A/N: Hi again peeps. Yeah. Chapter 4. Oh whale.

It's totally not been ages since my last update, right?

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHA.. seriously though, I'm so sorry about that. School caught up and..

And then.. Summer.. And..

*coughs* Enjoy..? xD


We land safely (sweet relief!) on the dirt floor with a thud on the soles of my feet. The smell of our surroundings makes me gag as it hits my face, and I'm quite sure that I'm not the only one that thinks so. "Ack! God! It stinks! They need to watch what the throw away down here.." Tess cries out to us in disgust.

I start breathing through my mouth as I tell her, "Tess, I don't think they realize that there even is a here." Dad snorts in reply as he continues to follow Tess and I from behind in order to grab our gear.

I check my 9mm handgun and mutter a curse when I see how empty the barrel is. I'm going to be out of ammo a lot sooner than I thought. I stuff it at the back of my jeans as I make sure that my old pocket knife is in the main pocket of my backpack, sticking it in my own jeans pocket.

MUCH LATER.

I lean against an old counter as I wait for the signal to show us that the coast is clear. A boy of about 11 shows up. Tess speaks to him of the ration cards and bribes him with them; she has a way with her words.

"You know he's expecting us," Dad tells her flatly.

Tess looks at him with her arms crossed over her chest, a smug look on her face as she tells him, "Well, that'll make it more interesting."

After a brisk knock on the door as well as the silhouette of the boy who helped us out passes the room's window, we immediately go through the door, our legs swinging with every stride in a quick pace. The amount of men in this particular area of Boston give me the creeps, all of them bearing too long itchy beards and scars etching their middle aged faces.

I make sure that my hand is within reach of my pocket knife every step of the way. Judging by the looks being shot at us in the area, I have a feeling that some of them are a little grabby. Their gazes are hungry and desperate, for what; who knows?

I maintain my cold demeanor and walk straight ahead, following Tess from behind.

LATER.

"We just wanna talk, Robert." Tess calls out in a relatively calm manner. I hold back a snort and wait for his response. We've managed to corner the sneaky bastard, taking out his hired guards like they were nothing.

"We've ain't got fucking nothing to talk about!" He yells out in panic.

I cup one hand over my mouth and say, "Put your gun down!"

I flinch when I see the sparks from where the bullet hit the doorframe, but the gun which was in his possession flies towards our direction, along with his reply, "Go fuck yourselves!"

Tess pushes past and tells us hurriedly, "He's running!"

"For fuck's sake, man!" I mumble as I sprint behind Dad and Tess to catch Robert, pushing past doors and obstacles of all sorts.

"Robert!" Dad yells out angrily.

My jaw drops as I continue running when I hear Robert's response, "Screw you, Joel!"

Bitch, you're gonna die tonight.

We finally find an open window and jump through, and to our, there he is.

The bastard himself tries to escape, attempting to remove the lock that he himself had put up to keep us out. Next thing you know, he end up locking himself in.

Karma's a bitch.

"Hello, Robert," Tess says to him chirpily. I let out a coughing fit when I realize that I can't hold my laughter in any longer.

Robert visibly freezes, turning around slowly with a semi-calm/panicked face. "Joel, Tess." His eyes flit towards me; he raises an eyebrow in recognition. "Have I seen you somewhere before-?"

"We're the ones asking the questions here, jackass. So keep whatever shit you have to say to yourself," I snap in reply.

He rolls his eyes at me, giving Tess what I think is supposed to be a "be-reasonable-you-shitface" smile, telling her, "No hard feelings, right?"

Tess smiles that innocently dangerous smile as she answers, "None at all." One would think you could trust Tess on that, but if you know her long enough, and notice that she's picking up a fucking pipe to pulverize you with it, you'd know not to fuck around with her.

Robert raises his hands in surrender, "Alright…" Silence hangs in the air for a millisecond before he takes off in an attempt to run. I roll my eyes at him when the pipe in Tess's procession hit him square in the knee.

He screams out in pain, "Goddamit!"

I lean against the wall in boredom, crossing my arms over my chest as I watch their interaction before my eyes. "We missed you," Tess says in that sarcastically chirpy tone of hers.

Jesus, I need me some popcorn. One hell of a show, right now..

"Look," Robert croaks out weakly. "Whatever it is you heard, it ain't true, okay? I just wanna say-"

Tess cuts him off, a sickeningly twisted look on her face, "The guns. Wanna tell us where the guns are?"

I suck in a breath of air through my teeth awaiting his response.

