Week 32.4 – Held

Previously: Twain told Yi Fan he could not change back to his other body, because his other self had been shot. And now…

Yi Fan stared at the door as if it weren’t there, as if she were watching something happen beyond it that Twain couldn’t see. “I could…” she trailed off, as if reconsidering. Then, more firmly, “There is a way. It’s risky, but I could get you out, and if we move fast, we might be able to stay ahead of the Czar long enough to get into China. Come on.”

She stood up and took a step toward the door.

“No, wait,” Twain said. “We can’t.”

Yi Fan let out a frustrated sigh. “You just said this was the only way. Now or never, come on.”

“No, I said I couldn’t do it the way you wanted me to,” Twain said. “There is another way, but I don’t think you’re going to like it. Frankly, neither will I, but it might be our best shot.”

“What are you talking about?”

Twain took a deep breath. “We need to let them torture me.”

***

The room was spinning, but it wasn’t a bad spin. The fuzz in his head was not a bad fuzz. In fact, it was almost entirely pleasant. But the thing that nagged at Cole, the thing he was trying to get his fuzzy mind wrapped entirely around, was the fact that he couldn’t feel any metal anywhere.

There was always some metal. It might not be enough to work with, or it might be sufficiently non-ferrous that he couldn’t manipulate it, but there was always something to sense somewhere. Even his body seemed less alive, with the comforting background flow of the iron in his bloodstream suddenly gone. It was like the sense had simply been turned off.

[blockquote type=”blockquote_quotes” align=”left”]Cole … knew that something was seriously wrong. And that seriously wrong thing probably had something to do with the I.V. needle stuck in his right arm…[/blockquote]And if he couldn’t sense metal, he couldn’t manipulate it. Cole forced one eye open, saw the hospital bed with the metal rails, and knew that something was seriously wrong. And that seriously wrong thing probably had something to do with the I.V. needle stuck in his right arm.

The line from his arm went to a machine that looked like it had some kind of centrifuge inside. The machine was probably designed to extract plasma from blood, Cole figured. But what was in the bag hanging below the machine was not plasma.

It was blue. And it glowed.

Cole tried to sit up, but either he was incredibly weak, or else there was someone invisible sitting on his chest weighing him down, because he could only lift his head. He let his head sink back on the pillow, his eyes closed. Or it could have something to do with those straps he’d seen and had just now processed. This seemed vaguely bad, although one of the more pleasant bads he’d ever experienced.

The door opened. Cole forced his eye back open slightly, saw a Chinese doctor checking his chart next to a naughty, naughty blonde nurse. “He’s stable,” the doctor said. “Step down on the drugs. The Czar’s going to want him coherent for questioning.”

Oh yeah. Bad.

Jeez, everyone’s losing their powers. What’s up with that? Hope this doesn’t go on too long. To find out, be here for the next episode, posting sometime this evening.

To read from the beginning, click here…