The pained expression in Five's face before he ran in the opposite direction filled Mara's head. 

Was it hesitance? Was it guilt? 

She couldn't tell. It felt almost foreign for someone like him, and it confused her.

Maybe Klaus was right.

Maybe it was just façade.

Or maybe its the lack of oxygen going through her lungs at the moment.

With her frame being smaller than it should be and the unfortunate position she was in, the man towering above her was easily winning. The baton was now slowly inching its way to crush her neck against the railing, and she could feel herself slipping.

The majority of the guards had chased after Five, leaving just three around her and trusting that they would get the job done. 

If a time would be as good as any, it would be now.

So with this in mind, Mara leaned back and brought her knee up to his jackpot.

The man immediately dropped the baton and reeled back, yelling and writhing as he did so. The Sparrow quickly took off, the other two men hot on her heels.

If her memory served her well, then there should be a staircase nearby leading to the second floor. She figured she could find an empty dark room somewhere there and finally get away from this dammed building.

Thankfully, the staircase wasn't that far. Mara already had it in view as soon as she turned a corner.

The railings lining the steps were glass instead of the concrete that surrounded the balcony, and it didn't seem to be supported by a pillar. It was merely connected by the edges of the two floors.

Mara wasted no time and she skidded down those steps. She spun around as soon as she reached the next flight of stairs, but just as quickly, something hard rammed into the side of her body and sent her crashing through the glass railing.

Her left shoulder was quickly met with the hard concrete floor and an unsettling crack echoed through her body. A sharp pain spread across her abdomen as the wind in her lungs got knocked out.

Mara tried not to falter, but everything was spinning out of control and she couldn't focus on a single thing. It didn't help either that the man above her was obstructing her lower body.

She tried to settle her vision, but who she saw was unlike the other security men. 

Tattoos snaked up from his collar and curled behind his pierced ears. His wild red hair covered his otherwise gruff face that held a very amused expression. He trapped both her wrists to the floor with his large hand and smiled almost contently as he pointed a very peculiar knife to her neck.

Mara frantically tried to pull off her glove, only for her to realize that it was lodged underneath his pressing grip. She tried to move her legs as well,  but to no avail.

The man laughed, cold and sinister, and positioned the knife above her face.

Is this really how she was going to go? Stabbed in the head inside the lobby of the biggest telecommunications provider in the world. 

At least its not entirely boring.

Mara only closed her eyes, waiting for the abrupt sensation of the knife piercing her body.

But it never came.

The weight above her lifted with a loud thud and Mara instinctively stood up, her eyes opening wide to Five smashing his whole body to the brute. The knife slid away from his grasp and the man was left stumbling to regain his composure.

"C'mon, I got you." Five stretched out a hand out for her to take, his soft eyes sending her head into a spiral.

Using her good arm, Mara took his hand unquestioningly and felt his familiar blue warp surround her.

They landed just outside the building, still in the compound and still with their hands interlocked. 

Behind Mara, she could see the guards through the glass door scrambling to reach them.

Five took note of this too and started running in the direction of the parking lot.

The heat coming from his warm hand kept her from focusing entirely on not trying to get killed and get the hell out of here. But still, some small semblance of her craved a bit more.

Five led them to the side of the wall, security not far behind them, and  blinked through. The two found themselves back in the park and it was here that Five let go of her hand. Mara felt a bit disappointed, but she quickly dismissed it. 

Danger was not that far behind anyway.

"This way." Mara spoke tiredly, and limped forward. "I'll take us back to the apartment."

Five nodded wordlessly, and the two carried on.

A mere fifteen minutes had already passed as she took them on a shortcut,  and the sky was starting to turn to an orange red. The afternoon sun felt warm on their skin as they slowed down to a walk, a bit more relieved but still alert.

Mara was still ahead, her whole body throbbing and her head in a daze. She could still feel her hand buzzing from his touch, and wondered why he came back for her.

He could've left without her. She was the one who caused the alarm anyway. From what she had seen, he didn't really need her at all.

So why is he still wasting his time with me?

The familiar apartment building finally came in to view, and Five began to walk faster, passing by Mara. Without any motion or word from either of the two, Five opened the door for her first.

