I look at Neave who sleeps facing me. Last night’s actions stupidly kept me up the whole night. I kept thinking, in the time I was awake: Do I tell her what I did or do we wait for the worst to happen?

I still don’t know. I exhale loudly: “I’m sorry.” The syllables taste like guilt and last night’s alcohol.

I look at her and shuffle closer to her and press our foreheads together. I take her in. I breathe her in and my hands caress her face and let my fingertips absorb her. I love her. I do love her.

“I love you.” I say, barely audible.

“No you don’t” she says from her sleep.

“No. I don’t. But I do.” I say and smile.

“You’re confusing me.” She says, turns her back to me and allows me to cocoon her. I inhale the mind-clearing scent of vanilla and brandy conditioner. One thought still pesters,

“Neave we have to go as soon as possible today, okay?”

“Okay…” she says without ques– “Why?”

“So we can be safe. Just in case they come looking for us.” I tell her a lie. What I should’ve said is: Because I may have told the wrong person some incriminating information.

“But I don’t think they’ll be looking for us until tomorrow.

“Neave. We have to go. Soon.” I say more seriously.

“Okay.” She grumbles. “Fine. I don’t like it here anyway.”

I smile and kiss her jaw. She doesn’t tense this time, thankfully. I take a second to smile and appreciate her.

We could be together one day… We could have a life together and love each other. I scowl at the thought I feel too feminine for myself. “But I do love you.”

“I do too” Neave mumbles. She probably doesn’t mean it since she’s still half asleep.

I hurry in the shower and get dressed just as quickly. When I’m done, Neave is up and presents me with a cup of coffee. I take a sip and thank her anyway even though there isn’t enough sugar in it.

Maybe I do need to drink less sugar. She kisses me on my cheek as if we were a dating couple and leaves for her turn in the bathroom.

While she’s still in there, I hunt for the gun in my travel bag and stuff it in the pocket of my grey, ripped jeans. It isn’t a very big gun, but it’s otherworldly. Futuristic, almost.

Then Neave comes out of the bathroom. Shorter than my time in there but her hair is still wet. She wears one of the newer things I bought her. A yellow top and a sheer, long beige A-line skirt with the bright red lipstick and the shades she took from her loft.

“You look pretty.” I say as she walks out in her brown combat boots.

“Thank you.” She says and neatly folds her dirty clothes into her case.

“Why don’t you just toss it in?” I ask.

She pulls her face into a disgusted expression. “Because it’s untidy, Oliver.”

“Yeah but, why don’t you pack it later.” I ask and she’s quiet. Did I say something?

“It’s habit, I guess.” She says. “A very good habit.”

“They made you do that, the Bureau?” I query.

“Yeah, but it wasn’t exactly torture… It was discipline.”

“What happened if you didn’t?”

“They’d give us one strike.” Neave admits.

“Like baseball?” I ask.

“I’m not sure about sport. But they’d hit us once. Not too hard, though.”

“Did you ever get a strike?” I ask. She tenses at the question for just an instant and continues folding her clothes. When she’s done she sits on my lap.

“I got much worse.” She says.

I can image what she means. Molestation, as she stated the last time. I blink away the concern, and steal a kiss from her lips.

“We’re just friends.” I say quickly.

“Just friends.” She repeats in parrot-like manner. I have a feeling we both don’t really mean what we’re saying. But whatever.

“Should we go now?”

“We should. If we want to escape a potential threat.” She says indifferently. Did I let something slip? Anyway, we leave the instant we’re done.

Neave books us out, since she booked us in. I mind my own business. I lose myself in the doors of the hotel swinging open and closed.

“Oh my God.” I hear Neave say in a tense whisper. She reaches for my hand and squeezes it in fear.

“Hmm?” I respond mindlessly. Then I see them, agents from the Bureau of Superhumanism. How did I miss them?

“Keep calm, Neave.” I urge her. “Stay alert, just in case they notice us.” I say and she nods as she finishes up. As they pass us I bow my head, burying it in a pamphlet. They make their way into the restaurant.

