Heart of Annihilation

by C. R. Asay

  “Hey,” I said, leaning causally against the stair railing.

  One faded glance of indifference, and then Thurmond was on his feet. The camp chair fell backward and folded with a clatter. He covered the distance between us in two strides and stopped. His eyes searched my face with his wonderfully normal, gray-blue eyes.

  I lowered my chin and lashes in a sickening moment of self-consciousness.

  Thurmond exhaled. His hands lifted to my cheeks. His fingers trembled against my bruised skin.

  “They said you might not . . . they weren’t sure if . . .” Thurmond’s eyes flitted away from my face before returning with lowered brows. “Dammit, Rose, do you have any idea how long I’ve been waiting to talk to you?”

  His gruff anger trailed away and he pulled me into a rough embrace.

  “Sorry,” I said, a little surprised at the warmth of his welcome. My voice muffled against his shirt.

  “Sorry doesn’t cut it.” He pressed his cheek against my hair. His breath was hot and fast on my scalp.

  I ran my hand across his back, trying to smooth away his tension. Maybe smooth away a little of my own discomfort at his lack of uber-army toughness. His breathing mellowed. My contrition went up a couple of notches. He drew away, stared hard in my face for a moment, and dropped his eyes.

  “So,” I let the word trail out. “What did you want to talk about?”

  He set the fallen camp chair back up, motioning for me to sit while he pulled another chair from under the RV. I lowered myself gingerly into the seat.

  “Just wondering how you’re doin’.” Thurmond said, slamming open the second chair on the asphalt. He ran a hand across his mouth and chin, hesitated, and then sat down as well. His elbows rested on his knees. He glanced over at me before looking away in obvious discomfort.

  “Pretty good, considering.” I rubbed my palm on my leg. “How’s your head?”

  “Fine. Thirty-six stitches.”

  “Really? That’s pretty decent.”

  “Should be a nice scar by the looks of it.”

  “Yep.”

  We sat in silence. Not uncomfortable, but heavy with the weight of a traumatic experience neither of us wanted to discuss. The sun heated my legs. I narrowed my eyes in contentment and let the world stand still.

  Thurmond watched me from the corner of his eye when he thought I wasn’t looking. The setting was so bizarre compared to what I’d expected that I finally couldn’t contain my curiosity.

  “So, where are we?” I finally asked.

  “On a movie set.”

  “Really?” I scratched my head. Interesting. “I woulda guessed another dimension.”

  Thurmond snorted. He appeared to be highly engrossed in a spot on his palm, which he kept rubbing with his thumb. “Well, not actually the set. More the base camp for the movie.”

  “What movie. Are we in Hollywood or something? Rethan Hollywood maybe?”

  “No. We’re on the base. You know, Fort Huachuca.” He cast me a fleeting look and then clasped his hands together, letting his eyes wander over the setting of bustling people and temporary buildings as though he hadn’t already been watching them all morning.

  “T.” I tapped his arm to make him look at me. “What happened?”

  “To what?”

  “After I passed out, or whatever, at the Rethan camp.”

  “Oh, yeah. I guess you were sort of out of it. I wasn’t sure when you were actually conscious.” He stared at his hands. “You were sort of . . . some of the things you said—”

  “Like what?”

  “It was nothing, really.”

  “Then why’d you mention it?”

  “Can we just drop it?” he snapped.

  I rubbed my eye, uncomfortable that whatever I’d said in my delirium was too embarrassing for Thurmond to talk about.

  “You could at least tell me how we got out of there.”

  Thurmond nodded, relief washing over his face at setting foot back on solid ground. “After you charged the battery on the Hummer—”

  “I did? I don’t remember that.”

