"I know how to be invisible here."

"Not to me, Warren. Not to me."

He watched Max and Chloe rush away, their footsteps heavy against the sidewalk. If Warren could have measured the number of times Max had walked away from him, he would have had a mountain range by now. He sighed and leaned against the wall, his head bumping against the bricks as it dropped back. He was starting to wish that he had taken that drink after all.

Warren could always separate his intuitions into two parts—the sensible and the impulsive. He considered himself a sensible guy; he measured possibilities by their logic, by their realistic potential. But when it came to Max, he often did the most reckless and idiotic outcome he could come up with. He would have stood on his head and juggled potatoes with his feet if it meant it could make Max laugh and that was what made him really uncomfortable. He did not like to be vulnerable.

But as Max slipped away into the dying sunlight, nothing but a barely-there silhouette, vulnerability was not on his mind. There was something wrong with the way they broke away from him, their urgency in finding Nathan. Something bad. Something big. It only took one look at the double moons that wavered in the night sky to see that.

So, really, it was no surprise to him that he pushed himself away from the wall and ran in the direction they had disappeared to. It was no surprise that after he rushed into his car and peeled away, he tried desperately to follow the trail of fading headlights. It was no surprise that he was being reckless and probably idiotic because he had no plan, no idea of what was going to happen. There was only a sense of danger and a sense that Max was about to dive headfirst into it.

"Damnit, Max," he muttered, slamming his hands against the steering wheel. They had parked at the junkyard and he would have missed it if he hadn't seen them dart away from their truck. He considered calling after her, but their hushed voices and tiptoes told him not to. His bottom lip caught between his teeth, he snuck behind them, dodging from behind one pile of junk to another.

The gentle evening breeze had gotten angrier, shoving him off balance. He heard footsteps to the right of him and pressed himself against an old refrigerator, his heartbeat thundering against his chest. A person walked past him and he peered out just enough to catch that it wasn't Nathan edging towards the girls but Mr. Jefferson. Panic seized like ice upon his veins and in the second it took him to choke out, "Max," a gunshot ripped through the silent night air. It was as if time had frozen, skipping by frame by frame. He saw Chloe lean back into the night before she collapsed. He saw the needle pierce through Max's skin before Jefferson dropped her to the ground. He saw her poised in the air for one terrible moment before she slipped into unconsciousness, his hands numb as they clung to the side of the refrigerator. He saw Jefferson heft her over his shoulder as if she were a sack of vegetables and it was only after he lifted both girls' bodies into his car and left that Warren felt the paralysis leave his body.

He shook his head slowly, trying to piece the scene before him into a logical scenario. Had he really seen Chloe get shot? Max get abducted? Mr. Jefferson the catalyst to both actions?

"No," he groaned, the word strangled in his throat. He rushed towards his car for the second time that night, speeding like a maniac as he took off towards the path Jefferson had left. He pulled his phone out of his pocket, nearly dropping it as his hands shook violently. He called Mr. Madsen first, then 911, then followed the dust trail of the car ahead of him. The wind scattered debris across the road with a vengeance.

It was a barn they stopped at. Old, slightly caved in, abandoned. The police had warned him to keep his distance, but the logical side of Warren had left long ago. To his credit, he did spend five minutes walking circles around his car, trying to ward off the insanity to rush in after Jefferson and bash his head in. But it was only five minutes and afterwards, he pulled out the old tire iron in his trunk and he still rushed in, making his way into the barn and then downstairs.

He got stuck at the door, but it didn't take him long to crack the code. Numbers had always been his thing, and as a kid he'd made everything into codes translated into more codes. This was just another code to work like an entangled string through his fingers.

He slipped his fingers between the door and the frame as it popped open, trying to slip inside as quietly as possible. The door brushed against the wall and he heard Jefferson's voice, full of laughter and measured words— the lazy claws of a predator.

"Oh, Max, you could have been my best subject. Such a waste, really."

