“You don’t think…” I pointed up the stairs.
“Why would he?”
“No, he is terrified of those things.”
“Not terrified, fascinated,” I corrected.
“What?” Dirk came and stood beside me.
“I got a sense of him being afraid, yes, but also curiously drawn to them.”
“Kate, what are you talking about?”
“She’s our team leader, Dirk,” Trip said. “She knows.”
Dirk’s eyebrows shot up. “Crap.”
We raced up the stairs and into the middle of the street. The street lights cut inverted cones down to illuminate the pavement. Greg’s Camaro was gone.
“Where did he go?” We looked in every direction trying to decide which way he might have taken.
There was only one thing that he would have left the safety of the subway station to see. Make that two things. “This way.” I pointed and ran toward the Dodge.
“That’s straight into the tornados!”
“Yeah, exactly.”
Dirk and Trip studied each other’s skeptical faces, then jumped into the Avenger with me. We rolled down the windows and drove straight for the freight train sounds at the center of the city. Dirk drove like a racer, while Trip and I searched the streets.
“Stop!” I screamed over the roar and pointed back to the street we had just passed. Dirk slammed on the brakes, swiveled the car around and we bolted down the street where the Camaro was parked.
Dirk screeched to a halt when the twin twisters met at an intersection several blocks away and began a deadly dance toward us between the sky scrapers.
We jumped out of the car and ran toward ground zero. The tornados blasted debris around us and we pressed against the walls, our hair and jackets whipping around us furiously.
“Look, there is something in the street!” I yelled into the roar and pointed past the Camaro, hastily parked with one wheel on the curb.
“You stay here, Kate!” Trip tugged on my arm, dragged me to the sidewalk and tucked me into an alcove against a shop door. My mouth dropped as I noted all the glass windows and shook my head.
“No way!”
“On second thought…” He scanned the area. “Over here.” He grabbed me around the waist and carried me across the street to a wooden door that was set into a wall plastered with billboard ads. He bent down and lifted a metal trash can lid from the curb and shoved it into my hands. “Stay here, stay down and hold this over your head.”
I nodded and huddled behind the lid—Trip, my protector, always thinking of my safety above all others.
A vibration drew my attention to a light post down the street. It teetered in the gale force and tipped back to hang in a power line. The light shuddered and cast a glow onto the street. I peered over Dirk’s shoulder to the thing I had seen earlier in the intersection. It was Greg!
“Trip!” I pointed down the street to the center of the intersection.
Greg stood with his arms up and his eyes closed while the wild winds whipped around him. A newspaper blew into his legs and stuck against his pants, rubbish cavorted in the streets and the back of the Camaro shifted around ninety degrees as the suction of the tornados drew near.
The breath-stealing vacuum was back, and I sandwiched myself between the alcove wall and the trash can lid and peered between the crack. Dirk whirled around when I pointed to Greg, and he took off running in his direction. Trip paused to wave me back, then turned and shot after him, navigating around flying fragments and fallen objects.
Dirk reached Greg first and grabbed his arm. The street light behind me exploded in a shower of sparks and I crouched behind the make-shift shield and whimpered. Trip stopped and hung back, clearly torn between protecting me and helping Dirk.
Dirk yelled at Greg who opened his eyes in shock. He yelled something back at Dirk and shook his head. Then he pointed up to the sky. Dirk grabbed him around the waist and began pulling him back away from the storm. Greg struggled against Dirk, fighting for his freedom. As big as Dirk was, I didn’t think he would have any trouble subduing the younger smaller kid, but Greg spun and twisted out of Dirk’s hold. Trip reached them just as the two tornados hopped simultaneously and closed in on the intersection from both sides. I screamed futilely, the wind ripped the sound from my mouth and mingled it into the roar of the storm.
My attention was wrenched away from the trio to see a motorcycle spinning in the funnel. “Oh God!”
