Well, guys, this is it. The last chapter of Bookworm! (It's also the longest chapter since #1.) Anyway, thank you so much for following my stories you guys. I love you all! ~DisneyPrincess55
Eleven
Finale
I exhaled, relaxed my tense muscles, and put my left foot on the beam in front of me. "You can do this," Isabelle whispered from behind me. The beam of light was shaking, and I smiled.
"Iz," I murmured, "Try to stop shaking." I took another step, rebalanced myself, and placed my next foot down on the beam.
"Right. Sorry." I stepped forward again, rebalanced, and took another step. How many more steps? I gazed forward at the wall before me and wobbled, nearly toppling over. "Careful," Isabelle called.
"I know," I grimaced. "I still have a ways to go, don't I?"
"Nollie, you've barely gone five feet—" she was going to continue, but she stopped herself and was silent. "Oh my God," she whispered, "Nollie, they're coming!"
"Well what do you want me to do? I'm six feet out—"
"Just don't move," she snapped, "Okay? Do not move." She flicked the flashlight off, and I was in the dark, balanced on a beam, three stories above the next flat surface.
"But—"
There was a shout and the sound of the door being flung open, as well as the footsteps of several men thundering through the entrance.
"Isabelle!" I heard Tintin shout, "Isabelle, where's Nollie?" His voice had an edge of panic to it. I teetered at his voice, relieved he was still alive.
"She's over there." The beam of light shone against my back once more, right as my leg cramped and I toppled off of the beam, plummeting down to the ground.
"NOLLIE!" Tintin and Isabelle shrieked simultaneously.
The world slows down when you're falling. Time could almost stand still, really. The only thing that was working quickly as I fell was my brain—I was thinking about how I could protect myself from the impact of the fall. My head. I pulled my arms around my head to create a cushion for my skull. I must be coming near the floor now…
I landed in a pillow.
Well, what felt like a pillow, at least. I removed my arms from around my head and opened my eyes to see what had saved me from an untimely death.
A gigantic bag of straw—a mattress made of straw had caught me. It must've been where the workers slept during the nightshift—it was a miracle it hadn't been destroyed in the fire, although it seemed as though the fire hadn't touched this floor. I rolled off of it right as Tintin and Isabelle raced in. I was enveloped in Tintin's arms before I even had a chance to say anything else.
"Are you okay?" Tintin let go of me and stared at me for a moment before hugging me again, "You scared me half to death!" Tintin's arm was drenched in blood—he'd been shot downstairs. The men appeared in the room at that exact moment.
"Mister Tintin!" One of them shouted, approaching us, "We demand you give us the money now!"
Tintin wrapped his arm around me as they came closer. "And how do you expect us to get it? Nollie almost died trying to get it—"
Suddenly, I was yanked away from Tintin and one of the men laughed a deep, menacing laugh as he held a knife to my throat, "Well maybe this time she'll actually die." I squirmed, trying to escape, but the man held the knife closer to my throat, so close that it was almost breaking skin. Despite the fact that I was terrified, I gave the men the impression that I was calm—steadying my breathing, swallowing my sobs.
"Let her go," Tintin shouted, "Look, I'll do it. I'll cross the beam. Just let her go."
"No you won't," the man holding me tightened his grip on my arm, "Your little girlfriend will do it, and if she dies, you'll be next to try. You don't have a choice. We're gonna get that money, whether she dies or not." I stared at Tintin—he stared back, his eyes told me he was planning something. But what? How would his plan help me now? "All right, let's go," the man removed the knife from in front of my neck and pushed me forward, the knife pointing into my back.
When we got to the top level, the man planted me right in front of the beam. "You can watch, but if you take a step closer, I'll kill you both." He was talking to Tintin and Isabelle, I realized as he pushed me forward onto the beam.
"My flashlight!" Isabelle exclaimed, "Sir, she can't see five steps ahead of her if she doesn't have my flashlight on her." Isabelle clicked on the light, and the wall in front of me was illuminated. "See! Now she can see!"
"Stop! Do not move any closer!" One of the men shouted. The light grew brighter as Isabelle moved closer to me.
"She needs to see, and I need to be closer to her so she can see," Isabelle insisted, "Look, do you want the money or not? Because if she can't see, she's not gonna be able to get your money."
"Isabelle—" Tintin sighed.
"No! I have to make it so Nollie can see!" She snapped back at him.
"Fine. You can be here. But you may not speak a word to her, understand? If she does not retrieve the money from the vault she will be killed." I exhaled at his words, trying to remain as calm as possible. "You better start walkin', girly, we don't have much time to waste," he instructed, and I nodded.
"I know," I whispered, taking a step. This was the part I'd already done—the first six feet. I needed to focus in order to survive, in order to not fall to my death.
