We were just letters and numbers to them. They called them Object Classification Identifiers. A for Anomaly, P for Prototype, R for Retrace, and S for Standard. Some of us even had code names.
It was now morning, the day after I rescued Leah. She was still unconscious. It was making my anxiety go through the roof but I managed to keep myself together. Okay, mostly together. I can keep a stoic facade but internally I was feeling nauseous, my breath felt short, and it felt like my heart was beating through my chest. I was afraid my other would stir but she was quiet. And I swear it felt like she was hiding in the dark, smiling at my discomfort. That might have just been my brain being dramatic. At least Leah looked peaceful. I knew I didn’t have to take her to a hospital because that was not in Donna’s instructions. I really hoped she did not fail to foresee me needing to take Leah to a hospital. Other than that everything was fine.139Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzRzDY1Y5YE
Our current hiding place provided some level of anonymity and temporary safety. Though that is about all it provided. There were not a lot of options when trying to stay off the grid so we were laying low at a cheap motel. This wasn’t exactly a four star kind of establishment. It was probably a one star at best, but at least it was clean. Anyway, it’s easier to stay anonymous at a place that accepts cash and I had to stretch out my money as much as I could. We had cash reserves, but we didn’t often carry a lot of money on us. Stuff like that makes you look suspicious.
And it wasn’t at all suspicious-looking for me to sneak an unconscious body into our second floor room. That was an image I hoped to never repeat. Fortunately no one was around and I was able to skip the stairs by jumping to the balcony and quickly getting Leah inside. Thankfully that was all the drama we had the night before. Leah was sleeping soundly on the twin bed furthest from the door. I spent the night sitting on my bed, facing the door. I learned a while ago that I can go without sleep for very extended periods of time without any mental or physical detriment. I did 40 hours once and didn’t even feel tired. It can come in handy in our type of lifestyle. Donna had assured me the night would be quiet and that I could sleep, but I was too wound up. I felt Leah was safer this way.
Just after sunrise, I decided to do my morning prayer. I was doing it late but I wanted more daylight and activity outside before I let my overwatch relax. I would have skipped it altogether but I’d missed too many prayer times as it was. To be completely honest, it was more like I had fallen out of practice. I’d fallen away from other things, too. First, it was just easier to be inconspicuous and not have my hair covered. That was what I told myself and it may have been true to some extent. Then it was easy to put off prayers because we “were busy.” My spiritual vacation ended a couple of weeks before I rescued Leah. I saw a family walking together and there was nothing really special about them except the mother and father reminded me of my parents. Maybe it was the glasses on the father and how he interacted with his wife. The smiles and joy felt too familiar. The mother and daughter were both wearing hijabs too. I felt something in me twist in pain like a void opened up inside me and the rest was pulled in to fill it. I suddenly realized that the expression of my faith was the only thing left I had connecting me to my parents. I couldn’t remember the last time I had thought of my mother and father. I was so intent on running away from pain that I had run from them as well. So I decided that I would no longer hide any part of me.
Leah slowly began to wake as morning traffic picked up on the highway outside. Once she realized she wasn’t at home she scrambled up on the bed and braced herself against a wall. She was understandably still scared and confused. And that was before she noticed someone else in the room. I was kneeling on my prayer rug, speaking in a language Leah has never heard before. Fortunately, I was about to finish. I ended my prayer, rolled up the rug, and placed it on top of my bed. I had taken off my hijab because I wanted to look less foreign to her. Yeah, I know what I just said earlier and yes, I had it on when I rescued her. But we were indoors and it was just us girls.
“It’s about time you woke up. I wasn’t sure how long you would be out,” I said to her.
“Where am I?” Leah asked timidly.
I picked up the TV remote from the dresser and tossed it on Leah’s bed.
“Motel. Don’t worry, you're safe. You can watch some TV if you like,” I said.
I may have come off a little cold because I was trying to cover up my anxiety. I had never tried recruiting anyone before and Donna hadn’t brought anyone into our little two-woman circle till now. I wanted to appear stoic. But I also didn’t want to intimidate the poor girl as I was still clearly doing. Leah looked at the door, wanting to run. So I tried a little levity. In a truly less than stellar moment...
“You can leave if you want. But I’m pretty sure you don’t have anywhere to go. Especially when your family and probably everyone in your community thinks you’re a witch,” I said smiling.
That was meant to be funny. At least by the tone in my voice, you could tell I attempted humor. Right? Who am I kidding? That was bad. I cringed on the inside as soon as I said it. I’m cringing right now just remembering it. The result was that Leah began to tear up. Then her fear and sadness mixed with frustration.
“But I’m not…” she began.
She wiped the tears with her hands.
“I’m not a witch. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I... I…” she trailed off.
Leah lost her words in sobbing. She moved off the wall and sat at the edge of the bed.
“Easy. You’ll be alright,” I said in as calming and soothing a voice that I could muster while feeling like an awkward idiot.
