Diana was no longer talking to Caine.
It was like they were children again and she was playing the silent game, sitting stiffly on the opposite end of the sofa with her arms crossed and her lips pursed stubbornly with her chin in the air like she was trying to smell something. She turned her body away from him in every way she could possibly do it even if it was just pointed at the door and she was staring at nothing. Caine seemed to be pretending he didn't care about this, he was slouching back on the chair with his feet up now on the small table in front of them once more, playing Sam's X-Box. He had been playing it for a few minutes now but his eyes repeatedly found their way to Diana. They went back and forth from her face to the screen. He was not doing badly, but not well either. Maybe if he paid attention then he might be better but Diana was far too distracting for him. He was still trying to think of a way to defuse the bomb building inside of her so they could go back to being happy that he was alive again.
Meanwhile Astrid, Anna and Sam had crowded in the kitchen where they whispered loudly to one another. They were each making everyone a cup of tea or coffee or a hot chocolate partly to give something to do and drink but also so that they could crowd around in one place together and talk about what had just happened. Sam had taken just a few moments to send Quinn down to the beach on his own and promised to call him later tonight if he remembered. Part of him wondered if he should have called Quinn up and told him what happened but at the same time he wasn't sure of what had happened. Best leave it for a few hours or day so that he could sort out his own mind and only call him if he needed to be there. No point in worrying everyone over nothing.
"You just found him lying there?" Sam hissed, glancing repeatedly over at his brother and Diana. Astrid had told him the basics of the story again and again as they waited for the kettle to boil. He still could not believe what he had been told no matter how many times he relayed it but the evidence was barely feet away from him. For some reason he had it in his mind that Caine dropped from the sky like a naked ghost before he hit the ground but that was ridiculous.
"Yes. I needed to do something quick before anyone saw him and that's why I called Anna." Astrid explained. She didn't go into much detail after the first sentence. After all, that pretty much explained it.
"Thanks," Sam said, momentarily turning to Anna. "It was cool of you to help out."
"No problem." Anna smiled. She had been silent mostly, just listening to Sam and Astrid discuss it with one another.
It was weird seeing Sam again. She had wondered if there would be any emotional feelings between the two of them but now she was in the same room as him there clearly wasn't. In fact Anna found herself grinning when she thought of how worried she had been about seeing him again. It was just like seeing an old cousin. You recognised them and liked them but you didn't think that much about them afterwards. Even when she found out Sam was a hero of the FAYZ and she remembered him saving everyone on the bus, it was still weird to think too much about him because after big events and acts of heroism, he blended back into the normal again.
"So what do we do now?" Sam asked looking back at Astrid again.
"I guess the only thing we can do is ask Caine some questions, try and get an answer from him or something." Astrid shrugged. "I'm just worried about how Diana is dealing."
"I am doing fine!" Diana snapped without warning. The three of them winced together when they realised they were not being as quiet as they originally thought. Astrid blushed and ducked her head as Diana stood up and stormed over to them, looking ready to do something she just might later regret.
Immediately Caine was up and turning around on the chair so that he could stare at them all on his knees. He saw a cat fight coming just as much as the rest of them.
"Let's not start fighting." Sam cautioned as he placed himself in between the two girls.
Diana hesitated for a moment. She actually seemed like she might challenge Sam just to get some of her frustration out there. "Whatever!" She snapped.
Turning around, Diana walked back over to the seat where she had been in when she had completely lost her mind after seeing Caine again. Staring down at the glass stained carpet she remembered each and everything she had been feeling when she dropped it. Shock. Fear. Confusing. And love for him, too. But the fear and confusion had over done the love he felt. Slowly she went to pick up the glass she had shattered to clean up the mess just because she felt the need to do something.
"Wait, Diana!" Astrid shouted when she saw what she was going to do.
"OW!"
Diana jumped up and clutched her hand at the sharp feeling. One of the pieces had cut along her hand and was bleeding hard now just under and along her thumb to the spot above her wrist that was trailing blood. A few drops fell down to the carpet or began to run down the skin of her arm. Caine was by her side in seconds but so was Astrid and Sam. Anna was the only one who was hanging back. As they crowded around her, Diana got the strangest sense of claustrophobia like she was being smothered.
