“What do you think you are doing?” He walks up to me, his boots crunching against the dirt and rocks and he almost steps on my fingers. “You can’t leave town now. It’s getting dark.”
“Your rules don’t apply to us,” I tell him as I push myself on top. Rules. I hate rules.
“Leave them alone, Earl,” the other one says, moving his knife to his other hand as he stares out at the opposite direction from us. “They’re part freak. Can’t you tell?” They both laugh at us.
Aiden jumps back over onto the car, heading towards them, fist clenched and raised. I quickly stand up and latch onto his arm, pulling him towards me as I back to the edge of the roof. I keep backing up until we reach the edge then I tug him with me as I hop down to the other side, landing with a soft thud in the dirt.
“Let me go.” He jerks his arm away from me and starts back towards the wall where the guards look down at us, still laughing under their breath.
“It’s not worth it, Aiden.” I grab the collar of his jacket and drag him backward then I take his hand and start to walk away out into the hills and desert.
“Yes, it is.” He grins as he looks down at our hands that are clasped together.
I shake my head, wanting to smack him. “You know that’s not what I meant.”
I try to let go of his hand, but he tightens his grip. “Can’t we just enjoy it for a second?” he asks as I wind downward into a group of towering rocks.
I resist the urge to pull my hand away and try to find the enjoyment he suggests, wondering if I can get there, but I can’t. Honestly, I don’t really feel anything at all, except the slight chilliness of his skin. My mind wanders back to Sylas and the kiss we shared before Gabrielle captured us. A spark of sadness hits me as I think of what he has turned into. How he no longer exists and has become a monster, that he might have been one of those things running around on the street.
“You look sad… what are you thinking about?” Aiden asks, his eyes sweeping the path in front of us—the rocks, the bushes—his body tensing with every vampire cry, as if he’s still not used to being able to walk with them.
“Nothing important,” I mutter. “I just hope we’re not too late to find the papers,” I lie. My thoughts are still firmly planted on Sylas and the kiss. I can almost visualize him changing into some unknown horror of a monster and I simply left him. What the hell? Why did I do that? Why am I so worried about it now? Why do I feel so… so guilty?
“You know we don’t need to go back to the colony; we don’t have to get the papers and take them back,” he says, tugging on my arm and moving me to the side as a snake slithers across the ground in front of us.
I gape at him, slamming to a stop. “Are you being serious right now? Because getting those papers is pretty much the only hope for humanity.”
“Who says humanity is worth saving? Maybe this,” he points at himself and me, “is what is really supposed to happen to the world. Maybe we are perfection,” he says smugly and starts walking again, pulling me with him.
I jerk my hand from his. “What the hell’s happened to you? You’ve changed and I don’t think I like it.”
He shrugs, stepping to the side, putting distance between us. “I’ve changed into something better.” I glare at him and he smiles. “Look at us, Kayla, the vampires won’t bite us. I haven’t seen you drink any blood and I know that I don’t have the thirst for it. We’re strong. Fast. Basically invincible. Isn’t this better than being a weak human and having to worry about surviving every day? It’s as if we’re perfect.”
I’m about to tell him that he’s lost his mind and sounds just like the Highers when we’re interrupted by a hoard of vampires blocking the trail in front of us. They’re lined up in a row across the path and between the rocks as they viciously snap their teeth at us and snarl; some stepping forward and some moving back like a rippling wave.
Aiden smirks at them and then at me, giving me the most arrogant look, before he takes off and charges headfirst towards the group, bringing his knife out as he charges. He jumps into the air right before he reaches the line of them and kicks his feet out in front of him, knocking down the front ones before he lands in a crouch. Quickly springing up, he slashes flesh and stabs them in the heart, moving at a speed my eyes can barely detect; I almost start to worry that he’s faster than me. The vampires explode into dust one by one while any that are left take a whiff of the air and start to retreat back into the shadows and down into the flat area of the land, letting out shriek after shriek.
Aiden strolls towards me with a gloating look on his face. “See what I mean.” He tucks his knife into his pocket and brushes dust off his hands. “This is much better. We kill them instead of them killing us. We’re the only ones that can control them.”
He seems like a completely different person than he was before he changed. When I changed, I felt better, stronger, but I didn’t lose my sense of compassion for the human race. Not like Aiden seems to have done.
He’s right. We’re the only ones that can control them, but it still doesn’t mean that this is what the world comes to. That we’re the future of humanity. There’s still so much we can do. We can still save the world.
Flashing me a grin, Aiden turns and strides off towards the hill like he’s proving he’s faster than me. I watch him as he makes his way up the hill while I trudge behind him, wondering if he’s lost all of the humanity inside of him.
If the Aiden I first met is completely gone, then it’s completely up to me to bring those papers back.
Chapter 13
We hike the rest of the night, keeping quiet along with a bit of space between us. A few vampires appear in front of us occasionally, but Aiden is quick to make sure that they know who we were and what they are dealing with by running at them with his knife, baring his fangs. Within a few steps, they backtrack and disappear behind the rocks, howling at one another and snapping their fangs, starving to death, yet knowing they can’t feed on us.
Eventually, the cave that we hid in earlier comes into view right as daylight is getting ready to kiss the land, trickling drops of light come down from the foggy sky. Aiden veers towards it and I wonder what the hell he’s doing.
“Where are you going?” I call out as I keep walking straight.
He turns around at the edge of a boulder and raises his arms above it, showing me his torn sleeves and the massive amount of tears in the fabric. “I guess I got a little carried away,” he says, seeming proud. “I’ll have to hide out until the sun goes down.”
Part of me thinks he did it on purpose. Part of me wants to leave him. Part of me wants to knock him out.
Shaking my head, I change directions and head towards the cave. When we arrive at it, nestled down between the rocks, Aiden rushes inside just as the sun glimmers over the horizon. I decide whether to keep going or wait since I’m not sure if he’s going to help me or not then ultimately settle on waiting, more because I worry what he’ll do if I leave him behind. Go back to the colony maybe and do something bad? At this point, I wouldn’t put it past him. Still, I find myself wishing I had some silver or something to knock him out with… although I’m not sure if it’d work since Aiden seems a lot different from a Day Taker.
I sit down outside on a rock with my knife in my hand, my elbow propped on my knee and my chin resting on my hand. I watch as the sky turns grey, lost in my thoughts.