Hypersubjects

by Ainsley Komper

  This was a different Lark than the one Braith was used to and he liked him, but facts are facts and a weak Braith grabbed from his shoulder. In the corridor, he could see the kid who brought him there in the first place. He did not want to go through the same process again and it was demoralising to be back at square one. Taran was backed by three agents behind him, although he did not need them because, with a single electrical blast, they would be able to take both Lark and Braith down. The sparks were already lighting up around him while a Dr and the girl looked at him, leaning on the wall to protect themselves. Lark tried to convince him otherwise, but the young Taser man seemed to have made up his mind. After saying how sorry he was, a big electrical discharge took place behind him. The girl on the wall smiled and ran to hug him while the Dr was in shock. She yelled at Taran in the middle of his thoughts and gave him a kiss.

  “I am so proud of you!”

  Dr Velia tried to split them up but Ciana pushed her back and they both walked to the guys.

  “So? What now?” Taran asked Braith.

  “We need to get to Mercy.” Braith said after a long intake of the compound.

  “I know where she is, follow me.” Ciana said, leading the way.

  “You just don't walk away from us!!!” Dr Velia yelled at them.

  With a recovered strength, Braith grabbed her and locked her in his room by twisting the lock handle.

  “You cannot outrun us. We will find you wherever you go. You are nothing without us, you are nothing without me!” Dr Velia kept shouting.

  “There are at least a dozen guys before we get to her.”

  “You alright with that?” Lark asked Braith who exhaled cockily.

  The four guys followed Ciana to Mercy’s room just to encounter a huge security force. Lark looked at Taran and said, “Take care of her.”

  “After you.” Braith said to Lark.

  They both jumped into the crowd, Braith roaring like an angry lion while Lark being more methodical. Braith felt alive after the prolonged sleep he had been forced into. With every punch, every cut, every kick, there were jolts of energy feeding his frenzy of violence. Slowly, before Lark and Braith finished their business, Ciana and Taran managed to reach the door but it was closed. Taran asked her if there was anyone inside except for the woman they were looking for.

  “A guard and a nurse.” She said.

  “I can try to load this up again.”

  “Not that fast, kid.” That was Braith intervening before breaking the door with a kick.

  “I think we could handle this too.” Said Lark while entering after Braith.

  Once inside, the guard was holding a gun, pointing at Braith who seemed to be the toughest one of the four.

  Ciana approached the nurse: “Is she ok?”

  “I am not authorised to say anything.”

  Lark looked at the nurse and asked her again: “Is she ok?”

  He saw some swirls around the nurse, flashes of colours he was able to read.

  “She has been heavily sedated but it is not completely working. I think she is ok, unstable but ok.” Lark said

  Taran wondered out loud how Lark could know, to which Lark told him he just felt it. Braith noticed a hint of jealousy from Taran when Ciana smiled at Lark.

  “Out of here! All of you!” Said the guard after pulling himself together. The show the enhanced subjects have put on for him by disabling all of his colleagues was no small feat and he knew he did not stand a chance, but he had to try. Braith looked at him and in a fraction of a second retrieved the weapon and broke it into two pieces. Unarmed, the guard ran away, so all the eyes were on the nurse who did the same.

  “You guys better have a great move than just kicking, Tasing and tracking.” Warned Dr Velia who had just arrived with two guards behind her.

  “Do you have to be so annoying every time you open your mouth?” Lark replied.

  “As of this moment, the order is to shoot to kill. You guys won't be able to make it out of the building unless you surrender unconditionally. You are all property of this institution and you all have signed contracts that stipulate that.”

  “You don't have the authority.” Braith replied.

  “Wait until we leak this to the press.” Taran also intervened.

  “Miss Rogers is far more valuable than all of you put together. I am sorry to disappoint you, my fantastic four.”

  “More guards are coming. The military is securing the building now. There are roadblocks in every direction. Helicopters are coming as well.” Ciana said.

  “You are amazing, Ciana, well done. Surrender is the best choice. Don’t you think?”

  “Can she feel all of that?” Braith asked Lark.

  “She can and beyond, that is how we found you so quickly.”

  “I am sorry, guys.” Ciana said.

  Braith and Lark looked at each other but were distracted by the sparks coming from Taran’s hand.

  “What are you doing?” Ciana asked.

  “What?” Taran answered.

  Then he looked down at his hand which was emitting small sparks and blinking.

  “I think that could be faster than bullets.” Braith said.

  “Stop it! We don’t want to shoot but we’ll do it if we have to.”

  “You don’t understand.” Said Taran, lifting his hand and looking at it in awe. “It is not me.”

  The guards behind Dr Velia ran away.

  “Hey! Come back!”

  They ignored her request as they knew what Taran was capable of.

  “I don’t know what’s happening.” Taran panicked. “I have no control.”

  He lifted his hand, gathering electricity around him.

  “You better move away!” Dr Velia insisted.

  His three colleagues slowly receded back to the door.

  “I’m scared!” He said to Ciana.

