Protect Me

by Selma Wolfe

Hope was pretty sure she could save them, but she was also pretty sure that she couldn’t save the integrity of Rick’s invention. A thousand plans flashed through her mind. All of them met instant deaths. Sure, she could smash the vial, but then Boran would just march them back to the mansion and take all of Rick’s notes as well - or separate them out, make just Hope go get the vial and leave the two of them behind.

  “I…” She heard Rick struggle; heard it when his defiance collapsed under the weight of brutal reality. Rick was too smart not to see the same odds she did. He wasn’t as experienced in the field, no, but he could still figure out what was about to happen. He could see there was no way to get out of this.

  She didn’t plan on saying “I told you so” when they got free, but she planned on thinking it a lot.

  “Fine,” Rick said, sounding as close to hopeless as she’d ever heard him.

  Boran made a satisfied grunt of acknowledgement and moved forward. Probably Hope should have been watching him, but something caught her eye and she turned her gaze to the goon standing at his shoulder.

  The goon hadn’t calmed down at all. His eyes skittered over the place from left to right, but not in the calm sweeps of a professional, or even a thousand yard stare. His focus just jumped from one point to the next without any purpose or direction. The barrel of his gun was shaking slightly in a way that Hope really, really did not like.

  Slowly Hope swiveled on her heel, trying to avoid catching the goon’s eye. Rick was glaring at Boran and slowly reaching into his pocket to pull out the vial.

  “Don’t.” Rick paused, his hand still in his pocket. His face was white, though he didn’t look scared, exactly. Just desperate. “You don’t know what you’re doing. Look, if you want money, I can give you money. But don’t take this. It’s not - if someone manages to reverse engineer it into a weapon - that isn’t something you guys will want to deal with either, not really.”

  Boran had the gun only barely angled up into a threat. The slightest hint of frustration crossed his face.

  “I don’t have time for your guilt problems,” he said plainly; Rick flinched. Hope kept looking between the two of them and the twitchy goon. She felt strung-out herself. Not being able to make a move was wearing at her nerves in a way she’d never felt before. All that advice about not getting involved with the client had been so right. Nothing could feel as bad as this did.

  The goon’s elbow jerked back violently and he raised the gun.

  Nothing could feel as bad except for Rick actually getting hurt.

  “Give him the vial, Rick,” Hope snapped.

  Everyone turned to look at her. The goon’s hand followed his eyes so the gun was pointing at her instead, which was an infinite relief. Probably Rick and Boran and Iseul were shooting her meaningful glances that she should be paying attention to, but Hope could barely tear her gaze away from the goon. Her fingers were tingling with nerves, and her calf muscles kept clenching and releasing. She knew something this guy was gonna panic. She could feel it in her bones. It was torture just waiting, praying that somehow, something would intervene before this guy could freak out and stick his knife into people she cared about.

  Out of the corner of her eye, Hope saw Rick’s arm slowly start to move.

  “Wait a second.”

  Hope clenched her jaw.

  Iseul stepped forward next to Rick and frowned at Boran.

  “This is extremely illogical,” she informed the big man. He raised his eyebrows and frowned. Iseul seemed to take this as an invitation, because she continued, “You cannot possibly be making more money from this Gouws fellow than you might being hired by Rick, or by myself for that matter. Why don’t you leave with us, and we can talk about this like adults.”

  Boran stared at Iseul for a long moment, and then rolled his eyes so hard that it looked like it hurt.

  “How stupid exactly do you think I am?” he asked.

  “In feet or meters?” Iseul shot back. Rick slowly, slowly turned his head to stare at her and she winced. “Sorry, I tend babble when faced with impending doom. It’s a character flaw.”

  Boran looked almost amused. Hope couldn’t help noticing the tiny tug of lips at the corner of his mouth, and the way he kept looking at Iseul. He liked Iseul, she thought, or would’ve, in another time and place.

  “Don’t be ridiculous. There is no doom. We can all part here as… well, perhaps not friends. But we will complete our transaction and all of us will walk away.” Hope couldn’t help noticing the way he flicked a glance over his shoulder toward the goon at his back. The goon didn’t appear to notice; his deep-set eyes were trained straight ahead. She wondered if he moved his head rather than his eyes, like an owl.

