Katrina approached the room her best friend, Helen, and herself had occupied for the past several months. She took one glance around the room before heading towards the adjoining room. There was still one more box to carry down to Helen's truck before the two of them could leave.
Katrina bent to grab the box when she heard some footsteps outside the other room. The sound froze her heart. She knew what was coming. The men that had been following her since the time a woman showed up out of no where and gave her a medallion. She felt around her ankle to make sure the knife she always carried was on her.
Slowly, she crept into the other room trying not to make a sound. Katrina peeked out the doorway to see where the men were. She couldn't see them.. She could feel that they are there but she couldn't see them. This did not bode well for her.
"Get her!" a voice cried.
"Don't you guys ever give up!" yelled Katrina as she ran down the hall away from her pursuers. She didn't expect an answer from them.
She needed to get to Helen as soon as possible. That is if her pursuers hadn't gotten ahead of her and caught Helen already. In the past, the men would do anything to catch her. At one point, Helen's life was threatened if she didn't go with them. She started worrying more of Helen's well being than her own.
Katrina shoved the doorway into the stairwell, trying not to lose too much her momentum. She ran down the stairs only to find herself confronted with one of the men that was determined to catch her. She recognized him as one of Helen's previous captors. She turned to run the back and found her pursuers descending on her.
"Fuck off!" Katrina yelled at them as she jumped the railing to the next set of stairs. She took off down the stair to hear people landing behind her and someone cursing in some foreign language. One she had never heard before.
Stopping her downward momentum, Katrina turned to the side and went through a door with a large 3 on it. She made several turns and went down a hallway. She slowed to a walk listening for the men after her.
Hoping she lost them, she quietly walked to the other set of stairs on that floor. Upon reaching it, she could hear someone talking. She took a chance and opened the door. Once again she thanked Helen for her forethought on oiling all the hinges within the building. She made her way down the stairs but froze when she heard the door that she just stepped out of, slam shut.
"Down here!" she heard someone yell above her. She ran down the stairs.
"Ah man," grumbled Katrina. she jumped on set of stairs to the landing between floors, nearly losing her balance. She glanced behind her to see one of her pursuers. "Shit!"
With that she jumped the last set of stairs. She took off running through the dark, unoccupied garage as soon as she landed. From the sound of the men running after her and the revving of an engine ahead of her, she deduced that they had not captured Helen yet.
She could hear other footsteps join the lone one that was after her. Now she couldn't tell how many was back there. All she knew is that every single one of them wants to catch her. "Dammit."
"Kat! Over here!" She heard a trusted voice yell. The voice belonged to Helen. She breathed a sigh of relief and began to run full tilt towards her friend.
Behind her, she could hear the footsteps become heavier. The men themselves had heard Helen call out to Katrina. They had not foreseen this and were now regretting it. With this inconvenience, they were not about to let Katrina escape them again. Some of them men began to pull something into him.
"No! Nonononono," Katrina whispered. She knew what they were going to do. They had used it once before in the past and had gotten several innocent bystanders killed. It was magic.
She reached into her pocket to pull out the one thing that could save her and Helen. It was the purple medallion that had started all of this. The chases through the streets of Los Angeles. The reason behind Helen and herself could not settle down in one place for too long. The reason behind the death of her foster family.
Katrina smiled grimly. She wasn't about to allow them their magic if she could help it. Not this time. No words were necessary. Just a thought, a strong wish on her behalf would release the necessary magic of the medallion.
Several men cursed as they discovered they could not release their magic. A few of them doubled over in pain and fell to the floor of the garage. Katrina's denial of their magic made some of them go frenzy with desperation. One man pushed himself forward to grab the back of Katrina's shirt.
Katrina wasn't of the same mind as his. For freedom was more important to her than her modesty as she squirmed out of her shirt. She left her shirt in the grip of her would-be captor as she lurched forward towards Helen's truck. She gathered herself and leapt into the back of Helen's black truck. She barely had time to grab onto something when Helen peeled out of the garage leaving behind many disgruntled pursuers.
As she sat in the bed of the truck, everything that happened began to sink in. everything in that vacant office building was too close. Too close for Katrina's comfort. They had almost gotten a hold of her and her precious violet medallion. With a sigh, she crept to the cab and crawled into the cab.
Helen's cool blue eyes studied her friend as Katrina settled in the passenger seat. She was worried about her. Helen had come to know Katrina in the 3 years they had known and lived with each other. She considered Katrina her younger sister even if Katrina was one year her senior.
"There's a shirt in my bag you c'n use." Helen said softly. "Ya know, there are other ways to get away without losing your shirt."
"I know," Katrina murmured, rummaging through Helen's backpack. "I was desperate. They were beginning to use their magic again."
Katrina didn't need to look up at Helen to know she was worried. She could feel her anger and worry.
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Katrina closed her eyes as she leaned back against the tree. She was exhausted from that morning's activities. Helen and herself had stopped by the nearby park to rest a little bit from searching for a new place to live. It had been this way for three years now. It had all started ever since that strange woman stopped her when she was on her way home from school.
"Katrina," Katrina heard someone whisper. Without knowing why she did what she did, Katrina stepped into an alley. Someone in some sort of grey cloak stepped away from the trash bin. Katrina studied the person carefully, cautiously. She didn't like the feeling she was getting.
"Thou art, Katrina?" the person whispered questioningly. Katrina backed up in fear. The fact the person knew her name and the way the person talked frightened her.
"I am," Katrina replied.
"I bid you, do not go," the person said, pulling her hood down so that Katrina could fully look at her in the face.
"Who are you?" Katrina asked, her curiousity getting the better of her. Katrina thought it odd to see someone with a bright a red hair as the person in front of her had. The lady, so Katrina had thought her to be, had captiviating amytheist eyes.
The lady walked up to her, keeping her there with her eyes. All Katrina could do was stare into the strange lady's eyes. The lady looked to the side, breaking off the contact, to take something out of her pouch. She took out a beautiful violet medallion. It seemed like the medallion was made of some sort of purple metal.
"This is for thee, my lady," the lady said placing the medallion into Katrina's hands. Katrina shook her head. she had a feeling that she should not accept this.
"I am sorry, my lady, but thou must keep it." the lady said with a tone that brook no arguement. The lady wrapped Katrina's fingers around the medallion. "Thou must be careful. Danger dost that medallion brings. Danger to thy family and to all who knows thee."
"What?!" Katrina asked, panicked. Katrina went to grab the lady's cloak, but the lady went back to standing by the trash bin and she disappeared.
Katrina stared at the spot the lady had just occupied. Then she looked at what she held in her hand. She didn't want this. She didn't want to endanger her family or her friends. Snarling, she threw the medallion towards the trash bin. It never got there.
Katrina's breath shortened in fear as she saw the medallion hang in front of her. Everytime she moved back, the medallion followed her. She turned around and ran. She ran home as if the devil himself was on her trail.
Upon reaching her room, she turned around, and shrieked. The medallion was still there, hanging in air. It had followed her home. Try as she might, she could not get rid of the medallion. That medallion also started the misery of her life.
The following weeks, was torture for the 13 year old. She was constantly followed to and from school. Other times, she was chased and threatened. Everything boiled down to a point several months later, when Katrina came home from school to find her home burning. She could hear the screams of her family from inside. A man, whom she recognized as one of the people trying to capture her was there, by the front door, waiting.
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