All Alone
The hall was icy cold. It was either that or he was unbelievably cold inside. It did not matter which; he still shivered.
As soon as they left the courtroom, his stupid stomach made him realize what was really going on around him. It cramped so badly that he could barely walk. The sound of the judge's gavel resonated in his mind and sent jolts to his bones. I'm going to jail for the rest of my life.
The thoughts that began running through his mind almost made him cry. He would never see the outside of a prison again. Killers stay in jail for the rest of their lives. He stopped walking for a moment as they passed through the barricade of reporters that had followed him from the courtroom. I'm a killer.
"Kid, look this way!" Harry subconsciously obliged to the man who had the woman-like voice.
Marner began getting aggressive with the reporters as they close in on them, like ravage man-eaters. Marner violently pushed one male reporter who attempted to grab at Harry, and the man angrilly returned the gesture. The two struggled with each other to the ground. Marner fought back and yelled something to another officer who was rushing towards the fight.
Chaos broke out. The reporters all made a mad dash for Harry. He was confronted on every side by cameras, note-pads, and small black boxes that he thought were tape recorders. Even worse was that everyone was talking to him at once. He felt the pulse pounding right above his heart… Oh no, not here.
"IT'S APPROVED!" A voice Harry immediately recognized, yelled above the chatter of the crowd. Harry felt his pulse calm somewhat and took a small breath in relief.
His attorney stood at the entrance to the hall from the street with a long sheet of paper in his hand. Harry unknowingly put a hand to where the pulsing had become unbearable.
He regally pointed to the colorful seal at the bottom and said, "The Magistrate recently issued that my client's name shall remain out of the paper."
There were shouts of outrage, all of which was directed towards Harry's attorney. He only smiled and pointed elsewhere on the official looking paper. "And photos as well due to the age of my…"
His attorney's words were suddenly drowned out by the reporters' united roar of rage.
A hand grabbed Harry from the crowd and roughly yanked him away from the mass of vultures and then through several twists and turns of the building. Harry's mind was too preoccupied to care.
He watched as tall bars loomed into view. The man pulling him said something to the guard at the bars that served as doors. The guard nodded and gave Harry a slightly eerie grin before opening the bars.
The officer with him pushed through the opening and went to talk to the other guard.
Harry flew pass a mirror as he stumbled through. He yelped softly and went back to look at his refection. A grim-faced person stared back him. He felt his face with his chained hands and traced a deep blood-crusted, gouged line running diagonally across his face from his forehead over his nose to his left cheek. From some officer's ring.
It still hurt, but not as much as before.
He touched his cheek. It felt waxy and was very pale. In the mirror was a deathly figure. He looked like a figure out of a scary movie. The scar crossing his face made him look even more frightening.
His eyes were cold emerald stones, like those onone of Aunt Petunia's necklaces. The pulse that he felt within him was visible. His eyes carried their signature emerald green, but it was hard and cold. He cringed from looking into his own eyes.
The cells loudly opened and closed behind him, and he jumped slightly. Thoughts of never seeing the outside of that place reentered his mind so suddenly that he got dizzy. He swayed a bit on his feet and felt as though he had been punched in the stomach.
"Fresh meat!" Someone yelled.
An officer pushed him away from the mirror, and Harry fell.
All of his helplessness left immediately. He felt the pulse burn uncontrollably once again. Harry growled under his breath. The new guard looked at him with disgust. Marner, his now regular guard, had stayed behind in the courtroom.
"Get up and move it!" The new man growled at him.
Harry ignored him completely and turned his attention to the inmates.
Inside one of the cells, the women were clawing at themselves and the others in there with them. Some were at the bars hissing and screeching like cats. Just like caged wild animals…
Harry stood up slowly with the guard eyeing him suspiciously.
"Hey Ronny," One of the ladies said to his new guard in a saucy voice, "whose the kid?"
"Why don't you bring him over so we can… show him the ropes!" Shrieked another in between bouts of maniacal laughter.
"And how to use his!" A beetle-eyed woman yelled while clutching the bars. All of the nearby ladies howled with laughter. The sound was so eerie and obnoxious that Harry subconsciously took a few steps back in surprise.
His guard swung around and, seeing Harry back away, swung his baton at Harry. Harry ducked on reflex, but he was not quick enough to avoid it and caught the hit on his shoulder.
