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She wasn’t shocked as much as she was simply uncomfortable in a truth that she had heard whispering from her sub-state for some time now; a feeling she had had once before but tried so hard to forget. The first time she fell pregnant, the news was devastating; in her youth, this meant the end so many things and she had tried on numerous occasions to rid herself of the of the virus camped in her extremes, unhinging her emotional state and ruining her preservation.
The first time she tried deleting the pregnancy was maybe a day or two after she had broken the news to Marcos. They had just moved in together and their life had so much potential, it could have moved in any direction. They were young and the world was ideal and they thought about doing so many things, about changing everything.
But that all changed and like a forest fire chasing the tail of a shifting wind, their world caught ablaze and the extremity of it all, the enormity of the challenge ahead sent her running straight into the inferno with nothing but the spit in her mouth to douse the flames.
And the day following the new truth; when the sobriety of their celebration brought with it the cold thud of reality and the sense of desperate isolation, she panicked and locked herself in the bathroom with a thousand pills of a thousand names but only one solution when they were added together.
She had been in there for only a moment or two with the door locked before the concern in Marcos’ voice turned from gentle persuasion to climatic coercion; screaming at the top of his lungs while beating through the wooden frames with his fists and smashing the lock from the door with the heel of his foot.
By the time he burst in; his hands high in the air swinging down to strike at her face, she had already consumed a great deal of tablets; her mouth, a swollen sea of white pills that spilled out onto the floor as his hands grasped her throat cutting her supply of air and tearing her by the last breath of her will, from the roaring fire and back into the choking reality where all the possibilities she had known were no longer carved in her name; they would equate for everyone else.
She didn’t think of running for a bottle of pills this time, something inside her, other than the thing growing in her womb, fed on her compassion; an uncommon emotion and preserving state that she could not comprehend but with it, she could not argue. Instead, she left The Behemoth on a note that she would attend to her sickness.
She was excused with the guard of a White Heart who walked with her down the winding stairs and out into the open air of the courtyard where now the darkness was peeling away and the thin light of day was claiming its right. The Woman gazed upwards and stood for a moment without rush and in silent appreciation.
The sky was a light blue, something she hadn’t seen in so long. As light crept over the stretch of night and it brought with it an open sky, free of the cold blanket that divided their aspirations for an amount of time one would not dare to collect. It was beautiful, to see a new day being born and to see into the depths of the heavens.
As The White Heart lowered his arms and disengaged his defences along with all those in the courtyard; bewildered and catatonic, staring up into the cerulean sky, The Woman slipped from his guard and stepped surreptitiously away into the retreating shadows against the walls of the complex and then ran through the winding corridors looking for the science rooms where she had last left her love.
Whatever would happen, she wouldn’t let The Child die, but before whatever was to happen, she insisted on seeing her lover one more time before the currents of fate swept her into their direction and took her further than her fight ever could.
As she entered At Science, she could hear the furious passing of ideas and commands coming from one of the rooms at the far end of the corridor. The men sounded confused, rushed and desperate; always a poor combination.
There was a row of five doors to her left and right. As she crept along the corridor, holding her breath to her heart, she heard the sound of a man cursing.
She stopped suddenly in front of the door which was partly ajar and to assure the absence of her presence she peaked through the gap, pushing the door slightly to allow more light to fill the darkness. What she saw next was as much less expectant as what she then did, bursting into the room and from the table beside The Man in White, taking a length of cable that curled next to some cutters and a row of empty syringes.
Not a thought entered her mind as her hands roped around The Man in White’s neck, digging her left leg hard into the ground, pulling her elbows close to her body, her left arm dead straight and her right arm circling the man’s head with the length of the cable, pulling it tight against his neck and leaning backwards, her left knee pushing into the man’s spine, her face glowing red, her eyes searing with hatred, the veins in her arms popping through her white skin and the man, flailing his arms uncontrollably trying to find the cable at his throat and end his play of death.
The Woman pulled tighter and tighter until The Man in White fell completely limp, the syringe that was in his hand falling to the floor, rolling beside her feet. She didn’t let go of the cable until the rage that swarmed her had completely subsided, the young girl tied helplessly to chains with frightened eyes, watching the incident unravel.
As her rage subsided, her veins; in its place, took flight with adrenaline and her hands started to shake uncontrollably; her heart pounded weakening her stomach yet again and directing her legs to run.
What had she done?
She looked desperately around the room for a key, something to remove the shackles from the small scared little girl. She leaned down to the man in white brushing his legs with her hands trying to feel for something that could undo the locks; keys, a knife, a pick, a fucking hack saw.
There was nothing.
“Where is the key? I need the key, where is it?” she said to the girl.
The girl didn’t reply; she was in a semi-catatonic state. The Woman ran to the table and scoured through the metallic objects throwing them around the room, her urgency lifting, in the back of her mind; standing over her conscious state she could feel The Behemoth and his army of goons rushing after her wanting to kill them both.
“Where the fuck is it?” she said screaming to herself.
She ran back to the man lying dead on the floor and brushed against his entire body.
“They must be here,” she said to herself again, this time tears welling in her eyes and her voice crackling under her growing dismay and negated defeat.
“No, no, no, no, no,” she said. “Where are the fucking keys?” she screamed.
Her heart pounded faster, her hands shook more uncontrollably and her tears were impossible to hold back as she saw the young girl willing her to run with a muted cry from her wide sad blue eyes.
The Woman stopped; her panic unyielding.
She fell to the floor.
She grabbed the length of the chains and pulled on them drastically trying in vain to tear them from their mooring.
She couldn’t leave The Child, not like this. There had to be some way to free her. As she got to her feet a door outside closed and the sound of marching loudened in the hollow corridor until it stopped outside her door.
The handle turned and light flooded into the room.
A Rising Fall Page 37
