Leora realized the futility of resisting and raised her hands while she walked back to the room she’d escaped, looking for another opportunity to try again, but without finding any. When she’d gone back in the room, Elias closed the door behind her and she heard him lock it, leaving her shut in. No escape.
A few minutes later, she heard him unlock the door, and the man entered pointing his gun and with a bunch of rope in his other hand. He threw it at the foot of the bed and told her to lie down.
She reluctantly obeyed, but when she saw him pull a syringe out of his pocket, she sat up, alarmed.
“What is that?”
“Considering your lack of cooperation, I’m not going to risk it with you again. You’re going to sleep for a little while, while I tie you up.”
Leora held her belly.
“Don’t inject me...”
“Shh...it’s just a little and you’ll sleep for a while.”
“I’m pregnant. Please.”
Elias raised his eyebrows, surprised.
“Well, we’ll have to do something about that, love. It’s my children I want you to have, not who knows whose children,” he muttered frowning, as he approached her, pointing at her belly now.
Oh, God, this guy is completely crazy. “Alexis, where are you?” Leora thought in desperation, but she knew that he couldn’t hear her from the city. She was alone.
“If you kill me, you won’t be able to have children,” she tried to reason with him.
“Ah, but if you were there, there must be other women out there, love, so if you won’t serve me, I don’t see why I should keep you alive. I’m not going to spend my life fighting with you. We haven’t had much of a chance to talk, I realize. You need to know I expect you to do exactly what I tell you and for you to dedicate yourself to only serving me. I understand that you could be tempted to fight but look, it’s simple...it’s the law of the strongest, and guess who that is,” he said facetiously, while he injected the contents of the syringe in a second, with one hand, while continuing to point the gun at her with the other.
“No, you don’t know what you’re doing, please,” mumbled Leora, feeling desperate when her mouth went dry and she felt nauseated.
Elias just smiled while he looked at her as if she were an ant under a magnifying glass under the sun. Like the ant that got burned up, everything went black for Leora.
THE SEARCH
Negro River, December 27, 2027. 1:00 p.m.
In exactly fifteen minutes, Alexis showed up in the control center. He’d put on work clothes, work boots, and his belt with his Atlantean sword on one side and his weapon on the other, as well as various chargers.
“You look prepared for anything,” commented Sofía, who had just come in, too.
Alexis’ mouth dropped open when he saw her in short Bermuda shorts, a tight short-sleeved khaki shirt, mountain boots and a belt with weapons. He couldn’t help but let out a whistle. Sofía had grown rapidly since he’d seen her for the first time. What was unsettling was that physically she looked more and more like the Gea he’d known.
“Why did you change? Are you expecting someone to attack us here?”
“Of course not, I’m going with you.”
Alexis opened his mouth to protest and then closed it. Whether it was Sofía with Gea’s jewels or Gea herself who wanted to go with him, in reality her power could help him.
“Very well, let’s go,” he conceded, heading towards the exit and running into Damaris. He raised an eyebrow seeing that she had changed, too, into similar attire with similar equipment as Sofía.
“And where are you going?”
“With you, of course. I’m not leaving Sofía.”
“This is ridiculous, we’ll be a crowd, if there’s someone out there they’ll hear us coming. And someone needs to stay here.”
“I’ll stay,” offered Althaea, who also arrived just then.
Alexis grunted, but he saw that they were both ready, so he gave up. Sofía offered him one of the backpacks she was carrying.
She saw his questioning face, and said:
“Food, juices, more chargers, communicators, more weapons, batteries, dry clothes, police and military lanterns.”
Alexis took his and put it on his back like them, and they left to find the vehicle.
When they arrived at the wharf from which Leora had left, they got out and studied the terrain.
“We don’t have any way of knowing where Leora got to,” Damaris hesitated, worried.
“You still can’t detect her?” Alexis asked Sofía.
“Nothing,” she answered, looking worriedly at the storm that was on top of them. Lightning crisscrossed the sky and an odd lightning bolt fell every few seconds in the nearby fields. The wind lowered the temperature and they could smell the humidity in the air.
“Does the storm scare you?”
“I’m not afraid of the stupid storm, I’m worried that the rain will erase any traces that could help us. We need to hurry,” Sofía indicated.
“How do we do this? The route moves away from the river, we could pass by without seeing where she is,” Damaris observed.
“We need to go up the coast,” Alexis indicated and started trotting up the river bank. He adjusted his vision, activating his nanites to see clearly in the dark. Sofía and Damaris did the same and followed him.
After jogging for a few minutes, they got to the small dock with the boat that Alexis had remembered.
“Shall we go in the boat?” asked Sofía.
“No, in the current we could miss some clues,” answered Alexis.
“Then it would be best that each one of us take a bank and one go in the boat. I’ll cross over in the boat and go up the other bank. Carry your radio in hand,” ordered Sofía.
“Okay, I’ll stay on this side,” agreed Alexis, relieved. In spite of his experience, it hadn’t occurred to him to go up the other side. They could have lost some detail that was there.
