On Fire

[gunshots]

"Shh, don't say a word!" The man whispered after firing those rounds and bent down slowly to look at her wound. He earlier had pity on the little girl the moment he saw her bleeding profusely and pointed the muzzle of his pistol away from her quickly before pulling the trigger.

"Make it quick…" she muffled in silence and continuously until he held her hand and moved it slowly away from her ear to see how bad it was.

"This must hurt so badly." He said gently and quietly to avoid being heard, and quickly hurried up to get something from his pocket with which to stop the bleeding, for he had compassion for her as though she were his own daughter and wished he could help beyond using bandages and a few first aid tools he had in his little bag. She was lucky he was a medic too, and did the little he could in just three minutes.

"Ouch…" She kept whimpering while he clothed her wounds, though he was not able to finish up everything for fear of being caught; at least he helped with her left foot and her head.

"Sorry about that. You are a strong girl, you know. You can survive on your own. Fear not!" He encouraged her with a low intermittent tone like a whisper.

"Why are you helping me?" She asked while trying to get up on her feet. He held her and helped her stand on her feet before giving her a reply which were his last words to her as well.

"I don't know. Maybe because I am a good man with a conscience. I can't possibly kill an innocent girl. I want you to head in that direction and do not look back. You are going to come out in the open and do not forget to take your right as you do. Now go!" He ordered, giving her directions too.

He was very proud of her and wished he could just go with her already, but he knew he had to return to the others. He immediately turned after a brief moment of smiling while watching her leave, feeling very proud to have met a brave and strong little girl like Sarah.

"Hey, what did you find?" One of the men who were with him before now asked the moment they both came to meet each other on his way back.

"Nothing." He said briefly and took the front lead to be ahead of the one who asked in order to avoid more questions that might cause suspicion.

"Thought I heard gunshots and I was wondering why you shot them!" The guy sounded obviously harsh on him in a bit to know if there was anything he was hiding, but the lie from his lips cleared all doubts.

"I thought I saw someone move in the dark but it was a rat. Fucking rats!" he sounded roughly in anger and grieved without looking at him.

"Okay, we are done here. Hurry up, we've got to catch up with the others!" exclaimed the other, and started jogging.

[gunfire]

"Get that gun from him. And where the fuck are the others!" Zod bellowed a minute after he had shot one of his men dead, who still returned without giving a positive answer as to where the little girl must have gone to.

"Sir." The one who returned with the man that helped Sarah replied while showing up on the scene only to see that he had shot one of the soldiers dead.

"Were you able to find anything… where are you?" Zod questioned furiously and at the moment was behaving like a psycho. He also pointed the gun he held at the forehead of the man who had helped save Sarah whilst he was asking the two of them and, he, who had the gun pointed at him, melted in fear that he was going to pull the trigger, but he didn't. Zod lowered his gun and walked back into his DSM Leveda car, feeling frustrated that he failed to confirm his kill and the rest of them joined him.

"As lucky as the little boy, huh? Thank your stars you are still breathing." The other soldier whispered in the ears of the one who had the gun on his face a minute ago while they were on their way out.

Sarah kept running with all her strength until she was out of the dark zone. Panting, she began to hop again and turned right as the man had said. When she found a truck carrying grains, she climbed onto it and hid herself in the bags of grain before the driver showed up. It did not take long after she had entered the truck before the driver drove out of the premises. The road was very quiet. She did not even know where everybody in the city went to, neither did she think of where the truck was taking her until it stopped in a noisy environment finally. She waited for the man who drove the truck to exit the truck before climbing down again from the back.

[crowd chattering]

"Wish you were still here Jason." She muttered as she made her way through the crowd in a place that looked obviously like a campground.

"Give me that!" a little boy about her age screamed past her, while chasing a few other kids about his age and as she turned her neck around to look at them in the midst of the crowd, she found a wooden chair and two cupcakes on it with no one there to own it. After a minute of looking around and finding everyone busy with something of their interest, she went for the cupcakes, picked up one of them and started eating while she sat down on the wooden chair to claim her lucky evening snack.

"Hello dear, are you eating my cupcakes already?" a voice asked from behind in a way that got her frightened and when she turned, his face was friendly looking as opposed to his tone…

"I'm sorry sir, I did not know it belonged to you, sir. I can't promise to buy you another one. You can kill me if you want." She begged frightfully the second she saw him and was already up on her feet.

"O come on, why should I kill you when I am also on the run for my life and so are all these people in this refugee camp. No one is going to kill you, my darling. Sit and finish your cake. I will get another one for my two children. Who are your parents and where are they?" He sputtered amicably and asked to find out… but Sarah sat down slowly and bowed her head in sadness as he joined her, paying attention to what she had to say.

"My dad's name is Taylor and my mom's name was Elsa. Dad left and my brother Jason died about an hour ago."

"What… What is the full name of your dad?" The man stuttered immediately in shock to have heard all that and desperate to know because all three names sounded familiar to him.

"Bourne… Dad's full name is Taylor Bourne." She said without even looking at his astonished face, because she was enjoying the cupcake, it happened to be the only thing that made her happy at the moment.