The only problem was, I couldn't. As I walked, my mind was swarming with thoughts. Tintin's arm was bleeding out from a gunshot wound he'd taken to protect me. Isabelle was holding a flashlight up at the other end of the beam, probably with a knife to her throat or a gun pointed at her head. Tintin could be in the same position—at gunpoint. I teetered as I took another step, exhaling. Everyone was always putting themselves at risk to protect me. Tintin did it more than anybody, and I couldn't stand it. What if he died trying to protect me? What if the bullet had gone into his chest, instead of his arm? I would have nobody.
Tears began to sting my eyes, but I blinked them away. No. Not now. I was twenty feet out, taking a step every ten seconds, moving three feet a minute. I couldn't cry now—I needed to focus. I needed to stay alive for twenty more feet. If something happened to Tintin, I would have Isabelle, Ruth, Audrey and Grace. I would have Rawnie and Kioni and Niara. I would be fine if something happened to Tintin. Everything would be fine.
I teetered again as I took the final step, off of the beam and onto the platform on the clear other side of the room. The vault stood in front of me: tall and gray and covered in soot. I moved toward it slowly, opening it and pulling the door toward me and stepping inside.
The room was filled to the brim with bills and coins—so many that I would have no way to get it all out on my own. I walked back to the beam, a plan brewing in my mind. "I need help!" I shouted, "There's too much money for me to take it all back on my own. I need Tintin and Isabelle to help me!"
Tintin came over first, hugging me when he reached the other side. "I have a plan," I whispered in his ear when he embraced me.
"I know." He kissed my cheek and let me go, right as Isabelle reached us.
"What's the plan?" She whispered as we got inside the vault
"Well, take as much money as you can and stuff it in your pockets and socks and anywhere else you can put it," I began, taking a stack of bills, rolling them into cylinders, and sticking them into my socks like they were a bunch of cigarettes. "Then we're gonna escape."
"How?" Isabelle asked, folding bills and coins into her pockets. Tintin approached the back wall and pushed against it.
"Brick's solid, Noll," he murmured, "I don't think there's a way out through here."
"There has to be!"
"Even if there was a way out, it's a ten story drop." He shrugged, "We'd be dead on impact. Our best bet is to just give the money to the men and head home."
I stared at him in disbelief.
"No. We can't go back to them. Once we give them the money, who knows what they'll do? They could kill us. There has to be another way to escape. Maybe there's a ladder on the side of the building? A fire escape, maybe!"
"Hey, what's taking so long?" One of the men shouted, "If you guys don't hurry up, we'll come over there!"
I walked out of the vault and shouted back my reply, "There's a lot of money in here! We'll be out soon, I promise!" I returned inside the vault and continued to pack money into my boots and socks. They became incredibly uncomfortable after I inserted a few more rolls, so I began to pack my trench coat pockets with money. Tintin had stuffed his wallet with so many bills that it was almost impossible to close it so he could put it back in his pocket—and there was still more money to take.
"Time's almost up!" A man shouted from across the beam, and my heartbeat picked up.
"Oh my God, we gotta get out of here," Isabelle exclaimed quietly. I stepped back from stuffing money in my pockets and surveyed the vault—which was just a tiny room walled in brick. There was a mid-sized window near the ceiling of the vault, and Tintin agreed to give me a boost to look outside of it.
"There's a fire escape to the left of here," I whispered, "I think we can fit out of the window!" Isabelle handed me her flashlight and I used the metal handle of the light to smash the glass out. Tintin had to stand up, me on his shoulders, so that I could be high up enough to get out of the window. I got a foothold on the brick wall below me and reached for the fire escape, which wasn't even a foot away from me.
"All right Nollie, be brave. Isabelle will be right out behind you," Tintin told me when I was still inside. "I love you."
"I love you, too," I whispered.
I wrapped my hands around the bars of the fire escape so tightly that my knuckles turned white before I pushed my feet off of the wall, throwing my abdomen into the fire escape. I tried not to scream in pain as my waist crashed into the metal bar, instead I pulled myself onto the platform of the fire escape and watched as Isabelle followed my lead. As soon as she made it onto the platform with me, Tintin pulled himself out of the window. His left arm was whitened from the blood loss, his right hand was still bandaged from the burn, and he gingerly pulled himself to safety on the platform, with a little help from me. As soon as he got on the platform, he hugged me tightly.
"You're the smartest person I've ever known," he murmured. As soon as he let go, we climbed down the fire escape as fast as we could—because when we got halfway down, the men realized we'd escaped and we were forced to move faster so we could reach the ground faster than them.
We beat them to the ground, barely. We were nearly to the car when they exploded out of the building and chased us down. They caught Isabelle first, then Tintin, who was exhausted from the entire ordeal, and finally, me. The biggest man, the one who'd held the knife to my throat and threatened Tintin and Isabelle with death, had caught me.
"You," he snarled after he caught me, "Why, this was your plan all along, wasn't it?" I was silent, and he pulled out his knife and placed the blade against my throat. "Wasn't it?" I started to cry.