My next move was more effective. I calmly walked over to the girl, knelt in front of her, and placed a comforting hand on Leah’s shoulder. Leah immediately hugged me. Actually she latched onto me fairly hard. It caught me off guard but I just went with it. Leah really needed a hug and I was the only option. It helped that I had so far demonstrated that I was not trying to kill her. I gently returned the hug and I kept talking.
“I know you are not a witch. You are special, like me. Do you remember the horse?” I asked.
Leah began to recall her rescue and sniffled.
“You…” sob “You’re stronger than a horse?” Leah asked.
She momentarily forgot to be sad when she remembered the impossible sight.
“Much. I’m actually stronger than everyone and everything. As far as I know,” I told her.
Leah released her embrace so I did as well.
“I was given an amazing gift.” I said, trying hard to sound like I knew what I was doing. “It appeared when I was a little older than you. And there are others out there like us with their own gifts.”
I got up and sat across from her on my bed.
“In case you don’t remember me telling you, I’m Sarah. What’s your name?” I asked.
“My name is Leah,” her voice was still shaky.
“It’s very nice to meet you Leah. Tell me about your gift,” I said.
“It’s a curse!” she yelled.
There was grit and anger in her voice when she said that. There was also a flicker of something dark in her eyes as well. It vanished as instantly as it appeared. I wrote it off as something caused by the fear and intensity she had been experiencing. I sighed and tried to look as sympathetic as I felt.
“The things we were given, even if they feel like burdens, are only good or bad because we make them so,” I told her.
I held out my hands with my palms facing up.
“My hands are neither good nor bad. I can choose to do good or bad with them. I call my power a gift because it allows me to help people. So, tell me about…”
I wanted to say “your gift” but decided to frame it in a more neutral way.
“Tell me about what happened to you,” I said.
I managed to speak with a calm confidence beyond my age that eased Leah’s fear. A little. She began to explain her version of what happened to her.
“It started a few months ago,” she said, looking like she wasn’t sure it was real. “I tripped and fell. My hand landed on the end of a shovel. And then the metal part… it disappeared into my hand. I didn’t tell anybody about it.”
I was curious if her weight and mass increased when she absorbed metal. The nerd in me really wanted to understand some of the mechanics of her power but it didn’t feel like the right time to let that academic side of me take the lead. Meanwhile, Leah kept looking down, not wanting to make eye contact. She was rubbing the palm of her hand like she was trying to erase the memory of the shovel.
“The man chasing you, was he your father?” I asked.
“Yes.” she said.
Her voice was starting to break again.
“When did he find out about your g...” I caught myself again. “About what you can do.”
She managed to compose herself a little.
“We were at supper and then I saw father staring at me,” said Leah.
Her gaze never left the floor and her hands were trembling. She began to rub her hands together hard so I reached out to hold them and reassure her.
“You’re safe,” I said.
Leah nodded her head and continued.
“My spoon was attached to my hand. It was like it was a part of my hand. I didn’t see it or feel it happening. When I saw it I got scared and got out of my chair and tried to shake it off but it wouldn’t come off. My father tried to pull it off but it still wouldn’t come off. It hurt like he was pulling my skin off.”
Tears began to fall from her eyes again. Her voice cracked.
“Then it went into my hand,” she said, her voice pitched up with emotion.
“What happened then?” I asked.
“My brother said he was in the barn and saw what happened. That I fell and my hand touched a shovel. The metal part disappeared into my hand and I hid the handle and ran inside the house,” she said.
Leah was sobbing while she spoke. She had to pause and take some breaths. She pulled one of her hands away to move some of her hair out of her face. She pulled it behind her left ear and then returned her hand to mine. I noticed a silver highlight in the hair by her ear. I hadn’t noticed it before. I wondered if it was from absorbing the metal, something natural, or the obvious that she had been very stressed lately. Leah was still looking down so I took the chance to look at the hair more closely. There were a few of them, close together. They were not gray. Gray and white hairs appear that way due to the loss of pigment. This wasn’t that. This wasn’t even hair being colored. The hairs were silver. As in they appeared to be metallic. More amazing is that they moved like normal hair. I was fascinated but once again I forced my inquisitiveness aside because Leah was not done speaking.
“Father said I was a witch and locked me in my room. I could hear him yelling and mother crying downstairs. I climbed out of my window and just started running. I slept in a barn and then when the sun came up I started running again. I ran through fields and hid in other barns. I just kept running,” she said.
“Then your father caught up to you,” I said.
“Yes,” Leah replied.
Leah suddenly got panicked and looked up at me.
“Does he know where I am?!” she frantically asked.
I gripped her hands tighter.
“No. I think I scared him off,” I told her.
I leaned in a little more with that last comment and smiled. Again I had tried to inject a little levity with my tone. Leah was still too lost in her emotions to notice.
