Tefia kept her mouth shut for about half an hour, impressive for her, before she finally spoke.
"How many times are we going to pass the same building?"
Tasha rolled her eyes. "Shut up, Tefia, I've just been trying to decide."
"What?"
"You two are going back to the Uni. The people we are dealing with are, as you saw, brutal. Two people have been murdered for God knows what reason today. And the two of you are both still so young."
"But we can help." Tefia said, obviously not expecting that answer.
"No more than me an Walton can do on our own.'
Tefia sighed, looking like she was holding back on something.
"I hate you." She said to Tasha.
"Something you want to tell us?" Tasha smirked in the mirror and then stared straight forward.
"Shut up."
"I never-"
"Just shut up, shut up." She was shouting by this point and she was looking seriously agitated.
"What's your problem, Tef?" I said gently.
"No."
"He deserves to know." Tasha continued to stare forward indifferently, as if she didn't really care.
"No." She opened the car door and got out, johhijg over to the wall at the side of the pavement.
"She should be the one to tell you, not me."
I nodded and undid my seatbelt (I was the only one who put it on) and quickly got out. I walked over to where Tefia was standing and leaned on the wall next to her.
"So..."
"I don't want you to hold it against me, or tell anyone else. It's part of my past that I can't change, but I don't want to hold it with me, but it will help with this." Tefia said this all in one breath and then leaned back again, her breath heavy. I had a feeling that it wasn't anything to do with the short jog.
"Do you want to explain?" I said gently.
"I worked for the P.E.F." she blurted, but it didn't really register, as at that point an explosion under the car blew it, with Tasha inside, across the road and into the building opposite. The car squashed like a bug and crumpled to the ground, glass shattering everywhere.
I could hear myself screaming her name, but couldn't comprehend why and barely felt it when Tefia grabbed my arm and dragged me into an alleyway.
"Snap out of it." Tefia hissed, slapping my cheek.
"But Ta-"
"We need to get away from here, someone's obviously out to get us." I could see that through her calm demeanor, she was feeling just as scared and worried as l did, a tear streaked a clean line down her dirty face.
"Tefia, we can't just leave her."
"This is Tasha we're talking about, she's not going to get herself killed." I could see the logic in her words but still couldn't imagine just leaving the girl who had loved - and hated - us so much. For all we knew, she could be injured - or worse - by now.
"In here!" someone yelled. Three kids ran into the alleyway and stared at us excitedly. Two wore masks that completely obscured their identities and the third was a girl about my age, insanely pretty with an evil snarl on her face.
"Fuchsia." Tefia whispered, venom on her tongue. "don't do this."
"Who's this, your boyfriend?" the girl, Fuchsia cackled (yes, really cackled).
