Good Night

"Where did she go?"

"She was right there!"

"Look around!"

The six boys ran around in that abandoned area littered by Inexa blood searching for the girl who stuck by them for the past few days. And when it came to them looking out for her, they had failed. 

Kai was the most frustrated. He jumped into a dark road and called out, "Ashe! You there? Make a noise, something. Where are you?" 

s i l e n c e. 

Kai leaned against a wall and breathed heavily. He was exhausted and felt like he was going to die anytime. His energy had decreased by a huge amount and it was coming in the way of thinking properly. He placed a hand above his left eyebrow, it was paining there. A little headache was forming. 

His head jolted up and realised that he was actually outside. Outside the mansion. The incidents that had happened made him forget for a while. He looked up at the stars just like how he did inside the game.

"Huh…the stars look the same in both worlds." He looked around for an address. Where were they? This was his chance to find his family. Well, at least the place they rested. His mom, dad and little brother had passed away long ago, back when Kai was still a smaller kid. 

But another situation was at hand. If they didn't find Ashe now, who knew what would happen to her? Kai turned on his heels and walked back to meet the others. 

"Nothing," Kai said and the others had the same answer. His eyes landed on Adrien who was staring off into the distance. Kai reached out and nudged his shoulder. 

Adrien shook his head and broke out from his trance and blinked, "Hmm?"

"What are you thinking?" Kai asked, sensing something running through his head.

Adrien's face fell and he looked like a normal boy now, rather than a blood thirsty vampire. His hair was messed up and lines of worry ran through him. He covered his face with his hands and groaned, tilting his head back, "It's all my fault…I should have kept an eye on that frail little girl."

"She's not frail," Kai defended, getting tense. If anything, she was the strongest person he knew. "She's strong. She'll be here somewhere."

Adrien shook his head, "You don't know Kai. She's really soft. Anything can break her."

"And what would you know about her, huh?" Kai stood in front of him, "You barely noticed her the times she was in the mansion. All you did was turn the other way!"

Adrien dropped his hands slowly at that, "What do you mean?" he stuttered at Kai's words. Romeo coughed and came between them. For a second, Kai thought that he had come to break them apart from starting another fight but Romeo took Kai's side. 

"I don't know how one could be so oblivious but…she has always liked you, man. Didn't you see it?" Romeo said. Adrien was half frozen and looked around at the others in shock. Luca and Jae-suk also nodded.

"She always asked where you were whenever you went off by your own," Romeo added. Ethan also walked forward and put an arm over his shocked brother. "Remember when we both noticed that our rooms were clean every morning we woke up?"

Adrien nodded in a daze. 

"That was only our room. The rest of the rooms were dirty as usual. But Ashe came in to make our room brighter so that you could wake up to a nice morning every day." Ethan laughed, "She's stupid, that one. But if she really did that for you, doesn't it mean there is something? Just think back, Adrien. How did you not see it?" 

Adrien looked up at Ethan, "I thought she hated me…and since you guys knew, why did any of you ever tell me!" Adrien had lost it now. He covered his mouth and started freaking, "Why why why!"

Ethan and Kai exchanged glances. Kai couldn't bring himself to ask, so Ethan did it for him. 

"Adrien. Do you like her too?" 

...… 

Ashe was thrown in the back seat before Lucas had gotten into the driver's seat and sped away from the city. Her head had collided with the ground and had lost consciousness for a while.

It was calm and peaceful in the car, the roll of the tires being the only sound in his head as he swept across the streets on the way to his hotel. 

A scream erupted in the vehicle and Lucas almost pressed the break in shock. "Tch, you're a feisty one aren't you?" he smirked and glanced at the rear mirror. Ashe had gotten up on the seat and found herself in a stranger's car. 

Her eyes shot from side to side and finally recognised the man in the driver's seat. 

"You!" she pointed. Back in the exhibition. Back at her house. At the ice cream parlous. That creepy look he had given her before he had driven away with Professor Martin. All the memories fell together and chills grew upon her. 

'Was he waiting for me to get out of the mansion?' she thought and got even more freaked when another frightening thought came to mind, 'Did he stand outside my room every night and watch my sleep through the windows?' 

"Why are you doing this?" she finally asked, still trying to be rational. 

"Cause I have taken a liking for you, of course," Lucas smiled and kept his eyes on the road. Ashe widened her eyes, 'Only if Adrien was this straightforward…' She looked outside and tapped the windows. The car was speeding fast.

She tried to open the car door to escape. 

"Not going to work. I've put on Child Lock."

