Jay Posey - Three

Jackson regarded Three for a moment, then glanced to Cass. Stared for a moment, as she was looking elsewhere. She caught his eye, raised an eyebrow. He looked back to Three too quickly. Eyes dilated. Slight flush in his cheeks.

Three smiled to himself. Looked like Cass had picked up another would-be suitor.

“Yeeeaaah… I just don’t think I’m ready for that. Not yet.”

“Suit yourself. But grab some blankets or something. Only thing’s gonna change that room is you broadcasting out of it.”

“Yeah… yeah, I guess that can’t hurt.”

He reached for the blankets on Three’s pack.

“Not those.”

“Oh. Oh, yeah, I’ll just pull ’em from next door. You’ll wake me before you go, yeah?”

“Course, kid. I’ve still got the morning to convince you you’re coming with.”

“Heh, right. Alright. Night, Wren,” Jackson’s eyes moved to Cass, held like they were taking a long last drink.

“Night, Jackson,” Wren answered, voice already distant and thick with impending sleep. Cass waved limply from the foot of the bed.

“See ya, Three.”

Three nodded. Watched as Jackson backed out, pulled the door to. Cass bent double and unbuckled her boots, slipped them off. Rolled her ankles, massaged her feet. Three watched her for a moment: small, tucked in on herself, with such fragile beauty his heart burned.

“Hey,” he said.

She rolled her head his way, eyes bloodshot, lids heavy. Smiled so genuinely, with such unexpected warmth; dawn breaking through a hurricane night. Three found he’d stopped breathing.

“Hey back,” she said, voice low. No more than a meter away. She locked eyes with him: deep brown, dancing, golden. Vulnerable. She leaned back, propped herself on outstretched arms, lithe, feline in her movement. Cocked her head. “You gonna fix me up or what?”

Three held. Evaluated. Wren’s breathing was deep, steady. Cass just sat there, staring back at him with those dark, depthless eyes. He stepped to her, brushed the hair back from her face. Traced her jaw with the back of a finger.

“Lay back.”

Cass lowered herself to the bed, slid her hands behind her head. Three planted a knee next to her, the inside of his leg firm against her ribs. Leaned over her. Wordlessly, he unfastened the first, then second clasp of her shirt. Lay back the left side. Her smile had melted into an amused smirk, but she never broke eye contact.

Three started at her collarbone. With his fingertips, he traced from the notch at the top of her breastbone, out to her left shoulder and back, stopping about three-quarters of the way to the slender curve of her neck. Her olive skin was warm, impossibly soft. Now he ran his fingertips downward, sliding along the inside of her breast. She watched from stillness.

He found a rib, placed a finger from his left hand there. Reached with his right into one of the many pockets of his pants.

“I hate to hurt you.”

“I’m glad it’s you.”

She let her eyes fall closed. Drew a breath.

Three took the Trivex jector from his pocket, placed its pepperbox-tip just above his finger, in the soft notch between Cass’s ribs. Aimed directly at her heart.

“Ready?”

Cass exhaled. Nodded. Inhaled. He fired. The jector hissed softly, punching its chems through the surface down deep into the center of her bloodstream. Cass’s eyes clenched so tightly a tear streamed, but she made no sound. The jector fell quiet. Cass exhaled. Three instinctively placed his hand on her chest, just above the jector. She dropped a cool, damp hand atop his. Opened her eyes, fixed him with a steady gaze.

“Come on, cowboy. Just four more to go,” she whispered. She patted his hand. He nodded, watched her close her eyes again. Didn’t ask her this time, just fired again. When it was done, she barely paused.

“Again.”

Three didn’t want to jolt her again so soon, but he knew better than to ask. He fired the third dose. Three was no stranger to jectors, having had to dose himself during some of the more unpleasant times he’d endured. He’d also been stabbed, shot, jittered, slashed, and burned. Given the choice of the six, dosing from a jector ranked third.

“Go, do it.”

Cass was trembling now under his hand, heart hammering against her ribcage. Sweat beaded on her exposed skin, as if a heavy dew had fallen across her. Three leaned closer, brushed her hair back from her damp forehead. Ran his hand over her scalp, soothing, and knowing the pain in her chest was overriding every other sense.

“Last one. You’re doing good.”

She nodded, but didn’t speak.

“Need a break?”

She shook her head, furrowed her brow. She didn’t want questions, she wanted to get it over with. He dosed her the fifth and final time. The jector hissed out the last of its chems; a single dose intended to shock a still heart to beating, to trigger adrenals to flood the bloodstream at full capacity. Three knew quint was the emperor of high-speed chems, but he’d also seen a man’s heart explode from a double dose of Trivex. This little sister had strength beyond measure. He gently closed her shirt, refastened it.

“We’re done, girl. Let’s get you some rest.”

“I don’t…” she whispered, mouth parched. “I don’t usually let people call me ‘girl’.”

Three smiled as he stood. He scooped Cass up off the bed, cradled her like an overgrown child. She didn’t resist. He walked around the bed and laid her gently beside her sleeping son.

He hovered over the pair, thought back to that first day. The first time they walked into his guarded, disciplined, secure world. And he wondered at just how far out from that world they’d brought him.

Three switched off the light in the room, tugged off his shirt, and decided he was going to allow himself a long, cool shower.

Cass could tell from watching him that he’d assumed she and her son were sleeping. He’d already startled her once walking naked by the open bathroom door, and now Three seemed to be oblivious to any notion of being watched, which was surprisingly uncommon for the man. The Trivex was working its way throughout her body, juicing long-starved muscle fibers and nerve endings. She lay motionless not for fear of being discovered, but because every joint, muscle, and nerve stung with icy vengeance at the slightest provocation. But here, with Wren cuddled next to her, she was warm, and comfortable, and safe. For the first time in far too long. Her body was deathly tired, and she knew sleep would come soon. It just hadn’t found its way to her yet. Outside, twilight was descending.

She watched Three in the dim orange light of the single bathroom bulb. Studied him, really. For all the miles they’d covered, and the trust she’d developed in him in spite of herself, she still knew so little of the man. He stood at the small basin in the bathroom, methodically shaving his head. His face. Careful, practiced strokes. Using a gleaming-edged knife not unlike the one Wren had cut his hand on. No, not methodical. Ritualistic. Preparation.

He wore no shirt, and from her vantage, Cass could see the rope-like muscles of his back, shoulders, arms. Not bulky, like those splicejob showboys. Just authentic, well-used, well-formed, like they’d been doing work for fifty years and would continue for twice that much more. “Go muscle”, she’d heard Ran once call it, “not Show muscle”. She’d seen more genetically perfect physiology before. But the history that Three wore upon him was more fascinating by far. His back and shoulders were a tapestry of crisscrossed scars punctuated by the occasional dark stain of ink where a masterful calligraphist had inscribed captivating ideograms upon his flesh, in lines vertical and horizontal, in circles, in spirals. She wondered at their meaning.