The Deaths of Me (NEW ADULT REWORK)

1. Rory's Dark Origins

There's nothing wrong with you that reincarnation won't cure.

--Jack E. Leonard

Rory scrambled, fumbling further inward to find the place where her power lay dormant. She knew it was there. It never left her. She found her power much like a cat napping in the sun, relaxed yet aware, and completely indifferent to her desperate demands.

She called to it—the fire in her veins—but much like a cat indeed, it eluded her as if sensing her weakness. She had to remain calm and tune out the darkness. She had to turn the terror to static. Cautiously, and after a few calming breaths, Rory tried again. She coaxed her power to life, finally feeling the familiar hum in her cells. Good, kitty.

She would burn the whole building down before she'd let them kill her again. This time she knew she would get out. Her wrists, upper arms, and legs were chaffed raw from her relentless struggles against the belted restraints. Just a minute longer, and she could light every cuff aflame, free herself, and escape.

A firm tsk-tsk sounded from her left as her blindfold was pulled from her face and white light flooded her vision. A man in white leaned over her. After a few seconds of rapid blinking, Rory recognized the cold dark eyes of the man who called himself her doctor. He held a personal recorder, and his gloved thumb pressed the record button.

"September 23rd, 10:08 am: Subject has shown the same signs of attempting to produce a protective flame. Indicators of her fire-summoning include feverish skin, numbness of the face, and quickened breath. As we have learned, sedatives have not been effective in the form of injection as her blood burns away the medicine almost immediately. We will administer nitrous oxide to the phoenix before initiating her third death cycle. So far, the gas has proved to be the only successful method in keeping her fire at bay."

Before she could protest, the man had switched out his recorder for a gas mask, and she had no choice but to breathe in as he pressed it firmly against her face. She yanked against the belts, hearing the clink of the metal against the hospital bed bars in echoing waves as the laughing gas forced her mind to relax. The tiny room may have meant to look like a hospital, but it was a crude farce. It was made to keep Rory disoriented and escape impossible.

A nervous young woman rushed in and squatted next to the man who called himself a doctor. Yes, Rory had seen her plenty of times. She was the appointed 'nurse'. Tendrils of dark hair had escaped from her white hood as if she'd gotten dressed in a hurry.

Her eyes flitted to Rory's face as she whispered, "Is she almost dead?"

Her voice, shrill and somehow shy, sounded like it had been dipped in molasses, carried through a makeshift toilet paper roll and string walkie-talkie, and poured into Rory's ear.

Since they'd discovered the gas, they'd used it on her liberally to keep her powers at bay. Each time it wore off, she'd tried to use her powers, but they kept sedating her. Well, she'd have to find a way around that just as soon as she was reborn.

"NO!" Rory cried out the second the mask was moved from her mouth. Her voice fell helplessly against the white walls. The effort from the shout rocked her skull in a slow-motion bounce house of vibrations. She could no longer find her voice.

The 'doctor' glanced over his shoulder at the worried nurse and shook his head. Rory choked back a whimpering gasp when she saw the nurse hand the doctor a strip of cellophane. The fluorescent light glinted off of the plastic as if it were mocking her.

"Thank you," he said. "The phoenix is prepared."

Ripples of sound and panic clashed in Rory's brain. It almost made the pain an afterthought. For the third time since being kidnapped two weeks ago, she was going to die. Rory knew it and still the urge to fight came fresh and tangible. She begged the fire inside to come to her, to rescue her, but the gas stunted her focus. Everything she'd been taught was wrong. The Council wasn't sending anyone to save her.

She'd lost track of the doctor in her desperation for escape, and as she locked eyes with the nurse, her oxygen supply was abruptly cut off. The plastic clung to her nose and mouth. The doctor's arm encircled her again and again, sealing her to her fate.

She threw herself against the restraints, gasped unsuccessfully for air. A whisper in the back of her mind reasoned that she'd be reborn. It was like a sad game. Wake up, fight for your life, lose, repeat.

Her body slumped back when she realized her fire wasn't coming. She couldn't save herself.

The doctor cut through the plastic just as the world began to fade to black. She greedily hauled in gulps of air, ignoring the burn in her lungs. The doctor and nurse hurriedly unbuckled her restraints and threw a soft, black cloak over her. The hood enveloped her in darkness, and she saw nothing until they deposited her back into her cage.

Still disoriented, Rory lunged for the door to the cage just as it shut. Her arm went through the bars, throwing her off-balance, and her shoulder twisted painfully as she fell. The doctor did nothing to examine the new injury.

Instead, he began speaking into his recorder. "September 23, 10:15 am: After administering nitrous oxide to the subject, it is undoubtedly effective in suppressing the ability to summon a flame even under extreme duress. In twelve hours, we will commence the third trial."

His gloved hand clicked another button on the tiny plastic piece, before it slipped back into his pocket.

"The third trial means you'll have to kill her," the nurse inferred as she chewed her lip.

"It wouldn't be the first time."

"Will he be pleased?"

The doctor knelt to look down sympathetically at Rory. With a sigh that held no relief, he answered, "If he's not, we'll just have to do it all over again, won't we?"