*Oookaaay, I hope there's still someone reading this. Maybe I should just quit, for I seem to be totally unable to create anything like tension. Anyway, chappie 7. lol*

Liz was glad as they finally entered the mall. Carter had been going on her nerves the whole morning through, starting with him stepping into the bathroom without knocking, for he had decided to shave right now, not caring about her protests, yelling at her the next moment for she was using the hairdryer and turned on the faucet for two seconds, to wash some mousse off her hand. Whether she was determined to die of an electric shock and stuff, treating her like a baby, and it did cost her a lot of overcoming not to burst out and kick his ass out of the room. That apartment was just not built for four people. On closer examination she considered that no space could be big enough for both of them.

The shopping centre was one of those new fashionable buildings, full of high-tech, chrome and huge glass windows everywhere, giving it a somewhat exclusive flair. "Ah, welcome to hellmouth", Carter grumbled at the huge entrance hall. Only one time he had been silly enough to join Terry on one of her shopping sprees, a lesson he never ever forgot. How could one spend hours, ambling through thousands of shops, looking at silly boring stuff? He never had any difficulties in buying his stuff within a few minutes. Perfumeries and boutiques, two words, that frightened him more than the permanent mortal danger they were under.

They took the lift up to the very top and sat down in one of the cafes, for Carter's knee was still damn hurting and he wasn't able to walk for a long time and none of them had had a breakfast.

"Well, ain't that great?" Carter put down the rest of his ham roll, lounged back, folding his hands behind his head. "This means we don't have to worry anymore, cuz we could simply die anytime."

The others moaned. "Can't we just sit here, for once not talking bout death or stuff", Liz complained.

"Bout what would you like to talk, honey?"

She looked heavenwards. "For example: life?"

"Just in case it has escaped your attention: this is our life. Welcome to it."

Instead of an answer she made a dismissive wave of the hand, refusing to give him any inflammatory stuff to go on, although she really would've loved to throw her plate into his arrogant visage as he smugly grinned at her in return.

"Ah, shut up, will ya, please?" Clear, who sat next to him, dug him in the ribs.

"Guess, I don't have to tell ya; that if you repeat that, you won't have to wait for the elevator to get you down, do I?" he reminded her, a fake smile on his lips.

Clear firmly shook her head as she saw that Alex was close to a breakout of fury. "It's okay, let him play his little games. Don't do him the favour and participate."

"Ooh, you guys are just so sweet", he replied. "Defending each other; cute."

"Jealous because no one'd do that for you, huh?" Liz smiled innocently, forgetting what she had decided to do only a few seconds ago.

"You better watch your words!" Carter narrowed his eyes to slits.

"Or else?" Withstanding his look, she leant forward, lowering her voice. "Carter, you know, when you're like that, so furious …. so cynical, so …. pheeew –" she sighed, unable to explain her feelings towards him in a better way, "manly, aggressive, absolutely cool, n the way you don't care bout other people …. it makes me wanna …." her eyes wandering up and down his quite impressive body, "I mean, it really turns me – off!" Giving him a short fake smile, she lounged back in her chair and prepared another sandwich.

For a few seconds he just stared at her, then gave a short laugh. "Bitch!"

She added some sliced tomatoes to her cheese sandwich. "So what, asshole?"

"Don't you ever expect any help from my side, when it's after you and I'm the only one near."

"Don't worry, I won't", she answered lightly and tucked in.

****

Alex' eyes shone with joy as he noticed what lay in front of them. They had been in some shops, Carter of course letting them know each ten minutes how bored he was, and then went outside to get some fresh air and sit in the sun, just enjoying the day. It was at the backside of the centre. A huge plateau, standing at the other end, one had a splendid view over the city. But to get there – Alex felt like a little boy as he grinned at the others, realizing they obviously had the same idea. "Oh no, no", Carter groaned.

