A New Leader

Part Thirty Two : The Shock

"You can't possibly go up there, you brought down Helios last time and nearly killed yourself." Nova following me around the house, detesting my departure.

"I have to, Birde needs help and I'm the only one who knows that." I stated, looking for my boots.

"There's gotta be someone up there who's on her side, Hyperion employees can't be that numb."

"I was that numb... times have changed since we were kids. I need to go." I finally found my shoes, resting next to the door where I usually leave them.

"This is a suicide mission." She still pestered.

"Living on Pandora and knowing that Jack is going to start mining erudium is a suicide mission, I'm going weather you'd like me to or not." I stated, regretting my harsh tone.

I grabbed my keys and heard Nova sigh, stopping me from walking out of the door. She was genuinely worried about me, she didn't trust her brother whatsoever after I told her everything that he had done. Our small adventure really set those facts in stone, I knew she had a hard time trusting him and my judgement. I turned and looked at her as her head hung in disappointment.

"I'll be ok, I've taken Jack on before and I can sure as hell do it again." I spoke, resting my hands on her shoulders.

"Just be careful, remember you were never really the hero type." She laughed a little, I pecked a kiss against her lips.

"I know, but things can change." I smiled at her before walking out of the house.

----------------------------------------------

"About forty percent done, princess." Jack looked at the device on my arm and inspected it, tapping the small bluish white tube. "By this time next week, you'll be back to normal."

He kissed my forehead before exiting our room once again, he left me alone with my thoughts constantly racing. I had become less weak to this device sucking the life out of me, I could somewhat walk around and even start to feed myself. To be completely honest, I was enjoying all of the attention Jack was giving me, its kinda like before despite the fact that he's sucking the life out of me and ruining my company.

I looked down at the device, feeling it suck on my veins and drain me. I tugged lightly at one of the tubes, watching it tug my skin back. It didn't hurt much, I continued to pull at it and watch my skin detach from it, it was almost like peeling a scab except it's a tube that inserted into my arm.

A slight buzzing came from my bed side table, making me jump and nearly rip out the tube in my arm. I geared my attention towards the table, seeing my ECHO device bringing up an unknown contact. I slowly reached over and picked it up, tapping around and bringing up the icon.

"Birde?" It was Rhys.

"R-Rhys?" My voice sounding hoarse.

"You sound horrible... is everything ok? I'm coming to see you."

"No no," I nearly yelled, feeling a strain on my throat, "I'm fine, everything is fine."

"Uh, what about Jack? He kinda took over."

"I know... he was taking my place, you remember what he said."

"Birde, don't lie to me, you're one of the most powerful people I know and there's no way you'd just hand-"

"I'm serious, it's ok."

"I'm still coming."

"Rhys, no."

He hung up, leaving me in the dust once again. I placed the device back down on the table next to me, sighing as frustration set in. A sudden shock was sent through my body, stunning me and making my body stiffen up to fall back against the bed. I knew it was Jack, hearing what had just happened between Rhys and I, knowing that what had happened between them in the past, this was not going to be good. I laid there, feeling my nerves come back and my body reset itself, I sighed and waited for Jack to come in the room and tell me that he's going to kill Rhys.

Ten minutes went by, the normal quietness settling around the room and slight voices from the other living quarters. I felt my back ache from the shock, my spine being the biggest victim of the constant pain. Twenty minutes went by, Jack was still not here, I became nervous... was he still watching me?

"J-Jack?" I asked, quietly speaking out in the room.

I knew he watched me, I found it out a few days ago when he let it slip, he knew I knew. But he didn't answer, he didn't come and I was growing worried and impatient, I sat up and pushed my aching back against the bed frame. Grabbing my ECHO back from the table and bringing up Jacks contact, sending him a message.

"Can you answer me please? Why did you shock me?" I spoke into the device, still feeling my back ache.

Twenty minutes passed and nothing, I groaned and threw the device on the ground in frustration. I stood up from the bed, feeling the pain travel from my back all the way to my feet. My body weight pushing me down to the floor and nearly smacking my face off of the wood, I groaned once again and tried to pull myself up. My heart raced as I was finally back on my feet, I hastily walked out of the bedroom and through the little home, having not seen this area for days.

I pushed open the front door and saw the small hallway with other doors surrounding me, no one walking around what so ever. I closed the door behind me, slowly making my way towards Jacks office and figuring out what was going on.