Kizzy followed her mother down the sidewalk and into the front door of a large apartment building. The floors were made of big, smooth white tiles. Beat up leather furniture sat in the lobby. Her mother led them to a staircase. More stairs. It was the last thing Kizzy needed. She turned off her brain and climbed. One story, two stories, three stories. She lost count. At some point her body went on strike. She couldn’t go on any further. She stopped and sat down.
“We’re almost there, come on,” said her mother.
Where are we even going? Kizzy thought. Her body and head felt so heavy. It was as if there was no blood left in her veins.
Her mother turned and stared. She must have noticed the look on Kizzy’s face because she rushed back down the stairs and helped Kizzy to her feet, and put her arm up around her shoulders.
Finally when they came to the correct floor, they left the staircase. They walked through the dark unlit hall and to a door on the left. Her mother took her keys from her pocket and opened to a large, bright apartment. The far wall was one big widow. The wall to the left was completely lined with old paintings. To the right was a spacious kitchen with a small black balcony that served as a fire escape.
“Do you remember this place?” her mother asked as they entered.
It seemed vaguely familiar, as if she had been there in some long forgotten dream.
Her mother took her to the living room and laid her on the couch. She cupped Kizzy’s face in her hands. “My baby, I had no idea you were so beaten up.” She stroked Kizzy’s forehead and covered her body with a blanket. “Are you in pain?”
Kizzy nodded weakly.
Her mother noticed Kizzy’s right hand wrapped in the towel. She slowly tried to grab it, but Kizzy pulled it away.
“It’s ok Kizzy.”
Slowly she gave her mother her hand.
She carefully unwrapped it, then froze. Her mother stared at the battlefield that her daughter’s hand had become. The look on her face was grave concern. Kizzy’s fingers were large and swollen and completely covered in red and white blisters. Her mother looked up with eyes full of tears.
“I am so sorry Kizzy,” she said. “I am so, so sorry you’ve had to go through all this.” She reached her hand out and held it to Kizzy’s cheek, the way she used to do when she was a child. Diego came over and sat by her side.
“I’m going to take care of you,” she said and went to the kitchen.
“We had medical supplies,” Diego said, “But we lost them at the hospital.”
Kizzy reached into her pocket, pulled out the bottle she had taken from the backpack and gave it to Diego. He ran it to her mother.
“This is perfect,” her mother said looking at the bottle. “I have some other supplies here in the apartment.”
“You’ve been here before?” Diego asked.
“I used to live here,” her mother said as she took a box from the cabinet. “We used to live here. Before the plague. Before Kizzy’s father left us.”
Left us? Kizzy thought. What did she mean? Kizzy had always assumed he died during the plague.
“You lived here?” Diego asked enthusiastically. “Then you know where this is.”
He took the Enoch pill bottle from his pocket and showed her the address.
“Yeah... I know where that is,” her mother said suspiciously. “Why?”
“That’s where we’re headed,” said Diego. “To find Dr. Enoch.”
“Wait, what?” her mother asked, stopping what she was doing. “That’s why you came all the way out here?”
“Yeah,” said Diego cautiously. “Should we not have?”
“You can’t go there,” her mother said.
“Why not?” Diego asked.
“Just trust me. We are going to hide out here for as long as we can.”
“But we’re not safe here. We’re not safe anywhere. We’re going to that place.”
“You’re not going and that’s final.”
“Do you have any idea what the hell we’ve been through just to get here? What pain you’re daughter’s been through?”
“I have to take care of my daughter now. And I say where she goes.”
“You have no right to keep us here.”
“I have every right.”
Diego looked to Kizzy, a fiery anger burned in his eyes. Kizzy laid still on the couch. She was powerless to do anything. Diego turned kicked a hole in the drywall. He stormed across the apartment towards the window.
“Oh kicking the wall, real mature,” her mother said.
Kizzy looked at her mother, then at Diego. She didn’t know who was right. Diego had a point. They had come too far and sacrificed too much to give up now. But her mother wasn’t wrong. Kizzy was too weak to go on. She needed to rest.
“Oh my god!” hissed Diego from the window.
“What is it?” Kizzy’s mother asked.
“She’s here,” Diego said.
Her mother walked to him.
“We have to get out of here,” Diego said.
“You’re not going anywhere. This is the only safe place there is.”
“She’ll find us,” said Diego.
“She would have to check every apartment in the whole neighborhood.”
“But she can smell me,” said Diego. “She’ll find me here.”
“If she could smell you, she’d be here already,” said her mother. “She’s lost your scent. Look at her she’s just standing still out there. If she moves from that spot let me know.”
Diego made a fist and locked his jaw.
Her mother busied herself in the kitchen mixing things from various bottles. She came to Kizzy with a jar filled with a golden liquid. It appeared to be honey. She poured the sparkling goo out over the top of Kizzy’s burnt hand. At first it stung and her arm trembled in pain, she bit her lip. Her mother covered the entire wound with the honey. Afterwards she took thin white cloth and skillfully wrapped Kizzy’s hand and taped it. She looked straight into Kizzy’s eyes, making sure she was alright. “It’s going to be ok,” she said. “You’re be safe here.”
