෴Adele෴
෴Javier෴
෴Hugo෴
෴෴෴ ෴෴෴ ෴෴෴
SERE
෴෴෴ ෴෴෴ ෴෴෴
A nagging itch between her legs woke Adele up from a warm comfortable sleep. She groaned and rolled over, hoping for a few more minutes of rest.
Rubbing her thighs together only increased the itching. She grunted, and reluctantly began the laborious process of disengaging from the pile of soft warm blankets.
Several minutes later she’d managed to sit up at the edge of the bed. The itch between her legs had only gotten worse when she’d ineffectually rubbed at the itchy spots.
She staggered to the bathroom, noting that her pants had shrunken further. The call of the toilet distracted her from the unbuttoned and unzipped jeans that were clinging tightly to her hips.
When she pulled the pants down and sat to pee, what she saw drove all remnants of sleep from her mind.
“2 live” was cut into one of her inner thighs. The itching was caused by the scabbed and healing cuts. The other thigh had the words “no eat no sleep” cut into it. She looked at herself with horror. She had no memory of doing this to herself, but the angles and relative accuracy of the right and left handed cuts made it clear that she had.
The bathroom had a shower. Part of her was suddenly desperate to use it, but the sight of the words cut into her flesh had driven any sense of safety and security far away.
In her pocket she found a tiny scrap of sharp plastic. The small curved plastic had a rough ground edge on one side. At first, she couldn’t recall where it came from. It looked so familiar. Then she looked at the bottom of both shoes. Sure enough, one of them was missing the plastic heel reinforcement. Finding this made her more confident she’d done this to herself, and that this was the implement she’d left herself the messages with.
The significance of the mostly healed over itching scabs suddenly hit her. “How long have I been here?” she whispered, looking around as though the mere utterance would summon a threat.
The itching she’d ignored from her left arm returned. She gingerly pulled back the sleeve, afraid of what she’d find.
“Where Hugo?” Another message that looked more recent than the lines on her thighs. The other forearm simply said “Act normal!” in half healed scratches.
Adele reflexively tried to summon a small portal home. The feeling of pressing against a vast weight enveloped her when she exerted the effort. The spot before her didn’t so much as flicker.
She looked at the terse messages on her skin again, then carefully pulled the too-tight clothing back on. “Alright, so what does normal look like?” she muttered to herself.
The lack of ability to recall how long she’d been there, or what she’d been doing, started to snap into stark relief against the soft, foggy mental fugue she’d been in.
She made her way to the dining area to find Mercator hosting Marcus.
Mercator rumbled an agreement to something Marcus had said. Seeing Adele, he waved her over. “Good morning, I apologize for not waking you. The main course has passed. But please, enjoy some dessert!” his jolly tone didn’t match his penetrating gaze or the toothy grin that Adele found increasingly unnerving.
She took a seat next to Marcus, as far from the giant figure of Mercator as she could manage while still trying to act normal.
The table was covered in an array of sumptuous desserts.
Without thinking, she picked a few sweet breads and rolls for her plate.
Mercator looked at her plate and smiled. Something smug and sinister hid within that smile. Adele smiled back, her smile uncertain and faltering.
“Where’s Hugo?” She blurted out. Then she looked around the room again. “For that matter, where’s Javier?”
Marcus turned and smiled, his wide pupils and slaw jaw making him look more than a little drunk or otherwise intoxicated. He pointed loosely at Mercator.
“They's hepping out inna kitchen,” he slurred out.
Mercator smiled wider still, revealing what seemed to be far too many sharp teeth. “Oh yes, your companions were interested in my private art gallery. After I showed it to them, they ended up—what is that phrase?—hanging out together in the kitchen. Those two are a delight! Such helpful young humans! I expect they’ll be crucial for me in creating a fine dish suitable for others like me.”
Adele glanced around the room as she tried to resist the delicious smells of the treats on her plate. “Oh, are there more like you? Will we get to meet them?”
Mercator nodded his giant horned head. His skin seemed to become a darker shade of blue for a moment as he smiled wistfully. “Most assuredly. I probably shouldn’t tell you this, but we, well, my people, we really love humans. You’re just so delightful. But to answer your question, I’ll be—I’ll be welcoming guests who are of my people soon.”
He smiled, this smile looking genuine rather than a show of teeth. “It’s been so long, I can hardly wait. Don’t worry, I’ll prepare you, but really they’ll love you just as you are. I have no doubt it will be a truly memorable meeting.”
The words sounded good, but something about his manner still put her off. She noticed he was paying more attention to her full plate than she liked. Adele looked around the room. “Honored host, could I—”
He shook his head. “Please, I’d prefer to dispense with the guest/host relationship, and just think of you as people staying with me for a while. People who might in time, become friends. So please, call me Mercator.”
