Betrayed

by Francine Pascal

  Ed held me. I love that Ed held me. While we were waiting for the ambulance. As they got me onto the stretcher. As we drove to the hospital.

  Darker and darker. Until there was nothing. Just black. Pitch black.

  At first I thought I had fainted. Maybe even died. They say that after you die, you can see your body lying there as your soul floats upward. You can still see all the doctors and EMS people working on you, trying to bring you back. I thought that would explain what was going on.

  Only I couldn’t see myself. And I couldn’t see the men in the ambulance, either. I could only hear them. I kept asking them what was happening to me. I kept screaming out that question over and over like some horrific broken record. “What’s happening to me?” And they just kept yelling at me, ordering me to follow their fingers with my eyes, ordering me to look wherever they were snapping. And I told them I couldn’t. I told them a hundred times that I couldn’t see.

  I can’t see anything. And they have no idea why.

  Of course, I couldn’t tell them everything. Then they would think I was blind and crazy. I couldn’t tell them about the drug Josh gave me, about Gaia’s uncle, about being fearless for a few days and then losing my freaking mind. So much of it is a blur, anyway. I mean, I’ve completely lost track of what happened when. I remember Josh being with me, trying to give me another drug, maybe? The antidote to the drug that ruined me? I’m not sure. And then he was gone, and then…I think he was there again…or maybe that was the time before. Sometimes everything makes sense, and then it gets cloudy again. I don’t know….

  I know that I’m getting sicker. My brain is getting sicker. That’s why I don’t know things. That’s why I don’t remember things. I know it. The doctors know it, too. My body is shutting down. I can feel it. I think maybe I’m dying. I mean…I know I am. But no one knows why.

  Except I know why. I do.

  I’m being punished, that’s why. My going blind is some kind of punishment from God.

  It’s just like that play we read in class. Oedipus Rex. Oedipus was this king who thought he could find some way to cheat his own destiny. He thought he could outsmart the gods. Like he was above the gods or something. Like he was above everyone. It’s called hubris.

  And that’s me. That’s been me my whole life. Acting like some kind of queen, placing myself so far above everyone and everything. It’s like, no matter who is in the room, I have to figure out why I’m above them in some way or else…or else I’m not me. Or else who am I? Like I’m no one if I’m not better than someone else. I wish I knew if I was making sense. It’s not coming out right, but it’s making so much sense now in my head.

  That’s what I tried to do to Gaia when I took that fearless drug. I wanted to beat her at her own game. I wanted to…I don’t know…conquer her, prove that I was above her. And I think maybe that was the last straw. God knew I was trying to cheat with that drug, and he decided that it was finally time to punish me for all my stupid pride once and for all—to punish me for my hubris.

  When Oedipus realized all the awful things he had done, he got so disgusted and ashamed of himself that he actually gouged out his own eyes. The blindness was like a part of his punishment. And now it’s mine. That’s the whole irony of this thing. It took my going blind to finally see everything clearly—to finally see how all my stupid pride has screwed me.

  But I get it now. I finally get it. My life is not a goddamned contest. There’s no “big winner” at the end. There’s no prize. I’m no better than anyone else. And that includes Gaia Moore. I get it now. I get it just in time to die.

  God, I’m scared. The drug…It still does weird things to my head. I can feel it. I’m so scared for the rest of it to go black—my hearing and then my mind. I need to tell everyone what I’ve learned. I need to make up for what I’ve done. Maybe then the gods will…you know…forgive me. Maybe. I need to tell Gaia. I need to tell Ed and Josh.

  Josh. What happened to Josh? Where is he? Why hasn’t he come to see me in the hospital? Unless…oh God…

  Maybe the gods have punished him, too.

  Blind Optimism

  AT SOME POINT GAIA STOPPED LISTENING to Heather. Probably around the time she had started to picture the two of them in cages. Heather and her in metal cages, smacking a giant lever for food pellets, sucking at a giant bottle on the wall for water, one drop at a time. Running in their giant metal wheels. Waiting for the occasional carrot stick…

  Human guinea pigs. That’s all they were to Loki. Fat little balls of matted fur with black vacant eyes and brains the size of a pea. Nothing but disposable lab rats.

