Lost (2 page)

Finally he threw a punch that caught air and nearly knocked himself off his feet. Gaia seized the moment. She leapt up onto the stoop behind him and jumped onto his back, wrapping her forearm around his neck. He flailed and struggled but wasn't flexible enough to reach around and haul her off him. Gaia gripped him tighter and tighter as he staggered, clenching her teeth and holding her breath as she pushed
his
breath out of
him. At last Behemoth took a lumbering step, then another, then fell to his knees. Gaia's feet hit the ground.

She released him, and he slumped forward onto the sidewalk. Dead asleep.

Gaia's faced twisted into an unconscious smirk. The big badass was sleeping like a baby. He actually looked kind of funny lying there all passed out. Then her vision clouded and her head went groggy, and she realized that she was about to do the same.

Dammit! No! Not now!
she thought, staggering in the direction of the hospital. She couldn't have a post-fight breakdown. Not when her father needed her. But the more steps she took, the deeper the fog grew, and Gaia was just able to duck behind a row of garbage cans for cover before she hit the deck.

Choking Himself Purple

ED STRODE INTO THE HOSPITAL
emergency room, shoulders back, exuding a sense of purpose. He tried not to think of the size of the guy he'd just left his girlfriend with. He tried not to dwell on his wounded pride. Gaia could take care of the thug. And while she was doing that, Ed would make
sure he took care of Gaia. And that meant looking after her dad.

“I'm looking for Tom Moore,” Ed said firmly as he stopped in front of the desk in the ER. “He was just brought in.”

The young nurse turned her tired brown eyes to the computer screen and tucked a wayward curl behind her ear before she started tapping at the keyboard. Someone very nearby let out a bloodcurdling scream that made Ed jump, and a baby in the corner answered with a screech that could have shattered glass. Two men near the coffee-vending machine yelled at each other in Arabic, one of them clutching an arm that was so broken, Ed could see its unnatural twist from across the room.

He swallowed hard and returned his attention to the nurse. Oh, how he hated hospitals.

“Are you family?” she asked in a bored way as she watched the screen. Apparently she was immune to the billion distractions around her.

“Yes,” Ed said without missing a beat. “I'm his son.” He'd seen enough movies to know that this was the only correct answer to this question. In fact, he always wondered why people didn't always say yes. It wasn't like the hospital personnel ever bothered to check ID. This particular nurse was so detached that Ed could have been a squat Asian woman and she would have believed he was Tom Moore's son.

“Okay, Mr. Moore,” the nurse said, addressing Ed. “Your dad is being checked over in exam room three just back there.” She pointed over her shoulder without looking away from the computer.

Mr. Moore.
He liked the sound of that. Even though if he and Gaia got married, he wouldn't change
his
name, it kind of made him feel like—

Okay, Fargo. Focus.

“Thanks,” Ed said, glancing up at the light blue curtain drawn over an open door. He had taken one step in the direction of the curtain, when Tatiana and her mother came bursting through the electrical sliding doors on the other side of the room.

“Ed!” Tatiana shouted. She jogged across the room, her mother close behind. Her blond hair was uncharacteristically mussed, and she had a panicked air about her as she ran right into his arms. She was obviously upset. They all were. They'd just witnessed one of the most important people in their lives choking himself purple, and there was nothing any of them had been able to do about it.

Ed gave Tatiana a quick squeeze, and then she pulled back, her blue eyes flicking left and right. “Where is Gaia?” she asked, adjusting the strap of her shoulder bag.

“She got sidetracked,” Ed replied.

“Sidetracked? How? Her father is in the hospital!” Tatiana's mother, Natasha, cried, throwing her
hands up. Her face was red, and her eyes were swimming in unshed tears. Natasha was clearly on the verge.

Ed reached out and put both hands on the older woman's shoulders. “She'll be here,” he said firmly, looking into her eyes. He and Natasha had recently spent a full night together waiting for Gaia, and Natasha hadn't been shy about the fact that she had no patience with Gaia's behavior. But this time it was different. This time he knew for sure she was coming. Gaia wouldn't let anything get in the way of being here for her father.

