As Syed looked down, the shock hit him. Everything had happened so fast.
He'd been shot.
One minute he was staring at a deranged Kyle pointing a gun at him and the next he saw blood and his body jerked with shock, before he felt the chair wobble and then fall, crashing to the ground and taking him with it. His head hit the concrete surface, even though he'd tried to hold it up, and his wrists were jerked roughly against the rope bindings as he'd tried to also raise them to protect himself.
Kyle hadn't waited to see any more; instead he had turned and disappeared out of the door: the sound of its metal whine as it closed was the last Syed heard of him, and the only light in the room was emanating from a battery operated lamp sat in the middle of the floor.
He'd been shot.
He lay there, tears welling up and then streaming out of his eyes despite him screwing them shut. He gasped in a raggedy breath that reverberated around the room and looked down over his body. He took in the sight of the blood on his leg where he'd been shot and saw the small pulses of the blood coming out of it. He wasn't sure what Kyle had meant to do. He'd shot him.
Was he a good shot or a bad? The bullet had dug a trench down the side of his leg. The graze had meant it hadn't actually gone through him, but it was bleeding and it hurt just the same to him because he'd been shot. Someone had shot him. With a gun.
His jeans were turning a dark shade of red and sticking to the wound. His head hurt. Maybe that was taking away from the pain in his leg?
He tried to relax his breathing and to also relax his stomach muscles, which had tightened in pain and worry. Kyle had left him alone; this may be his only chance to try and get out, despite Kyle's intentions of hurting him to make him stay. He would just have to fight the pain and try. Even if he was tied a chair that had fallen over, leaving him lying on his side.
He stretched his fingers and turned his hand, trying to get hold of the rope, and then he hissed in pain as something else registered in his head.
His arms hurt. His shoulder that was on the floor was giving off a dull throb and his wrists felt like they'd been yanked out of their sockets.
He let his head fall to the cold concrete floor and moaned in pain and defeat.
He couldn't do it. He couldn't do anything, he hurt so badly. He was going to die there. He'd bleed to death and he probably had a concussion so that would affect him if he fell asleep and he knew that no one would come and get him because only Kyle knew where he was.
His brain didn't want to work properly. He blinked his eyes but could barely see past the tears... tears which, he noticed as they fell to the ground beside him, had a pink tinge to them. His head must be bleeding too, from where he hit it. He couldn't think straight, he couldn't hold thoughts for very long and all he wanted was to be held by Christian. He wanted his mum to put a bandage on his head and tell him everything would be okay and he wanted his dad to pat him on the back and say he'd take care of things for him.
He wanted Christian. He wanted to see his eyes, see him smile. He wanted to be tucked up in bed and know he'd still be right there in the morning. He wanted to laugh with him in the park on a sunny day. Where was Christian? He needed to see him, he needed to know he was alright, that they'd both be alright, that they were together through all this.
Kyle said he wanted to kill Christian.
Christian was at home. Of course he was at home, he still couldn't go outside properly so Kyle would know exactly where he could find him.
Syed growled and jerked his body. The chair creaked across the concrete floor in a random direction. He was angry. Angry that Kyle was trying to destroy their lives and why? Because he was the best friend of the evil psychopath who had already tried and failed at the same thing?
He cried out as he forced the chair to move across the ground again with his full body weight. The pain fell to the recesses of his mind as he concentrated on trying to move himself. If he could just get to the door, maybe it would help.
The tears blinded him, getting in the way and making his skin itch as they fell down his cheek in streaks. He managed to summon enough energy to move the chair another few inches but the effort took its toll on him pretty quickly and he could feel the concrete scraping across his arm as he did so. He was out of breath already and the pain re-focused in the centre of his head like a migraine. He wanted to just close his eyes for a moment...
No! Bad idea... if he was concussed then sleeping or resting was a bad idea.
It was then, when he realised that he didn't have the energy or the capability to get himself out of the building, that he let his occasional sobs turn into a proper chance to cry.
"Christian..." he whispered through the difficult breaths, "I'm so sorry..."
He lay there for such a long time that eventually, the tears dried up as there was nothing more in him. The sobs hurt his stomach muscles and tied them in knots and they too, eventually died down to nothing as he didn't have the strength to keep them up even if he wanted to.
He felt terrible. He felt like he was letting Christian down by not being able to get out of the situation quickly. Christian would be at the door by now. He'd be out of the door. He'd have pulled the ropes apart and be free and on his way home, calling the police, sorting everything.
Syed, however, he was still stuck there, a weed, unable to conjure enough power to move a few feet across the room.
The light flickered in front of him. He watched the little light bulb as it began to fade and then it cut out. The battery was dead. Syed was now in darkness, with just a little bit of dull moonlight coming through a gap in a boarded up window. For the rest of the night he could do little else but concentrate on staying awake, mostly done by concentrating on the pain and throbs from different parts of his body as he felt the blood on his jeans harden against and in his wound.
As the sun came up he was still there, barely hanging on to his awareness, forcing himself to keep his eyes open by purposely making the pain worse. If he got out of this alive, he would never complain about a headache or stomach bug or a cold ever again.
What had Kyle done during the night?
And please, Syed quietly prayed, please let Christian and his family still be alright.