Phobia and Poison knew something was wrong the moment Angel walked back into the house. They may have only been in The Sanctum for a week, but in the desert, a week is a long time. Living full time with another person – sleeping in a room with them, eating with them, struggling to survive alongside them – you got to know them quickly. Angel was close to becoming like a sister to the two girls.
Phobia realised things were not right when she saw Angel's hands.
She'd never learned to read eyes – other people's eyes unnerved her. She'd stare into their eyes wondering why hers weren't the same – why her eyes weren't neutral coloured, why she didn't possess soft round pupils. Eventually she found herself forced to look away.
When she was first found, it was worse – she truly lived up to her name then, not even daring to look into others' faces, afraid of their unfamiliar features. She would stare at their hands and feet. After a while of identifying people solely by their hands, she'd learned to read hands very well. She still had trouble with faces, but all she needed to recognise a person was their hands. Masks did not fool her, and neither did trained liars – unlike faces, hands did not lie.
Today, Angel's hands were different. Harder. The tendons were raised – Angel was tense. And there were new marks – scuffs and scrapes that did not match Angel's usual activities. These weren't made by lifting and manual labour, no rock or sand or wood had made these marks. The marks spoke violence to her. Phobia felt the downy fur on the back of her neck and shoulders rising.
To her horror, she also realised that Angel's spear was gone. Angel couldn't have left it outside, she never did that for fear of it being stolen. Where had her spear gone?
Something had happened. Something violent.
Angel walked in with a wry smile. "How did it go with Midas?" she asked. Midas had picked up the two girls to help with work on the construction of a new dwelling for refugees, leaving Angel to go out to gather materials.
"Really well," Poison replied. Phobia knew that she hadn't yet noticed anything wrong. "We finished ahead of schedule, Midas was pretty happy. Now we just need to add the outer covering and it'll be finished. The architect... what was his name?"
"Lemon Mentos, I think," Phobia said.
"That's right," Poison continued. "Lemon Mentos. Well, he's experimenting with a new camouflage material to cover the outer walls. Apparently it's a new technology developed by BL/ind for overnight Drac expeditions." She grinned. "He certainly didn't say how he got ahold of it!"
"Probably the Battery Buccaneers," Harmony called from the kitchen. "You girls know them?"
Phobia and Poison shook their heads.
"They're a pirate gang," Harmony explained. "Like, literal pirates. Except there's no ocean, hah. But anyway, they specialise in hijacking BL/ind cargo transport vehicles and stealing the goods. They're also experts at reselling BL/ind goods into the desert illegally. They have undercover agents in most of the businesses in Battery City and even some of the other settlements – they're pretty powerful. That's how we get so many BL/ind developed goods brought out here, as well as gas and fuel. They even have a special code to communicate based on pirate terminology to avoid getting caught."
"Huh," Poison said. "That explains a lot."
Harmony laughed. "You didn't think all our stuff just appeared out of nowhere, did you? Everything has to come from something. That's just the natural way. Not that I condone the BB's methods – I'd hate to see their karma debt. But considering how much they've helped us out here live more comfortably, I guess that karma's paid back somewhat."
She walked out of the kitchen, letting out an "Oof!" as she plonked onto the couch. "I hate to say it, but it's illegal pirate gangs like the BB gang that keep our lives out here viable," she said. "There's a real business in pirating, and we depend on that business. Otherwise, bye-bye small comforts like genetically-modified desert fruit, meat and milk. Even gas. How else do you think those gang idiots power their fancy cars?" She winked at the girls.
Angel let out an irritated sigh. "Maybe it would be better if there was no gas, so they wouldn't be driving those dumb cars and pissing off Dracs," she snapped. She disappeared through the door to her room. "I'm going to bed."
Phobia looked at Poison. Poison had noticed now, she knew. Perhaps Harmony as well.
Something was definitely wrong.
Later, just after dark, Poison and Phobia decided to confront Angel. They knew she was hiding something, and they couldn't afford to allow something to go unsaid between the trio.
"Angel should know better than to hide something from us," Poison reasoned. "I mean, we have to have trust, right? All three of us. That's how we're all going to survive out here – trust. But we can't trust her if she's not going to tell us things – and it shows that she doesn't trust us."
