The Ascent

Chapter 44

Jasmine felt like a trapped animal as they stepped into a regular-looking laboratory. There was just something about their situation... a nagging feeling that things could go horribly wrong at any moment. That something would hurt them. That there was pain and suffering in their future.

It was quite a foreboding feeling that Jasmine couldn't do anything about.

"We'll take out your blood now," Melissa said as they entered a smaller inner room filled with syringes, vials, and other instruments that didn't instill confidence in Jasmine.

Hearing that, Ariyana hid behind Jasmine with the speed of light, making it clear she didn't like the idea the slightest bit. It was an expected reaction from a small child who, to top it all off, was scared, and Jasmine couldn't help but feel the same way. She didn't want to have her blood taken even though she knew that was the easiest way to prove that they weren't a danger to them, the simplest way to secure the help of the strange little band of humans who seemed to know more about what was going on than they let on.

"You don't like having your blood taken?" Jasmine asked gently, crouching next to Ariyana, facing the scared girl, feeling like an idiot for even asking such an obvious question.

Ariyana shook her head vigorously, her hands quivering violently.

Jasmine didn't blame her for being terrified because she felt more or less the same for many different reasons. However, being an adult had taught her how to lie, to pretend she had no fear when all she wanted to do was hide under her favorite blanket and never come out. Yet, being a grown-up meant recognizing your fears but still facing them head-on, or at least that was what Jasmine believed wholeheartedly.

"How about this," Jasmine said, thinking about when she was a child and what tricks might have worked on her. "She'll take out my blood first, and you'll see how easy it is. Then, after you're done, you can enjoy this candy I always carry with me."

The candy was only used for cases of dire emergency when Jasmine's sugar levels were low. However, it seemed this was also an emergency, only of a different kind.

"Okay," Ariyana whispered, barely audibly.

"Do we have a deal?" Jasmine asked, looking for a definite yes.

"Yes," Ariyana said reluctantly. "It's a deal."

"Alright, sit here, please, and give me your right hand," Melissa said calmly, like what had happened to the world could never change who she was at the core.

Jasmine sat on the hospital bed as she was told and offered her hand as instructed. The whole process was made more difficult by her odd compulsion to snatch her hand away and run off into the sunset, but she managed to control her instincts.

"Your veins are so bad," Melissa muttered after another unsuccessful attempt to find a vein, her face scrunched up in the strangest combination of annoyance and what looked oddly similar to fear.

Jasmine, on her part, was getting annoyed by Melissa's incompetence, especially since Ariyana was standing there watching the process, fluttering like a leaf in the wind that threatened to pull it off at any moment and carry it far away, never to be found again. After all, Jasmine had promised her a smooth sailing, and it was anything but.

"Okay, done," Melissa said, her voice shaky.

While Jasmine was worrying about Ariyana, Melissa had finally finished her task. However, she didn't look too happy about it. Jasmine chalked it up to Melissa's embarrassment about being unable to do such a simple task efficiently. Still, a small part of Jasmine doubted her own assessment.

"Okay, your turn," Melissa said, addressing Ariyana with fake cheerfulness that even Jasmine found creepy.

Something was clearly off, but Jasmine couldn't tell what it was. Thus, following orders sounded like the best thing to do. At least until she had things figured out.

However, upon hearing Melissa's fake kindness substituted with even more artificial sweetness, Ariyana took a step back instead of a step forward.

"It's okay, Ariyana," Jasmine said, hoping she was doing the right thing. "You sit up here and give your hand to the nice doctor. I'll hold your other hand to make sure everything is alright. Okay?"

"I want my daddy!" Ariyana screamed through tears.

"I know you do, and the sooner we finish this, the sooner you'll get to see him," Jasmine said, hoping she was telling the truth. "Then, you can hug him so tight that his bones break."

"I don't want to break his bones," Ariyana said, sniveling loudly. "I'll just hold on to him tightly and never let him go."

Once she hopped onto the bed, Jasmine kept her promise, holding the girl's hand, never letting go, not even when she squeezed her hand so hard that Jasmine wondered if her bones were about to be shattered.

Once Melissa was done, Ariyana looked so pale that Jasmine immediately started fumbling through her pockets to find the candy. Her logic was that the girl was about to faint because of blood loss, forgetting that something like that rarely happened when the amount taken out was so small.

Jasmine realized that something else was at play only when Ariyana started to shake uncontrollably. To her untrained eye, it looked like an epilepsy seizure, but from the way Melissa panicked, she could tell it was something far worse.

"Code red! We have code red in here!" Melissa's voice beamed from the speakers for everyone to hear, even before Jasmine could figure out what she was doing next to a paper-cluttered desk.

Confused, Jasmine didn't even have the time to try to protect the little girl she had solemnly sworn to safeguard before two massive men entered the room in a hurry and proceeded to inject Ariyana with something.

"No!" Jasmine shrieked, trying to stop them, but it was too late; her instincts were too dulled from the shock, and she failed to stop them.

"It's okay," Melissa said reassuringly but cautiously like Jasmine was a poisonous snake that could strike any moment. "It's just a mild sedative. Some of these things react violently to extraction, and this one seems to have already started the activation process. So, we had to put it to sleep, and the girl as well."

"Extraction?" Jasmine asked, her head still spinning.

It never stopped turning in circles since that day when the whole world stopped still and disappeared.

Still, the word sedative was the only one that Jasmine managed to understand for the time being, a word that gave her some comfort.

"What are you doing to my daughter?" A furious voice bellowed through the door, followed by a struggling Asher whom two burly men were trying to stop but were failing miserably.

He had gotten in the exact moment one of the guys who brought the sedative was turning Ariyana's limp body to the side.

"And you?" Asher said, his furious glare turning to Jasmine once he noticed her standing there stunned. "You were supposed to protect her! I trusted you!"

The words stung because he believed her capable of betrayal, but she couldn't blame him. It did look bad, especially from his point of view.

"She was infected," Melissa's words cut through the chaos once it was plain to see that brute force couldn't stop the righteous anger of a worried father.

Asher stopped struggling and suddenly went so still that Jasmine started worrying about him. Then what was said settled in her mind, and fear reigned her mindscape. Any coherent thought was lost in it.

"Infected with what?" Asher managed to spit out through clenched teeth.

"Alien parasites," Melissa said matter-of-factly. "We are about to do an emergency extraction as the parasite has become violently active. Thus, its probability of killing her increased."

A blanket of silence covered the room.

Nothing could be heard but hearts frantically beating.

Life or death was in the balance.