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A/N- it's short and (not so) sweet, but by no means the end…Review if you please!
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"I try to make my way to you
but still I feel so lost
I don't know what else I can do
cause I've seen it all
it was never enough
it keeps leaving me needing you
Take me away
Take me away
I've got nothing left to say
Just take me away"
-Lifehouse, "Take me Away"
Prologue: Failure
"No!"
The one syllable word echoed through the staccato ending. It reverberated off the mild fall air, the gray-ish sky, the brick buildings, and, through her ears, hung in her brain like a profound word of wisdom.
But it wasn't.
Those who might have hear would have known it. It was full of sorrow, anger, surprise, and disbelief. A heartbreaking cry succeeded by a rolling crash of skin and bone on the hard surface of pavement, and emotions and heart on the harsh reality of failure.
A failure she had never experienced before.
The failure of her beliefs
The failure of her world
~*~
Chapter 1: On the Roof
"Emma?"
…
"Emma?"
…
"Jesse?"
"Adam?"
"Where's Emma? Is she with you?"
"No we split up. She took the north complex. I took south. Why?"
"She's not answering her Com-link."
"Maybe she forgot how it works. She's only had it for a week."
"No…. I have a bad feeling."
~*~
Horror
Complete horror
It shot through her body, buckling her knees, banging her own flesh against the dry, cold tar and concrete roof. Her hands still clung to the edge of the 2 and a half foot rim around the presumably closed of square.
Her mind was tingling as it absorbed reality, the fact that it could no longer sense another mind. The fear and pain and anger it had once felt were silenced. She was truly and suddenly alone. That silence throbbed in the back of her head like a migraine.
Her wide open eyes stared into the black tar ground as she rested the top of her head against the gray concrete of the wall that fenced in the roof. The shock of the scene froze her down to her very being.
Shock gave way to hesitant tears.
And hesitant tears gave way to a flood of emotion, drowning out all other signed and sounds of life.
~*~
"Emma!" He cried. Fatigue had almost set in from the dead sprint of fear. How could he have been so stupid? Trained in the simulations, yes, but her inexperience in the field was an obvious danger.
"Emma!" His voice rang out again, like it was completely separate from him. His body knew he a job to do, a priority, but his mind was wrapped up in fear and guilt.
His eyes jumped from place to place, search for a sign of her. Maybe a discarded piece of clothing, say her funky green and silver scarf, or a shout, or a figure nearby that may have seen a scuffle. Whether she was here or not, he needed desperately to know for sure where she was.
"Jesse?"
"Adam! I can't find her!"
"Whatever you do, don't panic," His voice was calm and serious, but he didn't need any sort of powers to tell him, fear was being masked. "Listen, Jesse. I'm having Brennan and Shalimar fly over the area. Luckily, she still has her ring on. They just tracked her east of you."
He turned to his immediate right. A lofty brown structure stood a hundred yards away, beckoning him to come and search. With a determined look, renewed energy, and quick thanks, he continued his search for the MIA woman.
~*~
It was cold. Maybe night was coming…
As far as she was concerned, time had stopped. She was consumed in a mental stasis that froze her world into place. Maybe that's why she was cold.
She could feel her heart beat. It was thumping quickly like drops of water from a partially turned on faucet. It was scared, vulnerable, panicked, and confused. In her twenty-odd years of existence, she had never witnessed such a thing. She'd never hoped to. She'd never even thought about it enough to hope she'd never see. And now, the evidence was front of her, leaving her fighting to keep the images from surfacing.
Tears were gone. They'd left her face moist to turn quickly bitter and cold. She lacked the will to wipe them away. She lacked the will to do anything. The thought of standing and returning to the ground nauseated her. She couldn't walk by her. She wouldn't.
So sitting in the fetal position, knees held to chest with hugging arms, she stayed where she was, in fear, in sickness, in horror, in emptiness.