murder house / h.s

twelve.

Avery's POV

When I woke up, the first feeling I felt was fear. I realized that Harry's awakening had woke me up, but after that I noticed a pile of smoke creeping under the door.

"What's up, love?" Harrys melodious voice hummed, snapping me out of my fear for a mere second. My eyes widened when I saw the smoke was starting to fill the room. And apparently Harry noticed too, because he pressed his body against the wall and against me.

We were pushed up as much as we could be, and soon the whole room was engulfed in smoke. I watched helplessly as Harry let out a chain of whooping coughs, and before I knew it I found myself doing the same.

I wondered what it was like to watch two people die on live television. I wanted to know if everyone was screaming out for Harry to stay safe even though he couldn't hear the anxious fans watching from home.

I was finally accepting my fate-- death.

And all in an instant, Harry let one last cough and fell over. I thought he was just messing with me, but his eyes were screwed shut. He was either passed out, or dead.

"Harry!!!" I screamed, a sense of defeat overcoming me. If Harry was dead, I was surely next. But there was something I knew for sure, and that was the fact that if he had passed out he had minimal time to get oxygen into his lungs before he actually did die.

I had about five minutes, given I stayed conscious, to think of an escape route.

My first plan of action was to throw the backpack over my shoulders. We would need it no matter what, since it had food and minor first aid supplies. Even though it was obvious a bandaid wouldn't fix smoke in the lungs, we still needed it.

Then, I looked around the room desperately. Another cough took over but I quickly regained my strength when I saw our saving grace.

Thank god for air vents.

Only, it was on the ceiling. And last time I checked, neither me nor Harry were that tall.

The bookcase!

I ran as fast as I could over to it and gave it a good budge. Luckily, it moved with ease. I scooted it along the floor, with much noise from the scraping, until it was right under the vent.

By then, I could feel the intense burn in my chest. I didn't have long. And if I passed out, neither of us would get oxygen in time to live.

I quickly carried Harry up-- he was heavier than I had first thought-- and lugged him up as I crawled the bookcase. When I was at the top, I felt sadness overcome me. Something told me the training room wasn't our safe haven anymore.

Now the next problem would be unscrewing the vent. I didn't carry a screwdriver with me, and I was pretty sure Harry didn't either. This is where we were going to get stuck, I could feel it. This was where it went wrong.

And then something told me that we would be just fine.

I believed it.

In one swift action, I took a bobby pin out of my hair and expertly twisted it in the screw. One came undone and fell from the ceiling to the floor, which I couldn't see anymore because of the thickening amount of smoke.

I undid the other, and when I saw the open hole in the ceiling I realized that this would be the hardest part. The bookshelf wasn't far at all from the vent, but getting Harry up and into there would be a problem. It was hard enough simply carrying him, let alone hoisting him up.

But yet, time dwindled down and soon I knew the invisible timer would hit zero very soon. I picked Harry up slowly, and then all at once, before holding him above my head and easing him into the vent.

I was stronger than I had first thought.

Afterwards I pulled myself into the vent, and a feeling of relief took over me. All we needed to do was get to a safer room using the vents, and we would be all good. That is, if I could get Harry to wake up.

"Harry!" I slapped him on the cheek, and in the faint light coming from the training room I could tell that a bright pink mark had formed from the contact. I cringed at the thought of hurting my friend.

"Harry, wake up!"

I noticed his face was covered in black from the deadly smoke, its residue making an appearance on his features. I wiped at my face with my forefingers and it wasn't a surprise to see what looked like charcoal on my fingers as well.

Harry looked so weird when he was asleep, but at the same time he looked so peaceful. His curls hung lowly over his eyes, so you couldn't really see the empty emotion in them. His mouth twitched every now and then, signaling the life that was still present inside of him.

Waiting for him to come to wasn't going to work.

"Come on, you fat lug." I teased, pushing his body along while I stayed crouched down and crawling. "Haz, we have a fire to escape. We just finished the easiest part."

And that's when I saw his mouth stop twitching to form a perfect and friendly smile. I could tell he was staring at me, even though his eyes were obstructed from my view. He was smiling at me.

"Aves?" he coughed, a puff of smoke escaping his frail and weak lips. I lightly traced my finger along his cheek, feeling the calloused surface of the residue along with the smooth surface of his pale skin.

"Yes, Haz?"

"I wish you would stop calling me that." he said, still smiling. He wiped a few strands of hair out of the way so I could see his green eyes, full of life, staring right back at me. "But that'll have to do for now."

"How do you feel?" I asked, my heart still beating out of my chest from our slip with death. Harry just got in crouching position as I did, and started forward very slowly.

"I'm not too bad, how about yourself?" he asked hoarsely. By then we were moving carefully along the vents, checking for rooms we could retreat to that were free of fire. I never did answer.

After a while of crawling, we reached a vent that obviously led to a room. Since Harry was in the lead, he told me that he would check to see if it was clear. He peered into the vent's thin openings, and I heard him suck in a tight breath.

"What is it?" I whispered, fearing there was someone who could hear us from up here.

"Look for yourself." he said solemnly, and moved up further in the vent. Even though we couldn't see each other, I eyed the area where I thought he was suspiciously.

When I looked down into the vent, I felt like I could have melted and fell right through the cracks from shock.

Right below us, was our worst enemy with his gun pointed towards me.

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