Phobia shook her head. "I don't like this," she said. "Whatever's wrong, it must be big if she won't tell us. I mean, she wouldn't hide something from us usually. Whatever this is, it's pretty bad."
"Then it's all the more reason for her to tell us!" Poison pressed. "We can't let fear get in the way, Phobia. Remember?"
"I know," Phobia said miserably. "Bravery isn't having no fear, it's doing what's right despite being afraid."
"Good girl," Poison said gently. "Now, come on. We need to find out what's wrong."
They went through to Angel's room – their room. Poison pushed through the hanging bead-string barricade gently. "Hey, Angel," she said with a smile. Phobia felt ill inside. What if Angel snapped at them? Or got angry at them? They couldn't afford to have fights out here.
Angel looked up, her eyes dark. "I said I went to bed," she said coldly. Angel was never cold.
Poison's eyes were hard. "I know," she said. "But we knew you weren't sleeping."
"Yeah, how?"
"Because we know you," Poison said. "You don't go to bed before midnight, like most people here. And you don't get up before mid-afternoon. You couldn't be tired when it's just evening."
"Maybe I worked hard today," Angel retorted. Poison smirked. "Doing what?" she asked. "C'mon, Angel, Midas let you off easy today. He got you to go foraging because it's an easy task."
"Yeah well, whatever. I still want to sleep." Angel rolled over, refusing to face them.
Phobia couldn't stand it anymore. She was still scared, but she had to say it. She grabbed Angel's hand.
"Angel, these marks aren't from foraging!" she blurted out. "Look at yourself, something's wrong! You come home late with these cuts and bruises. They're not from wood or rock or sand, they're from bone. You didn't have you spear. You never go anywhere without your spear. Where is it, Angel? Where did you leave your spear?"
Angel ripped her hand away from Phobia, eyes ablaze. "I didn't leave it anywhere!" she hissed. "Will you two just cut the goddamn crap? Nothing happened today! Absolutely nothing! I went out, grabbed some firewood, whatever! Now piss off!"
Poison's eyes narrowed. Phobia watched the girl's fists clench. "If nothing happened, you wouldn't be acting like this! Want to explain why you've been in such a shitty mood since you came back?"
"Maybe because you two won't leave me alone!" Angel yelled. "I've been stuck with you two since you came, maybe I wanted some private time! ALONE! Without you two breathing down my neck the whole damn time! Maybe if you two weren't here,, I wouldn't be in such a shitty mood!"
Poison recoiled. Phobia felt herself shrink back in surprise. A horrible feeling settled in her stomach. Angel sounded like.. like she regretted taking them home.
Phobia saw that Poison's knuckles were white, her hands were trembling ever so slightly. She knew that meant that Poison was angry, unthinkably angry. Poison was scary when she was angry.
"Well, fine," Poison snapped. Her voice cut the thick air like a wire thread. "But just remember, you chose us. So next time you decide to rave about how you never get any privacy, just remember who it was who said we were coming home with you. This one's your own damn fault."
Poison stood up and marched out of the room. Phobia followed. She glanced quickly over her shoulder at Angel. In the fading light, it seemed like Angel was deflated. Smaller somehow.
She followed Poison, who stomped out of the hut and into the street. Then Poison plonked down by the gutter and started to sob. Phobia sat next to her, unsure of what to do. She didn't know what to do when people were crying yet.
She'd learned most social cues now, like the appropriate response when someone tells you their mother died, and why you shouldn't say certain things in certain situations. She'd worked it out pretty well now. But even to this day, she still had no idea how to comfort someone who was crying. All she could do was sit nearby awkwardly.
She tentatively put her arm around Poison's shoulders. To her great relief, Poison did not pull away – she turned and buried her face into Phobia's chest, still crying.
Phobia was still confused, though. Why would Angel say something like that? Why would she hurt them? Why would she take them home if she didn't want them?
Phobia wasn't that great at reading social cues, but she was pretty sure that Angel's behaviour had been pretty odd. She'd seemed ecstatic to have them the whole time, grateful to have the girls as friends. Right up until that afternoon, when they'd driven away to the construction site with Midas, Angel was waving and grinning as they left. Even then, Phobia had sensed nothing wrong. And even if her interpretation of social indicators were inaccurate, she knew Poison's weren't, and Poison hadn't sensed anything either.
