Narrowing her eyes, Para noticed that many of the signs and posters had pictures of Pax’s face on them. I have a fan club? she wondered in awe. And they’re violent terrorists? Cool!
“You stole Pax’s man! You destroyed her, and for that, we will destroy you.”
But I’m right here, she thought weakly. She didn’t notice as one of the women raised a rifle to her shoulder. It was almost as though she were in a movie and couldn’t control her own body, for she simply stared at the crowd in disbelief.
“Come on, Medea, we have to go,” Thornton urged again gently. “These crowds can get a little…”
“Die bitch!”
BANG.
The noise snapped Para out of her daze and she blinked and commented, “Wow, they’re rude.”
The bullet had hit her squarely in her middle and she had yet to notice.
“Fuck!” Thornton cursed. “Medea, are you okay?”
“What? Why wouldn’t I be...” Para suddenly noticed the smoking rifle pointed towards her. She looked down and saw the crumpled up bullet that had ripped through her dress and bounced off the side of her stomach.
Great. I’ve been shot?
She looked up at Thornton and saw him staring down at her stomach in horror.
Shit. Shit. Shit. Think fast, Para. This looks bad.
Chapter 8: Ignoring Important Information
Thornton saw the pieces of fabric ripped open at Para’s stomach and a surge of fear rippled through his own gut. She wasn’t Pax. She wasn’t a deva. She could die. Actually die. It took him a second to process the gravity of the situation as these sentences scrolled across his mind. A second was too long. If he had remembered only a fraction of an instant sooner that bullets were actually dangerous, he could have moved to stop the impact. He could have stopped it! He should have.
Looking up to Para’s face, he saw the pure terror that was painted across her soft, feminine features. He realized that he couldn’t bear to lose her too.
Shit. Shit. Shit, she was cursing in her mind. The terror on her face was not the fear of dying; it was the fear of being discovered. “Oh!” she moaned, gasping and grabbing her stomach. As she doubled over, she discreetly placed one hand on the floor to collect the bullet and grind it into dust between her fingers. She grimaced as she simultaneously shoved the index finger of her other hand deftly and firmly into the flesh at her side to puncture her body and draw blood.
BANG. BANG.
Thornton had begun moving to catch her as she fell, but when the sound of more gunshots reached his ears, his fear for her safety turned to anger. His head snapped to the left and seeing the bullets headed towards the already injured girl, he narrowed his eyes and flew directly toward the bullets. The blonde man reached out and grasped the small metal pellets angrily in his fist, which he then pounded into the face of the person holding the rifle. He quickly seized all the guns in the crowd and bent their nozzles, rendering them useless. For good measure, and out of pure rage, he quickly delivered a few more blows, knocking several of the more fanatical looking members of the crowd unconscious.
Para glanced up from her hunched over position as he did this, using the opportunity to dig her finger deeper into her stomach while gritting her teeth. She had been wearing a pale lilac colored dress, and when she pulled her finger out, enough blood began flowing forth from her abdomen to start to soak most of the midsection of the dress. As Thornton used his bare hands to destroy the guns, Para lay down on the concrete ground, and rubbed all of the fingers on her right hand into the blood that was pooling there. It would be obvious if only her index finger was coated.
In the few short seconds that it had taken Thornton to subdue and punish her offenders, in addition to disarming their weapons, Para had managed to create a wound and put herself in a convincingly victimized position. The bullet had been a joke, barely bruising her skin, but sticking her finger in an inch above her liver had been excruciating. She was in actual pain and she groaned softly and closed her eyes tightly as she curled up on the cold concrete.
Thornton quickly returned to her side. “Oh, fuck! Medea…” Seeing her hand and dress covered in blood and he began to panic and fell to her side. He reached out to lift her into his arms with shaking hands. His fingers were suddenly leaden as he touched the sheen of sweat that moistened her cheeks, indicating her agony. “Please tell me you’re okay. Please, please be okay. You can’t be…”
“I’m fine,” she croaked. Para sucked in a few short huffs of air, speaking in a small voice. “Thanks for saving me, Thorn.”
