XXIX

She really had thought she was getting better, that not being alone in the darkness of her room would have been enough.

How wrong she had been.

Just hearing that Henry plans to take her back paralyzes her. Her fingers cling to the sheets of his bed and she lowers her gaze, distressed.

He, of course, notices. He lowers his hand and calls softly: "Eleven...?"

She thinks of a way to tell him. She doesn't want him to think she's useless—like so many before him—but… Well, she doesn't want to hide things from him, either.

So, she tells him, in her way: "I can't sleep…"

"I've given you something to help with that," he assures her, and Eleven feels like she might cry just hearing the utter patience in his voice, at this hour, after she woke him up and made him go through the whole house searching for a way to ease her fever. "That's what the pill was f…"

"No," she cuts him off, and she forces herself to look up now, praying on the inside that he will understand what she wants to say. "It's… not that."

Henry narrows his eyes. Eleven purses her lips.

"Would you let me… see?" he asks, extending his hand again.

Although the gesture is similar to his previous one, the request is different, and they both know it.

Silently, Eleven takes his hand and closes her eyes.

Images and sounds invade Henry's mind.

A nightmare, he instantly recognizes. In the memories that Eleven reveals to him, everything is shown from her point of view.

Henry soon identifies the place where he is: it is the tiny storage room where he had asked Eleven to stay.

And then, the lights flicker and the screams echo through the lab walls. Henry—Eleven—runs outside the room and takes in the devastation of the day they ran away. Eleven's memory is detailed: every bloodstain, every broken bone, every tiny detail of his crime is perfectly replicated in front of him…

Henry, of course, knows that her memories are accurate, for he has never forgotten any of his victims.

He begins to feel his body wobble, and recognizes that Eleven is the cause of the imbalance: the shock of what she's witnessing is too much for her childish mind. However, in a sudden burst of lucidity, he runs towards the doors that lead to the Rainbow Room.

Henry knows what he will see as soon as the doors open and, for once, he feels remorse: not for the lives he has taken—beyond his personal feelings for these children who have done nothing but hurt Eleven, he knows that his actions have been necessary to ensure a successful escape for both of them, without pursuers who would threaten their freedom in the future—but because he has not been able to shield Eleven, even for just a little longer, from the cruel reality.

Let's keep going, he tells himself, and throws the doors open.

And the world seems to collapse around him. He feels the exact pain in Eleven's chest, her doubts, her fears…

And what shocks him most, however, is not seeing himself there, from her point of view, in the midst of all the carnage.

No, what shocks him the most is that Eleven's mind, which has previously reproduced an impeccable copy of the events of that day, has decided to alter the final scenario, the height of her fear.

Because what he sees, with his back to him, is not himself breaking Two's bones.

No: it's Two, breaking his bones.

Henry's body falls limply to the ground. His bones are shattered; his eyes, two empty sockets. Henry, still in Eleven's place, backs off.

Two turns to him, then. To her. His smug half-smile is not at all how Henry remembers it—especially since, the way he recalls it, the boy had done little more than put up a feeble resistance and writhe in agony as he mauled him. He takes a step forward, and Henry responds with one of his own… backwards.

The fear he feels—the fear that doesn't belong to him, no, but that he does feel—is overwhelming.

"So there you are." The flippant tone is a faithful recreation of the boy's voice. "I saw you made a new friend… Did you think he was going to save you, Eleven?"

"I-I… No… Peter… Henry… Why…? He…"

"He killed all of our siblings!" Two spits, his face now contorting with fury. "He was nothing but a murderer, and you thought he was going to save you? That he was going to take you with him?

"No, all he wanted was to use you to break free… And he did, huh? But don't worry; I've fixed the problem you've created."

As if that wasn't enough, Two kicks his lifeless head. Henry lets out a visceral scream and places his hands against his head. The next thing he is aware of is the excruciating pain in his knees, which have crashed to the ground.

"Easy there, Eleven," Two assures her with a maniacal grin that Henry can barely make out through his tears and his own screams. "I'm the one who is going to save you from this terrible suffering of yours."

Two reaches out to him.

And everything goes black.