In fact, Angel hadn't been this moody the whole time they'd known her.
Maybe she's on her period? Phobia thought hopefully. Luckily her biology seemed to be constructed so that she didn't seem to have a monthly cycle – she'd never had one as far as she could remember. However, she'd seen the way Poison and the other girls and women on the ranch had been like when they were on their period. It was a nightmare – they would go crazy. Poison was prone to fits of depression. There was one woman who would violently lash out at anyone who she felt had insulted her in some way (which was usually trivial anyway). Other girls would cycle through moods of happiness, depression, and violent anger. The worst was when all the women had co-ordinated their periods from being in close vicinity with each other all the time. Phobia and all the men in the ranch had to ready themselves to run for cover when it came for the time of each monthly onslaught of chaos.
Perhaps Angel is the same, Phobia contemplated. She hoped that was the case – that all this grief was just because Angel was a moody bitch during her period.
Although, wouldn't Angel have warned them if that was the case? That's what the women in the ranch did, to avoid conflicts resulting over trivial misunderstandings. You couldn't take a woman's insults personally if she was on her period, and so long as you were aware of when a woman was on her period, it was usually okay. So why hadn't Angel done that? It would have been nice to give them some warning, so they could give her space and let her be as moody as she liked.
Phobia looked up. The night had well and truly taken over the settlement. The darkness became clearer as her pupils widened to take in more light; her cat-like pupils were another advantage to her modified form.
As such, details that would have escaped a normal human were not missed by her. She sensed movement in a shadow by Carol and Lewis's house.
"Hey Alice, Dinah," she called with a smile. She liked the girls, young as they were – Alice was seven, Dinah was five. She wasn't sure why, but she got on well with the Coloured kids, and they seemed to gravitate towards her. Whenever she was in the street, it seemed the Coloured kids would magically appear to cling to her knees. She never imagined she'd be good with kids, but they were besotted with her. She knew it was probably only because she was closest thing they had to an adult of their kind.
The girls left the shadows tentatively. "You always see us, Phobia," Alice complained. Phobia giggled. "Of course I do, I can see in the dark like you, you know. What are you doing out here? Shouldn't you be inside?"
Dinah shook her head. "Mom and Dad are cleaning," she said. "They wanted us out of the house while they were dusting out the basement." Her eyes flicked toward Poison. "We wanted to stay in, but we came out 'cause we heard crying."
Alice reappeared beside Phobia, staring curiously at Poison. "Why are you crying?" she asked.
Poison lifted her head from Phobia's shoulder. She wiped her face clumsily. "Nothing, girls, it's okay," she said with a shaky laugh. "I just got a little upset."
"Did you fall over?" Dinah asked, eyes wide. "I fell over yesterday, it hurt." She offered her arm, showing a scabbed-over scrape on her elbow. "I cried."
"'Cause you're a big baby," Alice said, shoving her little sister.
"Am not!" Dinah yelled, soft mauve eyes shiny. Her bottom lip began to quiver and she ducked her head, letting a curtain of dark purple hair fall over her face.
"Am so," Alice taunted, fiery orange eyes ablaze. Her hair was purple too, but shot through with streaks of orange.
"Hey now girls, settle down," Phobia said sternly. The two girls immediately fell silent, obeying Phobia absolutely.
Poison smiled. "Maybe you two should go see what the Barista kids are doing?" she suggested, referring to the Barista family down the street. The girls looked at Phobia, who nodded in agreement. With her permission, they skittered off down the street, arguing again.
"You really have them under your spell, you know," Poison murmured. She'd stopped crying. Phobia shrugged. "They just like me because I'm the same as them," she said. "I look like them."
Poison shook her head. "I think it's a bit more than that," she said quietly. "They hang off your every word. They'd do anything for you. It's like you're in control of them or something."
Phobia shuddered. For some reason, the idea of controlling someone mindlessly disturbed her. She had an image of herself as some kind of tyrant, dominating a horde of minion Coloured kids, a pack of zombies. She didn't like it.
