Discomfort

KIAN

Druce is different. I know it, Kian thought as he walked back toward the shopping bags the group had left at the mercy of the crowd. He found himself with questions and assumptions after seeing Druce send a hunter of all people teetering on his feet, knocked unconscious by an impressively executed roundhouse kick.

He was caught staring after that, looping her actions on replay as he wondered, Who the hell is she?

Since they were children, Kian had known Emi to be a fighter, a tough girl who could hold her own on many occasions. She was often the one to help him rather than to receive the help, and so he had never doubted her strength, always admiring and learning from her abilities. That was normal. Being strong and capable but not deadly was normal.

The fight was short, and he didn’t have much to go on, but it was clear that Druce was deadly.

And he couldn’t use “normal” to describe her.

The walk back home to the Chrome District was silent for a while. During this time, Kian was totally submissive to his thoughts, and he was sure that the girls each had a series of thoughts cartwheeling through their minds just the same as he did.

He thought of how he had felt with the hunter writhing against his hold, the sizzling baton in his right hand. It was less a sense of power and pleasure that he had felt than it was an animalistic need to protect. The thought had almost eaten away at his brain when he rushed into the center of the conflict to keep Emi's opponent from delivering what might have been a finishing blow.

Emi had just thrown a jab at the hunter's neck who dodged and retaliated with a punch to her abdomen. She was propelled backwards into the glass water fountain, thrown off her feet, her back slamming into the structure, and her body stiffening in pain. Kian assumed shock was shooting through her body, which made her unable to react when the hunter raised his baton for a deadly attack.

It came as a surprise to Kian that his body reacted immediately to the now desperate situation. Within seconds, one of Kian's hands was on the hunter's shoulder, forcing him around to face him and socking the man square in the face with the other. He tightened his grip on the man's shoulder and wound back up to deliver another blow. This one didn't connect as the hunter attempted to force Kian into an arm bar, grasping his outstretched arm with both hands, setting his right foot back behind him, and twisting his body so that Kian's own body would become folded downward toward the hunter's right leg.

Rather than allow himself to be locked in place and his arm broken, Kian followed the hunter's movements step for step. As the hunter bent his body into a squat hoping to take Kian with him by the arm, Kian dropped low to the ground and used the hunter's grip on his arm to propel himself forward, leaning into his own body weight to throw his opponent off balance. He jammed his foot into the hunter's, dropping the man to the ground. Kian rolled himself over the hunter's back, strung his arm around the man's neck, and pulled him upward into a standing position with the hunter's back against his own heaving chest. That's when he had brandished the baton sizzling with electric energy as he had swiped it from the hunter during their scuffle on the ground.

Kian had seen with some degree of shock that Druce was masterfully holding her own against the larger hunter who had whipped the physically disabled lady across the face. Then, his anger boiled over as the hunter he held began to struggle harder against him. Emi had gotten up by then and had moved to the side, into Kian's line of vision.

He had been thinking at that time, What if I was too late? Like last time. Emi would've been gone and I would've done nothing but watched.

The thought sickened him and now, on their walk back to Chrome District, Kian finally understood why his brother had said what he'd said. If Emi jumps in, jump in with her. Nari wanted Kian to protect what he had, like Emi.

Because Emi's family, he thought, realizing he needed to be treating her better. She always has been. His childhood friend deserved his undying attention and care.

He then looked over at Druce and found a respect and, dare he think it, a friendly affection for her buried under suspicions he could not put a stop to. She was frowning now, trying to catch expressions on his face with her eyes without fully turning her head. The fidgety behavior of someone worried to death about something that they can't confirm.

But what is she worried about, and what does it have to do with me? Kian thought and figured there was no better way to put a stop to this nonsense than by asking.

But just as he opened his mouth to call out the girl's name, an unnerving feeling came over him that they were being watched.

Where is it coming from? Kian thought, looking with his eyes but not his head the way Druce was peeking at him. He made sure to keep up the appearance of being unawares until he pinpointed the location of two, maybe three hunters tucked out of sight off to the trio's far left. Kian, Emi, and Druce were walking in the center of the path leading towards the center of the Chrome District where the largest homes, and the governor's home, were located.

When he turned his head completely, he saw no one. He heard nothing. It was as if they weren't being followed at all and this was all a draft of Kian's paranoia.

But Kian was not paranoid. I know someone's there.

He figured they were on high alert following the group's dangerous interactions with those heathen hunters back there. Then, his next thought came with a stab of fear.

My family's in danger.

This was why he always laid low. These situations were why he always carried money on him, trying to pay off whatever danger might face his family at the hands of hunters. Usually, this tactic kept hunters off their back. Sometimes, it didn’t. And Kian would have to take matters into his own hands.

Kian had a feeling that this time was one of the times a money deal would do him no good.

This sucks, Kian thought, a swell of emotions building up in his chest. He pondered whether his actions were causing his family more harm than good as he worked so hard to protect them. He wondered if he was failing them.

I don't want this life anymore. I can't do it. I have to get my family off this Plate, before Selection, no matter what.

Kian had a feeling that if he waited any longer, it'd be too late.