It flung the motorcycle in my direction and crashed into the wall ten feet away. I fell back from the impact and crab walked away from the falling glass and wreckage. I lifted the lid over my head and put some distance between me and the motorcycle landing. The glass shards started crawling back toward the twisters. The motorcycle shifted. Chunks of metal peeled off of it and flew into the air disappearing into the debris cloud swirling around the tornados.
The suction of the giants tugged at me, so I clung to the wall. The trash can lid wrenched out of my hand and soared into the air. I couldn’t believe the guys were still on the ground. How had they not been sucked into the vortexes? They were right there between them. Then I noticed the newspaper was pressed against the ground beside them. I guessed the two tornados were somehow cancelling each other out enough that they were able to stay on the ground.
Trip and Dirk each grabbed an arm and began running Greg back toward me. The kid’s feet weren’t even touching the ground. Greg turned his head and spoke to the tornado, his face contorted into pain and anger.
I couldn’t believe my eyes. It couldn’t be! The twisters took notice of the three boys. They actually postured as though they were conversing about them. The tornados bent over toward the fleeing trio, and I saw Greg’s legs lift straight up behind them. Trip and Dirk were jerked backward shocked that Greg was being sucked up into the funnel.
“NOOOOO!” I screamed until my throat was sore. The tornados were sentient. They were taking sweet little Greg, but leaving the rest of us to fend through the debris and wreckage.
Trip and Dirk refused to let go of Greg. They were both pressed to the ground exerting all their significant power to prevent him from being sucked into the storm. Greg kicking and shouting at his protectors, tried to wriggle himself free.
I was afraid that any moment the tornados would change their discerning palate and choose to suck them all up into their freakish mauls. I couldn’t lose them! I couldn’t sit here and watch my protector and new family be eaten by two unnatural freaks of nature!
Something snapped inside me. I stood up and half marched half flew toward the intersection slapping debris away from me. I walked right up between Trip and Dirk.
“Kate, oh God, Kate get out of here!” Trip bellowed at me from his tug-o-war position.
I ignored him, reached up and took Greg’s face between my hands. I peered into his eyes steadily until he fixed his attention on me and away from the tornados.
“No.” I shouted. My eyes were burning coals of fire as I looked into Greg’s face. “You have not created these monsters. You are not the cause of all of this mayhem.”
His face fractured into an expression of deepest sorrow and self-loathing. I knew these were his thoughts. Somehow, I just knew in my heart, he had taken responsibility for this whole mess, the city’s destruction, the missing people, the freakish wasteland of tornados beyond the city borders. Gregory carried the weight of guilt for this whole world. I wanted him to be free. This was too much guilt for anyone to carry, much less this small sweet boy.
“No, Greg. You did not create them, but you can control them. Tell them to go away.”
He grimaced at me and his face cracked with grief. I knew he didn’t believe me, yet. I was determined to convince him.
“We need you. WE need you. We love you, Greg, you are one of us now. You are our family. Make them go away.” I nodded encouragingly. “Just send them away.”
He locked his eyes onto mine and his sorrow morphed into determination. Go
od, I’m getting through to him. He glanced back at the tornados, cocked his head as though listening. When he turned back to me his face had changed.
“Tell my mom I love her.” His eyes clouded over with an opaque greenish color.
I didn’t like what I saw in his eyes or his face. “What? No. You tell her! You take control of your thoughts, Greg!”
A serene calm stole over him, not a comforting sight. He’d made his decision. Robotically, he glanced at Trip, then Dirk.
“No. Greg. NO!” I pleaded.
“Goodbye, Kate. Thanks for the dance.” He twisted out of my grasp and Dirk’s hands slipped down his arm. The tornados bent over toward us and opened their mauls wide as they merged into one enormous super cell. Trip held onto his finger tips for a microsecond longer and then—snap—Greg flew backward into the tornados, and they immediately sucked up into the clouds. Then all was still.
A tour bus crashed down twenty feet away from us, and the quantum sphere landed on top of us.
We sat on the floor of the QHR, stunned. I kept looking into my hands as though he would reappear there any second. What had just happened? Where was Greg? My ears were roaring in the silence after the storm.
