Shattered
The Sign of Hope
The rain pounded on the roof, singing in a sad, desolate tone. The water ran in rivers across the green grass towards the street. The signs dotting the side of the road could not be seen, so heavy was the torrential rainfall and so fierce the wind. A branch snapped somewhere, crumbling into the dirt below. The sky was a dismal shade of black, threatening in its roiling clouds and angry thunderclaps. Lightning was the only guide, brief flashes of color that lit the sky and faded into dark.
The water trickled down the roof, racing against itself to reach the ground. Streaked by rain, the windows offered no sanctuary from the bloody reflection of the home. A small figure lay shivering in the corner, screaming with grief and sobbing with pain. Fear coated the furniture, the bodies heaped in the center of the room. They were mangled creatures, twisted, murdered in cold blood. Hitomi desperately tried to avoid seeing them, afraid, so afraid of her life.
She slowly lifted her hands to her eyes, the hands that had been clutching her aching sides and watched blood drip from her long fingers. It slowly fell to the floor, splashing upwards and settling into an ever-growing puddle beneath her. She tore her gaze away from it, but could still feel it soaking into her clothing, into her very skin. Her body refused to stop trembling; she could no longer control herself, lying bent and crooked in the corner of the house she once loved.
She could smell her brother's and parents' dead bodies. Her stomach churned and she threw up again, crying loudly as her body complained from the cramping the sight inflicted. She felt an animal tearing to escape from her and released it, screaming into the storm. The rain fell harder; thunder tossed back its mighty head and answered her, roaring louder than hundreds of lions.
As soon as she opened her mouth, blood dripped from her hair and cheeks onto her tongue. She threw herself against a wall, desperate to escape the metallic taste. The feeling, the sharpness drove her mad. She wanted to die, wanted to escape. Slowly, the red tickled her throat and inched downward. She sent up her calls again, and retched under the window as lightning sparked outside.
The puddle of blood was swelling around her, wide as an ocean, waves washing up against her flesh. Hitomi whimpered, but could not forge through it. Her body was giving up, laying slowly down into the shock, thanking the bleakness coming to take over her mind. A shroud of darkness was playing at the corner of her eyelids, inviting her to rest and forget about everything that happened. She fought against it, unsure why it was so important to stay awake, but knowing, somehow, she couldn't give in.
She struggled to sit up and reach the door. Desperately, a part of her was trying to let the rain in, let the rain wash away all the death. If only she could lift her dying body upwards… if only she could reach the handle, let the clean water wipe away her memories. Hitomi wanted to drown in the storm. Drown and forget.
All the way home, she fought. The storm, the icy wind, the hungry rain, she hadn't given into the desire to lie down and rest. The only thing on her mind was her family. Rushing back to give the cookie she made to her brother to comfort him during the storm. Helping her mother with dinner, throwing a carrot or two at her brother, who would be watching television. Letting her father tease her about work and offer her a job at his place again. But, no, she would always be independent… always self-sufficient.
And now, always alone.
Her lips parted again, voice rising in another scream. She didn't even recognize the cries. When it finally registered to be her voice, Hitomi winced and fell back to the floor. The scream was unbroken. The cuts on her back flared at the sudden impact on the wood, and tears soaked her cheeks. Hitomi laid perfectly still, waiting for that hurtful throb to lift her into senselessness. Or, better yet, into death. But it didn't come. The painful sting in her back continued unabated, but it was nothing compared to the splitting ache of her heart.
She was startled out of her reverie by bodies bursting into the door. At first, she thought – indeed, hoped – they were REP, coming to finish the job, destroy her. But these men wore uniforms of blue and gold and carried guns and flashlights. Her brain did not note that they were police and paramedics. She only knew they were alive. Her arms reached for one, but when she looked, the heavy body parts did not move. Blood dripped over her eyes, forcing them shut.
"Oh God…" a man said, dressed in a police uniform. He stumbled away, leaving behind his two companions. He fell out the doorway, whimpering like a small puppy. The remaining men exchanged looks when they heard the man retching and crying outside the door. Both had seen the bodies already, and, finally, one caught sight of Hitomi, who had quieted the moment the men burst into the house.
"Dear Lord, they left one alive. John, get over here!" he snapped at his friend, though John did not need urging. "I'm going after him," he said, pointing out the door. John nodded and bent at Hitomi's side.
"Hey, there, hon, relax. I'm here to help. Good guy. Show me what's hurt. If you can."
Hitomi tried to talk, she really tried. But each time her mouth opened, blood poured in and clogged her throat. The man had a gentle touch and looked her over. He lifted her shirt and glanced at her back. Her brain barely registered his gasp.
