Teen Ink
teenink
TeenInk I posted a new photo to Facebook http://t.co/Y2aXGHv5cc
Tue May 21, 2013 9:08am Reply Retweet Favorite
TeenInk "I'm a firm believer in Karma." - Emma Watson in Sofia Coppola's The Bling Ring featured at Cannes Film Festival... http://t.co/AtwVoR8xyT
Wed May 15, 2013 1:13pm Reply Retweet Favorite
TeenInk "If I fall asleep with a pen in my hand, don't remove it — I might be writing in my dreams." http://t.co/0FUP7fyJcB
Jason raised his eyebrow as Sabien jogged off. "Touchy subject, I presume," he mumbled to himself. "I'll take note of that." He continued on at a slower pace, not bothering to try and catch up with the other guy. He didn't feel like running around like crazy today. It was just to kill time, anyway.
Sabien kept moving and turning down a rather long street he stopped. He thought he was something, or someone crumpled on the sidewalk, he walked slowly over and looked at teh crumpled object. No it wans't an object, it was a girl, a thin, sickly looking girl, but a girl all the same, he wans't sure of her age, she was too scrawny for him to tell. She looked like she'd passed out. Sabien squatted down near her and looked at her, wondering what to do.
Zak had gone back to the window to look out, this time she was at the side of the window and teh curtain was just pushed back a little for her to see, but not enough for herself to be seen. She Xanthe lying on the side walk and a large, muscular young man squatting near her. The man was scarred up and looked dangerous, Zak wasn't sure what he was doing or going to do Xanthe, she hoped he didn't hurt the older girl though, at leats not when she was unconcious and couldn't fight back.
Xanthe was paler than usual with the blood pooling around where she was hit. It made her tattoos stand out drastically, especially her barcode. Needless to say, she was oblivious to the man crouching over her and the other still back rounding the first corner. Her breathing was incredibly shallow, it almost seemed as if she would die. But she wouldn't. She never did. The mutated genes that made her weak were also responsible for attacking the hemophilic blood. It was starting to clot, meaning she wouldn't bleed entirely to death. But she'd be in too weak to do anything for a while. That's for sure. The bloody bruise forming on her stomach pained her enough that she moaned slightly, her face showing the pain.
Sabien frowned at teh girl, she looedk like she'd been hit or something. That ha dto mean there was at least one other person beside this girl, Jason, and him in this 'abandoned' ghost town. Or somethingthing, but probably a person. He looekd over at Jason, to see if he'd come to the same conclusion. Sabien stood up, he wasn't a medic and he saw this person's 'barcode', she was an asylum patient, from his country. Sabien didn't know hwo to help her, plus he didn't want to help her and than have her recognizing him, that would be dangerous.
Jason crouched down by the girl after Sabien stood. He examined her quickly and proceeded to scan his surroundings. He glanced at Sabien. “That window—ground floor. She just came out of it—you can see the dust on her clothes and the clean spot on the sill. Whatever attacked her is probably in there.” He started looking for wounds on the girl, so he could figure out if he had the training to help her. He touched the tattoo. “A…barcode? Odd tattoo for someone to get,” he mumbled. The Xperime facilities were a well-kept secret to the other countries. He, as a Naviendan, had no knowledge of them.
Sabien looked up, he saw a curtain over a window and thought eh saw movement, but then again he'd thought he'd seen movement all week and it hadn't been true,s o he ignored it, he didn't se eit again after all. He heard Jason's comment about the tattoo and frowned until he remember Jason wasn't Xperime. He decided to not disclose why she had a barcode tattoed on her, he would've ha done of those barcodes on him if it'd been discovered that he was a shapeshifter, but he'd never been discovered.
"I'm going to check this building." he said stiffly, he walked into thebuidling and looekd around eth first floor, no one, nothing, he headed up the stairs.
Zak heard someone heading up the stairs, someone heavier than Xanthe had been. She looked around for something to use as a weapon, and her eyes fell upon an old janitor's closet, sh eopened it adn grabbed the first thing she saw, a semi0broken wood handled broom.
Jason nodded as Sabien went to inspect the building, making sure to cast a quick glance at it every once in a while. Though taking down this frail girl probably wasn’t a challenge, you never know what you could be up against. He was prepared to intervene should it come to it. He discovered the odd bruise on her stomach, and realized he couldn’t do anything for her. The wound was internal and unlike anything he had ever seen. He watched the building even closer now, building up a charge. Just in case.
The two destructive forces worked diligently to cancel each other out and allow Xanthe to be normal again. She started to stir the slightest bit. She opened her eyes enough to see the blurred outline of a broad figure—definitely not Zak—but was too weak to do anything about it.
No one was on the second floor either. Sabien storme dup the stairs of teh third floor as almost at the top when some hard smashed into hsi head. HE stumbled back a bit, stunned and putting his hand he looked up, he saw a tiny girl in black and gray holding a broom stick and standing at the top of teh stairs. He was breathing hard and had gone back for another swing, this time Sabien ducked and jumped up teh few remaining stairs tackling the small girl to the ground and wrenching the stick out of her hands. He toose dteh stick across teh room adn eyed the girl, wodnering who she was,
"Who are you?" he asked coldly.
Zak satred at the large man who'd taken her brook stick away, she wished she was bigger and stronger, so she could fight, but she ocudn't beat this guy. He was standing to ehr left now, in tehw ay of getting the broomstick back, but not in the wya of the stairs. Zak darted forward, she felt the man's fingers brush her arm in an attempt to grab her as she ran down the stairs, her small feet pounding the wood as she half jumped half ran down teh three flights of stairs. The man was following her.
