Part One- Finding Me

Prologue

Hi, my name is Emily Cook, I'm five years old. I'm special, I can't die. As long as I keep to a special diet. I'm sort of a mutant. However, I also have amazing brain skills. We found out when I was three. You probably can't remember being three but I can, it's all part of my power.

I was ill, seriously ill, too ill to walk, talk or scream. I had a feeling I was running out of time. To this day, nobody knows what was wrong with me. Pain kept searing through my body in painful flashes and my temperature was over 40 degrees centigrade. Rapidly, I merged in and out of consciousness. I was given an hour to live; my parents cried at the sight of me hooked up to all those machines and tubes. On my final predicted moment I threw my arm up so it was reaching to my drip. I was thirsty and it had some blood they were giving to me as part of a transfusion. All that ran through my head was 'blood, blood, come to me'. Water didn't appeal to me. When my mother realised and thought I was just asking to be held, she tried to hold me but I screamed in agony and demanded to be put down as soon as she lifted me. The bag containing the blood lifted at my commanded and feebly I popped the tube and drank the remaining blood, immediately it made me stronger. Mum and Dad were flabbergasted, absolutely white with terror. Dad didn't know what to do and neither did Mum. Run away? Get a doctor? Wait for the madness pass? Scream? They chose the third option. I felt all the strength return to me and return to me and my consciousness kicked in, causing me to have a sense and memory.

We haven't spoken about it since, I know it must haunt them. If I was human, it wouldn't have been right.

 

2: 1- Hunting

But it is two years on. They discharged me from hospital two days later. I must have just had a really bad mystery bug that had yet to be discovered. But I have not even done as much as thrown up since the illness. People do not really wonder why but I know my secret. This is a secret even to Mummy, Daddy and Jim the bear (my big teddy). It is so secret that, even though I don’t keep one, I would never write it down in my diary. So secret I never whisper to the wind or running water, for they are the spreader of secrets.

 

I grab the test tubes, all seven, and put them in the handmade-by-me belt. They slide in nicely, like a pen into its lid. Impatiently, I watch seconds tick by on my wristwatch. I leave at exactly nine, when most children are asleep or in bed. Do not worry, I do not need as much sleep as other children. Tick! My watch marks the start of my journey.

 

Over the rooftops I soar. Not scared of falling. I have done this so many times before. Listening carefully to noises below, in the houses. Finally I have some that are silent. Enclosed End, the dead end. Literally every house I jump on the people are sleeping. So I visit every one. I remember the cola bottle in my pocket. Not one of those cheap, plastic bottles that hold a litre but a proper, glass screw-top. I fill it up with fourteen test tubes, worth two weeks, of scarlet liquid. I skip through the other houses, just to fill the test tubes. I lick the test tubes. The people never wake up so quietness and painlessness must be my expertise.

 

One glance at my watch – I always give myself ten minutes to feed. No more-no less. Now the time is up so I need to return home. Up the attic trapdoor and through the window, my size makes me able to crawl through small windows and lightly skip back over the rooftops home.

 

Ten minutes past nine at night. I uncork a test tube and pour the contents into a shot class for the morning. I put it on my shelf and climb into my bed and fall into a long into a drifty, effective but light sleep.

 

A knock on the door.

“Emily, Emily love,” My mother calls through the door “Get up, you have to go to school.”

“I’m up Mummy.” I call back. “Up and getting dressed.” Shakily, I get out of bed and pick up my shot glass. Quickly gulping the drink down. It is thicker than water but that is something you get use to with time. Down it goes all in one, I smile, my fill is drunk. Today I am going on a day trip with school. Mummy helped me to pack yesterday. I have my lunch, books and I’ve snuck a the spare test tube. It is not full but could serve as a specimen jar for a bug. We are leaving school at nine o’clock and Norfolk for the day. Marie-Anne, my best friend, said she is bringing one hundred pounds. I am bringing ten pounds.

 

Eventually, I am in the bus. I feel so full of energy! I do not tend to have too much of my immortal drink before a long trip. Marie-Anne is droning on about horses, like her new chestnut pony. Luckily (for me), my selective hearing blanks her out and that leaves me left to listen to the roaring traffic. My energy high fades away. Boof! I slump backwards against the seat. Marie-Anne carries on droning for about another ten seconds and then asks me a question, asks it again then realises something is wrong and that she needs to do something. Miss shouts something, but blackness clogs my ears, like a cloud swelling inside my head.

