Sometimes I Don't Know What You Want Me to Do, Part 42

My vision was more blurry than anything, and whoever was in the room with me just looked like blobs, hovering over me like toy helicopters. I guess part of my mind knew it must be Adrienne and Alex, but my hand felt like it was on fire and there were about five or six other huge holes filled with shrapnel in my body. I couldn't do it anymore--everything faded into black.

I woke again a few hours later. My fingers were back on my hand but they felt unnatural there, clumsy. The rest of my wounds were patched up, too. Adrienne was next to me.

"Are you okay?" She asked. I could tell she'd been hit by shrapnel as well.

"Yeah, I'm fine. What about you?" I asked.

"I'm fine, Alex fixed me up."

"Where is Alex? I need to talk to him."

"I think he's outside," she said.

"Thanks." I stood, but immediately sat back down--I was really lightheaded. I stood again and leaned down to plant a kiss on Adrienne's lips. That girl was something special. I hadn't really been able to focus on her much, but... I knew it was real.

Outside Alex was walking around aimlessly. Harx was playing with the corpse of a dead animal.

"There you are, dude."

"Thanks for fixing us all up, man," I said.

"Well what else was I supposed to do? You were bleeding on my couch..."

"Yeah..." I flexed the fingers on my left hand. They felt like they were made of lead. "Anyway, I need you to help me make a new sword."

From there we went to work, and the process lasted more than two weeks. Throughout the week Adrienne and I grew closer and closer, spending more time talking and just sitting together than ever before. We had a lot in common. A lot. One day I was working with Alex in the makeshift forge next to his house. I walked inside to get a glass of water and there on the couch was Stewart. He looked like shit.

"Stewart!" I yelled.

He jerked awake. "Damn unicorn!!!" he yelled. All the happiness I had from seeing him alive vanished when I saw his red eye gleaming. I hid the emotion on my face, though.

"What the fuck happened to you?" I asked.

"Long story. Unicorn. You know."

"Oh. Duh."

"Wait, so what happened to your hand?" he asked. "I heard something about missing fingers?"

"Yeah..." I showed him the scars on my hand. "Anyway, I wanna show you something. I got a new sword. Well... two, actually."

We walked outside and I got the swords--I had to admit, I was proud of my work. They were beautiful--short and elegantly curved, bright white metal with small rubies up and down the flat of the blades and the hilts.

"Holy shit, dude. You made those?"

"With Alex's help, yeah. We took the liberty of making a new outfit for me, too. I figured I'd need one if I'm gonna be a superhero."

"Good point," he laughed. "Where is it?"

"Oh, watch this." I waved my hand and my clothes changed. Ever since I made my new swords my powers were amplified by nearly ten, it seemed. I was wearing a billowing blue and gold cloak over a suit of light silver armor. The armor wasn't metal, but protected better than any alloy ever could. It was lighter than cotton but much harder. Alex and I had no clue what it was, but he pulled it out of his jacket pocket. My swords went in an x shaped double sheath on my back.

"Nice."

"Thanks."

Just then Alex walked in. "What'd I miss?" he said.

"Nothin," Stewart said.

We joked around for a little while--it was the first time in forever that the three of us had been able to just sort of hang out. It was awesome. But there was something on my mind--those dreams I'd had. They were a lot more important than I was giving them credit for, and I knew exactly what I had to do. But I really, really didn't want to.

"Guys... I... I've got to leave."

"What?" Stewart said. "What do you mean?"

"I... I had some dreams... I... I dunno how to explain it. I just gotta go. I'll keep in touch, guys, but I don't know when I'm gonna see you again."

"Asshole," Alex said.

"Sorry." I couldn't look at either of them. I walked in, still in my armor, and found Adrienne and told her what I had to do. She already knew--we'd talked about it. She agreed to go with me and we went outside to say goodbye one more time. Alex and I had made armor for Harx as well, which matched mine. He purred as we approached. We got on and he was off, flying higher and higher into the air.



-The Knight