The Chase [Watty's2018]

Three

Liam

Louis didn't like the fact that I left Niall's hands tied, but I still didn't trust him.

Niall seemed as if he expected it, actually. He didn't complain and wasn't trying to get away. I may not trust him, but he is like us and he doesn't need to be there either. We had started moving again, Louis behind me and Niall in front of us. The silence was deafening. The only sounds were the birds and our feet moving through the woods.

"Story time," Niall announced randomly. "What they do in the Lab is really fucked up. Like they used push me to the limits just so they could take stupid notes."

"What did they do exactly?" I found myself asking.

Niall shrugged, looking back for a second. "They would burn me, cut me, basically you name it they did it to every extent you could think of. It would take me a while to heal really bad ones, but it was faster than average still. I don't think they realized that it actually hurts. Just because I heal doesn't mean I don't feel the pain."

I stayed quiet for a bit waiting for him to continue.

Louis asked a question while I was silent. "What about healing others? Did they know you could do that?"

"Yeah. They would have people with any type of injury come in. If I refused to do it... Well, the punishment wasn't worth not doing it, that's for damn sure. But most of the time, I would pass out while doing it. It's hard to heal myself, let alone anyone else."

"How long were you there?" Louis asked.

"About five years, I think. Maybe a little longer than that."

I hoped that would be the end of the conversation. I didn't want to know a lot about him and he didn't need to know anything about us.

"Is there anything else that happens when you use your ability? Like if you over use it?"

"Well, usually it's just that I pass out. There are other times when I almost never woke up because they pushed too far."

I bit my lip. I couldn't count how many times Louis almost lost me because they did the same thing.

"What were you doing... before all that?"

"Louis, I think that's enough with the questions," I interjected.

"I mostly explored the forest. My father was botonist, someone who studies plants, so instead of going to a normal school, I was always camping in the woods and learning about it."

I looked at Louis, who looked udderly lost. "I think that's enough," I said quietly. I turned back and grabbed Niall's shoulder. He paused and looked back at me. "You would know how to look for food, right?"

He nodded. "I know I'm stating something you don't want to hear, but I would need my hands."

Louis grabbed onto the back of my shirt, resting his head against it. He did that when he was getting tired or wanted to keep me calm but my guess would be he was starting to get tired. I reached forward and untied his hands. He slowly pulled them away from me and rubbed his wrist. "Are you allergic to anything? Is he?"

I thought to anything that made Louis sick. "No, nothing."

Niall nodded and looked around. "Give me twenty."

"Ten," I said. Louis just moved his head to the side a little.

"Okay. If I'm not back in ten, then... Do your thing?" Niall wasn't sure what to say, and it was evident. "I'll be back," he said quickly, looking scared for just a second. He quickly covered it with something else.