Kizzy wanted to believe it.
Her mother gave her a small white pill to swallow. Kizzy laid back and closed her eyes. Soon everything went numb. She dozed off. The world around her began to dissolve.
“It will all be over soon Kizzy,” was the last thing she heard her mother say.
20
Kizzy dreamed of the summer house by the beach. She had never been inside, yet her mind wandered the dry wooden floors that creaked under her feet, the clear glass windows that looked out onto the sea and the fire place that brought warmth in the winter and kept bugs away in the summer.
Her father was there. Kizzy had never seen him in real life and all that she knew of him was from a black and white photograph she had found in her mother’s desk. That’s how he looked in Kizzy’s dream; black and white, two dimensional, with sunglasses on his face and a strange patch of hair on his upper lip.
“When is dinner going to be ready?” he asked with a paper voice.
Kizzy looked at the unprepared food covering the ridiculously huge counter top. She wanted so badly to make him happy. She knew he’d be gone again soon.
“It’s ready now,” Kizzy said, pushing all the items into a large bowl. Lettuce, raw chicken, tomatoes and tuna. She brought it to the table. Diego was sitting there too. Her father sat with the white crow across the table. Kizzy wanted so badly to speak to him, she needed to know who he was, what he believed in, what made him happy. But he was too busy feeding the crow pieces of raw chicken to pay attention to her at all. Diego reached over and held her hand under the table. She could feel her face grow flush and her heart flutter the way it had when they escaped from Iris’s house. Her father and the crow
disappeared and now it was only her and Diego. She started to undress the way she had for Banshee, but Diego just laughed. He got up from the table and walked out the door. Kizzy was left red faced, naked, with her clothes in a pile on the floor.
She awoke frightened and embarrassed. Night had fallen and the apartment was dark.
The pain in her hand was completely gone. She could move her fingers now. When she unwrapped the dressing her mother had applied, her hand looked as if it had never been burned at all. Her ankle and neck, everything was pain free. Even the cuts at her hairline from the crows were gone. Whatever her mother had given her must have worked wonders. The only wound that remained was the spot where the crow had pierced her palm.
Diego sat crouched by the window. Kizzy felt angry at him, for the way he had acted in her dream. She shook her head.
Diego was staring mindlessly down to the street. Kizzy walked from the couch and put a hand on his shoulder. He jumped at her touch.
“Oh it’s you,” he said with a breath of relief.
“Sorry,” said Kizzy, the word crawling from her mouth like an old moth. She smiled at the accomplishment.
“You can talk now,” Diego said flatly. He crawled back to the glass. “We’ve got a problem.”
Down on the street below orange flashes were lighting up the inside of a mechanic’s garage. The sparks danced in the dark.
“Iris is in there,” said Diego. “There must be a generator.”
“What are those sparks?” Kizzy asked, her voice was thick and scratchy.
“A welder maybe?”
“Why?” Kizzy asked.
“She’s fixing herself,” he said. “Has been for the past few hours.” He turned to her with an exhausted look on his face. “She’s never going to stop chasing us.”
“Kizzy?” gasped Kizzy’s mother from the doorway. Her jaw was dropped, like she had seen a ghost. A large black blanket was wrapped around her shoulders. Her face was puffy, she must have been crying.
“What’s wrong?” asked Kizzy.
“How..” she shook her head and stared.
“How what?” asked Kizzy.
“How are you feeling?” her mother asked.
“The sparks just stopped,” Diego said.
“How are you feeling Kizzy?” her mother asked again.
“I’m feeling fine,” she answered. Why was she questioning her like this?
“We’ve got to get out of here,” said Diego.
“We can’t leave,” Kizzy’s mother said. “This is the safest place.”
“We need to get to the Enoch building,” Kizzy said.
“Wait until tomorrow,” said her mother. “Then I’ll take you there.”
“Why are you so set on staying here?” Diego asked.
“We just need to buy some more time that’s all.”
“For what?” Diego asked. “Why did you even come here to find us?”
“To help my daughter.”
“Then help her now.”
“I’m trying to.”
“By sitting here waiting to die?”
Her mother didn’t know what to say. Involuntarily she looked to the kitchen then averted her eyes. Kizzy turned to see what she had glanced at. On the counter was a small opened white paper box, about the size of a chipmunk. The suicide pill.
Kizzy looked back at her mother. Her mouth tried to form words but they had all evaporated.
“I was just trying to make it easy for you Kizzy,” her mother said.
“What are you talking about?” Kizzy asked, her lower lip trembled.
“There’s a psychopath coming for you,” her mother said, she was beginning to cry. “He said he would hurt you so bad, you’d wish you were dead. And the police are chasing you, and that droid was after him.”
“Wait, wait, wait. What psychopath?” Diego asked.
“A priest. He was dressed in red. He did this to my hand,” she lifted to show the cut on her finger.
“Morrigan,” said Diego. “I know him, it’s not a problem. And the police, we’ve been able to dodge them. That robot out there is the real issue.”
