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The invisible silken threads throbbed in the air, but Minji could hear Jesse speaking to Alec. Was this the beginning of a new attack, or something different?
“I’ll help you. Just let everyone go. Stop doing all of this, and I’ll help you.”
“Huuuuuuurts,” Ava answered.
But it wasn’t Ava.
It was the other.
“Tell me how to help you.” Minji forced herself to look into the eyes of the being within her daughter.
Tongue flailing, lips twisting, Ava made sounds that were inhumane and terrifying. Was it attempting to speak to her? Was this its language? The way Ava’s mouth moved and the noises issuing from her lips were reminiscent of something Minji had witnessed before, but she had difficulty focusing her thoughts.
“Please let Ava come back to me,” Minji begged one last time.
The bizarre enunciation continued, but the stir of invisible tendrils receded.
Close to tears again, Minji carried Ava on her hip through the waiting room and into the corridor. The male voices attracted her to the open doorway of the examination room. Jesse stood next to Alec cleaning wounds on the other man’s scalp hidden by his dark blond hair.
“How’s your daughter?” Alec asked, spotting Minji.
“Mesmerized,” Minji answered, revolving so the men could see Ava’s face.
“Mesmerized?” Alec appeared to consider the word before giving her a brief nod. “It works.”
“Alec was just telling me about his accident, and how lucky he was that it happened close to here.” Jesse’s gloved hands were gentle as he plucked glass from the other man’s hair and flesh.
“How did you know we were here?”
“Arthur Freestone’s call was all over the networks,” Alec replied, barely wincing at Jesse’s ministrations. “He said exactly where you were. I was in Phoenix, so I drove here to find you.”
“Did you see anyone else along the way? Like us?” Minji slipped into the room and sat on a chair.
Alec shook his head. “No. They were all like,” he glanced at Ava, “...her. When the event hit Phoenix, I tried to find others, but I never saw anyone else like me. I’d given up and gone home when I saw Arthur’s interview on the news. I got in my truck and drove here.”
The story sounded plausible, but Minji felt a twinge of uneasiness in her gut. “All those people on the roads...how did you avoid them?”
“They’re not always on the road unless it’s in their path. The ones in this area are being funneled through the boulevard, but elsewhere there are a lot of empty roads. Well, except for the car accidents. I have a 4x4, so I went off-road when I had to.” Alec
didn’t even cringe when Jesse started to stitch him up.
“And when you reached Vegas?”
If Alec was bothered by her questions, he didn’t show it. “The south side is relatively empty. They’re all heading northward. I was nearby when...I don’t know what happened actually. One second I was driving, the next I woke up with my truck wrapped around a pole. I think my head took the brunt of it, but luckily, I’m hard-headed.”
The smile that spread on his lips provoked one out of Minji before she realized it. He was charming in his craggy, cowboy way.
“You were probably mesmerized,” Jesse said, sewing little stitches into Alec’s scalp with skillful motions.
“I’m not affected,” Alec replied.
“Well, sorry to break this to you, but no one appears to be truly immune but Minji. We didn’t even realize we were going under at first. It wasn’t until Minji appeared to vanish in front of our eyes that we realized we really were being affected during the attacks,” Jesse explained. “Well, everyone appeared to disappear in my eyes. It took me longer to wake up.”
“You probably didn’t even realize you were mesmerized during the attacks. That’s why you hit the pole,” Minji suggested.
A stoic expression settled over Alec’s features at Minji’s comment. Shifting slightly was the only sign of his discomfort at either her words, or the needle. “I see.” After a long pause, he asked, “So how do you know you’re immune?”
“I’m pretty sure I am since I witnessed everyone else being affected,” Minji answered. “In the first attacks I was able to shake it off, though it did blind me a few times.”
