The Deathless Trilogy

3.15. I Will Always Find You

"Just kill me!"

The screams echo from just beyond me. I would open my eyes, but I don't want to see blood again.

"Please, kill me," the person cries again. I recognize the voice as Mitchell's.

Soldiers' boots pound against the floor beneath my head. My head. I can't tell if it's the pain or the pressure, but it feels like my brain is so full it might explode inside my skull.

"Oh my God," I hear General Kazemi say.

Celia wails fearfully, increasing the pressure in my head. Or at least, I think the pressure increases with the sound, but then I'm proven wrong. "I knew it," someone says in my head. The cadence reminds me of secrets and blood. My headband. It fell off. I desperately search for it, running my hand over the cool tiles. "You're alive Ms. Blume. I found you," the voice says inside my brain.

It's Gunther. He's in my head.

"I will always find you."

I have to get my headband on. I move my hand over the tile. Where is it?

"Lose your disruptor?" Gunther taunts from inside my brain.

My heart is pounding, and I hear him laugh. "I feel your fear, Isla. Your heart is racing."

"Help," I scream and the sound scrapes my throat.

More laughter echoes in my mind.

Someone drops at my side, panting and sniffling, and repositions the headband into place. I hear Celia repeat through tears, "It's okay. It's okay. It's okay. It's okay."

I'm not sure who she's talking to, herself or me.

I don't open my eyes, I'm still too afraid of the red, but I grip her hands over my headband.

"What happened?" someone shouts, they're voice echoing from the stairwell.

"It's okay. It's okay. It's okay. It's okay," Celia continues to repeat. Her hands shake beneath mine.

Declan answers the person in the doorway: "It's Mitchell. He killed the other prisoner Collins."

"How?" the person asks. I recognize the voice now as Winston's. "He was in a cell."

"From what we can tell, Mitchell picked the lock with a sharpened spring from the mattress. He used it to stab the guard and then to release Collins so he could slash his throat." Then Declan whispers, "General Kazemi said when she arrived, Mitchell was sitting on the ground holding the other prisoner in his lap, crying."

I hear Winston groan, and then a more familiar voice—Daniel's—shouts from the doorway, "What is Isla doing on the floor? Get her up. Come on, lift her up. They're waiting for her in the infirmary."

Winston grunts as he lifts me from the floor and deposits me into Daniel's arms. As I'm raised off the floor, my eyes fall open briefly. Blood spills from the detention center doorway like a vicious tongue licking the tiles, and the red fog returns.

All I see is red.

All I hear is red.

It consumes me. The red sinks into my heart, filling me with anger and hate.

"Close your eyes," Daniel whispers to me, hugging me close to him. "Don't look at the blood."

I shut my eyes again and as soon as he has carried me into the stairwell, I wiggle out of his arms. "I'll walk the rest of the way," I say weakly. "Just help me in case I fall."