Ashe's hands stopped moving when she heard that. Child Lock. Only a person from outside could open the door now. She tried to get someone's attention when the car stopped at a traffic light. 

"That's not going to work either. The windows are tinted."

She growled in frustration and looked around. Her feet touched an abandoned spanner and threw it against the window. It fell down back on the car floor with a dull thud.

Nothing happened to the window. 

"You can stop trying. Don't you know who my mother is? She travels in this car from time to time. The windows are made bullet proof. What good is a spanner going to do?"

Of course. Ashe fell back against the seat. He was Saye's brother. Their mother being the founder of Evertech, the company with a slightly faulty reputation for stealing blueprints. 

Ashe pounced forward and wrapped her hands against Lucas's eyes. He screamed and tried to keep the car steady, "Do you want to die!?" 

"Stop the car!" Ashe screamed back as she dug deeper into his eyes, even planning on hurting him. 

"LET GO!!" he freed his left hand and controlled the steer wheel with just his right hand. His hand wrapped around Ashe's and pried it away easily. But Ashe had one more free hand than him.

She pulled at his hair and he screamed even louder. The car skidded to the side and kept on skidding across the road. 

"Stop the car if you don't want to die," Ashe threatened and kept a hold on his eyes. 

"Fine, fine, fine!" he gave in and stepped on the breaks. The car slid a little bit more and came to stop in front of a half lit shop. Ashe heaved from the rush and dropped back on her seat. Lucas was heaving too. He cracked his neck bones, 'This girl is driving me crazy.' 

Ashe jumped to the front passenger seat and opened the car door from there. She knew that Child Lock was only applicable to the doors at the back, not the front two. 

Finally, she stepped into the night air. Before Lucas could get out, she ran, her shoes flying for her life. Lucas looked up and got a scare when she saw her run.

"Where do you think you're going?" he screamed after her. 

Once she was a distance away, Ashe slowed down and turned around to look back at him. 

"I don't know what's the deal with you and why you are so fixated with me. But there is one place you should be right now." Ashe panted and made sure he heard what she had to say. 

"And where's that?" he asked, not expecting anything. His hands played with his pocket as he stood in front of his car and stared at Ashe He never expected this seemingly timid girl to be so…wild. 

'Last time I saw her, she was so submissive and so weak looking. A shadow behind others. What happened to you? What changed you to be like this?' Lucas asked her silently, duly surprised. This was making him want her even more. 

"The hospital. Your sister is barely breathing," Ashe dropped the bomb on him and Lucas froze. 

"What happened?" 

Ashe shrugged and said the hospital's name, "Why don't you go and find out? She might even be dead by now." It hurt her to say things like this, but she wanted to make sure that this Lucas creep was going to go for good. At least until she found Adrien and the others. 

But things didn't go as she expected. Lucas smiled and shook his head, "I'm not concerned."

"What?" 

He walked forward and Ashe stepped further backward, already planning to run. 

"She's not my sister," he admitted and slowly, he started to get into a jog too. Ashe gulped. "It doesn't matter to me whether my half-sister goes to heaven or rots in hell. What I care about right now, is you and our plans tonight." 

'Oh my god, what a creep!' Ashe bounced on her legs and started running. Sadly, this time, Lucas followed too. 

Ashe ran as far as her legs took her. She was sweating in the middle of the night as she headed for the area where they took down the Inexas. By the time she reached there, her heart dropped. 

None of the boys were there. Instead, the place was replaced by workers cleaning up the area. She looked around and started to feel suffocated, even though there was no crowd this time. It felt like all the corners of the Earth were starting to press down on her, blocking her lungs and not letting any air escape her lungs. 

She clutched her throat and felt her vision go blurry. 

Strong arms wrapped around her torso and she heard a hearty chuckled in her ears, "Gotcha!" 

She looked up at Lucas' delighted face and this time, he didn't make the same mistake by letting her free. He dug out a bottle with clear coloured liquid from his car for times like this and made her smell it. 

Slowly, Ashe's vision completely blacked out and she fell completely limp in his arms. Satisfied, Lucas once again travelled the streets with a quiet Ashe at the back seat. 

He called for a wheelchair once he reached the hotel and helped her sit on it. Nobody noticed that it was actually a kidnapped girl. All of them thought she was a recently discharged patient who fell asleep. Her face was that pale and beaten up. 

And by the way, this was a hotel filled with rich people. Why would kidnappers come in broad light and show case their victim? Lucas wondered how many kidnappers got away with it that way. And how many kidnappers were getting away with it every day. He smiled in pride as he added himself to the list of kidnappers who got away with it. 

He was going to have a good night.