“The police aren’t a problem for you maybe,” her mother said. “But they are for Kizzy.”
“What you mean?” asked Diego.
“You’re not the one they’re after,” her mother said, pausing for a moment, then shaking her head as she looked to Kizzy.
In an instant Kizzy could feel the tower of her lies crumbling beneath her feet.
“Wait a second, what do you mean I’m not the one they’re after?”
Suddenly there was a loud bash at the front door. Kizzy turned to see splinters of wood explode from the frame. Another violent crash and it burst open completely.
Iris stood there proudly. Her left leg was now a mechanic’s pneumatic lift which had been crudely soldered onto her body. It was raised in the air and had easily destroyed the door. Her right arm was reinforced with two armor-like steel pipes.
“I could smell you from the street,” Iris said in an excited tone. She lifted the flamethrower and sprayed the room. This time there was no beeping, no pause, just instant flames. Kizzy leaped past her mother into the bedroom just inches ahead of the blast. Diego waited for the flames to stop and then sprinted across the hall to the room. He slammed the door shut.
“What do we do?” her mother asked.
Kizzy looked around. She jumped to her feet and began pushing the bed to block the door. Diego and her mother helped. The only way out was the window. Could they climb all the way to the fire escape outside the kitchen?
Kizzy ran to the window and opened. Iris was beginning to bash through the bedroom door. Her mother climbed out first, followed by Diego, then Kizzy. The ledge that wrapped around the building was only two feet wide. The ground loomed 40 yards below her feet. If she fell from that height she would become a splatter of meat on the sidewalk. The wind whipped at her back and through her hair, her heart rattled inside her chest. It was terrifying. She stared through the dirty window as the top half of the bedroom door was smashed to pieces and Iris came crawling through.
“Move!” Kizzy shouted.
“I can’t do this,” her mother said.
“You have to,” Kizzy yelled.
They began to slowly shuffle to the left. Her mother rounded the building’s corner with shaky unsure steps. Kizzy pushed up against Diego to try and get away from the window. She looked up through the glass to see the flamethrower spouting fire straight at her. It all happened in slow motion. Kizzy froze. The flames hit the glass in front of her and sprawled out, swirling like fish inside a hellish aquarium. The glass turned black. Diego grabbed her by the shirt and pulled her out of the way. The pane exploded out from the building and the flames erupted past Kizzy. She had to keep moving.
She rounded the corner, holding onto the building for dear life, reminding herself not to look down. Her mother had reached the fire escape with Diego right behind her. Kizzy looked inside through the living room window. The glass filled with fire. Kizzy flinched and slid out of the way before the glass shattered. She approached the fire escape. A chair burst out through the kitchen window. Kizzy couldn’t see, but she was sure Iris there was waiting with the flamethrower aimed and ready. Kizzy looked at the fire escape. She wouldn’t make it across to the stairs without being burnt to a crisp. She looked down to the opening on the floor below. Was there enough space to fit through if she jumped? If there wasn’t she’d fall the whole way down to the ground. She couldn’t just wait there any longer. Her mother and Diego were already a couple floors down.
“Kizzy, what are you doing?” her mother yelled. “Come on!”
“I can’t,” Kizzy said.
There was no answer. Her mother just watched.
>
Kizzy held her breath, steadied her feet and jumped from the ledge down to the fire escape landing, one story below. She landed hard on the steel grate, her knees smashed into the metal. Iris’s footsteps ran to the open window and blasted the flamethrower down through the fire escape. Kizzy crawled under a metal table. Diego and her mother hid under a window jamb. The flame roared past the edge of the table. Kizzy could feel the heat on her forehead. When it stopped she sprinted down the stairs. Diego and her mother continued their decent a few levels down.
The fire escape was suddenly jerked away from the building, knocking Kizzy to her knees. She glanced at the rusty bolts securing the structure to the wall. They began to crumble out from the ancient brick. She sprinted down the steps as the metal framework of the escape creak further and further from the wall. Kizzy looked up.
Iris was out on the escape now. She had her back against the railing, pushing with her pneumatic leg against the brick facade, forcing the metalwork further and further from the building.
Kizzy fell into, then up and over the railing. Her hands clamped on tight to the metal pipe but the frame continued to move away from the building. She reached her left foot up and managed to pry herself back into the escape. She clung to the railing like a dear old friend.
Suddenly the flimsy iron escape burst off the wall. It fell away from the building. There was a moment of weightlessness as it careened through the air and crashed into the building across the street. Kizzy hit hard against the brick. She blinked heavily and coughed away the dust, amazed that she had survived. The framework of the escape then began to jerk from left to right. She looked up again. Iris was yanking the iron bars back and forth, trying to dislodge the mass from its resting spot. But the escape was stuck fast and Iris began leaping down the steps towards her.
Looking below Kizzy saw Diego and her mother breaking into a window in the new building. They climbed inside. Kizzy scrambled down the steps, hoping Iris wouldn’t catch her. She rounded the corner and crouched down to enter the window.
The Enoch Pill Page 21