Only Human

Chapter Nine

It turned out that waking up a sleeping human was difficult.

"Liam," I said, "Liam!"

He didn't move, or even stop snoring.

"Liam, wake up," I said, "Hello? Wake up!"

Nothing.

I punched him in the shoulder. He bolted upright, his head hitting mine.

"Ow," he muttered, "What was that for?"

I resisted the urge to punch him again. So this was why humans were so violent. It was almost terrifying how fun it was.

"We need to get moving," I stated, "The City isn't that far away."

He took a look at the clouds, "Storm coming. If we get caught in the rubble when lightning strikes, we're toast. No pun intended."

"We can make it before the storm hits," I replied.

Lightning hit a piece of metal not far away. The resulting small explosion made me reconsider.

"Come on," Liam said, "There's barely any metal here," he patted the concrete, "So we'll be fine."

"Alright," I reply, "But I need to take a look at that arm."

Liam looked down to the blood coating his left arm, "I guess I landed on it."

I lifted his sleeve and started carefully cleaning the entire wound. It was a large one, but the blood spread had made it seem bigger.

When I bandaged it, I asked, "Can you lift your arm?"

He did it with a horribly pained expression on his face.

I sighed, "It should get better. But be careful and try not to keep tearing yourself open. I'm not always going to be there to fix you."

"Yes, doc," Liam replied.

"What do we do until the storm lifts?" I asked.

He shrugged, "Do you have a set of cards with you?"

"Why would I have a deck of cards?"

"Ha!" He shouted as if it were a great victory, "So you have cards in the City?"

I nodded, "I've never played."

Liam desperately tried to explain the rules of a game called crazy eights to me, but I couldn't picture it without the cards.

He eventually gave up.

"Who was Lily?" Liam randomly asked.

I flinched instinctively. No one ever mentioned Lily around me unless they wanted to make me pay for it.

"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have asked," Liam said.

"No, it's fine," I replied, "Lily Winters was like Elissa. Two years ago, she walked into my office with her arm nearly falling off and asked me to help her."

I took a deep breath and leaned back to continue, "I asked her why me, and she just said because she'd seen I was the best. So I took her into the clinic after hours and I started to work on her arm."

"There was blood everywhere. We had no painkillers left, or anesthetic, or sedatives, so she was awake the entire time. I kept trying to carefully remove her arm. When I finally finished, she was crying. She asked for something to eat."

Liam frowned, "But she survived."

"I went to the refrigerator and grabbed a sandwich, which was supposed to be my lunch. She ate it in two bites, thanked me, and left."

Liam was still confused.

"The next day, I was called down to the morgue to see why a patient had died. It was Lily Winters. She had a severe nut allergy, and I killed her. She should've survived and I killed her."

I started rambling nonsense, and Liam leaned over to wipe a tear off my cheek. I hadn't realized I'd been crying, but then I couldn't stop.

I had never told anyone about Lily. She was my ghost, my shadow, and she followed me around everywhere.

Now that he knew, I was afraid he'd hate me or stop me from helping Elissa, who had a remarkably similar injury.

But he didn't.

He stood up. He walked over to me. He sat down next to me. And he gave me a hug.

I don't know how long we sat there. All I knew was that one second, I was a crying, broken mess, and the next, something exploded.

My ears wouldn't stop ringing. My mind was spinning. Something hurt. Everything hurt.

I slowly rolled onto my side and coughed smoke out of my lungs. Lightning. Lightning struck the overhang.

My vision was blurry, and my eyes stung with smoke and tears. Liam. Where was Liam?

I couldn't move. I tried to crawl, but my leg was pinned. I looked at it. No visible tears in the skin. But as I felt around my shin bone, I realized there was definitely a broken bone. I took a deep breath and pulled.

Nothing happened.

No. No, this wouldn't be how I died.

Not alone. Not in the dark.

Not like this.

But with nothing else to do, I let the tears run. I cried for Lily, for Elissa, for Liam, for Marcus and Taylor, and for myself. When my head finally cleared and I had no tears left to cry, I started humming.

It was a haunting version of the song I had sung for Elissa before we left. Elissa. Her arm would be getting worse. She could be dead.

She was not dead.

I would get back to her in time.

I took a deep breath.

Don't you dare look out the window,

darling everything's on fire.

The smoke nearly became too much. I had to finish the song. Just one last song.

The war outside our door keeps raging on.

Lightning struck again. And again. I sung louder.

Hold on to this lullaby,

even when the music's gone.

The song was leaving. The ringing in my ears was deafening. Just one last chorus.

Gone.

Was Liam alright? He survived the strike. He had to have survived.

Just close your eyes,

the sun is going down.

I couldn't see the sun. One last sunset would have been nice.

You'll be alright,

no one can hurt you now.

The pain in my leg dulled. My eyes strained to stay open.

Come morning light,

A silhouette appeared in the smoke, moving towards me.

you and I'll be safe and sound.

The figure joined in.

Is this what death feels like? The music's gone.

The figure pulled the boulder off my leg. Was it an angel or a demon?

Safe and sound...

Was it really a world without pain beyond death?

Even when the music's gone...

Did I really just need to let go?

Just close your eyes...

My eyes were so heavy.

Safe and sound...

I closed my eyes and let go.