Hello, it's me again. Just so you know, this chapter is going to be a very short but important chapter that is going to be the second to last one in this story. So enjoy! (I know, what a lame line, but please don't be mad at me because I've got a whole lot of homework since I am one of those weird overachiever people who take a whole bunch AP classes and is in honors English and math and have to pay the price of having little to no social life.)

Heidi

Sacrifice

"Oh, my God!" I screamed, bursting into Cecelia's hospital room, which I'm sure is some sort of a violation of the hospital codes, but at a time like that, I couldn't care less.

All three of them—Cecelia, who had awakened, Gary and Dr. Krantz—looked up from their own reading materials—newspaper for Dr. Krantz, jumbo textbook for Gary and a copy of this month's Vogue for Cecelia.

Cecelia closed her magazine—but, I couldn't help noticing, leaving a finger in the page that she was on—and smiled a 100 watt smile at me. "Hey, Jess. What's up?"

"Rob's gone! He took Rob!" I screeched, causing a nurse who was passing by in the hallways to say in a very Hello-how-may-I-help-you-friendly-operator voice, "Miss, please keep your voice down. This is a hospital," only to be driven away by me, who was not nearly as polite nor friendly and yelled at the tope of my lungs, "FBI official business!"

Dr. Krantz stood up from his chair, put a hand on my shoulder—not a very smart move at a time like that considering my whole thing for personal space invasion—and said in a soothing tone, "Calm down and tell us what happened."

So I told them everything that happened—okay, not what happened between Rob and me the night before, but you know—while crying my eyes out. Honestly, it was very embarrassing bawling like a baby in front of my boss and coworkers in an orange plastic hospital chair.

"And now, all I have of him is his jacket which is of no use whatsoever because it's not him, and I don't know where I can find him because I don't," I babbled on, hiccupping along the way, "I don't," I hiccupped again, "I don't know whayavventouem," I finished, my last four words stifled by the burial of my face into Rob's jacket, getting, I'm pretty sure, snot all over it. Hey, I never said I was the most sanitary person in the world.

No one spoke. The only sounds in Cecelia's hospital room came from me who was still crying softly into Rob's jacket. Crying, crying, and crying…

Until suddenly, just like I had that summer when I was at that camp for gifted musicians or whatever and that time at school when Mark Leskowski had kidnapped Claire Lippman—Mikey's twins, ew, ew, ew, ew, ew—I had a vision. It wasn't a clear one, but all of a sudden I knew where Rob was—which was not the same place where I had dreamt Mini SSass to be last night for some reason.

And I ran for all I was worth.

Sure, I had to avoid a few obstacles—i.e. the nurses wheeling clean towels around and kids doing hopscotch, whom I accidentally tripped over, causing one of the little girls to scrape her knee, but I had no time to apologize, I'd do it later—but I got to Rob in less than fifteen minutes. Where I ended up was in an old garage. You know, the ones that criminals always seemed to be hiding their victims in those bad movies. It turns out that entertainment does have a certain amount of truth in them.

The place was moldy and dark and completely foul smelling.

"Lightning Girl, I knew you'd be here," a voice said. I didn't see who the voice belonged to until he flicked on the lights, allowing me to spot Rob and himself.

It was Mini SSass as I had predicted.

Rob recognized me instantly, and though he couldn't talk on account of the fact that his mouth was gagged, the spark in his eyes told me one thing, Don't try to safe me. Go, Jessica. Go.

I wasn't going to go anywhere without him. No, not without a fight. We had been through so much together, I'm not about to let all that go to waste because of this stout little man who, by the way, has a goatee—who does he think he is? The Pope?

"Let him go," I commanded, my voice shaking. I told myself that it was of anger—pure, unadulterated anger—not fear, but I knew better. I wasn't afraid for my own safety, but I was afraid for Rob. I mean, he may be a big boy and all but he was tied down by ropes.

As I was thinking this thought through, however, I noticed something. Apparently, this guy—Mini SSass, I mean—wasn't all there upstairs because I discovered that Rob's ropes were only single knotted and could be easily undone.

And being the rookie that he is, Mini SSass visibly left a gun in the corner of the garage, not two yards from where Rob was tied down.

I could save Rob. We could have our happy ending together. I could. We could. All I had to do to get Rob free was to distract Mini SSass.

"I'll let him go if you die in my hands," he replied.

"How are you going to do that?" I inquired, backing away, steering him as far from Rob as possible.

I put one hand in my pocket, as though I had a gun, which I didn't, because me, being the stupid, stupid, stupid person that I am, didn't bring any backup, a phone nor a gun, I led his attention towards my hands so that I could have time to eye-signal Rob to get himself free.

He knew, and started to subtly wriggle himself out.

"Put your hands out to where I can seen them," he commanded, looking crazy-eyed, like that Jim Henderson guy I dealt with the winter before everything in my life had gone askew—a.k.a. when Rob and I broke up—and I lost all contact of everyone I knew. Except Dr. Krantz, of course, but he doesn't really count since he's always going to be sort of a secondary character in my life, because he was such a poo-poo head.

Ah, be astounded by my maturity young ones.

I took my hands out of my pockets and held them beside my ears criminal-meets-cop style. "Okay, how about we make a deal?" I suggest, frantically attempting to send Rob telepathic signals to hurry up.

Mini SSass narrowed his eyes at me. "What type of a deal?"

"Um," I said holding out that one word as long as possible without seeming suspicious, trying to see out of the corner of my eye if Rob had untied himself yet. He'd gotten the ropes around his hands undone and was about to untie his feet while trying to make it subtle so that Mini SSass doesn't see his movement out of the corner of his dark, evil, mysterious—and crazy—eye—singular because Mini SSass seemed to have some sort of patch on the other eye. "I was thinking that if I—"

I never got to finished what I thought I could do because just at that second, hell broke loose, because just as I was finishing my thought, Rob got the knot around his ankles loosened and reached for the gun in the corner which was precisely the moment when Mini SSass noticed that his little—okay, big, since Rob was, like, over six feet—victim hadn't been oh-so-lovely in state of wanting assassinate his captor.

So before Rob could pull the trigger on Mini SSass, Mini SSass whipped out a gun of his own out of his belt loop. . .

And before anyone can say the words, "Screw you,"—which, by the way, was my favorite thing to say at that time—took a shot at Rob.

What did I do just then?

Oh, I just jumped. Right in front of Rob.

And the bullet when soaring right into my chest.


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