ELEVEN|
60 Hours, 43 Minutes
CAINE SOREN YAWNED. He rolled over in the bed and looked at Diana Ladris. He had fell asleep at Diana's house after she delivered the baby. Cassandra was wrapped tightly in Diana's arms, caressed ever so delicately. Both Diana and Caine fell right asleep after the birth process from sheer exhaustion.
Diana had allowed Caine to sleep in her bed, something that he had not done in a long time. Dahra, Lana, Sanjit, Astrid, and Sam had left as soon as possible, no longer wanting to be pressured with anything else. The birth of Cassandra last night had been the most stress-filled experience any of them had.
At the moment, Caine was debating on whether or not he should move in with Diana. She had obviously forgiven him and that was a good thing. The only problem is that he didn't want to give up his position as being King of Perdido Beach. If he did, it would ruin him. That would probably be the last straw for him. He would go crazy.
He watched Diana and his sleeping baby, Cassandra. They were both beautiful. Diana was beautiful in a way that attracted him, but Cassandra's beauty was different. She was elegant, a beauty that Caine could not explain but only look on at admiringly. According to Dahra, the baby was six pounds.
Diana's eyes flickered open and she sat up, yawning.
"Did Lana's healing work?" Caine asked.
"Yes," Diana responded. "I don't feel any pain at all. I guess that part worked. Goodness, I thank Lana so much. She brought me back to life, she healed me up after giving birth. What more could she do?"
Caine shrugged, shaking his head. "I don't know what else there could be. I bet she feels like a hero, having saved so many lives." He sighed, a sound signaling that he was inspired by Lana's work. "I wish I could be like that. But, no. I'm remembered as the bad guy. The one that tried to kill Sam Temple, my own brother. I'm still a bad person, I think. I just know it. I can feel that badness in me."
"I think you've changed," Diana admitted. "I always tell myself you will. And that you would come running back to me. But you didn't. All those nights I was by myself. Helpless. No protection. I'm not even witty anymore. No more smart remarks. This is a new Diana, Caine. Look what you did to me. How could you do that? You hurt me. I'm not the same. I just had a baby and I'm barely a teen!"
Caine was surprised when Diana got out of bed and walked over to him, pressing her head onto his neck, and started crying. He had never seen Diana Ladris cry. Not when she was giving birth, not when Drake almost killed her, never. And now she broke down. It was almost too much for him. He wrapped his arms around her and he, too, pressed his head against hers. And then something incredible happened: a tear fell from Caine Soren's eye. He was crying.
Diana felt the moisture of the tear and looked up. She gasped when she saw that he was crying. "You're . . . you're crying."
He did not have an answer to that. He himself didn't believe it. He was the most cold-hearted person to ever walk the earth, in his eyes. How could he cry? A while ago he would think it was a sign of weakness, but now it was almost seeming okay. It felt like a load of stress and unseen sorrow was released like a giant weight coming off of his shoulders.
Diana stared at him for a long moment, astonished that Fearless Leader had feelings. She studied him, this time looking deep into his eyes. Diana had once before looked into his eyes when the FAYZ started. At that time, they were deep and soulless. At this second, they looked like any normal pair of eyes if you didn't count the fear and frustration and sadness in them.
"What are you going to do, Caine?" Diana questioned. "I know you have to decide now. I can see it in your eyes and it's killing you. Are you going back to Perdido Beach or are you going to stay here with me?" The way she had laid out the options sounded simple. But they were not. In both of their heads, thoughts raced like cars would. If he stayed, he would no longer be King of Perdido Beach, a great accomplishment in his screwed up life. He wanted really badly to stay with Diana and Cassandra, but it would make him feel so low, so shallow.
Normally, if Caine was questioning on what to do, he would think to himself, sort his options out. But not this time. He felt comfortable enough to tell his baby's mama. "You know, if I am a better person like I thought I was, I would no doubt stay with you and Cassandra. But, I just don't know. You see, Diana, my parents didn't like me. They didn't want me. So they sent me to Coates. I've never had love in my whole life. The only person I cared about it you. You were the only one that loved me. And, when I lost you, it hurt. That's why I decided on becoming a better person. To try to get you back."
Diana looked puzzled. She hadn't expected to hear this from Fearless Leader. "What are you getting at, Caine?"
His lip quivered and then paused for a second. Out of nowhere, he bent forward, hugging his knees. "I want you so bad. I want everything back. Well, better than before. I want us to be decent people. Both of us. You already are. That's why you left me. But I just can't be a good person."
