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To find out if there really were any bodies there? Why?
When I reached the intersection, I panicked, because the footsteps were getting closer. Whoever it was, he was walking with determination, and coming for me. I could feel that fear and only that fear. Even without knowing who it was, or why they were coming, I felt a need to escape.
I was acting on instinct. I hurried into the darkness, putting a hand out to the wall. Dim emergency lights gave off a weak, blue glow in the distance. Murky shadows lined either side of the corridor, which got cooler and seemed to expand in width as I went along. Equipment was on either side of me, I had to run my hands along it. Some of it was turned on, and screen glowed in the darkness. I glanced at some of it: it was all written in the strange script I had seen on the wall.
I didn't have time to stand there and try to decipher it. The objects were cold, colder than the temperature of the air. Somewhere in the back of my mind, this thought turned over and over. I knew what it meant, but all of my thoughts had been funneled into this escape. Even if I didn't know where I was planning to go, or what I was planning to do.
The dark was terrifying, and the cold was uncomfortable. I shivered, but I pressed on, my heart thudding in my chest. I forgot all about the footsteps behind me, which had stopped. I don't know what I was thinking as I made my way down the corridor: perhaps whoever had been coming had gone some other direction. Maybe he hadn't been coming for me.
I reached the first blue light, and cool air rushed past me, faster now, indicating that the corridor ahead of me was very long. I stopped once I was in the shadows again, and looked back.
Nothing.
I crouched on the floor, close to a cold machine, to catch my breath.
Think, Alena.
I tried, but I couldn't gather my thoughts. I tried to slow my breathing, but I failed. I was in an all-out panic mode, and the worst part was, I didn't really know why.
Too late to change anything, I thought.
And I am a curious person. I suddenly wanted to know what was really happening here, even though I sensed I was going to hate the answer.
I waited, and then I stood up, my legs shaking. The corridor before me was pitch-black, but far at the end I could see light creeping from somewhere, along an edge. Maybe a lit corridor in the other direction, maybe the frame of a closed door. I couldn't tell.
I started that way, cautiously, moving into the darkness, willing myself to be brave. It was dawning on me that I was going to get caught, of course, and I was going to be punished, and probably not in a way that I liked. But Icouldmaybe hide, or figure out what was going on here.
At least I could figure it out. Information is power, right?
I moved another few feet, closing my eyes because it seemed less terrifying that way.
When I opened my eyes again, I saw a flicker of the light ahead of me.
At least, that's what I thought.
I took a step forward, and smashed into something. Hard. I opened my mouth to scream as it moved, warm and solid, and enclosed me in its grip. A hand went over my mouth and my scream was muffled.
"Hey. Hey, hey, hey."
The arms closed around me and I let myself sink into them.
It was Black.
I sank into him, because the main thing I felt about getting caught - by Black - was relief.
CHAPTER13
Black
I've seen a lot of shit in my life, but nothing that hit me in the gut the way Alena's empty room did. I took one look at the open compartment door, the tossed aside bedding, and I knew what had happened. I remembered not locking the door.
I went through the motions of looking in the bathroom, calling her name, but I knew even as I did that: she was gone.
Realistically, there was only one way she could go.
Questions started bubbling up: why? Had she overheard us? Was she just waiting for this chance all along? I'd always suspected Alena of hiding secrets in her mind. She was special like that. Maybe that's why I liked her.
But I pushed these questions aside. None of that mattered immediately.