Something about this sounded wrong to her, but she couldn’t work out just what it was. “I couldn’t presume. Well, honored host, I was wondering if there is anything I can do to rep—”
The giant smiled and shook his head, setting his loose, white hair stirring about his shoulders like a curtain in a breese. “No no no. I am most pleased that you think to offer, but truly, your enjoyment of my hospitality is its reward. I need nothing else from my guest but to know what you would like.”
The sense that something wasn’t right only grew stronger. Adele glanced around the room, desperate for an idea. She spotted the ice cream cooler under an intricate picture across the room. “May I get myself some of that ice cream?” She moved to get up.
Mercator was instantly on his feet and halfway across the room. He raised his vast clawed hands, indicating his desire for her to remain at the table. “Please, you’re my guest. Allow me.”
With her sense of the space around her, Adele felt something shift when he moved like that.
In another blink Mercator was standing by the freezer. In that fraction of a second, Adele felt the subtle shift again.
She sat down absently, and without thinking, picked up a cookie. She was about to bite into it when Mercator’s voice broke her trance-like state.
“What flavor?”
She looked up at the giant, crouched over the chest freezer that looked like a toy compared to him. Then she noticed the cookie at her lips and dropped it to her plate.
“Uh, which flavors do you have?”
Mercator bent down further, pulling out quarts of ice cream and peering at them.
Adele took the opportunity and swapped her full plate with Marcus’ nearly empty one. Marcus didn’t appear to notice, but kept eating in a stupor.
“Do you have something with pistachios?” Adele chose a more niche flavor she’d find the least temping, hoping he wouldn’t have it.
Mercator stood up. “This human language writing is so small. Would you be so kind as to have a look for yourself?”
Adele searched the freezer. There didn’t seem to be any flavors that didn’t involve chocolate. She wondered if packaged food like this would be safe, but the constant itching on her thighs and forearm argued against it.
Eventually, she made her way back to her seat, and faked eating a little more from the nearly empty plate she’d swapped with Marcus. By this time, he’d nearly cleaned her plate as well.
Marcus got up and staggered toward the bedroom area with a dull expression. A moment later, she stood and mimicked his loose limbed stagger out of the room. With every exaggerated step she was sure she’d be called out on her deception. She let out a long sigh of relief when she made it back to ‘her’ room.
Now aware of the shifts, she noticed them coming more frequently. Small increments of time when it felt as though she could engage her portal abilities.
When she heard Marcus snoring loudly from down the hall, she crawled into bed to wait.
With an iron will, Adele managed to stay awake until Mercator had strode in uncanny silence past the room. The giant’s glance inside appeared casual almost to the point of being disinterested, but the very sight of him glancing into the room left her breathless and unnerved, feeling like a mouse under the gaze of a bird of prey on the hunt.
Many yawns later, the suppressive field lifted. Almost not daring to hope, she created a tiny portal to her fridge in the office. The simple small portal she’d made so many times before still seemed to take far more effort than normal.
The moment it opened, sand and loose rock fell through it. She snapped the portal closed. “Ok, you’re a little rusty. No need to worry.”
She opened the small portal she’d used to talk to Midnight in his office so many times.
More rubble came through the portal. She opened a portal to her home in the Atlanta suburbs. Cool ash and a chunk of scorched drywall fell through.
“Oh my god.” She exclaimed, her eyes going wide as she took in what this meant.
She sat down on the floor against the wall, head in hands, and trying to be calm.
“What happened out there?”
Her hands shook as she opened another portal. Sunlight streamed through. She looked through the portal at Raz’s backyard. The scene looked normal. As usual, the landscaping was a little neglected, the grill and outdoor furniture they had enjoyed many summer cookouts with, parked near the basketball hoop on a small concrete pad.
She smiled and relaxed. With a small effort of will, she rotated the portal around to look at the backside of his house. As her view rotated around, she gasped when the wreckage of his house came into view.
After several failed attempts, she managed to open a portal overlooking the crater that had once been the home of her hope.
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A hand covered her mouth as she looked over the wreckage, surrounded by lines of blue and white striped policia tape.
“What on earth happened out there?” Her expression vacillated between hope and dread. She caught sight of the metal shaped improvised barrier and a sliver of relief shone in her eyes.
The sound of Marcus snoring broke her from her reverie.
She got to her feet on unsteady legs. Leaning on the walls more than she wanted to admit, she made her way down the hall to his quarters.
