Authors: Nia Shay
"What?" I rounded on him, mouth agape.
He shrugged. "Why so surprised? It's always been that way--you give, he takes. It seemed to me an intervention was in order if you're going to have any hope of making it out alive."
"You mean when I closed that wound, I closed off from him?" I jabbed an accusing finger into the center of his chest, staggering him. "I was supporting him and
you
made me stop?"
"I didn't make you do anything, dear heart. You followed my advice of your own free will."
"But you tricked me!"
"I
saved
you. You need your strength to fight. Forget about him."
"No, damn it!" Distraught, I raked my hands through my hair. "If he dies then there's nothing worth fighting for! I want him to live. I love him!"
Brax cocked his head. My own voice came out of his mouth like an eerie movie effect. "What is 'want?' What is 'love?' Can you tell me?"
"Shut up!" I burst into sobs, torn between frantic desires--to help Zeph or to murder Brax. I probably wouldn't manage either one.
"Jandra." He faced me stoically, a sullen blur through the haze of my tears. "Remember what I told you. Sacrifice is not in your nature."
"You don't know me. You don't
know
me!" Some foreign object materialized in my hand, and I hurled it at him.
"Get out of here!"
He dodged deftly, giving me one last, eloquent look. He made no brazen reply, simply vanished.
I turned back to Zeph--and screamed. His chest had gone still at some point during our argument. His eyes were open now, but glassy, glaring straight through me with a bitterness that said I'd intentionally betrayed him. I sank to my knees beside him and pushed his head to one side, unable to bear his empty accusation. Then I laid my head on his cold shoulder and wept.
It was the crying that woke me from the nightmare--a cacophony of heart rending sorrow, like pouring rain and thunderclaps and tolling bells and shattering glass all rolled into one. It dragged me from my little oblivion, my own unconscious whimpers squeaking to a stop.
I opened my eyes to find myself in a very familiar room. Zeph lay below me, splayed facedown on the tile floor. He'd levered himself off of his own table and collapsed beside mine, leaving a wide smear of red in his wake.
"Zeph?" I whispered.
His head came up slowly. "Jandra." His tear-stained face was wretched, the very picture of tragedy, yet when he saw me he managed a weak smile. "You're alive."
"Of course I am." I slid down and dropped to my knees beside him, trying to ignore the thickness of the blood pooled beneath my legs. Gripping his shoulders, I eased his head into my lap. "Just hang on. I'm going to get us out of here, and we'll get you help."
"Jandra. You must listen to me."
Oh, hell no. No death soliloquies. I wouldn't let him. "There's no time for talk now. We have to...."
"Not we. You."
I winced. "Stop it with that! You're gonna be okay."
"Jandra...." He exhaled the word as his eyes slipped shut.
"No!" I shrieked, digging my fingers into his shoulders. "Stay with me!"
He opened his eyes again, though his anguish showed clearly on his face. "There's only one way for you to survive," he wheezed. "You have...to take me."
"
Take you?
Oh yeah, there's a good idea. In case you hadn't noticed, you're sort of dying!"
"I'm already dead."
I wept a frantic denial at his words, but I was lying to myself and I knew it. No one could bleed this much and live. Still, I wouldn't be the hand that struck him down. I couldn't. I refused. I opened my mouth to tell him so, though my resolve surely showed in my eyes.
But before I could say a word, he smiled at me again--not a pained grimace this time, but that radiant smile that made him look every inch a son of the divine. My words died in my throat as he raised a trembling hand to cup my cheek. "You've given me everything, Jandra. Now it's my turn. All that I am, I give to you."
"No, Zeph."
"It's the only way." A tear welled up in the corner of one amethyst eye. "I love you."
"Please." I shook so hard it hurt. "Please don't make me do this."
"You must live."
"No! Not without you. I love...!"
And my world exploded into a blinding inferno of agony. The reflected pain I'd felt from the bullet wound paled in comparison. My screams echoed off the concrete walls, impossibly high-pitched, a jarring counterpoint to the indistinct roar of human minds that suddenly filled my ears.