A hand grabbed hold of Warren's wrist and he hissed as he whirled around to find Mr. Madsen's wide-eyes and his index finger pressed tightly against his lips. He pointed behind him, where the oncoming siren of the police could faintly be heard.

"He's in there," Warren mouthed, pulling his wrist loose. "The son of a bitch."

Madsen shook his head, a single warning. But Warren was past warnings. "It's Max," he insisted, as if no one seemed to understand. "It's Max. He just...he drugged her. She was like a corpse that he just dragged off to do fuck knows what. And I don't...and Chloe..." He trailed off, seeing the fire in Madsen's eyes and he couldn't say it. There was a chance she wasn't dead. He'd only seen the bullet, see her body fall. There hadn't been time to dwell on much else.

"Move aside, son," Madsen mouthed, pushing him aside as he rounded the corner.

There was a whiplash of air against Warren's neck as the door burst open again and a band of policemen marched in, their loud voices carrying against the still room like ricocheting bullets. Outside the wind screamed.

"Police," they announced again, unnecessarily, and Warren ran forward, reckless and idiotic, and yelling for Max even as he rounded the corner and saw Max taped to the chair. Even as he saw the needle in Jefferson's hand, too full and too final and pressed too closely to Max's neck.

He swung the tire iron at Jefferson, felt the clang as metal connected with bone. There was a shout as Jefferson stumbled, a chime of metal against the floor, and the burst of gunshots ringing in his ears. He heard the shouts telling him to move aside but the only thing he could focus on was the word that tumbled out of mouth over and over again.

"Max!" He threw himself upon her sitting form. "Max," he mumbled and her eyes were heavy and glazed over as she looked towards him. He tugged the tape loose and she collapsed into his arms. "It's going to be okay, Max," he muttered into her hair. Her breath shivered against his chest, uneven and confused.

There was more clatter behind them as the police cuffed Jefferson, bleeding from his foot and his side.

"I found Chloe," Madsen called and Warren noticed the form lying to the other side, the shallow rise of her chest the only indication that she wasn't lost.

Paramedics rushed in and suddenly the room was too full of people rushing from one side to the other. Blood, yells, someone crying, the sound inhuman as its shrillness rose higher and higher above the noise.

"You need to back away, sir," one paramedic said, and Madsen only shuffled from one side to the other. "You can ride with us to the hospital."

"They're saying there's a tornado out there," another paramedic said in a hushed voice.

"The wind's already dying off now, though. Definitely not a tornado. Working up to nothing, I think."

"Chloe," Max mumbled, her hand grasping wearily at the air in front of her.

Warren grabbed hold of her hand, squeezing it lightly as he struggled to hold her wandering gaze. "She's still alive," he reassured, but that was all he could say as her eyes slipped closed. A paramedic was attempting to take her pulse while another pair shooed Warren away to place her upon a stretcher. He watched them take her away, like pieces on a chess board, one role for each person. It was if all the emotion had been stripped and placed into the ambulance that sped away, leaving Warren with only the thunder of his heartbeat still in his head. He wished his emotions could have been stripped as well.

"Is there a cheeseburger in that bag?" Max asked hopefully, wincing as she peered over her shoulder.

Warren chuckled and pulled out the wrapped burger, sneaking a quick glance behind him to make sure no one had noticed.

"Oh, come on. It's not like anyone would care. They know the food is shit," she encouraged and immediately ripped apart the wrapper.

"I had to fight a ninja to get that. Also, jump through three hoops of fire and ride a shark," Warren bragged, settling into the chair beside her. He threw his feet upon the bedside table next to him.

"Oh, well, in that case, you forgot the fries. Mind going back?" She had already devoured the burger.

"I suppose," he said, cracking his knuckles. "But it'll cost you." The words came out a bit too harshly and he winced, hoping she'd know he only meant it as a joke.

"Well, as soon as I get out of here, I'll buy you a thousand burgers to make up for it. You know, for the whole...Jefferson thing." There was a far-off look to her eyes, the humor vanished. The crumpled wrapper dropped from her hands and he picked it up, placing it into the small trash bin next to him.

