Assassination of Memories
Chapter XIX – Suicidal Shadow

Shadows' POV

"SHADOWS!"

I looked over as Tranq clomped down the stairs his eyes full of horror. Fang raised an eyebrow sitting across from me as Jared prepared dinner in the kitchen. "What?" "There's this guy hanging up on the back of your door." Tranq gasped looking like he was going to be sick. I had smelled something funny earlier but thought it might have been a side effect of Angel's mind probing. I tipped my nose to the air and flared my nostrils my stomach lurching slightly. I rushed up the stairs slamming the door to my room open. I heard a groan as the door slammed into wall, I pushed it back to see Holden on the back of the door. He was covered in his own silver blood but his smell was faint, meaning he was going to die. But it was how Holden was held up on the door: with a long oriental knife stuck through his stomach and 'I picked up your tab' scratched into the wood of the wall next to him. I knew that writing, but I had to be sure.

"Who did this to you?" I hissed grabbing Holden by the collar. He moaned again trying to bring his hand up to choke me. His hand only moved passed his waist. "Answer me." I snarled. Tranq was standing off to the side watching me. "Jackass." He spat out. Well at least Neo didn't have to kill him now; I took the knife out of Holden's stomach making him sag down the door like a depressed rain drop.

Holden's eyes barely had any life in them as he looked up at me; the stupid emotions that the little voice in my head had brought out gave me a weird pang of an emotion I couldn't describe. "Who did this to you?" I said slowly grounding out the words in vicious snarl. Holden just kept looking at me. "I can make this a lot more painful for you. I'm in a good mood, don't wreck it and you might go peacefully." I said a little gentler.

Yeah. A little.

"Did he have black hair? Tall with a cloak? Dark red-brown eyes? Answer me Holden!" I was near screaming. I didn't know if Blaze had survived the month I had left him a mile away to the mercy of Lycans, though for some unknown reason I had just forgotten about him until I busted Iggy out of the hospital. I needed to be absolutely certain; I could barely smell anything but Holden's blood so if Blaze's scent was anywhere in here it'd be difficult to find it. "That bastard will pay." Holden spat. So it was Blaze. Weirdly, even though he tried to kill me, I was relieved that Blaze was alive. It meant that the thing I did for him wasn't wasted. Whatever that was exactly, I was sure that I didn't heal Blaze's Swiss cheese stomach.

"Where is he?!" I barked. Holden simply glanced out the balcony doors. They were closed but when I came up to them and put my nose close to the handle sniffing I could smell Blaze on it. He had been here, oh he had been here. I blinked at my own thoughts wondering where that had come from. I wondered if he had watched the symm but I highly doubted it. I straightened up opening the balcony doors stepping onto it. He had defiantly been here, the fresh air got rid of Holden's smell and I could smell Blaze's scent over the balcony where he landed. I remembered those dark red Draco like wings that were so powerful whenever Blaze took from the sky and I on the ground. He looked intimidating, using them to get his point across Copies' thick heads. Powerful yet graceful at the same time, he wasn't like some of the few Copies that once had wings who could barely fly in a straight line. Those guys didn't last long, barely even four weeks before Copies stopped getting wings. I glanced down to the ground a story below me then back up at the sky. The only thing is I wouldn't be able to find his scent on the ground if he flew and right now Max was behind me staring at Holden. She looked torn between complete horror and ripping Holden's guts out. "Shade? Who was here?" Tranq asked beside me looking out over the balcony. "Blaze." I breathed surprised by the slight admiration that filled my voice. I was changing right now, I knew Blaze had been startled by how much I had changed since leaving the Organization but I was changing right now. Emotion in my voice? Emotions I've never felt before starting to make me sick with feeling? As I stood here thinking of Blaze I was turning into something different, someone different. I could see Tranq noticed that.

"Shade what's happening?" He sounded concern. I shook my head, sure I was having all these new emotions running amuck inside me but I was impassive on the outside to anyone else. "Who the hell did that to him?" Neo said staring at Holden, Max jumped realizing he was there. "Someone named Blaze." Tranq said turning to the Dead-one. "Blaze, the one you ran into? The one when you came home you were about to break down, that Blaze?" Neo said. "Stay out of this Ash." I growled not in the happiest mood right now. "After going to a certain museum I found that records from the Great Plague that says you haven't died yet. You might want to go fix them before someone else with enough brains gets their paws on them."