His fingers convulsed against my face as he forced even more azoth into my body. I couldn't pull away. I couldn't shut out the noise. His nails tore into my cheek, and still his life burned through me. My lungs ran out of air. Fire raged in my chest. Muscles strained. Joints locked. So much pain. So much pain.
Until, perhaps a minute later, it cut off like a switch.
Gasping, I slumped sideways, hitting the bloody floor with a sickening splat. I nearly gagged on air as my lungs finally filled again. Dimly, I could hear Zeph panting beside me. He was still alive, at least for the moment. Thank God.
I wasn't sure whether or not I'd survive, though. I felt like I'd been flayed. The glut of energy he'd force-fed me set my insides to boiling. My limbs twitched randomly, as if bioelectric voltage still raced through them. I tried to say something, but my mouth refused to cooperate. I only managed to produce a thin groan.
The sharp click of boot heels rang down the hallway outside. My screams had drawn someone's attention. A muffled curse reached my ears over the jingle of a key in the lock. The heavy door slammed open.
"
Was zum Teufel?"
Briggs. Judging from the tone of his voice, he thought he'd lost both of his captives. It wouldn't take him long to find out otherwise, though. He had only to follow the trail of blood.
But his footsteps came softer now, as if he was edging into the room, wary of taking chances. "Bothersome wretches." The ominous click of a pistol's hammer punctuated his words. "More trouble than they're worth."
I squeezed my eyes shut, grasping after some shred of survival instinct. When that didn't work, I reverted to my training. The old mantra: breathe deeply and evenly, empty the mind, and wait for the pulse to slow. And when
that
didn't work, I just went limp and prayed for a miracle.
I don't know whether I got one, or if it was simply good timing, but something seemed to shift inside me at last. The foreign azoth broke like a wave against the shore, washing its power through every inch of my body. It didn't burn this time--it felt as warm and wonderful as Zeph's touch always had. As if the very essence of his soul had blended with mine. I cautiously stretched my arms against the floor, testing their newfound strength.
"Verdammt!"
Briggs's strident voice sounded just above me. I looked up in time to see him lowering his gun to his side. We surely didn't look very threatening in our sad state. "How touching." He sneered. "You cower together even in death."
"Hermann Briggs. Leave us." The voice that poured from my lips seemed to echo through four octaves simultaneously. Some notes sounded like me and some like Zeph, but some were like nothing I'd ever heard before. Some distant part of my mind was impressed.
Apparently it made an impression on Briggs, too. He fell back a step, his mouth falling open as he brought his weapon to bear. My body began to move of its own accord, bringing me first to my knees, then to my feet with an eerie grace I'd never possessed before. Briggs's Magnum tracked me all the while.
I ignored the gun, staring into the depths of his eyes. "You are not beyond redemption," the alien voice proclaimed. I begged to differ, but my mouth spoke on heedless of my opinion. "Leave now, and your life will be spared."
An ugly grin broke across his face. "You can't control my mind, you unholy bitch."
"I don't seek to." I frowned at the barrel of his Magnum, which he still held trained on the bridge of my nose. "Will you leave me no choice but to destroy you?"
Briggs spat a curse, but I hardly heard it. I was already reacting. My arm came up lightning-quick to bat the pistol aside. His shot ricocheted somewhere on the other side of the room. In the same motion, I twisted my wrist to grasp at his, jerking it sharply upward. The bone snapped with a gruesome crack.
He endured the pain of the fracture without so much as a cry. The gun fumbled from his limp fingers and clattered to the floor. Undaunted, he jabbed a punch at me with his other hand.
The blow struck my shoulder, numbing my arm with its force. Hissing, I released him and brought up my other hand to catch him by the throat. I squeezed, hoisting him several inches off the ground with hardly an effort.
Now he let out a strangled scream, grasping at my fingers, but he couldn't pry them loose. "Your fate has been sealed," I informed him gravely.
"Abomination!" he choked. "Should have been killed...with the rest of your kind!"
Fury snapped through me. My eyes began to burn, bathing Briggs's craggy features in pale green light. I narrowed them so I could see better, though I didn't really need to look at him. I could feel his hatred twisting within him like a cancer. I couldn't release him and expect to walk out of here--if Zeph and I were to live, Briggs had to die.