  “I can’t accept that.” Iseul put her hands on her hips and gave Boran a concentrated frown, her forehead crumpling up over her nose. “Even if we were to go back on our words once you released us - and may I remind you, we aren’t the ones who’ve lied - the public loves a redemption story. With your boss out of the country and unreachable, it would be easy for you to plead ignorance of some sort. You could say you were lied to by the South African government. There are about thirty different groups that claim to be the South African government; it would be extremely difficult to prove your guilt.”

  “That’s quite the case you’ve built there,” Boran said. He smiled grimly. “But I’m afraid it’s not that easy. Even if it was that easy, I can’t just walk away.”

  Iseul kept her gaze determinedly on Boran, nodding like she was fascinated by his words, like she was trying to understand. Hope could see stress tighten the lines at the edge of her mouth and eyes, but only because she was looking for it.

  "Alright, look." Boran brought a hand up to run through his hair, an involuntary conversational gesture. It put him just slightly off-balance. "The reason I need the money is..."

  Hope couldn't move; she had to keep Boran’s backup in her sights. Her fingers clenched fruitlessly on empty air as the adrenaline built up in her system went nowhere. This was the perfect moment, and she could do nothing but watch it pass by.

  Out of the corner of her eye, Hope saw Rick lunge forward and jam the taser right into Boran's sternum. Boran's eyes went wide and his mouth opened, but no sound came out.

  "Take it off! Take it off!" Hope yelled, her eyes riveted to the goon, who didn't seem to realize what was happening yet.

  Assuming you're not going to kill them, a person's body doesn't actually shake like they're getting electrocuted when you tase them. There’s occasionally shouting or their eyes might roll back in their head, but Boran couldn’t seem to catch his breath to yell. There was no real way to know unless you saw the taser in Rick's hand.

  Of course, that meant that it would be easy for Rick to give Boran enough jolts to kill him without even realizing what he’d done.

  Rick had more self-control than she'd thought; after barely a millisecond he pulled the taser away and let Boran slump to the ground. Usually inexperienced people panicked, which made them terribly dangerous. Hope was proud but also viscerally worried.

  "Stay back," she said, and stepped toward Boran, who had been standing between the goon and her friends. Now it was just her standing between this huge hulking brute and two vulnerable, inexperienced people that shouldn’t be there.

  And she was tired.

  The goon’s head swiveled between Hope, the taser still held out in Rick’s hand, and Boran sprawled out on the floor.

  He tilted his head up to meet Hope’s eyes again. His eyes narrowed.

  “You don’t have to,” Hope started to say, but she knew it was a useless effort before the words were even out of her mouth. This guy had more muscle than sense, and he actually did have a snowball’s chance in hell of getting out unscathed. Rick and Iseul were remarkable human beings, but that didn’t change the fact that they were rank amateurs to violence.

  Every inch of Hope hurt. Blue and green hadn’t started to blossom across her limbs yet, but it would later t
hat night (assuming she lived that long). Her ribs were definitely at least cracked, and she was horribly afraid of moving wrong and puncturing something. She’d been there when a man’s ribs tore open his lungs and he drowned on empty air - not an act of violence but one of God, horrible bad luck while driving down a rain-slick African road.

  She was scared and battered and tired; this whole things had taken too long for adrenaline to save her. Nothing but the last dregs of mettle was clinging to her bones. The goon lifted his lip in a snarl. His muscles twitched as he prepared to charge, and Hope could feel despair seep into her blood like a sickness.

  And yet, when she flicked a glance over at Rick and Iseul, they were waiting, pale-faced but calm, certain that Hope would save them.

  Hope gritted her teeth. So she would save them, she swore to herself. Somehow. Then the goon let out a roar and lunged forward, and thinking time was up.