“I thought you were gone,” he said brokenly.
She heard the genuine concern in his voice, and looked up at him. She almost felt surprised to see how much he cared for this girl that she’d fabricated out of thin air. She was an illusion; a ghost and a lie—but he seemed to believe in her wholeheartedly. It was possible that he was so vulnerable and alone that he needed to believe in her. Could she really manage to make him fall in love with a woman who didn’t even exist? I can do this. I can make him love me, and break his heart like he did mine. We’ll finally be even, and he’ll know how it feels. She realized that through the pain she had clutched his arm tightly, and she forced herself to loosen her grip. She couldn’t have him noticing her strength because of a moment’s indiscretion.
Yells and curses abruptly startled her out of deviously plotting his downfall as she stared deeply into his eyes. Turning back to the group of people who had shot her, she squinted, not quite understanding what exactly had happened. Most of the crowd had begun to disperse after the initial shots were fired, and most of those remaining had dispersed after Thornton had knocked several of them unconscious. Yet a few still remained, and they were holding signs that featured Pax’s face on them, with phrases like “AVENGE PAX BURNSON” and “SAVE THE GIRL WHO SAVED THE WORLD” scrawled in marker on cardboard.
I really have a fan club, Para mused to herself in wonder, and they know that I destroyed the comet! Or at least, they think the strategy was my idea; which it was. She couldn’t resist the warm tingly feelings that arose in her stomach at this knowledge, temporarily overshadowing the searing pain from her improvised, self-inflicted “bullet” wound. Best of all, they just tried to kill Thorn’s new girlfriend for me! Awww, how sweet! If he really had been dating a new girl, they would have killed her—and I probably would have found that more amusing than tragic, despite my best efforts. How ironic that they shot the girl they were trying to defend! She couldn’t resist a small laugh at the situation. But the laugh pained her incredibly and she immediately moaned.
“Let me see the wound,” Thornton said, moving her bloody fingers away from her stomach. It looked a lot worse than it was, and he cursed. “Damnation. Hell and blazing damnation! I have to get you to the hospital.”
Para’s watch chose that moment to vibrate persistently, and her whole body instantly tensed. Great. Less than five minutes remaining. This is going to be troublesome. How do I escape from the hospital in time to separate? Ugh, why do I put myself in these situations? Do I enjoy the stress or something? At this point, the media had arrived on the scene and were excitedly snapping photos of the CEO and the injured girl. The sirens of law enforcement and paramedics could be heard somewhere nearby, but their arrival had not preceded that of the media.
“Just hold on, Medea!” said Thornton, lifting her gently against him and standing up.
“Wait! The dress! Don’t forget the dress!” she exclaimed, noticing the fallen bag which Thornton had cast aside once the first bullet had been fired. “Oh, no! Is it damaged?” she asked frantically.
“The… dress?” Thornton frowned, but he obediently bent his knees so he could pick up the bag—without dropping her in the process. “You’ve been shot and you’re worried about a stupid dress?”
“Oh,” she groaned, grabbing her stomach. She looked down at the wound, as though assessing it. “The bullet didn’t hit any vital organs,” she assured him with a grimace.
“It’s painful as hell, but I’ll be fine.”
“Sweet Sakra. You’re way too calm about this. You must be in shock. Let’s get to the hospital.” Thornton said this forcefully and immediately levitated dozens of feet into the air, instantly taking them away from the media and the gathering crowd of onlookers. He had moved quickly enough that no one would have been able to see him fly; and even if they had, he would have blamed it on a new company experiment.
“No hospitals!” she protested, fearfully checking her watch. “Trust me. I work at a hospital and they’re all politics. Stitching up a wound like this is child’s play and it would be embarrassing to my co-workers if I showed up asking for them to look after me. I can take care of this better on my own, at home. Just let me get some bed-rest and I’ll be fine.”
“You were shot! They have to get the bullet out and stop the bleeding…”
“Good grief, Thorn. It’s such an easy procedure that a six-year-old could do it.”
