Chapter Six:
Awakening
The sting of cold winter rain
Somehow I need it to hurt
You set the ocean aflame
I'll stand and watch it burn
-The Mask Slips Away, Red
{Karai}
The silence that follows the relentless screaming is nothing short of unsettling. Father keeps his eyes closed, his body completely relaxed in the chair. Roth and Elias share a questioning glance before Elias clears his throat.
"Mutant, are you with us?"
Leo's body is stone on the table, save for the steady rise and fall of his chest.
Roth crosses the room to Leo's side. "Saki, give him a command. Test the bond."
Father taps his index finger on the arm of the chair. "I already have."
In an instant, the room shifts. Leo's body reanimates, his hand shoots out and grips Roth by the throat. He doesn't even have time to scream before the fingers clench and crush his neck. I flatten myself against the wall, breath lodged in my chest. The sound—God, the sound of bones crunching echoes in my skull.
Roth's eyes roll back into his head as blood bubbles from the corners of his mouth. Elias swears and scrambles to the back of the room as Roth's body drops in a heap below the table.
"Saki!" he shouts. "What're you doing?!"
My father does not answer. He remains in the chair, head down, eyes closed. If he didn't exude hatred from every pore of his being, I'd say he looked at peace.
Leo sits up on the table. His eyes don't look the same. They're deeper, darker—sinister and cold and void of everything Leo has always been. My heart sinks to my gut and freezes over.
Elias knows. Death has us strung to the air by our throats. He tries to run, to reach the door, as if he could possibly escape what he's created. He tries.
But in a moment, he is dead. Slide, step, crunch.
His mangled body hits the floor, his last breath squeezed up from broken ribs.
The silence returns.