“Henry!”
“Henry!”
Jenna stumbled to her feet, trying to reach Henrietta, but before she could…
The world around Zaire twisted as he Jumped just a few steps forward, catching Jenna as blood spilled from between her lips.
The Jumper had expected as much.
Similar to Henry, Jenna was suffering from internal bleeding; though, her case was much more severe than Henrietta’s.
After all, Henry’s body was attuned to The Jumps she would be making in the future – she was not exactly a full-fledged Jumper yet but half was better than nothing.
“Jenna!” Townes hopped forward, though his legs weren’t yet steady enough to attempt such an abrupt maneuver.
Zaire could only sigh, focusing on Townes as he wrapped Jenna in his arms; then, the air around him shimmered as he Jumped just a few steps to the right, angling his body slightly.
Townes fell on his back.
‘A lot of load…’ The Jumper internally complained.
Once again Jumping, The African Teenager was suddenly kneeling next to Henry, watching as a slight trickle of blood poured out of her nose and ears.
“Damn, Henry…” Zaire complained, shrugging Townes off his back so he could brush Henry’s hair behind her ear. “I’m doing this because you’re gonna complain about blood in your hair when you wake up.”
“Will… will she wake up?” Townes toppled over, withholding a barf. “Will… will… will they be okay? Jenna, Henry? Are they going to be okay?”
Zaire frowned. “They will be if you help me with them,” He shouted.
The last thing The Jumper needed was a panicking teenager.
Henry would panic when she woke up…
Jenna would panic when she woke up…
Zaire had stored two stacks of panic tolerance so Townes was not allowed to panic, lest he be tempted to Jump the boy halfway across the world and leave him there.
The only reason The Jumper hadn’t done that was in consideration of Henry’s and Jenna’s feelings.
Especially Jenna – she seemed to have some kind of old friendship with Townes.
“COME HERE!” Zaire ordered.
Townes shook in place for a couple of seconds, met Zaire’s eyes that told of endless pain if he didn’t listen, and steadily made his way toward Henry and Jenna.
“Okay, so…” Zaire shifted his body, allowing Townes to hold Jenna, then Henry. “I am going to need you to hold them as if you’re laying them on a bed. You’re going to feel a sudden shift, then you let them go, okay? You have to let them go, or you’re going to fall with them.”
“I- I am not… too comfortable doing this,” Townes argued.
“Stretch your arms as much as possible… cradle their heads. Arch your back… good, good!”
The instructions came and Townes soon found himself in a very awkward position – it was as if every inch of his body was enduring a ten-hour workout.
“By the way, how are you still alive?” Zaire suddenly questioned.
It was almost an afterthought if he was being honest.
The Jumper could barely withstand Henry’s barrage of space because he was a Jumper.
Of course, Henry’s body instinctively tried to avoid damaging itself as much as possible.
In Jenna’s case, Henry instinctively tried to spare her sister from the micro-factures in space and Zaire arrived in time to protect her from the brunt of the instability.
But in Townes's case…
‘A really lucky guy?’ Zaire pondered.
Yet, in his experience, no one was nearly that lucky.
The world, like cheating, functioned under the assumption of Murphy’s Law – everything that could go wrong, would definitely go wrong.
“Wha—” Townes's eyes widened when he heard the question, suddenly conscious that Zaire would not ask such a question normally.
WHOOOOOOOOSH
The air shimmered and then, Zaire and his passengers were somewhere else.
“Release!” He ordered.
Townes felt the sudden absence of support – only the tips of his toes were able to balance him as he tilted forward, being dragged by the weight of Henry and Jenna.
Even without Zaire’s need to tell him, Townes dropped the girls and desperately rotated his head to the right, hoping to fall anywhere other than the empty air ahead.
Henry’s and Jenna’s bodies fell, and then a splash came.
They had both fallen into cylindrical pods almost twice as tall as their bodies.
Zaire leaned over the pods, using the mobile stairs to steady himself.
Townes gripped his arm for support.
“They need to stay in there for a couple of minutes,” The Jumper commented. “During that time, I have to decide what I will do with you.”
Townes gulped. “Perhaps…” He mumbled, “Perhaps, we should wait for Henry and Jenna to decide anything.”
