FLOOD

Call of the Ocean

The brothers stayed like that for a few seconds more, both staring down at their grandfather, both of their faces white and drawn. Then Eli collapsed to one knee, raising one trembling hand to his face, touching the blood on his cheek.

I wanted to launch myself off the table, to run to him, but my body was buzzing with pins and needles, just starting to wake up. My blood just starting to pump through my body to wake my joints back up. I struggled to sit up, elbows knocking the metal table.

Cain was at his brother's side now, and surprisingly, he hooked both arms under Eli's armpits, helping him up, dragging him back over to the chair he'd been sitting in. "Eli? Hold on." There was a rending sound as Cain tore the bottom of his shirt, already ripped from the fight with his grandfather. "Hold this to the wound, apply pressure."

Eli mumbled something and gestured vaguely in my direction, his brows drawing down low, and Cain turned around and spotted me trying to sit up. "She'll be fine. Just sluggish for the next little while."

There was more hammering somewhere in the building, and Cain's head jerked up. "We have to get out of here, now."

I managed to sit up fully now, though the room spun a little bit at first, but I managed to stave off the dizziness with a deep, even breath. I didn't trust myself to speak yet, but Eli said what I was thinking.

"Those are our...her soldiers...it's fine."

"No, it's not fine." Cain darted another look over his shoulder, and his eyes locked on my face. "We have to get her out of here, somewhere safe."

What the hell is he talking about? 

The look on his face, the way his eyes glittered, I was pretty sure he wasn't concerned for my safety. Not really. It made me want to run, but I couldn't even stand up properly, not yet. My feet touched the floor, one at a time, and my knees nearly buckled. I braced myself on the table top with both hands. Finally I managed to grit words out, though the inside of my mouth felt like it was coated with dust. "We'll be safe when the king and queen come."

Cain turned back to Eli, gripping his shoulder. "We have to get her somewhere else, away from them."

Eli's face went dark. "What are you talking about."

"Just you and me and her, somewhere safe. Somewhere we can study the results of the tests. The vault. Grandfather talked about it...we can go underground-"

Eli sat up straighter, and then flinched, his hand flying up to the rag Cain held against his face. "What? What the hell are you talking about?"

Cain's mouth twitched downwards, the slightest bit, and he kept darting looks over his shoulder at me. I wasn't sure if he was afraid I was going to gain my movement back and run for it, or if he was afraid of my reaction to all this. Right now I longed to throttle him, but I had to concentrate all my effort on standing.

The feeling in my legs had come back, that was a good start.

"I didn't like the way Grandfather did things, I think he snapped towards the end. And banning you was never my choice." Cain's voice broke. It almost sounded like he was pleading. "But we can't throw this all away. What happened to Vee was amazing, scientific leaps and bounds the world has never seen before. The implications of our work with—"

"She is not a science experiment." Eli's voice was a snarl, and he shoved Cain's hand away from his wound. The gash in his head began to seep blood again. "You stay away from her. Get out of here."

I could only see Cain's back, but his entire body went tense. "I'm...I can't...not after what happened to our family. Not when we're so close to a cure."