"It's not like that," she protested. "I'm not – I don't control them!"
"If you say so, but whatever it is you do to them, it's creepy."
"But I –!"
"Hey."
Poison and Phobia looked behind them. To Phobia's surprise it was Angel, silhouetted by the light from the hut. Even in the dark, she could see the tear stains on the girl's cheeks.
She looked awful.
"I don't know if saying sorry is going to help," she said timidly. Her eyes were downcast, unwilling to meet those of the two girls.
"I didn't mean what I said," Angel continued. "I was saying those things because... I... I don't know."
She hugged herself. "I really have no excuse for what I said," she admitted. "I was out of line. I don't blame you if you really want to leave now, what I said wasn't forgivable."
Poison stood up and walked over, putting her hand on Angel's shoulder. "Don't be dumb," she said. "This isn't high school. This is the desert. We can't walk out on each other just over a petty argument, that'd be stupid."
Phobia stood up as well. "It's okay," she agreed. "Just give us some warning next month."
Angel stared at her in confusion. "Next month?" she exclaimed surprisedly. Her eyes widened, and she doubled over laughing.
"Angel?" Phobia asked, confused. She'd thought she was being insightful for once, guessing that Angel was just on her period. Damn.
"I'm fine, I'm fine," Angel said, still giggling. "I guess I deserved that. I was acting like a crabby bitch. But no, Phobia, that's not why I was being horrible to you two."
She looked melancholy again. "I'd be happy if that really was just the problem," she said sadly. "I wish it was."
Phobia looked at Poison, confused. Was she missing something? Poison shrugged. She hadn't got it either; obviously Phobia wasn't ten minutes behind again.
"Look, come inside and I'll tell you," Angel said. "I can't tell you out here."
The two girls followed Angel back into the house and into their room. Harmony and Midas were nowhere to be seen; probably in the basement asleep. Harmony had had to go to bed earlier and earlier recently.
Angel sat on the mattresses, the two girls following suit.
She looked visibly uncomfortable, not looking at them. Phobia saw that she was gripping her hands tightly, restlessly rubbing her knuckles and squeezing her thumbs. Angel was very nervous. She was going to tell them something pretty serious.
"The reason I was being so crabby and I didn't have my spear and my hands have weird cuts on them," she blurted out, "is because I helped a Drac."
The two girls blinked.
"I almost got caught!" Angel exclaimed. Poison motioned at her to keep her voice down.
"I was out near the plateau," she said, lowering her voice. "I'd gone out there because I saw some fallen trees that I thought would be really useful – Midas would love them for the new huts, they'd be great building material. But while I was out there, a Drac squadron came around patrolling. I was in a bad place; all I could do was hide behind a boulder. Oh god, I was so scared."
Angel's eyes were big and shiny. She rubbed her hands together harder.
"I was so afraid they'd find me and kill me," she whimpered. "And one of them saw me. I thought I was going to piss myself, I was terrified. I thought I was dead when he told his squad leader. Lucky for me the dude was an asshole – he didn't take the Drac seriously. He made the Drac check it out, though. I had to take him hostage. I didn't want to, I just wanted to run and hide, but I knew that if they caught me they'd kill me. Attacking the guy caused enough confusion for me to drag him off and hide."
Poison looked livid. "Do you have any idea how stupid that was?" she exclaimed. "Attacking a Drac? You'd have been better off making a break for it!"
"I wasn't thinking straight!" Angel retorted. "I was fucking terrified, who the hell thinks logically when they're about to be killed by a bunch of Dracs?"
Phobia flapped her hands, motioning for the two girls to simmer down. Angel lowered her voice again.
"So I took him hostage and hid in a cave. The Dracs got confused enough that they didn't see where we went. In the end they drove off. God, I was so lucky they didn't find us."
"So what did you do with the Drac?"
"I knocked him out. I didn't know what he was capable of, he could have been one of the really nasty Dracs, the shoot-first-ask-later ones. Then I tied him up and checked his stuff. I found his ID – it turned out he was only a rookie. I was really, really lucky – he was totally incompetent!"
"What did you do when he woke up?"
