These Different Times (Nick Clark FF)

40.

Luciana wasn't taking the news that Alejandro was not immune well.

She was more hurt than angry that he led her to believe for all this time.

Nick had gone with Reynaldo to El Pelícano to deliver the Oxy that they were expecting and so Luciana was staying here with me.

We mostly sat in silence; her on the bed while I paced in front of the door, peering out of the windows a couple of times to see if they were coming back.

When he did return, he stormed into the trailer, didn't greet us and just went straight for our bag, which was sitting in the corner of the room.

"Nick?" I asked quietly, speaking for the first time in what felt like hours, "What-"

"We're leaving," he said, cutting me off, "Both of us. Luci, go pack a bag, you're coming too."

"What?" she demanded, "What are you talking about? What happened?"

"Marco says they don't need us anymore. They don't need the supply of Oxy from us. They're coming for us, for all of us. We need to go."

"But what about everyone else?" I ask and he turns, putting his hands on my shoulders, "He doesn't care, Tay. He doesn't care about any of us." he glanced at Luciana, "They killed Francisco. His wife and daughter too."

My trembling hand came to cover my mouth, "They're going to kill us all."

"Yes," he said quickly, "That's why we need to go."

"No,"

The two of us looked at Luciana, who was shaking her head.

"Luci," Nick sighed, "You have to come. You'll die if you don't."

"Then I die," she said firmly, "I am not leaving, Clark. This is my home. I'll die here."

"Luciana, please." I whispered, "Come with us."

"Where are you going to go?" she demands, making me look up at him.

She had a point.

"Anywhere is safer than here right now," Nick stated, "We'll talk to Alejandro. He'll understand."

I wordlessly followed as he left the trailer again, jogging to catch up with him so I could get him to stop.

"Nick," I whispered, "Nick, wait!"

"What?"

"You heard him last night, he's not gonna let us just leave. He's scared."

"We're leaving," Nick said firmly, "Even if he says no, we are going. I am not going to see you get hurt."

"You can't protect me from everything, Nick."

He ignored me and stormed into the building where we knew Alejandro was, "You need to prepare to leave this place."

"Excuse me?" the older man said, "I'm with a patient."

"Marco is coming," I murmured, keeping my voice down, "He doesn't need the supply of Oxy anymore. He's joined with someone else and they're coming here. To The Colonia. Nick's right. You need to get everyone together and evacuate."

I looked around to see that we weren't disturbing any of the patients, relieved to see that while two of the patients seemed to be awake and talking, one was still fast asleep.

"We need to go." Nick repeated, "We're not going to be safe here."

"I am not leaving." Alejandro said again, "No one is. If anyone has a problem with that, they can come and take it up wi-"

As if from nowhere, the man, who I thought was asleep, lunged at Nick, who was sitting on the stool closest to him.

"Nick!" I yelled, shooting across the room to push him out of the way.

"Taylor, don't!"

Alejandro intercepted me wrapping his arm around the man's neck to try and pull him back from him, letting out a painful yell when the man's teeth sunk into his lower arm.

"No!" I yelled, picking up a metal bowl and when the infected was let go, I swung for him.

Nick's hoisted me out of the way before he ran at him, his arms locked around the man's middle before pushing him towards the edge of the balcony.

"Nick!" both Luciana and I shrieked as he and the infected man toppled over the railing, landing on the patients who were on the downstairs level. 

I rushed to look over to see if he was okay, relieved to see that he had landed on the floor while the man had landed on top of another patient.

The next couple of minutes were a blur of total confusion; two other people were bitten; one lost his nose while the other, lost her finger. 

I finally calmed down enough to run down the steps to get to Nick, reaching the bottom in time to see him sticking his thumbs into the infected's eye sockets to kill it. 

"Nick," I breathed, crossing the small space between us and I quickly helped him get to his feet, "Let me see you." 

"I'm okay," he whispered but he stood still, letting me check him over to make sure that he was indeed fine and not bitten or injured in any other way. 

"You're good?" I asked, cupping his face in my hands as he stared by me, looking at the two people who were now bleeding profusely from their bites - including Alejandro, who Luciana was attending to.

"Nick," I pressed once he hadn't answered me, making him look into my eyes, "Are you okay?"

"Yeah," he repeated, giving me a weak smile, wrapping me up into a tight embrace, "I'm okay."

Resting my head on his chest, I looked at the chaos. 

People from the community were on their way to find out what was going on and when they saw that their leader was one of the injured, people understandably started to freak out.

I kept my eyes on the older man as he stood up, his eyes fixed on the bite on his arm and for the first time, I could see fear in his eyes. 

He was terrified.

People rushed to help him, wiping the wound with wet towels, wrapping a bandage round it, anything really to try and stop the bleeding. 

Luciana looked on helplessly, knowing that they all thought that he would die from blood loss rather the infection that was slowly but surely, taking over his system. 

Nick grabbed my hand and started pulling me towards the door and while I was hesitant in leaving Luciana, I followed, knowing that we had to gather up what little we had before we would make our exit from the Colonia. 

I was still a little shaken up from the whole event; I couldn't keep my free hand still and felt as if my legs could give out at any moment. 

I had almost lost him.  

"Grab the water," he whispered once we were back in our trailer, "And the granola bars. Anything you think we might need."

I ignored him and sat down on the bed, placing my head between my knees to try and get some air back into my lungs. 

"Taylor?" Nick asked weakly and I felt his hand on the back of my neck as he gently massaged the warm skin to try and calm me. 

I could feel myself relax, something his touch always helped me do and I reached back so I could take his hand. 

"That's it, Beautiful." he whispered, his lips against the back of my head, "Deep breaths. I'm okay, yeah? We both are."

"We're okay," I agreed, taking one final deep breath. 

He was okay.