“I think you need to take this more seriously,” said Thornton, moving faster through the air. “You could die.”
“Stop overreacting! Don’t you think… oh,” said Para, suddenly remembering to be surprised about his flying. “Are we flying? You can fly?”
“Yes,” said Thornton awkwardly. “It’s... a special ability. The levitating—it’s a martial arts thing. You see, my family, we’re special...”
“Thorn, I just want to go home. Please. Please just take me home.”
“Let me take you to my home then. We have a state-of-the-art infirmary in the Kalgren Compound, and the very best in…”
“Thorn! Please.” Her watch vibrated again, indicating three minutes remaining. “I’m a doctor and I know my own body. I just want to go home and get some rest. Physically, I will be fine. But emotionally? I’ve been shot by people holding up signs with the face of your ex-girlfriend. I didn’t realize that dating you would make me number one on the hit-list of crazies. And now you’re flying. While I appreciate your help, I just need to go home and lie down to get rid of this massive headache before I have to go to work again. Will you leave me alone for a while?”
“Medea, I’m so sorry that this happened. It’s all my stupid, fucking fault…”
“No, it’s the fault of the person who shot the bullet.” That is, it’s their fault I had to use my finger to create a fake bullet hole in my side. Ouch! And it’s Paxie’s fault too for being so awesome that she has a fan club! Weeee!
Thornton buried his face into Para’s hair as he changed his course of flight slightly, heading for her little house. “God, it seems like all I do, every time I see you, is cause you pain! This is the second time since I’ve been your boyfriend, in a matter of weeks, that I’ve made you bleed. The second time that I’ve exposed you to life threatening injuries…”
“You silly goose,” said Para, laughing. Something about danger had always excited her, and she spoke her next words with a teasing tone: “Haven’t you ever seen a bit of blood before?” Reaching up to grasp behind his neck, she pulled his head down so that his lips fell against hers in a kiss.
Thornton was surprised at first that she was able to be playful and affectionate in a situation like this, but his thoughts dissipated as he kissed back tenderly. The warmth of her tongue seemed to release some of the tension from the situation as he lost himself against her softness. She mumbled something into his mouth, but he didn’t understand her through the dizzy sensations in his mind.
“What?” he asked.
“Skyscraper,” she repeated.
Thornton realized he was flying directly toward a high-rise office building and he diverted his path around it.
“Sorry,” he said with a sheepish laugh. “Your kisses are distracting.”
“And yours completely take away the pain of having been shot,” she said, smiling up at him. For once, she wasn’t lying. His kisses did take away the pain from having been shot. With her own finger.
Her watch beeped again as Thornton descended to her house and hovered outside her bedroom window. She scowled at herself for completely forgetting that her body was about to split into two halves. Thornton fiddled with unlatching her bedroom window so that he could slide it open. Once he did, she climbed inside and sat on the ledge. She made her posture slumped as though she was tired or in pain.
“I have to be honest with you,” Thornton admitted, “I didn’t think human girls could hold up under so much pressure. You really could have been killed today.”
Para smiled. “What species have you been dating? Human girls have a lot of great qualities. At the very least, we’re better than household pets and potted plants.”
Thornton gave her an amused look as he pushed the bag containing her dress through the window and onto the floor of her room. “Can I come in to help you to clean and dress the wound? Maybe if I bring you the instruments that you need?”
“No,” she said softly, trying to ignore the vibrating of her watch against her wrist. She glanced at her watch and saw that she had thirty seconds remaining. “Thanks for taking me home, but I need to be alone now. I need to process a few things. Can you understand that? Can you give me some space?”
Space? Space! She wants space? She needs medical attention and someone to stay with her; to take care of her! Sakra, I will never understand women. But then... it is my fault she’s in this situation. She probably associates me with being injured at this point—and she did just see me fly for the first time. That can be traumatizing. Wow, I’m really smooth aren’t I? Should I lie and tell her it’s a company device? A portable jet-pack or some crap like that?
