(27) A Reluctant Parting

Dear reader, it's Elaine again. I want to apologize for John's childish behavior. He was just trying to annoy me, and he succeeded (He'll wish he hadn't soon enough). Anyway, I guess I'll pick up where he left off.

So, we embraced and I was filled with an overwhelming joy to be in his arms once again. But it couldn't last forever. We had to break apart, and then we had work to do. He turned to his parents and they began to discuss how they could get these people out of this basement. I made my way across the room to see to the people who had been displaced and forced to hide by the Beasts. I was helping the refugees, some with small children, eat what few provisions we had brought and pack up their few, meager possesions. Some of the people had this dead look in their eyes; I could tell they had lost so many loved ones that they had given up hope. They would probably not live very long if we made it out of this city alive. That "if" was insurmountably improbable.

I glanced at John frequently. He seemed to be in his element, working out a plan of escape and attack; his analytical mind was calculating the best method for accomplishing his two goals. One time, I caught his eyes as I glanced at him. We stared at each other for a long moment, then I saw an idea form and click in his mind. He smirked at me and sauntered over.

"Hey baby, he said, putting his arm around my shoulder and giving me a squeeze, "you think you could help me out with a little plan of mine?"

I looked deep into his twinkling eyes and saw a hint of something else behind the sparkle, was it fear? I couldn't tell, but he was doing an awfully good job at hiding it. I nodded. He smiled.

John led me to the elevator shaft he had blasted a hole in and pointed up at the long, narrow space above us that seemed to stretch on endlessly. The few lights were weak and flickered randomly adding a decidedly creepy atmosphere to the already disturbing place.

"Now, Elaine, I know that you can hoover about 10 feet off the ground or so, but you are also really agile at climbing because of that. What you need to do is, hoover to about 10 feet, enter at the level above us, and try to make a ruckus so that the elevator will descend. Once it stops at your floor, we'll have our ticket up."

I swallowed hard and stared at the floor 10 feet above us. When I looked back, John was staring at me with a look of fear mingled with pain on his face. Suddenly I was wrapped in his arms. My hands slid up his chest, snaked slowly around his neck, and into his black hair. He stroked my curls and whispered in a husky voice,

"I don't want anything to happen to you, but this is the only way, you're the only one who can do this. I need you, in more ways than one. I love you Elaine, I don't want to lose you. Be careful, be safe, I'll always come for you." With an enormous effort we pulled apart so we could stare into the other person's face. It took even more self-control to not kiss each other passionately, as we wanted to do so desperately. We broke apart and I slowly sprang into the air where I rose until I reached the doorway.

One short blast from my ray gun created a hole large enough for me to squeeze through, I looked my last on John's handsome face, full of longing, before I disappeared into the dark hallway.



[Side note, I know that John wrote this on his last post: Well dear reader, you shall not be disappointed. Next time I shall tell of how I bested the entire Beast force in the capital with a piece of string, two weather balloons, a bar of chocolate, one 4000xp blaster, 25000kg of explosives, and one smokin' hot babe. You shall have to wait through the "gooey love stuff" as he called it before I can get to the point in the story where he does get to do all that.]