  “Yeah. Totally saved our asses.” He expressed his gratitude by giving me the slightest glance. I offered him an encouraging smile. “So after you charged the Hummer,” he continued, “I put you in the back seat and started heading south. I knew the base was somewhere in that direction, so I followed that road along the power lines. The damn road was such a mess from the commander’s vehicles and the rain that if we’d been in anything but a Hummer you never would’ve made it. I kept second-guessing myself, you know? Stay on the messed up road, or take one of the hundreds of little sidetracks and hope for some hermit in a cabin with a cell phone or something. Finally, Boderick points to this invisible turn—”

  “Wait, Boderick? As in Deputy Boderick? Little Bodie?”

  “Yeah, that ratty little Rethan—”

  “I know who Bodie is. Where’d he come from?”

  “He freaked out after the commander showed up. Little twerp hunkered down and waited out the fight.”

  “Smart, I guess.”

  “He resurfaced just in time to give me a hand with you. So he points out this track, and ten minutes later we see all these bright lights and equipment and stuff. At the time I thought I’d driven into the twilight zone, but come to find out it was this movie crew filming a night scene.”

  “Really? You drove right onto the movie set?” I wondered if they had gotten our arrival on film. “So what happened next?”

  “Next? I get out of the Hummer, yelling my head off for help. Boderick thought you’d stopped breathing, so I’m racing around to the back seat to check on you. Then all these people start gathering around, pulling out cell phones. You can’t imagine how pissed I was when this one guy started taking pictures!”

  “Really? Did you break his phone?”

  “Yeah. That and his nose.”

  “You busted his—” A giggle bubbled out of my throat, a choked, burbling sound I couldn’t stop. Thurmond jerked his head up, his expression confused.

  “I can picture it—” The words battled with the laughter, tripping over each other and chopping my sentence into pieces. “—a bunch of pampered Hollywood folk with their makeup and fancy clothes having to deal with all our mud and blood. And you, you flattening some guy and freaking everyone else out.”

  Thurmond laughed softly. The strain and stress drained from the lines around his eyes. Dad always said, why cry when you can laugh? I buried my face in the crook of my arm and let it all out.

  “Oh, man,” I said, running the back of my thumb against my watering eyes. “I bet that was awesome!”

  “Yeah.” Thurmond chuckled. “Sure.”

  “Miss Rose, it looks like you’re feeling better.”

  I pressed my hand to my mouth as the humor faded. The voice belonged to a gorgeous woman who had appeared a few feet away.

  Highlighted blond hair, tight black skirt, and red stilettos made her legs look five feet long—everything about her screamed super model. I pulled my unlaced boots up closer to the chair, feeling very plain and clunky.

  “I’ll have to tell Dr. Tolman you’re finally up.” She put a cell phone to her ear before continuing. “You really shouldn’t be out of bed. Mr. Coy gave specific orders. He wanted to know immediately when you wakened. I’ll need to find what happened to your nurse as well. Excuse me—” She lifted the phone closer to her mouth, turning her head away. “Dr. Tolman? Yes, that’s right. Come right over. No, there was nothing I could . . . Yes, yes, of course. I’ll tell Mr. Coy you’re on your way. Thank you.”

  She snapped her phone shut and turned her heavily made-up eyes on Thurmond.

  “Devon.”

  “Hi, Angie.” He sighed her name. I frowned, surprised at the jealousy rising in my chest.

  “Is there anything I can get for you?” Angie asked. She dropped her eyes back to her phone, dialed, and held it to her ear.

  “No thanks.” Thurmond looked at me b
riefly, pressed his lips together, and turned back to Angie. “Wait, actually, could you have someone get us something to eat?”

  “Of course. Just sit tight. I’ll be right—” She pulled the phone closer to her mouth, strutting away, her heels clip-clopping across the asphalt in short, brisk steps. “Xavier. Yes, she’s awake. Right. Outside your . . . All right, see you soon.”

  Angie called out to the occasional person she passed and collected quite the following before she rounded the corner of one of the far trailers.

  “Wow.” I followed the last shining glint of red, patent leather kicking around the corner. “Friend of yours, Corporal?”

  “She’s been really helpful.” Thurmond lifted his shoulders to his ears.

  “How helpful?” I looked at the branded hand in my lap, my self-consciousness graduating to full-blown insecurity.