"Get away from me!" Diana snapped, stepping away and hurrying to the sink.
"Man you got bitchy as the years went on!" Caine snapped back, turning and throwing himself back down, turning back to his game.
Maybe it was mean or out of order. She was clearly shocked and a little scared but she was also being unfair if you asked Caine. He had just come back from the dead. He had died. He had sacrificed himself to save everyone else, including her, and all she was doing was shouting at him and moving like he had some kind of contageous disease. It was insulting and incredibly hurtful.
Diana let out a growl as she thrust her hand under the tap and began to wash away the worst of the blood. She almost shoved Anna to the floor when she pushed her out of the way in her anger. Sam and Astrid hovered by the side for a moment, sharing a nervous glance before they slowly separated. They both knew what to do. Sam settled down facing Caine and Astrid made her way over to Diana while Anna moved to cautiously lean against the wall out of swinging range. Neither Sam nor Astrid knew how to handle this on top of the confusion of Caine's reappearance but they were going to do their best.
Astrid stared at the hand in the water for a full minute as she tried to think of something to say and in the end she just sighed. "You need stitches."
"It's fine!" Diana snapped.
"I'm serious, Diana." Astrid frowned. "Come on. We'll take you down to the hospital, give you some time to breathe."
Diana hesitated and glanced out towards Caine where he was ignoring Sam's attempt to talk and getting more violent in the Call Of Duty game which included shooting his own men. Then she looked over at Astrid again who was frowning with concern. Finally she nodded her head and went to grab her bag from beside of the door, careful to avoid dropping blood all over it.
"We're just going to get her hand stitched up." Astrid explained to the two boys. "Be back soon. Why don't you two talk some more while we're gone."
"I'll come." Anna offered. The last thing she wanted was to be alone with Caine and Sam.
"Okay, come on."
The three girls wrapped Diana's hand in a blue and white kitchen towel being careful not to hurt her anymore to keep her from bleeding the whole way there. They only had three but they could easily wash it out afterwards. As soon as her hand was wrapped up she pulled free from them and strode ahead on her own. She was not going to show any weakness by asking for help or even accepting their help when they offered. Astrid momentarily glanced from Diana to Caine. She was starting to act a lot like her old self with Caine here. This did nothing for Astrid's worry apart from maybe make it worse.
As soon as they were gone and the door was shut firmly behind them, Sam moved closer to sit on the same sofa as Caine, who still ignored him completely. In honesty he didn't know where to start so he just started with moving closer to him.
He didn't look any different. Actually he did and that was the weird part. Caine looked really healthy like shortly after they had actually entered the FAYZ. He was handsome, seriously healthy and well fed (Sam just couldn't get over how healthy), tanned with no bags under his eyes from sleepless nights and no wide eyed look from the horror of his past. In fact he really did look like he was fresh from Coates Academy on that day when they had met for the first time. Even his hair, long and perfectly clean. There was no grease or even any dust or dirt from where he had been lying in the park on the ground. The only sign that there was anything wrong was that his clothes were all much too big on him and he had a nervous sort of twitch in his eye whenever he shot or killed something in the game. But still he was so healthy! Even more than Sam who had been alive for the passed two years.
"You're not that shocked." Caine said suddenly.
"What?" Sam blinked.
"Diana won't talk to me, when she does she shouts and Astrid keeps talking in her big words and all scientific crap, and Anna just stares at me like I'm a mutant zombie monster freak." Caine grinned at the Z word before he turned serious again. Still he did not look away from the screen in front of him or slow down pushing the buttons on the game controller in his hands. "You don't really seem at all hurt or shocked or anything. You just seem completely normal."
Sam nodded his head and smiled. "Astrid, Diana and especially Anna all got used to life being normal again. None of them wanted to accept anything new was going to happen. They just wanted to be them again. I wish I could be me again but deep down, and not even that deep down, I knew this was coming. I knew that was not the end. I guess something I learned, apart from the fact that this was not the end, was that the FAYZ is now a part of me whether I want to play pretend or accept reality. I gave up on reality a very long time ago, not long after it started in fact."
