A Human Element

by Donna Galanti

  "So what?" Laura tried not to laugh. "What's it to you, okay? Just leave me alone. Go on, get outta here."

  "What's it to me? I'll tell you. Because if you get thrown out I get stuck with some nerd roommate who can't attract the hot guys when we go out, like you, that's what. And my whole social scene goes out the window and I never get laid again for the next four years. I'll practically become a virgin again. Technically, after four years of no sex, that's what happens."

  "Doesn't sound as if you had too much trouble the other night, slut puppy." Laura threw back without looking up.

  "I thought you were asleep." Moe tapped her foot.

  "Who can sleep with your loud mouth getting banged?"

  "That's it. You're pissing me off now. You better get your shit together because I don't want you to get kicked out and go back home."

  The word home sent Laura into an emotional spiral. She pulled the comforter up to her forehead and willed the tears to stop. "I don't have a home, okay?"

  Then the tears spilled down in a river of release and she let out a great sob. She waited for Moe to shut the door and leave, but she didn't. The comforter was pulled down off her face, and there stood Moe with a crooked smile.

  "Okay, spill. Oh, wait, it looks like you are." Moe grinned. "I guess I can skip my class for once."

  Laura told her about her parents dying in the fire right before she left for college, about her beloved home where she grew up, about her good friend, Mr. B, and her special lake. She even told her about the mysterious man in black who appeared every few years.

  "Most likely he's got it for you bad, man." Moe laughed. "I mean look at you, you're smoking hot with that hair, those eyes, and that body. Has he ever touched you?"

  "Well, no. And part of the time I was a kid anyways."

  "Hmm, evil pedophile maybe?"

  "No, he never came near me. Besides, he looks like somebody's big uncle."

  "Yeah, sugar daddy uncle maybe. Did he call out crude comments?"

  "No."

  "Said, 'Hey, baby, wanna get it on?'"

  "No!" Laura laughed.

  "So there you go. He's a good guy. A guardian angel who ogles you from afar. Sure, you get a buff guardian angel in black. Me? With my big-boned dorkiness I'd get some fat slob with drool hanging off his mouth tripping over himself in awe to glimpse my Amazon beauty."

  "You're not dorky," Laura insisted, but she felt better.

  That night they stayed in crying and laughing. Moe hugged her and listened.

  They whipped up frothy margaritas in their blender, dug around in their shared closet for tortilla chips and salsa, and spent hours chatting about boys and school like normal freshman girls do. Laura felt like a clean and empty bowl waiting to be filled up again.

  But she never told Moe about her special powers. Since then, almost four years ago, she never did. She forced herself to forget about her strange abilities as well, and over time the thoughts of others faded from her mind. She now had a safe harbor with Moe and it helped free her from her past, a little bit.

  After her parents died, Mr. B had convinced Laura to leave for college. She had no choice. She had nowhere else to go and she wanted to get as far away from Coopersville as she could. He helped her take care of the details like the cremations, the brief service at the church in town, and listing the land for sale.

  She stayed with him those few days before she left for college and huddled in his loft bed, crying much of the time, until he told her it was time to go or she would miss the start of the semester. So Laura left for college in a fog and vowed to forget all she had known and been, except for Mr. B. He stayed the one good thing she could count on.

  And now she was moving on again to start a career in communications for a large healthcare company in New Jersey. Moe had tried to persuade Laura to find a job with her in New York. Moe wanted to conquer the big city together, but Laura wouldn't be able to survive in a world of concrete and skyscrapers. She needed trees and space. At least New Jersey had some. She found a cute studio apartment next to a park where she could sit in her kitchen and look at the leaves changing. She wanted to be alone again.

  Laura sighed and forced herself to get up from the couch, after concluding the hangover headache would not be cured by aspirin alone. She washed her face, threw her hair under a frayed baseball cap, and brushed her teeth hard to eliminate the metallic taste in her mouth from a night of drinking. Feeling near normal, she drew on sunglasses to hide her puffy eyes and headed out for much needed sustenance at The Bakery. She grabbed a coffee cake and quart of orange juice too, just in case Moe's parents stopped in for breakfast before graduation on Saturday. She felt comforted knowing they were coming in town.