‘That might not be a bad idea…’ Zaire internally judged.
Disappearing Townes would leave Henry and Jenna in a bad mood – not that they would be able to think about anyone else right now.
“Where are we anyway?” Townes seemingly forgot his fear in an instant.
His eyes greedily drank in the atmosphere and features of a secret lab. “This is a secret lair, isn’t it… it is, right?” He squealed, biting into his fist.
Human-sized pods filled with mysterious liquid…
No windows and a solemn, dark interior…
Large computer screen connected to a large, glass table…
Everything was giving Townes a very distinct impression.
“We are in Nebraska,” Zaire checked his smartwatch to confirm – after all, as a Jumper, where was always just a step away so he had taken to identifying places and not where they belong. “It should be Deep Labs in Nebraska. That’s all I can say… it’s one of those places The Shop discontinued and I got up and running again.”
“The Shop?” Townes questioned, always having a keen instinct for asking the right questions.
“Not something you need to know,” Zaire rebuffed and added. “So, your name is Townes, right? You were childhood friends with Jenna?”
“Hmmm…” He nodded. “What is the liquid they are immersed into? What does it do?”
“It’s called The XY Serum,” The Jumper educated, not completely sure about the origins of the liquid but admiring its healing properties nonetheless. “It should patch them up properly. It is supposed to be some kind of re-birth fluid. You know, like how everything heals when you’re in your mother’s womb?”
“That…” Townes paused. “Strangely makes sense,” He chuckled.
Zaire similarly chuckled, feeling the tenseness of the situation fading from his mind.
Sure, he had been in dire situations before but when it came to Henry’s matter, he was always high-strung.
Being stabbed never hurt Zaire but he could imagine being stabbed with Henry around would be an ordeal… because he would have to think about her safety as well.
He internally sighed. ‘It’s been a long time since I had to worry about the safety of someone else.’
The minutes ticked by.
Zaire and Townes filled the room with conversation but only half of The Jumper’s mind was truly focused on the conversation – he was paying attention to Henry and Jenna.
A minute later, Henry’s eye twitched.
The Jumper wasted no time, directly Jumping into the pod and grabbing Henry, Jumping back outside, and repeating the process to snatch Jenna.
There was a danger to Serum XY.
Leaving someone in the liquid beyond the point of healing would send him or her into a deep coma – that was a lesson Zaire had to learn the hard way.
It cost him a month of important events.
“We have to leave, Townes…”
“One moment, please…” Townes was tapping away at the computer, and Zaire was surprised to find that he was competent. “I just need to reset the switches on the pod.”
“What switches?”
“You know, the software for the pods is a bit outdated. They stopped cycling the Serum XY about a month ago,” Townes explained, tapping away at the keyboard as if it was his lover and it was only them in the world. “I think… if we had come in a month, the Serum would have evaporated by then.”
That piece of information startled Zaire.
Only he knew the pains he had to go through to attain two tanks worth of Serum XY – it was one of his greatest Jumping feats to date.
There was no way it could be lost.
This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
That was why he spent a hefty sum and possible exposure dragging scattered professionals to build a stable, self-cycling system.
‘One of those guys fucked up…’ He internally growled. ‘I have to pay them a visit!’
“And done!” Townes announced.
‘I will check it a little later…’ Zaire mused.
While he knew enough about Townes to know he was an autistic savant, Zaire had met enough geniuses to know that they often missed obvious things.
“Hold onto Jenna!” He ordered.
As soon as Townes held Jenna, and just for added certainty, slipped his arms around Zaire’s waist…
WHOOOOOOOOSH
The four vanished with a shimmer of air.
………………
Lights flickered on, detecting motion within the room.
Before the automatic defense system could activate, Zaire pressed his hand to the wall, undergoing a series of scans in the blink of an eye.
Usually, he wouldn’t have to physically touch anything but Townes, Jenna, and Henry were new to the system, and he had to register them first.
It was a room.
A simple white room.
At least, that was how Zaire designed it to look on the surface but as three new people were registered into the system, white walls bent away to showcase the room in its entirety.
It was almost three times as large and filled with black outlines where hidden cabinets and doors were located.
The room held everything The Jumper could ever need.
It was one of his last resorts after all.