Marcus lay sprawled across the bed. In sleep, she noticed how soft and puffy his face looked. She absently touched her own cheeks, her hand drifting past the unbuttoned jeans that fit so tightly over her itching thighs, suddenly aware that he wasn’t the only one who was a bit puffy.
She tried for several minutes to wake him. Eventually she poured a thin stream of cold water onto his cheeks and forehead until he sputtered blearily awake.
He wiped his face on the blanket and looked at her blankly. “Cinco minutos más!” he muttered and rolled over.
A distant thumping reached her ears. The sound was so deep she almost thought she could feel it through her feet.
“Marcus, I can’t give you five more minutes. Time to get up!” she whispered urgently in his ear. When he didn’t react, she pulled the blankets off the bed and tossed them to the other side of the room. Repeating the cold water drizzle finally got him out of bed. He stood with a drugged, unsteady carriage.
He muttered something that might have been a greeting. Adele took off the chain she wore around her neck that carried her late husband’s wedding ring on.
A loud sound that might have been an alarm rang through the complex. Followed nearly immediately by a loud pounding like a hammer on stone. The clicking of claws on stone and gusts of breath from giant lungs was the only warning that Mercator was coming down the hall.
She froze. Mercator ran past the open archway without so much as a sidelong glance into Marcus’s room. She waited until she could no longer hear the clicking strides before letting out her sigh of relief.
Marcus seemed to have slipped back into a walking sleep. Adele ran out of patience. She slapped his cheeks and pinched his ears until he opened his eyes again.
“Marcus, listen to me. I know you’re tired. Try to focus!” She pressed the chain into his unresisting hands. “I’m going to send you home.” She grabbed his head and tilted it up to her, forcing him to look her in the eyes. “Get in contact with Midnight! I’m going to look for Hugo and Javier. Call Midnight and get him here!” She took his head in her hands and looked at him eye to eye. “Do you understand me?”
Marcus seemed to understand. He nodded and tried to stand up straight. He finally leaned against the wall and locked his unfocussed gaze in her general direction. “Get Midnight. I guh it.” He mumbled.
She pulled him in for a quick hug and then let him relax back against the wall. “Make sure you hold still,” she said. Marcus didn’t react, just continued to lean against the wall and gaze in her general direction.
Adele focussed her will. The wall behind Marcus started to shimmer. There was an unusual sluggishness, even resistance, to the portal creation. She clenched her fists and pressed down harder on the mental controls she’d created for her ability.
The place felt like it was actively resisting her now. It wasn’t the total suppression she’d run into before, so she pushed harder. Finally she’d forced the outer bounds of the portal to be, into a big enough shape and size.
Adele stood shaking, covered in sweat, and panting as though she were running hard. Her ears roared with her racing heartbeat. She tried to speak, to reiterate his mission, but each time she tried to speak her focus wavered and the portal began to collapse. She looked him over, his slack and off balance form, and somehow dug a little deeper to further enlarge the portal to ensure he would pass through unharmed.
Knowing what was coming, she winced in advance, trying to brace herself, then flipped the switch in her mind. The portal to be, instantly shifted from an imaginary plane visible only to her, to a sheet of torn reality, an active hole in space leading to another point in space. Even prepared, the shocking burst of pain forced a low guttural grunt from her. She stopped breathing entirely as Marcus fell through the hole and landed on the strip of gray dusty grass near the edge of the devastation of the bunker buster detonations.
The instant he was through, she allowed herself to relax a tiny bit. The portal snapped shut. A small object fell to the ground. Adele sagged, tried to sit down on the bed and missed, sliding to the floor. She lay there gasping for breath.
As her pulse and breathing slowly returned to normal, she reached out for the small chunk of leather and rubber with a look of concern and horror on her face.
It was the toe of one of his shoes. She turned it over to look inside, and let out a tension filled breath when she verified it was just a tiny bit off the tip of his shoe. “Sorry about the shoes Marcus. You’re lucky you favor Italian fashion.” she muttered as she half leaned, half grabbed at the bed and struggled to her feet. She absently snorted, coughed, swallowed the metallic taste down, then wiped away a bright red smear from her upper lip as she dug deep for strength and courage.
She heard another bang in the distance. The sound was followed nearly immediately by another loud pounding like a hammer on stone.
A low grinding sound was just audible, then what sounded for all the world like voices arguing.
She sat on the bed, her arms clutched around her, for what felt like a long time, contemplating the appealing idea of just making another portal and escaping. The need to just get away so deep and poignant she let out a low moan when she realized it wasn’t an option. After more time than she was proud of, she took a steadying breath and made her way toward the voices. She knew she couldn't leave without her boys.