  “Rose?”

  “Forget it,” I muttered.

  “You look great as a Rethan, by the way.”

  “I’m not a Rethan!” The words thundered out like a defensive linebacker.

  “Sure you’re not.” A smile played at the corners of his mouth. He tried to hide it under a finger and thumb. I rolled my eyes and lounged back in my seat.

  “I’m not a Rethan. I’m—” Did I really sound that panicky?

  “Do you want to talk about it?”

  “You think it’s true. You believe everything Rannen said about me.”

  “I think maybe you should look at the facts.”

  “I don’t want to talk about it.” Agitation worked its way into my nerves. A shiver of electricity made the hairs on my arms stand on end. I hunched in my seat, willing the sudden, angry pounding in my head to not warp my good feelings toward Thurmond.

  “We’re going to have to talk about it sooner or later.” Thurmond turned away, his face serious.

  “Why? Because hanging out with a creature from another dimension totally creeps you out?”

  “It doesn’t, actually.”

  “Of course it does. You can’t even look at me!”

  “That’s not true. It’s not like that!” He stood up with a frustrated huff and locked his hands behind his head.

  “Then what’s it like? As you can imagine I’m feeling a bit insecure right now. ”

  “Dammit, Rose! Have you seen yourself?” Thurmond turned to face me. His hands dropped to fists at his side. “Do you have any idea how responsible I feel?”

  I didn’t realize my mouth was hanging open until a hot breeze dried my throat.

  “Responsible?” I coughed and moistened my mouth with my tongue. Memories crept into my head, little demons I’d been trying to shut out. “T, you saved my life . . . like, a whole bunch of times.”

  “Do you know how many times the doctor said, ‘If only you’d gotten her to us sooner’?” Thurmond gestured at me, anger tightening his eyes. “Your temperature was through the roof. Your heart was a mess because of all that damn adrenaline, and you exploded the defibrillator when they tried to use it on you. Nobody had the first idea of what kind of blood to transfuse, not to mention they finally had to induce a coma because you wouldn’t stop screaming!” He scrubbed a hand down his face. “Two days I’ve been sitting outside this trailer, waiting for some indication you were going to pull through, all the while racking my brains to figure out what the hell I was going to tell your dad!”

  I leaned back in my chair as his words steamrolled me, realizing for the first time that I’d never told him about Dad. Quoted him, sure, but never let Thurmond in on the greatest tragedy of my life.

  I pressed my hands to my ears. I didn’t want to hear any more. It was all in the past, one of the darkest moments of my life. Here on the other side of things I felt that it didn’t belong, something obscene that was best left to rot in forgetfulness.

  But Thurmond’s face held no forgetfulness. For him this hadn’t happened in a subconscious, dreamlike world. This was the constant of his life, something vivid and horrifying. Something he hadn’t had the luxury of sleeping away. It could very well have been one of the darkest moments of his life.

  He turned away, rubbing the sides of his face. I didn’t move. Movement would imply that something actually happened.

  Except this moment wasn’t about me. I’d been lost in my own fear and pain for so long. How could I deny someone else, someone I cared about, the sympathy and compassion he so rightly deserved?

  I pushed out of the chair. Veins stood out on Thurmond’s arms. I wrapped my arm around his waist and rested my cheek on his hot back.

  He didn’t move for a moment, then rotated around to face me. His arms enfolded me in a tight embrace. He nuzzled his face into my neck, his breath steady and warm. I don’t know how long we stood like that, two people reveling in the fact that we were both still alive and relatively well.

  I sighed. Thurmond drew away, but only enough to pull me over to his chair and onto his lap. I leaned against his chest. It wasn’t comfortable, but the warmth and security of his arms around my waist more than made up for it.

  “So what happened next?” I prompted. “After you drove onto the set?”