  If he didn’t die for any of his other long list of sick atrocities, he had to die for what he had done to Heather Gannis. Blind. The bastard had made her blind. A girl who had absolutely nothing to do with anything. A girl who was barely even Gaia’s friend. Gaia had always thought there were certain limits to Loki’ s maniacal tendencies. But clearly his boundaries were long gone. People were no longer people to him. They were just test samples—masses of tissue and blood and genetic code. He probably had a stack of human test subjects frozen in some locker somewhere, like frogs waiting to be dissected by a room full of squeamish sixth graders.

  He can’t be my father. He cannot be my father….

  Heather had asked her family to leave the room, which, Gaia was ashamed to say, was a gargantuan relief. But once Gaia, Heather, and Ed were alone in the room, Heather began to speak. And once she had opened her mouth, Gaia’s relief disappeared in a puff of horrifying black smoke.

  Heather was still talking a mile a minute, sometimes only half making sense, but she’d already told Gaia enough. She’d told her about the drug that was supposed to make her fearless like Gaia and about all the other promises Loki and Josh had made. She’d told her about all the horrific side effects—the body tremors, the uncontrollable shouts and violent fits, finally explaining Heather’s bizarre behavior of the last few days. And, of course, all the other horrible side effects that had brought her here to the hospital: the confusion, the incapacitating sickness, and now her loss of sight. And she’d confessed every word of it right in front of Ed Fargo.

  Gaia and Ed were seated on either side of Heather’s bed, face-to-face. Or rather, they would have been face-to-face if Gaia had been able to look at him. But it was hard enough for her to face Heather’s ordeal, let alone take on the thousand unspoken feelings hovering between her and Ed. She had still only looked him in the eye a total of about four times since walking into this room.

  Allowing him to hear all of this was only making Gaia more uncomfortable. It could only be dangerous for him to hear the real extent of Loki’s evil. But Gaia couldn’t have shut Heather up if she’d tried. Heather needed to tell her story. It was almost like the emotional equivalent of having her stomach pumped. Like if she didn’t puke all the facts out right now, then she just might die from keeping them in her system. Although, God help her, Gaia wasn’t sure Heather was going to live regardless. Her breaths were so shallow, her skin so jaundiced. Occasionally her limbs would break into mild, involuntary tremors. Occasionally she would talk in nothing but gibberish. She’d already lost her sight and some degree of brain function. Gaia was dreading what she might lose next.

  “I’m fool,” Heather uttered incoherently, gazing blankly at the ceiling. “No, I’m a fool. I am so sorry. I didn’t know what I was doing. Say you forgive me, Gaia. Please say you forgive me….”

  Heather reached to her right, grasping to find Gaia’s hand. Gaia quickly took hold and leaned in closer. She still couldn’t believe after her whole “pilgrimage of guilt” from her house to the hospital that Heather was lying there asking Gaia to forgive her.

  “It’s okay,” Gaia said, squeezing Heather’s fragile hand. “You don’t need to apologize. This wasn’t your fault. This was them. They did this.”

  “I wanted to hurt you,” Heather admitted as tears began to fall from her eyes again.

  “It’s okay, He
ather,” Ed assured her.

  “I don’t care,” Gaia promised her. “You only felt that way because Loki was screwing with your head and Josh was manipulating the crap out of you—”

  “No,” Heather interrupted, shaking her head wildly from side to side. “Not Josh. Josh loved me. Josh wanted to fix me, but I wouldn’t let him.”

  Gaia dropped her head in anger. The son of a bitch had Heather completely snowed. He actually had her convinced that he loved her. How could Gaia possibly get it through Heather’s sick and foggy head that Josh felt anything but love for her? That he couldn’t care less if she dropped dead at this very moment, lying between Gaia and Ed in a sweat-stained hospital bed with her parents praying for her out in the hall? Fix her? What the hell did that mean?

  “Heather. What do you mean, Josh wanted to ‘fix you’?”

  “Something counter,” Heather mumbled, licking under her lips to fight off her dry mouth and then swallowing slowly.

  “What?”

