THE AWAKENING [Part One]

by Michael Timmins

  Taylor caught up with Joseph inside the room.

  They watched as the creature that had attacked them stood over a slain guard. The rest either had their guns trained on him or them. Joseph located a guard about to shoot and rushed him.

  Taylor felt a need to do something as well. He caught sight of a guard behind a post, occasionally popping his head out to fire a couple of shots. He moved to deal with him, but the guard saw him coming. The guard panicked, but managed to get his gun up and fire two shots into Taylor. The two bullets struck him in the chest and staggered him back. The pain was intense at first, but quickly diminished. Taylor shrugged it off and continued toward the guard. The guard attempted to shoot again, but was shocked when all he received was a click for his effort. He scrambled backwards, trying to get away, but there was nowhere for him to run. Taylor stalked him slowly, ready for him to make a run to get around him. As he edged closer, Taylor felt an uncomfortable warmth in his chest. It was followed by two metal clangs. Taylor looked down and saw the bullets that were in his chest had worked their way out and fallen to the floor. Taylor looked in time to watch the wounds close on his chest. He looked back up at the guard and could tell by the look of horror on his face he had also witnessed the repair.

  That was when the guard tried to make a run for it. He scrambled over one of the sofas and ran for the door. Taylor cut him off and brought down his hand in a fist upon the man’s head. His fist plowed through the man’s skull bones and ended with a ghastly wet thud as he buried his fist in the guard’s brain. Taylor quickly pulled his fist out as bits of brain matter stuck to it and cerebrospinal fluid clung in clear sticky strands, like spider webs after a rain. He disgusted himself. He had just killed someone. Yes, he had also killed that woman, but not by choice. This… this he had done of his own volition. He would never forget this man either.

  The gun fire stopped and Joseph looked up from the thigh he had been devouring. The bigger creature, the one that had attacked him and Taylor stood in the middle of the room. It tossed aside a spinal column and stared at him. Joseph stood impossibly still. He knew, in the dark place where he kept his truths, that this thing, if it chose to attack him, would kill him quickly. He wasn’t sure what to do, so he continued to just stare into the creature’s eyes. Movement off to the left caused them both to turn as Taylor took a step towards Joseph, as if to show some solidarity. However, as soon as the creature’s eyes locked with his, Taylor froze. The beast seemed to consider for a moment, then nodded towards them and ran towards the back of the bar. Joseph’s eyes met Taylor’s — they moved to follow. Behind the bar was a door that emptied into an alleyway. Once they were outside, the creature turned back towards them, examined them, and shifted. The moment he started to do that, Joseph felt the pain explode again in his body and he collapsed into a heap, crying out. His body made the necessary changes to revert back to his normal form and by the sounds of it, it was happening to Taylor, too. Joseph spared a glance towards the creature, but it wasn’t a creature any longer. Standing there, sneering down on them stood a large man. He didn’t seem to be sharing in any of the pain hitting them. Joseph wondered if he would ever be like that.

  As pain wracked Taylor’s body all he could think was ‘when would it end?’ He found himself gasping for air and even his lungs felt afire as they reduced in size to accommodate his smaller body. Through slitted eyes he managed to glimpse the man who had been the creature, and he didn’t like what he saw. There were times when he saw certain viciousness when he looked at Joseph, but only at times. This man wore that face as if it never knew another one. Taylor knew instinctively this man was not a good person, in fact, far from it. Taylor had never known evil. He led a fairly sheltered life, away from all the bad things people did to one another, a symptom of being a loner. He never dealt with evil, but he was going to have to deal with it now. This man was the only one with answers, answers on how to end this. That thought was a hope Taylor was unsure he should have, but it was a hope he was willing to risk. With this new-found hope, Taylor ignored the pain and stood, straightened himself and looked at the man. Next to him, Joseph, as if feeling outshone, also stood up quickly. The man watched them as they stood, panting from the pain, before him.