He went flying awkwardly because of his heavily chained hands. Before he could react, he flew face first into one of the bars of a cell. There was a loud crack, and he felt his nose break. Blood squirted everywhere and continued to drizzle from his nose.
His eyes watered from the pain, but he could still see what was happening around him. All of the inmates in his line of vision were glaring at the officer. Even the ladies the officer was talking to were giving him half-smiles and glancing at Harry in something akin to disbelief and pity.
The officer appeared to not have seen the extent of his actions, or if he had he did not care. Harry could not care less which. He wanted revenge.
He saw red. Maybe it was just his blood, or the pulse burning like lava in his chest, but his mind was clouded with it as he stayed on the floor.
A hand reached out from between the cell and grasped his jail shirt tightly. Harry felt something bubble within him. He turned, ready to attack, and found a silver-haired guy peering at him from behind the bars.
The guy did nothing but look into his eyes, then a startled gasp rose from his throat as his eyes traveled upwards to Harry's forehead.
"The guard." The man said in a gravel-like voice, his head shaking as though he were afraid to speak the words. "Bring him to the bars!"
Harry saw the other inmates in the cell smiling nasty smiles. He was sure something horrible was going to happen to the guard. Harry nodded slowly, afraid to move too fast.
He stood slowly, using the bars as crutches. He turned around and promptly slipped and fell on his own blood.
That attracted the guard's attention. "Ha! It's about time someone put you in your place," He approached Harry now, "you're nothing but a little wanker!"
He grabbed Harry by the back of the neck and pulled him off the ground. "You little bugger!"
Harry spat directly into the man's face, putting some of his blood on the man as well. The man's eyes flashed in fury. "You ba-."
Harry jumped and kneed the man so hard in the groin that Harry felt a strong ripple go through the man's body before they both fell against the bars.
Hands reached out and grasped the officer immediately. The man screamed and fought, but the hands were persistent. Harry swayed and, spent, sat on the floor breathing heavily. His head was pounding and spinning. He knew that loosing so much blood was making him dizzy.
He laid himself flat on the prison floor, in his own blood and closed his eyes.
The events after that were difficult for him to recall. He heard the clanging of the bars mixed with hurried footsteps, joyous yells and cat-calls. He heard loud shouts and whistles. He felt himself being lifted. There was some time that he felt he was bouncing up and down. Finally, he was laid back down again. Then, everything went completely black and silent.
"-when the nineteenth got away!" A male voice yelled.
"And the kid almost d-." Harry heard a woman say softly before being cut off by the man.
"Who cares about the kid, Miriam! We lost six able-bodied men! The kid could get put to sleep for all I care!"
Harry thought about opening his eyes and looking at the man, just to get the picture of the man's face in his mind. At the moment, he had Uncle Vernon's face with the man's voice shouting.
"I care for the kid. He's just a lost kid, John. You heard what his family did to him! And you said yourself that he was in a bad state when you walked in and saw him in the cell."
Harry heard the man snort loudly. "And I still want to know who brought the piece of trash to this cell!" The man soundly as though he were speaking to someone in particular but no one responded.
"It's impossible that someone brought him in here. We had lockdown right after the attack, and then we had an emergency meeting. No one had blood on them except the people who were hurt. That means none of the faculty carried him. And it's very unlikely that the inmates carried him to my hospice."
The man snorted again. Harry heard someone approaching him. He felt the body heat of the person. And then her perfume hit his senses. It was the perfect blend of strawberry and another sweet fruit that he couldn't identify.
Harry knew then, even before he had seen the last, that he liked her. She laid soft caresses on his body healing him with her very touch. She must be an angel.
"Miriam-."
"Oh, leave it, John!" The lady said.
She went back to applying nasty smelling medicine to Harry's face.
There was silence. Only the sounds of breathing reached Harry's ears. He felt himself nearly drifting off to sleep under the massaging that the lady was blessing him with.
It was a touch he had always imagined his mother would give him if she were still alive.
He had always had a dream with her in it. It had a great white house with a grand yard. It had a gigantic tree, and he would try to climb it in every dream.
He would always manage to climb that tree. But once up, he was not able to get back down. He would cry, and he would fall from the tree. Then his mother would come… She was a beautiful, red-head woman, the one that Harry found in a ripped picture in the cellar before Uncle Vernon burnt it and beat Harry for going in the cellar and going through their things. Uncle Vernon had conveniently forgotten that he had sent Harry down there in the first place.