"I don't know what got into me," Diana whispered. "I don't know why I acted evil. I don't know why I followed you. But I do know this: I never want to be looked at as a bad person again. Caine, what are our parents going to do if the FAYZ wall comes down? We've killed people. Well, you have at least. But I helped you."
Caine stood up. "This is it, Diana. Enough. Here's what is going to happen: I will announce to everybody in my little kingdom, or whatever you want to call it, that I am resigning as King of Perdido Beach. I am going to start helping my brother, Sam Temple, with anything he needs me for. I now have a heart."
Diana looked straight into his eyes, expecting to detect some type of lie. But she didn't. She could see only truth. "You're not lying," she murmured. She reached for him. She didn't know what part she was grabbing for, but she knew she just wanted to hold him. So she just held up her hand and Caine took it, pulling her up and embracing her with a hug.
"No, Diana, I am not," Caine said truthfully. They both pulled away as their beautiful baby girl started to cry.
There was a knock on the door. Sam was still lying down in he and Astrid's room, naked from his masturbating. He was just going to go for another round, but the knock had stopped him. He quickly jumped out of bed and threw his clothes on, running for the door without a shirt as he always did at home.
Sam opened the door and it was Astrid. She was wearing a genuine smile. Sam immediately what had happened to cause the change of emotion from when he last saw her.
"Hey, Sam, what's up?" Astrid asked, still smiling. She stepped past him, entering the living room. She strode over to the bedroom, flicking on the light. She took a seat on the bed where Sam's shirt was lying. To Sam's luck, she didn't notice it.
"What caused the change in your mood?" Sam inquired.
"I was at Stefano Rey Park and I was crying," Astrid started, "but then I was thinking about depression and I remembered reading an article on it, saying that if there is someone who is depressed, that person might be able to heal themselves if they communicate with others more. So I went ahead and talked a little to Brother John and I had a long conversation with Orsay and Sinder."
"They are both pretty cool," Sam commented. "Sinder and I used to be really good friends. Not anymore, not since the FAYZ."
"Oh, well, I figured out that I have a lot in common with them," Astrid said. "I think that article might help me out. Either way, I'm still sad about Petey right now."
"I'm worried," Sam admitted. "I mean, he might have been the only one powerful enough to stop the FAYZ. I just wonder how we will get out now. I think soon enough the outside world will break the dome."
"If that's possible." Astrid paused, then her eyes went wide. "Oh, my gosh. We have to go to Caine and Diana right now." She got to her feet, taking Sam's hand in hers, and then pulling it.
"What? Why?"
"Little Pete. You know how he was the most powerful person in the FAYZ? I just got the most horrible idea, and I hope it's wrong."
"What is it?"
Astrid sighed. "I'm thinking that if two mutant people have a kid, especially when the father is a four bar, that their kid could be terribly powerful. A five bar, the only one like Little Pete."
Sam studied her expression. He didn't understand it. "I think it's a good thing. If Caine and Diana can get the baby to believe that it could stop the FAYZ, then I think their kid can make it happen."
"Cassandra isn't autistic," Astrid pointed out. "With Little Pete, the problem was that he was autistic. That's why he made all this happen. That's why he didn't know exactly how to stop it."
"Exactly," Sam said. "So it's a good thing. Cassandra will be able to stop the FAYZ."
"Assuming that she will be strong enough." Astrid exhaled audibly again. "Let's go to Diana and Caine and discuss this. I don't like going over things twice."
Sam and Astrid got ready and walked out of their house together. The walk to Diana's house was very short, but they made it a little bit longer by walking very slowly. Astrid was wrapped in Sam's arms as they walked, and they were silent; there wasn't really anything they could talk about walking to Diana's home, only nine houses down.
When Sam and Astrid were on Diana's front porch, Sam knocked on the door, and they waited for an answer. It only took a second for Caine to open the door, Diana right behind him, carrying the baby, Cassandra.
"Oh, well, hey, Sam," Caine greeted, smiling. His smile was just a regular smile, not the sarcastic and evil grin he usually wore. It surprised both Sam and Astrid.
"Um, Caine, do you think Astrid and I can come in?" Sam asked. "We need to talk to you and Diana about something."
"Sure," Caine allowed, stepping to the side, making a "come in," gesture with his hands.
Sam and Astrid came inside hesitantly. For Astrid, she noticed that the set-up was very similar to her house. The way the couches were facing each other, the TV pressed against the south wall, the way the lamps were on each side of the couches, it was all mesmerizing.