“Thank you, come again” says the receptionist. Neave smiles tensely but it looks genuine enough. Her flight instinct has taken over.

We walk hastily away as the agents stride into the restaurant to the bartender.

That snake of a confidant sold us out. I knew it!

Neave and I make haste to the door. Once we’re outside, we run. This time she runs faster than me. We stop running but quickly walk when we reach the next block.

That was so close. I glance back at the hotel just as the doors burst open. Both Neave and I tense up simultaneously.

I am once again scared and fear for our lives.

“Keep your head down, Neave. Maybe they won’t notice us.” I tell her, but I don’t take my own advice.

I glance back. That is my mistake because they notice me and not her. But they must have figured out by now that wherever Neave, the superhuman is, I go.

Neave follows closely behind me, her hand tightly woven with mine.

“Fu¬–rack.” I say without thinking. My breaths have hastened and my grip on Neave’s hand becomes even tighter.

“Ow–loosen up–” She battles in the slightest way.

“I’m sorry.” I say again. “It’s my fault.” I say and I begin to ramble. The agents just reached the block we’re on and I force Neave to walk faster.

“What?”

“They’ve seen me, Neave. I’m so sorry,” I say, sounding as if I’m about to cry. I am so sorry for so much more, and if we almost– or do die– either of us, I am sorry for that too. I take note of the dread on Neave’s face. This is all my fault. This is my doing. Before I register, the words come out for maybe a final time, “I am sorry.” I say, because for the briefest second ever, I think of leaving her, handing her over personally. No. you won’t. At the same time, I think like the traitorous bartender. He must have figured that I could’ve gotten drunk, and I’d sleep until late. Too bad for him. We had a few minutes to spare. But that seems useless now since the agents follow us hastily. They’re hot on our tails.

“Run.” I command Neave in a shaky tone and she does as I say. I follow closely behind her and we both shove people out of our way– some into the streets where cars stop just in time. We could be responsible for so many deaths at this moment, but the only lives that would matter now are ours.

We run onto the next block and the next and past Neave’s first hideout, where, if we had woken up earlier, we could still be hiding out if it wasn’t for that snitch who makes barman confidentiality sound like it means something. It means shit. That’s what. There is no such thing as barman confidentiality because if he knew how to shut the hell up, we wouldn’t be in this screw-up now.

I should really be angrier at myself for telling the damn prick.

“Neave, hurry!” I yell, because they are only a few feet away now.

I can hear her exhaling noisily. She’s scared too. More scared than I am. Of course she is more scared than I am. She’d be experimented on again or maybe even end up dead if she lands in the hands of the Bureau again.

I take the lead now and drag her along. I make a sharp turn almost into a silver vehicle that hoots me out of the way.

I don’t bother with it. I keep moving. Thankfully the car almost runs one of the front men over who fusses. We’re safe just for a second, then they turn up and we run even faster than I thought was possible.

There’s no way we can escape in a tame crowd. So, I decide to do the unthinkable and start a riot by punching a stranger in the gut. And then a lady on my left. We advance. Just for a second I think something is about to happen. Nothing does. All I see in return are angry faces.

“Neave help me here,” I say, as we keep moving. “Hit anyone in your way. Push people as hard as you can.” I order her. She shoves a child… a girl out in front of her, heartlessly. The lady next to her pushes Neave. Neave pushes back. The agents aren’t far from us. I push a child too, since that seems to be the form of the martyr. Then I punch a man and he falls to the ground.

I shove a lady and so does Neave. Successfully done. They hit each other and begin to quarrel. Neave does the unthinkable and kicks a child so hard he cries out. Now the crowd is becoming rowdy. I try not to laugh, but a small giggle escapes me. It’s not funny.

I punch another man, just as one of the agents grab my shoulder. Luckily for me, the man I punched pushes the agent to the ground. He goes for a swing but instead hits a lady but softly. Her husband notices. Start a riot. Check.

Neave is only a foot away from me. I grab her by her arm just as the fight begins to erupt like a volcano– a fight of different issues and different groups. Like politics.

Even the agents battle in the riot we started.

