L.L. Foster - The Awakening

He was only a few yards away.

Gaby turned and fled. On her way across the room, she spotted a fresh corpse, unmarred with disease. Given the bright, suggestive clothing, it had to be the prostitute Rose.

Poor Bliss.

Gaby found the door and went through it with no idea where it led. She trusted God to see her safely outside. As the door shut behind her, impenetrable darkness closed in.

She crawled forward, feeling her way…

And that's when she heard the doctor speak. "You let her do this."

Gaby's heart dropped. Dr. Chiles wasn't dead!

Luther shouted, "No, Mort . Drop the gun. Now."

"I can't."

The doctor laughed.

And a final shot rang out.

Unable to bear it, Gaby turned back, frantically retracing her steps. If Luther wanted to apprehend her, she'd somehow talk him out of it. Or she'd find a way to evade him.

But she had to know if Morty was safe. He'd come to help her because he cared; she couldn't just abandon him.

Reaching the door she'd gone through, she opened it a mere crack and saw Luther bent over a supine body.

Morty.

He wasn't moving.

A scream crawled up her throat, but before Gaby could get the sound out, several things seemed to happen at once.

She saw the doctor drag herself upright against a rickety table, her mouth twisted in wicked delight. She held Mort's gun.

Luther pushed to his feet and faced her.

The badly wounded doctor stumbled, and a kerosene lantern crashed into one of the oxygen tanks.

An explosion rocked the building, shooting flames everywhere.

The door blasted shut on Gaby. She tried, but it wouldn't budge an inch. Something must have collapsed against it, blocking it. She listened hard, but all she heard was the snap and crackle of hungry flames devouring the carnage.

" No !" Gaby pounded her fists on the door, but it didn't matter. No one acknowledged her calls, and the door didn't dislodge. Smoke seeped into her darkened room, bringing with it the caustic scent of burning wood, cloth, and… flesh.

Gaby tried kicking the door with her feet, but the smoke grew thicker, burning her eyes and throat, reminding her that despite being a freak, she was still all too human. She finally had to move away.

Heart pounding hard, silent prayers running amok, Gaby crawled and crawled until she found a hole in an outer wall that led to the swamp.

She stumbled out, fell onto to her back in the prickly weeds, and gulped in great gasping breaths. When she could breathe again, she faced the destruction. The flames didn't seem to spread, but with how that room had exploded… could anyone make it out of there alive?

Gaby didn't realize she was crying until the sirens began winding down and she heard her own sobs. The weakness so enraged her that she shook a fist at God.

"This is why I can't be friends with people? This is it? Is this my fucking lesson?"

Her raw voice competed with the sounds of chaos, echoing in hollow dismay over the surface of the swamp, emphasizing the futility in all that she did, all that she'd dared to do.

More emergency personnel arrived. Police, firefighters, EMTs. More voices. Enough lights to brighten the woods and send eerie, dancing shadows everywhere.

Drawn to concealment against her will, Gaby got to her feet and moved out of the open, choosing a position behind a copse of trees where she could watch the busy swarm of police and medics, and still escape if anyone spotted her.

The hot tears continued to fall unheeded down her cheeks as she hunkered down, praying to see Luther or Mort in one of the bright emergency beams trained on the building. So much pain filled her that she wanted to curse and wail. She wanted to scream out her anger.

But doing so would accomplish nothing more than her capture. She'd screwed up enough already—no need to add to it.

Doing her best to tamp down emotion and heighten awareness. Gaby waited as professionals got the fire under control. Soon, the thick smoke subsided and only choking odor billowed out the windows and a busted door.

Please , she prayed.

Seconds later, her heart thumped in relief as a tall, familiar form emerged.

Fingers locked together at the back of his neck, Luther stepped away from the destruction. The female detective, Ann, stood close beside him.

"I don't fucking believe this," Luther cursed.

Appearing dazed, Ann put a hand to her stomach. "They're all dead, Luther. I don't… I don't even know what they are. Human?"

"Fucking experiments." Luther dropped his hands and punched the damaged door hard enough to break knuckles.

Glued to the sight of him, Gaby winced in sympathy for his pain, both physical and emotional.

Cuddled up to him, Ann pleaded, "Don't be a caveman, please. I'm too shook up to take it."

"Sorry." Luther flexed his hand. "It's just… I know the guy who killed them all."

Gaby's stomach hollowed out. Surely, Luther didn't believe that Morty had done the deed? That was too absurd.

As Gaby's thoughts tumbled, Ann hugged herself up to Luther. "Why do you suppose he did it?"

Slinging his arm around her and pulling her close, Luther said, "God only knows, Ann. God only knows."

Gaby turned her back on them and buried her face against her knees. Yeah, God knew. But He wasn't about to share with the likes of them.

If only she'd gotten that damn door open, if only she hadn't left Morty in the first place, then… Luther would have locked her up.

For the sake of humanity, it was better this way.

But then why the hell did it hurt so much?

With nothing else to do, she used a rough tree trunk to pull herself to her feet and, in the near silent way of wraiths, exited the woods. She had to disappear, and if she didn't hurry, Luther would catch her in the act of packing up the tools she used to write and illustrate her graphic novels.

Nothing else mattered. Not any more.

Feeling an awful twinge in his heart, Luther pressed a fist to his chest.

Ann grabbed him. "Are you all right?"

"Yeah." But he wasn't. It felt like someone had just ripped out his soul. He'd thought for sure that Gaby would be here, in the middle of the awful destruction.

But so far, there'd been no sign of her.

Duty demanded that he couldn't leave yet, but damn it, he needed to find her. He wasn't sure why, but it felt crucial.

As paramedics carried Mort out on a gurney, Luther had them pause. "One second."

"We need to move."

"Yeah, I know." Luther touched Mort's shoulder. "Mort, where's Gaby?"

Faint and rilled with pain, Morty whispered, "Luther?"

"Yeah, it's me. Was Gaby here with you? Is she hurt? Where is she?"

Reddened from smoke and blurry with pain, Mort opened his eyes and looked at Luther. "No."

Frustration threatened to implode. "No what ?"

Mort pressed his lips together. Flames had singed parts of his hair. A hastily bandaged wound in his side still oozed blood. Various scrapes, bruises, and burns discolored his fair skin. "Gaby's not here, Luther," he said. "She was never here." And then he passed out.

The paramedics hurried on their way.

Sensing a betrayal, Luther watched as Mort was loaded into the ambulance, and he stood there as it drove away, stood there even as the lights disappeared from sight.

Morty had appeared too sick and hurt to lie.

But then, maybe he was too sick and hurt not to lie.

Luther needed to figure out which it might be.

Head pounding and irritation level at an all-time high, Luther strode down the hospital corridor. His thoughts joggled left and right, but always there, dead center, was a need to see Gaby.

She'd gone and disappeared on him, and he was pissed as hell.