  “Counter…,” she uttered again, making absolutely no sense. “Counter…” She blinked down hard over her vacant eyes with frustration. “Counteragent. Josh tried to give me the counteragent to the drug. Because he loves me, Gaia. But I wouldn’t let him….”

  “Wait, there’s a counteragent?” Gaia asked urgently.

  “Yes. I don’t know.”

  “Yes or no?” Gaia felt herself giving in to frustration again. How the hell was she supposed to know if anything Heather was saying was true or not? If there was an antidote to the drug that had poisoned Heather—if there was any way for there to be one less casualty in this disgusting war, Gaia needed to know about it. But with Heather in this state, there was no way to know anything for sure, and Gaia was losing patience fast. “Heather. Is there a counteragent or not? Yes or no?”

  “Gaia, come on,” Ed said, scolding her with his eyes.

  “Don’t yell, Gaia, please,”Heather whimpered. “You hate me. I know you hate me.”

  “No,” Gaia insisted, looking to Ed for forgiveness as she spoke to Heather. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to yell, Heather. I just want to help you. I didn’t—”

  “You despise me,” she cried. “I know you do.”

  “No,” Gaia insisted. “That’s not true, Heather. All I’m trying to do is—”

  “I just wanted to be like you, Gaia!”

  This sudden outburst stunned Gaia and Ed into complete silence.

  Gaia stared at Heather’s stricken expression. Now she was quite sure that Heather had lost her mind. Either that or she was just speaking nonsensical gibberish again. Because no one…no one in their right mind could possibly want to be like Gaia. Especially someone like Heather Gannis—someone that sane people actually did want to be like.

  “That’s why I did it,” Heather went on, closing her eyes as she spoke. For a moment she suddenly seemed completely lucid. “That’s why I took that drug. I just…I wanted your strength. I wanted to be stronger than you. No, I wanted to be you, but stronger. No, that’s not even it. I mean, yes, I wanted to know what it felt like to be empowered like you, but…that’s not why I took the drug, Gaia. That’s not why I wanted to be like you. Oh God, what am I babbling for—it’s obvious, isn’t it? I just…I just wanted them to love me the way they love you. The way Sam loved you. The way Ed loves you.” Heather opened her eyes and gazed up at some unknowable image in her head. “I wanted Ed to look at me the way he looks at you. The way he’s probably looking at you right now.”

  Gaia’s eyes drifted toward Ed. Heather had either momentarily regained her sight or else she was psychic. Because Ed was looking at Gaia. And while she couldn’t possibly define what his look meant, she could feel his dark brown eyes tugging her forward and nearly pulling her to him across the bed….

  They both turned away. Gaia could only assume that Ed had turned away for the same reason she had. The shame of being caught by a girl who couldn’t even see.

  That’s what was so shameful about this feeling for Ed. She couldn’t control it. And that’s what was going to get Ed killed if she didn’t do something about it. Gaia had tried everything to sever ties with Ed. She’d avoided him, she’d insulted him, she’d told him all kinds of cruel lies. But she could do nothing to curb her feelings, regardless of all the grave, tragic circumstances that surely should have taken precedent. People were dying. Loki was roaming around out there somewhere, drugging people, putting innocent people in the hospital, setting buildings on fire. Heather was lying right between them, suffering, and still…one look in Ed’s eyes and it all fell away.

  Maybe that was the real reason she’d worked so hard to avoid eye contact tonight. Because two uninterrupted seconds in Ed’s eyes and Gaia was right back in bed with him, wrapped up in his purple sheets, rolling around in blind optimism while the rest of the world was falling apart. And she couldn’t let that happen again. She would never again be caught indulging in some foolish romantic fantasy about Ed while his potential murderer snuck up from behind. She had to keep her eyes wide open. And she couldn’t do that if she was gazing at Ed.

  “What’s going on in here?” Heather’s mother was suddenly standing in the doorway, looking possessed. Before Gaia could even open her mouth, Mrs. Gannis had all but hip-checked Gaia out of the way to tend to Heather. “Why is she crying? Why is my daughter crying?” She turned around and gave Gaia a primitive death glare. “What did you do? What did you say to her?”