"So you guessed it wasn't the end?" Caine snorted.
"No, actually. Now that I think about it, it was more like I was just prepared for it." Sam said. He waited a moment before asking a question. He was talking now and Sam wanted to take advantage of that. "What is the last thing you remember?"
"Dying."
"Seriously? That's the very last thing?" Sam stressed.
Caine hesitated like he was thinking. Sam thought they might have a break through but then he shrugged his shoulders. "Yup. Last thing."
"I don't think you're telling me everything." Sam noted.
Caine smirked again. Sam fell silent and continued to watch him as he played the game. But as he died several times it was clear he was just as distracted as Sam.
G*O*N*E
Diana didn't like hospitals. She wished she could have stayed back and avoided the whole place altogether but at the same time she had wanted to get as far away from Caine as she possibly could. When she had first seen him she had been in shock. Next she had been so happy she had wanted to hug him and never let go until the day they died together. But then the fear and shock of him being back and it being like FAYZ again had left her so angry and cold she couldn't bring herself to do anything but shout at him for things that were not even his fault. So some time away, even just to get a needle through her skin, would be good for her. She just needed to clear her head, maybe get some fresh air or something. Anything. And it would have been better if she could have gone alone but at least both Anna and Astrid seemed too shocked to talk much.
The reason that she didn't like hospitals in the first place was normally the same reasons as everyone else. Hospitals were a place people went to die, they were a place that stored sick people with terrifying and painful diseases. It was a place that had a lot of bad memories and trouble for all different people. But she disliked the hospital for other reasons as well. The main reason for her was because of after the FAYZ they had been forced to stay in a hospital for weeks on end before they were finally released into their families care. They had been healed, they had been fed and they had been looked after but that didn't make it any less of a prison because they were locked up and they were not allowed to leave freely. Ever since then they had serious bad memories and she didn't like them but she preferred them to spending any more time with either Caine or Sam. It was just so much to think about at one time.
"Okay, I know the hospital isn't far from here but are we seriously going to walk?" Anna said suddenly as they stepped into the evening air.
"No. I have an idea." Astrid said.
She took the two of them down the streets and knocked on a large red wooden door. It was only a few houses down and it looked almost warm even if they could only see it from the outside. After Astrid knocked it didn't take too long for a plump looking women to answer the knocks. Anna and Diana had no idea who she was, but Astrid did. The two greeted with an extremely friendly hug before Astrid pulled away with a grin on her face.
"Good to see you, honey, but Tony isn't here I'm afraid." The woman said. Her voice was almost comically deep and Diana and Anna shared twin looks of surprise.
"Oh, I know." Astrid smiled. "You see, the problem is that my friend needs to get to the hospital." She waved to Diana. "She's badly cut her hand."
"Oh my!" The woman gasped. "Let me just grab my coat. Here, go wait in the car."
Astrid accepted the keys from the woman and pushed the other two down back to the road where a blue SUV was waiting for them. Astrid immediately climbed into the front seat and Diana and Anna climbed into the back as the woman hurried back into the house. As soon as she was gone Anna and Diana turned confused looks Astrid way until she noticed them staring.
"What?" Astrid blinked.
"At any point now are you going to tell us who this woman is?" Diana asked. She cradled her hand to her chest but was able to ignore the pain mostly.
"It's Cookie's mum." Astrid shrugged. They both had blank looks shot her way. "You two know! Cookie! The bully Caine disfigured with the cross that Lana healed later on. Her names Mrs Haddle."
"Oh... Since when have you been in contact with Cookie and his mum?" Diana snorted.
"For ages now!" Astrid snorted right back. "Ever since I called them about the book. You know I probably could have mentioned this on more than one occasion but you probably were not listening like normal when we eat."
"Oh..." Diana mumbled and leaned back in her chair just as Mrs Haddle came out of the house and almost rolled towards them, barreling into the drivers side.
"Hold on, sweetheart!" Mrs Haddle said before taking the keys back and starting the car.
