Adapt (I)

TJR Garcia © 2020

SCARLET

Boe hasn’t spoken since Logan had fled. Once we clean up the scene, we start driving home. Boe’s face is set in angry brooding mode as he glares at the passing town and countryside.

The air becomes too thick with tension. I have to say something. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.” He says in a low, grainy voice.

“Don’t bull shit me.”

His lips purse. “Just...” he swallows. Something in his demeanour changes and her asks suddenly, “You didn’t need to know their names?”

I stare straight out through the windshield. I hadn’t really thought about it. Logan’s words had been running through my mind too much to think about the five therians Boe and I had cut down. We come into the out skirts of Green Haven. “Yeah, so? Isn’t that what you wanted?” I say, curtly.

He frowns. “It was, but... I was expecting you to flip out. And then you didn’t.”

I bite my tongue with the defensive retort I instinctually want to spit out. “What’s your point?”

He takes a few heavy breathes. “What do you think that guy meant when he called you a hybrid?”

I double take at Boe. “What? I don’t know. I didn’t listen to him. You told me not to.”

“Yeah, but what he was saying... Why didn’t he just kill you? He had you flattened.”

“I don’t know. He was crazy.”

“Scarlet, he got away.”

The words hit me in the gut like a baseball bat. My record, every Therian that I have seen and not one walked away. Except Logan. Logan got away.

I look over to Boe. “Don’t worry. We will get him.”

His jaw muscles flinch. “It won’t be the same.”