 

3: 2 - Freak Accident

Lying down, no upside down. I actually cannot open my eyes. I try, that’s better. The light sizzles my eyes a bit; only for the time it takes my eyes to adjust to the surroundings. Light filters through the cracked windows.  Seats are ripped out of their places, hanging by just a thread and some slivers of plastic . It looks like some people are dead, blood dripping down their faces and forming puddles on the floor; for some people there is no blood, so they have either got away with it or they died before they got the chance to bleed. Instantly I know what has happened, it is hard to believe that I caused it all on my own. Using my telekinetic skills I pull a phone towards me to call 999. Marie-Anne is still next to me, if that is what you would call it, proof these seatbelts do not serve for much protection and the chairs are what you need to be careful with. The bus has been turned upside down and the glass windows have cracked. Not only on its side, the bus is fully upside down. Which is not possible, is it? There is a wide gash in Marie-Anne’s shoulder, bleeding heavily. It looks ugly and will probably cause a scar. Using my telekinesis I undo my seatbelt and, using a bubble of some kind of force field to gently tilt myself upright, latch onto the wound. I have not developed the conscience to tell me this behaviour is wrong but I know that normal people find it so. Slowly, my fill is taken and it is hardly anything. When that has finished I float along (careful not to bang my head on the floor[or new ceiling{it depends which way you look at it}]) and inspected the damage. We really are completely upturned, how has this happened? We are not on a busy road and seem to be in the middle of nowhere. Our bus was rectangular but now has enough dents that would have allowed it to roll. I hear sirens and land on the roof (or new floor). Caution  is taken to make little noise. Someone wakes up and screams. Instantly I recognise it, Bryony from the year above, very popular with friends in every year.

“Omygod, what happened to my leg?” She sobs. “And why am I upside down?”

“Bryony, I’m going to help you,” I reply calmly “but you need to calm down.” I have never done this on anything heavier than myself, but I hadn’t had an energy boost when I tried. Bryony cannot be much heavier than I am.

“What are you going to do to me?” I hear her whisper. She sounds scared and her face shows I am right.

“Just calm down, don’t scream.” All my concentration goes to moving her from her awkward state. Slowly, she moves out of her seat onto the new floor. Inspecting her leg, there is blood spreading rapidly around the bone sticking through the black trousers. The hospital will have to sort her out. Her eyes open wide.

“How did you do that?” She asks. The sirens get closer, closer. I must act quickly. I ask a question.

“Can you remember what happened, Bryony?”

“No, Emily, it’s all foggy.” Something sparks inside me.

“Wait a mo’” I whisper. Grabbing my rucksack. Pain shoots through my left arm. I find the empty test tube in my pink bag and walk over to Mrs Filler. She is a good pick because she is close and wearing a skirt. I find the fleshy back of her leg and make a small but deep nick. The test tube fills up scarily quickly. It is still bleeding even after I try to make it stop.

 

“Emily, hurry up.” Bryony’s weak voice calls. The sirens are almost here. I tip the contents of the test tube into her mouth. Not allowing a chance for her to think about it so that by the time she comes to her senses she has drunk most of it and she doesn’t have any questions to ask.

“More.”  She whispers. It is said softly, but sounds very much like a demand. I get more. We carry on for about three more test tubes when she slowly licks her lips, sits up and goes: “Wow, I can remember my birth!” I shrug and ask the question:

“What about what just happened?” The answer that follows is strange.

“Oh, so vividly now! You passed out and started calling something bluh-or something like that.”

“Blood.” I suggest in case it might be the right word.

“Yeah, anyway, you started having some sort of fit. Then the bus started crunching in and the walls came in with a terrible sound of grating metal and the driver panicked, hit a sign and the bus rolled onto its roof-which you know never happens.” The sirens have got just outside the bus in a large flash of blue lights. A policeman, no he is actually a paramedic (I think), walks in through the window that is most cracked.

“Hey you guys, are you okay?” He asks, casting an eye around the wreckage. We tell him that we are but need to get Bryony’s leg looked at.  “What on earth happened in here?” Bryony gives him a quick run through as he approaches us and his colleagues come in to remove the unconscious and dead.

“Okay you two, outside there is an ambulance and my friends will drive you straight to the hospital.” He looks at Bryony’s leg and realises she cannot walk. “I will quickly escort you out.” He calls someone over to help him keep Bryony’s leg straight and as soon as a larger hole is cut through the bus by the fire crew she is placed in a wheelchair and wheeled out the wreckage with me walking alongside the paramedic. We are put in the back of an ambulance and I am sat down but Bryony gets to lie on the bed. The woman in the front drives off as soon as the door is closed.

 

We get put straight into A&E. After about five minutes we go to the nurse. It is a totally different hospital to the one I’m use to. At our hospital everyone has to wait the same sort of three hour wait but here we get through really quickly as they are concerned about Bryony’s leg.

“So, what happened?” The nurse asks. Bryony touches her forehead. Both pairs of eyes grow wide. After about thirty seconds the nurse pulls away, both pairs of eyes return to their usual size.

“Thank you, Miss…” The nurse starts.

“Randa, Nurse,” Bryony said. “I’m Bryony Randa and this is Emily...”

“Cook.” I state guessing that they need my surname.