The room was a place only two people knew existed, and Zaire only considered it two people because he had left secure instructions for redundancies if he somehow died.
‘The CIA still impresses me…’ Zaire internally praised.
Townes opened his mouth.
“Don’t ask me where this is…” The Jumper quickly course-corrected. “This is one answer you will not get… and if you do get it, you will not like the result.”
He gestured to two rectangular black outlines on the ground. “Put Jenna there and I will put Henry here.”
The Jumper placed Henry on the outline and soon, it rose out of the ground followed by a strong suction sound that pumped the transparent air mattress.
Townes followed Zaire’s instructions.
Within a second, Henry and Jenna were lying on beds as soft as cotton and the unconscious smiles on their faces told Zaire that death was no longer an immediate concern.
Of course, as a Jumper, death would always be a concern but at least for now, Henry was safe… somewhat safe.
“What next?” Townes questioned, staring at Henry’s and Jenna’s pale faces. “I mean… they look better but still not completely healed.”
“Because they’re not completely healed,” Zaire added.
“What?”
The Jumper examined the girls, running his fingers through Henry’s blonde hair.
Jenna was better – not entirely healed, but better.
Henry, on the other hand, had pulled space into herself – something not even the most insane Jumpers would try to do, much less succeed.
“This is going to get harder before it gets better,” Zaire spoke, not sure if he was warning Townes or himself.
“What do you mean?” Townes questioned, not liking the undertone of Zaire’s voice.
ARGH
Jenna groaned half in bliss and half in distress.
Townes quickly knelt at her side, placing a hand on her forehead and then shoulder, trying to guess what exactly was wrong with her this time.
He was, of course, frantic.
Zaire knew better – the more concerned your target, the calmer you should present yourself, even if your feelings were not necessarily so contained.
Life was often made of illusions.
Just as The Jumper was about to leave Henry’s side to tend to Jenna, he felt a subtle shift in Henry’s position – it was too quick to be anything but a micro-jump.
“Wha… What?” Jenna awoke confused. “What is… Townes? Zaire?”
“JENNA!” Zaire’s voice was solemn. “Go take a bath. Head left and you will know the shower when you see it… you don’t want to be here for what comes next,” He urged.
“What?” Townes and Jenna mirrored each other’s thoughts.
AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH
Suddenly, Henry’s eyes snapped open, revealing only whites that were soon overtaken by the blood red of bursting blood vessels.
Her body jumped up, down, right, left, and sometimes, her body even contorted into impossible positions.
It was demonic.
Jenna and Townes were no way believers in Supernatural but even without the revelations of the day, they would have stayed far from Henry on a normal day.
After all… there were seizures and then there was whatever was happening to Henry.
“HENRY!” Jenna sobbed, her fear overtaken by a sisterly instinct that she didn’t even know she possessed.
“Hold her back, Townes!” Zaire ordered, grabbing Henry’s shoulders and slamming her back onto the bed each time she instinctively tried to Jump away.
Any other Jumper would have been halfway into The Atlantic Ocean by now, but while Henry was power incarnate, Zaire was control-incarnate.
Power was meaningless without the control to apply it.
BANG
Henry slammed onto the ground.
BANG
Zaire Jumped her back onto the bed.
The air shimmered as Henry and Zaire tackled each other in a confrontation of space – she would vanish and appear somewhere random, followed quickly by Zaire slamming her back onto the bed.
Still, he was struggling.
Somehow, Jenna broke free of Townes's control – not that he was really trying – and dashed to Henry’s side, grabbing her sister’s legs in hopes that she would stop randomly Jumping around the room.
And… it worked.
‘I am looking at this the wrong way,’ Zaire realized. ‘To Henry, I was someone who hit her, but Jenna is her sister. Even subconsciously, she will try to get away from me but feel safe around Jenna.’
“Townes!” Zaire yelled. “Come and hold her hands.” You are allowed to die after all.
Henry contorted some more but she no longer Jumped, probably aware that Townes and Jenna would probably end up with missing body parts or buried in a wall.
When Jenna and Townes had Henry mostly under control, The Jumper Jumped to the furthest wall in the room and started to rip open the hidden cabinets.