Passing the dining area, her stomach once again complained about her skipping the meal. As she passed the freezer, she noticed the intricate images above it again. Part of her wanted to stop and look at them. She shook her head in a sort of unheard argument with herself and continued down the unfamiliar hall toward the shouting voices.
When she reached the end of that hall she was faced with a decision. One path led toward the distant voices raised in anger, the other away.
She looked both directions several times before hurrying away from the sounds. She found her way to and then past the room full of wall art. She found a sleeping area sized for Mercator, and a kitchen she would have called big even if it wasn’t built for someone well over twice her height. She remembered Marcus’s words, and couldn't picture any human helping out in a kitchen this size.
A giant stone topped island dominated the center of the room. The top of the island was just below her eye level. A primitive looking cleaver with a blade longer than her arm rested next to a thick slab of wood on top of the stone island. A fire pit stove was still burning with a low, banked, bed of coals. She could smell the bacon frying in the giant sized pan.
Looking around the kitchen, Adele heard something small and plaintive that reminded her of a cat in trouble. The soft sound drew her attention to a tall door opposite the stove. She approached the door, then stopped short. Something about the door seemed to trigger a visceral aversive reaction in her.
Suddenly afraid, she approached the door tentatively. Her hand shook as she reached for the handle. When her hand touched the cold cast bronze handle the heavy door let out a small squeak. The small sound inside went silent.
Adele jerked her hand back and stepped back away from the door. She backed up until she bumped into the stone island. She wiped first one then the other sweaty hands on her pant legs. She spent several moments bringing her near panicked panting under control.
Gulping loudly, she grasped the handle and slowly pulled the door open. A wave of cool air filled with the stink of stale urine, vomit, and blood rolled out.
Something wriggled and skittered in the shadows at the edge of the light. She took a step backward at the sight. When the door opened all the way, a light came on.
“Oh my god!” she blurted out at the sight of Hugo hanging from a pair of hooks driven under his achilles tendons on both feet, partially supported by Javier.
Javier scrabbled at the floor with his wrapped stumps to keep himself positioned to lift Hugo with his forearm stumps. His eyes were tightly shut, whether against the sudden light, or in a desperate bid to not see who had opened the door, she didn’t know.
“Your hands! Your feet?” she looked away from Javier, shifting her gaze to the inverted Hugo. She started to hyperventilate. “Hugo, where are—where are your?” She couldn't bring herself to finish the question. “What? Where? What?” she couldn’t seem to catch her breath. Suddenly lightheaded, she slowly, with deliberate motions, leaned on the door frame. She closed her eyes and took a slow shaky breath. When she opened them again, the same horrific scene was there.
Javier opened his eyes at the sound of her voice. He shifted on the floor and grunted in pain. “Mrs. Owens, you need to get out of here! It’s Merca—” His flailing movement caused one of his forearm stumps to hit the wall. He cut himself off with a high pitched, choked squeal of agony.
She sobbed silently, then wiped her eyes with her unbloodied sleeve. She snorted, ignoring the coppery taste as she swallowed down another mouthful of blood. Adele wiped her nose with the red stained sleeve, then looked at her hands, and back at Javier and Hugo’s stumps. “Oh god. This isn't happening. This can’t be happening!” Her voice rose as she repeated her denials.
Responding to the sound, or perhaps just the tone of her voice, Hugo’s eyes fluttered open. He stared blindly around as though he was seeing somewhere very different than his surroundings. “¿Mamá? ¿Mamá? Mami, me duele mucho, duele tanto! ¿Javier?, ¿Javier?!”
Javier put his cheek against Hugo’s forehead and gently lifted Hugo’s head to rest on his shoulder. “I’m here mi hermano. It’s almost over.” He awkwardly pushed and pulled himself against the wall and lifted Hugo as best as he could to relieve the pressure on his hooked ankles.
Looking at her with a dark, intense gaze, Javier spoke with a low intensity. “Mrs. Owens. I know—I know you can’t get us home. It’s not your fault. You need to get that axe and do the right thing for us.” He paused and let out a deep hacking cough, before spitting out a crimson blob. “At least give Hugo mercy, even if you can’t help me.” He blinked away the tears he couldn't spare a stump to wipe away. “You need to do it now. Then you need to go. Get help, and tell Midnight what happened. Make sure this monster pays.”
Javier slipped out of position, and scrambled to maintain his posture against the wall. Hugo’s weight pushed against him. As Javier lost the battle against Hugo’s dead weight, the hooks pulled harder on his mutilated feet.
Hugo started crying out, begging for help, calling out for his mother again.
Hearing Hugo’s cries, Javier grimaced and levered himself back up into position on the bloodied wrapped stumps where his hands and feet used to begin, and lifted Hugo up again.
