Red

Chapter 28

Nate

I felt my consciousness return slowly, and immediately I was hit with a feeling of immense soreness. My whole chest was sore, like I had peen pricked with a thousand needles. I tried to open my eyes again, and this time they obeyed, just in time for me to see Clarissa and Mike leaving.

"Hey."

I was shocked at how quiet my voice was. I could barely hear it, so when Clarissa shouted "wait, Mike, stop!" I thought she must have some kind of super hearing. She was in a wheelchair, which I didn't understand till she turned around. Where her left leg should be there was a prosthetic metal limb.

"Nate, you're awake!" Clarissa rolled herself closer to me. "How are you feeling?"

"I'm good." As I spoke, my voice grew stronger. "Extremely sore, but good."

"Well, I would expect so." Mike walked over to us. "You just got stitches. I think you'll be sore for a while."

"Well, that explains the feeling of being stabbed by a million little needles."

Clarissa laughed. I glanced at her leg again. How long as she been like that that she can be over it? I didn't mention anything, but I guess my face said it all, because hers fell. She studied me. "What's wrong, Nate?"

"Your leg. What happened?"

"Oh, um." She stared at the wall behind me. "After we realized you were missing, I guess I passed out. Mike and his college professor Dr. Dorado brought me here, and when I woke up, it was just...there. The doctor said I would've died if they hadn't removed it, and there's not much I can do about it." The smile returned to her face. "Might as well get over it and work with it than fight it and never be able to walk again. As much as I hate the prosthetic, I hate this chair more." For emphasis, she squirmed a little. "Makes me feel helpless. I don't like it."

I rubbed my eyes. "How did you guys find me? I know it was Mike and someone else, but I don't get how it was even possible."

Clarissa looked up at her older brother. "Are you gonna explain Mike? 'Cause I really don't know, either."

"Well..." Mike looked around the room, his eyes finally settling on the window. "After I, um, called you, my friend Marley came over and kind of demanded I tell him what was going on. He really gave me no choice, so I did, and he offered to help. Honestly, I could use all the help I could get. I promised Clarissa I'd find you."

He cleared his throat. "So, we got in the car and just drove around the city for a while. We finally found the ally you were taken in; so the skid marks. Speaking of which..." He dug around in his pocket for a moment. "Oh, um, I forgot. These aren't my clothes. Anyway, we found your glasses. Thought you might like those back.

"Continuing on, after that, we headed back to Marley's place and looked for your address the old-fashioned way. I'd had a hunch you were there and ended up being right. So we looked through phone books–"

"That is really old-fashioned," Clarissa cut in. "Why didn't you ask me?"

"Because I had just gotten off the phone arguing with you."

"Oh right."

"Anyway," Mike said, glaring at his sister. I just smiled at their antics. "Marley found close to two hundred Nate Walkers in the phone book. Apparently it's a common name. To narrow it down, we just used a bit of logic and decided to try out the address farthest from town instead of calling up everyone listed. Thank God logic paid off. I don't know how much longer you could've held out. And that is basically it."