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My cell is dark and damp. Visibility is zero, and it smells like dead fish. To add to all that I think my left arm is broken. I'm sitting on the edge of my rock-hard cot trying to recollect everything that has happened in the past few days. Where am I? How did I get here? What happened to Rachel? I took a deep breath. I needed to think back to the beginning of these things just to make sense of it all.

School was normal. Well, as normal as my school can get anyway. Rachel asked me to hang out with her that day. I think it was Tuesday? I'm not sure, I've lost all track of time. Any way, back to Rachel. I agreed. Why not? I've had this major crush on her since the eighth grade. She has deep blue eyes, a smile that could melt anyone's heart, and long dark-brown hair that falls just below her shoulders. Simply put, stunning. Even in our school uniforms.

After school we just decided to walk to our houses to get a change of cloths, and just to talk with no interruptions.

"Sooo," she said. "I hear that your going to be going away this summer."
"Yeah." I sighed. "I wish I wasn't. My parents are shipping me away to some stupid military style camp. Linda says that it'll be good for my character."
"That's stupid."
I moaned. "Tell me about it. At least you get to stay here and hang out with everyone."
She shrugged. "Not everyone."
This made me stop. "Why? Are you and Alexis fighting again?"
Rachel shot me this look. It was the 'off limits' look. Yikes. That look scared me. I wasn't sure if I wanted to know the answer to that question. She sighed. "No, Alex and I are a peace. Well, for now any way." That was good, I didn't like it when they were fighting. "I just wish you weren't going. I want to hang out more."

Wait. Is she implying what I think she is? Or is it just paranoia? Maybe it was nothing and she just genuinely just wanted to hang out.
I shrugged. "I do too, but that's not in the best interest of good ol' step mom." I rolled my eyes
"Did you talk to Bill about it?"
"Only about a thousand times. Linda has got him convinced that this will be fun and exciting."
Rachel drew closer and put her arms around my neck. "It'll be okay." She said before letting go.
Maybe it would, maybe it wouldn't. We pressed on. Within minuets we were at home. We both lived in the same apartment complex, but two separate buildings. She lived in the dark blue building at the end of the complex, and I lived in the brown one right smack dab in the middle.
"Logan, once your changed why don't we just hang out at my house?" She suggested.
"Sure thing." I said. We parted and I headed towards my apartment. I twisted the door handle on the large brown door, and pushed it open. The smell of home was the best. It was even better considering Linda got one of those Air Wick candles that she burned all the time.

I ran into my room, changed into jeans, my Pats shirt, and skate shoes. Once I was dressed I headed out the door toward Rachel's apartment. As I walked by the other apartments I noticed some gang looking guys eye-balling me. This kind of thing was unusual in the part of town I lived in. There was three of them. They were all white, wore black do-rags on their heads, beaters, work-style boots, and baggy pants. I kept walking.

The complex was pretty big, and Rachel's house was about 200 feet from mine. I looked to my side. They were following me. My heart started to race. Maybe it was coincidence, I told myself. It wasn't. I'm about 5'10'' and these guys all stood over me, almost by a foot.

I'm not sure what they wanted, but I got the feeling it was something important by the way they circled me. What ever it was they wanted it, they weren't getting it from me. The one in front of me just smirked. He had a tattoo of an eagle on his forearm.
"Give me your wallet kid." Eagle-arm said
Truth be told, I didn't have my wallet. I left it in the apartment on my night stand. I shrugged casually trying no to look afraid. "I don't have one."
Eagle-arm reached into his pocket, and pulled out a rather large knife. "Make it easy on yourself and just give it up."
The two guys behind me pushed me closer to the knife. I was sweating bullets. I had never been in a real fight. Only the training sessions with Lee Mathers. We had gone over this stuff before, but I've never had to apply it. I just looked up at Eagle-arm. He didn't like it.

His response was to grab my shirt and pull me closer. I reacted by grabbing his wrist, spun around so my back was against his stomach, pulled his knife arm so it was in front of my chest, and drove my free hand right into the side of his elbow. I heard it crack, but I knew I couldn't stop there. I used every bit of strength and adrenalin to pull him over my shoulder, and toss him into his buddies.

The all fell over in a mess of arms and legs. Eagle-arm was groaning about his arm. I'm not sure if I broke it, but it was hurting him real bad. His two thug friends stood up and charged after me. The first one to arrive was one step in front of the other guy. He swung for my head. I ducked. The guy swung so hard he lost his balance. I swept his legs from under him. He fell forcing thug number 2 to side step.

The second guy swung for me much like the first one did. I ducked, and spun so we were back to back. I drove my right elbow into the guy's spine. I swept his legs from under him after the blow to the back and he fell flat on his face. His head hit the pavement pretty hard.

Thug number one was just getting his wits back. He was staggering for a moment, but then came right back. He swung at me again, missing barely. He followed it up with a left that clocked me right in the head. He knocked me back a foot. I was disoriented from the hit. That guy just broke the skin on the side of my head. I stayed still lying on the ground in a heap. My eyes were closed and I listened to his heavy foot steps coming toward me. He grabbed the back of my shirt, and I drilled my foot into his stomach. The guy let go pretty quick. I jumped back up and tackled the guy right into a couple of trash cans.

I got up right after the tackle. He didn't. I was out of breath, and my head hurt. I still had my wits, I did a double check to look at his friends. Eagle-arm was still moaning, thug number 2 was knocked out cold, and thug number 1 wasn't going to be coming after me again. He looked up at me with wide eyes. He quickly stood up, and tried to run. He tripped over the cans that were just knocked over. He quickly pulled himself up and ran leaving his two buddies behind.

I don't know what drove me to do it. I'm not even sure how I'd pulled it off. I looked over toward Rachel's house and saw her staring at me with wide eyes. A phone was in her hand, and her eyes were red with tears. I wasn't sure how much she saw, the whole thing took only about 5 minuets.

She burst thew the door of her apartment running towards me. She didn't even bother to put shoes on before she came out. She ran towards me full speed, or as fast as her bare feet could take her. She jumped into my arms and started sobbing uncontrollably.

"I thought they were going to kill you," She choked. "I didn't know what else to do so I called the cops." As if on cue I heard the faint sounds of sirens heading toward the complex. I didn't say anything, I just let her bury her face in my chest and sob as I stroked her hair. (TBC)