  “Oh, this is going to be fun,” The man said.

  Taylor thought, Yeah, fun, fun like being in hell.

  Chapter 3

  Kat’s arm snapped up, taking Jeffery’s swing upon her forearm. Quickly, she dropped down and threw four punches into his abdomen. He grunted and stumbled back. As quickly as she dropped, she was back up, springing back and forth on the balls of her feet. Fists held before her in a defensive stance. Jeffery righted himself and took a moment to catch his breath.

  “Good. You’re quick, Kat. The only thing is, you had me good, you should have closed and finished it,” Jeffery said as he slowly approached her. He must be thinking criticizing her would distract her so he could get close enough to strike. She played possum and let him get close, she shrugged and lowered her eyes as if in chastisement and waited for the swing to come. Jeffery didn’t disappoint her, he took one more step towards her and she saw his weight go to the ball of his right foot as he moved in for the swing, bringing his fist in from the side to cuff her on the side of her head. She could imagine the surprise he had on his face, as she also took a step forward almost at the same moment. She closed the space between them so his swing would be wide. Turning her back against him she grabbed his large arm as it swung in and rolled with it, bending her back so he was lifted up. She continued the swing to the left, sending Jeffery tumbling over her to land heavily upon the floor never letting go of his wrist. She twisted his wrist and planted a foot into his abdomen which cleared the rest of his lungs of air. Stunned from the abdomen kick, his cry from the pain in his wrist was frozen in his throat. She thought to finish it, like he said, but she didn’t wish to hurt him. Well… not to hurt him seriously. She waited for him to figure out which to do first, breathe in or breathe out, and to stop gasping. As soon as she saw his moment of being stunned was almost through, she twisted his wrist a little bit more and then dropped a foot on his abdomen again, repeating the process.

  “I can do this all day, Jeffery. Do you yield?”

  He didn’t reply and it took her a moment to remember that he wouldn’t be able to.

  “Just nod your head, if you can.”

  Jeffery nodded, turning a little blue. She stopped twisting his wrist and proceeded to rub it where she had applied the most strain, trying to stop a little of the swelling that would occur. After a moment, Jeffery regained his ability to breathe and to speak.

  “You’re good, Jeffery,” she said before he could say anything. “The only thing is, you should never assume after four years that I don’t know you well enough to know when you are trying to trick me. You should also know if I want to finish it, I could, at any moment. The only reason you were standing was because I chose to let you.” She smiled at him.

  He smiled back.

  “True enough, Kat. Forgive me for underestimating you. I don’t think you really need my training anymore, Kat. You are the best student I have ever had. In fact, you are way beyond student level. I would say you are easily my equal.”

  She raised an eyebrow at him. He raised his hands as if in submission.

  “Okay. I guess you are more than my equal. But, don’t let that get to your head. Just remember in life that fights don’t work like this. You will not be bowing to your opponent first and agreeing to attack at a designated moment. The attacks can come whenever, and however the enemy wishes.”

  She nodded at that. Of course, she knew this well enough already, but it was sound advice and she didn’t feel the need to point it out. Jeffery had been her instructor for the past four years, ever since she was sixteen. He had trained her in just about every martial art form at his disposal, from Karate to Muay Thai to Kendo. Her parents had insisted on it.

