluctant to go when I saw Serenity slip out however I eventually thought she needed time alone rather than me hovering all over her. Besides she seems to be an expert in creating suspicion.

To my surprise there was a target area some quarter kilometer in front of the house. Menningin took  out an old fashioned sniper from somewhere in the basement that basically looked like a shoot gun with a better aim. The targets were scarecrows with their vital organs demarkated. The patch of open field actually turned out to be a treeless patch of forest. The scarecrows were easily 100 years old, or so they looked like, decaying in to the air.

Ryan took the first shot that went off track and basically lost in the woods. Chase and I took a laugh out of that.

"Watch how it's done old man." I boasted only to see the target still damage free after my fire. "Dammit."

Ryan laughed harder in reply. "Not so old now eh?"

Chase stepped up and manage of remove a finger from the poor guy. "That is still better than yours."

"Wait." I picked up the so called sniper from behind. "Lets see what this baby can do."

I held it to level my eye and took a close up view of the target. The gun was heavier than I imagined and I felt my shoulder cramp after merely moments of holding it. I took it down and adjusted my position so that both shoulders bore equal load. The gun was now focused on the targets chest and I pulled the trigger. The force of the shot caused me to tumble back and lose grip on the gun.

"Is it that hard?" Chase teased as he held the sniper. "Woah that's heavy."

I raised a brow at him.

"Bring the target closer, it doesn't help that it is 50 feet away." Ryan clearly had enough of our failures.

I walked to the scarecrows mounted on a wooden post imbedded in to the ground. I pulled hard but couldn't lift them out. Chase came to my aid after I signaled to him. Till he arrived I looked beyond the targets in to the forest. It seemed like a whole different world, a dark one.

My eye caught something to the side of a distant tree. I ran up to it to see what it was. The rusted toolbox sat quietly on a surfaced tree root. Out if curiousity I opened the box and spread my hands through the many tools in it as my mind pondered over the reason why many were not in it. The blue kit seemed very old and was probably there since the beginning of time.

I held my ears and dived to the ground when I heard the loud gunshot. I looked behind to give Ryan a piece of my mind for shooting at us only to see both him and Chase in the same condition as me. I grabbed Chase letting all my anger on him and watching him whimper. "Where is Serenity?!"

"How should I know!"

"Well sh-" Then it hit me, the clubhouse.

"Listen to me, take Ryan and run back to Mennigin and ask if he ordered anyone to dismantle the clubhouse yet. GO!" I shouted and watched him scamper through to Ryan towards the clubhouse as I ran towards the Clubhouse.

I kept running and running, dodging trees through the forest and felt my heart race as I did. Serenitys suspicions had made me wary too. If it was anything like I imagined this to be than I hoped she wasn't in the clubhouse.

I wasn't an inch closer than before, or so I thought. The clubhouse came in to view after minutes of intense running. But it wasn't how I hoped for it to be. The moment froze when I got there, the clubhouse was tilted towards the water with its supports giving way and soon it disappeared inside the blue water.

What had just happened? I fought my idle state and without thinking I jumped in to the cold water. My eyes took a moment to see properly through the air bubbles coming out of the structure that was still falling. I peddled till I got  a hold of it. The door was jammed and no matter how hard I tried to yank it open it just wouldn't budge. Cmon cmon..

I swam over to the window and saw the interior slowly fill up with air. My heart pounded so much that it hurt me. I could not see her and for a moment I was relieved that she wasn't here. Just as I began to swim back her body floated towards the window montionless. My eyes widen in horror and my legs felt numb.

I vigorously struggled to swim back which did not help my speed. I managed to break the window with a jerk of my elbow and removed any remaining shards of glass. Before she drifted away my hand grabbed her shirt and eventually I took her out of the falling house. I wrapped around her and  lifted her with much difficulty to the surface letting in a huge breath of air when I did. She layed motionless on my shoulder. Why did she not breath as I did..

I gripped her face and I sternly whispered "IF YOU LEAVE I SWEAR TO GOD I'LL KILL YOU."

Her eyes were closed and hair stuck to her face. I slapped her on her face and shook her vigorously but she only moved to my motions, nothing more. My heart filled with an uncomfortable heat, was she..gone?