Chapter Eleven

Robert remembered the flashing lights and the little girl as she stood in front of that car. It was raining relentlessly, and he remembered his mum wanted him to go buy her something from the chemists. He couldn't recall exactly what it was, only that she needed it, and being the ever-helpful son,he wandered out onto the drowning streets to go get it for her. Water sloshed through his ears and blurried his vision, but even with eyes closed, he knew his way to the centre of the city.

The streets were busy, traffic blaring through pedestrain crossings and red lights. People were walking past him, as he dug his hands into his pockets and kept his face down. It was only when he reached the fifth corner on the journey to the chemists that he heard the boom of panicked horns. He jumped and looked up ahead to see a girl with black hair and carmel skin standing right in the centre of the road, her hands splayed up in front of her, her mouth opened in a silent scream.

There was a moment, a clear second, when he saw her body flash before his, her small frame crash through the bumper of the car, before she rolled up onto the windscreen and crumble onto the roof of the car. She would roll faster and faster, before she would fly through the air and fall, crumpled, onto the ground.

It wasn't nice. Blood would fly everywhere from the millions of cuts she would gain, and the blood would mix with the clear liquid of the water that still fell from the sky.

He didn't think, because he knew thinking wouldn't save her. He just jumped and pushed her out of the line of traffic, before he collapsed onto the ground and felt the sickening crunch of his head smacking gravel and the searing, unsweltering heat that rose from all across his body.

He remembered there not being one car, but two, and he remembered hearing crashes, sounds that he didn't normally hear on his usual walk into the city. He remembered the sound of an animal, keening and screaming into the skies above, pulling himself forward before being rocketed back. Like flowers, pain and agony bloomed through his body in places he didn't recall being anywhere near the car that ran over him. He didn't know. Maybe there was another car. He couldn't tell. He was so confused. And it hurt so much.

"Sophie!" someone screeched at the top of their lungs. "Sophie!"

Was that her name? He didn't know. He didn't want to know. He just wanted the pain to stop. To end. To finish. He breathed, but the air wasn't going to his lungs. He choked on water and thought he was drowning. He tried to open his eyes but they were like sand and refused to stay open. He saw stars, blinding lights, flashes of white.

He thought he may have seen God.

But somewhere, somewhere quiet, he thought he also heard a silent, "Thank you."

He thought he breathed his last.

Until he opened his eyes and saw a classroom full of students with the sudden thought that this was MSA. He was dizzy, disorientated and scared. No one could see him, and no-one could hear him. He fell down onto the floor and closed his eyes.

Robert opened his eyes and heard her voice as he dreamt. He was drifting through space, and the voices that came and went sounded an awful lot like the guys from the MSA crew. He wanted to reach out and see if Camille was among them, but he was too sleepy and he just wanted to continue dreaming. He felt he'd finally found out who he was, and he was finally at peace for it.

He was happy, content now, and he didn't have to worry over her anymore. His friends, the ones he'd never met in person, would keep her safe. They'd make sure she was happy.

Until he heard her crying.

Until he heard her speak in the deafening silence of the halls of MSA.

Until he heard her say "I love you."

He listened to her, and fought against the bonds that caged him. How desparately he wanted to see her again. How badly he wished to cease her crying and tell her he was okay, that he was happy, that he was finally free.

"I would've liked to have touched you, you know. I would've loved to have felt your heartbeat, right under my hand... Goodnight, Robert Alexander. Sweet dreams."

His name. Robert Alexander. She knew who he was. He started and fought again, unwrapping the tight coils around his body, enclosing his mind. No! he thought against them. No! Camille! He stabbed at anything that came too close for comfort and twisted against anything black that made him blind. He didn't want this. He wanted her. He wanted all of her.

He grunted and kicked.

He pushed and shoved.

He sweated and screamed.

"Goodnight, Robert Alexander. Sweet dreams"

No!

He turned against it all.

Dammnit!

He didn't care if he never breathed again. He didn't care if he had to spend his entire afterlife in that school. He didn't care if he was only here because he was on life support in some far off hospital he didn't know where.

He wanted her.

He wanted to sit beisde her and make up silly dances with her, and joke with her and call her nick-names. He wanted to feel her hand under his and smile with her whenever she done something funny or cute.

He wanted her.

He wanted to protect her and shleter her. He wanted to show her his own dance moves and cheer for her all the way from MSA while she battled in the Streets.

He wanted to be her friend.

"I love you, Robert."

He gritted his teeth and opened his eyes to the sounds of rushing nurses and a frantic doctor. He opened his eyes to the surprise of finding no heart monitor working and a whole rush of pain up his spine. He opened his eyes to the needles that snaked through his body, and duvets around his bed hiding all the bandages and drips that seemed to envelop the bed in white.

But most of all, he opened his eyes with the knowledge that she was waiting for him out there.

A/N::Heh! I wonder what happens next? Will Camille and Moose be reunited? Will a challenge face them? Will there be a happily ever after? X*

xxx