CHAPTER 10
I begin to catch on. I got knocked out by some trick they set for me. I was having a nightmare, or hallucinating, but something really bad has happened and I can't tell what. I'm sitting on the floor behind the stage back drop, where I fell when something hit me in the head. For some reason, it's raining . . . indoors, and everything is sodden. My dress clings to me like a big, cold leech, but at least it's almost all water and not blood. The puddle I'm sitting in is bloody water, and almost makes me gag. My right eye hurts, and I'm mostly blind in it. Over the ringing in my ears I hear all kinds of loud noises I can't make sense of.
And Tommy's dead. I can see it somehow, just like in my nightmare. That part of it was true. Sue crying over him means their trick went wrong. Her sobs twist in the pit of my stomach. I never felt envy before, but Sue was in on the trick that got him killed. How could she be allowed to mourn him like that?
My heart is skipping rope. I shout to Ms. Desjardin, because everything is so loud, "I'm going to let you go. Don't run. I want to talk to you."
I see her lips move, saying "I won't." I un-flex, ease her down to her feet. My left arm goes down. She crawls away to sit with her back against the wall. She gazes at me with eyes as big as goose eggs.
"I'm sorry. I made a mistake. I thought you were Sue," I say switching my angry gaze to Snell. She screams.
Flex!
"Quiet!" I shut her lips. The power feedback makes my wrist flip over.
I turn to Ms. Desjardin. "Why is it raining in here?"
She yells, "Sprinklers!" which I hear as a whisper. I do smell sulfur.
"Is there a fire?"
"Not really."
My mind follows the pipes, finds the valve. Flex! I shut them off. Then I pull the alarm wires, too. The bells have already made their point. It's still noisy. Are those gunshots? I don't know that I hear any better, but my ears signal relief.
I reach up next to my right eye, and find a stinging wound on my temple that makes me yelp. My fingers come away bloody, and I scream. The nightmare comes back to me. I turned to Sue. "What happened? What trick did you and Chris try to pull?"
Sue still can't move, and her face is terrified. I un-flex and let her talk. Her words come out sprinting. "U-ah, Carrie, no! It wasn't me. I had nothing to do with it. Chris hates me too. She tricked both of us, but . . . but . . . something else happened. Some guys are shooting, they're killing everybody. You must stop them. Please."
A quick series of scenes from Sue's mind pound into me. I see her asking Tommy to take me to the prom, her mind is transparent to me then. I know she's truthful, that she was sorry for what she did to me in the shower, and she had no intention of tricking me. Neither did Tommy. This telepathy is a new facet of my power. From the new information, I realize I like Sue. Admire her, in fact. She forfeited her prom and I feel how hard that was, but it was nothing compared to persuading Tommy to take me instead.
"You were afraid of losing Tommy? To me?"
Before she could answer a bullet zips by her head and puts a hole in the backdrop, and ricochets off the brick wall.
"Carrie! Release her!" says Miss D., "She'll get killed!"
I force Sue down flat, maybe a little too rough, pressing her against Tommy. Handling live bodies is hard. Un-flex. I release her. Just then, this guy with a rifle steps on stage from the auditorium and comes back stage toward us. His gun is pointed at me. Flex. My finger points, and his bullet isn't going anywhere. I lower my finger. Instead of trying to shoot, he talks first. Sue sits up and stares at him.
"Hi, Carrie. Remember me, bitch?"
He shouldn't have called me that. Puzzlement and anger mold my face making my temple sting. My power's on high, my head is pounding, my mood is really bad. "No."
"Carrie . . ." says Sue, her voice like a mouse. I glance long enough to see her shake her head.
Just as I'm beginning to feel merciful, he escalates things. "My name is Dillon," he says through his teeth, "and you've been giving me the cold shoulder for the last year."
I wrinkle my brow, that makes the cut next to my eye sting like fire. He might as well have hit me.
