Harley

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My lids were heavy. 

As I watched the world blur, shadows eat the light and leak from sewer drains crusted in sleet, surrounding streetlights in armies, every footfall brought me nowhere but another stretch of street feeling just like the last. I didn't feel the cold air, all I felt was tired. Creatures clawing at my stomach. 

The ground wavered, and I grasped onto the jacket back of the figure keeping a steady pace before me to keep myself from falling.

"Bro, you good?"

"I'm… yeah," I let go. Wrapped my arms around my middle and breathed. Leon was concerned, as usual. Jenna was ahead. The small figure beside me didn't say a word, but cast a gloomy gaze in the direction of the deserted street to our right. 

"Thanks,"

I was starving.

Food was something strange to me. It hadn't always been, but it had become something I forgot about or tended to make me feel even worse after I had eaten. It was painful, and forced, and I knew I needed it. But I couldn't bring myself to eat it. 

I was really regretting that now.

"Hey can we stop for a minute?"

Leon tapped Jenna's shoulder, their voices quiet in the dark.

"Harley wants to know if we can stop,"

She shook her head, and her words came 

"We're almost there,  he'll survive,"

He looked from me to Jenna, a mix of exasperated or worried or something else creasing his forehead and tearing his hair across his face in the night wind. He slowed, to walk next to me.

"Are you sure you're okay?"

I bit my lip and nodded.

"Yeah,"

Unconvinced.

"You can talk to me, you know," A smile didn't break the concern on his face, but wavered there in the semi darkness all the same. "If you want to,"

I opened my mouth, to say I was fine. Snap like I was used to doing, raise my voice just enough to make myself feel a little power, but a loud rumble escaped my stomach instead.

"Oh, that's easily solved. Wait up,"

He reached into his jacket pocket, fumbling around and making a series of 'hmm's and 'wait's and then finally an "oh, here we go,".

With a triumphant expression he held his hand out, clutching the battered and crushed remains of a granola bar. I took it in surprise.

"Oh, thanks,"

"Yeah!" He gave a double thumbs up and a broader smile. "Anytime," 

I took a bite, a shaky, stiff, unsteady bite, and felt it fall through my hands as a hard lump slid down my throat, again colliding with the suddenly stopped forms ahead of me. 

    It clattered to the ground, and I took a step back. My fingers wound their way around my middle, clutching my aching sides as I squinted through the dark, standing on my toes to see over their shoulders. 

    “We’re here,”

    Jenna’s voice was dry. I couldn’t read it, but could sense a bitter aftertaste in her tone that carried history. Fog pooled at our feet like tear gas through trenches, the wrought iron  gates looming over us with pointed ends and wide open doors that were anything but welcoming, on one side, the shape of a figure silhouetted against ghostly pale light within. 

    “You’re late,” An unfamiliar voice crowed, dripping. Dripping with a sound that seemed to announce proudly it was addicted to expensive wine, and talked condescendingly while adjusting its cufflinks. The first thing I saw were his hands, doing exactly that. The slicked red hair turning up its chin to peer at us through catlike eyes that seemed to gleam, silvery and superior. He could have been less than 18, he could have been age old, voice holding centuries of wisdom and tricks. When he met my eyes, chills ran down my spine, followed by a numbing cold when he turned to Jenna. 

    “I don’t have time for this,” She spoke, her back to us. I could almost hear her teeth grit in annoyance. 

    He raised his chin even higher, the smirk falling into a slack glower. 

    “You always have time, Avella, so don’t waste mine.” 

    “You-”

    “Besides,” He stood upright and stepped forward, his height rising alarmingly fast. “You should be happy to see me,” 

    “I’m only here for your services,”

    “Ah, of course. My services. You’re helpless again aren’t you?”

    “As if I have ever meant to come to you before,”

    “But in the end you needed me,”

    Silence, and he sighed.

    “Typical, typical. Young venatores, ever unwise.” He smiled this time, showing a slim row of polished teeth as his eyes flicked once more over the both of us, standing behind Jenna in silence. “And you brought company, I see? How rude of you to leave them unintroduced.”   

His face was inches from hers now, and as she turned her head to the side to avoid him, the disgust on her features didn’t fade.

    “You, and you,” she snapped. “This is Lockshire.”

    Leon inched closer to me, maybe instinctually. Out of the corner of my eye I could almost sense him trying to get me to share his discomfort, but the specter called Lockshire spared him nothing but a halfhearted glance before finding himself before me, faster than seemed possible. Bending over to meet my fear in the eyes.
    “You must be...,” 

    I blinked, but couldn’t speak. My eyes fell to his hand, waiting patiently for me to shake it. I dug deeper into my pockets. His breath was in my face, his unmoving stare sending jabbing pains into my temples and a confusion in my chest that took the form of an ache. 

    I took his hand, and his eyes narrowed. 

    “D’arco,”

    “How do you-”

    “A pleasure to finally meet you, again,”

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A.N. And we're back! To those who stayed patient through my hiatus, thank you. To those who didn't, I'll miss you! Thanks for reading, don't forget to vote, comment, share, etc.