Black & Blue ( ON HOLD )

Prologue Part 3

Soon they reached the brink of city, finding themselves in a dark alley behind a worn-down restaurant. Goosebumps pricked at her bare arms, and tingles on her spine threatened to send her body into hypothermic spasms. The street lights created shadows at their backs as the world began to wake, the sky filling with rainbows of colour - a blue to orange spectrum across the sky with red lining the clouds above.

"I don't trust you." Mika tugged on the fabric of her clothes.

"I would expect nothing less."

"Then why should I follow you right now? And what's keeping me from killing you? You know, I have been fending for myself for the past..."

Her voice trailed off sluggishly.

She stood pondering, then realized that the man was far ahead and ran to catch up.

"I think I've lost track of time," She concluded, "maybe it's best I got a watch."

The man threaded himself through the shadows of the alleyways.

Mika walked down the middle of the empty streets.

"I don't think it's competentive of you to be walking in the middle of the street as a wanted girl, babbling on about -"

"- Young woman."

"What?"

"I prefer young woman, and I am entirely competent, and I would prefer it if you used the word correctly. Also -"

"- Sorry, I'll dumb it down for you. I don't think it's super - uber smart of you to -"

"Yeah mister, I get the idea. Anyways, as I was saying, it's not good to eavesdrop on my conversations. And -"

He paused. "You were talking to yourself!" He threw his hands in the air.

"And I do believe I am smart," she continued, "at the very least I'm smarter than you. I'll have you know I tutored all three of my younger siblings, and I can memorize all the lines of a book after one reading."

The man grabbed her wrist and pulled her into the shadows with him.

"You might be smart," he whispered, "but I'm street smart."

"Don't touch me!"

Suddenly his grip tightened and he swung her behind a dumpster as a car went speeding by. How did he...?

She jumped out to see the car slow down and turn a corner.

The man roared at her. "Kid! you can't just -"

Mika's lips parted as she heard the car's squeaky brakes with the smell of burnt rubber and the screech as it backed into the alleyway before them, so the car was facing her.

She could almost hear the gas pedal hit the floor, speeding towards her.

Her body shivered.

Then she felt a hard grasp around her waist and a force pushing her onto and up the emergency escape on her right. When the oxygen finally cleared her mind, she was atop a rooftop panting with effort.

"Wow, you're really out of shape!"

"You can't touch me. It's bad enough I let you take care of me, and I don't want whatever mental illness you have to rub off on me."

"Sorry? I offered to take care of you. And if that's not what you want, then you can go. And I'll request a repayment of some kind for my efforts."

"Repayment? REPAYMENT!? You think that I have the ability to repay you at the moment!?"

"Well, I guess you can't leave then can you?"