Flip the Coin [BL]-Chapter 210. Arriving

I opened the car window and watched the trees and bushes along the roadside. Putting my hand out, I felt the wind pushing it back, and the scenery in the car with my mom came to my mind. The scene changed, and I felt myself sitting on a bike, my hands spread as if I were flying, as if I were about to experience a great adventure.

"Kenny, tell me what’s wrong with you." Henry whispered in my ear before he placed his thumb on my cheek.

"Why are you crying?" He wiped my tears away before I could do it myself.

"I don’t know." I choked out, feeling that my insides were riddled with holes.

"Give me your hand." I put my hand that had just assisted me in flying back inside the car, placing it on his hand.

I watched him bring it to his mouth and kiss it as if I were a girl... What the? Has he lost his mind?

"Look, see how gay I am? Doesn’t that make you angry?" He teased with an awfully smug look.

I furrowed my brows at him spouting nonsense when he put one of my fingers in his mouth, sucking strangely on it before taking it out again.

"See? Infuriating, isn’t it?"

"Is that your way of cheering me up?" I asked with a laugh.

"Mhm. Does it work?" He said, putting another finger in his mouth, looking very dedicated while doing so.

"Bhahahaha!! Let go, you fucker. Gross." I pushed him away before wiping my fingers on his shirt.

Henry bumped into my shoulder with his, and I lightly punched him; then he lightly punched me back. I shoved him, and he ruffled my hair.

"What is wrong with you?" I elbowed his waist, and things might have escalated into a real fight if the car hadn’t halted.

I wanted to look out of the window to see where we were when my chin was grabbed, and my head was turned back to that disobedient dog.

"What?" I asked, as his hand combed through my hair, which he had just had his fun with.

"I need a haircut," I mumbled. Though it wasn’t as long as Henry’s shoulder-length hair, it was longer than I had ever had it.

"No, don’t. It looks cool like this." When he was finished, he nodded at me.

I turned to the window and slid it up while looking out.

This was the Center? It looked like some high-tech building, all in white in a strange round shape, with floor-length windows.

"This looks like a laboratory or something from outer space." I commented, feeling Henry turn annoyed all over.

"Most of The Four Hundred are here, and Ethan said the public is eyeing them. If they still try crap, then we’ll have no choice but to defend ourselves."

"Mhm." I didn’t really care anyway.

I stepped out and saw my grandmother alongside Ethan, who had also arrived, together with police officers and soldiers.

"Mr. Howard? Mr. Devin?" A police officer stepped forward.

"Yes," I answered, with Henry following behind me out of the car and looming at my side.

The officer took out handcuffs.

We were still in front of the building, and I looked at the handcuffs in his hands, unsure what to make of it.

"What do you think you are doing?" Ethan stepped in front of me while Henry pulled me closer to him.

"It’s just procedure," the officer smiled.

"He can walk these few steps without being restrained." Ethan replied unhappily.

"Fuck." I sighed.

"Just let him." I got out of Henry’s hold and lightly pushed my lawyer away.

I presented my wrists and heard the clicking of the cuffs, along with seeing the sadistic smile of the officer and the solemn faces of the soldiers watching from the side.

"Mr. Kennith Howard. The deal your attorney agreed to was five years in the custody of the newly built Center for the Survivors of the South District, without the possibility of being released any earlier. Do you agree to this, and will you sign the deal personally now that you have come of age?"

Five years. I am still seventeen, but on paper, I’m already nineteen. I will be out at twenty-four.

"I agree, and I’ll also sign the deal personally." I nodded.

"Good."

I looked back at my grandma, who had her walking stick gripped so tightly that it’d probably soon shatter, and grinned at her.

It’s not so bad—from lifelong imprisonment to thinking for a few moments that I was a free man, then to five years. I can live with that.

I was dragged to the entrance of the white building while Henry walked behind me. His killing intent made the soldiers who followed so nervous that a few had their hands on their holsters.

When we entered, there was a large white reception room with a middle-aged woman sitting there. The moment she saw us, she placed a stack of papers on the desk. Ethan rushed past us to take the papers first and quickly skimmed through them.

Then a pen was placed in my handcuffed hands, and when Ethan nodded and set the document on the counter, I signed whatever it was.

When I turned around, I found bodyguards with luggage following us, while my grandmother apparently wasn’t allowed to come inside.

Some personnel in white took over my luggage, and the counter lady put the stack of papers that I had just signed away.

This was the first document I signed since "coming of age"—what a bummer.

"Are we in the same room?" Henry asked Ethan, and Ethan turned to the officers before looking at the counter lady.

"...No." She answered.

"We have to be in the same room. You want us to cooperate, right? You want us to heal after what we went through? You see, I am traumatized and scared of everything, so I need to be near my friend." Saying it so matter-of-factly while possessively hugging my neck wasn’t exactly making him look traumatized, but okay.

The officer from before took my handcuffs off, which he could have done before I signed, but did not, and the counter lady typed on her computer.

"Now you are in the same room."

"Thank you, miss." Henry smiled charmingly at her.

She laughed and stood up to show us the way, while the soldiers, police officers, and bodyguards were asked to leave.

I looked back one last time and made a military salute to my grandma, who grimaced back at me through the glass door before I followed the lady together with Henry and Ethan.

On our way through the white corridors full of big, calming drawings, we saw a few people, some in white clothes, some in casual ones, but everyone was part of The Four Hundred, as well as people that looked like doctors.

All of them nodded at us or smiled; this at least created a bit of a welcoming atmosphere, and more importantly, the survivors I saw seemed to be fine. They were also not as skinny as before, so they had been fed, which was also reassuring.

How nice would it be if they really built this facility to help people?

Well, we’ll see whether it’s true or not soon enough.