"Oh yes, yes", Clear and Liz nodded, laughing. While Carter seriously considered to drive back home alone, for he thought it to be too embarrassing that someone could see him with these jerks– fortunately there were only a few people near them - the three of them went back about twenty meters to take a run-up. In front of them the whole ground was made of glass still covered with rainwater from the last shower about ten minutes ago. Combined with all the dust at least still enough to make it a pretty slippery affair. The next second they ran past Carter and slid whopeeing over the surface. They were stopped somewhere in the middle of it, Clear stumbled and fell down, sweeping the other ones to the ground, where they were lying in a knot, laughing their asses off. "Sure you don't wanna join in?" Liz giggled, looking at Carter, who still was profoundly shocked by their childish behaviour, even more as he saw another young couple, looking at each other, the same idiotic expression on their faces, his friends had.

"Aww, c'mon, Carter, give yourself a kick up the backside", Alex laughed, "it's fun!"

"If you come over here you can get a kick up your backside", he called back. "Man, you guys are pathetic!"

"I guess we can live with that", Liz smiled, getting up, as the young pair suddenly slid past them.

"Wohoo, two more meters!!" she congratulated.

"Hardly surprising", the girl replied laughing, "seven years of figure skating."

"Hey, that's unfair, that's – oh look!" With her shoe Liz wiped off the dirt a bit, so they could see what was below the thick sheet of glass. It had to be the basement of the mall, for they could see some people pushing big handcarts full of garbage and pieces of cards, which seemed to contain products for the several shops. "Whoa man, that's interesting, watching people work on your day off ", she bantered as the other ones leant forward, watching the hustle and bustle with interest.

"Can we stop the fucking sightseeing of mall's underground now?" Carter was deadly bored. Sticking his hand in his pockets, he found the keys for Alex' car, remembering that he had forgotten them on the table at the restaurant. He shrugged. If they wanted to stay here all day, okay, he'd fulfil their wish.

"Hey, what was that?" Alex asked astonished.

"What was what?" Liz wanted to know, listening with half an ear.

"Didn't you hear that?"

"What do you mean? That unnerving voice from behind, from the direction of our misery-guts?" Clear laughed, faltering, when she caught his eye. "What?" she asked, having a dreadful foreboding, that turned her stomach.

She could see him looking down on the glass, somewhat disbelieving. And then she felt it, too. A slight shaking, going through the ground. Followed by a faint crack. This couldn't be true. But as her mind was still refusing to believe, she already knew it was.

"What is this?" The girl wanted to know, her voice quivering. Grasping her boyfriend's hand, she made an anxious step forward, creating the effect that the crackle increased.

"Don't move!" Alex said, seeing that she was close to run away. "Don't. – Carter?"

Carter had almost reached the corner as he heard a familiar voice calling for him. Shit, he'd nearly managed to get away. "So the view's not that beautiful?" he mocked at them, expecting to see them approaching him. His self-confident smile started to fade away, as he saw the five people seemed to have turned to pillars of salt. Before he could ask his question, another, a this time quite loud, sound of breaking glass, gave him an answer. He thought the situation over quickly. Since most part of the glass was covered with dirt, nobody was able to see how far the fissures had extended, so it was no good idea to step on it as well, as if trying to save someone from breaking ice covering a lake. "Okay, no panic, I'll get help!" he called over his shoulder as he left them, as fast as his hurt knee allowed.

"Oh my God!" the girl shrieked in fear, as another crack made her stumble. Liz could see the fissures running through the glass like thousands of little veins. No one down below them had an idea of what was going on above them. About six meters above them. Again she glanced over the surface, but it was hopeless. The ends, where the glass met the stony ground, were too far away to reach them in time, and every move they made would surely crack the glass completely. She was still wondering how such a thick sheet of glass was able to break so simply, as the young woman, standing some meters away from her, cried out loud, as she slipped and fell down. Instinctively Alex and her and her boyfriend, standing closest to her, tried to grab hold of her. For one second, that seemed to last an eternity, there was an eerie silence, followed by the earpiercing mixture of the sound of horrified screams and cracking glass, crashing to the ground, dragging all five of them down into the depths.