"No sir," I sobbed, "N-no sir."
"Stop!" Tintin shouted, "It was my idea. I had the idea to escape. Let her go."
"No," my captor snapped, "She needs to be punished for what she did."
"She didn't do anything! I told you, it was me!"
I knew what I had to do in an instant. "Tintin, don't. You've already been shot trying to protect me. I did it, all right? I came up with the plan to escape so that my friends wouldn't be put through any more danger today. I love them, and I don't want to be the reason they get hurt anymore. So punish me. I escaped. I came up with the big master plan to get me and my friends out of there alive. And we lived. And if it'll keep them alive, then kill me." Nobody moved.
"Nollie." Tintin chided, "Stop." My captor let me go and I stood in front of him, staring him right in the eye, my back to Tintin.
"What are you waiting for? Do it," I challenged him, "Kill me and let my friends go." He didn't move. "I disobeyed your orders. I didn't bring the money back to you. I escaped. I should be punished." Again, nobody moved. "That was your plan all along, wasn't it? Once we got the money back to you, you'd kill all three of us. Well then get on with it."
"Let me go," Tintin pleaded his captor, "Please. I need to speak to her." His captor did as he was told, and Tintin approached me, shoes crunching on the gravel, embracing me. "Nollie, listen to me," he whispered in my ear, "You're not thinking clearly. You're exhausted. It's three in the morning and you need sleep. You've been through a lot today. We need to go home. They're gonna let us go, sweetheart, everything's gonna be okay." I began to cry halfway through his plea, and he hugged me tighter. "It's okay, it's okay."
"Just get out of here," my captor sneered.
"See, Noll? They're letting us go. We're going home. Let's go home, sweetheart." Tintin let me go and gestured for Isabelle to follow. I watched them walk away, before turning back to the wire-haired men, staring at them for a brief moment before walking towards them and taking a few stacks of bills from one of my pockets and handing it to the biggest man.
"There's still money in the building," I told him as I handed him the money, "There's a lot left. You can have as much of it as you want. I'm sorry I escaped. I'm sorry I didn't do what you wanted me to. You probably have a good reason for this money. Maybe your kid is sick or something serious like that… Thank you for letting my friends and I go." I turned back for the car. Tintin smiled as I approached, but in an instant his face darkened and he shouted something right as a blade went into my back. I screamed in pain and collapsed onto the gravel, watching as the man raised his knife to stab me again. The world slowed down again, as it had when I was falling, and I watched as something quick flew through the air and went straight into the big man's head before he could stab me again. Someone shot him. Tintin appeared beside me, gun in hand, staring at the other men. He shouted something I couldn't make out before bending over me.
"Nollie," he shouted, "Nollie, I'm right here. The men are all gone now, it's okay. We're gonna get you some help." He lifted me in his arms and put me in the back of the car with Isabelle, who cradled my head on her lap. "Keep her awake," he instructed, "Even if she just closes her eyes, it can be detrimental to her health."
"Why?"
"Because if she falls asleep, there's a chance she won't wake up." I barely remember the ride to the hospital, but Isabelle says she held my hand for the entire drive and continuously repeated my name in order to keep me awake. She talked to me about Sherlock, she told me about the fact that Wesley had admitted to fancying her last night and that was why she'd come over, to tell me about Wesley.
When we finally reached the hospital, Tintin carried me inside the emergency room and told them what had happened—oddly enough, he told me later, the situation didn't surprise them, and they knew who he was upon arrival. The nurses put me on a gurney and wheeled me away, telling the two that I'd be just fine.
I woke up to Tintin sound asleep beside me in my hospital bed, a bandage wrapped around his upper left arm. "Did they stitch you up?" I mumbled, and he woke up.
"You're awake!" He announced excitedly, "Nurse, nurse! She's awake!" A nurse with a nametag reading GREY came into the room, nodded when she saw me, and scribbled something down on a clipboard.
"You will both be discharged tomorrow morning," she said before disappearing again. Isabelle sat up on the sofa across the room and grinned.
"You guys are alive!" She exclaimed, "Oh, this is great. I'm gonna call Ruth and Grace and Audrey—" She vanished at this, and I turned to Tintin.
"Thank you," I murmured, leaning my head on his shoulder.
"What are you thanking me for?"
"You saved my life."
"I did nothing to save your life, sweetheart. I simply killed Bateson and scared the others away so I could get to you before they could."
"Still!"
"You're the real hero, Nollie sweetheart."
"I was the one begging for them to kill me—"
"You're my hero."
The next morning we returned home, hand in hand, and fell asleep on the sofa—exhausted from the events that had taken place in the past few days. One thing I knew: no matter what happened, Tintin would always be there to save the day.
Nurse Grey was named after Meredith Grey. I'm a Grey's addict now, since May. xD Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this story & please review! I love you all :) ~DisneyPrincess55