  Truth was, she liked it. She was good at it. In
the past four years, she had learned over a half a dozen fighting styles and was more than proficient in all of them. She sometimes surprised herself at how easily she could take down Jeffery. She was not short by any means, but her five foot ten height seemed small to his six foot seven. He was also much bulkier than her. He easily weighed two-hundred and ninety pounds. She was only about one-hundred and forty pounds. Her body was a nice mix of defined muscles and feminine curves. Her tawny colored hair, a family trait according to her mother, was cropped short to prevent being used against her in a fight. She had an olive tinge to her skin, a trait of her Mongolian heritage, once again, according to her mother. Her face was long, but not overly so, and her eyes tilted slightly giving her an exotic look. Her arms were slim, except in her biceps and forearms where her muscles were well defined. She had smaller breast, which didn’t bother her, since large breasts make fighting harder. Her stomach was not as well defined, but was flat as a board. She didn’t like to do too many abdomen exercises since she hated how six-packs looked on women. She much preferred her flat stomach. She had hips that flared slightly, giving her, at least, somewhat of a womanly shape and adding some definition to her backside that she was sure would otherwise been nonexistent. Her legs were long and well defined, another source of her strength. She had a very powerful kick and she liked how they looked in heels, too.

  She glanced over at Jeffery who was rubbing his wrist. He was a brutish looking man. Not attractive at all, which she was pretty sure her parents had done on purpose, to thwart her becoming attracted to him. Though after four years of being with the man all this time, she couldn’t help but feel some attraction to him. He was kind and funny and was also aggressive and incredibly strong, which she found attractive in a man. She knew he thought of her as a little sister, though she was sure if he wasn’t being paid really well by her parents, he wouldn’t hesitate to bed her. She saw the way he looked at her body when she wore her workout gear. She knew he was physically attracted to her, but wouldn’t take it further, and she respected him enough to not push it.

  She wondered if he knew why he was teaching her. Probably not, after all it was a family secret and as far as she knew, only members of the family, more precisely only the first-born females were told. He must have noticed how quickly her bruises disappeared though. He probably had asked questions and she was sure he was told firmly if he wanted to keep this cushy job he would let it drop and not worry about it. That ability to quickly heal was the only reason she half believed the story of her ability told to her by her mother. She remembered when her parents explained that little bit of craziness to her four years ago, when she turned sixteen.

  Kat left high-school and began the run to her house ten blocks away. She always ran, and she suspected that even though she was going to get her license soon, she would continue to run home. She was on the cross country and track team, and one of the best competitors the school had ever seen. She held several track records and won most of the cross country meets she participated in. She let her feet run the course home as her thoughts wandered on their own. Her parents had told her yesterday that on her birthday, they had something very important to tell her today. She was hoping they were going to buy her a car, but she sensed by their tone and the way they looked at her when they said it, it was something more serious. She wondered if her parents were separating, but discarded that idea quickly, her parents hardly ever fought. In fact, they seemed more in love every day. She counted herself lucky she had parents who were still in love and together. Too many of her friends were children of divorced parents and they usually didn’t have a very good view of themselves, as if they felt something about them created the atmosphere for their parents to not get along and separate. She knew that was silly, but she understood the brain plays tricks with you, if you let it.

  She had always been grounded in reality. Something her mother commented on often. She understood she was smarter than most sixteen-year-olds. When most girls her age were chasing boys, partying and shopping, she was studying. Not just studying what she had to in school, but beyond school work. She read about history, philosophy, and chemistry.

  She had her dad to blame for that. He got her interested in those subjects. Yet, he did it subtlety. He would start reading a book on one of those subjects and wait for her to ask questions about what he was reading, as children often do. Then he would ask her questions in return about the subject, and would try to get her ability to reason things out to come up with the answers. Sometimes she could, others she couldn’t. When she couldn’t come up with the answers, he would say something to the effect of, if she didn’t know the answer, maybe she should read this for a bit and see if she could find the answer. He knew she was curious, almost to a fault, and he would use that to get her to read all these books most forty-year-olds would balk at. Damn him. He was devious. But, she couldn’t help but fall for it every time. She still did in fact, even after she realized what he had been doing. It never failed. Though half the time she would just skip the questions and take the book out of his hands and take it to her room to read. She wondered if he even read them.

  She rounded a corner and realized she was almost home. She slowed to a walk, now dreading getting home. She worried what they would tell her. She turned up the walkway to her front door, and slowed to a stop. This moment seemed life changing.

