~Jack~
Jesus it's freezing in here. Ines is curled up on her side and muttering something over her breath while Connor is sleeping like the dead next to her. Probably not the best simile to use, given our current situation. Lily's got her mouth open and is breathing lightly, with an adorable smile on her face. How can she be having happy dreams right now? No, how can she be sleeping at all? She normally doesn't fall asleep for ages. I guess everything that's been happening and her lack of sleep just caught up with her. I could sit there for ages, just listening to her breathe and mutter under her breath but I'm restless. I head to the small, grimy window and look out onto the street where I've got a good view of anyone heading up or down the street.
I hear someone move for a moment and I'm hoping it's Lily, but Connor comes and sits next to me.
"Couldn't sleep either?" I ask him.
"Nope. I'm surprised the girls can, though."
"I know. Especially Lily. I mean, she was so close to him."
"Yeah. All the teachers are like her parents back there. She was telling me this story where when she was fourteen she got a sex talk from practically all of them."
"Ew. That is..." I trail off.
"Yeah."
"Does she ever talk to you about it? I mean, growing up without a family?" He looks at me like I'm crazy.
"Are you kidding me? She has a massive family. Have you noticed she knows everyone in school? And all the teachers love her. That's because they're all her family."
"Deep."
"Yeah. That's why she's so messy and yet she's really clever. She grew up around teachers and high school students."
"What about Matt? How long has he been here?"
"Oh, he came maybe a month after me? Yeah, something like that."
"Yeah. As much as I dislike the guy, we really need to think about getting him out of there."
"I know."
"Listen. I like you more than him but that doesn't mean I won't deck you if you hurt her. I swear I will."
"You know I wouldn't. But the same applies to you, you know."
"What do you mean?"
"Lily's like my little sister."
"Fair enough." We look out the window when we see some bulky guy head round the corner, followed by another guy of similar build. My breath catches in my throat and I look at Connor, my eyes wide. Fuck.
"Get them up." He runs to where we packed our stuff and slings his and Ines's backpacks on his shoulders. I run to where the girls are resting and shake them awake. Lily sits up immediately and Ines does a kind of roll, then crouches and stands up, albeit slightly uncoordinatedly. I look at Lily and she's looking at me with this fear in her eyes. I nod, and that's all she needs. She's at the other end of the room in a heartbeat, grabbing her backpack and opening the window on that side, looking out.
"Any way out?"
"I think so. There's a ledge that goes all the way around the building that's about two feet wide, and another one above that that we can hold onto." We all rush to the window and Lily grabs my face in both hands and kisses me so hard I thought the top of my head would come off. She hops on top of the window sill and crouches for a moment then hops down to the ledge. Shit. It looks so much higher from up here. I take a deep breath and step onto the ledge. Connor's next, and then Nez.
"Sling your backpacks around to the side, they pull you backwards," Lily calls out. The streets deserted, thank god. We can hear people coming up the stairs and I look at the others, miming for them to hurry up. we inch our way around the building, where there's a ladder that extends from the alley beneath us to the roof. Surprised that wasn't removed by the council or something. Lily swings onto the ladder and tests it before climbing up.
"What are you doing?" I catch her leg.
"They'll probably be coming around this side, too. Also, I saw some sheltered places on the roof we can leave our bags."
"Good idea." She starts climbing up above me, and I can't say I mind the view from below. She pulls herself up onto the roof and helps me up. We wait for the others and throw our bags under a canopy, but not before Lily pulls a few vicious-looking knives and a couple of guns out of her pack and sticks them in her jacket.
"Alright, we ready to go?"
"Go where?"
"To see Matt. I mean, they were either here looking for us or looking for information, and we had already scoured the place after... You know."
"Good point. So, since they didn't find us here, they'll probably look for us at the hospital next. So we have to get there first."
"Um question, how?" Ines asks.
"Good point. Umm, we can... hotwire a car and get arrested, steal a car and get arrested, get a taxi and waste time... take your pic."
"We're wasting time. Let's just go. It's not that far, we can run." Fuck. We all set off at a jogging pace and probably look really suspicious in our dark clothes and backpacks.
