Diluted (NaNoWriMo14)

Chapter Two

I stumble out of the warehouse and into the night. It's dark everywhere, and I'm alone. The people I came here with -- Markus, Allison, Roderick, Mace, Blue, and Cynthia -- are lying dead in the building I've just run out of.

I try my best not to think about that, but it's hard to block it out. The five of them were some of the most important people in my life, and now they're gone. Dead, and not about to come back to life anytime soon.

A car alarm nearby goes off and a chorus of shouts and screams follows it. Figures. This is the rougher part of town, after all. Robberies, car thieves, mugging, and murders aren't all that uncommon.

I brace myself against the wall with my good shoulder and let out a deep breath. I shake as my breath clouds in front of me and is whisked away by the cool night breeze. A few tears slip from my eyes and run down my face, their tracks soon becoming freezing cold paths of moisture on my skin. A terrible guilt eats at me, burning me from the inside out. Nine of us were killed today. Nine people less on the Necaena side of things, and that means that there will be nine more empty beds back home.

The thought of having to go home and be the harbinger of such terrible news makes a few more tears fall. I'm overwhelmed with the urge to leave this all behind, to run away and never come back. We're fighting a lost war. More and more of us are killed every week. Just last week, we lost three of our most senior warriors, not to mention the two newer warriors that went down fighting alongside them.

Our numbers are dwindling, the amount of people who possess abilities is at a new low, and yet we continue to fight.

I let out a choked sob and wipe away the tears on my face, but I only end up smearing blood from my gloves all over me. My shoulder is burning, and the bricks against my back are cold and rough. If I tilt my head back far enough, I can see the stars and a sliver of the moon; the rest is blocked by the roof of the building I'm leaning on.

I know that I have to get back, or somebody will come looking for us -- for me, though they won't know that. They won't until I tell them what happened tonight.

Somewhere in the distance somebody slams a door shut. I hear the screech of a cat and see it dart past the entrance of the alleyway I stand in, a streak of gray in the night. My eyes pick up the details of every last thing around me, thanks to their special adaptation that allows me to see in the dark, but I don't want to see any of the things here. I want to see that girl again. Arabella, the daughter of my worst enemy, the murderer of nearly everyone I held dear, and yet she was somehow still the object of my attention.

The way she moved so gracefully, even though she fought with a sword that wasn't her own, was captivating. Despite the fact that she'd just murdered my loved ones and had been attempting to kill me, I had found myself enrapt by her beauty -- I still am enrapt by her beauty. Her hair, her eyes, the tilt of her mouth as she concentrated on swinging her sword through my neck...

Not to mention her incredible, lithe body. Her curves were visible even through her thick clothing, and the thought of her makes me shiver even now.

I am fully aware of how wrong it is -- not just the fact that we're enemies, but also considering the blood on her hands -- but I still can't help wondering how amazing it would feel to run my hands down the length of her body. Would I be able to feel all the coiled muscle she so obviously had? Would it just be soft, gentle curves all the way through? Or would it be a combination between the two, muscle stretched, flexing, and strong underneath all the slopes of her feminine body?

"Stop it, Thane. This is insanity,"I say aloud to myself. My words make a fog in the air that disperses slowly. The sight of it grounds me, somehow, brings most of me back to reality and the situation at hand, but a portion of me is still debating how it would feel to have Arabella's naked body pressed against mine under the sheets of my bed.