“What is going to happen to me now?” asked Leah.
I was not too sure what happened now. Donna hadn’t told me anything other than to wait for her. So I told Leah what I did know for sure, and hoped it would help.
“Well, right now, we’re waiting on a good friend of mine. She found me when I was a girl and helped me. It was not too long after my gift first appeared,” I said.
Part of me wanted to tell the whole story but I decided that the simple version was best for now. I felt that telling her that she was in the same room as a monster would have been counterproductive.
“She helped me to get control of my abilities.” I told Leah.
Technically she helped me with my emotional state too, but again this seemed less complicated.
“Her name is Donna. She is looking for another special girl in New York and asked me to come here to find you,” I said.
“Do I have to meet her?” Leah asked.
I answered honestly.
“No. That is up to you. I can take you home or anywhere else if you want. It is your decision. But I would like you to at least meet Donna. Please give her a chance to help you. If you still decide you don’t want to go with us then we’ll take you wherever you want to go. We will respect whatever you decide,” I said.
I was hoping she would come with us. Donna didn’t cover what would happen if Leah didn’t want to go with us and I was afraid that there wasn’t anywhere safe we could take her.
“I want to go home. But…” he voice trailed off again.
More tears flowed and Leah’s voice cracked a little.
“Are these gifts from the devil?” she asked.
I sighed. I’d struggled with that question too. I wondered if my powers were from something evil, especially when I thought about the months in my murderous feral state.
“I don’t know where they come from. But how we choose to use them will reveal if we are following God’s will,” I told her.
I hoped that was the case. Many times I’d prayed asking for the reason this happened to me. Prayed to be forgiven for all the killing. I was still waiting for an answer. Leah stayed silent for a moment, trying to think of where she could go, but there was nowhere else to go.
“I’ll meet your friend,” she said.
That made me relax a little. I also realized I was holding my breath for her answer.
“Good. She should be here soon,” I said. “I left some clean clothes for you in the bathroom so you can clean up and change if you want. They’re not what you normally wear, sorry. But after Donna gets here we can get your clothes cleaned and you can put them back on if you want,” I said.
“Okay,” said Leah.
I think we both needed a break. I decided to let her get cleaned up and maybe relax a little before I started asking her how much she knew about her power. Leah got up to walk to the bathroom then paused and turned back around.
“How did your friend know where to find me?” Leah asked.
It was a good question.
“Donna has an ability as well,” was the real simple answer.
I really hoped Leah wouldn’t ask, but...
“What kind of ability?” she asked.
I wondered how much I would have to simplify the answer. Not because Leah wasn’t smart enough to understand, but because I felt like I could barely explain what Donna did without it sounding like BS.
“It’s a bit difficult to explain. But in simple terms, she can sense things before they happen,” I said.
The Christian Bible, in its many forms and versions, takes a pretty clear stance on those who practice fortune telling and divination. You’ll find the same view in the Qur'an, incidentally. I mention this because explaining Donna’s ability in a way that does not sound witchy could be difficult depending on the audience. Case in point, Leah’s eyes widened.
“No, she isn’t a witch. You really have to let her explain. Please, trust me,” I begged.
“But it sounds like something a witch does,” seemed to be her thought process by the look in her eyes.
What Leah did say, with a little skepticism breaking through, was “Okay.”
It was the last thing Leah said to me that day.
There was a knock at the door. It was too early for housekeeping so I looked at Leah and put my finger to my lips. She caught on, nodded, and hid behind her bed. Slowly and silently I moved to the door to look through the peephole. And a shotgun blast tore through the door and into my face. It didn’t hurt, but it took me by surprise and made me stumble a few steps back and close my eyes. The moment of surprise was long enough for a rush of wind to come in as the door flew open. Long enough to hear Leah’s scream abruptly fall silent.
When I opened my eyes, Leah was gone and a three man team had rushed in to greet me, with guns blazing. I didn’t react except to step back further from the attack to give myself some room to maneuver. Then I just stood there and waited for their magazines to go empty. I appeared both bored and annoyed. They were dressed in the latest black tactical gear and were stunned to see me still standing. I give them this much credit, all their shots were either center mass, completely trashing my shirt, or head shots. Besides the overkill of shooting me till their weapons were empty, they appeared to be pros. I was pulling a piece of cheap wood out of my hair as I calmly sat on the bed and began to speak.
“You should…” I began to say.
I was interrupted by another shotgun blast to my face. It had the effect of blowing my hair back. I also had to pick a metal pellet out of the corner of my eye. The only thing I had left to do was to try and save their lives.
“As I was trying to say, you guys should really start running,” I told them.
One nervously asked “Why?”
I sighed.
“Because you’re ex…” was all I got out.
The building exploded. Well, something exploded next to the building. Same effect though. I was going to say, “Expendable.”
I tried to warn them.139Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡcM8G9tz1Ip
