Skylar's POV:
My vision grew blurry and my mind hazy after feeling a pin prick on my arm. They had drugged me. I could faintly feel myself being lifted into some kind of vehicle. A loud chopping noise let me know it was a helicopter as we lifted into the air.
My limbs were heavy and limp, and I was so tempted to give in to the darkness that beckoned me and surrounded the edges of my sight.
I couldn't, I wasn't sure why, but I couldn't give in. I knew I shouldn't. Voices merged together around me, I wasn't able to make out the words. But one voice did sound familiar.
At the sound of the masculine voice, I could feel my heart start pounding and panic flooded my mind. Even though I didn't know why. "Skylar," a looming face hovered above mine. His eyes, the dark menacing eyes that peered down on me, they sent waves of hatred rushing through me.
I wanted to get away. I struggled but it was a strenuous task simply to move an inch. The man smiled. "And she can't remember who I am?" He turned to someone else beside him. "She can't put together many coherent thoughts at the moment. She probably recognizes you slightly, but doesn't know why. It'll only last for the next hour or so."
"Fantastic! Without her hating me, she won't be so stubborn about not going back to the School." "For now," the other voice replied. "I…" It was hard to find the words and my throat hurt. "I do… Hate… You."
The man let out a hearty laugh, "Oh, I'm sure." He turned away from me and began to chat with his colleague.
Fang. The word was echoing in my head. Fang. I hadn't the slightest idea why. It was the last word I remember thinking as I began to drift into a drug induced sleep.
Fang's POV:
I watched as they loaded her into a helicopter. Eraser's swarmed the air around it and Skylar, Max and Ash were all limp as they were carried into it. I grit my teeth.
I heard Nudge gasp behind me. Gazzy shushed her. "Do you want us to get caught?" She glared at him but didn't make another sound. I could feel dread welling up inside me. Skylar was headed back to the School. The very place I vowed she wouldn't ever go back to.
There was nothing more I wanted to do then punch out the teeth of the eraser that was holding her and grab her. I couldn't. Grabbing any of them would mean either suicide or capture for the rest of the Flock. That wouldn't help anybody get out of this situation.
"We're just going to have to follow them to the school," I whispered loudly above the noise of the helicopter. It began to lift into the air. "We'll wait until it's dark, then we'll try to break in and get them back."
"What if we're too late?" Angel's voice was unnervingly calm as she said the words. "We won't be." I was assuring myself more than the others. I hoped we weren't, I didn't think I could live with myself if we were.
I didn't know what to do without Max, my best friend since childhood. I probably wouldn't miss Ash, I felt bad to admit. And Skylar. I hadn't known her for very long, but I was already too attached.
I loved the way she smiled. The way she would look at the world as if looking at it for the first time when she was flying, it probably was her first time actually seeing those things. She found beauty in things I ordinarily overlooked. How she still fought and tried to control her ice, even when it caused her pain.
She had softened me, she had made me love her even when I wasn't looking for love. I loved her even when I wasn't even sure what love was.
I loved her even when I probably couldn't be more wrong for her. She was light and happy despite her past, and I was normally dark and silent. But maybe that's what made us fit together. I didn't know what to think about that.
I startled myself when I realized I had said I loved her, well, at least internally. I was surprised, but it was also a nice feeling. My gosh, I scolded myself, you really have gone soft. But I couldn't be that right now, not when Skylar's and all their lives depended on it.
Skylar's POV:
When I woke up, fluorescent lights burned my eyes. Overwhelming dizziness made me lean back against my pillow. I was on a small cot. At least it wasn't a cage, I thought.
I found myself dressed in white, again. I felt out of place in fabric. I realized with a sickening glance around the room and a look down at myself, I hated the color white. It was the color of nothing, the color of sanitized, sterile lab coats and walls that I stared at when I felt lonely.
I was never scared of the dark, simply because it provided me with an escape from the blankness I faced almost have of my life. White was blank, white was nothing, white was the color that I had had no control over because it was everywhere.
I shuddered. Max was laying down in a bed across from me, Ash in another. Ash was sitting up, leaning against a wall with her eyes closed tightly. "It was my fault," the words were so soft I had to strain to hear them.
"What?" She opened her eyes and I could see the despair that was tearing her apart. "I had a tracker in my arm, same as you. I lead them right to you."
I didn't understand why this would upset her, the School had found her once more. She was amongst the people she had allied herself with a long time ago. "I don't see why this is a problem for you, you did your job, didn't you? In one way of a sort."