  The glow grew and, in a second, he turned back and placed it over Mercy’s chest, giving her a jolt of electricity. Dr Velia screamed and then Braith, Lark and Ciana fell down to the floor.

  MERCY

  She grew up in a family with many cousins and was constantly in the middle of their quarrels. Since she could remember, she had always been like that and in order to try to solve arguments between people, she used to do what her mother told her to: “You have to put yourself in other people’s shoes. In that way, you will understand their reasoning. Every mind is a different world with thousands of different rules.”

  You could say that knowing two languages paired with that mindset, a career in diplomacy would have been the most obvious path for her, but Mercy lacked that certain spark of determination and stubbornness required to mediate. Her flare to feel the pain of others made her weak and vulnerable. Many boyfriends took advantage and her friends from high school kept telling her that. Natalia, one of them who wanted to be a Doctor and was studying for it, noticed that Mercy was an Empath. Her apparent condition that later on turned out to be positive was that she was a Somatic Empath or even perhaps that she had a disorder with the mirror-neurons that would be responsible for a variety of Synesthesia called Mirror to Touch Synesthesia. Whether it was one or the other, Natalia was unsure and always recommended further tests, which Mercy was always afraid to take. As Mercy was not suffering from anything actually affecting her health, there was no reason to pursue a cure. From Natalia’s point of view, it would be a fascinating exploration of Mercy’s mind, therefore, a way to understand her constant need to please everyone else, to solve conflicts and relate to others. Still, Mercy refused while her symptoms worsened according to the fluctuation of the hormones in her body. It was painful to visit Natalia at the hospital as it was full of patients in pain, which she could almost feel, all of them, one by one. While waiting for her once, by chance, she felt the sting of a needle in her skin only by looking at a child being injected when a nurse opened the door of the paediatric pavilion. However, Natalia had been one of her best friends since she moved to the big city and, back th
en, as young adults pursuing their own careers, they still met to catch up in Central London. Mercy told her everything she was doing in the big Hollywood blockbusters and their Visual Effects she was working on and Natalia shared all the gross stuff happening at the hospital by the Thames where she was starting her practice. Mercy forced her friend to agree to never meet inside the hospital again because the whole experience was too intense for her. Years passed without an incident until the biggest of them all came along: An accident. It took place by the Blackfriars Bridge where a guy driving under the influence of alcohol shortly before midnight hit the taxi that was taking Mercy home, thus injuring the driver, Mercy and her flatmate, plus a biker who was passing by, a couple crossing the bridge and the drunk driver himself. Her experience at the emergency room was overwhelming, if not devastating. She did not have any broken bones or big traumas, just small concussions and a few scratches, but her pain was beyond intense. No drug had the power to calm her down and no doctor, including Natalia, was able to relieve her. When her dad came, she begged him to take her home, which he initially refused. By her side, he was just repeating what the doctors adamantly told him but she did not want to listen anymore.

  “They don’t understand. They cannot feel what I do.”

  “And what is that, sweetie?”

  “At the accident, I could… I don’t know how to say it but… the driver.”

  “The driver is in a coma, darling.”

  “I… all of his pain, all the blood coming out of his head, the explosion inside his spine, I could feel it, I still feel it, it is here somehow.”

  “You just need a strong painkiller.”

  “The biker broke his ribs, three of them.”

  He looked at Natalia and her colleagues.

  “Is that true?”

  They nodded.

  “And who told you that?”

  “Nobody, I can feel it on my ribs.”

  “Darling, please.”

  “Take me away, now. Take me to the sea. I won’t get better here, I know it.”

  “The doctors said…”

  “They don’t know anything about me but I know about the broken ankles of the other driver, I know that the lady who was crossing the bridge died this morning and I know way beyond that.”

  She ripped the wires attached to her and walked to the door, but they blocked her.

  “Mercy!”

  “I am just going to pretend that I am fine and then I will leave to the sea, to the North, with or without you. Even if they don’t believe me, I will run away in the middle of the night, with you or without you. I don’t care anymore. I am tired of feeling everyone’s pain while nobody can feel mine.”

  She sat down by the window.

  “There is so much angst, fear, so much aching all over that I can barely handle it.”

  “I am sorry, guys, but I am taking her with me now. I can't stand seeing her like this.” Her dad finally said.

  Once at the car, when leaving the hospital behind, she started crying. Her father was looking at her through the mirror. In the back seat, she was smiling at the same time that tears ran down her face. She thanked him profusely while he looked troubled.

  By the sea, Mercy walked on the beach, relaxed and peaceful. He was waiting for her, sitting on a rock with a basket full of beers.

  “This is it? Aren’t you going to talk about it anymore?”

  “I told you, Dad, it is difficult for me.”

  “And very scary for me. Natalia and the other doctors confirmed that everything you said was true, although there was no way you could have known about it.”

  “It doesn’t matter now.”

  “It does matter, for crying out loud! What if you get involved in another accident?”

  “What are the chances?”

  “That’s not the point!”