The End of Her World

Chapter Twenty Four

Seconds after the screen had faded to black, a line of agony sheared up her torso, as her knees crumpled beneath her, and she bellowed in agony as a sparkling black haze ripped her vision into a truncated half focused state that eventually slipped into a bleary red hot strain of pain that exploded from every nerve in her back.

She writhed on the ground….

Sweat poured down her face…

Blackness.

She woke to feather down pillows propping her up on her bed. A buttery finger of light traced along her chest, covered by a simple tanktop. Her back throbbed, and her mouth was bitter tasting, and her head felt like it had just been wrapped in foil and microwaved.

Cooper sat in a chair next to her, his blond hair slicked to his forehead in a spiky wave, his head thrown back as he slept. He blinked and peered at her with sleep smeared eyes. “Hey,” he murmured, his eyes bright with worry. “You feeling okay?”

“No,” grunted Katrina. Pain throbbed on her upper and lower back tediously. “What’s wrong with me?”

“You somehow injured your spine,” replied  Cooper, his eyes dark with worry.

“I don’t care. We have to find Fade. We have to.”

Cooper observed her with turbulent, whirling eyes that resembled facets. “Even if we did, there would be no guarantee that he would be sane.” He gestured toward the kitchen where the TV that had broken Katrina’s heart lay.

Coldness welled up in Katrina, mixing with pure hatred. “I don’t care. I love him, and I have to get him back.” Her voice resembled a stone laced with hoarfrost as she added icily, “If you don’t want to help me, get the hell away from me.”

Cooper met her glare with a calm, even stare. “What am supposed to do if I don’t help you?”

“I don’t know, neither do I care. We start today,” Katrina rolled out of bed, forcing back tears of pain as her body shrieked in protest from the abuse of the last days. She unsteadily placed her feet on the ground, and stood up, ignoring her body screaming with pain. She walked forward calmly, her sanity held in place by her iron will, her pain forced aside.

“Come on,” she ordered. “We’re sparring.”

A few minutes later, Katrina and Cooper stood a rectangular pad of foam, circling each other with calm, calculating movements. His eyes were guarded,  hard like stone. The look of a trained killer, on the face of a patient student.

Lightning fast, he darted forward, hooking out a hand to ensnare Katrina. She ducked, and made a tight fist with her hand, smashing it into his jaw. They were both wearing gloves, but he still stumbled backward, and dropped into a quick roll, and popped up, a few paces away from Katrina.

He leaped up seamlessly, and his well muscled arms wrapped around Katrina throat from behind, effectively cutting off her supply of oxygen. Ducking down, she fastened her hands around his legs, and heaved upward, slamming him to the floor in a bone jarring impact. His breath whooshed out of his nose, but he refused to give up. Rushing upward, he sank a quick fist into her jaw, flooring Katrina as whiteness exploded across her vision.

Rolling to her feet stiffly, she shrugged off the pain. “You’ll do,” she acknowledged.

Cooper reached out a hand to shake. She grasped it, and lashed out a foot, sweeping him off his feet, and sprang on top of him, and sank an elbow into his throat, blocking his airflow.

“Don’t trust me.” She growled coldly, and let him up. His eyes glittered in the gloom, and he reached up, and wiped a smear of crimson off the side of his face.

“Nice work,” Cooper said calmly, meeting her cool gaze with a hot glance.

"Yeah," she accepted. "Let's go. We have work to do," she added. Cooper responded with a terse nod.

Katrina ran up the stairs, eager to quell the throbbing in her heart, and the lingering images of Fade remaining in her mind.