Time Seizure

Chapter 5 - The Source of Her Powers

Any familiarity of her surroundings was now lost to Max as she found herself falling through a never-ending rabbit hole, while strobes blasted like cannon-fire from every direction. Her whole body, arms, legs, and even her neck, stretched like gum and flexed like a pretzel. Her limbs twisting in such angles should have brought her the excruciating pain of her bones fragmenting, or tenderizing. Yet, she could only register the sensation as much as rubber with electricity.

With the piece of her sanity that still lingered, she imagined this force, this friction, stretching her out into an incredibly long spaghetti, or perhaps even a string tight enough to fasten on a guitar. Bizarrely enough, the physical numbness made this unusual circumstance somewhat relaxing, assuming there was a bottom to this pit, to which she would find out in a couple of seconds.

She was faced-up when her back met the bottom with the thud of a sinking pebble meeting the riverbed, followed by her head; it was neither painful nor pleasant, but nonetheless preferable to what she expected. Her neck and limbs retracted instantaneously, snapping her head, hands, feet, and all other joints back in their right places.

Fatigued, Max drew her eyes shut to pass out as she conjured the blue butterfly again, its wings fanning with grace, with simplicity... with liberty... tranquillity.

*****

In a matter of time, the hipster's surrogate family could feel her fit easing down in their bracing arms. When it relented, they could at last release some of the tension that hardened their lungs. Chloe studied her nerd friend closely, detailing her oiled forehead, her pale sunken cheeks, her beaded lashes, and the steady motion of her chest rising and receding like waves lapping at a shore during a golden hour as she now laid unresponsive, yet alive... barely. Her bleeding stopped too, at least it seemed.

A closer inspection, however, brought the punk's waning concern to the stirring motion beneath the teen's eyelids, shifting it back to the opposite process. Whatever could be going on in her conscious after that trigger just now, Chloe could only hope was more lenient than the odds she pondered over.

Lacing her nails through her bear-brown hairline, Chloe inched her lips towards her chapped ones. "Hang in there, Super Max." She cooed.

"Your family is right here, baby." Her mother joined in, raising Max's hand to her longing heart while she hooked and arm around her husband's. "Me, Chloe, and David."

Watching these two women lodged an ache deep within the vet's thick exterior; David wished so badly to come up with any comforting words of his own to offer them all, but his tongue remained tucked. All he could do was look on in pity, envy, and admiration.

Shortly, a heedful finger found its way onto Chloe's shoulder and prodded her lightly.

"What?" She spat, whirling to see that it was Kate.

"I think you need to see this." Kate never really knew this punk bluenette, nor Rachel, but she knew from observation that they were close outside of Blackwell.

From the way this girl had her fixed her stare to the outside through the windows, Chloe decided to take her word for it. Blowing out her annoyance, she lowered Max with the level of care she would give to a baby and rose to see for herself what everyone was so transfixed on.

The very moment she caught her own glimpse of the mysterious glowing figure, and the face, her heart stopped, ice showering her body.

"No... No fucking way..."

Shaking in denial, she threw herself against the glass window nearest to her, blinking rapidly as to be sure she wasn't hallucinating, because her eyes had to be playing tricks. There was absolutely no way this was Rachel; last time they found her, her rotting corpse was wrapped in a bag, buried in their junkyard; Max was right there beside her, and despite the stench, Chloe recognized its scent as hers alone.