"I made sure he didn't think I was a pushover. I had to be a bitch. I didn't want to be, but I had to – I couldn't let him think I was afraid or weak in case he tried to exploit any weaknesses. It was really hard, I was so scared, but I think I convinced him. Anyway, he didn't seem to want to harm me, so I guess there wasn't any point in keeping him there. I didn't want to kill him, so I told him to just go home. He didn't like that – apparently Battery City was too far away to walk. So I told him to camp out for the night."
"So he's out here, on the plateau right now?" Poison asked, sounding horrified.
"He doesn't know where The Sanctum is," Angel said. "I made sure of that. But yeah, he's on the plateau. In a cave probably."
"And your spear?"
Angel looked miserable. "I gave it to him," she lamented. "He said he needed a weapon – I threw away his ray gun so he had no protection. I made him promise to stay until I could come back tomorrow to pick it up."
She angrily wiped away tears. "I'll probably never see my spear again. I don't know why I thought it was a good idea to give it to him, I must have still been loopy from the attack. Oh god, what am I going to do?"
She began to cry. Poison reached over to hug Angel. Awkwardly, Phobia followed suit, so the three girls were knotted in a group hug around Angel.
"I just feel so stupid," Angel sobbed. "What if he works out where we are? What if he brings his squad to kill us? What if he doesn't give me back my spear?"
Secretly, Phobia felt relieved. Angel had opened up to them. She'd trusted them. More importantly, she'd trusted them with some pretty bad news. She understood now why Angel hadn't wanted to talk to them before – running into Dracs was really bad. Especially if there was now a risk of them discovering The Sanctum. And what if Angel was reported for attacking a Drac? What if she was added to the Wanted list? She was just a girl, a teenager. She wasn't a hardened criminal. Phobia knew what happened to Wanted people – they were treated like terrorists, captured as if they were dangerous animals and thrown into prisons with other criminals. A horrible dungeon with hardened killers and bandits. Angel wasn't one of them. She'd never survive in one of those prisons. But would BL/ind take any notice? Or would they treat her like any other bandit, throwing her into a prison to be eaten alive by the other inmates? It didn't bear thinking about.
If word got out in The Sanctum, there would be uproar. Angel would probably be accosted by the gang leaders and persecuted for risking the safety of the small haven in the valley. Keeping the community secret was of utmost importance, and risking that secret was a serious offence. Anyone who accidentally slipped up would not be let off easily. Angel wouldn't be any better off in the clutches of the gang leaders than if she was thrown in a BL/ind prison.
Yet she'd told them. She'd trusted them. And the fact that she'd trusted Poison and Phobia with this awful secret made Phobia feel a lot better. Angel did trust them after all – she wasn't sick of them, she was just afraid for all of their safety. Despite their now dire situation, Phobia took comfort in the fact that the three girls were still friends.
"I j-just wish I hadn't gone to get the b-bloody trees," Angel blubbed, face red, eyes puffy and cheeks wet. She rubbed at her eyes shakily. "Sh-should have stayed... should h-have stuck to the v-valley... I fucked up..."
Phobia was in a sticky situation again. Should she hug Angel? She looked helplessly at Poison.
Poison smiled wryly at her, before taking Angel's shoulders and pulling her into a hug, resting Angel's head on her shoulder. Angel bawled into Poison's shirt.
Phobia found herself fascinated by Angel's crying. She hadn't seen that many people cry before – two people in one day was a jackpot for her. People were so interesting when they cried.
Crying people should be so ugly, she mused. But there's something about them... that takes away that ugliness.
Was it the instinct to try to comfort whoever it was that was crying? You didn't want to hug ugly things. Maybe that instinct took away the ugliness, so you could actually comfort them without being disgusted. Because really, crying people were ugly. In Phobia's opinion Angel was usually fairly pretty, but right now she was a mess – her hair was everywhere, her face was red and blotchy, and everything was wet and gooey. Not only was it coming from her eyes, it was coming from her mouth and nose – Angel was leaking all over Poison's shirt.
Yet Poison wasn't grimacing in disgust or pulling away. She was hugging Angel closer, murmuring reassuring words. Her face was a picture of sympathy and concern.