Not even the truck man I left her with,
Ed thought, indulging in a wave of nervous uncertainty. He glanced at the glass doors. Where exactly was she?

Natasha took a deep breath. “Where is Tom?” she asked, glancing toward the nurse at the desk, who was now dealing with the arguing Arab men, about as interested in their plight as she had been in Ed. Natasha twisted her one silver ring around and around and around, like she was trying to unscrew her finger from her hand. “Did they tell you anything?”

“He's in one of the exam rooms,” Ed said calmly. Someone around here had to be calm. Suddenly Ed felt like the solid, responsible, in-charge manly man. He stood a little straighter.

“We will go see him,” Natasha said, starting past Ed.

“Hold on,” he said, stepping in front of her so quickly, her head hit his raised arm. “I think maybe I should go back there alone.”

Natasha's face scrunched up and hardened all at once, and for a moment Ed thought she was going to go into a full rage right there in the middle of the emergency room. This was exactly why he didn't think she should go back there. She was in no state to be dealing with doctors and nurses.

“You don't tell me what to do!” she said. “I need to see him.” She turned a deeper shade of red than he'd ever seen on a person. Realizing suddenly that he might have just overstepped his bounds, Ed looked to Tatiana for help. She caught his eye and then stepped up behind her mother, wrapping her slim fingers around her mother's arms.

“Ed is right,” she said. “You can't go back there like this. First we'll sit and calm down, then we'll be able to see Tom.”

Natasha seemed to instantly deflate as she allowed Tatiana to lead her over to one of the chairs along the wall. All in all, Ed thought, he'd handled himself pretty well so far. He'd established himself as Tom's son and defused a potentially volatile situation with Natasha. Gaia would be proud.

Now all he needed was to find good news behind that curtain. That was what Gaia really needed.

Please just let it for once be good news. . . .

Compulsively Shined Shoes

HE WAS ABLE TO HEAR EVERYTHING
. After months of being trapped in this cold, white cell, he had trained himself to hear it all. Every turn of a key in a lock. Every click of a door. Every footstep. Every word. Every sneeze. Sometimes he even heard a breath. With nothing to see, nothing to smell, nothing to feel, his hearing had become honed. Like that of a bat. Or a mouse. Or the lab rat he was.

There was something going on. New sounds. New words. New tones. Things were starting to fall apart; that much was clear. He could tell from the high pitch in his captors' voices. He could tell from the running. The quick clip-clip of their compulsively shined shoes.

He pressed his fingertips and palms up against the glass that closed him off from the sparkling white hall beyond. From the gleaming tile. From the one tiny crack in the plaster on the far wall of the hallway that he'd studied so hard and for so long that it had started to appear in his dreams. It was the only thing of discord in this regimented, sterile place. Or at least until now.

Footsteps came. Rapidly. His heart hit his throat,
and he pressed his cheek against the glass, waiting. Suddenly a guard ran by, left to right down the hall, zipping past his eyes in a blur of color. So close, yet so untouchable.

More voices.

“What are you going to do with them? You can't move them! We have strict orders to—”

“The orders don't matter anymore! We have to contain this!”

A third voice. A scared voice. Possibly the voice of 501, the guard with the twitchy eye. “I don't even care now! Just let them go! If the cops come here and find this place—”

Let them go!
the prisoner thought, pressing his face so hard into the glass, it hurt.
Yes! Let them go!

“NO! We have our orders!”

“Aren't you listening to me? Loki's not coming back! He's as good as dead! I say we save ourselves!”

There was a loud clatter. A punch landed. A jaw cracked. A body hit the floor. The prisoner had a sinking feeling that the silenced one was the one who would have helped him. He swallowed hard. If Loki were as good as dead, wasn't he as well? Would the morons out there even bother to continue to feed him? Would he rot away in this white room for the rest of his numbered days?