  “Next?” Thurmond said. “There was talk of calling an ambulance until this one guy walks up. You could totally tell he was the star of the show by the way people deferred to him. So he takes one look at you and starts barking orders. The next thing I know, he’s having you loaded into this orange Ferrari and driving away. They had Boderick and me follow with Angie in an Escalade.”

  “A Ferrari? On that road?”

  “Naw, the main road was thirty seconds in the other direction. With pavement.”

  “So Bodie just kinda blended with all the other people? What do people think of him? As a Rethan, I mean?” I tried to convince myself my concern was simply for his welfare.

  “Do you really think a bunch of Hollywood people even think twice about a guy with silver hair and eyes?” Thurmond asked. “Hell, half the people in this place look like aliens themselves.”

  Aliens. I didn’t like that word. It seemed inaccurate, even derogatory.

  “’Kay,” I said.

  “You don’t look that different, Rose.”

  “I wasn’t talking about me.”

  “Sure you weren’t.”

  “Finish the story, already.” I nudged him.

  “That’s pretty much it. We met up with you here on the base, where they had a makeshift hospital set up in that RV.”

  “Why here? Why not a real hospital?”

  “You really want me to answer that?” Thurmond tugged my hair.

  “Oh, you mean because of the whole Rethan thing?”

  “Mr. Coy took charge. He called in his personal physician and paid a load of other medical personnel off the books,” Thurmond explained. “He said he didn’t want you under the microscopes of any unknown doctors. Not to mention how we are now officially AWOL.”

  “Oh.” I watched my previously unblemished military record take a belly flop into the swamp. All I needed now was a stint in the pit of some military prison to top everything off. “Who’s Mr. Coy anyway?”

  Thurmond looked past me with a nod.

  I turned to see a man with jet-black hair striding up. He wore some very classy Ray-Bans, a white, button-down shirt open wide at the chest; a white pair of pants with an accented silver and black belt, and shiny black shoes. He looked to be in his late forties, his skin tanned and his teeth unnaturally white.

  Thurmond helped me off his lap and stood with me.

  “Xavier Coy.” The man extended a hand with perfectly manicured nails. His voice was strong and cocky with a hint of an unidentifiable accent.

  I narrowed my eyes, hesitated, and then jammed my hand into my pocket. I didn’t know if it was the cold, subtle tension in his jaw, the microscopic curl to his mouth as he looked at me, or from the back of my mind, but there was something about this man I heartily loathed.

  “Mr. Coy.” I nodded.

  He arched an eyebrow as
he waited for me to say something else. When I didn’t, he dropped his hand.

  “It’s Xavier Coy,” he said.

  “You want me to call you Xavier?”

  “I’m just wondering if you know who I am?”

  “Sure. The guy who loaned me his trailer and his personal physician,” I said. “Thanks, by the way.”

  Even that much gratitude stuck in my throat. Xavier shifted his weight to one leg, and I was struck with an odd sense of uncertainty coming from someone who otherwise seemed to have everything together. Then it came to me. The hair, the voice, and that annoying aura of the untouchable celebrity—of course, Xavier Coy!

  “I remember who you are now,” I said, recalling the lame date I’d gone on a lifetime ago. Xavier took a step back. His smile faded. “I saw you in that one movie once. Um, The Omniscient Observer. Definitely two stars in my book but my date liked it.”

  His shoulders dropped, and he exhaled. The toothy smile returned. Clearly he’d expected me to say something else.

  Traitor. The harsh whisper made me look up and around. I pushed Thurmond’s hand off my waist.

  “Rose?”

  I jerked back around to face Xavier. Hatred flared in my chest. My cheeks grew hot. His smiling mouth was moving, saying something to me while his gaze was directed somewhere over my left shoulder. A perfect moment. A perfect target. Who could stop me? Why would they think they needed to? Electricity shivered into my fingertips.

  “Rose.” Thurmond repeated my name right in my ear. He might as well have stabbed me in the side. A crackle of electricity leapt from my hand into my thigh with a sizzle. I gave a tiny squawk. The anger and hatred, so poignant moments ago, vanished in a sickening wave.