Catalyst (6 page)

             
“What’s he doing in here?” Jeff said angrily and Miguel grunted in agreement.

             
“Hey,” I croaked and it was so quiet in the van that everyone could hear me. “He saved me. Ask him all the questions you want
,
but he risked his life to save mine.”

             
Merrick nodded to me.

             
“I know that, I’m sorry. Thousands of years of habit are g
onna be hard to break.
” He looked back up to Daniel.
“
I’d shake your hand but...”
Lighters and Keepers couldn’t touch each other’s skin, so Merrick just tilted his head to him,
“
b
ut t
hank you.”

             
It was like everyone held their breath.

             
“You are more than welcome.”

             
I couldn’t help but think this was the first time in history that a Light
er and a Keeper had called truce.
I wondered if it woul
d be a recurring event.

             
Daniel looked down at me as Miguel threw a blanket over me and started looking at my face.

             
“I’d like to come but I’m needed out here. There are other enforcement facilities nearby. I’ll go to them and continue to help if I can.” He touched my shoulder and I saw Jeff tense beside me. “I told you to be strong and everything would be ok, didn’t I?”

             
“Thank you.” I reached over to grab his hand. “You could just come with us.”

             
“I could. Maybe one day,” he said and patted my hand, creeping out backwards. “But for now, I have a lot to make up for.”

             
Lillian pulled him in for a hug. He looked awkward and unsettled by it but patted her back before stepping back to let Cain and Billings in the van. Billing turned before shutting the door.
             

             
“I would head for the hills if I were you. We rigged the place.”

             
Daniel nodded, looking first at Lillian for a long second, then
back
at me.

             
“We’ll meet again someday. Be safe.”

             
Billings slammed the door and whoever was driving jerked us into first gear and away from the building. I heard a faint siren or alarm going of
f and felt a rush of panic. I h
eard Billings counting down
softly
looking at his watch.

             
“I set it for five minutes. That should be plenty of time for the innocents to get out.”

             
“Get out for what?” I asked and Miguel told me not to talk and got me to sip some water.

             
Billings made a show of an explosion with his hands. I understood. That’s where they were when Daniel had me by the van. Setting a trap. A bomb.

             
The alarm got louder and then I heard yelling.

             
“Dang. I thought we’d make it,
” Billings barked. “Well, we brought you for muscle. Let’s go guys. They already closed the gate
but I only count six of them, a
ll enforcers.”

             
“Let’s do it
fast
,” Cain ordered as the van screeched to a stop and the door slammed opened.

             
He jumped, then Billings, then Miguel.

             
Merrick looked down to me.

             
“Be right back.”

             
He was gone before I could say a word to him in protest. I was still foggy and groggy and essentially exhausted. My blood felt thick and sluggish in my veins but I struggled to s
tay awake. I tried to sit up, but
Lillian stopped me.

             
“No, no, no. They’ll be fine. They are handling them.”

             
“What’s going on?” I rasped.

             
“They’re fighting the enforcers at the gate blocking our way. It’s ok.” She kept looking out the window and
not at me. “They are doing fine
. Almost all the enforcers are down now.”

             
“And now?”

             
“Here they come.”

             
I felt the movement of people jumping in the van.

             
I tried not to think about the enforcers out there. They were innocent
,
but under a spell. It wasn’t fair to them. May
be we could help them somehow, l
earn how to break the
compulsion from the Lighters, c
han
ge the persuasion. We could s
how them how it really was.

             
I felt a hand on my forehead as the van jerked into movement again and felt strange for worrying another second about anything that didn’t have black hair and green eyes and
was
looking at me with such concern it
made me ache, right at that
moment.

             
We slammed through the gate and I saw pieces of it flying around
t
he windows from my spot on the floor. And then we were home free, I assumed.

             
“Hey,” Merrick said with concern. “I k
now this is a dumb question, but
do you feel alright
? Wher
e do you hurt the most?” he
asked running his hand over my hair.

             
“Everywhere,” I answered truthfully. “Come here.”

             
He lay
down beside me without hesitation, though there was barely room, and wrapped his arms around me under the blanket Miguel had given me. I barely had the strength to snuggle in but I did my best.

             
You have got to stop doing this to me.

