Hi there, my wonderful Sparks!
I hope you are all liking Luke’s perspective. If you are, please click that little heart button 🧡 to send me some love.
I’m sure you are itching to know exactly what happened, and especially what happened after, and how this all ties in with the friction between the boys…
Patience, patience, we’ll get there.
For now, here’s the next installment.
INDEX | Chapter 6 | Scenes 1 & 2 | Scene 3 | Scene 4 | Scene 5 & 6 | Scene 7-9 | Scene 10 | Scene 11 | Scene 12 | Next Scene →
Previously: Luke finally gets home after a month away and Logan confronts him about what exactly happened with the interrogation. After a heated argument, Luke agrees to share the details, and we get to see his perspective on the interrogation, working through the process while Elle fights desperately with all her will until she stops, and Luke tumbles headlong into a memory.
Jenina was looking up into the pale blue sky that surrounded her through eyes that were not her own.
She could see the moisture in the air, a fine vapor that sucked the warmth from one’s bones. Here and there the vapor gathered on a dust particle. Her eyes fixed on one in particular and as the droplet formed into a crystal, it fell under its own weight, growing, falling faster. The hexagonal lattice of hydrogen bonds branched into dendrites as it was hit by the wind, the points narrowing, elongating, repeating...
While Jenina watched the snowflake grow, she became aware of an army amassing on the ground. She could sense the energy building there, six distinct energy signatures, became ten, became twenty, became forty. Their collective presence grew and strengthened with intent. Their fear resonated with the freezing wind.
* * *
What is this? What just happened? This can’t be good.
* * *
Jenina could feel the reins she wasn’t holding, and the comforting warmth of her friend, Chrys’ body against her with the small sack of provisions between them as they rocketed higher with each of Starling’s powerful wingbeats at a frightening pace. The saddle beneath her was a sturdy seat, but having Chrys to hold onto made the speed easier to endure.
Jenina looked back to look at the hole she had blasted. The heat of the energy that facilitated their escape hadn’t yet dissipated, and they were already a league above the ground. thinking about the magnificent release of energy it had taken. The heat of the flames and the glorious green flash. Somewhere in the smoke, a bright fleck of energy appeared, angry and red as Korus, a concentrated beam. Jenina warned Chrys with a thought. The blast was coming straight at them! Chrys urged Starling to evade, but the young Maxillian horse had only ever had a single rider before. She was just strong enough to carry Chrys comfortably, she couldn’t maneuver well with the added weight.
* * *
“It’s Elle, she is doing this.” Luke thought while he could before getting sucked back into the memory.
* * *
Starling turned round to face the red energy as it sped towards them all, too quickly to evade completely. It hit. In reality, it only took an instant but, Jenina felt the red laser burning through flesh and bone as if it took minutes. The energy cauterized the wound as it penetrated the horse’s wing as it came forward to shield them, then went straight through her graceful head, at once filling the air with silver feathers and the stench of burned fur. Jenina felt the sensation as if it had been her own body that was run through but not the pain. That came later. When the blast finally reached Chrystelle.
Starling’s one remaining wing beat a last time, turning them over in the air as they started to fall. It hurt. Everything hurt. It hurt like Jenina’s whole body was on fire again like it was going to hurt later if she survived.
* * *
The pain shocked Luke to his senses once more. She was in pain, Jenina, even though the blast hadn’t touched her. Luke struggled to free himself, holding onto the pain like a dowsing rod to find his way back into his own mind. Why do I feel this so deeply? Why does it hurt me? This is bad… Luke thought, but it was not enough and after another second he plunged back, feeling himself falling through freezing air.
* * *
Jenina was falling. It hurt so much she couldn’t muster the strength to stop her decent. She was surrounded by a cloud of feathers and snowflakes, that twirled and eddied with the wind, and through watering eyes she watched them swirl. It was all so pretty, pretty enough to distract her.
Starling hit the ground first, compacting the snow. Chrys fell, perfectly cradled beneath the remaining wing. The blood, spattered with the impact, bright red drops on the snow. Jenina smiled despite her anguish, just before she hit beside Chrys. Pretty.
Chrystelle heaved a breath, only half filling her one remaining lung. Jenina felt the air escaping. The hole through Chrys’ body wasn’t so much a hole as a void. The flesh and bone had been blasted away. Most of the top half of Chrys was lying inside Starling’s wings. The other half hung awkwardly, twisted. Jenina looked at her friend. Barely a hand’s width of Chrys belly was left connecting her backward-facing legs to her chest.