I applied more pressure to his throat, smiling in grim satisfaction as his eyes bulged in their sockets. Some part of me yearned to drain him, to suck every bit of life from his body and leave nothing but a withered husk. But I didn't want to take his corrupt soul into mine.
Instead, I followed Zeph's example, pushing power outward. I'd never done it before, but the knowledge was there inside my mind and I didn't question it. Briggs stiffened violently as azoth poured into his body. He began to seize, nearly jerking free of my grasp.
I squeezed even harder. "Die," I whispered. The single word echoed, playing accompaniment to Briggs's gurgling yowl.
Soon, small wisps of smoke began to rise from the man's skin and hair. I dropped him, fearing he burst into flames entirely. I'd done my work well enough, anyway. He gasped and convulsed for less than a minute before he died. I drew back a foot and kicked the corpse away, propelling it across the room to crumple beside the door.
Zeph stirred weakly at my feet. I looked down to find him gazing up at me, his dark eyes wide and reverent. "Jandra."
I smiled, bending to lift him up off the floor. It took a little effort to balance his lanky frame in my arms, but his weight didn't trouble me at all. I arranged him carefully on my table, since it was the cleaner of the two. "There is one more," I told him, my new voice as somber as a requiem.
He closed his eyes and nodded. "Markus."
"He cannot be allowed to live."
"I know. I...." His words broke off into a gasp and a spate of racking coughs. Blood bubbled at the corners of his mouth.
In my heart I wept for him, wailed at the injustice. But fairness and sentiment are human concepts, and my mind was no longer entirely human. I watched with a sort of horrified fascination as my hand skimmed the air above his ruined abdomen, as if taking the measure his wounds.
Then I turned and walked away. The sounds of his labored breathing echoed in my ears, but it wasn't enough to sway my steps. Apparently neither layer of my altered consciousness had any desire to watch him die.
The sensation of being led by invisible strings slowly diminished as I neared the door. My heart and mind were united on the subject of Father Markus, at least. I would find him. I would kill him. And then I'd come back for Zeph, otherworldly compulsions be damned.
An acrid stench assaulted my nose as I reached the heavy steel door. I looked down on Briggs's remains. His bowels had let go, of course, but that wasn't the source of this smell. I nudged the corpse with my foot, causing his head to loll. Two thin streams of blood had oozed from his nostrils, the fluid thick and dark against the waxy pallor of his skin. It seemed to be smoking faintly.
Frowning, I reached down and lifted the body by its shirt collar. The strange, bitter odor nearly overwhelmed me at close range. Another rivulet of the bloody sludge trickled from Briggs's left ear. The short hairs of his sideburn had shriveled away where the stuff had touched them. As if it weren't blood at all, but some sort of corrosive chemical. How...odd.
I didn't have long to puzzle over it--the sounds of furtive motion in the hallway distracted me. I smiled blandly at the scuffling. Briggs's cries seemed to have made his comrades wary. I switched my grip on his collar, holding his limp weight in front of me like a shield as the door creaked open.
A rush of exhaled breath preceded a masculine voice.
"Mein Herr...?"
A strangled gasp followed as the guard got a good look at his commander's condition.
I hurled Briggs's body at the man. He fell backward with a surprised grunt, then began to scream shrilly. He flailed and flopped, but the corpse's dead weight seemed to roll in perfect time with his spastic motion, keeping him pinned to the ground. I stepped over them, out into the hall. Soldier Boy hadn't even brought any backup. Idiot.
"Bleiben Sie dort."
The carillon voice spoke for me, spouting words I could only assume were in German. Soldier Boy went still at the sound and looked up at me, white-faced and whimpering.
"Alarmieren Sie keinen,"
I added.
"Nein, nein, ich nicht!"
the young man gabbled.
"Verletzen Sie mich bitte nicht!"
"Fear not," I replied as I drifted past him, wondering what the hell else I'd said.
The hallway looked exactly as I'd dreamed it would. I noted that as ironic, but basically didn't give a damn. The part of me that was still Jandra was also still too furious at Brax to find much value in his so-called help. And the part of me that had become vengeance personified seemed to know the way. I headed to the right without hesitation.