“Well,” The nurse looks confused. “That was awfully odd, but let’s get you to x-ray.” I walk alongside her as she pushes Bryony to fracture clinic (obviously, Bryony is in a wheelchair).

“Excuse me, Nurse.”

“Yes, Emily.”

“Well, isn’t it a bit, you know, getting an x-ray and that, when it’s obvious to a five year old that it’s an open fracture.”

“We still have to x-ray it. Now while she is waiting let us get you checked over.” I get escorted back to the check up room. They want to know why I had the fit in reaction to the energy rush but they do not really want me traipsing back and forth to here so they call a couple of quick tests and then decide that they will hand me over to my local hospital to figure that out. So really, they are letting me off quite lightly.

 

When I get to the fracture clinic I am told that Bryony has been wheeled to her own room. They do not seem to notice that I am five. They just point the way and tell me where to go. The room is in a maze of rooms with a painting of Snow White and the Seven Dwarves on it. I think it is the surgeon with her.

“We have to take her to theatre.” He says. I let confusion show on my face.

“Theatre?” I ask. “Isn’t that for performing?”

“No, young girl, we have to put her under.”

“Under?”

“Under anaesthetic.”

“So you are giving her an operation?”

“Yeah.”

“Why didn’t you say so?” I ask. He classes her as an emergency, which is wise considering a bone is sticking out of her leg so there is a high risk of infection. The anaesthetist strides in and gives her a thing they call giggle gas. Bryony has to put this massive snorkel thing in her mouth and take deep breaths in and deep breaths out. Then the anaesthetist gets this injection and the surgeon pins her hand down so they can give it to her. All of Bryony’s giggling makes me want to giggle too. So we are both giggling for a while. Then Bryony falls asleep. So I wait whilst they wheel her away on the gurney.

 

Bored.

          This is very disappointing.

In the after surgery ward. Bryony has just come out. She is still asleep. She was only in there for about half an hour. Before they brought her out they stitched her up. So I did not get to see them perform a real live stitching.

 

When she wakes up enough to speak she says, it is very slurred, her leg hurts. They do not do much about it. We chatter about random stuff. At one point we get moved to a young children’s ward. It has pictures of various fairy tales in it. We got one with Cinderella opposite us. The beds are cool. Usually, if a child gets admitted to hospital, the parents get a choice to stay or leave. So the hospital has beds that actually fold into the wall. I stay in one such bed, the one next to Bryony’s gurney. They are using Miss Filler’s phone to ring up all the parents. Bryony and My parents are coming to get us tomorrow.

 

That was a trip well wasted.

 

Oh, my bed is ready. That was quick considering they had to do the bedding as well. I clamber in, lie down, and wait for them to put Bryony in and leave us alone.

                                                  The questions started.

 

She wants to know everything: how I caused the bus to upturn. Why I had fed her blood. Now I look back myself, why did I feed her blood? Her new abilities? My telekinesis? Did she have to keep drinking blood? What was her new power? Even my boffin brain does not know the answer to all of these. It is really hard trying to explain to a six year old.

“Don’t bother explaining.” Bryony interrupts. I am staring up at the ceiling, about a quarter of the way through my explanation.

“What!?” I splutter, puzzled. “You ask all these questions, but don’t bother with the answers?”

“No, I mean, I’m taking it all in, but my memory is dragging a bit at remembering all this. Maybe if I use my power. By touching your head, when you feel my hand, just stay calm.”

“Okay.” I grumble, it is annoying because I am being cut short, and do as she says. Approximately a minute later she drags her hand away.

“Fascinating,” she nods.

“What?”

“Oh, nothing.”

“Bryony…”

“Ok, I’m sorry, I cannot control these things.”

“Bryony, how deep did you look?”

“I saw you hunting the other night.” That relieves me a bit as she has not gone that deep. Then comes what sounds like her biggest fear. “Will I have to hunt like that too?”

“I do not know.” I reply. “But since I’ve been doing that I haven’t gotten ill.” Then I add. “And for God’s sake go to bed. I thought surgery was meant to leave you tired.”

“It does,” She whispers. “Night” I turn on my side and go to sleep.

 

4: 3-Making Plans

Eleven hours later, I’m at home. I have a support bandage put on my left arm and an excuse to get out of Phys Ed for three weeks to heal. Every two weeks I have to go to my local hospital, Our Local Health Centre, and have tests. It is not really a health centre, the building is huge. After the whole class had recovered we had to go to the police station, I don’t know why, and give some sort of statement. That is, all but Mrs Filler, who has extended sickness leave. Funny, nobody actually died. I will just say that I was unconscious for most of it, but when I woke up I went straight into action. The whole class was asleep, then Bryony woke up so I helped her. They should buy it as it won’t be totally lying. I will just miss some stuff out.