I looked at Trip and his expression mirrored mine, confused horror. I slowly turned to look at Dirk and the intense grief on his face broke open a flood of emotion in me.
“No. No. No.” I shook my head in disbelief. “No!” My voice morphed from a whisper to cracked appeal. “Where is Greg? Dirk, where is Greg?
“Gone.” He huffed and his brow crumpled.
“Gone where?”
“He’s…he’s dead, Kate.” Dirk’s deep bass voice broke.
“No!” I turned to Trip. “Where is Greg?”
He shook his head and gathered me into his arms. I fought him off. “No! He’s not dead!” My voice shot up! “He’s not dead! He’s just…he has to…he could’ve…” I couldn’t think of any scenario in which he could have survived. “Noooooo.” I doubled over and wailed in grief. “He was right there. He was about to change his mind. I was getting through to him.” I snapped my head up, my eyes wild and gasped great draughts of air. “OH GOD! What is this place?” I jumped up and threw my back against a wall, suddenly very afraid of everything and everyone in this nightmare of a hellhole.
Medics rushed into the room and suddenly stopped. “They’re not wearing orange!” The short one pointed to me and Trip. “What is going on?”
One of them started toward me. “NO! STAY AWAY FROM ME!” I screamed at them and held both hands out in front of me. “I want to go home! NOW!”
The medics looked at Dirk and Trip. “What happened? Why is she so freaked out?”
Trip stepped between me and the medic with his back to me. “Why is she so freaked out? Are you kidding me? Our friend just died in there, and you want to know why we are freaked out?”
“Friend? Someone from the world you were in?” He asked Dirk.
Dirk squinted his eyes at the medic. “No, the jumper that was with us, Gregory Mathews.”
“There were only three jumpers. You are all back safely.” The medics looked at each other suspiciously.
“No, there were four of us. Kate and Trip and me and Greg. It was Greg’s jump for Pete’s sake!” Dirk was getting agitated.
“We have no record of a Gregory Mathews.” The female medic typed on her CompPad and shook her head.
A sound started low inside of me, a sort of low popping sound from the back of my throat. It grew until it was a long sustained wail of agony. Trip whirled around and wrapped me in his arms. I beat at his chest trying to break free, screaming the whole time.
“Wrong. NO! This freaky place. Let me go. Let me go.” He just held me tighter. “People don’t just stop existing! He was real. Greg was real!”
I fought against Trip, kicking and screaming trying to get out of this horrible place. “I loved him like a brother! He was my…he was real! Let me go. I can’t take it anymore! Let go!”
He held on. When he broke into a sob, I snapped my face to see his grief stained features and collapsed into his chest. “Trip!” I gasped. “I am so sorry…ahhhh…” I wailed in agony. We both fell to the floor and sobbed into each other’s shoulders. Dirk stumbled over and knelt down beside us and we included him in our embrace and all cried together.
The medics fidgeted awkwardly and whispered to one another, but, to their credit, they didn’t try to approach us. I don’t know how long we sat there in tearful mourning— until my legs were numb—but finally Trip staggered up and gathered me into his arms. I pressed my face into his chest and he carried us out of the orange wing toward our own Chartreuse medics.
We were processed and put through the detox showers and released. We stood in the QHR just staring at one another. Trip took my face between his hands and just gazed into my eyes. There were no words. The tragedy shared between us was too big and fresh to speak about. We drew strength from one another, but there was someone else I needed to be with. Only one set of arms could truly comfort me right now. I needed peace, serenity and bliss.
“I need Corey.” I whimpered when Trip wrapped his arms around me. “Take me to Corey, please.” My lips quivered and the tears I thought I had cried out trickled down my cheeks.
“I know. I will.” He kissed my hair and we left the processing room, Trip’s arm around my waist, holding me up as we navigated through the terminal.
We picked our way through the Chartreuse section and tried to talk to several white coats, but they were rushing around in a chaotic frenzy of activity. Trip finally grabbed one of them as he skittered near us.
“Is the green team back, yet?”