She would come like an angel, smelling sweetly like the woman treating him now. She would take away all the pain with one kiss.
But he never received that kiss, for every time he had that dream, he would awake to Aunt Petunia's pounding on the cupboard door.
Not this time! There's no Aunt Petunia to ruin the dream this time!
Harry could feel her coming. The smell of her perfume was tickling his nose. Her red head was closing in. He felt her body heat. Bit by bit her face loomed in. He could almost decipher her facial features. He saw her green eyes; they were the same color and shade as his.
We do have the same eyes, he remembered from the loomed in closer. Her lips were nearly touching his cheek.
"Get off me!" Harry's eyes flew open at the shriek.
He was in a completely walled cell. There was one opened, black, and knob-less door. There was a tiny window that was barred completely. Only the tiniest bit of sunlight came through, the only other source of light was opened door.
A very petite brunette was struggling with a tall, heavy-set man. She could be my height! Harry watched them struggle with one another for a few moments in astonishment. The woman, though considerably smaller than the man, was putting up a good fight.
A loud smack rang throughout the room. The man took a startled step backwards and held his face.
Harry thought he saw the man's eyes flicker to him, but he was certain that he only imagined it. The man let go of his face and walked quickly out of the cell. He began talking to another officer in hushed tones.
The woman, looking stunned by her own actions, hurriedly began packing up bottles and bandages that Harry guessed were for him. She threw worried glances at the doorway where the two officers were conversing. She did not seem to notice Harry until she made for a bottle of foul-smelling ointment that lie next to him.
"Lie down!" She whispered to Harry fiercely, pushing him into a laying position. "He's in a foul moo-." The door slammed shut behind them. "Oh that's rich, lock us both up together. At least we don't have to see his distorted face!" She slammed the bottle of ointment into her bag and took out a thick, radio-like device and began punching buttons.
Harry, enthralled by the sight of the woman, did not see that they had company until he heard the click of metal and saw the gun held to the nurse's head.
"'Distorted'? You know you love this face." Harry was frozen stiff, and he gripped the hard mattress beneath him from fright.
He suddenly remembered discussing guns in class one day. It was not a topic that he had liked, but he had still been interested in. He remembered hating the thought that a single bullet could kill immediately if aimed in the right area. It did not give the victim any chance of fighting back. Most people deserve a chance to fight back…
Especially the nice nurse! Harry was suddenly brought back to realty by a scream from the nurse.
The tall officer held her beneath him on the ground. She struggled, but Harry could see that the gun to her head was keeping her from defending herself. Her shirt was ripped open. Harry blushed and turned his head slightly as he saw what he knew he should not.
"Come on kid, you can watch! You might actually learn something and get a chance to do it to her yourself!" The officer gave a very ugly smile and quickly unbuttoned his pants.
Harry gripped the mattress harder. Where was help? Why did not anyone hear her screams and yells for help?
He shut his eyes in concentration. The pulse came to life. I have to help. It grew stronger, and stronger. I have to help!
"Get off her." He said. The words vibrated throughout the room. The man did not seem to have heard him. The woman did however, and turned to look at Harry with tears in her eyes, willing him to lie back down.
Harry felt more anger bubble up inside of him. He said it one more time. The man turned to him with blank eyes. Harry's breath caught his throat as he saw the gun suddenly pointed at him.
Harry felt it coming from within him. He could not control it. It bubbled slowly up from deep within him. The pulse was beating painfully and burning like lava. And just when the gun went off in the man's hand, something erupted from Harry's eyes. The bullet met a beam of green light inches away from Harry's face. The bullet spun there in front of Harry as though it wished for nothing more than to impale itself in Harry's head, but something was keeping it from completing the goal.
The man jumped up with his pants around his ankles, appearing completely unaware of his state of undress. His shocked eyes frantically shifting to bullet unnaturally spinning in midair and then to Harry.
Harry felt himself smile in relief. He barely noted the glow or the burning of band on his wrist as the man turned and tried to run. He did not get far. The bullet spun around and zoomed right into the back of his head before he had taken three steps. His face implanted itself on the wall with a gory, bloody explosion
Harry sighed in relief that the nurse was saved and succumbed to a sudden sleepy heaviness that fell upon him.
.
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