We run away from the angry crowd and make a sharp turn. We’re at the front of a bodega. We walk slowly because some motion is better than not moving at all when one tries to escape.

“That was ice cold, Neave.” I say.

She looks at me, fearfully, “What was cold?”

“The way you kicked that kid.” I say with a smile. She probably feels really bad. But that act saved our lives. And it was funny to see too.

“I feel horrible about that.” She says just as two, fast paced gunshots fire, from the sound of it, two different guns, and the far away crowd shrieks. One shot each. We start to run again. We make a right into an alley and then left into a street with not too many people.

“What you did was reckless, too” she says, not looking at me but focused on where she’s going.

“What? Attempting to start a riot?” I ask, quickly glancing at the road then at her.

“Yes,” she says.

“It was to buy us some time. You shouldn’t feel bad for thinking about yourself.” I say, holding her arm. Neave is about to make a left but I make a right. The force of my turn is so strong that I pull her and she falls to the floor, hard. Crap.

I help her up but she can’t run now. She must have hit her coccyx and hurt her ankle.

I am such an idiot. Not just for hurting Neave now, but the other time when I threw the vase at her. For putting her life in danger, too. How clumsy am I?

“Come on,” I say as we limp down the street. “I’m sorry,” I say again for the third… fourth time today.

“It’s okay” she says in the lightest tone she can manage now.

“I got us into this. I told the bartender.”

She looks at me startled for a second, but shakes the thought away.

I carry her left across a street into an alley.

I sit her down on the filthy street. “I’m really sorry I got us into this.” I say.

“Why did you tell him?” She asks calmly, but clearly she’s angry.

“I don’t… I’m not sure.” I say. I’m really not sure.

“So why did you think you could tell him, Oliver?”

“I thought I could trust him, Neave.” I say apologetically.

“Okay, listen Oliver,” she begins to spit. “When you’re with me you cannot trust anyone else. Not anyone. Only me. You can’t confide in anyone else, okay?” she commands sternly.

“I’m s…”

“No. Oliver, do you understand?” Neave asks seriously. I don’t say okay because I know the words ‘I’m sorry’ will replace it, so I nod.

“Okay. Good” she says finally. She breathes deeply in and out and tells me to help her up. Both of us move carefully down the alley into a street with fewer people than before. This isn’t good.

We walk slowly, Neave clinging to my wool sweater.

“Are you okay?” I question in a lighter sincere tone.

“I’m fine. Thank you.” She says in the same way.

That’s our attitudes, our characters… I’m sorry and she’s thankful– but now is not the time to point out petty details.

We walk a little further when we see a chrome car drive straight down the street and halt. Neave already knows it’s them before they step out.

These are two different agents now. One of them looks no younger than nineteen and has a white vest peeking from the black canvas sweater he wears. He has blue eyes and his skin looks as if it has never seen daylight. His blonde hair is the darkest thing about him.

I turn the other way, even though I know we can’t escape now, but Neave doesn’t move. I see recognition in both the boy and Neave’s eyes.

Her brother maybe?

My vision is almost slow motion as all the glass windows around us shatter and the small pebbles in the area come forth and circle like vultures around Neave and I. I glance at her. She is the one doing this.

Atmospherically manipulative. Geologically destructive. Like the trick she did with the brick wall in her apartment.

What looks slow is sound-speed. This is what I see: Neave slowly exhales to the sky as a bullet is only inches away from her. This bullet becomes suspended just as it makes contact with her trachea. She’s dead for sure.

No. It actually stops and drops as slowly as a snail moves.

Time speeds up again just as the glass shards and pebbles gain velocity and momentum, shooting like the bullet out in every direction. They are compelled by her power. I am frozen in shock as screams start and stop as quickly as they began. I glance at the agents in front of me, glass shards and the small rocks are embedded in their every part. Skulls, arms, legs, eyes, throats.

It’s a gruesome image. Reaped from a nightmare.

That white vest the boy had on turned blood red. He is blood red. She is blood red. They are blood red. Everyone is blood red.

They are all red because they are all dead.

And Neave killed them all.

***

Tell us: Have you ever been caught in a riot? How did you manage to escape?