✅ Younger Than You Think?

"C: Terminal"

Iriña propped herself up on her elbows, and looked at her handiwork. From a dozen alphabet blocks, there were two left. And somehow she had managed to find a combination that gave the letters she needed. Admittedly, one of the 'E's was a backwards '3', and the second 'M' was a rotated 'E', but she was sure people could understand the cry for help, just as soon as they looked.

She tried flexing her muscles, to see if she was still too weak to move. She wouldn't know until she actually tried to stand up, and she didn't want to give her captors any warning. But she knew that now was her best chance of escape, while the woman – Mary? – was in the bathroom. Iriña looked up, and saw that the waiting area currently had two other people in it. Business travellers, surely. And there was a guy in uniform pushing a mop along on the edge of the area. Would any of them be able to help her, or to raise the alarm? She wasn't sure.

She shifted position slightly, confident that she was getting stronger now. But she wanted everything to be perfect before she made a move. She used both hands to fiddle with the buckle on her chest, trying to free herself from her restraints without arousing suspicion. She told herself she didn't actually need to get away; just get far enough to get someone's attention.

"Hey Seamus," Lyle grunted. The man must be Seamus then, so Iriña knew all of their names now. Not that it was much help to her. Seamus was following the teenager's pointing finger to look at the alphabet blocks.

"Are you trying to..." he started, and Iriña pushed herself up on one hand so that her body wasn't blocking his view anymore, coincidentally leaving herself in a better place to run from. He quickly scanned ten letters, and read the words aloud in a whisper. "Need my meds". Iriña could imagine the wheels spinning in his head; knowing that she was smart enough to make words even if she couldn't talk. And knowing that they'd somehow separated her from her parents without warning, he must be able to see that this was a possibility. What would he do? He could ask her what the meds were, but there certainly weren't enough letters for the answer. He would be worried, and that meant he was more likely to be careless.

"Okay," he answered. "How's your voice? It should be easier to talk if you whisper. Can you say the word?" He knelt down beside Iriña, and she resisted the urge to slap him. There was no point now.

"Faaa buuuh..." she managed, and allowed herself to cry a little. She could last a day or two without her pills, but this guy didn't know that. There was at least a chance that with an unknown medical problem, he would give up and snatch another kid.

"Volaxemir?" he guessed, and Iriña could only shake her head. But she was amazed that was the first thing that came to his mind. "Abatacept? Sulfonamides? Synapsidrel? Antihistamines? Insulin?" She just shook her head to each option. There was no way he would get close to the right answer. And the worry must have been visible in her face.

"Okay, I'll do my best to figure it out. Is this something that's going to be a problem before we get to Grandpa's house? Yes? No... I don't think it is. You're worried, not panicking. So we can probably ask you again when you can speak. But I'll do my best. You have to believe me, Kelly, we really care about you, and we don't want you to be uncomfortable if there's any way we can avoid it. So be a good girl for us, and you won't have to take another nap. Understand?"

He stood up again, and took a step or two away. Iriña just nodded. She noticed that he kicked the blocks apart as he passed, so that her words wouldn't be visible, and then got an old-fashioned flip phone out of his pocket.

"Hey, Jeremy. Wondered if you could check something for us. You remember that girl we were talking about, Irene Blake?" When she heard that Iriña clenched her teeth, and felt more frustrated to discover she couldn't even do that properly. He kept calling her Kelly, but he'd seen her real ID. The fact that he didn't even try to pronounce it right just made her so angry. "Yeah, can you check her doctors' records for me? I think she said something about a medication regimen, and I want to make sure we've got stuff in stock before she arrives. No, no I don't think so. But..."