Then I’m aware of a familiar presence. Tense and bristly and urgent. Standing above me. Shooting in a frenzy.
Ben.
Why the hell did he come down from the tree? He was safe there.
I want him safe. I want that more than anything else in the world.
I make a whimper of objection, but the small sound is lost in the chaos. There’s gunfire everywhere. Ben is still standing over me, right out in the open, turning and turning as he shoots in all directions.
Trying to keep anyone else from getting to me.
Taking on the entire world to do it.
He’s going to end up on the ground right beside me. We’ll both die together.
Maybe that’s the way it was always supposed to be.
I’m having trouble seeing, so I blink through the sweat and blood dripping from my forehead. I don’t know why I’m bleeding there. Maybe I scratched my face in the fall.
I’m looking in the opposite direction from where Ben is pointed right now, and I see the guard aiming at him from farther down the road. I’ve still got my pistol in my hand. I might as well use it.
It takes all the effort I possess to raise the gun and pull the trigger.
The guard falls.
There.
I saved him.
At least for right now.
That’s all I’m capable of doing anymore. The world is no longer lit by that narrow, stark beam of reality. Even that light is darkening into blackness.
Oh well.
At least now the fight is over.
I’m so tired all I can do is close my eyes.
I’m not dead.
That’s my first conscious thought.
I should be dead. My body hurts like I’m dying. When I blacked out earlier, I was sure it was the end. But now I’m conscious again.
And someone is shouting at me.
Maybe it’s not a shout, but it sure feels like it to me.
“Annabelle! Annabelle, baby! Wake the hell up! Don’t you dare be dead!”
Ben. My poor love. He’s so upset.
I fight to clear the shadows from my head and push back the pain enough to think.
“Annabelle, don’t you fuckin’ do this to me!”
“You don’t have to be mean about it,” I manage to mumble.
