New Kid On The Block

Ch 11: Lost in the Fire

"Oh my god, this is awful." I groaned my mouth full of the worse made pizza in history. The crust was all gooey like it had been barely cooked and was burnt at the same time. The cheese was stale and the sauce left a bad taste in the mouth.

"I promised you'd experience everything San Francisco had to offer. That means the bad and good." Wrench said the emoticons on his mask up turned arrows. I glared at him as he stood leaning against the kitchen counter in my apartment. He folded his arms across his chest. 

The entire kitchen was littered with pizza boxes from Wrench's little plan. He'd gotten a slice of pizza from twenty different pizza shops within twenty miles of my apartment. He said it was a way for me to get a taste for the "culture" but I think it was really more of an excuse to eat pizza. Not that I'm complaining.

"This is disgusting." I took a large drink from my pop bottle trying to wash away the bad taste. "Do you hate me or something?" I asked him jokingly.

"Hmmm no, far from it actually." He hummed leaning forward, catching me around my waist, and pulling me towards him.

"Hard to tell when you have me eating crap pizza." I whined but even so couldn't stop the grin tugging on the corner of my lips. "It leaves a bad taste in the mouth."

"I could fix that." He replied lowly and I laughed playfully shoving his shoulder.

"Sure you could bud." I turned but before I could escape he caught hold of me again drawing me back against him.

"Bud? Since when did I become a seven year old fat kid?" He chuckled resting his chin on my shoulder.

"As if you'd be a seven year old, you barely have the maturity level of a five year old."

"Well...huh. I got nothing. I mean you're not wrong-" He was cut off by the sound of breaking glass. "The fuck was that?" The ground beneath us shook along with a loud explosion. We stumbled forward catching ourselves against the corner of the counter. My first thought was maybe the hot water tank blew. But why would the glass break first?

"We have to-" Wrench was interrupted by the glass of my living room window shattering. In dropped a remote sized grenade. For a second I stood completely still unsure of what I was really seeing until I heard Wrench yell at me to get down.

I felt him pull me down towards the ground but not fast enough. The grenade exploded, the sound of it deafening. It sent our semi crouched bodies reeling forwards against the cabinets.

The pain was blinding and for a second I was knocked out cold. "Kit!" My eyes blinked opened and I let out a groan. "Get up we have to get out of here, the place is on fire."

I looked over his shoulder wide eyes. The curtains and couch were completely engulfed in flames and everything around it was catching like dry brush.

"Now is not the time to go into shock." He said seriously, but I could hear the worry in his voice even with the voice manipulator. I blinked my eyes again squeezing them shut then opening them again. I started to get up, letting him help pull me up off the ground. Almost instantly i was hit with a wave of nausea and had to lean heavily against the counter to stop myself from leaning over and vomiting.

"I think I might have a concussion." I muttered weakly.

"That's a later problem, not dying of smoke inhalation that's a now problem." He replied wittily. "Here lean against me."

We made it to the door and out into the hall before the third explosion rocked the building. It was somewhere higher up and nearly caused me to fall face first against the wall.