A part of her wanted to tease, but she decided not otherwise. She was too tired to hold a conversation, and she could tell he felt the same too. 

His eyes pointed low and his head slumped into his shoulders. He shuffled in a way that the toes of his shoe would occasionally hit the back of his heel as he walked.

Five did the same simple gesture at her apartment door, and still, they did not speak a word even when they saw the additional member in the room with them.

Klaus and Vanya were huddled by the couch in soft voices by the time the pair came in. But as soon as they saw the dried blood and dirt matted across their clothes, the two almost immediately stood up.

"You guys look like crap. Are you okay?" Vanya tried to help Mara sit down by the coffee table and the latter collapsed on the chair.

"Obviously not. Look at her arm." Klaus pointed at her. "Its as dead the skunk I accidentally ran over one time."

Five cast her a grim look, his eyebrows knitted tightly together and chucked his hands chucked into his pockets. He sat in the chair opposite to her and leaned back as well.

"What happened to you?" Vanya asked.  Her hands hovered over her dislocated shoulder, not quite knowing what to do.

"I got pushed off the second floor." Mara huffed as she tried to sit up straight, but the throb in her shoulder stopped her. She turned to Klaus and gestured to her broken limb. "Do you mind?"

"I don't think you want to ask him." Five deadpanned.

"And what difference will your chicken arms make?" Mara shot back.

"Yeah, you can't compete with these guns." Klaus spoke enthusiastically as he proceeded to flex his arms, and Mara immediately wanted to take back what she said.

The boy said nothing. He simply stood up, and Mara's eyes followed his actions up until he set himself behind her.

"Don't hate me." He breathed near her ear. The action left goosebumps in its wake and it made Mara want to punch him more than anything.

"What are you-"

Five snapped her arm back in place with one swift motion, and Klaus slapped his hand over her mouth to keep her from finishing cursing them to the pits of hell.

"Trash." Klaus had said.

Mara shook her head, shrugging him off, and glared at both Klaus and Five who only sat back in his seat with a satisfied look.

She rolled her shoulder in its socket and winced at the dulling ache. Using her other arm, she pulled back her collar and saw the swelling surrounding her whole torso. 

God, I'm so dead.

Vanya was kind enough to make her a makeshift sling out of the spare rag towels Mara left around the kitchen, but Mara refused.

 If she was went back to the Academy with a cast, the old man would never let her off. Even she wasn't sure she wanted to know what he were to do to her.

However  while her shoulder felt a bit more relieved, the rest of her body wanted to collapse. That particular sting in her abdomen still burned through the surface of her skin. She still had no idea what was causing it, but she could no longer keep her eyes open and she felt herself sagging towards the table.

Mara slid off one of the gloves from her hand, resting the leather piece on the table. Her bare fingers brushed the fabric above the stinging space and came back red. The thick liquid dripped slowly through a hole in her sweater and into the floor, creating a small pool beneath her.

A hand rested on her shoulder, stopping Mara from collapsing on the table and putting her back on the chair. She hazily trailed up the limb to the now faded blue eyes of Five.

He knelt by her, hand still on her shoulder as he carefully, and hesitantly, lifted up her sweater. The cool air on her bare skin made her shiver and she wanted to swat his hand away, but her arm only dangled off from the chair.

"There's glass sticking out of you." He spoke quietly.

Mara looked back down at her blood-soaked abdomen and tattered clothing, and true enough, there was red stained shard peeking from under the fabric

"Oh." she breathed, feeling dizzy. "So it seems."

"What do you mean 'oh'?" Klaus' voice seemed so far away now, "You were just walking around and dripping blood everywhere like some sick version of Hansel and Gretel?"

Mara closed her eyes just as Five stood from his position, only to come back with a bunched up towel and pressed it against her.

"Why didn't you say anything?" He almost sounded like he was giving her a lecture, but Mara could care less about fighting him back.

"Must've been the adrenaline." she mumbled. 

Her consciousness was already somewhere else at this point, out of tune with the rest of the world, and Mara didn't mind. She let herself drift away with the ringing echo filling her mind as her head dangled to the side along with the rest of her body.