This place was unfamiliar to me, surrounded by stacks of 40ft containers flanking in an orderly manner along the way. Either we were nearby a port or inside freight facilities. Nick walked me to his dark coloured McLaren 675LT Spider by the car park and let me in. I lounged into the passenger's bucket seat similar to Milla's 911 while he reclined it backwards to reduce the stresses on my back before strapping the seat belt for me. He shut my door and entered into the driver's seat.

My face was too swollen to properly appraise the interior of the car but I managed to watch Nick pressing the ignition, turning some buttons and tapped the touch screen panel in the middle console just to secure my comfort. He pressed the accelerator pedal, making the car roar like a T-Rex.

As we exited the compound, I carefully turned to my left to see a white-coloured fascia board on a barrier wall with 'ShipGoUK.com' and an address printed on it, Bennett Street, Ardwick.

He didn't say where he was taking me to but then again, I didn't ask. The pain was still throbbing despite the anesthetics he gave me which left me feeling drowsy. The entire journey to the unknown was silent except for LANY's song 'Valentine's Day' played on his audio system followed by another LANY's 'Malibu Nights'. I never thought he could be so melancholic.

We arrived at MRI's A&E approximately five minutes later, where he parked his car in one of the disabled spaces in reverse. He unbuckled his seat belt, got up and opened my door. He tried to help me to get out but I refused and insisted to go back home. He ignored my request, placing one of his arms around my back with the other under my upper hamstring, to boost me up, making me stand.

Once I was out, he shut the door behind me and urged me to walk a short distance to the entrance ahead of us but I declined, ordering him to send me back. So he lifted me under his arms and carried me all the way into the waiting hall.

Although there was another staff member greeted behind the reception counter, to my dismay she was just as nosy as the previous one. She interrogated us about my bruises and scars to which Nick and I simultaneously answered, "She had a fall" and "I was beaten up".

When an awkward silence emerged between us, Nick quickly rectified our contradicting statements in a casual manner, "My men got drunk, beat her up by mistake and she fell down a flight of staircase."

"Oh," she mouthed. "I thought you two were a couple or something."

Once again, Nick and I instantaneously replied, "Nope" and "No", shaking our heads.

Hearing this, she slowly edged away from us.

"Why were you there, Zahida?" Nick tilted his head to my side.

"The name is ZJ," I retorted.

"But Zahida is your name, isn't it?"

"Only a few can call me that."

"Thank you, I'm honored to have that privilege." Nick grinned cynically to which I didn't respond. "Why were you there?"

"I was doing stupid things my instinct told me not to."

"What was your instinct telling you to do?"

"Stay home and countdown to daylight savings."

"Counting down to daylight savings," he echoed. "That was one important mission the world needed you to do but you abandoned it because you preferred to go to his aid, and for what?"

I kept quiet, too pained to respond, too angry to answer.

He sighed and said softly to my ear, "What Abs did to you back there was the reason I spared your life today. Don't go chasing down something that isn't worth it. Get yourself protected. Be like me."