SCRATCHED

Chapter 30

Timeless, Somewhere In Nowhere.

It was like walking on a cloud with no fear of falling. Her steps were slow, each one carefully touching the floorboard, her mind still trying to believe what her eyes were seeing. Then she broke into a run, and she was in her father's arms. He looked so shiny she feared she would go through him, and she would turn around and he would be gone. She feared that this place somehow disconnected her from herself, and she wouldn't be able to cry, and the tears would become embiggening bubbles inside of her and explode. And she would be back to the nothingness, the prison where you were not caged, but given so much space you felt lost.

But no. She was in her father's arms. She could feel him. Squeeze him. Her tears were soaking his lab coat.

"I'm sorry Dad."

"It's OK, baby girl."

Their closeness to each other had an effect. They could both feel and see the objects solidifying, the colors attaining perfect sharpness. The closer they were, the truer and stronger the space became.

"Dad?"

"Yes, baby girl?"

"What is this place?"

"Somewhere in nowhere."

It sounded like the title of a book, or one of those movies where teenagers got kidnapped by an evil time master at summer camp. She wondered what it meant, and the possibility of it meaning so many things. Weren't the human race somewhere in nowhere? Stranded in space just like they were, making it a home just like they did, and knowing too little of what was outside?

"There's someone you need to see," her father said.

"Who?"

She appeared just like he had, out of nowhere, the tall beautiful woman Amy had held pictures of and cried herself to sleep. She felt it, the connection, and the space they shared breaking out of the blur, becoming complete, every bit like home.

"Mom?"

"Hello, honey."

Her smile was magnetic. Amy wanted to crush her into a long and warm hug, but she couldn't feel her legs. And when her mother walked to her father's side, she found herself taking steps back, a sad realization dawning on her.

Her voice came out cracked, like the sudden sound of the walls around them. "Dad, are you-"

"I'm here, baby girl."

"We're here," her mother said.

The place was falling apart, specks of dust falling with crumbling wood, the quakes intensifying, threatening to throw them off their feet. Her parents didn't move, but they were fading into a sudden distance, shrinking. She couldn't move again. She couldn't chase after them and give her mother that hug.

"Come home," they said.

"Mom! Dad!"

They were gone. And she was screaming. Initially, it had been because she had felt a strong probability of never seeing them again, because her father had vanished and she had lost her mother for the second time, but soon she realized it was because she felt pain, an excruciating scorch on her skin. Nowhere then everywhere. She was on the ground, rolling and kicking, the world around her falling apart.

The living room was disappearing, being sucked into the same time vacuum as her parents. First, it was the colors, then the pictures, then the furniture, and soon it was all empty. She tried to get up, to grab something, anything of her family's that she could hold onto. But it was empty, and the pain was sucking the life out of her. She heard voices shouting her name. She couldn't answer. Her eyes were closing.

It all went black.

* * *

"Amy, open your eyes! Why isn't she opening her eyes?!" Alex looked to Tianna, who was still holding the lighter. Seconds earlier when its flame was against Amy's skin they had wondered who was being tortured most, her or them? Camie couldn't bring herself to watch.

Tianna shook her head. "It only dies in its early stages. Even then it takes a few hours for a person to wake. In her case, I'm afraid this can only slow down the effects, buy her some time."

"No. No, there has to be a way! Amy, come on!" Alex cupped her face, shaking her gently.

They were in the room, all of them, not far from the creature chaos, but safe. Casper and his men would not think to look for them anytime soon. They had talked about going out to the woods, where her screams were less likely to be heard, but Tianna had warned against moving her. The poison would only spread faster. They eventually understood what she meant when the flame touched Amy's skin, when her face twisted and body shook in pain.

She had no strength to scream.

Their hands were folded and fingers crossed. They sat in silence, watching the sun diminish, just like the life in Amy's body. Camie held Jay's hand with one of hers and Amy's with the other. Tianna was grieving alone close to them and though Brandon and Alex were far enough away from each other as possible, it was hardly because they were thinking about each other.

Brandon's dry and empty eyes saw failure whenever they looked at Amy, and when they darted to Tianna and then the rest of the room, he felt suffocated. He had to do something. Anything. He would be damned if he stood and watched Amy die.

A light bulb shone above his head, and he caught her words immediately after her chapped lips uttered them. Everyone sprang. Alex placed her ear above Amy's mouth.

"I can't hear her," she said.

They were lower than whispers, and possibly at this stage, senseless babblings. But it gave them hope. Brandon heard the words only because they rhymed with his thoughts.

"Her father," he said, eyes bulging.

"What about him?" Jay asked.

"Think about it," Brandon stepped forward, "Amy said her father is rarely home these days. What kind of father would leave his daughter all alone during a Moan apocalypse?"

"He sounds like an asshole," Tianna said. Alex and Camie's eyes were glittering with realization.

"No," Camie said. "He's a pharmacologist. Graduated from Bamford at the top of his class."

"Exactly," Brandon beamed.

"So now the question is...," Jay began.

"What would the best pharmacologist in the country be doing during a Moan apocalypse?" Alex finished.

The question answered itself. "We need to get back to Woodland," Brandon said. "And fast."

"We also need to find the lab," Jay said.

"Medical Research Labs at Bamford," Camie said.

Brandon shook his head. "Pharmacology like that can't be done so out in the open."

"Right," Alex said, and Brandon felt something in his heart unclench. "So, if I was a genius badass pharmacologist willing to abandon my daughter during a real-life World of Zombies 4 to make an antidote that would eventually save the world, where would I do it?"