"Wait!" I say, recalling him. "You're the guy who's always calls my name and then makes gross gestures."
"Gross? I was just expressing my feelings toward you."
"That's how you showed you liked me? With obscene gestures? You were harassing me!"
"What's harassment to one girl is just romance to another."
That appalls me so much my tongue ties up. Can anyone be that ignorant and deceived about girls? I never thought I'd meet someone more socially inept than me. I almost feel sorry for him. He's already dead, but he doesn't get a reprieve because he points his rifle at me.
"I'm glad I missed my shot," he continues, "because now I get to look in your eyes while I kill you. You've spurned me for the last time, you cunt."
Oh, he shouldn't have called me that! He pulls the trigger. My power holds the bullet fast. The Sue and Ms. D scream, thinking I got shot. Instead, the blast deforms the rifle behind the barrel. The kick knocks him back. Flex. My power grabs him, in mid-fall. This is hard again and My arm extends. My breath comes heavy as I get to my feet. I notice the my wet dress is transparent. Embarrassment irritates my disposition.
He screams. I snap his jaws shut on his tongue, and blood streams out of his mouth over his lips. As I hold him, details of his and his buddies' plans are laid bare to me.
Flex. I drop the clip from the gun, it floats in the air. Flex, I force him to his knees. Flex, I yank the rifle from his arms, my left hand gestures, then smash him across the face with the butt of his rifle. Flex, flex, flex . . . I beat his face bloody with it. I hardly hear Sue's screams. Ms. D. rushes next to me.
"Carrie, stop it."
I nod. "I'm just about done."
I guess that sounded ominous, because she backs away from me.
Flex, the clip floats in front of his face . . . Hot flex and it goes red hot. The bullets inside all go off at once. The explosion rips away his lips, his nose ,and half his teeth.
Now both the females behind me scream.
"No! Carrie! Please!" I don't know which one says that. My power is raging now and won't be denied.
Flex! The rifle levitates and points at him. Hot flex . . . and the barrel goes red, then white hot.
Flex!
The rifle impales his remaining eye. The barrel burns out the back of his head. Un-flex. I let him fall.
I turn back to Ms. D and Sue. "Now I'm finished."
Ms. D faints. My heart is slamming in my chest like a jackhammer. I walk up to Sue. "There are three more guys shooting. They have a giant bomb in the parking lot. Sue, they're planning to kill everyone. I'm blind in my right eye. I need you to look out on that side. Can you do it for me?"
Sue stood as still as a wax figure.
"Sue, they killed Tommy! You can't stand here and do nothing while they murder everybody else in the school."
"Okay, yes, I'll scout for you."
"Good!" I put my hand on her shoulder. "I'll never hurt you. We're friends now."
She nods. "Yes, I'm your friend."
I emerge from behind the backdrop to the stage. My power vibrates in my bones and buzzes in my head. I'm on fire like the sword of God, ready to punish the wicked.
A/N: 8/24/14:
Those who've seen the 2013 remake of Carrie know that Chloe's version has a cruel streak. Unlike Sissy Spacek's and Angela Bettis' Chloe's Carrie White is definitely conscious and in control of all she's doing. Her judgment might be influenced by her power, (her eyes dilate when she uses it; she looks like she's doing crack) but (Spoiler alert) she's the sort of Carrie who whips Tina Blake with a live wire, knocks her into a fire and lets her burn. That takes quite a sadistic imagination to do that. And I won't even spoil what she does to Chris.
That's the version of Carrie White I'm working with here, though I'm taking influences from the book and the other two films. Why? Because I love the story that much. Chloe's depiction is closer to the book, as close as filmmakers have dared to get.
I was hoping to get this done in under 6,000 words, but I can't judge length to save my life, yet. I should have known that once I was telling it in two voices and several POV it would inflate the word count way above that. However, this is not going to turn into a novel. It will be done in more 5,000 words, 8,000 words tops.
No matter how long it ends up being, I hope everyone enjoys it.