“Please go,” Para said nervously, fingering her watch.
“I just don’t think I should leave you alone right now,” he began, “but if you really want me to, I will. I just think you might have some questions, and I really want to explain before I go. There are some very peculiar things I should tell you about my family and heritage…”
“No,” she said firmly. “I would love to hear it all, but I am so exhausted right now. I’m going to clean up this wound and rest for a little, if you don't mind. Please? Would you go and let me be by myself?”
“I don’t know if I can leave you in this condition,” said Thornton with a frown. “No gentleman would.”
“Thornton Vincent Kalgren, please leave me the hell alone,” she said fiercely, pushing herself off the windowsill. There were ten seconds remaining in her merger. “I will be fine. Text me anytime if you’re worried about me. Now go.”
“Okay,” he said hesitantly, leaning through the window to give her a parting kiss. “As you wish. I won’t interfere.”
“Thank you.”
When he left, she stood up and grabbed the dress bag, breezing down to the basement before closing the door behind her. Her prana would not be traceable from within the thick walls which she had covered with a protective coating to conceal her energy. She immediately collapsed on her couch, pressing a hand over her wound and groaning. It was only a puncture, and she knew it was not serious, but it still ached and put her into quite a sour mood. The bleeding had already stopped thanks to her demigod-anatomy and mystical healing metabolism.
Para had been lying on the couch for barely a second, not even enough time to take a few deep breaths and truly relax, when she felt a familiar tingling in her cells as each one underwent an instantaneous division. Amara felt herself tumbling to the ground off the couch, and Pax ended up lying lopsidedly on the arm of the chair.
“Ow,” mumbled Pax, then she immediately brightened. “Hey! Did you see? I have fanatic fans, too! They’re just as crazy and obsessive as Thorn’s fans, maybe as crazy as yours!”
“No way. Your fans just try to kill for you. They don’t kidnap you from preschool and tell you they intend to marry you for your fortune, even though you’re only three. (I was lucky that Ash was always around to save me from those creeps.) They also don’t worship you and sacrifice farm animals for you, or… oh, Sakra! The dress.
”
Amara pulled herself off the ground and rushed to the shopping bag, before noticing that her hands were covered in blood. She quickly created a blue fire around her hands, which instantly boiled the blood and dirt off her skin. “Better than hand sanitizer,” she mused at the technique. Reaching out tentatively, she gently pulled the dress from the bag and began to caress the crystal-encrusted bodice.
“It’s just what I wanted, Paxie. Oh, Sakra, it’s just what I always imagined.” Amara’s eyes instantly watered as she clutched the dress against her. “Sakra! Why did it have to be so perfect? It’s Viscaria’s fault—that bitch! Why did she have to rip this design from my brain and turn my dream into reality when the rest of the fantasy has been slaughtered?!”
Pax stared at her friend, torn between the urge to go to her and console her, or to give her a private moment. Her eyes settled on the glistening crystals of the gown which Amara stroked lovingly, and she found herself crossing her arms over her chest and frowning. Uncle Ash, you’re a dick. I bet even Sakra doesn’t know why you do the idiotic things you do. You made her so happy; you were so happy! Why the hell would you…
“Stop thinking, Pax. I can hear your goddamned thoughts!” shouted Amara through her sobs. She released the dress in a panic when she realized that she might ruin it with her tears or stray droplets of blood from her bullet wound. “Let’s talk about something else. Like for instance, about how your actual dream—the one about getting gunned down by a firing squad—came true.”
“Yeah, that was weird, wasn’t it? They said the exact same thing that they said in my dream, and the bullets… it wasn’t perfectly the same situation, but it was pretty similar.”
“It’s like that time you dreamed about Suja and the comet when we were in the vector zone,” Amara mused, reaching out again to touch the silvery fabric and sniffling. “Maybe you’re developing a mental power too! Prophetic dreams—you can tell the future. Maybe warn us of danger.”
Thirty Minutes to Heartbreak Box Set (Books 1-3) Page 70
