Oli was lying on the stage, holding his now bleeding arm. The blaster he’d been aiming at Rabbit had dropped and slid across the wood, far out of reach, not that he seemed to notice. Oli was too busy trying to crawl backward and escape the dark shadow currently making his way across the side of the auditorium toward him.
No, not a shadow.
“Baikal.” Rabbit let out the breath he’d been holding and dropped the rose to the ground without a thought. He rested his hands on his knees and inhaled deeply, trying to steady his racing heart. “Thank Light.”
He straightened, but then realized Void wasn’t heading over to him, but still making his way toward Oli.
And he was still holding up the blaster he’d already used to shoot Oli in the arm.
“Don’t!” Rabbit bolted forward, grabbing onto Baikal’s wrist, attempting to force him to lower the weapon. “You can’t!”
“Watch me,” Baikal growled, shaking him off. But when he lifted the blaster again, Rabbit leaped in front of him to block his shot. “Move!”
“You can’t just murder him!” Rabbit shook his head and scrambled to come up with a legitimate reason, one that Void would accept.
“He was about to murder you,” Baikal reminded darkly. His eyes were flashing with anger and the swirls of smoke continued to seep off him in waves. “No one gets to threaten you in any way and live. If I had been the one who’d fired just now, he’d already be dead.”
“Sorry, boss,” another voice came from the other side of the stage, though Rabbit didn’t turn just yet to see who it was, too busy trying to defuse the situation.
“He’s not right in the head,” Rabbit explained, then realized Baikal probably had no clue who exactly it was his friend—whoever that last speaker was—had shot. “That’s Oli!”
The corner of Baikal’s eye twitched and he paused but didn’t drop his gun.
“I thought he was dead,” he rushed on, “this is the first time I’m finding out he isn’t. But he isn’t the same, and he even mentioned something was wrong with his brain.”
“Your mom hit him over the head,” Baikal recalled, seemingly telling himself.
“Exactly,” Rabbit agreed anyway. “That must have been it.” Honestly, it was a damn miracle Oli had even survived considering the material of the pot she’d used to do it. “He’s not okay. He needs help.”
“He’s a threat,” Baikal corrected. “Move. There’s only one way to deal with threats.”
“No,” Rabbit shook his head. “You can’t.”
“Move, Rabbit.”
“My mom already killed him in front of me once!” Tears pooled in his eyes and he did nothing to stop them from falling. “You saw what that did to me. Baikal,please. I only just got myself. I don’t want to lose me again. I don’t want to ever feel what I felt that night again. Don’t make me.”
Baikal hesitated.
“Boss?” that new voice sounded again, and this time Rabbit glanced over his shoulder to find a lithe guy standing over Oli, a blaster drawn and aimed at him as well.
He turned back to Baikal, knowing it’d be pointless to try and convince anyone else. He’d seen the new guy once or twice on campus and recognized that he was the one named Flix, a member of the Brumal. Loyal to Void.
“I’ll make a deal,” Rabbit blurted.
Baikal’s brow furrowed. “A deal?” He snarled and motioned toward the stage. “For him?”
“No,” Rabbit corrected, “for the guy he used to be. For my friend.”
Rabbit understood how to be loyal too.
“It’s my fault he’s like this now,” he said. “My mom is the one who made him this way. I can’t just stand here and watch him be killed. He needs help.”
“And you want to get that for him?” Baikal’s mouth pressed into a firm line. “You want me to turn the other cheek and let the man who just tried to shoot my Possessio go without a scratch?”
“Flix shot him in the arm,” he reminded, smart enough to know not to bother with the whole Possessio title argument right now. “I’d hardly call that unscathed.”
“Rabbit.”