As much as Phobia also felt concern and sympathy for her friend, she was also fascinated.
Does that make me a bad person? she mused. I'm so.. detached.
This revelation shocked her. It settled, a heavy weight on her chest.
I can't even comfort my friends properly.
Poison looked up at her and gave her a reassuring smile. She'd read her like a book, Phobia already knew that. It was the main reason they'd become inseparable – despite Phobia's inability to engage properly with other people, Poison countered this with her extraordinary ability to empathise and understand. Poison was a true people person.
"Phobes, do you wanna grab some water for Angel?" Poison said softly. Phobia nodded and jumped up, whispering a silent thank you to Poison as she left the room for giving her something to do – some way to help rather than sitting by uselessly.
She went into the kitchen, locating the cooler chest quickly despite the darkness. She flipped up the lid, rummaging among the many bottles and containers of water to find a small bottle. Midas was able to access substantial amounts of water thanks to his ties with Black Jack, so they were never short on drinking water.
She found the bottle she wanted – a little drink bottle usually used for short travelling trips – and went back to the bedroom, pushing through the strings of beads.
By now, Angel was no longer blubbering into Poison's shirt. She'd calmed down somewhat and was now just resting in Poison's arms, staring into space and hiccuping occasionally.
"Here, Angel," Phobia said, holding out the bottle of water. Angel smiled bleakly and took it, taking great gulps from the bottle. When she was done Poison took it from her, tipping small amounts of the remaining water into her hands and wiping Angel's face with it, rinsing away the tear tracks.
"Thanks guys," Angel mumbled when Poison was done.
"Don't worry about it," Poison said. "You're our friend, remember? We gotta stick together, even when you fuck up like an idiot."
Angel snickered, smirking bitterly. "Maybe the radiation's killed my brain already."
"Oh, don't talk like that," Phobia said, ruffling Angel's hair. "You're not brain-dead. You just fucked up a little."
"A little? Were you even listening?"
"Of course I was." Phobia shrugged. "And relatively speaking, I don't think it's so bad."
Poison and Angel both stared at Phobia. "Um. Please explain," Poison said. "Your logic eludes me."
"Well, c'mon!" Phobia said. "He's just a rookie Drac, for a start. You yourself said he's incompetent. If he really is stuck out in the desert with no experience of staying here, then he's not going to risk his only chance of escaping – you. He's not gonna piss you off, or you won't help him. And as far as he's aware, he needs that help if he's going to survive, right?"
Poison raised an eyebrow. "I suppose," she said. "But still.. it's not a great situation."
"It's better than if you'd dealt with a proper Drac," Phobia said. "A real experienced Drac – or even just one of those really evil ones – would have just tried to kill you, whether you tied him up or not, right?"
"Right," Angel said, sniffing.
"Right. But this guy didn't touch you – he asked you to help him. Any Drac out to hurt you wouldn't have done that."
"But what about tomorrow?"
"Don't worry about it," Phobia said confidently. "Me and Poise will go with you. We'll hide while you deal with the guy, and if there's any sign of a scuffle we'll be right there."
"Cool, but what about The Sanctum?"
"He has no way of finding out! You said he didn't follow you, or see what direction you went in. You also said the Dracs were already checking out the area. We can't do anything about that – that wasn't your fault. If anything, the best thing we can do is warn the gang leaders that the Dracs are getting too nosy. They can sort it out."
Angel nodded. She looked much calmer now, less afraid. "I guess," she said. "Thanks, Phobia."
"No problem." Phobia grinned. "We just gotta get up early, hah!"
Poison groaned. "And it's already so late," she complained. "As soon as we're done with this, I vote we go straight back to bed!"
"That's if Midas doesn't catch us and dump errands on us," Angel sighed. "Life has gotten so complicated lately."
"Just think, after tomorrow this will all be over," Poison said soothingly. "For now.. I guess all we can do is get whatever sleep we can. We'll need it."
With that, the girls settled down. Poison blew out the candles, Phobia pulled off her jeans, and the three girls snuggled up together on the mattresses. Within moments they were asleep.
The first rays of dawn pouring into the room was woke Poison up. Her eyelids fluttered, irritated at the light. She wasn't yet used to sleeping through sunlight...
