Hi! This is the second chapter of this, obviously. I hope you enjoy this one as much as you did the first chapter, and thank you for looking at this one, too! As usual, enjoy!

URGENT NOTE: IF YOU DIDN'T READ THE FIRST CHAPTER, YOU NEED TO! THIS IS AN ALTERED VERSION OF THE ORIGINAL STORY, IT HAS BEEN REPLACED!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Ch.2

She didn't know where she was, or what had just happened. At the moment, she couldn't think straight. All she could see, over and over in her mind, was Andrew's head, two bullets puncturing their way through his skull, and all she could feel was the blood spattering over the side of her face. Her throat still hurt from when she had screamed so loud. And she was aware that she had killed a man. She, Tanya, who had never even gotten into a school fight in the playground, who had never raised a hand, ever, to anyone, had just slashed open a man's throat. She couldn't see. All that was in her head and her vision itself seemed to be in shades of red. No words formed in her mind, just pictures, horrible, flashing pictures that she didn't want to see.

She had stopped being able to see straight after the incident in the alley. She knew there had been a person who came down from the roof. She knew she was scared of him, because she didn't know who he was or where she was, or why she was there. But he had helped her, which was something she had to force herself to recognize. Her heart, however, was still pounding in her ears, and each time it thumped, it sent an extra wave of red over her field of vision. All she could do now was cry. And that was what she was doing. She was sitting in the back of a car that she didn't recognize because the man who had helped her had put her here. He was talking to her now, in calm, soothing tones, but her mind gave no response and neither did she. He checked her wounds and then closed the door. He went to the front and got inside, and they began to move. She hoped he didn't hear the soft, weak cry of surprise she let out when the car started up.

He tried to talk to her again after a while, but she still gave no answer. She had lost her voice. It wasn't there anymore. She had lost Andrew and killed a man. She was gone right now. It would take a great deal of coaxing, if that was what could be used, to get her back. Her leg hurt, she was in more pain than she had ever been in before. But she took it. She took the pain as her punishment for what she had just done. It might not have been entirely wrong, she hadn't meant to kill him, she was protecting herself. But it hadn't been entirely right, either. And now the pain was what she got for having done it. Andrew was gone, and there was no one who could comfort her here any longer. She was alone and in pain because she had done a bad thing.

It was a long time before they got to wherever it was they were going. Since she couldn't see, not only because of the red, but because she had never looked out of the window, only down at her lap and her hands, now dirtied beyond cleaning, she didn't know where they had gone. Her hands would never be clean again, no matter how hard she scrubbed. Dirty.

The man gently lifted her out of the back seat of the car and draped one of her arms over his shoulders, helping her walk. He sat her down in a chair. It was very dark in here, but she liked the dark for now. The red had now gone to brown because of the dark. She wanted it to stay that way until it went away. The dark was good.

The man spoke to her again. He came close to her with something in his hand. She couldn't see what it was, it was all brown and black, and she let him lift the leg of her pants to better inspect the wound. He told her something else, and there was a brief stab from a needle. She didn't flinch, not one bit. The man gave her something in a cup. She was aware of warmth from it touching her hand, and for the first time realized that she was cold, very cold. At first she didn't drink it. When she did, she moved slowly, as though she was unused to the movement. It was warm, and the warmth made a small line down the center of her body. The line of warmth went away. She wanted another. So she sipped the sweet liquid again. The brown went away. Again. She was warmer now, and the black changed to gray. Another sip changed that to a light bluish color, and the last made it all go away. The cup was empty.

"There," the man said, "It's all right."

She looked up. He was wearing black, and a mask covered his face. She wondered why, but the thought quickly dissolved to nothing. Nothing mattered any longer. The pain was gone. She still could not speak. When she noticed the numbness of her leg, she looked down at it. It made her stomach churn, and she looked away.

"I gave you some morphine. It makes the pain stop."

She looked at him again, a question in her eyes. But she didn't know what question it was.

"You were hit in the leg with a bullet. I can fix it up for you, but it'll take a while. Will you be all right?"

She didn't know, and looked around for a second at nothing before her eyes came to rest on her empty cup.

"Would you like some more tea?"

She looked at him, glanced at the cup, and forced her head into a stiff nod. She watched his hands when they poured the tea, trying to focus on something, anything.

"Do you know who those men were?"

A look. Nothing was in it.

"That man in the alleyway. Do you know who he was?"

Alley. Blood. Death. She looked down and saw the man's blood on her shirt, and let out a yell, frantically ripping open the buttons and throwing the shirt off and onto the floor. She didn't care that she only had on a bra beneath it, she wanted the blood to go away, she needed it to go away. He was holding her hands, and she was aware that she had been trying to wipe blood off her flesh that wasn't even there.

"Calm down! Calm down, it's gone now. It's all right now. You'll hurt yourself if you do anything else. It's all right now."

Panting, she looked back up into the man's face, and, very slowly, she relaxed again, the sound of his voice bringing her back. She was relieved she could hear him. She stopped.

"Good. Here, hold on a second." He disappeared for a few seconds, and it was so long she almost thought he had gone away and left her, but he came back with a blanket. He draped it over her shoulders. Very slowly, her hands touched it, and then she pulled it tightly around her. There was a pause. "Are you hungry?"

A blank stare.

"Are you hungry?" he asked again, staying calm. She thought. Forced a nod. She couldn't remember when she had last eaten, or what, or with whom. That did not mean that she hadn't eaten in a long time. It meant she could not remember. Parts of her mind were still blank. She didn't know what being hungry felt like right now.

"I'm gonna go get you some food, okay? But first, I'll wrap up that leg." She watched, neither feeling nor thinking anything, as he brought out some bandages and wrapped her wound tightly. It still made her stomach churn, but she kept her eyes fixed on it, her punishment. When he was finished, he handed her her cup of tea again, and told her softly to keep drinking it. She took it in her hands and looked at him, watched him get up. He was very near the door when the first word she had said since the alley came out of her lips. It was very soft, and very weak, but it came out.

"Thank you." She said nothing more.

"You're welcome," he said, smiling kindly before leaving the room and closing the door behind him. And she sat in the dark, all thoughts and emotions drowned. Numb.

A/N: That was the second chapter! Hope you enjoyed it, and thank you as usual for reading thus far! Stay tuned! Bye!