  After years of spending holidays and vacations with them, they became the family she lost. From the moment she met them—and Moe embellished them with her tale of woe—they took her in under their wing and granted her daughter status. Moe's mother, in a way, reminded Laura of her own mother. She was a big, bosomy woman, as tall as Moe, who would crush you in a floral-scent filled hug.

  Outside of Mr. B they were all she had. She wished he could make the graduation ceremony but he had a bad cold. At eighty-three he had slowed down but his mind was still sharp and witty. As she waited in line at The Bakery to pay, she made a mental note to go visit him this summer.

  The sun shone high overhead as she walked back to the apartment. Sweat trickled down her back in an uncomfortable drip. It proved to be another humid, hot day. The headache that had subsided came crashing back in painful waves. She pressed her palm to her forehead and wiped the sweat away.

  This wasn't a hangover headache. This was the same headache she had as a child. The familiar pain blinded her and she stumbled down the narrow street back to the apartment. She hung onto the railing heading up the stairs and fumbled with her keys to get in the door. She had to get out of the light and lie down. She needed more aspirin and Moe had to have more in her room.

  "Moe," Laura called out but got no answer. She must really be hung over to still be asleep. Through squinted eyes, Laura saw the microwave glowing a fuzzy 12:55 p.m.

  She shoved the food into the fridge and shielding her eyes from the bright kitchen light, shuffled to Moe's room and pushed open the door. She opened her eyes wider to the cool, blessed dark. The pain enveloped her head in a stabbing vise. A smell invaded Laura's nose. An overpowering coppery smell. She gagged. Fresh waves of it hit her. She bent over holding her side.

  "Moe? Sleepy head, get up. You didn't get sick in here did you?"

  Laura stood up. Moe's outline rose from the bed in the dimness. Laura felt herself along the bed with one hand while covering her nose with the other to ward of the stench. The comforter was pulled all the way up over Moe's head.

  "Moe?" Laura whispered again, this time fear snaked its way down into the pit of her stomach. She shook the top of the comforter. It felt wet. She pulled it down and shook Moe but felt wet, floppy rags. She pulled away. Both her hands dripped with warm, wetness. She gagged again, afraid she would throw up, and jumped back to the wall.

  "Moe!" She shrieked now and scraped her hands along the wall reaching for the light switch. "Where is it? Where is it?"

  At last she forced it up and closed her eyes from the glare. When she opened them red ran down her fingers and arms. Her red handprints decorated the wall in a pretty border. It wasn't vomit. Moe hadn't thrown up on herself. Blood spread slowly to stain the comforter. Its crimson circle grew larger. Laura stared at the cover, poked up in clumps hiding Moe's face. She shook off her paralysis and ripped back the comforter with both hands and screamed.

  Moe's eyes bulged from her head and her lips were pulled back in a twisted, silent scream. Her hands faced palms to defend off something in her final, terrifying moments. But it was her neck Laura stared at. Those weren't rags she felt in the dark, but the pieces of Moe's neck flapping open. Her neck had been savagely ripped open. Claw marks whipped around her wounds. Blood pumped o
ut of a gaping hole in Moe's neck.

  Laura fell to her knees at the bottom of the bed and twisted the end of the comforter over and over. She felt herself falling into a dark pit where no one could follow. It was her parents' death all over again. She punched herself over and over in the gut in anger and grief. She wanted to hurt as those she loved hurt. All the normalcy of the past four years became erased in this room.

  "Come get me, you freak!" Laura sobbed into the air. "I'm waiting."

  She wiped her bloody hands on the rug. Scrub. Scrub. She couldn't get it all off. She banged her head on the floor and tore at the blanket in a mad craze when something fluttered down off the bed. A piece of paper. She clutched it in her blood-encrusted fingers. Words scattered across it.