Sunlight. Shit. Morning. Shiiiit.
She sat straight up, jolting out of the bed swearing. She shook Phobia and Angel awake. "Guys guys guys!" she exclaimed. "Wake UP!"
The two girls looked blearily at her for a moment, before snapping into action.
"Fuck!" Angel hissed. "What time is it?"
Poison glanced at the clock. "Four thirty," she said. "Thank god it's summer."
"Still, we gotta get going if we want to get my spear back," Angel said, hopping around the room as she pulled her boots on. "Damn, damn, damn. I wish I had an alarm."
Phobia was still yawning. "You and your stupid Drac boyfriend," she mumbled dreamily, eyes half-closed.
"He's not my boyfriend!"
"Why are you so anxious to see him then?" Phobia clearly wasn't fully all there yet.
"To get my spear back, you doofus!" Angel said, rapping her fist on Phobia's skull. "Wake up already!"
Once they were ready, the three girls tiptoed through the house and out the door. Fortunately Harmony and Midas were still asleep. Midas didn't need to get up until the afternoon, when most Sanctum residents roused themselves, and Harmony would sleep through anything.
The journey to the ridge took less than an hour, such was the haste of the three girls, particularly Angel. She was frantic to know if her spear had survived the night. A growing, gnawing knot took hold in her stomach. What would she find when they got to the ridge? Would the Drac boy have run off with it? Did he break it? Would he even still be alive? A horrible image took hold in her mind – the boy, starkly dead, body riddled with laser burns. Belongings looted. Her spear, snapped broken. Angel forced the image to the back of mind, not wanting to think of the worst.
Eventually they got to the plateau, just as the sun was beginning to rise up over the horizon. It was a wonderful sight, but Angel couldn't dwell on it. She ran straight to the boulder where she told the Drac to meet her. He wasn't there.
Her first instinct was to panic – he'd run off with it, he'd been killed, it was broken, it was gone. She gulped for air, trying to stay calm.
"Hey, Angel!" Phobia pointed to the ground. Angel stared in disbelief at a line of neon spray paint. The mark just screamed 'come and get me, I'm right here', it was so vivid. Only an idiot would create such an obnoxiously obvious mark. Or a rookie Drac, Angel mused.
"You guys wait here and hide," she said. Poison nodded and pulled Phobia behind the boulder.
Angel followed the line, which lead all the way to the mouth of a cave. Shit, she thought, he really has no idea. She was stunned at his stupidity. Anyone could have followed the mark to the cave and found him, and he would have been easy pickings. Maybe he really was dead. Hopefully her spear had been left alone. She fervently hoped so.
She parted the curtain of roots, entering the cave. She saw the fire first. Why am I even surprised? she thought. Stupid idiot must have a fucking death wish.
She looked around. There he was, snuggled up in a sleeping bag, dead to the world, perfectly alive. She bet he'd taken sleeping pills too. It was a miracle he'd survived.
"Hey, wake up... yo, wake up!" she called. It took him a moment. He was worse than Phobia, thrashing around in a desperate fight to stay asleep.
"I'm over here, Drac." He looked in her direction, blinking stupidly.
"Uh?"
Guess it's time for the bitch act, Angel decided, crouching beside him. She glared at him, arms crossed. "I'm here to pick up my spear," she snapped.
The Drac looked around blearily, as if unsure of where he was. Various expressions of shock, confusion, and bemusement crossed his face. She could practically see the cogs turning. Despite herself, she grinned. "You're a slow one in the mornings, aren't you?" she asked dryly.
The Drac blinked and shook his head. "Uh – spear. Um, over there."
Angel nodded and stood up, picking up the spear off the wall. "Good to see you didn't need it," she said. "In fact, you're damn lucky you didn't need it."
"What do you mean?"
"Do you have any idea how obvious this cave is?" she asked. The Drac frowned. "I thought it looked pretty hidden," he protested.
Angel shook her head. "If any bandits came by here, they'd have known immediately that someone was in here," she said sternly. "If the smell of smoke or the bright neon spray paint didn't tip them off, the fact that you used a pretty common cave for squatting would have. Don't they teach you how to survive out here in that fancy city?"