At first, Astrid was thinking Diana copied the way she had her living room set up, but then she quickly realized that Diana had never been into her home.
"Go ahead and take a seat on the couch, if you want," Diana offered politely.
Both Sam and Astrid went over to the couches and sat, Caine right behind them, taking a seat on the opposite couch from Sam and Astrid. He stared at both of them with life-filled eyes, unlike his usual unsatisfied, dead, and miserable glare.
"Do you want anything to drink?" Diana inquired. "We have water, tea, and coffee."
Sam and Astrid both snapped their heads towards Diana. "Did you just say you have water, tea, and coffee?" Astrid queried.
"Yes," Diana replied proudly. "Just like everybody else, we have plenty of water."
"Yeah, but nobody else has tea or coffee," Sam pointed out. "How did you get it?"
Caine smirked. "Nobody wanted to even attempt to raid my house like they did everybody else. They knew they'd get hurt. And my mother, before the FAYZ, would always drink tea and coffee all day. Her nickname for sites like Myspace, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube, was always Coffee And Tea. When I came over here to see Diana give birth to our beautiful baby, I stopped by my house before the FAYZ, and grabbed all that coffee and tea that nobody thankfully took, and brought it over here to Diana."
The way Caine spoke was with a mature tone. He sounded experienced, Sam noted. It was a different Caine, not the old Caine that loved to threaten to kill him. Not the Caine that had red, evil eyes.
"Sure, I will take tea any day," Astrid said, snapping Sam out of his thoughts.
"Me, too," Sam added, straightening up.
They sat silently as Diana exited the family room to go get the tea. Caine stared at Sam and Astrid, not thinking at all that he was being rude. Astrid stared at him back, feeling that if she looked away, Caine would think Astrid the Genius as inferior or think she was intimidated by him. Astrid refused to believe she was inferior to anyone at all. Sam, on the other hand, looked quickly away from Caine's stare with no attempt at hiding his intimidation. He was scared of Caine and honestly didn't care who knew it.
That was another thing about Sam Temple: he did not care what other people thought. He did not care if there was somebody who knew about his fear of Caine. He did not care if there was somebody who knew that Sam would like to never fight with Caine again in his life. He did not care if there was somebody who knew that Sam really did think Caine could kill him. However, there was some things Sam would like to keep secret, things that were personal.
He supposed that was personal, his feud with Caine, but so many people knew about it that it didn't feel at all personal. The personal things were like the fact that he had an obsession with masturbation, or the fact that he was dying without watching or looking at porn, and the fact that he wanted sex from Astrid so bad.
Diana returned to the living room, her hips swaying in that elegant way in which she always promenaded. She placed the steaming cup of tea on each of their laps, Sam, Astrid, and Caine taking it gladly.
Caine was the first to take a sip of tea, not puzzled at the sight of the beverage like Astrid and Sam was. Caine had been drinking tea ever since he went to the island where Sanjit and his siblings had formerly lived. Caine no longer thought that he wanted to kill Sanjit, not anymore. In fact, he had forgotten all about the day he had tried to kill Sanjit, and Diana attempted suicide to see how much Caine really loved her. So when he saw Sanjit last night, he didn't want to kill him anymore.
Sam and Astrid were musing at the cup of tea, thinking about how delicious it looked. The steam made it look that much more scrumptious. They were reminiscing about the good old days before kids had to fend for themselves.
"It's tea," Astrid murmured. "It's actual tea. I cannot believe I am drinking it." She raised the cup of tea with a shaky, stunned hand, and drank deep. She wasn't really drinking as she was gulping, just as Sam was. Neither of them noticed how wild and ravenous they really looked, until they saw Diana and Caine's expressions. Sam gulped one last time and was finished. He set the tea aside and he breathed in air deeply. Astrid was done with her tea very shortly after. They sat back, relaxed, enjoying themselves and the sweet taste in their mouths.
"Um, okay, so what did you drop by here for?" Caine requested, inspecting the expressions of Sam and Astrid.
Diana walked around the couch and came to take a seat by Caine, interlocking his fingers with hers. She then got into a comfortable position, where she caressed her head onto Caine's lap. Caine stroked her face, smiling at her with love-filled eyes.