“In that case, that leaves me in charge of the boat, let’s go,” indicated Damaris, heading towards Sofía.
Damaris took Sofía to the other side. The river was more than three hundred feet wide at that point.
“Can you hear me, Alexis?” Sofía checked in by radio.
“Loud and clear. Let’s go,” he answered. They started jogging.
They trotted along for more than an hour, without finding anything. Alexis and Sofia both had to go into the water more than once, sometimes up to their waists, when the shore disappeared, either from small natural cliffs, buildings, or some other small accident that made the shore impassible.
Sofía was going up the left bank, when she saw a glow. She stopped and adjusted her vision. In the dark she couldn’t see anything, but with infrared she saw a hot zone. She pointed her police flashlight and a powerful beam of white light illuminated the area. She immediately shone it towards Damaris and Alexis.
“Did you find something?” she heard Alexis say by radio.
“The remains of a fire. And footprints. Damn, Leora’s boat is further up. Tell Damaris to bring you over, there’s no doubt she got out here.”
“I’m already there.”
In less than two minutes, Damaris and Alexis arrived on her side of the river. Sofía kept examining the area when suddenly she found something.
“Oh, shit,” she exclaimed without meaning to.
Damaris and Alexis ran to her and they could see what she’d found. Traces of blood. Footprints in the sand, that clearly showed someone had dragged something, taking it to...a vehicle. Without saying a word, the three started running, following the tire tracks and then it started to rain.
The storm had been threatening for hours and when the front finally arrived, it was a downpour as if they had been submerged underwater. It was hard to breathe with so much water falling. The road flooded fast and they had to slow down, and continued walking until they stopped.
“The prints,” Damaris observed.
The tire p
rints had been effectively erased by all the water.
“Let’s follow where they were going,” Alexis said, returning to the road slowly, while he got some provisions out of the backpack, taking care that no water got in. Sofía and Damaris did the same and they ate as they walked slowly, trying to discover anything.
After about fifteen minutes of walking blindly, they had a stroke of luck. Under an area of trees, the tracks hadn’t been erased and they could see how they went off to a side on a narrow path between the trees. They started to run again until they had to stop. The tracks abruptly disappeared. Alexis studied the ground carefully and could see that the vehicle had been parked before going on. A moment before the water erased them, he could see tracks going around the side of a thicket. He ran towards it and almost tripped over a wire at ground level. He gestured to the women so they’d see it and looked around carefully. There were several traps in the area, the wire was only one of them. They carefully advanced a little more until they found what they were looking for—a well camouflaged entrance, in the ground. The entrance to a bunker.
Alexis tried to open the door, which looked armored, but it was locked. His veins popped out from the effort, but the door didn’t move an inch. He pulled out his sword, exasperated, but Sofía stopped him.
“Wait a minute,” she said while she supported her hands on either side of the lock. Her jewels lit up and she could see its internal mechanism. The lock was mechanical and there was no way to open it without the key. Sofía grunted in frustration.
“Lend me your sword for a minute,” she asked Alexis who grudgingly handed it over.
“To break the door, I think that I really have more experience...” he started to say but Sofía didn’t hit the door. Instead she made a cut in her hand, wincing in pain. The golden blood started to flow, quickly helping the wound to close, while she concentrated.
The nanites from Sofía’s blood dispersed through the mechanism and when they reached key places, she gave them instructions to transform. The nanites took on the chemical elements of Sofía’s blood and the carbon from the metal alloy of the locks, and transformed the metal into powder. The whole process took a few seconds. Sofía retrieved her nanites and closed her injured hand.
“Open the door,” she ordered Alexis, losing her balance, weakened. Damaris held her up while she gave her a drink from the backpack to recover.
Alexis looked at her doubtfully but pulled on the handle. The door opened with no resistance, leaving a little cloud of dust at the edges. They immediately entered the bunker, one after the other.
The place was large, but they went through it in less than a minute. They found rooms with provisions, bathrooms, kitchen, bedrooms...but they didn’t find anyone.
Leora woke up little by little, felt that her mouth was dry and her head still hurt. When she tried to move, she found she was tied up again. But this time, it was what seemed like an operating table, in a hospital room. The room was small but had electricity.
“Oh, dear, I didn’t think you’d wake up yet. Would you rather go back to sleep?”
“What the hell...” Leora found herself on a birthing table. She was completely tied down, with strips of cable every few inches—her torso, her whole arms, her legs up to her ankles, and her head. She was completely immobilized.
She was covered with sheet, but felt cold and realized he’d taken off her clothes.
“No, stop, what are you doing?” she asked, feeling desperate.
“Don’t worry, please, just relax. I don’t want to hurt you, as you’re imagining. I just want to get that shit out of your belly, so that later you can dedicate yourself to me without inconveniences.”
Panic gripped Leora.
“It’s a complex procedure, if you do it wrong you’ll make me bleed out...”
“Oh, please, there’s no chance I’ll do it badly. I read all about it. I’m self-taught, you know, dear? You’ll see it will be very good to live with me. I’m a genius. Now, this thing you have is very small, from what I saw with the ultrasound. I thought I might make a cut in the belly, but after seeing it well, I’d better do it vaginally.”
