Hayden's vision burned red with rage as he lay grasping his leg, screaming. Kate and three others rushed into the room and tried to assist Hayden, but he lashed out at them like an animal backed into a corner. Pulling himself up onto the cot, Hayden looked down to assess his leg, from the amount of blood he knew it wasn't deep enough for him to bleed out, but it hurt like hell. The four lab coats stared in shock, unsure if they should help or leave as Hayden ripped the sheet off the cot and tore off a few pieces to tie around his leg. Without any hesitation, Hayden was hobbling down the hall, tearing through the facility looking for the girl who had ruined it all.
Sirens began wailing in every room of the facility and Harrison covered his ears as he lay on his cot. With his ears ringing, Harrison closed his eyes and tried to be anywhere but there, especially if Lili was there and she was happy again. Kate rushed into the room several minutes later, flushed and breathing heavy, "He's gone mad!" she breathed into Harrison's face. "You have to find her before he does!" she panted as she pulled Harrison up and pushed him out the door. Harrison turned back in the hallway to look at her, curious as to why she didn't move to help look with him, "GO!" she roared and that sent Harrison running through the halls, searching for his Lili.
Lili found herself pulling on every door in every hallway hoping that one, just one, would give way and let her find a place to hide. The sirens were making her head spin, her body was quickly failing as pain turned to numbness, and she began to feel sleep try to pull her to lay down right there on the glossy white floor. Stumbling over her own feet clumsily, Lili tried yet another door and was almost thrown to the ground in surprise when the handle turned down and let her into a storage room with rack upon rack of colorful liquids sitting in what looked like a mad scientist's lab.
Prowling through the stacks looking for anywhere to hide, Lili read labels with combinations of numbers and letters that only made her head spin more as she tried to make sense of this sinister room. She was so absorbed in reading the bottles that she didn't notice the door handle slowly moving down or the door opening and shutting again once it had let in a thing far more sinister than the room. Hayden moved slowly towards Lili's unassuming silhouette, his eyes full of hate, hunger, and lust. Grabbing a large tube off the shelf full of electric blue liquid, Hayden whipped the tube turned baton through the air and cracked it over Lili's head. She instantly crumpled, covered in blue.
Harrison followed the trail of smudged blood through the halls until he came to a door where the streaks of blood ran under the frame and into the room. Harrison pushed quickly into the room to the sound of grunting, he turned the corner of the second set of racks to find Hayden pulling a crumpled bleeding Lili towards the door. Harrison stopped in shock to see her naked form covered in large red and purples welts, blood covered her body as if her insides could clothe her outside. Rage, unlike anything Harrison had ever felt in his life, boiled through his entire body as he screamed and charged Hayden. Tearing at Hayden like a ravenous dog, Harrison pulled Hayden's screeching form away from Lili and threw him against the wall.
Hayden panted on the floor, but before he could get up, Harrison tore into him, grasping at Hayden's throat and pushing every bit of strength inside him into Hayden's neck. Unable to get his arms out from underneath Harrison, Hayden died within seconds. The sheer weight of Harrison's hate bored through his neck until Hayden's hypothesis was finally disproven; one could not manufacture a person to be entirely good or bad, human nature always found a way to mix them together.
As his anger drained out of his body, Harrison looked down at the shocked face of Hayden, then pulled himself shakingly towards Lili who lay in a fetal position on the floor. "Lili?" he whispered as he scooted up next to her face with his and kissed her forehead. "Please be okay," he kept whispering under his breath, his voice shaking with fear at her unresponsive face. Even through the blood seeping from her nose, the blue tint to her skin, and one eye swelling almost beyond recognition, Harrison felt his heart leaping from his chest just for her to open her beautiful eyes and tell him everything would be okay.
"Lili?!" he whispered, far more desperate as she continued to not respond. "Lili, please!" he begged and pleaded, tears pouring down his face and sobs racking his body. "Lili..." he pleaded again as he pushed her wet hair back from her face. Her eyes fluttered open, scared and searching at first, then warm and lovely when she saw it was Harrison who laid there with her on the concrete floor. "Where did he.." she croaked, "dead," was all Harrison replied.
Coughs began to shake Lili's body and she spat on the floor a pool of blood and spit. "We're going to make it through this Lili," Harrison said as he moved closer to Lili and pulled her onto his lap. "Harrison.." she started before coughing up yet more blood, this time no saliva watered down what she coughed up. Harrison wiped the blood from her mouth on his brilliant white clothes, and Lili began to cry as she coughed up more blood. Harrison looked closer at Lili as she cried and saw that tears weren't leaving her eyes, but blood was. Panicking, Harrison felt a warm liquid soak through his shirt and pulling away Lili's hand he saw every cut on her hand that she had used to make her blood into other things was leaking blood rapidly.
"Harrison," Lili said again softly after her last coughing fit took a break, "I love you," she whispered. "Lili.. I love you too," Harrison said as his tears began to fall onto her blood covered body. "I'm so so sorry," she breathed out as her body continuously evacuated blood from every orifice and cut in her body. Harrison watched the light leave Lili's eyes, and sorrow filled his entire being. "Lili!" He screamed to anyone and everyone, but mostly to her. Tears poured down his face onto hers as he leaned down to kiss her lips for the first time. "I'll love you forever," Harrison whispered to Lili.
Epilogue:
The next fall, Harrison returned to College Prep High, but nothing was ever the same. After spending months in rehabilitation and psychiatric therapy, Harrison just wanted everything to go back to normal. People whispered behind him everywhere he walked, and none of his friends took the time to check in with him anymore. Occasionally he saw glimpses of Claire as she continued through her life as if nothing had happened. The pity in her eyes was mixed with a jealousy that was still unsettled even in Lili's death.
One day in late September, Harrison was called into the headmaster's office. Upon arriving, he saw Kate talking with Mr. Smith and handing him papers to sign. Harrison almost turned around and left right then and there, but the memory of Kate's kindness caught his interest as to why she would be there so long after everything had settled.
When he opened the door, Kate rushed forward and hugged him. Taken aback, Harrison didn't move his arms but also didn't try to leave her embrace. No one had thought to give him any actual comfort throughout all of this and it was so nice to be reminded of what it felt like to be cared for, but it also reminded him of Lili. Her smile, her passion, her dead body lying in his arms.
Once Kate pulled back, Mr. Smith and Kate asked him to verify two signatures on a contract. The paperwork stated that the 'legal guardians' of Harrison Tobiah and Lili Addanc verified that their children could participate in an experiment at the San Francisco Genetic Research Lab. The names written in lieu of their parents' were Mark Brook and Claire Mettlen.
For the rest of Harrison's life, he went to visit Lili's gravesite every September and brought with him a wreath of small purple flowers. He would spend an entire day sitting with her and telling her about how his life was going, how much he missed her and he always ended every visit by reminding her of how much he loved her.