The medic eyed our green jump suits. “No they aren’t back yet.” He seemed concerned. “We, uh, we have never had a jump last this long…or had this many people go through at one time.”
His anxiety beaded up on his forehead and caused his eyes to flick around at the monitors while he spoke in rushed tones and clipped phrases.
“They aren’t back yet? Are they in danger?” My voice was pitched somewhere near the ceiling. I cleared my throat to bring it back down. “Why aren’t they back yet?”
Trip patted my hand. “Don’t you monitor the jumps?”
“No, we have no way of knowing where they are or how long it has been for them.” He ran a shaking hand through his hair. “We are monitoring all of the quantum channels, though. If they have lost their way…”
“LOST!” My voice cracked into a squeak. A dull ache began to fill my chest and I couldn’t seem to feel my fingers anymore. I drew in large gulps of air and closed my eyes, concentrating on staying in one piece.
“Is that possible, to lose track of them?” Trip asked and wrapped his arm around my shoulders.
“I don’t know, this has never happened before.” He shook his head. “Don’t worry, I am sure they will be back any minute.” He raced to answer a beeping machine.
It had happened before and we both knew it. It had just happened. Gregory was ‘lost’ forever. “Trip? Where are they?” Panic climbed up my throat to choke me.
“Steady there, Katie girl.” He rubbed my arm and pulled me close to his side and locked his eyes onto me, pouring his strength into me. I took a deep cleansing breath, pushed it out through pursed lips and let his familiar and soothing words bring me back from the edge.
“Let’s go to the waiting room. That will be the first place we can talk to them.” He dragged me through the gray shiny corridors and we began the long vigil.
I paced a trail in the linoleum floor, worry building in my chest with each step. Corey, be okay. Corey, be okay. Corey, be okay…was my mantra. Where could they be? That was the wrong question. I felt my chest clench in fear. Hadn’t we just witnessed how horribly wrong things could go in the jumps? My heart was filled with dread for Corey and grief for Greg, there wasn’t much of me left to worry about the rest of the team. I would die if I tried to carry the burden for all of them, but as I t
urned by the lounge chair for the 235th time I caught a glimpse of Trip’s reflection in the window glass. He was not handling this very well either. The anxiety sketched across his face gave me pause. I lowered myself into the chair directly across from him, my knuckles whitening as I grasped the arms of the chair.
We stared into each other’s worry stricken faces and I couldn’t help it, Trip needed me as much as I needed him right now. I stood and closed the distance between us and climbed into his lap. He opened his arms and pulled me tightly against his chest. We sat in silence comforting one another with strokes and touches and an occasional kiss to his cheek or my hair.
Finally, I said what had been ricocheting around inside of me. “I didn’t think we could die in the jumps.”
He squinted at me. “Of course we can, Kate.” He tilted his head as though he wondered if I were short a microchip. “What do you think all of this talk of surviving is about?”
“Oh.” I pursed my lip to one side and gnawed on my inner cheek.
“Besides, I already died once at this camp and had a near death experience on my jump. There are no guarantees.” He shifted and snapped his eyes to me awkwardly as though he just realized that his words were not comforting and what they could mean for Corey and the rest of our jump team. “Hem…but…uh…you are probably right…”
I arched an eyebrow. “Don’t try to mollify me, Trip. I’m a big girl.”
He cracked a half smile and pressed his index finger to the tip of my nose. “Who uses big words, evidently.”
“Yeah, well, we each have our own weapons.” The corner of my mouth twitched, and then I took his hand. “You died?”
“Yep, Tara and I both died in the Scriptorium.”
“What?” I leaned back and looked him square in the face.
He lifted his shirt to reveal the huge scar over his heart.
“Oh, yeah, I remember your scar.” I placed my palms on his chest and fingered his scar gently. “Can you tell me about it?”
Intensity stilled his whole body. “Uh, n n not if you keep doing that! I won’t be able to think straight.” His abs quivered beneath my touch and that familiar burning expression flared in his eyes.
The Torn, Book One of the Holding Kate Series Page 14
