5. Chapter 5

Adrian, please... where are you?! I called out in my mind, my body trembling as the men dragged me back.

“Ahh! Let my sister go!” Noah cried, kicking frantically as two heavy-set men forced us apart.

I didn't care what they did to me. All I could think of was my brother being thrown out into the Red Hour.

“Please, we’ll do anything….”

“Adrian!” Noah shouted, cutting off my desperate plea.

I shoved my hair out of my face and looked toward the street. Far down the avenue, Adrian was sprinting like a man possessed, his boots pounding against the cracked asphalt. Hope surged through my chest like a jolt of electricity.

“Let us go!” I screamed, twisting violently until the men released their grip.

I scrambled across the floor, pulling Noah tightly into my arms as we stared through the shelter's protective barrier. Right behind Adrian, the crimson silhouettes of the Red Ones were closing in at terrifying speed, long blades raised to strike.

Whispers broke out among the refugees crowded inside the warehouse entrance.

“He actually came back for the kids?” Madam Rosella murmured under her breath.

Just as the nearest Red One swung its blade downward, Adrian launched himself forward, diving straight through the threshold of the Red Shelter. He crashed onto the hard concrete floor in a rolling slide just as the crimson figures glided harmlessly past the barrier outside, completely ignoring the shelter as if no one were there.

“Adrian! You came back!” Noah cried, slipping from my grip and dropping to his knees beside him.

Adrian pushed himself up, gasping for air as sweat poured down his dirt-streaked face. “I promised I would,” he panted, offering a faint smile before looking up at me.

He stood up on unsteady legs and reached out, gently ruffling my hair. I scoffed in fake annoyance, swatting his hand away, but relief washed over me so hard my knees shook.

Adrian turned toward Rosella, holding up the pink plastic container with a smirk. “Here’s your cream, Madam Rosella.”

Rosella snatched the bottle from his hand, inspecting it with a cool, calculating gaze.

“Four days,” she said, her voice smooth and even. “I admire your bravery, Adrian. But don't think you’re safe here forever. You get four days in the shelter. It was supposed to be two, but since you’ve shown how humble you can be, I'll give you four.”

Her tone was calm, but her dark eyes held a vicious, dangerous promise. I could tell from the tight set of Adrian’s jaw that he saw it, too.

“Thank you,” Adrian said quietly.

He gestured for us to follow him as he led us through the dimly lit warehouse to find a space where we could rest for the night.

“I don't trust her,” I whispered as we settled into a shadowed corner far from the main entrance.

A few feet away, an elderly woman lay huddled under a ragged blanket, her breathing shallow and rattling in her chest. Seeing her made my stomach twist. It was a stark, horrifying reminder of how brutal the world outside our hidden tunnel truly was, and I couldn't help but say a silent prayer that my mother was somewhere safe and warm.

Adrian leaned his back against the cold brick wall, eyeing me with mild surprise. “You have remarkably sharp senses for a child who spent the entire apocalypse hidden underground.”

I didn't answer right away. Instead, I pulled a pair of spare jackets from my backpack and arranged them into a makeshift bed on the floor. I might have been sheltered for years, but I had watched half my family perish when the world ended, and Noah was too young to remember normal life at all.

“What about you?” I asked, holding my head high as I looked at him. “How old are you? I never asked. Seeing as you just risked your life for us, I want to learn who you are. Not that I trust you completely or anything.”

Adrian chuckled softly, shaking his head. “Thirty-two.”

My eyes widened slightly. He was almost my mother’s age, though she was a few years older.

“Thirty-two,” I repeated softly. “So what’s your story, Adrian? You know ours, so it’s only fair we know yours.”

I sat down on the concrete, gently patting Noah’s back as he drifted off to sleep beside me.

Adrian leaned his head back against the wall and closed his eyes. “I don't have much of a story, little girl. You should get some sleep. We have a lot of work to do tomorrow.”

I stared at his tired face for a moment before turning away. “If you don't want to share, that’s fine. But know I’m not going to trust you so easily.”

“Fair enough,” he murmured.

In this ruined world, sleep was a rare luxury. I curled up next to my brother, clutching my mother’s faded scarf close to my chest. ‘Mom, wherever you are, we’re going to find you. Please just be okay,’ I wished desperately before exhaustion pulled me under.

***

In my dream, everything was quiet and peaceful, the way the world used to be before the Red Ones came, before my mother vanished. Sunshine warmed my face, and green grass stretched out in every direction. I knelt and reached out to touch the soft soil, but my fingers passed straight through it like mist.

What is this place? I thought, bewildered.

“Hey... little girl...” a strange, echoing voice called from the haze.

Panic spiked in my chest as the beautiful scenery decayed into pitch darkness.

***

“No!” I gasped, sitting bolt upright as my eyes snapped open in the dim light of the warehouse.

Cold sweat slicked my forehead. For a second, I thought the apocalypse was just beginning, before the harsh reality of our surroundings crashed back over me.

Beside me, Adrian was already on his feet, his eyes wide with horror as he scanned the empty blankets.

“Where is Noah?” Adrian demanded, his voice laced with panic.

“Noah?!”

My heart stopped. I scrambled to my feet, tearing through the jackets on the floor. He was gone. His backpack was missing, too.

Shit.

My hands trembled violently as terror clawed at my throat. If Noah had disappeared in the middle of the night in a shelter full of dangerous strangers, Madam Rosella had to be behind it.

Without thinking twice, I charged across the dark warehouse straight toward Rosella’s private quarters.