There was nothing but splatters of mismatched images.
Blazing hot pain.
Jasmine’s screams.
Bonnie’s barks.
Nila’s sobs.
Then more pain shoving me deeper and deeper down the drain of consciousness.
My blood was weak, diluted with agony. My soul broken but refusing to abandon a body that was hours away from succumbing to the black shroud of everlasting sleep.
Help us...
The bars were locked. There was no way out.
However, they could’ve been wide open and there wouldn’t have been a hope in fucking hell of moving.
We were dead.
The fact we were holding on was merely a formality.
More time passed and I stopped trying to catalogue it. I was drifting, twisting, fading...
Not long now.
A sudden burst of strength let me say something I should’ve said many times in the past. Something I always took for granted. “I—I lo—ove y—you, Kes.”
A cough wracked my body, clutching my pain, increasing it tenfold.
As the fever bathed my skin and my lungs rattled with sickness, I sighed and gave up. I’d said goodbye. I’d done everything I needed.
My senses slipped across the room to my dying brother and I held on. Hopefully, we’d find each other again. Hopefully, I’d find Nila again when I deserved her and paid for my sins.
Hopefully, all would be better in a different world.
I’m sorry, Nila. For everything.
Brother to brother. Soul to soul.
There was nothing else here for me.
I closed my eyes.
I let go.
Chapter Five
Nila
I CHASED HER.
He’s alive!
Vertigo tried to trip me as I jogged in the wake of her wheels. Disbelief and suspicion did their best to kill my intoxicating high.
He’s alive.
