The Call of the Others

Chapter 6

Martin was pacing and frantically eating an orange popsicle when Charles, Preston, Joe, and Alice arrived at the hospital.

"Martin? What are you doing?" Charles asked.

"I'm freaking out, man! I'M FREAKING OUT!!!!!" he said, waving around his popsicle around.

Charles held up his hands protectively. "Calm down, dude."

Joe elbowed him. "Be nice. He had to see it all," he muttered discreetly.

"I thought you hated popsicles," Preston said, pointing to the frozen treat.

"I do!" Martin wailed, tears streaming down his cheeks. Thrusting the orange popsicle down and creating an orange puddle, he wailed, "And it tastes so bad!!!"

Alice stayed with Martin outside to calm him down as the guys went in to see Cary.

"Martin is crying outside about an orange popsicle," Joe said, jerking a thumb to the door.

"I know," said (much to their surprise) Cassandra, sitting on the side of Cary's bed, toying with a handkerchief that was tied up into a pouch with two knots. "I gave it to him to calm him down. The poor kid's scared out of his wits."

Cary was laying on the bed, his whole right leg in a cast, suspended in the air by a metal frame.

Glancing from the guys to Cary, Cassandra got up and said, clasping her hands together, "Well, I guess I'd better be going, then. Feel better." With that she dumped the handkerchief on the small table by his bed and left, saying bye to all the boys on her way out.

"Sure took you guys long enough to show up!" Cary said when the door closed with a bang. "Cassandra-CASSANDRA-came before you."

"Sorry, we just found out this morning," Joe explained.

"Wait-what's in the handkerchief?" Charles asked, eyeing it suspiciously.

Cary opened it with great difficulty, showing the brace on his arm. "Chocolate. And NO, you can't have any."

Joe swore he saw Charles licking his lips when he saw the glistening wrappers. He was so fat sometimes. No, this was Cassandra's stupid power of suggestion. Just like with Alice. No. Bad Joe. Don't be bad, be good.

"When are you going to be better?" Preston asked, staring at the brace.

Mouth full of chocolate, Cary said, "Ah dolb oh." (Translation: I don't know.) Swallowing, "Maybe in, like, a year. All I know is I feel like crap."

"Sorry," Preston tried. Then, looking around at them, asked, "Is Cassandra really that bad?"

"YES!!! The only person who likes her is you!" Cary shouted.

"And Joe!" Preston said defensively. "And she gave you chocolate, Cary. Come on."

"You like her?" Charles asked, eyeing Joe suspiciously.

"Who...Who do you like?" Alice asked, entering the room.

"Cassandra," Charles and Cary said in unison.

"I don't! Not like that, not like anything!" Seeing their skeptical faces, he added, "Just like a human being. A. HUMAN. BEING. That is all, that is all it will ever be."

"See! Two against...Against..." Preston said, trying to count them all.

"Three," Alice said with her arms crossed.

"She sucks," Cary added, then sighed. "BUT I've decided to join her in getting the others."

"No!" Alice cried, feeling defeated.

"Look," Cary said, his tone serious, the first time Joe ever heard it like that, "I know what it's like to be helpless, hurt, and trapped. And it was shit. And I am never going through that again. And heaven help me if I'll let some other person-thing-creature, go through that."

"Cassandra did this," Charles said gravely.

"So what if she did? I'm helping. If, or when, I get better."

"You choose now to be heroic? When all of our lives are in danger?" Anna said, ignoring the if.

"My life was in danger less than 24 hours ago, and I survived."

"And look at how you ended up."

"Alice..." Joe said.

"No, Joe. YOU listen to ME. I called you compassionate, and I never should have, because now I've created a monster! Look, I'm not going into this ridiculous scheme. And if you are-"

"Then what? What are you going to do, Alice?!" Joe yelled. He never fought with Alice before.

"I'm going to break up with you!"