The moment he stepped back from the glass, 457 appeared at the side of his cell. This was the round-jawed,
pudgy yet strong Hispanic guard who brought the prisoner his shots. Who held him down while 492 and 501 administered the serums. The numbers were embroidered in gold thread along their black collars. They were the only names he'd ever known his captors by.

He narrowed his eyes as 457 hit whatever it was at the side of his cell that made the glass slide up silently and out of sight. Guard 457 drew his gun from his holster and leveled it at the prisoner's heart.

“What's going on?” the prisoner asked calmly.

“I'm moving you,” 457 said. “One false move and I have no problem taking you out.”

The prisoner looked at 457 and waited. “What, no handcuffs?” he asked, arching his eyebrows.

“Don't get funny with me. I don't need 'em. I got this.” The guard lifted the gun half an inch. “Now move out into the hall and make a right. I'll be right behind you, and there's nowhere to go but straight, so don't try running.”

His pulse was racing like a Thoroughbred's. Was this actually happening? Was he going to move outside these four walls? He tentatively stepped past 457, never taking his eyes off the gun until he was in the hall. It was colder out here. The air was crisper. Sweeter. It was a whole new smell, and his nostrils actually prickled. He almost closed his eyes to savor it but stopped himself. Better to stay alert. Take it all in. Find some way to escape.

“Move it,” 457 ordered.

He walked down the hall, past the other cells. Some were empty. One held a girl, a redhead, who cowered in a corner, rocking back and forth. One held an older man, stooped and tired. He looked up as they passed, his blue eyes hopeful.

Why were these people here? What was their offense? Was it merely loving someone, too? Was that all they had done?

The hallway opened onto a larger room where 501 was just struggling to his feet. A bruise was already forming on his left cheek.

“I thought I put you down,” 457 said to the smaller man, still keeping his gun trained on the prisoner.

Guard 501 looked the prisoner over. His eye twitched once. “Just let them go,” he said again. “If we get caught, we're taking the fall. Remy and them have already split, you know.”

The prisoner looked at 457, who betrayed himself by flinching at this last news. But then his grip tightened on the gun. “We can't let them go,” he said. “We have orders.”

“Fine,” 501 said. Then, faster than the prisoner ever would have thought possible, 501 ripped his gun from his holster and blasted a shot, sending 457 reeling backward.

The prisoner stood there for a moment, stunned and free, as 457's gun clattered to the floor. The wound
was in his shoulder, but it was bleeding like a geyser. He didn't even shout out. He simply looked surprised.

“Well?” 501 said, the twitch wild now. “Run, you idiot!”

That was all he needed. The prisoner took off through a door at the far end of the room. There was another hallway, and a guard came running toward him from the other end. He raised his arms and ran, ready to give the man a swift elbow to the jaw if he tried to stop him, but the guard just ran right past him as if he weren't even there.

The next door opened up onto a brightly lit room that was three stories high and made almost entirely of glass. He blinked against the harshness of the light, almost appalled by it. Until he realized it was sunlight. Until he realized that those spindly things on the other side of the glass were trees.

Salivating now, he careened toward the exit door, across a marble floor dotted with black speckles and trimmed with gold. Every second he expected someone to jump out and tackle him to that floor. Every moment he expected to hear a shot ring out or a voice call for him to stop. But nothing came. There was no one. And in moments he was tasting fresh air.

Outside, he found himself feeling almost drunk. There were birds. There was wind. There was grass and asphalt. A fast-food wrapper skittered across the pathway in front of him, its bright red color one of the most beautiful things he'd ever seen.

A slam sounded from the compound behind him, and he realized that he wasn't yet free. He wasn't yet safe. He ran toward the woods that bordered the building. Ran until the branches ripped through the soles of his soft slippers. He spotted a large rock and collapsed behind it, pressing his back up against its cool, uneven surface.

His breath was harsh and ragged. He hadn't had this much exercise in months, and it made his heart pound dangerously. He sat for a moment and waited, gasping as quietly as possible. Listening. Waiting for the army that he was sure would be sent after him. They couldn't really all be gone. Most of them had to be there still. And when they realized what 501 had done, they would deal with him and come after the refugee.