They were white with black outlines, much like everything else in the room – made for maximum storage capacity.
Even Zaire wasn’t sure what was in every hidden outline; though, he more or less had an idea.
It wasn’t until the fifth cabinet that Zaire found what he was looking for – a black briefcase with a small screen in the upper-right corner.
The briefcase was opened with a swift scan of The Jumper’s finger, revealing two vials of cloudy, glowing green liquid.
The air shimmered.
Townes was bumped aside as Zaire appeared just right of his position, sliding the sharp end of one of the vials into Henry’s neck.
He grabbed Townes’s hand and forced the startled teenager to keep the vial in place until the liquid was completely drained.
The veins in Henry’s neck glowed with the introduction of the rare medical concoction.
Then, before Jenna could react, The Jumper appeared at her side, similarly sliding the pointed end of the second vial into her neck.
But she did not receive the full dose – she didn’t need it.
In the two seconds Jenna failed to react, half the vial’s liquid had entered her bloodstream, and with unnatural grace, Zaire re-directed the vial to his own neck and injected himself.
Henry was instantly unconscious.
Jenna held Zaire’s gaze for a couple of seconds before she gave in to the drowsiness.
The Jumper felt his mind growing heavy but unlike Jenna and Henry, Zaire had long since trained himself to resist unconsciousness for as long as possible.
For a Jumper, unconsciousness was akin to death.
Zaire stumbled to Henry’s side, barely reaching her just as his feet gave out and he was forced to crawl the final few feet.
Then…
His finger brushed her hand and the air shimmered – Zaire and Henry were gone.
…………………
AN HOUR LATER…
Jenna awakened not long after Henry and Zaire had disappeared, and with Townes’s aid, she quickly found her balance.
Admittedly, neither Jenna nor Townes were eager to examine the situation in detail.
They were frightened, twisted, terrified, and frustrated.
Frightened by the thought that Zaire and Henry would not return.
Twisted by the general situation of instantaneously traveling from one place to the next.
Terrified by the thought that Zaire, unemotional as he was, would do anything to protect his secret.
Frustrated by the fact that they could do nothing but wait.
Jenna had the idea to dig through everything in the white room, hoping to find tools that would give them a chance to defend themselves if it came down to it.
But Townes disagreed – as far as he understood Zaire, and Townes had been watching The Jumper for more than a year, Townes understood that Zaire liked looking for reasons.
When Cassian bullied Wilder in the cafeteria every day after school ended, Zaire didn’t react until Wilder had had enough, slipping bath salts into the beef slices in the cafeteria.
Beef slices were Cassian’s favorite.
But even then, when Zaire reacted, he beat Wilder to a pulp in the storage room.
Townes, autistic as he was, understood the logical choice – it was easier to beat Wilder, someone who had little presence, than Cassian and the other bully who were more likely to speak out.
A ruthless yet practical decision.
Wilder changed schools not long after.
When Evander tried to forcefully drag Elara into the school’s backroom for the third time, Zaire didn’t react until Elara changed her seat to sit next to him.
Probably the best decision of her life.
Still, Townes understood that it wasn’t until Evander tried to snatch a coffee out of Elara’s hands, in turn causing it to spill on Zaire’s white shoes that his fate was sealed.
Ironically, it was Cassian and Evander – the two bullies – that ended up beating each other to a pulp.
Last Townes heard, there was a stabbing and one of the boys was rushed to the hospital… but as someone who could see with unnatural detachment, Townes knew it was Zaire’s doing.
Turning two hormonal teenagers against each other was no difficult feat.
There were at least five such examples in the semester alone and Townes was sure there were several smaller incidents that he failed to notice.
“What are you thinking about, Townes?” Jenna whispered, barely wishing to be heard but it was impossible in the stifling silence of the white room.
“Henry is our best bet,” Townes murmured.
“Best bet for what?”
He turned to Jenna, somberness reflected in his eyes. “To make it out of this room alive,” He stated.
Jenna flinched. “What… what,” She swallowed a mouthful of air and steadied her voice. “What do you mean? You’re joking, right?”
Nervous…
Uncertain…
“ρ1A1v1 = ρ2A2v2…” Townes whispered.