"Sweet Jesus… What did they do to you?" his hand dug in his bag for a compress to halt the bleeding. He murmured to himself as he worked. "Why haven't you fainted yet? The loss of blood… Jesus."
The younger man returned, without the other. When John glanced up, he shook his head. John could hear the other sobbing outside still.
"Uh… Take a look at the others, Dennis. Maybe…?" John said. Dennis nodded calmly and looked over the others. His expression turned from a professional one, to utter horror as his eyes settled again on the bodies. This was his first good look at the torn, mutilated flesh. One – a woman, he thought – was missing most of her face. She was lying on the top of the pile. Next to her was a little boy. His body still oozed blood from dozens of wounds. Underneath him, barely visible, was an older, taller man. Must be the father… Dennis thought, unsettled. The whole family… God, who would do such a thing?
"No," he finally said to John. The man looked at him with sorrow but asked no other questions. A moment later his attention was back on the young girl curled around his feet.
John nodded to himself and began whispering encouragements to Hitomi. He wasn't sure if the girl could hear him, but he had to keep trying to get through to her. It was best if they kept her alert until the other paramedics carried her to the ambulance. She had some chance of survival if she kept fighting like this.
He lifted the cool compress to Hitomi's back, still speaking low and unhurried. John pressed it gently against her skin and was shocked by what the water cleaned away.
"Oh no… Dennis, look at these cuts…" he said, frightened. Dennis walked over to the shivering girl, followed closely by another policeman. The third man was scribbling all over a notebook, hurriedly trying to make notes of the entire crime. John's finger stabbed at the bloody crisscrosses decorating Hitomi's lower back. He carefully wiped away the red rivers, and both the policeman and Dennis gasped.
"That's…" the notebook threatened to fall to the floor.
"REP. Shit."
"Yeah… What… should I do?" John asked haltingly.
Dennis shook his head back and forth, clearing his brain. "It's said that every REP member keeps a bloody knife… Doesn't clean the blood off, you know? Because… damn it…" he closed his eyes, relieving himself of the picture before him. "Because it shows how many 'conquests' they've had. We need to clean up that cut."
John nodded slowly and lifted a special antiseptic. He poured it onto the cloth and lifted it again to her back. "This may hurt, ma'am. I want you to breathe, slowly, and just relax. Everything will be okay." He pressed the mixture against her injury.
Hitomi dimly noted someone or something had come to her and was digging about her wound. Those cuts. She screamed again, fearsome, afraid, and lifted an arm, the heaviest limb of the all, and crashed it against the face of the monster behind her. She heard a grunt and tried to scramble away. Her body lifted, then crumpled to the floor, helpless.
"Oh, shit. John, you okay?" Dennis quickly attended to his partner, leaving Hitomi alone a moment.
She felt a burning in her throat and choked, gasping, hands clutching the bloodied skin. The darkness blurring her vision danced away and illuminated the bodies of her mother, father, and brother, lying together, dead. She tried to cry out to them, reach for their empty shells, but couldn't muster the strength.
The men around her were focused on John and his bleeding face. Hitomi was whimpering, fighting against the darkness that nipped at her sanity. Her uncertainty at holding onto her ruined consciousness, as if she were waiting for some kind of sign, was answered. As the black descended around her, hungry for her life, Hitomi saw it. A feather drifted slowly from the ceiling. Her body called to the gentle creature, recognizing it somewhere in her heart. The feather dropped to her hand, white, shining, and pure, as if from an angel's back. Her deadened fingers closed over it, trembling, and the dainty object cleared the blood away from her hand.
Dennis stared at Hitomi after ascertaining that John's nose was not broken. "Look, there," he whispered. John, clutching his bleeding nose, glanced at the girl. He searched her crippled body for a moment, his eyes finally landing on the feather. His head snapped back when he noticed what astounded Dennis. Hitomi bordered on unconsciousness, hardly recognizing the men where still standing around her.
"No… blood?" John said in a hushed manner.
"None…" Dennis agreed in the same quieted voice.
Others entered the room and made their ways to Hitomi. Her body was gently lifted into the air. Onto a board, though she couldn't tell. They were whispering among themselves, terrified. Some tried not to touch her, though their job forced them to. Many of them stared at John, who was still cradling his smashed nose, seated on the floor in the blood. They carefully strapped her down onto the uncomfortable wood, adjusting her head between the pillowed supports. No matter how delicate they were, no move they made didn't hurt her battered body.
As she was gently arranged Hitomi's lips parted, begging for air, searching for some repose from her suffering. A technician waved over the oxygen mask. As the plastic sides gently touched her face Hitomi's voice squeezed out a thin, frightened yelp. The men exchanged startled looks.