  One day this will be you. He is toying with those you love but it's you he seeks to destroy in the end. He won't stop coming. Remember your powers and use them. You must survive. Be true to what you are and you can stop him.

  A fury grew inside her and she shoved the note into her front shorts pocket.

  "Stop who? Who is he? What do you want from me?"

  But he was right. She had to try and use her powers. She had forced herself not to use them over the past four years, and the thoughts of others around her became softer until their sounds faded out altogether. She had saved her mother and Mr. B once with her healing powers. Could she save Moe?

  The gruesome thought of putting her hands back onto Moe's bloody, ripped open neck forced her to push the vomit back down her throat. But she had to try. She staggered to her knees, and looking up at the ceiling, placed her hands on her friend's body. Her fingers moved over her chest and slid across her shredded neck. Laura forced her hands still.

  "Come back, Moe. Please."

  She imagined pouring her life energy into Moe through her fingertips. She imagined her neck stitching up and the blood pumping once again through her body. She imagined her alive and laughing. But she felt nothing. Either her powers had truly left her or Moe was too far gone to bring back.

  Laura fell back on the rug and crawled out of the room. A bloody trail of handprints followed her. Red. Blood is so red. She stared down at her stained hands.

  "Come get me, you asshole. Whoever you are. If it's me you want." She cried, as she hobbled on hands and knees.

  She was tired of being strong and overcoming tragedy. She didn't want to be strong again. Pain shot through her head like a mechanical arm stabbing her over and over with an ice pick. Dizziness engulfed her. She welcomed blissful darkness to rescue her from this nightmare. She didn't want to remember Moe as a gruesome, shredded thing.

  She kept crawling. She had to get to the phone. Then the shaking took over and she rocked on her knees on the musty shag rug. She had to call the police. It was the sane thing to do. But instead, she curled up into herself and just lay on the floor, praying for her own death.

  The man in black stood in the parking lot hidden by a bush and watched Laura's apartment. He looked at his watch and decided he had to call the police now. He had seen her go in fifteen minutes ago holding her head. He wondered if she could handle the scene she found. He wished he could protect her from it, but she would survive it and it was the desired outcome.

  He walked over to the pay phone on the street corner and dialed 911. He pretended to be jogging when he heard screams and saw a suspicious character in bloody clothes run out of apartment twenty-two. He hung up when the operator asked for his name and address. He sighed and walked away. It was all he could do. He should not get involved. But he already was. If he wanted his kind to go on the girl had to survive.

  CHAPTER 12: 2006

  Doctor Bjord lived every day knowing he wasn't considered a serious scientist by his peers any longer. As a promising geneticist in the 1960s and 1970s he once had the entire international science community at his ear. When his last triumphant project proved to be a disaster, he was shunned by the government and stuck down in this government facility basement to rot out his existence on animal testing.

  The President of the United States did not even know of the work done here in this windowless building in Arlington, Virginia. But Bjord did. He knew too much for them to give him his walking papers. They wanted to keep him safe and imprisoned under their watchful eye, and give him enough menial work and a huge paycheck to keep him satisfied. But most of all they wanted him to keep an eye on the bungled results of his final project.

  At seventy-five years old he wouldn't be around much longer to be of any trouble and yet, there was the slim chance he could still create something of value from his pet project. Bjord hadn't given up. If his experiments worked he would be triumphant again. He would be crowned brilliant and brought back to the world on a pedestal for all to hail. He would transform the world with his genius and make America's military unstoppable.

  If his experiments worked. If. His brain worked over the details of his recent failure and how he could make it work next time. He had to make it work. What was he missing?

  A knock at the door halted Bjord from writing in his daily log. He shuffled over to it, passing nattering, caged animals in his path. He unlocked the door with trembling, aged hands and opened it to see Bruce, one of the building's many security guards, standing there with a covered tray in his hands.

  "Hi, Doc. Got his meal tonight as usual. Some kind of meat thing."

  Bjord took the tray from him. It shook in his weak fingers. "I didn't realize it was time already."