It hadn’t been too long before Jason heard the sound of floorboards thumping as two sets of legs ran down them. He positioned himself near the entrance, ready to disable whatever dared come through it and out into the open. He was surprised when a small little girl popped out. She looked really young, like eleven or twelve. Nonetheless, Sabien was obviously chasing her. With a crack, Jason sent a burst of lightening out in front of her in warning. “Stop and drop to the ground, hands up and visible,” he said in his militant way.
Xanthe was conscious enough now to know something was going on. She used the sudden explosion of noise to give her gumption enough to roll and painful prop herself up on her elbow. Her hair spilled over her face and blocked some of her blurry sight, but she saw what she assumed was Zak and the broad outline from earlier. She heard another coming from the building.
Zak came to a halt quickly and glanced behind her at the big man and then too the this new guy, she glanced at Xanthe. Her hands were shaking, she couldn't move, this guy could strike her with lightening or the big guy behind her could hit her. Xanthe looked concious, but was weak and sickly.
"Who are you?" the big man asked, blocking her way back into the building, a bruise was forming where she hit him in the head with the broom.
Xanthe let out a sharp breath as she pushed herself up farther. “N..mh..” she managed. Apparently, she couldn’t speak well at the moment as she trembled in pain. So, she did the obvious thing. She used a little bit of her power—just enough so she could communicate. Just establishing enough of a connection where they could hear her. No… you came to us… to our place in this miserable city. It is you who should be answering your question… Who are you?
Jason flinched at the sudden voice. It sounded like it was coming from everywhere at once. He glanced at Sabien to see if he was the only one who heard it or not. He finally looked over to the now conscious girl. It must be her.
Sabien barely flinched at the sound of teh voice in his head, he'd learned not to hsow when something odd happened. At the asylum a lot of the patients tried things like that on the gards in an attempt to escape. Sabien turned to the girl on the ground,
"Don't ever do that again." he said his voice hard and cold.
Zak didn't answer the question adn instead stayed still except for her shaking hands, she looked from the lightening guy to the scarred guy. They both were dangerous and no wboth were looking at Xanthe, maybe, just maybe...Zak started to slowly back away from the group of people, hoping not to be noticed.
Xanthe lifted her head enough to see them, and noticed Zak trying to slip away. Sure, the girl was the one who agitated her hemophilia, but she wasn’t coldhearted. If these two were hostile, she didn’t mind Zak escaping. She took a breath. “w..wh…o...a-a…re y-you?” She tried, but it was barely audible and difficult. She resorted back to her original plan, not really caring of the consequences. Sorry, my only form of communication at the moment. Kind of in rough shape if you haven’t noticed. It takes too much to speak. So, Navienda soldier and—from your lack of reaction I’m guessing Xperime guard, who are you people?
Jason didn’t notice the other girl slipping away. He was trying to figure the mind-reader out. Sabien seemed totally used to this sort of thing, for some reason, but he was totally foreign to this. He crossed his arms and waited to see what Sabien would do at her ‘disobedience.’ It was strange to have someone talking through their mind, but he could kind of understand. She wasn’t in the shape to do anything else.
"I told you not to do that!" Sabien growled, glaring at the girl, ye she was use dto it adn didn't react with surprise or anything to it, but he still didn't like people inside his head. He took a few steps forward and looked down at her, she'd live, he coul tell, she was getting stronger already, slwoly, very slowly, but she'd be back to whatever normal was for her soon.
Zak continued toe back away quietlly, she was very clos eto an alley she could slip in, just a few steps more. She wtached to see what the big guy would do to Xanthe as she moved.
Xanthe’s suspicion of the guy being a guard was confirmed. He was definitely from one of the institutions; you could tell by the way he spoke to her. A subordinate, mentally unstable ‘asylum’ patient. Except they weren’t even nice enough to put that sort of cover on it. Look, as soon as I’m strong enough to speak, I will. But I can’t. Hit me if you want to. Can’t say I’m not used to it from those in your profession.
Jason glanced back and forth from Sabien to the girl. Everything had gone silent now. So either they were having a glaring contest or she was ‘speaking’ directly to Sabien.
Sabien grunted, he wasn't one to hit someone who was already down, she hadn't techiquely attacked him, though he was starting to lose his patience,
"Well then why don't you try shutting up until you are able to speak and communicate normally." he said, it was supposed to be a question but came out as a command.
Zak slipped into the alley and started to walk faster, she could hear one of the guys speaking, the big one speaking to Xanthe, it didn't sound to civil. SHe kept walkinga dn turning down another alley picke dher pace up, when she judged she was far enough away she satrted to sprint, trying to put a good amount of distance between her and the group of other people.
Before replying to the oh-so-charming guard, Xanthe communicated to Zak before the girl went out of range. That was my apology for freaking you out with my power. Don’t say I never did anything for ya…and good luck, Zak. With that, she glared at guard. I’m not your charge. This isn’t one of Xperime’s institutions. I have no reason to cower at your anger. So, I have no reason to shut up when there’s important information I want to learn. The fact I don’t invade your privacy and find out for myself should be reason enough for you to grace me with an answer. Who are you?
“Not that anyone cares, but I’ll answer your question. Name’s Jason. Your turn,” he said after a minute observing the glaring contest.
Sabien was still angry. but he knew he should answer ehr question, otherwise she'd invade his privacy,
"I'm Sabien." he growled, he rosse dhis arms on his chest and put his legs slightly apart as he glared down the girl,
"Now tell us your name." he commanded, angry.
Zak heard or thought, or whateve ryou calle dit when someone talk in your head, Xan. She didn't respond, she wasn't even sure what she'd say if she did. No one had ever spologized to her so she wasn't sure how to take it, she just kept running, making many twists and turns as she did so, hopefully she'd get far enough away to not get cuaght.