  The goon took one solid step and then forgot about Boran’s prone body on the floor. He stepped on Boran’s arm and rolled slightly over the uneven surface. Some small part of Hope’s brain processed pity for Boran. The rest of Hope threw herself shoulder-first into the goon’s midsection, completely graceless but effective nonetheless. The goon’s arms flailed in the air and one huge hand clamped onto her bicep with a crushing grip, but that wasn’t enough to keep his huge bulk upright. He slammed into the floor and Hope slammed into his chest a millisecond later.

  She scrambled upright, using the surprise of the fall to yank her arm out of the goon’s grasp. Her foot caught against one of his tree-trunk thighs, and Hope stumbled.

  It was enough time for the goon to recover. Rick’s wordless shout was all the warning Hope had before the goon hauled himself up and snatched at Hope’s legs.

  She bent her knees and jumped straight over his arm on instinct. Somewhere behind her Hope heard a gasp.

  Hope wanted to yell at Rick and Iseul to run now, while they had a chance, but she didn’t have the breath for it. Before her feet even landed on the goon’s chest, she was already throwing her weight forward. One toe hit the goon’s chest and Hope tumbled forward over his head.

  If she was less beaten down she would’ve landed sharply and turned halfway into the next punch, but Hope was running on empty. She hit the ground off-balance and her shoulder caught jarringly. Instead of doing a neat somersault her body jolted and she rolled once or twice before curling up on her side and gasping for air. Something hurt; everything hurt. Hope didn’t know if her collarbone was broken or if she’d just dislocated her shoulder. Her lungs seized up and spots danced in front of her eyes as she tried desperately to suck in a breath.

  She couldn’t stay down. The goon was probably up and lumbering toward her as she lay there and just tried to breathe. Hope pressed a palm flat to the ground and tried to push herself up, but her body didn’t move.

  Footsteps filled her ears and a hand settled on her shoulder. Everything was confused; Hope knew that she should be curling her fingers into a fist and prepping herself to fight.

  But she didn’t feel angry, she felt oddly calm. Something smelled good, not like the sweat and panic that had filled her nostrils for the last few hours.

  That hand rolled her gently onto her back, another hand coming up to cradle the back of her head to soften the feel of the concrete underneath.

  Hope blinked up at the blurry face above her. It was too small to be her enemy for sure, and the dark eyes were too big. She could see dark hair and a sharply outlined jaw. It was a handsome face that tugged at her only half-conscious mind, drawing her back up out of the darkness, and back into painful reality. The face started to come into focus with the rest of the world, and Hope winced. It was familiar…

  “Rick?”

  “Okay, good, you’re with the living still, no thanks to you.” Rick’s voice was tight in a way she’d never heard before, like he actually needed to keep a grip on his temper to stop it from fraying. Hope gave him a brief, unfocused smile and started trying to push herself upright again. The frown lines on his face deepened, but his hands were infinitely gentle when they went around her back and slowly drew her up.

  The room swam in front of her; past Rick’s outstretched shoulder she saw Iseul shuffle away from the goon’s prone body and peer down at Boran’s slack face.

  “Thanks,” Hope gasped as her whole body screamed in protest. Her shoulder twitched and she bit back a yell. “Okay, grab my shoulder.”

  Rick’s frown shifted into confusion. He clearly didn’t get it, for which Hope counted herself lucky. If he did understand, he probably wouldn’t help.

  She forced her face into a blank expression and grabbed Rick’s wrist with her good hand. “When I put your hand on my shoulder, I need you to push back.”

  Before he could ask any questions she didn’t have the energy to answer, Hope shoved her bad shoulder into his grasp. She clenched her teeth and jammed her shoulder forward. Rick obeyed her request on instinct, the way she’d bet he would.

  There was a sick, wet popping noise and the joint slid back into place. Hope swallowed down a wave of nausea.

  Fortunately the feeling didn’t settle; her nerve endings were apparently already stretched to the limit informing her that she was hurting and tired. Rick looked a little green, though.

  “You didn’t tell me that was going to happen,” he said, swallowing slowly and deliberately.

  “Because if I had, you wouldn’t have helped.” The fog began to clear from her vision. Hope tilted her head to look around Rick and reassure herself that the goon was still flat on the ground. He was. “Now help me get up.”