The ride was clean and quick. Mrs Haddle knew exactly how to drive fast and safe, sliding in between of the other cars without actually breaking any road laws. Soon they were pulling up outside the small hospital down at the end of the street. It was rarely busy but today there was a news crew outside as well as a large ambulance with it's sirens going off loudly enough to make the girls all wince. They climbed from the vehicle, Mrs Haddle insisting on waiting for them so she could drive them home, and hurried into the hospital. As they moved closer they caught attention of quite a few people and Diana and Astrid were worried they would be recognised but if they were then there was easily something more interesting to be looked at, as they all turned away back to the ambulance.
Diana had to put up with Anna and Astrid holding her arms almost protectively and guiding her up the stairs and through the automatic front double doors. With only a quick glance around Astrid headed straight to the front desk where a woman was shuffling through paper work and chewing on the end of her pen.
"Excuse me!" Astrid said. "My friend needs help, please she's hurt."
"What's the problem?" The woman asked, only barely looking up.
"She's cut herself, she's bleeding badly." Astrid explained and forcibly held out her hand to show the wound.
The woman stared at the blood stained tea towel and the long cut on her hand for a full minute before she called a doctor over. He was lounging around with a nurse when he heard his name and hurried to take Diana from their hands. She was led through a large set of doors into a corridor and further down into another room. As she was taken away the nurse asked them to fill out and incident report, handing over a clipboard and pen.
The two girls managed to find two soft chairs either side of each other by the door and Astrid filled out the form. It was pretty standard though there were quite a few questions that she didn't know the answers to, like if she was allergic to something or anything in her history that should be noted down but she managed to write down what had happened, as in cutting herself on the glass. Anything else and then Diana could fill out the rest when she came back out.
"How long are we going to be here?" Anna asked, glancing out the window where the new crew were still hovering.
"Ready to go home?" Astrid said with a small smile and shrugged her shoulders. "I dunno, hopefully not too long but long enough for Sam and..." She glanced around nervously in case anyone happened to be listening before she leaned over and whispered. "...You-Know-Who to have a nice long talk."
Anna sighed and leaned back, glancing out the window again. "Do you know what all the fuss is about outside?"
As if to answer her question the door opened. A set of reporters and cameras flocked inside in a single rush, shouting and flashing lights, before they were being shoved out once more by some scary looking men in dark uniforms. They were still struggling to control the crowd when in between them all a man strapped down on a hospital bed was pushed inside. When Astrid saw him she gasped and stared.
He was burnt, badly. His right leg was pitch black and the rest of him was a mixture of torn and shredded clothing, crispy hair burnt to the scalp and red boiling flesh that still looked wet with his own blood covering his torso and extra limbs. As he was pushed inside, the man was screaming louder than anyone else in the room and outmatched all the shouting reporters.
"Lizard! That lizard killed by babies!" The man shrieked, his voice surprisingly strong considering how red and toasted his throat was. "It shot fire everywhere! It shot fire and killed my little girls! It killed my babies! You have to go back and catch it before it's too late! It's dangerous! A monster! A little black fire monster!"
"Oh my god..." Anna moaned and covered her mouth like she might throw up.
"Help! Please! It was a fire! That monster is still out there! You have to do something!"
He looked right at Astrid. It was hard to tell at first because one eye looked swollen and melted shut but his other eye was crazy wide and locked directly on her. She found it impossible to look away and her mouth was too dry to respond or make any sounds at all. He screamed and reached up as best as he could while they were struggling to hold him down.
"It's a monster! A monster! You have to do something! You have to do something!" His last words rung out as he was pushed through open doors and vanished.
The last of the reporters were pushed from the building doors and Astrid realised she had dropped the pen and form on the floor at her feet. Now her hands were shaking too much to pick them up and she struggled to stay calm to just breathe normally. As Anna hurried to pick the board and pen back up again Astrid forced each breath to come out calm and ease back in again. Both of them had been shaken. But only Astrid was thinking of what he had said. He claimed a fire breathing lizard set a fire and killed his daughters? At any other time Astrid would have laughed and said that was ridiculous. By any child of the FAYZ knew better than to laugh and say anything was ridiculous anymore.
But... What did that mean then?
12) Is the burn victim serious or crazy?
13) If you could change something what would you change?
