Foreboding

/fôrˈbōdiNG/

noun

fearful apprehension; a feeling that something bad will happen

Luke's POV

----------------------------

From the moment I received the unplanned call from Ashton to the moment when I stood in front of Calum and told him that one of the girl's was hurt, my heart was beating out of my chest and I was cursing myself for thinking that this plan would work without someone getting hurt. Although nothing was confirmed, judging by the sound of anguish in Ashton's tone, someone was seriously injured.

My mind reeled at the thought of Melissa lying on a table and allowing Ashton to operate on her without any anesthetic or true doctors within the room like she would normally have in the colony. It was suddenly hard to breath as I envisioned her scrunched up face showing the pain that was radiating off of her body.

But then again, I was in the colony, helpless against the inevitable that was occuring miles away in that cabin that I presumed would be safe. I shook my head as my legs carried me toward the exit of the hangar which Calum and I were speaking in.

The tanned boy followed closely behind me, holding his head high as he attempted to save the woman that was the love of his life and his best friend. When I had told him of the predicament, his eyes had filled with tears as he tried to control his emotions under the scrutiny of colonist's eyes.

After we had exited the colony and had placed a suitable amount of space between us and them, he relinquished those tears and allowed them to free fall down his face. Seeing his tears and understanding his pain, I felt my heart slightly constrict in both pain and guilt of knowing that this was all my idea to begin with.

While Calum had not come up with the idea, he had went along with it, thinking that it was in the girls' best interest to be hidden from the scornful eyes of the rebels and that this would be the best way to strengthen the people's belief in our leadership. However, looking back on the decision in retrospect, it was obvious now that we both regretted the decision to send the girls away.

Despite it beginning as a way of protecting each of our prized possessions, it was now becoming clear that we had no idea what type of harm would come to them out in those woods.

Even worse, we weren't even near when those incidents occurred, which made our hearts swell with guilt and our souls long to be beside each of our girls so that we were finally able to protect them from something, but the things that we tried so desperately to protect them from always seemed to occur without our presence.

"I knew we shouldn't have left them in those woods with only Ashton," Calum muttered under his breath, his angry footsteps leading him around the woods quickly as he had memorized the path to the cabin multiple times from his constant trips to ensure the girls' safety; however, all of those trips could have never prepared the tanned boy for the tragedy of hearing that someone had been injured while he was away.

"How did you ever convince me that this was a good idea?!" he shouted out, throwing his hands up in the air as he continued in his fast pace toward the treeline. Although I had scoped out the area thoroughly before telling Ashton that he was able to build there, it was never that simple in finding a safe place for someone like Melissa and Moira.

Those two girls, despite being the sweetest people in the world and only wanting the best for everyone, held death warrants over their heads due to the false promises that my father had made and his ability to brainwash a whole group of people against a person that only wanted the best for them.

I resented my father for that immensely as I realized how strong the hatred was toward the leaders of the colony having partners as Calum and I did. There was a resounding hatred toward our leadership style because the people thought that love in any form was scary and untameable, but then again, they weren't all too wrong.

My love for Melissa was untameable, but that did not make it unsafe or unfitting for a military leader to have. The love I shared with Melissa allowed me to fully embrace the concept of caring for a person to the point that I would gladly step in front of a bullet for them, which was needed when fighting in a war as gruesome as this one was set out to be.

This love that I had found when I was merely an eighteen year old enabled me to look at the world through another's set of eyes and see the true essence of it. While there was always that saying to never walk in another person's shoes, I disregarded that when it came to Melissa, gladly taking on her burdens and refusing to let her bear them as I struggled on and saw her insufferable pain as she did.

Melissa was the only person who ever allowed me to breath since I had been brought to that forsaken colony by my father when I was merely a teenager. That blonde haired and blue eyed girl gave me everything that I could ever imagine in return for my complete trust and adoration, which I had taken full advantage of on many occasions.

She was the shelter in every storm and the current that kept me afloat within the riptide. The girl that I had saved from the laboratory had actually saved me from my life of bland and useless order following. Although she would say that I saved her and gave her a more abundant life than she could ever dream of, it was quite clear that she had saved mine.

As my feet felt the familiar crunch of the autumn leaves beneath it, I found my breathing to grow to be labored from the thought of Lissa's blood covering that old wooden table that Ashton had managed to obtain from a store in town without being caught by any disapproving members of society.

Not saying that Ashton had no idea what he was doing, because we all knew how to stop a bleeding vein or artery or tie off a tourniquet, but this was talking about a possible life threatening surgery. From the way his voice sounded on the receiver, he sounded to be out of breath and running, leading me to believe that they were a while away from the cabin when the accident occurred.