“Mrs. Owens! Do it now por favor!”
Adele glanced back at the giant cleaver then at the young men she thought of as ‘her boys’.
“Not a chance. I’m not leaving without you!” She stood next to Hugo and grabbed his legs. “I can’t lose you too!” she whispered. With an exertion of her power she sliced through the hook structure with a tiny portal that only existed for a fraction of a second. The tiny portal that should have been nearly effortless, sent a shock of pain down her spine, and left her weak in the knees. Across the room behind her, a slice of bronze no thicker than a single molecule appeared in the air and drifted to the floor like a leaf in the breeze.
The majority of Hugo’s body weight was abruptly hers to support. Javier bit back a scream into a high-pitched pained grunt as this shifted the weight around on him.
She lowered Hugo to the ground as though he were made of the thinnest, most precious glass imaginable. The ugly bronze hooks covered in dried blood were still embedded in Hugo’s ankles. Looking at the wicked, deep, barbs, she couldn't see how to get them out without hurting him even more.
“Gracias, mami.” Hugo muttered as his body went limp.
Javier nodded agreement. “Thank you.”
She just nodded, unable to look away from the battered and mutilated bodies of her boys. Anger began to overshadow fear on her face. “I’m sending you both to Charité in Berlin. I’m sorry I don’t have a good hospital landing point in Spain. Charité is one of the best. If I get out of here, I’ll make sure we get the best healing available for you both. You’ll be whole again, I promise. Please don’t lose hope Javier. You’ve both been unimaginably brave. I’m so very proud of you.”
Javier didn’t answer. He’d finally allowed himself to pass out.
Adele moved them into position next to each other, as close as she could maneuver them to keep the required portal as small as possible.
The effort of opening the small portal ahead of time to verify a safe arrival spot dizzied her. The hospital trauma center waiting room was clear enough at the moment; most importantly, it was staffed.
She let the tiny portal close and sagged against the wall. In the sudden quiet, it occurred to her that she could no longer hear the raised voices. A dark wave of paralyzing fear crashed over her. The image of Mercator suddenly yanking the door open and catching them was so abrupt and visceral she stiffened and held her breath for a moment, fully expecting it to happen.
With an audible gulp, and an invisible battle of will against a fear that wanted nothing more than to turn her into a helpless quivering mess, she turned her back on the door and started building the portal under her boys.
Several long and increasingly painful moments later, the portal was ready to be activated. She worked to keep her breathing steady this time, knowing she’d need everything she had. Even the knowledge of how much it was going to hurt meant nothing to her now. She knew in her heart it was nothing compared to what her boys were suffering.
She kept the portal structure in place as she laboriously struggled to her feet. Breathing hard, she looked down at herself in the reflective shimmery surface of the portal ready to snap into being.
Adele Owens didn’t like to think about her age. She told herself that age was just a number, and that her often neglected fitness routine and occasional attention to eating healthy was making a difference.
The woman in the reflection wasn’t the woman she thought of herself as. This woman looked weak, scared, and tired. Above all, she looked old and worn out. With a half shrug and narrowed eyes, she nodded grimly at her reflection. Adele tightened every muscle in her body as though anticipating a heavy blow, and activated the portal.
The boys fell through without a sound, both of them letting out pained moans when they hit the hospital tile floor a few inches below. The strain forced a visceral grunt out of her as the portal drank in her power to exist despite the passive resistance she’d encountered here. The open hole in space ripped the energy out of her so much faster than she’d ever felt before. She had just shifted the portal away from her boys to step through it herself when she felt the sharp, nauseating feeling of her energy bottoming out.
The portal aggressively snapped shut, the last image she saw was the shocked medical personnel rushing toward the boys. All her strength fled. She staggered back against the door, tried to lean on it, and fell when it swung open. She lost track of time staring up at the rough-hewn timber and stone ceiling. When she finally came to her senses, she couldn't have said whether seconds, minutes, or even hours had passed. She reached for her ability, ready to go home herself. Nothing happened. She tried harder, but stopped immediately when a deep, sickening shock of pain radiated from behind her eyes and down her spine.
“Well dear, looks like it’s time for plan B. See you soon honey.” There was no plan B.
Seeing the boys off had lifted a weight off her shoulders. She grabbed hold of the stone island, and struggled to her feet. Considering the giant cleaver as a weapon, she realized it was far too heavy to even carry, let alone wield, in her current condition. She took a breath, smelled the cooking food, and nearly vomited at the realization that she wasn’t smelling bacon at all. A moment later, she staggered out of the kitchen and toward the raised voices like a woman more dead than alive.