Beautiful Crime ※ DogNut

thirteen

The group's plans of leaving were severely delayed after DogNut and Courtney were almost forced to tell the story of what happened since the sickos began to exist to Chris for his Chronicles of Survival book. Adelaide sat down beside DogNut and held onto his arm as he began his story, giving him gentle squeezes whenever he became upset. That was her job now, reminding him that it was okay to cry and to fall apart sometimes.

Adelaide kept an eye out on the outside world, noticing that it would soon be dusk and everyone knew that nobody went out after dark, it was far too dangerous even for the most experienced fighters. She would've suggested to wait until the next day but Adelaide knew how anxious DogNut was to get back to the Tower, and staying another day longer might make things worse.

Adelaide walked back to her room, packing up a small backpack of photos and clothes before looking around the small room one last time. The last night she'd spent in that room with DogNut now felt so long ago, that her life had changed so much over just several hours. Shaking her head to herself, she left her room and walked to get her weapons before walking outside into the dusky sunlight.

Placing her belongings down, she knelt down to Esme's height as she was sitting on the steps of the museum, trying to put on her best 'mum' smile. "I'm leaving now," she said, placing her hands on either side of Esme's body.

Esme shook her head, shaking a little. "I wanna go too!" She was fidgeting, giving the obvious signals that she was about to have a complete meltdown with screaming and crying and it wouldn't be pretty.

"You can't, it's too dangerous." Adelaide paused, licking her lips before speaking up again, moving her hands to cup Esme's face. "Listen, sweetheart. Mama's gonna go on ahead and make sure that the Tower is safe for both of us and as soon as I know that it is, I will come back for you, okay? I promise."

Esme began crying, clinging onto Adelaide tightly. "I don't want you to go!" She sobbed into Adelaide's shoulder.

"I know, baby, I don't want to leave without you but I have to." Adelaide took deep breaths to stop herself from crying before turning to Hayley who stood at the top of the steps, keeping a tight hold on Esme. "Protect her with your life, if anything happens to her-"

Hayley nodded, taking a step forward. "I know, you'll kill me." She gently removed Esme from Adelaide, keeping the crying child away from Adelaide. "Go, we've got everything covered here."

Adelaide nodded, picking up her belongings and walking down the steps and towards the main gate. Jackson stood beside her, tucking a walkie-talkie into her belt before leaning against the gate to wait for the rest of the team to arrive. "Looks like you're going to be stuck with me for a while," Jackson joked, gently knocking her elbow against Adelaide's arm.

Forcing herself to smile, Adelaide gave Jackson a sideways glance, going along with the joke. "How wonderful, just when I thought I could ditch you for good and never see your ugly mug again."

The pair smirked just as DogNut came and pressed a kiss to Adelaide's cheek, an arm wrapping around her waist. Adelaide smiled as she turned around to give him a long and deep kiss, causing Marco and Felix to tell them to get a room and Adelaide giving them the finger, continuing to kiss DogNut.

DogNut broke off the kiss and laughed before moving his lips to Adelaide's ear, his breath causing chills to go down Adelaide's spine. "When we get back to the Tower, we are definitely repeating last night," he pressed a kiss to her cheek before walking off, a smirk on his lips as he winked in Adelaide's direction.

Adelaide blushed a dark shade of red as the group walked out of the gates and into the unknown. While everyone went on ahead, Adelaide hung out at the back, twirling her baseball bat in her hands. Now that she was alone, she let her mind wander. She wondered if leaving Esme behind was truly the best idea for her and if she should have just taken Esme with her regardless of the danger. But it was far too late to wonder about it now, bringing Esme to the Tower would have to wait a few days and Adelaide knew that they would be hell.

"Hang about!" DogNut shouted, causing everyone to stop and Adelaide to snap back into reality and jogged to the front of the group, her hands gripping her baseball bat as she stood beside DogNut. "Babe? What's going on?"

"Bloody sickos!" DogNut hissed, drawing his sword.

Shit.

Adelaide hastily placed her baseball bat into her backpack and brought out two of her throwing knives, waiting for DogNut to give her the signal to attack. She wasn't afraid, she'd fought off perhaps hundreds of sickos over the year she'd been at the museum. She could easily take down the four sickos in front of them – she'd done it before and she could easily do it again but she wasn't in charge here; DogNut was and whatever he said goes.

But before she could do say or do anything, Courtney gripped her spear with both hands and advanced past DogNut and Adelaide and towards the sickos. "Come on then!" She almost screamed. "I'm all yours!"

Note

It's happening and I'm not ready. I don't want it to happen, like ever. I think the next chapter will be short like this one but I don't know, I'm still in the middle of writing it so for all I know, I'm completely wrong.