  “Pushy, aren’t you?” Rick said, sounding greatly relieved. His tone made Hope pause and take another long look at his face.

  She realized that the first thing that came to mind when she looked at Rick wasn’t his sharp cheekbones or strong jaw anymore. It wasn’t even his dark eyes, striking in their curiosity. Instead of any one feature, it was a feeling of rightness, a feeling of coming home.

  When Hope first met Rick she had been content, but drifting, wanting something without knowing the shape of it. She’d been waiting for the next thing to come along, and almost hadn’t realized it when he’d invited her into his life and kissed her at the door, asking her to come inside.

  “Always,” Hope said, and the somber tone of her own voice ringing in her ears made her realize she’d completely forgotten the original question.

  True to form, Rick paused and narrowed his eyes, thinking it over. His face softened and he reached out a hand. Hope really needed to gather her strength, get up, and take care of things, but when Rick’s science-scarred hand touched her cheek she shut her eyes and leaned in to the feel of it.

  “Guys?” A high-pitched voice entered Hope’s consciousness and her eyes blinked open in sleepy surprise. That was Iseul talking, she thought muzzily. “Guys, that’s adorable - sort of disgusting, but mostly adorable - but… This guy is moving. That’s normal, right? He’s allowed to be moving?”

  Hope forced her eyes all the way open just in time to see the goon jerk his head off the ground. Stubborn bastard, she thought in weary amazement.

  “Tase him!” she yelled at Iseul and scrambled to her feet, feeling every muscle and joint fight her along the way.

  Iseul whimpered; Hope heard it as the goon got to his knees. The man was clearly still out of it, but there was a smirk underneath the drool on his lips. He knew. She started hobbling faster. Rick hovered at her side, clearly unsure of how to help.

  “I can’t,” Iseul whispered. “I… I can’t hurt somebody. He’ll die!”

  At the moment, Hope was okay with that. “You can do it, he won’t - look, just give me the…” There were only a few yards between her and Iseul. She could grab the taser and down the guy and then they could finally, finally all get out of here. Hope ignored the way her knees screamed and the twitch of loose ribs in her chest and strode ahead of Rick.

  Iseul held out the taser and was biting down i
nto her lip to stop tears, obviously ashamed of herself. Hope wanted to tell her that it was fine, this was normal, she wasn’t weak, but she was barely able to even get enough air in to breathe. Later, she could do those things later. They’d all have a talk about realistic civilian expectations later. Hope reached out a hand for the taser.

  Iseul turned her head the smallest amount, looked over Hope’s shoulder, and screamed.

  Without a single pause for thought Hope’s body started moving as if of its own volition. She completely abandoned the taser, yanked herself around, and flung herself the other way. There was no time for thought or finesse; she was operating in milliseconds. She pushed off of the ball of one foot with all her strength, felt the other foot impact the ground a moment later, and then -

  Pain pain chest rammed up against the object, twisted her back, Rick’s horrified face staring down at her, pain pain more pain where?, the goon’s weaker than he looks because he barely has the strength to twist his arm, how did she know that, the body behind her back making some strange movement - vibrating?, oh pain pain even worse pain oh shit.

  There was a loud thud as the goon fell to the floor behind Hope and all the pieces of the puzzle fell into place with him.

  “Good job,” Hope told Iseul, who was clenching the taser in a white-knuckle grip, and was white through her naturally darker complexion. “Don’t let me fall on the - ”

  There was a split second of disconnect where words and colors stopped working, and Hope knew that she was going to pass out and she knew that Rick was already opening his mouth to beg her to come back, and she wanted to tell him everything would be okay but -

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  When she looked back on it, Hope was sort of impressed with her own confidence. The first thing she said when she woke up to hospital lights was, “I love you.”

  “Oh God, she has amnesia,” a very familiar voice groaned.

  Hope wasn’t quite stupid enough to attempt sitting up, but she did gingerly start to tense all her muscle groups, to get an idea of the damages. It turned out that her body’s unanimous vote was “lots of pain” and that she was an asshole for doing this to herself. She couldn’t disagree.