*COMPLETED*
One event in history has the power to change everything. One choice...can leave an entire society shifted. For the new society, it is a constant battle between two powers, separated from one another by a defining characteristic.
...
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We wait outside his room, waiting for the doctor to allow us to see him. Tate sits beside me, his hand in mine as Mia sits on the other side, Gage on the other side of her. We sit in a row of silence, though my heartbeat pounds violently in my chest.
He was barely alive when they brought him here, and I can't help but think he didn't make it through surgery. I shake those thoughts away as Sam and Logan trot up the hallway, little Becca in front of them as she runs towards me.
"I've missed these so much!" She says, jumping into my lap with a frozen flavored popsicle, her favorite snack that the Sectors didn't have. I laugh down at her, playing with her auburn curls.
"You should have told me that! I would have gotten you some," Tate winks down at her as she giggles, squeezing her shoulders up to her face.
My insides warm to the sight of her smiling. When we were finally reunited again, she immediately asked about Quinn, and I didn't know how to explain to her that he was in the hospital without scaring her. So instead, I brought her with me.
The others came too, Sam and Mia reuniting with happy tears and a very, very long hug. When we came, Mrs. Bridges was still here, too, she nearly fainted to the sight of her daughter alive. Now, we all wait in the hallway, waiting to finally see Quinn after a day and a half. I slept in the hospital ward, everything in the Sectors on pause until William's trial, to which I can't wait to tell Quinn about.
Tate stayed with me the entire time, never leaving my side except to go get us food from the cafeteria on the first floor. His presence never failed to calm me, his smile always bringing me certain joy.
I'm brought out of my staring contest with the floor to the sound of a door opening.
"You can see him now," the doctor says, stepping out of the room and gesturing for us to go inside. A few moments later, he disappears down the piercing white corridor.
I jump from my seat as if it were on fire, rushing to the door and slowly stepping inside.
Inside, Quinn lays on a hospital bed weakly, his ribs bandaged tightly. He appears tired, but as soon as he sees us walk into his large room a wide grin takes over him.
"Hey guys!" He shouts. I stride around his bed and lean down to hug him gently, placing a small kiss to his forehead.
"Hey!" Logan says, popping in and closing the door behind him. Quinn eyes all of us in the room, first staring at Sam, then Logan, then Gage, Mia, Tate, then finally little Becca in Tate's arms.
"What happened while I was out?" Quinn questions.
Gage steps forward and takes a seat on a chair resting next to the hospital bed. "We won man, we won!"
A gaze of triumph and victory floods over Quinn as he tries to move, but winces in pain at the action. "That's amazing! Where's William now?"
"In jail, his trial is tomorrow," Tate explains.
"Trial? You didn't just kill him? Who got shot then? I heard someone get shot," Quinn states, bewildered as the entire room falls silent, heads hanging in sorrow as we realize he still has no idea.
"Quinn," I begin to say, "That was...mom," I shudder. "She was there to save us, she tried to kill William but she missed...he didn't."
Quinn stares forward at his feet with a drained face, hardly believing what he is hearing.
"That bastard is going to pay," he says through a clenched jaw and gritted teeth. The heart monitor begins to pick up, the beeps coming more constant as his heart beat rises rapidly.
"Calm down, please, try to calm down," I say soothingly.
He takes in a few deep breaths, holding back the tears in his eyes with extreme effort.
"Did you bury her yet?" He asks, breaking his gaze from his feet to look up at me with saddened chocolate brown irises.
"Not yet, we were waiting for you to get out of the hospital. She would want you there," I say, taking hold of his hand and squeezing it for his and my comfort.
"I miss her," he says after a moment.
"Me too."
"I want to be there, at the trial, I want to see what happens."
"You can't," I say, "You won't be able to leave the hospital for a while, the trial is tomorrow."
He heaves a sigh of frustration and defeat just as Tate motions to sit Becca down on the floor. He steps forward towards the bed silently reaching into his pocket to pull out two new earpiece devices.
"There were extras, put this in tomorrow and you will hear everything, alright?" Tate says, handing the piece to Quinn who glares at the piece with animus.
"Thanks," he says, "I want to make that bastard pay for what he has done."
"Believe me, buddy, we all do," Sam says with a devilish grin, and everyone laughs gently.
We all stood there for what felt like hours, joking and laughing with one another, bringing up the broken and beaten down spirits of every single one of us.
It all just feels different now, the world is different now. There is no such thing as being a Pure anymore, every single person the same.
My brain still can't wrap itself around such a draconian idea, but I can't help but grin at the fact that we are free.
No more perfection, and no more oppression.
Every single man and woman the same, just like it used to be before the war.