 

I’ve started hanging out with Bryony recently. Since my fit Marie-Anne has been giving me the evil stare. It might be because that gash in her shoulder is now a scar and her mummy says that it has totally ruined her (thin to me) chances of becoming a supermodel. So that is me barred from her house.

 

Bryony is unwell. She is at home. I am walking to her house now. Five Riverway Walk. Knocking on the door, I tremble slightly. Her mum answers.

“Hello Emily, you must want to see Bryony, right?”

“Yes, Mrs Randa,” I smile. “Oh don’t worry, I’m pretty resilient to most things.”

“If you insist…” I walk up to her bedroom door and knock. After waiting a little while I quietly enter. She smiles. I sit on the end of her bed and, like a doctor, ask what her illness is like. She has been having painful flashes through her body at high speeds. Recently her temperature has started creeping up. I remember those symptoms.  They were in my first two weeks of my start- of-blood-craze mystery illness.

“Bryony…” I whisper-I do not know why.

“Yes.” She whispers back. I grab her hands and tell her to search. Afterwards she says: “Do you mean…?”

“Yes.” I give a straightforward answer. “You have to hunt.” We sit still and think for a while. We come up with a solution to help her get better.

 

I will bring her some blood tomorrow morning via her bedroom window (luckily facing the back garden), using my mind strength to fly.

 

Finally, it is the day after. I give her the drink. We carry on until we work out a hunting plan.

“What will you drink it from?” I ask.

“Hmm, good question, will one of those test tubes work?”

“Probably not, it took me most of a drip before I got better.” I think for a second. “I got it! Look for a cola bottle made of glass.” I was going to use it but it has to go to a better cause. I can always refill it.

 

Wow, this is cool. I have never flown properly before. So the daunting three stories high I’m going is the highest I have ever been. My tummy feels like it has been left on the ground. Before I set off I throw a couple of rocks at her double glazed window so she knows that I am coming. Hah, her hand, it is opening the window.

“Hey.” I quietly call.

“Hello.” She calls back. She does not sound too good, much worse than yesterday. Luckily, she is not yet as bad as I was. Surprisingly, her mummy has not taken her to the hospital yet. I float in, sit down and release the lid on the bottle. Reluctantly, Bryony takes the bottle and, with a shaky hand, puts it to her lips and gulps. She puts it back on her desk.

“It tastes like metal.” The six year old smiles.

“Yeah, you get use to it.” I reply. She picks it up and downs it in two. Her face lights up.

“I feel great!” She beams.

“You look it.” I beam back. “Same in two days.” I smile a gappy smile. Why is it gappy? My tooth just fell out on the carpet.

“Okay.” She smiles, picking up my tooth and returning it to me. “Just do not forget the immortal glug.” She reminds me. I put the tooth in my pocket and walk home.

 

Two days later and I bring her a fresh test tube. I do the same as last time. Quickly she pops the lid off and downs it in one. We work out the hunt. I will come to her house at nine with the test tubes. We will hunt once a week. We are doing the first one tonight.

 

Knock! Thud! The rock makes noise as it clatters on the window and bounces back to the dry mud. Bryony jumps out the window.

“Feeling immortal already?” I ask.

“Yeah, never more alive,” She says. “Are you ready?”

“Planned as anything.” I take a wad of folded up paper from my pocket and unfold it.

“This is a map of the town.” I point to the blue lanes. “These are the lanes I found easy.” I point to the red ones. “Here are places not many people sleep well or they have alcohol and drugs in their blood. This will spike us and lead to bad effects. The white lanes however,” My fingers skim the long road going down the middle of town. “Are places I don’t try. Quite public.” I think, was there anything I missed out? Oh yeah. “If I’m ill and cannot hunt do not go here ever.” Constantly whacking my hand on the black square. “The dead man’s estate. The blood here is druggy, alcoholic, and tar-filled. It leaves you hungry for more. Addicted, almost as if you are directly taking the drug. But here is my suggestion.” Tracing the route to

Enclosed End and Sleep Street. “Enclosed  End is better but farther away. Sleep Street is a walk away but mostly they are single people or happily married couples doing what mummy calls making love.” She chooses Enclosed End. We go off into the night.

 

Bryony makes quicker progress than I thought she would. She says it’s because when she touches me she has access to all my memories and secrets. Even my birth, which I don’t remember! So basically if I was ever there she can be there too. So she fortunately knows all about my hunts. After we have our fill she holds my hand and finds out what I do with it. When we arrive back at her house we make a new date. Next week 11^th June still in 2006. Exactly four months until my birthday: 11^th October. I will finally turn six like is Bryony now.

5: Part 2 - Prologue

Part two- Loss

 

                 Prologue

That’s how it went. Every week for two years. Then my class had a lesson on ‘who is your idol?’ Someone said that their idol was their mum; you should always be able to tell absolutely everything to your mum. So I did.