Leora gave in to the panic and screamed while she tried to break the cables, but only managed to hurt herself tightening them. Desperate, she started to cry. She couldn’t move an inch, and was completely at the mercy of this crazy person.
Alexis, Sofía and Damaris were going through the few papers and maps that they’d found in one of the rooms of the bunker, that seemed like an office, when Sofía suddenly stood up.
“It’s Leora,” she exclaimed, as if she had heard her.
“Where?” asked Alexis, startled.
“Follow me!” shouted Sofía, taking off running, first out of the bunker and then running through the forest.
“Sofía, what’s going on? Where is Leora?” she felt Alexis asking her using mental communication so as to not waste breath, and besides she probably couldn’t have heard him. They were running at twenty-five miles an hour and he almost couldn’t catch up to her.
“Ahead of us in a straight line, I could hear her...she’s in deep trouble. She screamed in panic,” Alexis and Damaris heard.
They ran a few minutes, until they could see some small houses. They kept on until they got to what seemed to be the center of the little village, where there was a small health center.
“She’s there,” pointed Sofía, without slowing down.
“You think I should use anesthesia, dear?” he asked her, concentrating on what he was doing. He had introduced a speculum between her legs that hurt her and he was moving around a medical light to illuminate another instrument, that looked like a hook, introducing it into her.
“Alexis, save it, for the love of God,” thought Leora with all her strength, crying, but knowing it was too late. Her wrists and ankles were bleeding from the force that she’d used, but she couldn’t break the cables. Nor could she close her legs or do anything to stop Elias.
“Open your eyes, Leora, and show me where you are,” she suddenly heard Sofía in her mind.
Leora’s heart jumped.
“Sofía, where are you?” she thought, trying to force her eyes open and look around at everything around her.
“We’re coming,” Sofía answered.
“If you’re going to be that tense, I have to sedate you, dear, you’re doing damage and I told you I don’t want to do that,” grunted Elias, while he gave her another injection.
“No, no, no, no, no,” sobbed Leora, but she couldn’t keep him from injecting her in the arm, in the same way she couldn’t stop him from doing anything else he’d done up until then.
Elias waited a minute, until he saw her lids getting heavy, then smiled and bent over the instruments inside of her again. Leora tried to keep her eyes open, desperate, but it was harder and harder to do. Suddenly, the door slammed open and before he could even react, Leora saw a movement as fast as lightning and suddenly half of Elias, from his left shoulder to his right side, fell to one side, while the rest of his body fell to the other. When Elias collapsed, Leora could see Alexis’ sword dripping blood. In one fell swoop, he had cut him in two. Leora couldn’t see anything else.
STORM
Negro River, December 27, 2027. 6:00 a.m.
Elias’ body was still moving and the head, on what remained of the middle of the body, even seemed to be trying to say something, while blood gushed in all directions. Alexis, disgusted, kicked him away as he passed.
“By Gea,” exclaimed Damaris entering the room behind Alexis and Sofía.
“I’m here,” said Sofía, while Alexis cut away the cables that held Leora with his sword.
Damaris looked at her surprised, but she recovered and headed towards Leora’s head while Sofía went to one side, trying not to interfere with Alexis.
Damaris opened one of Leora’s eyes and saw that she was unconscious, while Sofía got the speculum out of Leora. The hook had been in Elias’ hand and was covered with blood. Sofía h
eld her hand against Leora’s belly and concentrated.
Alexis finished freeing her and looked at Sofía anxiously.
“Talk to me,” asked Alexis, at the same time not wanting her to.
“The embryo is still embedded, but there’s extensive damage next to it. A centimeter to the right and it wouldn’t exist now. But the lesion is serious, we’ll have to repair it urgently or the reaction of her organism will expel the embryo when Leora wakes up. The tissue is damaged. It’s inflamed and it will react against the embryo. She needs cellular regeneration, antibiotics, sedatives, and probably psychological treatment. And the first part before waking up,” said Sofía, worried.
“Why before waking up?”
“While she’s unconscious she’s relaxed—when she wakes up she’s going to tense up from the pain and the panic, and that tension would be enough to finish detaching the embryo. It’s hanging by a thread.”
“How long will the injection he gave her last?” asked Alexis.
Sofía concentrated again.
“I’d say a couple of hours, maximum, analyzing her blood.”
“You can’t cure her?”
Sofía examined Leora’s insides and the deeper she went, the angrier she became.
“Damned bastard. No, I can’t repair that much damage without nanites. Not only would she lose the embryo, there would be permanent damage to the uterus.”
“Without nanites? You said without nanites?” stressed Alexis, desperate.
“Nanites could repair this. But that would transform her into one of us, of course.”
“Well, do it.”
“You can’t do that without asking her, Alexis,” answered Sofía, crossing her arms.
“You just said, when she wakes up, it will be too late.”
“You know that it can only be done in special cases and if it’s a question of life or death.”
“Like when they used them on you, Sofía,” Alexis said, frowning.
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