She let out a bitter and dry laugh. "That's what I've been telling myself. But the truth is, I could have been happy with you guys, if you let me. I would have been happier there than I ever would've had the School. Now all of us are captured, because I was too selfish to leave."
I felt a pang of sympathy go through me for the fiery girl. "You can't blame yourself entirely. While it was your tracker, you were barely with us for three days. For most of which you were injured, it's not as if you could've gotten up and left with broken ribs," I told her, trying to make the whole situation better. Nothing could've have made it better, I should've realized.
Ash smiled, a painful smile but a smile nonetheless. Max was rubbing her eyes as she sat up, when the door opened. In the doorway stood Jeb, accompanied by two eraser's on either side looking like cliche goons. "Ash," Jeb nodded at us. "And Skylar, you two are going to be taken in for testing. Max, Dr. Jekyll should be with you shortly."
I almost wanted to laugh at the irony of his words, it sounded almost as if we were in a doctor's office, awaiting a checkup, not the School. I stood, knowing no amount of struggling would do me any good.
I felt an eraser's clawed hands latch onto my arms, I withheld a wince. The feeling was all too familiar. Ash did the same and we were led down a long and narrow hallway before turning into a room.
In the room was one chair and one examination table. This couldn't have been good. "Skylar," Jeb gestured to the chair. "Take a seat." I did, never taking my eyes of Ash.
"And what about me?" Ash spat, menacingly. "You can find yourself a place on the table." She hopped onto the stainless steel structure with a scowl. Jeb walked over to Ash's side, hands in his pockets.
"Fire and ice, did you know there was a poem called Fire and Ice? It was by Robert Frost. A lovely poem, although a bit depressing." A sinister smile was spreading over his face. "'Some say the world will end in fire, some say in ice. From what I've tasted of desire, I hold those who favor fire.'" He cited.
"You see, even Frost knew that it could all only end one way, not in both. I do have to disagree with him favoring fire, you see, I'd much rather end in ice." Anger flushed through me, "You will, I assure you."
Jeb ignored my threat, pulling a syringe out of his pocket. "It can only end one way, and My Dear's, I favor ice." He was about to plunge the syringe into Ash's neck when I shouted, "No!"
Ash's eyes flashed toward me, shocked by my reaction. "Dru- Drug me. Not Ash." Jeb looked at me from under hooded eyes, "I'm not drugging her, Skylar. I'm killing her." I knew that I couldn't let that happen.
"Kill me then," my voice shook and was uneven with fear. "Kill me," I told him, trying control. Coolly, I added, "I favor fire."
That was when Max burst through the door, Jeb's face reflected surprise for a mere moment before turning back to Ash. He shoved the syringe into her neck. Her eyes widened but she didn't make a sound.
I felt an anger flash through me, so deep it was primal. I lunged for Jeb and clamped my hands around his neck. He pried at my grip but it was futile. I wasn't going to let go, at least not without more of a fight.
"Ash," Max said softly, kneeled so she was eye level with Ash. Ash was laying down on the table. The color was fading out of her and her cheeks looked waxy. That one word brought me back into reality.
I had known I was killing Jeb, but I didn't want to be a killer. Instead of continuing to choke him, I slammed his head backward into a tiled wall. He collapsed to the ground. He probably had a concussion, but he was alive.
I rushed over to Ash, "Skylar." Her voice was weak and frail. "Take my hand," I did as I was told. In that moment, I felt an overwhelming power rush through me. It was so hot it burned my veins and skin where I touched her. Her palm remained flat against mine, her fingers gripping my hand so I couldn't move.
I screamed out in pain. Max tried to pull my hand away, but instead yelped back. Our skin, Ash's and mine, had singed her. It was as if every fiber and nerve in my body was suddenly ignited in flames and heat, and the ice that was running in my blood remained. But it was batting with the the fire.
I felt Ash's hand go limp in mine and the pain stopped. "I… Gave you…. My fire," Ash managed, then her head lolled to the side and her eyes glazed over. I stumbled back into a wall, if I didn't I knew I would fall to the floor. "Skylar," Max approached me slowly as if approaching a wild animal. "We have to get out of here, now."
And so we ran.
Author's Note: Hi guys! Sorry I had to take the last chapter down and replace it with this one. For some odd reason the spacing got a little messed up. Tell me again if that happens and I'll try to make sure it doesn't. Don't forget, please follow, favorite and review. So how do you feel about the ending of this chapter? Tell me in a review! Thanks. XOXO- Skai.
