041 !! SICK

Several pairs of footsteps creep behind the protected walls of Tannyhill, the grass softly crunching beneath their feet as they shuffle behind trees, their hearts in their throats conspiratorial eyes throwing skeptical glances around to ensure their safety.

"Are you sure this is safe?", Georgie whispers beside Kiara, her fist clenching and unclenching by her side.

Kiara nods with pursed lips.

"She's the only one who can clear John B".

"Okay, I've got a plan", JJ leans between the two girls getting a clear shot of the mansion stood before them surrounded by a vast green expanse.

Pope nods furtively, "We can do plan. Let's do the plan thing. Let's get it. Let's plan it out".

Kiara turns back to him, grimacing.

"Are you sure you can handle a plan right now?".

"Course I can handle a plan right now.
I'm . . . . I'm Plan Guy. I'm . . . I'm Mister Plan-o-Matic".

JJ sighs grabbing hold of Georgie's arm gesturing for her to follow him towards the nearest tree cover.

She obeys, quietly shifting behind him, his hand protectively clutching her arm pulling her along with him.

They settle their backs against the tree, the older blonde peering out from behind it towards the enormous house proudly standing in the middle of the green in all its shimmering glory.

She spots Kiara and Pope bickering in a corner, her gaze narrowing as she strains her ears in an attempt to make out the words being passed between them in a furious manner.

"If Pope follows out properly, we'll be fine. I'll be right here, holding lookout".

Her attention gets captured by the boy standing beside her, pressed deeply against the tree trunk.

She nods in understanding.

He looks at her, his eyes assessing her every inch of her face, a thoughtful expression masking his features as he studies her in silence.

"What?", she frowns.

His stare remains, long and steadfast — watching her, assessing her, looking for some invisible sign that would make sense only to him; her sole partner in crime, her only fellow survivor.

He swallows roughly peeking around the tree when Pope goes running past them.

"Are you . . . are you okay?", he glances at her from the corner of his eye.

Her nerves shoot up at his words, a fearful pit of anxiety flooding her entire body in anticipation for an admission she's sure he's bound to make next.

No. He can't know.

Inhaling, she straightens up.

"Yeah. Why?".

"Nothing. Just . . . with everything going on, I kinda feel like we've been a little distant. You're always busy with work and when we do find the time to breathe, something goes to shit".

He looks physically in pain at the words leaving his mouth, as if the weight of them is only now hitting him.

She places her hand over his, smiling faintly.

"I'm fine, J. You don't need to worry about me".

He glances down at their fingers tangled together, a pensive look enveloping his face.

"I know but I still do. You can always talk to me. You know that, right?".

His eyes are sincere and that only grows her anxiety. It's awful knowing how much someone trusts you, depends on you while hiding something that would absolutely crush them to know.

I'm sick in the head, so horribly sick.

She shakes her head, passing him a nervous smile and takes off behind Kiara when the brunette signals for her to follow.

They sprint through the grassy tract of land stopping directly below a tree that leads up to one of the windows.

The lights are lit behind the thinly curtained window, Kiara already aware of the inhabitant climbs up the tree with Georgie heaving as she follows behind.

The muscles of her thighs and calves ache in the effort it takes to pull herself up the tree and haul her entire body right over to the spacious window ledge Kiara is situated on, already tapping away at the glass.

There is a disturbance behind the window, a light shuffling when the curtain gets pulled back and Sarah's tired face leans in, her eyes widening as it lands on the pair of brown and emerald ones desperately gazing up at her from behind the glass.

She tries to open the window, her eyes searching and scared whilst the glass stays firmly fixed in place.

"Shit", her voice comes out muffled in the normal hush of the night surrounding the two girls sat on the window ledge.

Kiara shakes her head bringing her hand up to reveal a poster with John B's face plastered over it announcing the bounty put on his head.

"Are you in on this?".

Sarah's eyes sadden, her gaze faltering as it shifts from Kiara to Georgie and then back to Kiara.

Her lips tremble as if she's only just on the verge of descending into a proper mental breakdown and that is when Georgie realises that for someone who for the past twenty four hours has been the 'enemy' in her mind, Sarah looks quite frankly very miserable.

She looks like she's spent the entire day with tears streaming down her face, her eyes red rimmed and face contorted into an expression of pain and despair.

That isn't a villain's face.

Call it Georgie's inner ability to melt at every little hint of humanity but right now, despite the fact that she cannot see herself fully trusting the girl before her, all she really wants to do is pull Sarah in for a hug.

And that's what you get for being intolerably nice. So pathetic.

"Did you think I was?", Sarah whispers against the glass, her soft eyes meeting Georgie's for a millisecond before turning to Kiara.

"No", Kiara exhales.

She plants her hand on the glass, Sarah mirroring her and putting her palm over the material separating them.

"Sarah!".

"Kie", Georgie grabs her friend's arm, Sarah immediately repulsing back as the sound of a male voice calling out Sarah's name booms louder and closer.

The two scurry to get off the window ledge and fall back down with a thud, their descent off the tree trunk much difficult than the ascent.

Georgie presses her lips together suppressing the sound prying to escape her mouth when she gets up on her feet, her thighs aching and thorny grass tendrils sticking to her exposed leg itch her skin reddening the surface.

She sighs quietly just as Kiara grabs her hand and pulls her along, their departing frames running away from the magestic house looming behind them.

***
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