Saving Jay

[Jay Carpenter]

Alana’s snarl was unhappy. “Why is the doctor helping him? I thought he was meant to be punished,” she said. Her father looked up casually, stony expression chiseled marble.
“Here is the lesson, daughter,” he replied. “The worst punishment is not always death and suffering. The worst is powerlessness. If he is unaware and delirious, we extract no justice.”
Alana pondered these words while the doctor strung up tubes and bags. The invader settled to stillness soon after, but Alana left unsatisfied.

---

Jay woke to warmth trickling his leg. It took him a moment to realize he’d pissed himself. Probably not for the first time. Another moment to realize he was not in the chair. Everything ached. Face a swollen bag. Arms burning. Wrists throbbing. But the ache streaking his chest was indescribable. He barely wanted to look when epiphany shot adrenaline like lightning. His eyes flared disks, neck twisting. A medic’s tube trailed his arm. What the hell? he thought, wrenching it free in one swift yank. Saline and blood leaked fresh. Legs of lead curled beneath, and he cried in defiance just to push to his knees. Standing was probably out of the question. The power was an empty void, still. But now was not the time to wonder if it would ever return. His heart pound with fresh hope. He was alone! The cables were discarded. Buckets of water were empty. The ties broken. Blue-eyed man gone. Amengual gone.

He literally crawled to the door, breath frozen in delicate hope of escape. His hands were shaking when he pushed it gently open. The creaking pounded drums in his ears. So fucking loud! Hope was fanned ever so slightly soon after. Nobody was out there. Okay. A plan. Stop and make a fucking plan. He needed a weapon. He needed to fucking stand on his own goddamn feet. He needed to calm the fuck down. One mission at a time. He breathed. Just breathed. First, move. Anywhere.

Like some cockroach uncovered, streaked with black and just as filthy, he all but fell up the stairs when an alarm sounded shrill warning. He froze. Tensed for attack.  Was that about him?!

With one hand thrown across his abdomen, the other holding the aching arm, he stumbled… crawled… climbed the old stairs. People raced about at the summit. He pulled himself to stand, emboldened by the chance at escape, but his legs were sacks of water pulled across sinking sand. It wasn’t easy to walk.

One step and a blur in white smacked hard. Jay fell to his side,
“Oh my god, I’m so sorry,” the woman said, only to gasp when she realized who – or what – she just ran into. She offered him a fearful hand upward, but Jay clamped down hard on the attached wrist and wrenched her forward. Her yell was drowned in the chaos of the fire alarm. The lights went dark afterward. Sunlight became a rare commodity breeching windows spaced far apart. The white flicking of hallway strobes caught wild in both their eyes.

“Where’s Amengual?” He demanded, sneering against the woman’s struggles. It took little effort to fling off Jay’s grasp, and she ran away a moment later.

Suddenly, doors opened methodically all around him. He gasped and scoot backward, hiding around the edge of the staircase, when row after row of children were led single-file through the corridor. None hurried except the frantic-coated individual in the lead. Fright and fury bonded deep to the bone. Nobody looked at him.

The shadows of bulked soldiers passed in the distance. He had to get out of sight. The hall was too long to traverse quickly, so he managed to fall into the nearest room. Empty. Windows to escape, but he was too weak to turn the lock. He was searching for something to bust it open when an angelic voice broke the storm.

He had to be hallucinating. But fearful that it wasn’t real as much as it was, he turned and beheld the most beautiful face he’d ever seen. “Cay?” he asked, voice nearly gone.

His baby sister stared at him only a moment before she broke into one of those infectious, victorious smiles. All teeth and hair, he used to tell her. He fell to his knees like her presence finally burst the last of his strength. “I brought you pie,” she said in sing-song humor. She started to run forward when another silhouette loomed suddenly behind. “Watch ou-“ Jay said.

A swing and Cayli stumbled. Jay was spent. Tears streaked his face for hope promised and terror replaced.  Alana hovered. A small handgun was aimed, but like a miracle, Cayli recovered. She grappled Alana. The gun flew from reach. The two entangled with girlish roars of might and fury. Cayli swung out just like Jay taught her all those years before. But Alana hooked an arm around Cayli’s throat, crushing it.

Jay would crawl through lava to get to her. But his limbs wouldn’t move. He tried. Dammit. TRY! Move! Tears streaked failure. Cayli’s blue eyes bulged. She wriggled and fought. Alana was the stronger, though.

A little bubble of chill slicked his bare arms, and the gun was pushed into Jay’s reach. The Power. Cayli’s power. He snatched it up and aimed. The room blurred. Cayli and Alana blurred. He raised the pistol. The kind he gifted his own mom. The kind Zacarías might gift a daughter. It was tiny in his palm. Aim taken. He had to hold his wrist steady with the other hand. But the floor was rocking. His baby sister was choking to death. But Alana was a child too. He’d crawl through lava to save her.

“I saved you,” he whispered in defeat, chin quivering uncontrollably. The gun fired. Both girls crumpled to the floor.