Chapter 19
Chapter nineteen
Dane
I’m falling.
Darkness surrounds me with no end in sight. I open my mouth to scream, to shout for the others, but nothing comes out. My arms and legs won’t move. I’m a prisoner in my body, plummeting deeper into pitch-black.
A faint beep echoes in the distance. Another follows, steady and slow.
Then a motor hums, and something clamps around my upper left arm. Before I understand what’s happening, I hit solid ground.
I jerk my arm, but it still doesn’t move. The buzz now shifts into a slow chug as the stranglehold eases.
I inhale sharply, peeling my eyes open. Drop ceiling tiles and recessed lighting stare back at me. The unexpected brightness spikes my headache, and I groan.
“Oh, you’re awake,” a woman says nearby. “Good, you should drink some water.” Something pokes my left cheek. “Turn your head.”
Where the fuck am I?
I force myself to blink and squint through the lighting. I try to lift my hand, but my arm doesn’t budge. My wrist and elbow are pinned by restraints.
The beeps increase as realization sinks in.
No.
I struggle to move both arms and legs. A strap catches my throat, giving me barely two inches before it stops me.
“I’d advise you get yourself under control before you pass out,” the woman states casually.
Whipping my head around is a baaaad move on my part. Everything spins. Pain jackhammers in my head like a demolition frenzy, and nausea rolls in my gut.
Fuck.
There’s a short huff, then heels click away from me. “You’re almost finished with your session. I’d stay still if I were you. I’ll be back in an hour for your transfusion.”
Transfusion.
Shit.
Fuck.
When I open my eyes again, a straw stares me down—three straws linked together, dipping into a jug of water. Machines crowd the space beyond it. Wires trail to electrodes, to a blood pressure cuff, to an IV of fluids, and an another filled with blood. My blood.
No wonder I feel like shit.
I lean as much as I can to reach the straw, and wrap my lips around it.
After several chugs, I finally feel sated and slowly roll my head onto the pillow and assess my situation.
I’m alone in a tiny room with a curtain for a door.
There’s a toilet and sink in the corner—no privacy—but I take that to mean at some point they’ll let me out of this bed for bathroom breaks.
Considering how tightly I’m locked to this bed, it’s my only opportunity for escape. I could be anywhere, though.
I close my eyes, trying to ignore the pounding headache and failing miserably as it consumes most of my attention. Fear snakes up my limbs and wraps my chest in tight coils at the direness of my situation. Even if I did escape, I wouldn’t make it off this place against everyone here.
What about the others? Are they okay? Are they together, at least?
Damn it! I can’t give up. What if Charles tries to kill Rae again?
I thrash, straining and throwing everything I have at the restraints, even though the pain in my head screams at me to stop moving, I push through it, desperate to find a weak point to help me out.
I yell and grunt and try to kick or twist, but I’m granted no wiggle room or even a sign of anything loosening.
The machines are beeping like crazy until I collapse, panting for air and absorbing the repercussions of those attempts as they hit my body like a train. I’m too worn out from the blood loss. Too weak to fight back, even if there was an opening.
The world spins again, and I close my eyes, unable to resist my body pulling me back to oblivion.
“Wake up!” someone hisses in my ear, followed by a tap on my cheek. “Come onnn,” she groans in a whisper. A whole hand starts patting my face. “We don’t have much time.”
As I come to, a grunt escapes my chest involuntarily at the tightness in my muscles from a bed that’s no longer comfortable.
It also doesn’t help that I can’t move or stretch my limbs at all, aside from the brief bathroom break I was allowed earlier between exchanging the blood draw and the transfusion.
Something smacks over my mouth. “Shhh!”
I recognize the voice but am too out of it still to place who it belongs to.
Cracking my eyes open, I turn my head toward it.
No one’s there.
I blink, confused. I swear I felt something on my face.
Was I imagining it?
“Hello?”
This time, whatever it is squeezes my cheeks. “It’s Alice.”
“How—” The words come out funny with her hand still squishing my face, and her hold tightens before I can continue.
“I followed you guys because I was worried. I’m obviously an expert spy, so I hitched a ride in the trunk and held onto you when we fell in the portal.”
“If you’ve been here the whole time, you could have rescued me sooner,” I gripe. When she doesn’t say anything, I release a small huff. She was probably too scared to do anything until now. “Never mind that. What’s the plan?”
“The scientist monitoring you went to the bathroom.”