"Are you bipolar or something? Just now you were all calm now you're getting pissy with me." Neo growled back. Max's head was whipping back and forth from Neo to me like she was watching a tennis match trying to decide to butt in or not. "What do you care if Blaze was the one whose blood I was covered in when I came back, huh? When the hell did you start caring?" I snarled trying not to warp. Calm down, he's a smug corpse but this is what he wants. He wants a reaction. The little voice said mixing in with my own thoughts. I was angry, I was upset and I was just downright sick with the alien emotions whirling inside me. I wanted Blaze to explain these things to me; he had so much more experience what with being the first person to tell me what crying was. I felt like fling myself off the balcony even if I couldn't fly; I just wanted to feel the freedom that weightlessness had. I was just so damn confused, nothing made sense anymore since my world had turned upside down. My eyes moistened but I knew I wasn't going to cry, though I did know that my emotions were going to flood out if I didn't do anything. I ran out of my room pushing past Max, jumping the stairs landing at the bottom with a thud. "Shade—" I flashed passed Jared out the front door just wanting to get away from everyone. I couldn't take it; I wanted them to leave me alone forever. And I knew how.

I pounded for the mountain that overshadowed our house, running on hands and feet for speeds of 460 miles per hour just to get there faster. I got up the mountain going around to the rocky jagged side where the trees disappeared, where the mountain started to drop off. I wanted the highest ledge, I wanted the most freedom and I wanted the fastest leave. A cliff appeared in front of me probably six-hundred feet away. I kept running my feet thudding against the rock. I heard the sound of huge bat-like wings pushing the air maybe a hundred feet away getting a burst of speed. I felt like shooting at him to make him leave. The cliff was now three hundred feet away, I straightened up into running on two feet. The wings swooped down, beating at the air as he rushed after me.

"GO AWAY!" I screamed my voice showing the anger, confusion and fear that whirled around my head. It felt like I was going to be sick, my throat closed making me choke. He couldn't catch me, without feathers he couldn't make himself anymore streamline to go faster he had to rely on the power of his flaps to push him forward. I pounded my feet against the rock to get away from him, I sprinted the last of the distance flinging myself off the edge of the cliff. I felt his fingers just brush my back but I was instantly out of his grasp as I began to fall.

Carter's POV

She flung herself off the cliff! How stupid could she be!? Why the heck was she trying to kill herself in the first place?! The one I knew as Blaze almost had her yet she slipped through his fingertips. He hovered just a little past the cliff for a moment before he aimed down and tucked in his large dark red dragon-like wings dropping like a rock. Beside me Nevaeh's eyes widened as she watched her Protected dived after Shadows. "Shouldn't we do something!?" she cried.

"She flung herself off a cliff I can't really save her now. How could I be so stupid?! If someone's running towards a cliff they don't exactly stop right at the edge." I muttered to myself tipping my hat up slightly, "Come on Blaze I'm counting on you." Nevaeh glanced over to me her dark fogged grey eyes moistening. "If she dies you'll be gone! Carter don't tell me we can't do anything but sit here." A tear rolled down Nevaeh's cheek. I wish I could say something but all I could do was look back towards the cliff.

To the say the least I was scared, if Shadows died then I'd have to go with her as her Guardian. And Guardians couldn't come back after passing their Protected on. Please Shadows I'm begging you to stop being the brat you aren't and be the person you really are. I thought my fingers lacing around the IS necklace in my pocket.

Alright that's all I can do, you guys if there's anyone religious out there can you like, pray for me? I've been having this pain in my side and my dad's starting to think it could be appendix related. I could have a ticking time bomb in me waiting to literally burst. I'm scared guys, really scared. I'm scared of the pain, the surgery I'd have to go to, the needles... the list could go on. Please, I don't care if you send me a prayer or anything, just pray for me, I could really use it.

Thanks guys

~Akiko~