  When she entered the house, it was strangely quiet. Her house was large, too large for the three of them really. She often wondered why her parents never had another child. With the four bedrooms upstairs, you would imagine they would wish to fill it. When she asked, they told her she would understand when she got older. She hated that answer. She would understand, if they would just tell her. She stood in the foyer, not wishing to move further into the house. She listened for sounds. There were none. She looked up the stairs and couldn’t see any movement, neither was there movement from the great room off the foyer.

  “Mom… Dad…?” She called out from the foyer. Maybe they weren’t home and she wouldn’t have to talk to them till later. She had a track meet in a couple of hours so she would have to leave, then by the time she got home it would be late and she could just head to her room and avoid this talk all together.

  “We’re in the kitchen, sweetheart.” She heard her mom reply from down the hall. She took a deep breath and headed toward the kitchen. As she entered the kitchen she saw her parents off to the left, sitting at the kitchen table. She was always amazed at how beautiful her mom still looked. Most moms she had seen of her friends who were in their late forties, like her mom, looked like it. Her mom looked like a model of twenty. She had tawny hair like Kat, she also shared the olive colored skin with her daughter, but that is where most of the similarities ended. Her mom was not nearly as tall as her daughter; Kat was almost a foot taller. Her mom had high cheekbones and full lips. She was buxom and fleshy, but not fat in the least. Not even chubby, just… full. She had a larger flair to her hips than Kat, and her figure was almost a perfect hourglass in shape. Everything she had seemed to be in the right proportion. She was the type of mom all her guy friends wanted to come over and spend time with, and all her friends’ moms made snide comments about, unable to hide their jealousy.

  She often wondered how her father had been so lucky to marry her mom. It wasn’t that her dad was ugly. He just wasn’t what you would expect to have a wife so beautiful. He was tall, which is where Kat got her height. He was skinny, almost sickly so. His face was long, horse like and his cheeks were shallow. He had thinning, black hair that barely hid his scalp. He looked a lot like a doctor, which he was, and one of the smartest men she knew. She wondered for a long time if her mom married him because he was rich. In one of her braver moments she asked her mom just that. Her mom laughed at her and then moved closer and told her that she had more money than her dad did. She was wealthy in her own right, so no, she hadn’t married him for his money. She did it because she loved him.

  “Honey, come sit down.” Her fa
ther motioned her to take a seat.

  She did, but remained quiet. Her parents looked at each other, and exchanged one of those knowing looks.

  “Kat,” her mother began, “We need to tell you something and it is going to seem very strange and unbelievable at first, but you must believe us, for we are telling you the truth.”

  Kat gave them a puzzled look. This was not the tract she thought they were going to go. What could they tell her that would seem strange and unbelievable? What was this all about?

  After a pause her mom continued. “I know you are aware your body tends to heal quicker than most. Bruises disappear in moments and cuts heal in minutes, if not quicker?” Her mom paused a moment and Kat took this as a cue to nod her admittance. Her mom nodded back. “There is a reason for this. You have a special affliction. Well, perhaps affliction is the wrong word,” she corrected after she saw her daughter’s look of fear. “I only use affliction because that is often what it has been called over the centuries. Your ability to heal is part of a genetic trait you carry, passed down from generation, to generation since early in history. It has been passed down because someday it might have to be used.”

  “What is it?” Kat interrupted. “What is this…affliction?” She spat out the word, not liking the sound of any of this.

  Her mom looked to her dad.

  “You better explain this part dear.”

  Her dad leaned forward. “I won’t bore you by explaining the simple stuff. I know you understand about stem cells and pluripotent cells, so I will skip that explanation. However, how this pertains to you is— you have an abnormally large amount of these. Most adults have only a few; of course, few being a relative term, but a few that serve only a minor purpose. In your body, they serve a more important purpose. They respond to any damage your body takes and replaces all the damaged cells in the area, making the injury nonexistent.”