Something Alive

  “And the prodigal’s ducky joins us,” said Ian as Ed sat down at the dinner table.

  “I could never say no to pretty women,” said Ed.

  “Pretty, no, beautiful,” Ian corrected him and looked over to Danny who smiled.

  “So, everything good at the hospital?” Ed asked Danny as he took a bite of his dinner.

  “Yeah, or well, as good as it can get at a hospital. At least there hasn’t been anyone with an arrow stuck in them yet,”

  “Speaking of which, how is the arm?”

  “Better than the eye,” said Ian with a devilish smile, “I really am glad you used solid arrows that day,”

  “As am I, but they eye doesn’t look that bad,”

  “It’s gonna leave a scar,”

  “It’ll be a handsome scar,” said Danny.

            For the rest of their dinner they talked about all manner of things, joking about everyday events and just forgetting about the events of the last few weeks. After dinner, Ed offered to do the dishes so Ian could take Danny upstairs for a bath and then bed.

            After the dishes, Ed made his way to the deck where he sat, drinking from his whiskey bottle and attempting to write. Hours went by and at some point his cat had jumped up onto his lap and fallen asleep there. He also didn’t notice Ian when he sat down next to him. It was only when he spoke that he realized he was there.

  “How’s the book going?” Ian asked.

  “It isn’t,” Ed said as calmly as he could, recovering from the fright.

  “Ah, yeah, better you than me,”

  “Funny, that’s what I said about your coding,”

  “To each his own,” said Ian and took the whiskey bottle from Ed, he made to take a swing from it but thought better of the idea. “You really should drink something better,” he said handing the bottle back to Ed.

  “If it were not for whiskey, I’d die a man less mature,”

  “Let’s hope that’s still awhile off,”

  “Yeah. Why aren’t you next to Danny?”

  “Can’t sleep, as always. JR hasn’t come home yet,”

  “What’s up with that guy these days?”

  “I wish I knew,” said Ian.

            JR splashed his face with a handful of cold water from a tap in the bathroom of a hotel room. His head was swimming and he had no idea how he had gotten here.

            He stared at his reflection, breathing heavy and his face as pale as bone. The crystalline veins on his left forearm still pulsed faintly but the itching had long since seized.

  “She betrayed you,” the voice whispered in his ear and a woman appeared in the mirror next to his reflection.

            She was fair of skin and dark of hair and clad in nothing but the same crystallite veins that pulsed on his forearm. Her eyes and the veins on her body pulsed in time with his.

  “Devon took her from you,” said the woman and caressed his hair.

  “No,”

  “Yes,” she whispered. “And Ian will soon marry the doctor and leave you,”

  “No,” JR said anger starting to well up inside him.

  “And Ed will die,”

  “No!”

  “Then you will be alone,”

  “NO!”

            JR smashed the mirror with his right arm and a splatter of blood burst forth from the impact.

  “Yes,” the voice whispered.

            Ian woke at the break of dawn and got out of bed without waking Danny, as he normally did. He left his room and headed for the staircase, passing by JR’s room but froze as he did.

            From inside the room came a strange noise, a sound uncommon to the usual blaring of JR’s music. It was a whimpering of sorts. Ian edged closer to the door and placed his ear to it, listening.

  “What are you doing?” asked Ed as he stepped out of the bathroom.

  “Either JR is crying, or he’s got someone in his room,”

  “No way, I saw him come in, he was alone,”

  “You think he knows Dev and Melisa are?”

  “I don’t know,” said Ed as he came closer and listened. “That’s not crying,” he said, “that sounds like moaning, it sound like someone is in pain,”

  “JR,” Ian said knocking on the door, “JR, open up,”

  “What’s up, buddy?”

            It was JR’s voice but it did not come from inside the room. Ed and Ian both spun around to see him ascending the staircase. Ian noticed that for once JR did not wear something that covered his arms. They had thought he was hiding something from them, like a tattoo, but there was nothing out of the ordinary on JR’s arms.

  “If you’re out here…” started Ed.

            Ian tried opening the door but it was locked, so he broke the door open. The smell of blood hit him before he saw the body on JR’s bed. It was a young woman dressed in a combat vest, but she as riddled with lacerations.