  "Hey, you know what they say, time flies when you're having fun." Bruce smiled and turned away. Bjord glared at the security guard's retreating back down the dark hallway. What an idiot. He will go home, eat meat and potatoes, make love to his sagging wife, and have a satisfying night's sleep with no thought in his head but which game is on television this weekend.

  Bruce stopped at the elevators and gave Bjord a wave before he stepped through the doors and shot up to a lighted world where people lived in real time. Time for Bjord remained the same. His concept of reality included permanent darkness that enveloped him in these concrete walls as his own clock ticked away, stealing each minute.

  Bjord never left these walls. He slept in a cot in an old connecting storage room with a dribbling shower and a fridge stocked once a week with groceries delivered to him. He couldn't stand the building's cafeteria-style mush. He had his paycheck deposited into his bank account that had grown substantially over the years. He couldn't wait to spend it on himself in lavish style when his brilliant project succeeded. Then he could deliver the most amazing weapon the U.S. government would ever possess. He just hoped to succeed soon before age took over his body.

  Bjord shambled back to his work area carrying the tray and turned a corner leading to a back area of the expansive basement. The dark cavern that spread outward sat below a large complex of rooms housing five-hundred government employees. Bjord preferred to contain his work in the largest main room. There was one other room and he headed there now.

  Bjord reached the back of the dim corridor and placed the tray on the floor. He slid open the viewing window of the iron door before him and seeing nothing disturbing slid it shut. He pulled a set of keys from his pants pocket and fit it in the keyhole. The iron door lay three feet thick, protecting the world from the soundproof room beyond it. Bjord slipped the key in the lock and turned it clockwise. He then removed the keys, placed them on the floor, and proceeded to slide three heavy bolts out of their placement that covered the width of the door. This ritual finished, he picked up the tray and pushed the heavy slab open.

  Laura woke in darkness and confusion. The nightmare pulled at her in waves of fear and she sat up, focusing on the streaks of moon filtering through her bedroom. She switched on the bedside lamp and drew her covers up around her shoulders. Her alarm clock blinked a repetitive florescent green and she stared at it as flashes of her nightmare came back.

  She had been running through dark woods by her lake back home. An evil man chased her in the silent shadow
s of trees and moonlight. She could not hear the man chasing her as she dodged around trees and rocks. She did not know who he was, only that he stood taller than the average man. She glimpsed a frozen leer every time she saw him not far behind her in the brush.

  Was it a game of cat and mouse and she was the prey? To survive she had to find a hole to hide in. If the tall man found her he would slash her throat open with his monstrous hands, all the while grinning as her lifeblood pumped into the wet earth. He would then carry her drained corpse up the mountain and bury her deep where no wild animal could dig up her remains and feast on her flesh.

  She stopped as she came out of the woods to find herself teetering on the edge of an enormous pit. She scrambled down the slope of the hole, scraping herself on dirt and pebbles. She reached the bottom and threw herself on the ground clawing at stubby grass. She flung dirt to the side, tearing her hands and nails. She peered up at the pit's edge to see the man standing above her in a dark silhouette. They were connected. But how? The clouds raced behind the man. He stood with arms crossed, mocking her meager attempt at escape.

  She couldn't stop now and resumed her digging when her hands hit something hard. She cleared away the dirt to reveal a small black metal door. She pushed away the moist muck on it and pulled down on the handle.

  She looked once again to the top of the pit. The man had stopped grinning. He unfolded his arms and strode down the crater's steep walls. An evil scowl shadowed his face. His descent would be her death.

  She tugged down on the handle and with one strong push cracked the door open and squeezed through the opening. She found herself in complete darkness so solid she lost her balance and leaned to feel for something to brace upon. Her hands came in contact with smooth, cold walls. She ran her hands along the walls as she lurched forward through the tunnel.

  Her head knocked against the narrow sides as she stumbled along, when her body smacked into a wall of cold metal. Terrified of the blackness surrounding her, she threw herself on the metal wall looking for a way out when she felt a handle. She yanked it down fast and pushed, then shielded her eyes as she entered a room infused with an emerald green glow.