Chrys breathed again with only half a diaphragm, ribcage expanding trying to compensate, but the air followed the easiest path and went out through the hole. Jenina crawled closer. It was an odd sensation to have her body respond when it felt like half of it had been blasted away. Chrys heaved another breath as Jenina reached her. Jenina’s whole body dripped cold sweat, the moisture freezing as it formed into little ice drops. Her hands shook as she gathered up Chrys’ top half into her arms. She was so light. One more breath.
“It’s alright, Jenina.” Chrys voice reached Jenina even though she no longer had the strength to form words with her lips. “I’m sorry this hurts so much but I’m grateful for our link. You will carry a part of me with you. Our mission can continue. You have to keep going, never give up.”
Jenina shook her head, willing Chrys to understand that it didn’t matter, that she was the one that mattered. Jenina felt her own heart beating oddly, freely, as if it no longer had anything to beat against. Blood poured into the snow.
“Chrys,” Jenina choked out the name, bearing the sting, alongside Chrystelle’s pain, without a single tear.
* * *
“No! It’s too much. Let me go!” Luke tried to call out but the words stung in his head, they broke apart and flew around his mind in circles, taunting him. They stung in his throat before he could imagine his larynx constricting around the escaping breath. The sounds stung on his lips before they could be formed. It hurt like a bad toothache. An undeniable sting. The words escaped him. All he could do was watch, and feel, as two hearts that had always beat in time got more and more out of sync.
* * *
“Run,” Chrys said soundlessly. Jenina felt their heartbeats waver. She felt the shudder as the tattered muscle inside Chrystelle’s chest squeezed the last bit of cooled blood through incomplete veins. The light in Chrys's eyes faded as they froze. And suddenly all the pain was gone.
Jenina felt only the cold.
* * *
“No! I’m not her. I’m Luke. Luke, not Jenina, not Elle. LUKE! Out! Let me out. LET ME OUT!” Luke screamed his rebellion as silently as Chrys had spoken her last word. The cold was agony. The agony was agony. He felt that girl dying as though he was the one dying. More importantly, Jenina had felt it. Elle. Jenina was Elle.
Elle’s name was Jenina.
My name is Luke.
I’m Luke, not Jenina!
Luke tried to let go of Jenina’s head. The drugs made it harder, harder to think clearly, harder to disengage. Luke struggled to pull away from the artificial bond, it felt like she was clinging to him, like she wanted to fill the void left by Chrys’ link with Luke.
He tore his mind away in bloody shreds.
* * *
Luke was aware of very little after that. There was a vague recollection of reaching his bedroom somehow, of an unwelcome visitor shouting at him. None of it mattered. His mind was in tatters. His consciousness fragmented. He didn’t know how much time was passing, or how events fitted together.
Now he was traveling, surrounded by soldiers. Now he was descending the tower staircase. Now he was back in his bedroom staring at the closed door, drooling on the bedspread.
Then he woke up in a cell.
Next Time: With Luke’s side of the story told, Logan is more aware than ever of the gaping holes and the fact that they will need to fill them in eventually. What will happen when the PG demands more? And what will happen when the boys finally have to face one another?
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and as always, I love hearing what you think so, feel free to:
OMG... Writing a violent action encounter like this has to take toll on the writer. Surely you had to envision the trauma in order to write it. I mean I felt it! How horrifying it would be for Jenina experiencing the eviseration of Chrys and Starling. Clearly Jenina and Chrys had a deep connection as virtual twins in sync as one entity that was severed with a horrific mental trauma!
And then Elle / Jenina has the single minded self control to hang on to that memory and turn it against Luke along with turning his identity perception upside down. Amazing and brilliant but what pain she put herself thru again in the process!! But clearly explains why he was almost catatonic.
And the burning question for me now is how much did Luke actually reveal to the PG while he was in custody? And yes Jenny, I loved the narrative thru Luke's perspective, very effective as a device to help put the puzzle together for this initial critical event!
I just went back and re-listened to your last three entries to make sure I had a good understanding from " Luke returns" to the present. I hate how much I love how good you have gotten at cutting off at just the right place to make me sit here tapping my toe waiting for the next release :) you are getting really good at this lady... Really good.