  “Abigail,” said Ed.

  “You know her?” asked Ian.

  “She was one of the agents, soldiers, people that took me,”

  “How the hell did she get in my room?” asked JR.

  “That’s what I’d like to know. Where the hell were you last night?”

  “Out,”

  “Out?”

  “Yes, out, I went to a bar with Bernard, met a girl, took her to a hotel room,”

  “And mutilated her?” asked Ed.

  “No, what kind of a sick person do you take me for?”

  “This isn’t looking good, JR,”

  “That’s not even the girl I met, she was a red head,”

  “I need to get Danny,” said Ian and headed back to his room.

  “You guy’s believe me, right?” asked JR.

  “I don’t know, dude, you’ve been acting off lately,”

  “I wouldn’t do this though,” JR said gesturing at Abigail.

  “Coming through,” said Danny. She rushed past the two of them and started looking over Abigail’s wounds.

  “Didn’t you say she was dead?” Ian asked Ed.

  “Well, yeah, that’s what I was told, but I never saw the bodies. If she’s alive-”

  “We need to get her to the hospital,” interrupted Danny.

  “No,” said all three the men, Ian and Ed more out of habit than anything else.

  “She needs medical attention,”

  “Yes, and we still don’t know if we’re being watched,” said Ian. “She’s supposed to be dead,”

  “She will be soon if we don’t get her to the hospital,”

  “What if we brought you what you needed?” asked JR.

  “I need an operating theatre, how are you going to fit that in here?”

  “Danny’s right,” said Ed. “We need to risk it,”

  “Damnit,” said Ian. “Help me pick her up,”

  “I’ll bring the car round,” said Danny.

  “What should I do?” asked JR.

  “Just…stay,” said Ian frustratingly as he and Ed carried Abigail out of the room and down the stairs.

            They were pacing up and down the hall outside the operating theatre, waiting for Danny who had been inside for hours. They had taken Abigail to the emergency room as soon as they arrived and while Danny worked her magic, Ed and Ian worked theirs on the on-duty police officer.

            They were fully versed in lying to police, as they often had to do it while on assignment, and after spinning a tale of how they find her next to a road while jogging, the officer completed his report and let them be.

  “Yes, Dev,” said Ian answering his phone.

  “Where are you two?”

  “At the hospital, why?”

  “I just got a SMS, they want us to go to some mansion. Apparently our handlers are waiting for us there,”

  “Damnit, by when?”

  “Tonight,”

  “Shit,”

  “Why are you at the hospital?”

  “We found a girl in JR’s room, she’s supposed to be dead, according to Ed she was one of the agents who captured him,”

  “The she’s also one of the agents that killed Melisa’s twin,”

  “What the hell have we gotten involved in?” asked Ian rhetorically. “Head over to the house, we’ll be there as soon as we can,” he said and ended the call.

  “What now?” asked Ed and Ian explained the situation to him. As he finished, Danny came out of the theatre.

  “And?” asked Ed.

  “She’ll live, hopefully. But she won’t be awake for a while,”

  “That’s good, but we’ve got bigger problems. Is there somewhere we can talk?” asked Ian.

            She gave him a worried look, but gestured for him to follow and led him to a storage closet.

  “They’ve sent us a location,” said Ian solemnly.

  “Then you have to go,”

  “Yes,”

  “That wasn’t a question, Ian,” she said.

  “Will you be okay by yourself?”

  “I managed to survive for years before you stumbled into my emergency room, I think I’ll live a few weeks without you,”

  “I hope it’s not that long,” he said and stoked her cheek, “I don’t think I’ll survive that long without you,”

  “Oh, you will, you still have a wedding to attend, remember,”

  “How could I forget,” he said and kissed her.

            At around nine that night they stopped in front of a massive mansion. There were guards patrolling the walls, snipers on the roof and in a few of the trees, and groups of guards on the grounds. All of them dressed in black and armed to the teeth.

  “Well,” started Devon, “here we are,”

  “Here we are,” echoed Ian.

  “Let’s not keep them waiting,” said Ed and he got out of the car.