Great. And we’ve been wasting time chatting.
A hand grips mine and tugs. Only now do I realize my arm is free. I bend my knees and test the other arm.
Another groan crawls up my throat, but I bite it back with gritted teeth.
It feels so fucking good to move again.
I push myself upright and throw my legs over the bed, testing my leg strength. I have no idea how long it’s been. Has it even been a day?
Thankfully, I’m still having the blood transfusion, so my body’s almost back to normal once I stretch a bit.
I go to each machine and start powering them down.
If they’re anything like the ones in our infirmary, they’ll beep or set off alarms if I disconnect first. Hopefully, being off won’t trigger their own alarm to whoever’s watching my vitals remotely.
Then, I start ripping wires and the cuff off, then remove the two IVs and needle from my arm and slap my hand over it to put pressure there.
“Alright. Make me invisible,” I tell her. It’s quiet, and for a second, I think she’s bailed on me. “Alice?”
“Um... right. Let me see.”
She pokes my arm.
“What the fuck are you doing?” I guess where her arm is from that poke, grabbing her and directing her hand to my forearm. “Take my arm.”
“Oh. Yeah.”
I narrow my eyes at her. At least, where I think she is. “Have you done this before?”
“I’ve made objects invisible. Same thing, right?”
“We don’t have time for this,” I growl, pulling her with me to the curtained door. “Keep trying and don’t let go. I need to find that scientist before he realizes I’m gone and tells everyone. Which way?”
“Three curtains and then a door on the left.”
I nod, covering her hand on my arm to make sure I don’t lose her while running. The door’s cracked open, so I slip us inside and close it. A guy with buzzed black hair and a lab coat jumps around in his office chair to look at me, his hand hovering over the phone.
There’s a heartbeat of silence as we both stare at each other, and then we move, him grabbing the phone and opening his mouth to yell, and me wrapping my arm around his throat and dragging him out of his chair.
I use my other arm against my wrist to help add more pressure, cutting off his air.
His hands scratch and beat at my arm, but I refuse to let him go and miss this chance.
I kick the backs of his knees to make him drop and give me a better angle, squeezing with all my strength.
Finally, he falls limp. I drop him to the floor and search his lab coat and pockets for anything that might be useful. There’s not much other than some gum, a paperclip, and a pen, but I’ll bet his ID will come in handy.
Slipping off his lab coat, I pull it on. He and I look nothing alike, but at first glance, all anyone will see is another scientist in their coat with a clipped-on badge.
I plop into the office chair and spin to the computer. “See if you can find any weapons nearby.”
“A gun?”
“If that’s an option, then yeah. If not, then maybe a kitchen knife or something sharp will do.”
“Got it. I’ll be right back.”
“Oh, and Alice?”
“Yeah?”
“Thanks.”
It’s quiet. Then, “You thought of me for Harvey’s funeral even after I attacked you.” Another pause. “I want to be a part of the family he made. I want people to share stories about me like they did for him.” She sniffs. “I also need you guys to kill Dad. I really don’t wanna die.”
I nod, offering her a soft smile. “We’ll kill him,” I promise. “And I won’t let you die. Just stay close to me or stay hidden.”
The door opens slightly and closes again.
I get to work clearing the monitors from my chart. The scientist was already logged in, giving me access, but it won’t be a high enough clearance to get me all the information I’m looking for. But I can start with checking other active patient charts.
When those only show subject code names and their vitals, I flip to their cameras.
It doesn’t take long for me to find them.
Or, some of them, at least.
There’s no sign of Raegan or my brothers, but I do find a room filled with some of the Guild members who’d been on this mission with us.
They’re in narrow hospital beds and hooked up to their own machines, like I’d been.
I notice Fabian first, considering his football player size, and then Zedd and Gabriel are a few beds away, followed by over half of the others from our mission.
But where are the rest?
I don’t see Raegan’s friend Portia and her group or Reid and his team.
This time, I hack into the network to get full access, sweeping through every security camera angle I can find. I start mapping out the island—which I confirmed from outside camera feeds—and where I am in relation to the others while searching.
The door creaks, and I snatch a pen from the desk, my body tensing for a fight. It closes without a soul in sight, and I breathe a sigh of relief.
“A warning next time would be nice,” I mutter to Alice, who appears and rolls her eyes.
“Here.” A scalpel and a pair of scissors drop to the desk by my hand. “It was the best I could find.”