Kristen Simmons - Breaking Point

“Ember?” She kept the flowers on her lap.

“We’re getting you out of here,” I whispered.

“What? You… wait… no.”

I must have looked surprised, because that’s what I felt. “What do you mean no ? We’ve got to hurry. Sean is—”

“Not Sean,” she said firmly, but there was an edge to her voice. “Ember, you have to leave.”

“What?” She was mad at me, that was the only explanation for why she was acting this way. She had good reason, but still, I was here, I was going to get her out. Surely she had to see that.

I realized she was probably afraid, but this seemed crazy. She’d attacked Brock and the guards with her bare hands for what they’d done to Sean, and now she was too scared to leave a hospital?

“You’re not taking me anywhere. You’re leaving. Now .” Her voice hitched. If she kept this up, the Sisters were going to hear her.

My brain couldn’t wrap around this. “You don’t want to leave?”

“No. I want to stay,” she said resolutely.

“We can’t talk about this now. There’s no time.” I glanced over my shoulder. No one was coming. Yet. I snatched the flowerpot off her lap.

“No! You don’t understand!” Her voice cracked. “He can’t see me like this!” Her perfect cheeks were splotchy red now. They stood out in sharp contrast to her yellow jumpsuit.

“Like what? With short hair? Rebecca, he won’t care.”

“That’s not what I mean!”

Sean burst through the door at the same time I jerked Rebecca to a stand.

Only she didn’t stand. She fell flat on her face.

“What the…” I knelt to the ground to pick her up.

“I told you!” She was crying now.

Time slowed, and everything became crystal clear.

There was absolutely no concern that Rebecca was going to run because she couldn’t run. That explained the limited military presence. That was why Sisters ran this place.

I closed my eyes and saw it happen, just as it did at the reformatory. Rebecca in her gray uniform charging Ms. Brock, the headmistress. The guards trying to contain her. Then crack! A baton colliding into Rebecca’s back. Her sharp cry of pain. We’d been separated. I’d never known the extent of Rebecca’s injuries.

“Sean!” I snapped. “I need your help!” I tried to pull Rebecca up, but she couldn’t support herself. Nothing below her knees moved. Her thin legs splayed limply to the side. Paralyzed . I heard the word in my head but it was wrong. It had to be wrong. She could walk, she just wasn’t trying.

Rebecca moaned softly, a terrifying, desolate sound, and I knew then that she could try all she wanted; she’d never walk again.

At that moment the fire alarm went off.

“Becca?” Sean asked, confused. He knelt beside her.

“G-get a wheelchair. Where is it, Rebecca?” The blood had drained from my head and extremities, and I felt very cold. The siren bit into my eardrums, and a bright light from above the door began to flash. Fear of another kind filled me. I had had about enough burning buildings to last a lifetime.

“She doesn’t need a wheelchair,” said Sean. “Get up, Becca.”

She didn’t get up. She was wailing softly into her hands. He reached for her arm but didn’t touch her. Like he couldn’t. Like there was an invisible wall between them.

I scanned the room, landing on a pair of crutches and leg braces against a cabinet on the opposite side of the room. Whoever had brought her here had left them far out of her reach. A surge of fury rose within me so immediately that I nearly screamed.

I sprinted toward them, gathering the intricate black plastic braces and the modified crutches, and returned to the floor.

“How do I put these on?” I demanded.

“Becca, look at me,” said Sean.

A Sister, about my age, pushed through the door.

“Oh dear!” she said. “Did she have a fall?”

“Back off,” I growled at her. She stopped short.

“There’s a fire drill,” she said cautiously, as if we couldn’t hear it. “We’ve got to move everyone we can outside.”

I shuddered to think about the people that couldn’t be moved.

“How do I put these braces on?” I demanded of the Sister.

Sean didn’t wait for an explanation. He scooped Rebecca up off the floor and carried her out of the room.

“She’s being transported to another facility,” I said between my teeth. The Sister’s mouth had formed a small o .

The siren was much louder in the hall. I stuffed Rebecca’s crutches under my arm and clapped my hands to my ears. Girls darted into rooms, shouting directions at one another. I inspected the chaos, convinced that this was some ploy to catch us.

Tucker was nowhere to be seen.

“The stairs are that way!” shouted the doctor over the noise. “The elevators shut down when the alarm is pulled!” He was pushing a man in a wheelchair toward the emergency exit. The patient cried out in pain, pressing his hands to his ears.

My breath was coming fast, raking my throat. We hurried to the emergency exit and joined the crowd of Sisters assisting amputees and wheelchair-bound patients down the stairs. Two girls had dropped their sweet Sister façade and were snapping at each other about how to get a patient’s walker out of a crack in the handrail. I prayed that this was simply a drill; they were leaving a lot of people behind.

“Blend in,” I told Sean unnecessarily. I might be able to do so, but not him. He was the only soldier in sight.

It didn’t matter what I told him anyway. He wasn’t listening.

Rebecca’s hands remained over her face, a shield from Sean’s blank stare. Her legs hung over his arm. I could not swallow the lump in my throat.

Truck’s words from before the blast kept echoing in my head. What were we supposed to do with him once we got him out? We can’t support that kind of care down here.

She’s okay, I told myself. We’ll make her safe. We’ll take care of her. She’ll be fine.

Please let her be fine.

We’d made it to the landing of the third floor when I saw the other soldier. He was running up the stairs, shoving through the crowds of Sisters into the second floor hallway.

My heart stopped cold.

Chase.

We’d taken too long. He’d come in after me. He’d probably been the one to pull the alarm. And now he had no idea where to look, and was going the wrong way. I opened my mouth to shout for his attention, but he had already disappeared behind the heavy silver door.

“I’ll meet you at the car,” I shouted in Sean’s ear, throwing the braces and crutches onto Rebecca’s lap. Without another word I shoved down the last flight of stairs toward the second floor.

My heart was racing as I burst through the heavy door. There were no Sisters here, no doctors either. I heard the weakened call of one of the patients left behind in his room and fought the urge to follow his voice.

“Hello?” I screamed over the siren. I didn’t want to say his name if I didn’t have to. Eerie worship music rang between the blasts of the siren. My blood burned in frustration. How was he supposed to hear me with all of this racket? How could I hear him?

“Hello!” I shouted again, this time running around the nurse’s station. I slid on the slick linoleum floor, grasping the circular desk for balance and sending papers flying through the air.

We saw each other at the same time. He didn’t hesitate. He ran toward me from the far side of the hallway. As he drew near I could see the fear creasing his forehead. We collided; he grabbed my hand and whipped me after him.

Our way was blocked.

We stopped short, and I slid again, righting myself just before I fell. A soldier stood before the door ten feet away, his face drawn with anxiety and fear, his gun raised at Chase’s chest. I didn’t have to glance at his gold name badge to know it read HARPER.