"We ran over the basics," the Drac growled defensively. "Basically, the idea is to not get stuck out here."
"Well, you did a mighty fine job of screwing that one up. You're lucky you're still alive."
She hefted the spear and walked towards the entrance of the cave. "Thanks, and good luck getting back to the city," she said. "You'd better start walking if you want to get there before dark."
"Wait!" the Drac said. Angel stopped. What on earth would he want?
"Um," the Drac said, still looking half-asleep. "I didn't catch your name."
Angel snorted. He really was an idiot. "That's 'cause I didn't give it to you," she snapped. "Remember? I'm not going to hand my identity over to a Drac."
"It's not as if you showed me where you live," he insisted. "And I didn't exactly get to grab a picture of you. So I can't report you or put you on the wanted list. Besides, apart from threatening a BL/ind agent, you haven't even committed any crimes we can publicly condemn you for. So you're pretty safe."
Angel didn't believe him. She didn't trust him.
"If it helps, my name's Stuart," he offered.
Angel nearly laughed. He really was stupid. "You're an idiot," she said. "You seriously have got to be the worst Drac I've ever heard of. Giving out your name like that, no wonder I was able to catch you so easily."
She smiled properly. "Just for that, I'm telling you my name, you're too incompetent to figure my identity out anyway even if you tried."
She parted the curtain of roots. Just as she stepped out, she called back, "Angel. My name's Angel."
"Wait!" Stuart called, but she was gone, sprinting as fast as she could from the cave. She streaked past the boulder, hissing "Phobia, Poison, come on!" She didn't stop to look, hearing the crunch of boots on gravel as they hurried after her.
She didn't stop running for a while. Even after Phobia and Poison called for her to stop, she kept going, fear and adrenaline spurring her on. It wasn't until she was about to vomit that she stopped, dry retching at the dusty rock beneath her.
Her body felt like lead. She sank to the ground, clunking ungracefully to the rocks. Her hip hit a stray rock and it hurt, but she couldn't – didn't want to move. She didn't want to breathe or think. She just wanted to lie here until it all went away.
"Angel... Angel!"
The voices, though faint, grew slowly louder. Angel realised it was Poison and Phobia. They'd fallen behind, she realised.
Eventually they caught up to her. Poison sat down beside her. "What happened in there?" she asked?
"He asked my name," Angel said.
The girls were quiet for a moment. Then Phobia asked, "Did you give it to him?"
Angel nodded. The girls were quiet while this bit of information settled on them.
"Why?" Phobia asked.
"He's stupid," Angel said. "So, so stupid. He picked the most obvious cave, he marked it out with goddamn spray paint, he had a fire going, he even took sleeping pills. He wasn't on guard when he woke up, even before he saw it was just me. He just sat there like a vegetable. He told me his name. Stuart. I almost felt bad, it's a miracle he lasted as long as he did. So I told him my name. It's not like he's going to be able to hunt me down. He's too stupid even for that."
She felt herself laughing. "He's like a baby, he really is. I don't know how he became a Drac, I thought Dracs were meant to be smart. Scary. Evil. But he's far from it... he's innocent. A baby. That's all he is. I don't know if he'll even make it back to BC."
Tears began to roll down her cheeks.
"He'll probably die."
By the time the girls got home, it was mid-afternoon. The Sanctum was in the full swing of business – the girls had to dodge carts, bikes and motorcycles as they made their way through the business district. Children played in the streets as they left the business end for the suburbs, the younger Coloured kids stopping to stare at Phobia. They slowed down as children swarmed Phobia, touching her hair and skin and asking questions.
"Hey, Harmony!" Angel called as they entered the house. Phobia instantly realised something was wrong. She could smell the iron stench of fear and blood, and even before they entered the house she'd been able to hear whooping gasps and stern talking, but it hadn't clicked until the smell hit her nose.
"Angel," she said urgently, but it was too late.
Harmony was in the living room with Donorcycle and Kitty. But this wasn't just a birthing exercise.
"Harmony?" Angel asked, her voice high and tense.
"H-hey, sweetheart," Harmony said between gasps.
"I guess the bunny decided to stretch its legs."