Thief

She held the gun awkwardly, away from her body, as if afraid it would spontaneously go off. She'd only picked it up because she could hear someone coming. The building was old, with hollow walls and floors of wood where every step creaked and every sound echoed.

Standing by the window, squinting in the faint gleam of moonlight through the grime on the glass, she inspected the gun. Pull the trigger to shoot, she knew that much, but was there some kind of safety mechanism she would have to do something with first?

The door creaked and she jumped, gripping the gun with both hands, silhouetted by the window. A man came in.

Before she had time to even think, he cried out and fell to the floor. She stifled her own startled cry.

She stared at the dark hole of the doorway, frozen, holding her breath. She saw and heard nothing but a faint stir of breath from the man on the floor. The whole house felt still, at least from here.

Moving hesitantly, she crossed the room. She crouched by the man, holding the gun carefully at her side. His eyes were closed, but he was breathing steadily. She looked closer, and was startled to notice blood seeping on the floor, pooling beneath his head. She watched it slowly spread, eyes wide with horror.

His eyelids fluttered, and she scrambled backwards.

He groaned and blinked slowly, raising a hand and rolling onto his back. She could see dark blood caked in his hair, at the side where it was cut short. The moonlight glinted off his dark curls.

She hid herself in a shadow, crouching, clutching the gun, watching him as he slowly sat up. She was fairly certain he wouldn't be able to see her. She was wearing black, and it was dark away from the window.

Skin washed pale in the moonlight, he turned, one hand to his head where the wound must be. He studied the pool of blood on the floor, smeared where his hair had rubbed through it. She watched him, trying to figure out where the head wound had come from, or why he'd fallen as if shot, or why he seemed perfectly fine now.

Sure on his feet, he crossed to the window and looked out, as if he'd never fallen at all. Then he turned and surveyed the room. She cringed deeper into the shadows.

"I know you're there," he said softly.

It didn't look like he was looking toward her, although she couldn't be sure with the light behind him. He must have seen her before he fell. But how did he know she hadn't run?

She realized he didn't know. Instead of searching the room to see if she was still there, he was hoping he could make her reveal herself. She stayed still and silent.

"I can't see you," he continued, "but I know you're here." His head turned, scanning the space. "You're in this room somewhere, whoever you are."

She held her breath.

"I won't hurt you," he said, holding his hands up by his head. "I have no weapon, and you have a gun, don't you?"

Had he seen that too, in the split second before he fell?

He crossed to the door and closed it. "It's safe to come out," he said. "But if you don't, I'll find you."

He seemed dedicated. Maybe he really did know she was there. Maybe he'd seen her, as he was waking up.

She leapt to her feet, shoving the gun out in front of her, pointing it at him.

"Don't move," she hissed.

He stood with his hands raised, watching her calmly.

"Why are you here?" she demanded.

The moonlight glinted in the whites of his eyes. "Looking for you," he said.

She brandished the gun. "Why?"

"You don't know how to use that, do you?" he asked. He took a step closer, and she backed a step away. "You're holding it badly."

"Why are you looking for me?" she demanded.

He paused. "To get you out of here," he finally said. "You shouldn't be in here."

"I know that," she snapped. She paused. "Can you really get me out?"

He nodded.

"Do it, then!" she said.

"Put down the gun."

"How do I know you can really get me out of here?" she asked.

"You don't," he said. "But if you don't trust me, you'll be stuck here. I'm not helping someone who's pointing a gun at me."

She hesitated. "Why did you fall?" she asked. "Where did that blood come from? Why aren't you hurt?"

"It's complicated," he said.

"Explain it to me, and maybe I'll put down the gun."

He sighed. "I'm... a sort of thief," he said. "I stole a possibility."

She waited for him to explain himself.

"It's how I can get in and out of this house," he said, "when other people can't. I can steal possibilities. I can take something that might happen, and make it no longer a possibility. There's a cost, of course. No one can turn something into nothing just like that.

"I saw the gun, pointed at me, so I stole the possibility of being shot."

"You... got shot in the head so you wouldn't get shot in the head?"

In the darkness, she could only just see his smile. "Something like that."

Did she believe him? She wasn't sure. But she slowly set the gun on the floor.

"This way," he said, turning to the door and holding it open for her.

"You first," she said, so he went out, and she warily followed.

The hallway was dark, but she could see the shape of him in the faint light from a window ahead, above the stairs. She followed him to the end of the hall and down.

At the bottom of the stairs was the front door. Every time she'd opened it, it had led back into the house, as if she was opening it from the outside. She'd gone back and forth a dozen times, getting nowhere.

He put his hand on the doorknob, and she heard a grinding thump from beyond the door. Then he pushed it open.

She shoved past him, dashing out onto the dark porch. The moon shone above, light filtering through the tangle of vines hanging down from the lip of the porch roof.

A sigh of relief fell from her throat, and she turned back to look at him. He waited inside the house, holding the door.

"How did you get in, anyway?" he asked.

She tucked her hair behind her ears. "You can steal possibilities," she said. "I can steal distance."

"Distance?"

She nodded, a faint grin appearing on her face. "Steal the distance between here and there, and now I'm there instead of here. Apparently it doesn't work when you're inside a house that does a similar thing."

He laughed quietly to himself, then gave her a wave almost like a salute. "Goodnight, distance thief."

"Goodnight." She smiled, and was gone.