Soundtrack: Walking In My Shoes - Depeche Mode

So, before you read this; I edited my authors note on The Touch Of A Healer and made it into the twelth and last chapter, just to have a better transition from one story to another. It is really short (about the length of the first chapter of TTOAH), so I guess you could refer to them as prologue and epilogue for the story. Hope you'll take your time to read that before you start off with this, though it doesn't make it any harder understanding this story if you don't.

And I'm really sorry about me being so unorganized lately and updating chapters and publishing the wrong ones. I'll try to improve!

THE TOUCH OF THE DARKNESS

He toned out Sam as the speech was spoken. Not because he found it uninteresting, or because he was a disloyal friend or whatever. Not that, though his disloyalty just triggered the pain surging through him as the teenagers applauded for the "heroes" of the FAYZ and some even clapped him on the back, as if he was actually counted as one of them.

The memories of what he had done drained him further then his sleep deprived nights had already done to him. That kid... Why didn't he save it? Maybe he would've shot it instead of the coyotes by mistake, but what is worse? Putting the kids life at risk, or accepting that he was dead meat? He closed his eyes forcefully, trying to forget, but it was impossible to do so.

In fear of attracting unwanted attention, he lets his eyelids slip open again and tried to look as normal as possible. More desperate then ever to blend into the crowd, even though his strawknitted fedora said otherwise. He picked up his waterglass and sipped in cautiously, seeing another person through the transparent glass.

From the other side of the table, he watched Lana with close eyes, even after placing the glass back onto the table. If there was one person looking more exhausted then him, it was Lana. She seemed more then ready to collapse and he felt sorry for her. He wanted to speak to her, ask her if she was okay, if there was anything he could do to help, but his low status made him reconsider it deeply.

'Quinn?' the voice of his former best friend speaking directly to him pulled him out of his thoughts. He looked up from where he was sitting to greet the all too forgiving Sam standing behind him, a cheerful smile plastered onto his features. 'Would you do me a favor and keep an eye on Little Pete?'

'No prob, brah,' Quinn replied. Because there wasn't a problem. Other then the remorse surging through him at the thought of Sam letting Quinn back into his life, giving him the chance to earn his trust over again. He hated himself for what he had done to Sam. Nonetheless how accepting Sam had become just over the past week.

Sam smiled thankfully at Quinn, before he stalked off with Astrid, leaving Little Pete behind with him. Quinn stayed at the table, picking at the pie and turkey that was left on his plate. Little Pete was easy watching, he never seemed to need anything. They could just stay at the table for those hours that Sam and Astrid would be gone, and Little Pete wouldn't mind that his only entertainment would be his gameboy.

So while the four year old sat next to him on the bench, playing like another hardcore teenager, Quinn glanced up at Lana. Just like him, she was picking at her own leftovers, though she didn't seem to do it out of boredom. She did it more relentlessly, as if she was stabbing imaginary people. Quinn found himself threatened by the way her eyes were the same as those of a predator, but somehow it seemed to fascinate him at the same time.

He must have seemed like a creep, sitting there for an hour straight, staring at the innocent girl before him, but he couldn't help himself. His mind was set on autopilot and he kept telling himself to stand up for himself and start off a conversation with her. But he couldn't make himself do so. After all; they were strangers to one another!

Well, not really. They knew each other, or they weren't completely strangers anyways. After all, they had both been in the small deserted cabin when the coyotes attacked. And he had been the one to catch her when she fainted just three days earlier, followed by carrying her to Astrids house afterwards.

So no, they weren't complete strangers. But the only interaction that had ever occurred between the two of them was either while she was unconscious, or killing coyotes with a piece of gold, and it didn't make them best friends. Just like it didn't make him talk to her either.

But even with this on the table, the real obstacle, was that she was so much higher in status then he was. Compared to each other, she was like a celebrity and he was a homeless. Then again, Sam, the only other person who could ever cooperate with Lana, was friends with people such as himself.

Or used to be...

You know what, he thought to himself. Screw it!

'Hey Lana, how are you-' he started off, looking up from his plate to greet nothing but empty space before him. His head flicked from left to right and finally he spotted her back turned at him as she stalked off to wherever she had now claimed as her new house.

He told himself that if it hadn't been for Little Pete, he would've followed her and kept her company. But he knew that Little Pete could walk. He knew deep down that the real reason simply was because he didn't have more courage then what he got in the heat of the moment.

Drake sat in the chair that belonged former shrink, in the room he knew all to well from his time back at Coates. He had occupied the office as his own after Lana left him. When realization had struck him, the room had literally been torn apart. He couldn't stand the constant reminder of their first time. His first time.

Part of him felt utterly humiliated by the fact that he had lost himself over a girl. But a bigger part was yelling with destructive rage over the fact that she was the one to leave him. How the hell dared she?! She didn't actually think she had the right to do so, did she? That she would get away with doing so? How ignorant was she?

He had wanted to go after her, man he still wanted to.

But not yet. No, not just yet.

He needed to gather strength first. Meaning not only recruits that would back him up when Sam and Edilio and the rest of the idiots who would try to fight back. No, he also needed to gather his own strength. And what was left of his dignity.

What made it worse was Diana. She knew, he was sure of it. The way she looked at him whenever they saw each other. Yet, she didn't comment anything, which was worse then if she did open her stupid mouth, letting yet another snarky comment get ahead of herself.

He looked down at the nine guns laying at the table before him, next to his stocked up feet. Man, how good it would feel to put a gun to her head. Even though Caine had returned with Pack Leader the day before, and even though he was somewhere at the school ground only a couple hundred yards away; he was still a couple hundred solar systems away when it came to his mental condition.

There was no guarantee that he would ever recover from the shock the Darkness had given him. So killing Diana now would be the perfect timing. Though he'd have to kill Caine first, just to be on the safe side.

And although Drake hated to admit it: he needed Caine. This of course was a chance for him to take charge at Coates and recruit guys who might just be stupid enough to team up with him. Though if he ever wanted Sam dead, he'd need Caine to do it for him.

And then, when Caine least expected it, he'd be stabbed straight in the back. He'd torture them both. Him and Diana. Of course Caine would be cemented first. Drake would even cement every inch of the sociopaths body, if that was what it took for him to be restrained of power.

The leftovers of troubled kids that had stayed at Coates would all be too scared to stand up against Drake. They all were scared, but seeing their former leader dead would make them obey at every cost. And then he'd have the backup he needed to get Lana back.

A girl was not allowed to push him around like that.

He'd punish her for acting the way she had. He would. When he found her. He would hunt her down if that is what it took for him to find her. And then he would make her regret every single breath she had inhaled since the very moment she left him.

So, Quinn was the new guy, which was most likely very predictable since it was a famous request. Sadly, I don't like Quinn much, and so writing now my second fanfiction with him is nagging at my very soul. So you won't be reading much from his point of view, because I don't handle his overdramaticness, no matter how fucked his life may or may not be. Anyways, hope you liked this chapter although it was really bad and short. The next one will be up soon enough and it'll hopefully be better!

Please review, even if you did not enjoy! ;)