Chapter Twenty One
I could feel the hard, cold metal vibrating. I could hear the soft hum of the engine. I could feel agony and grief around me. All of these I know even when my consciousness was drifting aloof. Away from my mind. But aside from all of that, I could feel nothing. I couldn’t feel my body. I couldn’t hear my thoughts.
I was nothing.
“When do you think she’ll wake?” I heard a whimpering voice asked.
Someone moved on my left. I heard the scraping of clothe on the metal bed. I could feel every presence around me. I could feel that we were currently on the move; in a truck bed. I could hear someone crying. And I heard no more before I felt myself pulled into the darkness once again.
“Please, wake up,” somebody pleaded as I felt a warm hand touched mine.
My eyes snapped open. And I hear them gasped. I took in a deep breath as if I was trying to catch my breath that stopped. Then, I blinked a few times before everything came into focus. I was in a delivery truck floor and so is everyone; except for Steven who I saw in the driver seat through the small window.
Everyone was looking at me wide-eyed and they looked like they were afraid to come near me. They all looked a lot worse for the wear. They were dirtied and bloodied like no one had taken a bath for a few weeks. But since we had just escaped from another fight, it was to be expected.
“Water,” I croaked to Carly as I clumsily reached a hand to her. She flinched but then she shook her head and took a bottle of water from her left and slowly made her way towards me. Then, I felt Drew crawled towards us and lifted my head to make it easier to drink the water Carly was slowly giving me. I gulped down at the water like my life depended on it. My throat had felt so dry.
Carly had stopped giving me the water and I managed to choke on air. I coughed a few hard times before I settled down again. They gave me a wary look and I furrowed my brows at them. What is wrong with everyone?
I coughed again, “Why- why are you,” cough “looking at me like that?”
“Your heart stopped,” Carly blurted out.
“What?” I asked, unsure of what I heard.
Carly gave me a firm look. “Your heart stopped beating earlier, Katra. It did,”
“We thought you were dead!” Tash cried as she threw herself on me. I winced and groan at the sudden weight and Tash let me go with a laugh and tears pooling in her eyes. “Don’t scare me like that!”
I ran a weak hand through her hair and I dried her tears. She smiled at me before new tears started to fall. Then, she faced everyone with a determined gaze. “I told you she’s still our Katra,”
I gave her a questioning look. She crawled towards the small window connecting us to Steven and asked him for something. I crawled to the truck wall and sat myself. Everyone was warily looking at me and I couldn’t help but ask why. No one had answered me.
Then, Tash handled me a mirror. I raised a brow at her and she gestured that I look at it. I raised the mirror to my face and I dropped it. Thankfully, it didn’t shattered. I shakily reached for it again and looked at myself once again.
My blue eyes that I inherited from my dad was no longer there. In its place was a swirling silver; a mercury-like that never seemed to stop swimming in my iris. My reddish hair that reminded me of my mom was no more. It lost all of its color and what replaced it was a platinum gray.
I gasped at my appearance. My hold on the mirror tighten to the point that it shattered on my palm. The glass had cut through the skin and blood dripped to the floor continuously. I stared at my bloodied palm and I saw my reflection in the clear red liquid.
I looked like a monster.
“You changed as soon as you produced that tornado that destroyed everything. If it aren’t for Griffin, we wouldn’t be here,” Tash explained as she reached for my hand but I evaded her. “It took us aback. But I know your still our Katra,”
My breathing hitched up as blood pooled by the truck floor. I slowly raised my head and saw that everyone except Tash was looking at me with fear. My heart constricted with pain. Everything was spinning around me as my eyesight slowly closed in on me.
I bolted up despite the pain that assailed me in that one action. My body protested but I didn’t listened. With one last look at their fearing eyes, I ran towards the truck door, pushed it open and I burst on the street.
The moment my feet touched the ground, I almost fell but I picked myself upright and dashed away from them. As I did, I heard Tash calling for my name. Begging me to stop but I didn’t.
I ran.
I ran.
And I didn’t looked back.
Where would I go if even they fear me?
ԘίŊ
I break my feet as I reached our old home. Ruin would have been the appropriate term at what I was seeing. The house was no more. Debris, shattered windows, roofs were littered on the ground. The remaining army trucks were in pieces. Some trees were uprooted and thrown aside. Bodies with and without gun wounds appeared here and there. It looked like a tornado passed through.
Scratch that, a tornado did passed through.
My tornado.
What have I become?
“AHHHHHH!” I screamed at the devastation in front of me. “Why does it had to be me? Why! I’ve never chosen this! I’ve never chosen to be a Rein!”
I continued to scream until my shouts turned into a cry. Tears streamed down my face as I saw a little cross by the corner. I slowly walked towards it and I knelt down in pain as I saw the name written in the cross.
Carlos.
My little kid is truly gone. All my memories of him flashed before my eyes. His sweet smile. His addicting laugh. His childish charms. The moments he would give me roses or any flowers he deemed pretty. The moments he would run to me for a hug just because he liked so. The times he would crawl in my bed because he had a nightmare. And all the times he would tell me that he was glad he met me and that he loved me because I was his Katra.
The times he told me that I was his hero.
And he was my little sunshine.
I’ve lost Zoi. I’ve lost Carlos. I’ve lost the others. I’ve truly lost everything.
I heard my heart shattered to a million pieces that even the mightiest glue might not fix. I heard the shattered pieces fell to the deepest of all pits; making recovery impossible. And it all seemed to last forever.
I dried my tears and gave my prayers and a final goodbye for my little sunshine. Then, I laid down a rose atop of him. Grimly, I stood up from my kneeling position and faced the direction where I saw dad’s vehicle took off.
It was high-time we had a family reunion and end all of this.
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