Astrid spoke before Sam could say anything. Sam did not look at it as rude because he wanted very desperately not to be the one informing Caine and Diana about what might come to happen. The good parts, however, he did not mind telling them about. "Okay, so I was at the park, the Stefano Rey National Park, and I was talking to Orsay and Sinder. We were just talking about what was going on in the FAYZ when they brought up a good point: what happened when two powerful 'mutants freaks' have sex and have a kid? That got me to thinking. Diana, your power is to read other peoples power levels. Caine, your power is to suspend gravity, you're telekinetic. A two bar and a four bar give a baby a new life. That could be very dangerous and very helpful at the same time. Diana, there has only been one five bar in the FAYZ. We are thinking that this baby could have the potential to be the second five bar. If so, she will be the only five bar here in the FAYZ."
Sam carefully studied Caine and Diana as Astrid stopped speaking. They were frozen, their blank faces showing no emotion whatsoever.
Caine was looking down at Diana, his face horrified. "I thought I was the strongest person in the FAYZ, Diana. You . . . You lied to me. You told me there wasn't a far bar in the FAYZ."
Diana shook her head. "I've never, ever, read someone who was a five bar. I don't know what they are talking about."
"Astrid just said Cassandra was the second five bar in the FAYZ," Caine pointed out. "That means there was a person in the FAYZ that was five bars. And you're the only person in the FAYZ that can read powers, so you must have told them."
"No, no, no," Astrid yelled. "Diana didn't read the other five bar in the FAYZ."
"You just said Cassandra was the only five bar in the FAYZ that was alive," Diana whispered. "So, then, who is this five bar you are talking about?"
Sam saw that Astrid was sweating in confusion and nervousness, so he carried the conversation further. "All right, everybody just listen! The five bar that is no longer alive was Little Pete. You know, Peter Ellison, Astrid's brother." Sam shot a glance at Astrid, who was holding back tears at the reminiscing of throwing Little Pete to the bugs. "Caine, Diana didn't know Little Pete was a five bar, don't blame her. I am going to tell you something that is going to surprise you, but you have to keep this secret." Sam looked around the room and got nods from everybody.
"What is the secret?" Caine blurted.
Sam breathed in shakily before going on. "Okay, Little Pete was the five bar. If you are wondering how we know, it's because he is the one who started the FAYZ. Look, it's a long story that we don't have time to tell. Either way, he couldn't stop the FAYZ because he was autistic. He didn't know. And now he's dead. As far as we know, there's now no way to bring down the FAYZ. But we have one, only one, solution: Cassandra. She could hold the key to it all. Chances are, Cassandra's not autistic, and, if she starts to learn that the FAYZ is a bad place, she can possibly bring the barrier down. Now there are many complications to this prediction, and I want to go over them all."
There were confused faces all over the room. Even the speaker himself, which was Sam, was confused. Perhaps he didn't know what he was talking about either. Maybe he and Astrid's prediction was way over the top. Either way, the estimation had to be shared. There was always a possibility. Even if it sounded insane, anything could happen. The coming of the FAYZ proved that much.
"Okay, so, here's what I was thinking: we can't force the idea of just how terrible the FAYZ is on Cassandra because, if we do, then that might result badly later on down the road. Here's what we do; once she gets a little bit older, when she can understand things and how bad they are, she will probably make the FAYZ come down. What we can't do is pressure her. If we pressure her, there might be dire consequences, as I've said before."
"But what if she is autistic?" Caine pressed. "What if she's autistic and there's no way for the FAYZ to come down?"
"There's only one way we can know about that," Astrid responded. "Dahra Baidoo. I'm sure Dahra knows how to determine if Cassandra is autistic. Although it's almost certain that Cassandra isn't autistic, we have to check. In this situation, we have to be one-hundred percent sure of everything if we want this to end well."
Just then, the baby girl started crying. She whined and she whined. Diana held her tightly, rocking her back and forth. Cassandra continued to cry—and then she wasn't the only one: Diana was also shedding tears, but they were of sorrow and sadness.
"That's what we do then," Astrid said. "We find Dahra Baidoo."
Author's Note: Wow! So, I know this chapter didn't have any action, but I think it had plenty of drama! Towards the end of the chapter, when I was writing it, I was starting to get thrilled myself! How funny, isn't it? Anyway, I want to apologize for taking so long to update(I took four months!) I also apologize for the long paragraphs; I don't usually write long paragraphs, but, well, I guess there's a first time for everything. Okay, so, yeah, I am trying to squeeze all the Gone characters in, but there are a few that are going to have to wait, such as Jill, The Siren, and Justin. Last, but not least, I have a question: is there anything you want to know about, or anybody you want to see more often in the story? If so, just go ahead and comment! Before I end this chapter, I just wanted to note, for the record, that this is the longest chapter . . . YET ! Only by two words, in fact. Please, comment/review! Thanks!
FEAR
