Speechless

Chapter Nineteen

Dr.Reynolds, Dylan, and the scientist all lift Jason from his chair and I rise from mine immediately. The scientist opens the door with one hand and holds onto Jason with the other. All of them hold Jason like he's fighting and they need all their power to keep him still, but they don't. Jason's just standing perfectly still, he's not fighting, not fighting at all. They begin to take him out from the room and I hold onto Dylan's arm, stopping him. They all look at me with dark eyes. "Please, I'm sorry, just- just please don't hurt him! I will go willingly! Please!" I beg. Surprisingly the tears don't come, I plead but don't cry. I feel like crying, I feel like screaming, but I just don't.

"You had your chance!" Yells Dr.Reynolds. "This is what must be done!"

"Please," I whisper. I look up into Dylan's eyes and see mercy, I also see regret.

"I'm sorry," he whispers so even Dr.Reynolds won't hear. He then throws me off his arm and I land on a chair until the chair falls, ending with me on the floor beside the collapsed chair. Dylan then looks away and then they pull Jason out of the room, his heels gliding on the ground. I stare at the empty doorway until I look back at Libby, she has no look of any sympathy for Jason or me. She's still sitting on the chair with her arms crossed, one of her legs is on the floor, tapping rapidly, and the other is on her leg with her knee out and her ankle resting on her other knee. Wait, her foot is tapping. Then it hits me like a bucket of water being poured over me all at once, her foot is tapping.

"You don't know what's going to happen," I say bluntly. She narrows her eyebrows and chuckles at me.

"How do you figure?" She asks with slight laughter in her voice.

"Your foot is going insane. You're somewhat nervous or at least on edge. Maybe your just excited to see how this plays out because you don't know what the result will be. This plan of theirs was just as shocking to you as to me. They're, for once, one step ahead of you." I say, proud of myself.

"No," she says as she stands up and leaves. "I'm one step ahead of them," she walks out of the doorway, out of sight, until poking her head back in to say one more thing, "I saw them go down that hall, if you'd like to find them and save your boyfriend's life, that is," she says, pointing down the hall in the opposite direction she was going. I immediately run out of the room and to the left, sprinting through the hall. I begin to breath a little heavy before seeing all of them standing there, they seem to be waiting for me. I see all of the other members have come out from hiding and Dr.Reynolds is holding Jason against himself with one arm around Jason's neck and the other holding a gun against Jason's head. But the rest of them are standing in a circle around Dr.Reynolds and Jason, who are the two in the middle. The only person gone is Libby. I take a step closer to them all and Dr.Reynolds yells louder than necessary,

"Stop! Don't come any closer! Turn around and go back to the Draining Room or else Jason gets a bullet to the head!" I stare at Jason and he shakes his head,

"Don't do it, Aubrey!" He yells.

"Shut up!" Dr.Reynolds cries as he hits Jason upside the head with the gun. Not enough to knock him out, but hard enough to shut him up.

"Let Jason go first," I request.

"Can't do that sweetheart," Dr.Reynolds retorts. "Turn around now, Aubrey. Don't kill Jason the way you killed Jim,"

I then stop breathing for a good twenty seconds. No one moves or makes a noise in that time. When I breath again you can hear me gasp for air.

I immediately stare at Jason, but he only drops his head and closes his eyes in guilt. Dr.Reynolds looks from me to Jason and then back to me with a smirk on his face. "You never told her, did you, Jason? You never told her about how when she was knocked out from running into the wall that you told me about how she killed Jim when I had asked for a background story to get to know you two." He says. Jason only sits there, completely still.

"He wouldn't just tell you that," I say.

"Well I did ask other questions leading to this information, but he did willingly tell me. So let's skip the details of our conversation and why don't you, Aubrey, tell the story of Jim's death." Dr.Reynolds suggests.

"No," I say sternly.