That sign alone gave me chills down my spine as I envisioned Melissa running from a fellow Raider as they tried to shoot at her, managing to nip one of her arteries before Ashton could stop them from shooting.

As we approached the house, it was obvious that something was vitally wrong by the massive amount of light focused upon the kitchen table and the two silhouettes that were standing around the lying down, cringing figure. I caught myself assessing the details of the situation, searching for some sort of sign that the assistant to Ashton was Melissa, but that was when I heard it: a violent scream.

By the high pitched and the breath needed to be taken in behind it in order to reach our distance from the house, I knew that it could only be Melissa screaming for mercy as Ashton did something vitally important to her wound in order to properly take care and heal it. Both Calum's body and my own went rigid at the sound, recalling the last time we heard it.

The flashbacks began from four years ago when Lissa had been taken from the technical room back in Central Office when we had first retrieved the Code. Although I had not witnessed the screams first hand, all of the systems of that raid were recorded and played back to me a week after we first declared Melissa to be missing in action.

The tiny whimpers that had left her mouth as Calum told her that he would give me the line and the sudden strength in her voice when she heard my voice pronounce the words 'I love you' were all recorded and lying within the data system of the colony.

Even worse were the moments after those emotional goodbyes that were only originally heard by Calum and Ashton as they drove away from the facility, full well knowing that Melissa was being taken by Michael's twin to be returned to her mother and father.

While their actions had been a part of Melissa's wishes, it was clear by the frozen state of Calum's body that he would not have done it that way if he could do it all again. His face was ashen and his bones were rigid. Not a muscle in his body moved even in the gusty wind of those autumnal nights; Calum was frozen in place like a statue.

As Melissa's screams rose in volume, I grew annoyed with the normally tanned skinned boy and began pulling him toward the house with a great deal of strength. Nothing caused him to move though as I saw through his dazed gaze and watched his eyes become transfixed upon the door of the house as though it were the most dangerous thing in the world.

"That is my girl in there," I muttered finally, giving up on manual strength in defeating his stubborn nature. His face remained stoic as he stared through me, his eyes meeting mine while his mind wandered toward the logs of the cabin repeatedly. Nothing made him move as I begged and pleaded with him to follow me into the house for my own sanity's sake.

"Please don't make me see her like this alone," I whimpered, watching as one of my best friends in the world finally snapped out of his trance and gripped my shoulder firmly with one of his hands before leading us toward the cabin and opening the door very slowly as if he were afraid to disturb the surgery happening.

However, as he opened the door, I found myself wishing that I had waited outside for the screaming to stop as I witnessed Ashton clamping an artery of Melissa's upper arm as Moira held a single bullet in clamps that were held with shaking hands.

My eyes widened at the site as I saw Melissa's body bow in pain and a inhuman scream erupted from her mouth as Ashton reassured her that I was coming and she was doing fantastic. Sweat bunched at Ashton's brow as he began suturing the area which the bullet had seemingly entered in through.

Moira looked as though she would pass out soon, her hands that were wearing white sanitized gloves were covered in Melissa's blood and her mocha skin looking paler than Melissa's almost pure white skin. The blue eyes that belonged to the mixed girl raised from her responsibility of looking after Lissa to meet with my tired and scared ones as I found myself questioning every single decision that had led to Melissa being kept here in the first place.

Why had I ever thought of taking her out of that laboratory for my father? Why was I so selfish as to let her get into my life and become attached? Why did I not listen to my father's warning that she would die if I continued to see her? But most of all, why had I chosen to kill my father instead of facing the issues we had head-on?

If I had done that, would this be a little bit different? Or would I still be watching the love of my life wither from the pain of a needle weaving in out of her skin as though she were fabric being sewn together?

As I found myself looking at the blonde haired girl more, I felt my stomach churn with the reminder that she had been exactly in this same position only three and a half years prior. The amount of pain strickening her face and the withering away from her abusers touch despite her inability to flee due to being chained to the table.

My heart stopped as I heard another scream exit her mouth and Ashton attempt to console her while Moira finally lost her meal from earlier in a trashcan beside the table. Suddenly, Melissa's body fell limp after that and allowed Ashton to continue stitching without another audible sound; however, I knew better than to think that Melissa would ever stop screaming in pain.

Therefore, tears welled up in my eyes as I realized that the woman I loved was unconscious. More importantly, she was unconscious and upon that dining table due to my decision of keeping her hidden within this cabin in the middle of the woods. Although I had been trying to help her, that moment was when I realized that I had failed her.