Retro-cognition

Chapter 4 - Angels

 Chapter 4 - Angels 

Unique opened her eyes. Her head ached and a horrid noise made it worse by the second. She stared at the awful ceiling while Sion was whistling in an off-key tune.

“Please stop,” she whispered. Her mouth was dry. What happened?

“You’re awake!” Sion turned and squatted down beside her. “How are you feeling?”

“Much better now that you’ve stopped making those horrible noises,” she muttered.

“Don’t be like that. I have an idea.”

“Let me wake up properly first. My head hurts.” She groaned and struggled to sit upright. Sion helped her lean against a wall.

“Where are we?” she asked and looked around the room. The faded wallpaper fitted in with the dusty smell that filled her nostrils as she inhaled. Sion ran a hand through his hair and averted his eyes.

“Well, ehm…  I think that they called it a hotel? Maybe a motel?” he said.

“What’s that?”

“Apparently, it’s a place where humans pay to stay overnight or something.”

“How’d you pay then?” Unique frowned. They didn’t have any gold or anything similar to offer in exchange. She raised an eyebrow at Sion who remained silent and stared fixated at a point on the floor.

Her mouth dropped open when her thoughts caught up with her mind. “Oh, Sion. Please tell me you didn’t…”

He jerked around to face her. “Didn’t what?”

She glanced from side to side and leaned closer to him. “You didn’t… steal… right?”

Unique widened her eyes when his deep baritone laugh echoed through the room.

“You—“ he tried to talk, but his laughter cut off his words. 

“What?”

“I didn’t steal anything, Unique. Don’t be silly,” he said as he calmed.

She frowned. “Then how did you pay for the room?”

That made Sion silent. He looked away and mumbled something incoherent.

“I can’t hear you.”

He scraped his shoe against the faded carpet and stuffed his hands deep in his pockets. “I… Ehm. I paid in another…” he stopped talking, and Unique watched as his face turned beetroot red as he muttered, “You know what? Let’s just forget about it… It’s really not relevant.”

Unique didn’t understand what he was trying to say. Nor did she know why he couldn’t just tell her what he did to pay for the room. But the thoughts of him disappeared when her stomach complained loudly.

“What’s that?” Her hands flew to her abdomen in panic. Was she exploding?

“Don’t worry. It’s the gravity down here.” Sion walked over to a plastic bag with various colorful flowers on the side. He grabbed it and turned to her. “As far as I could tell, it mainly has something to do with the inner functions. Guess we have to live like humans too, huh?”

Unique just stared at his hands. He was rumbling through the bag until he found what he was looking for, he pulled up his hand with a smile. He handed something at her, and she couldn’t see what it was—except that it was something wrapped in foil.

"Eat this." He threw the small package. She scrambled around on the bed, in an attempt to catch it.

"You throw like a girl," she said as she studied the bar. "What is this?"