******

Thousands of fragments and broken pieces of glass littered the grey coloured concrete ground. Many of them speckled with a red liquid. Puddles of it between. Overshadowed by a bizarre zigzag pattern, caused by the sunlight that fell through the destroyed surface. It had won one more time. The air seemed to vibrate with a dark euphoria. Three people were lying on the ground, their wrenched and atrociously disfigured bodies covered with white sheets, to protect them from inquisitive looks, the blood from the innumerable cuts and injuries turning them red.

Carter stared at them, blankly, following the lines of the corpses, shown underneath the sheets. He tried to swallow down the lump in his throat, but couldn't seem to manage it. The knowledge that he hadn't participated in his friends' silly game and therefore was still alive, didn't make it any better. He'd had hardly reached the entrance of the mall as he heard the terrible screams and sounds behind him. He'd jerked around to find the place, they had stood only a few seconds ago, empty. An icy claw had grabbed his heart as he ran back and looked over the edge. He closed his eyes.

"There is no sense in that."

He slowly turned around to the young woman, who was standing behind him. She had a bandage on her right hand, some scratches on her face and arms and her summer dress was torn, but she didn't have to share the fate of the three people in front of them. "I don't understand that." She gently touched his shoulder, but he evaded the contact. He couldn't bear being touched when he was that tensed. "Those poor people. They had nothing to do with it. I wonder why –"

He rubbed his temples, the only indication to his frame of mind. "Shut up Clear, okay?" he asked in a low voice. "I don't know the answer. If anyone does at all." He glanced at the ambulancemen and their patients. "How are they?"

"Better as one would expect under these circumstances. – Do you come with me over there? Liz has some deep cut on her leg, perhaps we have to go to the hospital so they can suture it there."

Following her, he had his eyes fixed on another person, sitting beside Liz.

"I don't want to hear any comment like 'I told you'", Alex said in a warning tone. There was a large scratch extending over his left cheek, the first-aid attendant just treated.

"You really think me such an asshole?" Carter asked, regaining his habitual coolness. "Well, maybe you're right", he added, as Alex just stared at him wordless.

"Anything else?" Alex wanted to know, obviously trying hard to pull himself together, for after all the time he had spent with that guy, he was already suspecting where this was leading to.

"You're not that badly hurt", Carter began.

"Sorry", Alex replied sarcastically. "Next time I'll make more of an effort, okay?"

"I'm just wondering why the four of us are still alive, while they have taken our place." He pointed back at the corpses of the young couple and an employee of the mall, which was killed by the falling down glass. The ambulanceman gave Carter a strange look as he went away to have a look after another casualty, after having finished to fix up Alex. "Three of us supposed to die – three of them dead."

"What are you trying to tell me, Horton?!"

"I'm expecting you, to come up with an explanation, Mr Premonition!!"

"I'm not clairvoyant!"

"Aww, did little Cole Sear lose his gift?" Carter kept on provoking him. "For fuck's sake, Browning, say something!! I'm soo sick of you and all that shit!!"

Before answering, Alex took a deep breath, suppressing the wish, to jump up and smash that boy's face in. "You wanna know what I'm sick of?" Without waiting for an answer he continued, his voice low, but strained, "I'm sick of being made responsible for that. It's not my fault, it never was my intention to live this way. I'm sick of you looking at me, waiting for an answer, expecting me to find a way out each time. And I'm even more sick of constantly having to repeat myself, for some fanatics are just not willing to stop making me their scapegoat, since their inability to cope with that situation without my help drives them mad. Does that answer your question?"

"As far as I'm concerned, I'm outta that freaky little game", Carter said grinning arrogantly. "It's not following its rules, that means I don't have to hang around with you guys any longer. Should've left you days ago. Have yourselves a nice little rest of lifetime, wasting it on trying to stay alive. I'm gonna live now", his grin broadening, "for you know, I'm never gonna die!" He turned around, wondering where the sudden blackness, following the heavy blow against his head came from, knocking him unconscious before he hit the ground.

*Hehe, I mean, aww, I know that end was soo cheap and pathetic, but I just couldn't help to take revenge on that f*+# …. er, for the things I forced him to say. Writing is a weird affair ….*