Out of the Black - Lee Doty [145]
"You're saying I'm you now?" Anne held up a finger in inspiration, "Hey, are you my inner child?" Had she been drinking? She felt punchy.
"Saints preserve us! No, I'm not saying that you're me, but you're going to be a lot more like me when you wake up, I think."
"...because I'm sleeping now." She waved her finger of discovery about. Her neck was really starting to smart. Maybe she'd cut it in the minivan crash.
His face hardened. "Right now you're at the beginning of a transformation, and I am at the end of my life. Right now you're lying in rain and glass and our blood with my teeth buried in your neck and a channel of power flowing between us."
Anne's hand froze on her neck. She took a step back. She remembered now. She realized who this kid was. It was like someone had turned on all the lights, but her finger was still in one of the sockets.
The kid's face softened into sadness tinged with compassion. Resignation settled into his eyes. "If they don't find you, do your best to find them. The guy you really need to tell this to is a silly-looking kid named Alexander Ahmed, formerly of Rosemont College. The people traveling with him are Rae Jackson and Ping Bannon, both of the CPD. All nice folks. They'll probably end up just as dead as me... just as dead as you."
She was still thinking about that when she noticed that the kid seemed to be getting smaller. She looked a little harder, just to be sure. Not smaller, lower. He was sinking down through the dark waters in which they now floated. She had no idea when the car crash had ended, and no idea how they had gotten here, but he was leaving and soon she would be alone in these frightening depths.
"Don't go!" She shouted, grabbing his shirt at the shoulder and pulling him into an awkward bear hug.
"What are you doing, Anne?" he asked as if she were drinking mustard straight from the bottle at Denny's. But though there was mocking in his tone, his arms wrapped desperately around her waist.
"You're not getting away that easily, Junior!" She adjusted her grip and got an arm under one of his shoulders, "I'll take you seriously, okay? Besides, it looks mighty dark down there." Even in her panic and confusion, she had some compassion to spare for the little stranger who had shared her dream.
"Hey, at least I don't see any flaming pits or pitchforks," he said, craning his head to the side, "this was actually a fair-sized concern- I've been on a bit of a murdering spree lately..." He broke off as their grip slipped and he slid a few centimeters down. "You can't stop this, Anne. I'm done cheating death, now it's your turn for a while. Savor it."
"I'm not letting go! You just need to hold on a little longer and we'll find a way out of here!"
"You can still help, Anne." He said with resignation in his voice, "You just can't help me."
Epiphany
"...and then I woke up on top of him, and I ran away as fast as I could- which wasn't actually that fast." Anne concluded. It had taken less than two minutes recount her confusing story, including the rest of the dream that had just come back to her like an epiphany.
The others were silent, staring at nothing in particular, lost in private thought. From time to time, the silence was broken by urgent instructions between the surgeons as they worked behind her.
The cop looked like she was going to cry.
Ping looked from Anne back to Alex. "So, what are we supposed to do now?"
"Uh... he didn't mention anything about that." Anne said, shaking her head.
Alex looked up, startled out of his thoughts. "Run... we run! Now!"
"What?" Ping's eyes darted to the exit; to the shattered observation window.
"Kaspari's here! Come on!" Alex took a step toward the exit, but Anne caught his shoulder.
"What about them?" She waved her hand toward the two unconscious Feds. "We leave them, they're dead, right?"
"We can't fight him... you don't understan..." Then he checked himself, set his jaw. "You're right. We can't leave them."
Anne turned to the doctors.