The Awake

Escaping The Sleeping City

I wasn't ready for him to spring awake the way he did so it surprised me. I jumped back, into Aaron, knocking the flashlight from his hands. It fell to the floor and it spun towards us.

"What's going on? Who's there?" I heard Ty say as Aaron and I stumbled around, trying to regain our flashlight. After only three seconds of fumbling with the flashlight, I pointed it towards where Ty was sitting, to find a pistol pointing in my direction.

"Easy, Ty. It's me, Dray." I said to my cousin.

"Dray? What happened?"

"No time to explain right now. Where the hell did you get a gun, that fast?" Aaron cut in.

"Who are you?" Ty asked, pointing his gun at Aaron's voice.

"I'm just Drayton's friend." Aaron replied. "So where'd you get the gun from?"

"What did you expect? I live in St. Louis. I always keep it in this drawer." He said looking down at his desk.

"Ty, I'll explain everything on the way, but we need to go." I said turning the light towards the door.

"Did you already get Luke?" Ty asked looking past me, expecting to see his brother standing behind us.

"He's still asleep." Aaron said quickly.

"Let's go wake him up" Ty said pushing past us.

"We can't wake him up." I said, following Ty.

"Why not?" He said stopping to look at me. "Is he okay?"

"He's alive." Aaron said walking towards the exit.

"I'm not leaving without him."

"We don't have time." Aaron said as he left the room.

"Ty, I need you to bring something of yours." I said changing the subject.

"What?" My gun?" Ty asked.

"No, I need you to bring anything chemistry related. I don't know what we'll need for antidote."

"Antidote?" Ty asked confused.

"Just do it, please." I said. Aaron was already making his way back to the front door. I had a feeling the two wouldn't get along well. Ty walked over to his closet and opened it. He pulled out three large boxes. Each contained test tubes and a large variety of pipes and flasks. The boxes were too big to carry all at once. So, I called for Aaron down the hallway and waited. I assumed he was already out in the truck so I grabbed a box and Ty grabbed another. We walked through the hallway until we got to the door. I stepped out to see that Ben had backed the truck up, closer to the house so we didn't have to walk as far. Aaron had already opened the trunk for us so we put the two boxes inside. Both of us went back into the dark house to retrieve the last box. As we passed Luke's room, Ty stopped. He reached for the handle and turned it. He pushed open the door and saw Luke propped up against his bed, just as I left him.

"I'm not leaving him here." He said stepping into his brother's room.

"Fine, grab him." I said waiting. He picked up his brother and walked back to me,

"He's your cousin, too, you know. Why don't you want to bring him? There's plenty of room." He said.

"It's not that I don't want to bring him. We just, don't have room." I said as we went back to his room for the remaining box.

"There's plenty of room in that big house of yours." He said I picked up the box.

"You haven't seen how full the house is."

"How many friends do you have staying there?"

"Seven, including me." I said. The number suprised him.