12 Seconds (#1 in Military series)

Chapter 22

Chapter 22

 

The blood wouldn’t come off.

Rubbing frantically at the palms of her hands, Julia’s heart began to beat faster as she stared at her stained skin.

Flashes of past memories began to litter her mind in no specific order.

An IED explosion near the border, killing two of her friends. A parade in a street back home. A gunfire battle outside of a school. Helping a medic cauterise the shredded limb of a man who stepped on a mine, his blood gushing across her uniform.

The images wouldn’t leave her alone as they began to flood through her brain.

It was as if the latest explosion had opened a flood gate and they had all come pouring through, unadulterated and without that shininess to them which told Julia she was imagining it.

Pressing the bottom of her palms firmly against her eyes, she rubbed the memories away before she opened her eyes again, shaking her head slightly when bright shapes formed in her vision.

Blinking the blurriness away, Julia continued to walk behind the others as they circled back on themselves, her fingers still rubbing at the dried blood on her skin.

Julia did not know why it was so important. Her uniform was torn, covered in a layer of dust with blood everywhere, and not all of it was hers.

Blood stained the bandage on her arm, it drenched her uniform and it covered her flesh.

So why was she so worried about her hands for? She couldn’t answer that question but as she looked at the pattern of dried blood on her palm, she paused.

Lifting her palm closer to her face, Julia had to shake her head a few times because she was certain that she had seen the face of the insurgent she stabbed to death.

“Reynolds?” Marc called back to her, snapping her out of her reverie.

Dropping her hand back to her side, Julia looked up and caught sight of how much distance they had covered without her.

Hurrying to catch up, Julia could see the question in Marc’s eyes.

He wanted to know what was going on with her but Julia did not know whether or not she should tell him.

How did she tell him that she was beginning to remember?

How could she tell him that the woman, who he was just coming to accept was gone, may be returning afterall?

Julia frowned, was that how she felt about it? That she was only temporary and now the other girl was coming back?

That she was being taken over, as if someone was stealing her body and voice?

Because she shouldn’t; Jules was the real Julia, wasn’t she?

She had been here first, that’s what her child-self told her. Jules had been here first, which meant she got dib’s on her body, wasn’t that how it worked?

But in all the memories that Julia had of ‘Jules’, of this other woman, she found herself hating her.

Julia let out a small scoff as she realised what that meant. She hated herself.

Now that was a dilemma.

Looking back down at her hands, she began to pick at the blood that pooled in her nails when she spotted Kazeem step up beside her.