“The Mass Continuity Equation?” Jenna was confused, but it helped to focus on anything else. “What about it? Do you think it has something to do with how Henry and Zaire do what they do?”
“No… The Mass Continuity Equation is something we learned in Robotics School as children,” Townes shifted uncomfortably, not quite meeting Jenna’s eyes but she knew he was looking at her regardless. “Then… you are smart enough to understand Zaire. You… you watch him more than I do.”
Jenna’s mouth dried.
Perhaps, she and Townes were the only ones to truly understand Zaire… and as someone The Jumper had shown particular interest in, Jenna knew a lot more than she let on.
Enough to know that Townes was the only one truly in danger; after all, for better or worse, Jenna understood that her survival was tied to Henry’s.
“Do you think they will come back?” Townes inquired.
“They will,” Jenna was almost certain. “This room…” She gestured. “Has too much Zaire in it to be abandoned.”
“Hmmm…” Jenna seemingly realized something. “—and if this room has Zaire everywhere in it, then…”
She rose from the cotton bed, startled when it automatically sunk back into the ground, forming the black outline from which it emerged.
All the white walls looked more or less the same.
“But judging by Zaire’s cabin in the forest,” Jenna reconstructed the cabin in her mind.
She had been there with Henry three times.
Even though the white room was unknown to her, Jenna understood that Zaire’s aesthetic style remained constant.
She wandered from one side of the room to the next, finally stopping at an outline in the ground that was wider but tucked between two smaller outlines.
“If that is the bathroom and that is the living room, then…” Jenna pressed her hand to the ground and what arose from it was a white tabletop. “Then, this is the kitchen.”
Townes ducks his hand into the drawer beneath the tabletop, withdrawing a handful of white rice. “The cabinets themselves store the food. There is no bag.”
“Try another cabinet.”
Townes dug around some more, finally finding something with a plastic encasing – it was ramen. “Beef or chicken?” He shrugged, eyes shifting between the two packaging.
“Beef—” Jenna immediately decided. “And look for some limes in one of the cabinets. Zaire likes his beef ramen with lime and cheese,” She added.
∞
Henry stirred awake.
It was difficult to actively fight against the headache building in her head but she did…
“Why do I feel like I have been eating shit!” She groaned, cursing expletives faster than her mind could keep up.
“You’re awake,” Zaire commented. ‘And you have been eating space… which is worse than shit!’
Henry could barely see him through the thick mist that obscured the wooden room.
Still, she could make out some things.
The room was metallic but a brown metal that seemed almost indistinguishable from wood at first and second glance.
Metallic cylinders, almost like cans, hung from the ceiling on thin, silver threads.
Everything seemed old but somehow, Henry could tell the cans were soaked up to their ass in advanced technology.
The more she focused on the cans tied to strings, the clearer the comforting hum of a beckoning sleep became.
The wall was a cube, made of countless three-dimensional crosshatches.
Everything was designed too purposeful – too measured.
“What the heck is this place?” Henry questioned.
Zaire frowned, shrugged his shoulders, and rose to his feet, tapping a random piece of the brown wall as if to demonstrate a point.
With that single tap, a ripple of air spread through the room.
‘No… not air,’ Henry realized.
It was almost as if there was something liquid in the room, rippling with the slightest of movements – but it was not liquid.
Henry was breathing.
Had it been water, she would have been drowning… but it was also not air.
“A space isolation room,” Zaire commented, slumping to a seat against the wall, not too far from Henry but also not too close. “Well, to be more precise – it should be called a Sound Concentration Room.”
“It’s weird…” Henry’s voice shimmered and trembled in the air.
“You’re weird…”
“What?”
Zaire gestured to the shimmering air around them. “This is you…” He revealed. “This place is flooded with Spatial Torrents.”
“Uhm…” Henry scratched the back of her head, feeling the soft mellowness of blood. “What the—”
She stared at her sloppy, red fingers.
“You need a bath…” Zaire chuckled.
“I need a fucking doctor!” Henry urged.
“A doctor and a blunt,” He nodded.
“A doctor and a blunt,” Henry agreed, nodding her head.
Zaire extended a hand and in preparation for what would happen, Henry took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and linked her fingers with Zaire’s own.
The air shimmered and they were gone.
WHOOOOOOOOSH