  Gaia suddenly felt the irrational need to find a hole and crawl inside.

  “No, no.” Ed stood up out of his chair. “Mrs. Gannis, it’s nothing like that. We were just—”

  “Mom, cut it out,”Heather demanded. “You don’t know what you’re saying! Gaia didn’t do a thing wrong. She’s not…she’s not…not me. I’m her. Not me…”

  Heather was beginning to fade again. Her moment of lucidity had clearly passed. She whispered a few more incoherent words as her father and sister entered the room.

  “What, sweetheart?” Mrs. Gannis asked desperately, leaning her ear as close to Heather’s lips as she could manage. “What are you saying?”

  But everyone in the room knew what she was saying. Everyone but Mrs. Gannis, whose denial made Gaia feel like crying again.

  Heather was saying absolutely nothing. Of course, in her own head she was probably saying a great deal, but all that was coming out was gibberish. Half words and faint, exhausted whimpers.

  Mrs. Gannis stepped away from the bed and turned back to Ed and Gaia. Her face had gone completely cold. “Visiting hours are over,” she stated definitively. “I think you should go…both of you. I’d like to say good night to my daughter. Without you here.”

  “Sure,” Ed said, trying in vain to make the moment seem normal. “We’ll get going. Heather, I’ll call you, okay?”

  Heather was still mumbling to herself in her own world.

  Ed walked to the door and opened it. “Gaia…? You coming?”

  “Yeah,” Gaia replied, trying to unglue her eyes from Heather’s pale gray face. “Heather, I’ll…I’ll come back, okay? I’ll—”

  “Good night,” Mrs. Gannis interrupted, tacking on a horrid fake smile just to push Gaia along.

  “Good night,” Gaia muttered as she backed away to the door. “You’re safe, okay? You’re going to be fine here with your family, so don’t worry now, and…just get some rest, and—”

  “Gaia,” Ed cut her off, subtly indicating Mrs. Gannis’s stern expression, belying her desperate desire for Gaia to get the hell out of that room.

  “Okay,” Gaia breathed. Standing right by Ed at the door, she realized just how utterly twisted her world had become.

  She was stalling. She did not want to leave Heather’s side. Gaia Moore did not want to leave Heather Gannis’s side. This truly was the twilight zone.

  But she finally gave up and turned around, following Ed out of the room. After all, there was really nothing else she could say. She’d already resorted to telling Heather lies. You
don’t have to worry now? You’re safe? Those were big, fat, monstrous, supersize lies. With the exception of telling Ed that she didn’t love him, they were probably the biggest lies Gaia had ever told. Now that she’d heard Heather’s entire story, she knew the truth.

  They were all far from safe. And there was plenty to worry about. So much more than Gaia had even imagined.

  Autopilot

  ALL TOM HAD SEEN WAS THE KNIFE. One glimpse of that faint glint of light reflecting off that shiny, jagged blade and he had launched off of his scraped-up, aching, exhausted feet and aimed for the bastard’s wrist.

  There had been no time to consider the absolute absurdity of it. No time to wonder how he could possibly be opening his own front door on another deadly crisis—another millisecond between life and death after the entire harrowing nightmare he and Natasha had just returned from in the Caymans.

  They’d finally found their way home from Loki’s endless succession of horrors and death traps, and all Tom had wanted to do when he’d opened that door was to sit in a chair for at least three legitimately calm minutes. Just three minutes before he voluntarily reentered hell. Three minutes of holding his beautiful daughter. Three minutes of sitting at a simple wooden dining table with Natasha instead of in a torture chamber or a prison cell or even a turbulent flight back to the States. Three minutes to take a look around that table and see the woman he’d fallen in love with safe at home and her daughter and his daughter seated together like sisters. A family. That’s what they could have and should have been building right there in that house. That’s what he had so hoped to come home to. An honest-to-goodness family. But that was utterly impossible as long as one particular family member continued to breathe.

  Tom had honestly thought he might have found three decent minutes to dream about a new future instead of obsessing over his deadly and tiresome past, but one glimpse of that knife and he knew….

  To expect three minutes of his life without Loki was to expect too much.