"When are they letting you out?" he asked softly.

"Tomorrow. They were only keeping me on watch for the rest of the day. To see if I had any adverse reactions to the drugs or anything. And I guess to see if I was all here."

"Oh?" was the only thing he could stutter.

"Yeah, I think I'm good. I mean, you know, considering." She was focused on a stain on the wall behind him, her eyes tracing its unusual shape.

"I thought I lost you," he breathed and her eyes snapped back to him. "I mean, it was like I could actually feel the life leave you as you were in my arms." He cleared his throat and picked at a loose thread on his shirt.

"Yeah, it was...close," she said after a few moments of silence. She held her hand open in front of her, flexing her fingers open and closed. She sighed and her hand dropped limply to her side. "They said I died in the ambulance. They had to restart my heart and there were a few moments where they thought I wasn't going to come back."

He paled and pulled too hard at the thread, ripping the end of his shirt. "But you did," he choked out.

"Yeah, I did."

"How's Chloe?"

"She's...okay. I think. She's not out of the woods yet. They think there might be some brain damage, but they won't be able to tell till she's conscious." Neither of them mentioned the possibility of her staying unconscious.

"Well," he said and the room felt too small suddenly, even with the two of them. The beep of her monitor beside her and the discordant buzzing of the intercom outside filled the silence between them.

"I...thank you, Warren. You know, for everything, really," she finally said.

He reached a hand gingerly for her own, running his thumb over the back of her fingers. "Well, you know me, mister white knight and everything."

She scoffed and squeezed his hand before struggling with a yawn. "I'm really tired."

"Okay. Call me when you get out and get settled at home? I could bring you another burger or something." He kicked his feet off the table and dusted a piece of imaginary dust off of his pants.

"Could you...maybe stay a bit? Just until I fall asleep?" A small blush crept over her cheeks and she looked away. "I mean, you don't have to. It's just...easier to go to sleep that way."

"Uh, yeah, of course." He reached for her hand again and her grasp relaxed into his. She gave him a sleepy smile and he flicked on the TV above them, turning the sound down to a whisper. A news team sat before them on the screen, relaying the storm that didn't quite happen—a tornado that built and then quickly died before it could gain power.

"Most amazing thing I've seen in my career," the meteorologist told them, pointing out the numbers on the screen behind him. It definitely was amazing, and bizarre, and Warren could almost pinpoint the waning of the storm to the moment the ambulance pulled away from the barn.

They said I died in the ambulance.

He shivered and turned the TV off, slipping Max's hand out of his own as she settled deeply into sleep. He walked around the hospital for a bit, stopping to chat with Joyce and Mr. Madsen in the waiting room near Chloe's room. He nearly offered to get them coffee when he noticed the nervous smile that brightened Joyce's face.

"She's awake," she told him and she laughed as she pinched Warren's cheeks. "She's got some memory loss, though. And she's having some trouble with her speech. But it could be so much worse. We'll just have to keep going down the road to see what happens, but she's still there. She's still Chloe." Her laughter turned to sobs and Warren placed an awkward pat on her back before Mr. Madsen took over.

"Max is asleep, but—"

"Oh, I'll let her know, honey, don't worry. You should head on home. You've been here all day. Nothing left for you to do that you can't do at home." She collapsed back into her chair, fanning her face with a magazine.

"Yeah, yeah, you're right." He gave them a brief wave and headed downstairs towards the exit. The sun had been rising when he'd entered the doors that day and now the sky was dotted with stars. The hours had faded away though; it was only the ache in his knees from sitting for so long that had given away the reality of time. He leaned against the window beside the door, lifting a hand shakily through his hair. The night breeze was unbearably calm against his skin. But Max was okay, she was okay, and she would be so glad to hear that Chloe had made it. It was a bumpy road, but it would all be okay. Not perfect. Never perfect. But okay.

A butterfly swept down from the breeze, its wings electric blue as it fluttered past him. It settled on his shoe, beating its wings for one second, two, before taking off again, wherever the breeze would take it.