"Alright, then Jason will die," he says. I don't fully believe him, but I won't let Jason die because I don't want to tell this story.

"Okay!" I cry. "I'll tell it," I say in a lower voice. Dr.Reynolds has a small smile on his face.

"Then let the story begin," he says. I take a deep breath and begin the story, staring at Jason.

"Jim and I had this little camp set up deep in the woods with a small tent. Our tent was really just blue tarp covering our heads, but we made it work. We heard a noise late at night while cooking a rabbit for dinner and didn't think much of it at first until we heard the noise again. It was just breaking of leaves and twigs at first, but then we heard the moans. Jim told me to go run and hide and not to worry about him. So I stood up and started to weave through the trees and I ran so long and so fast I needed to take a breather. So I stopped and leaned on a tree and caught my breath. But that's when I heard it.

"I heard the leaves breaking again and it was so dark I couldn't see a thing, or I couldn't see details at least. I could make out figures and whatnot but I couldn't distinguish Jim's face from the rest of The Gone in the situation. I looked down and saw an arm so I took my knife from my sheath and stabbed it right in his neck. I missed his head, and he was Jim." I'm near tears at this point and Jason knows that Dr.Reynolds is putting me through torture.

"That's enough," Jason interrupts.

"No, it's not," Dr.Reynolds retorts. "Continue, please," Dr.Reynolds asks, moving the gun closer to Jason's head. I take a deep breath and continue.

"Jim falls to the ground and I am taken over by shock and regret. I would've done anything to take the last ten seconds back but it was too late, Jim was dying rapidly. The blood went everywhere and The Gone scented it. I bent down, in tears, to face Jim. "'I'm sorry,"' I said. He just nodded and laid there with his hands overlapping over his throat. He removed one hand and lifted it up into the air and moved it forward then backward, urging me to leave him. "'No,"' I said. But he shook his head and pointed in the opposite direction from our camp. I looked back over my shoulder and when I turned back to Jim he was dead.

"I stood up and ran a good distance before turning around back to Jim and I saw some Gone, probably three, and they were bending down to eat him. I turned back around and ran. That's all I saw and all I know. But he could be wondering the world, just walking aimlessly. Or, he could have been put down a long time ago. That I have no clue," I finish. I didn't even notice the tears on my cheeks, nor did I care.

"Good, very good," Dr.Reynolds says. I don't smile or show any facial expression, I only look at Jason. "Now I will give you one more chance to take the easy way out," he says.

"I'll be in the Draining Room if you need me," I say. I turn to walk to the Draining Room when I stop and look over my shoulder, realizing I'll never see Jason again. "Jason," I start, tears dripping off my chin and courressing my cheeks. "I love you."

"I love you, too," Jason replies. That was what I needed, a proper goodbye. I needed closure, closure to make me feel whole. I'm about to turn around and walk away but I hear a loud boom and turn my body all the way around. I see one man that worked at the Sanctuary fall and a bullet hole through his skull. Then I hear another gunshot and see another man fall. Soon, I see Dylan fall and it's only Jason and Dr.Reynolds. I don't dare turn around, because I have a good idea of who it is and I can't see that face right now.

"Goodbye, you son of a bitch!" I hear behind me. Then Dr.Reynolds falls while the ringing of the gunshot is still in my ear. Jason falls too, and I'm worried he's shot and my whole body collapses in on itself, but then he stands up and brushes himself off. He then looks behind me with wide, scared eyes. I turn around, too. I see a small amount of smoke rising from the gun that held the bullets that went through these people's brains.

And then I see the gun in Libby's hand.

"Libby, are you alright?" I ask her as I walk closer to her, slow and cautiously.

"You better get out of the path of the bullet unless you want to die," she says.

"What?" I ask. She steps around me and fires the gun once more. I hear a body fall to the floor and turn around to face him. I can't cry right then, I'm too shocked and frozen in fear. The body that's laying on the floor with a bullet in his stomach is Jason.