Sure enough, he seems hesitant and paranoid, "Yeah, sure, but.. it's complicated, alright?" I keep my mouth shut, but my mind is active. I suddenly remember a really old song by Avril Lavigne called Complicated, so I chuckle when I hear his excuse. The look of horror on his face makes my day, so I continue to watch him try to weasel his way out. "Look, just hear me out on this, I gotta-"

Dad wordlessly walks over to Robert and kicks his face, inevitably shutting him up. "Fuck," he croaks out when Dad kneels beside him and takes a firm grip of his right arm, ready to snap it on Tess's orders. I found things like this entertaining, but I never said they weren't gruesome. "Ah! Stop, stop, stop, stop!" Robert calls out in pain, his eyes squinted shut because of it.

Tess walks over to him and says, "Quit your squirmin'," she kneels down beside Dad, hovering over Robert. I breathe out a lazy sigh and walk about a meter forward and watch from that section of the wall. "You were saying?" Tess beckons him to continue.

Robert continues to grunt in pain, but says this piece of crucial information as if it were nothing, "I sold 'em." My heart drops to the pit of my stomach, my eyes widen at his baffling statement. I push against the wall to join Tess and look at him in complete shock.

"You what?" I growl at him from where I stand.

Tess holds a hand up to shut me up, working her jaw and continues, "Excuse me?"

"I didn't have much of a choice," he says in one breath. "I owed someone."

"You owed us. I'd say you bet on the wrong horse," Tess snaps at him.

He stumbles on his words, fumbling and bumbling as the blood from his nose continues to trickle onto the floor. "I just need more time, just gimme a week."

"You know," Tess answers in a haughty tone, "I might've done that if you hadn't tried to fucking kill me."

"Come on, it wasn't like that-"

"Stop trying to weasel out of it and answer her, you son of a bitch," I tell him bitterly with gritted teeth. Dad's surprisingly calm about this.

"Who has our guns?" Tess asks him finally.

Silence.

I take it upon myself to get an answer from him, so I grab him by his stupid pony tail and bring him to my face, "Answer the fucking question, you slimy-"

His response is unexpected, catching all three of us off guard. "I can't. Just gimme a couple more-"

I look over at Tess and Dad, impatient looks painting both of their faces. I give Robert a hard punch to the face and it lands with a loud thud on the concrete floor. My knuckles feel tight after the punch so I shake my hand vigorously to rid of the pain. Dad simply snaps Robert's arm, dislocating the joints in his bones. The crack is loud enough for me to hear, so I do my best not to cringe at the sound.

"AUGH! Fucking.." He lets out a high pitched scream as he curls up into a ball, his right arm flailing around uselessly.

Tess repeats the question more forcefully this time, but the reply he gives us is worse than the one before. "It's the Fireflies. I owed the Fireflies." I run a hand through my hair and shut my eyes, counting to 10 in my head, trying to stay calm and not beat the shit out of him right then and there.

I let out a hysterical laugh and stare at him manically. I wasn't sure of whether to laugh or to cry, so I chose the former instead.

And I feel emptier than I've ever felt before.

Robert continues to ramble, until finally, Tess gets up, aims her gun at his head and says, "That is a stupid idea." Two shots are fired, causing Robert's blood to seep into the ground.

I slump against the wall in disbelief, baffled by what had just happened. "That was a fucking waste, wasn't it?" I ask them in an annoyed tone.

Tess and Dad remain quiet, not sure where to go or what to do next. "Well, now what?" Dad asks Tess.

Tess nods her head in confidence, looking over at both of us as she says, "We'll go get our guns back."

I scoff and reply, "Are you fucking kidding me? How the fuck are we supposed to do that, Tess?"

"I don't know," Tess admits, defeated. "We.. explain it to them. So come on, let's go look for a Firefly."

I sigh loudly and jam a hand in my pocket, reaching for a toothpick to chew on. Silent footsteps approach, causing me to jerk my head up; but what catches my attention is the voice that follows after. "You won't have to look very far," the voice tells us.

Her shadow comes closer, making her figure easier for us to see. Her face is all too familiar; I'd spent enough time with her to know her habits, and she happened to enjoy lurking somewhat.

Marlene in the flesh.

"There we go," Dad announces. "Queen Firefly."


A/N: EEEEEK! DON'T KILL ME!

You guys, I'm really sorry, but I'm super busy with school, so I hope you understand why I won't be updating until further notice. Trust me, I really want to, but I'll probably fail junior year if I get too carried away. I'm can't afford to let that happen to me this year.

I'm really sorry, guys. I hope you understand.

Much love xx 33

-LGGH AKA Atticus