             
I nodded.

             
“I know,” I countered
and pointed to my lips limply.
Asking. It felt like déjà vu all over again. He smiled and pressed a careful easy kiss t
o my upturned lips and then rested
his forehead against mine.

             
No more. I mean it this time. You can not leave my sight. I hope you enjoy watching me shave and talk Keeper talk, because you are attached to my hip from now on.

             
I laughed silently bu
t could feel the movement of it. He chuckled too and I loved it so much that
I didn’t let on how much it hurt my body to laugh.

             
“I don’t care anymore. If that’s what it takes, then so be it. I just k
now I never want to be away
from you again.” I saw Danny watching me with concern and worry from
out of
the corner of my eye. “That goes for you too, brat.”

             
He chuckled and shook his head.

             
“At least you still have your sense of humor.”

             
“Humor? You
are
a brat.”

             
“I missed you too, little sister.”

             
I smiled and felt Miguel p
ouring something onto my knee, a
ntiseptic of some kind. I sucked in a breath through my teeth, wincing. Merrick bolted upright and glared at Miguel.

             
“Hey,” Miguel held up his hands in surrender. “Just a little peroxide.”

             
“It stung a little, that’s all. It’s fine,” I said.

             
Then we heard the explosion.

             
Everyone turned to look but Merrick kept a firm hand on my shoulder to hold me down. I did
n’t want to see it anyway. I
had enough
of
violence and death. I just wanted to forget it all.

             
I pulled Merrick back down to me and let him fu
ss over me as I was so exhausted
and couldn’t do much else. He tucked the covers around us and kissed me somewhere where there wasn’t
a bruise every thirty seconds. He t
u
cked my wet hair behind me ears, r
ubbed his hands
up and down my body to warm me, m
urmured sweet things in my mind.

             
Ryan detangled himself from the girl, who sti
ll refused to talk,
and leaned over us.

             
“Hey
, there. How are you
doing?”

             
“I’ve been better.”

             
He looked aghast.

             
“Oh, Sherry. I’m sorry. That was stupid-”

             
“I’m just joking, Ryan,
” I calmed him. “I’m ok. I’ll
be
ok,
”
I corrected.

             
For whatever
reason my mind waited until that
momen
t to let it all crash over me; everything that had happened, t
hinking
I’d never see my family again, h
ow much I hurt all over. All the things that the Lighters had done to me. All those human enforcers. All my family members surrounding me, who came to save me. All the people who had come through those rooms and didn’t make it out. My lip started to quiver.

             
Ryan leaned down to half hug me and it was the last straw. I started to cry.

             
I didn’t try to hold back this time. I couldn’t anyway. The tears spilled out and I felt Ryan stiffen. He rubbed my arm.

             
“I’m sorry,” he whispered.

             
“I’m ok, Ryan. It’s not you. I just can’t...”

             
“I know.”

             
He pulled back and Merrick enveloped me in his arms once again.
And
I cried. I cried long and painfully. My body shook with the force of it and it just added to the already very present pain, but I did it anyway.

             
I needed to.

             
I felt someone rubbing my le
g, a
nother person rubbing my hair. Merrick was in my head and surrounding
me with his arms and his love which was w
arm like the sun.

             
I decided it was time to stop and felt Merrick wipe the last of the tears away. I looked around the van, embarrassed by my meltdown, and saw Jeff at my head and Marissa behind him, her arms around his neck. They both smiled sadly at me when they saw me looking. Danny was still watching me and I tried to smile at him again. He didn’t look
at all
convinced that I was ok.

             
Miguel kept working on me and Billings was talking to whoever was driving. The woman was back to gripping Ryan’s shirt as if he were her only lifeline, his arms were awkward and loose around her.

             
Cain and Lillian were both in their own world in the far back. She was in his lap and they both looked asleep but I doubted they were. He held her close and tight, their f
aces resting against each other
.

             
I remembered him agoniz
ing over which one of us to save. I hope
d
that
he didn’t feel
bad about that. I understood. Between the two of us, she had been
the worse o
ff. Plus, she was the one he loved. And he did love her, I knew that, but
I wondered if he knew.

             
I
t all worked out in the end. We were all safe, f
or now.

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