As they finished the last adjustments on the straps, a finger brushed her oozing wound. Tears welled up in the eyes that were unfocused on the ceiling. A technician slapped the hand that touched her, snapping loudly at him. Another one shook his head at the noise and carefully arranged a strap over her back. She whimpered.
"She can obviously still feel the pain," a small man noted.
The only woman on the team shot him a look.
"What? Look at her! She's dead, anyway."
The others looked up when the woman struck him, hard. She forced him out of the house, much to the astonishment of her colleagues. She stared at the others, waiting for a challenge, but they all shrunk back. Hitomi's dulled brain recognized nothing but the slight warmth from the feather she clutched still.
The medics lifted the board and her and moved slowly towards the door. The rain was still hissing outside, but the wind had abated enough to allow free movement. Hitomi's eyes saw the man who had fled her home shivering next to the door. He let out a short, anguished cry when he saw her body inching down the stairs. She wished to reach to him, comfort him, but the only comfort for her was in the stillness.
The cold rain washed over her. The paramedics crept towards the ambulance, a white vehicle, lights off for the moment, siren silenced. The words "We Care! Hospice" were painted neatly on the door.
Several people were staring, now. Neighbors out in the rain, policemen, a second ambulance – none of them would spare her.
"Something about this… what is it?" asked one man. A medic, trying to ignore him, felt the same uncertainty.
"Oh God! The rain!" shouted a policeman. The others stared, and, slowly, their cries joined the officer's. The soaking rain was not washing away the blood that decorated the delicate face of the girl. Instead, each tiny drop added another red streak to the brutalized Hitomi. A medic dropped a corner of the board in shock. Dennis, walking with John to the other ambulance, watched in horror as Hitomi's body jolted against the cement. Her fingers clenched around the feather, her wracked brain despondently trying to ignore the fresh signals of pain.
The young woman who had cast the other medic out of the house took up the frightened man's place. She lifted the board with no words and guided it gently towards the ambulance. The other carrier refused to look at Hitomi or the woman, staring, steadfast, at her destination.
Getting her body into the ambulance was a bit trickier than was necessary. The splashes from the bloody rain splattered onto anyone lifting Hitomi's body into the vehicle, deterring all but the woman. Unable to lift the board on her own, she cursed at her companions, begging for their assistance. When a civilian stepped past the long rows of police tape, no one spoke. The man hoisted the board on his shoulder and let others balance and adjust her, to avoid the aggravation of her wounds. When she was safely inside, he simply walked away.
Out of the rain, the blood no longer rained down upon her body, and the others felt comfortable enough to cover her and fix the oxygen mask securely over her mouth and nose. The ambulance jolted forward, but Hitomi did not notice, could feel nearly nothing. Suddenly, a warm rush of wind encircled her, whispered through her veins. Her eyes opened wide, mouth gasping for breath. It felt so sweet, so calming. She relinquished her body to the darkness immediately afterwards. The shadowy curtain closed over her eyes seconds later and left her in cool, forgiving darkness.
The paramedics in the ambulance stared. The feather in her fingers had shivered back and forth in some unseen wind and every drop of blood – from the house, from her wound, from the rain – vanished. The air sparkled and every trace of the blood was gone. Even the young woman, who had shown so much bravery before, pressed herself against the back of the ambulance, shaking her head. The two other medics with her looked into her eyes, fear prevalent in every swallow.
In a whisper, the woman asked her companions, "where did it all go…?"
Author's Notes: Well… Here we go. The next chapter will have Van in it, so, for all those you of who are anxiously awaiting his arrival – he's coming! For those of you who don't know, a hospice is a place where people are taken when doctors are sure of their deaths – as in: it's only a matter of time. Please don't believe I'm insensitive while I write these explanations. My grandfather recently went to a Hospice and did not come out. Please, any reviews would be greatly appreciated. If you want to be added to the mailing list and hear when each new chapter comes out, please e-mail me at catwinner earthlink.net.
For all those of you who noticed the chapter was posted twice, I'm sorry, but I couldn't fix it until I had a new chapter to upload. My apologies. Fixed now, though!
ReddAlice: Thank you for reviewing so many of my chapters. : ) You give excellent criticisms. I tried to make the gang seem like any other. It's because REP stands for Random-Evil-People. I know, I'm an idiot. Still, REP – menacing acronym at least, eh?
Skittles: Well, here's the beginning of Hitomi's new life. It should get more less violent and more focused on Hitomi's healing. If one can really heal after such a tragedy…
Sereia: First of all, I love your name. Secondly, I loved your comments. I hope everything I'm writing is still living up to your expectations.
SabineballZ: Van's coming! :D
Purplesmurf: Thanks again for reviewing, I hope your still enjoying the story!