The Final Showdown - The Moon Trilogy - Book 3

Chapter thirty-six:

   Although the effects of the toxin had most likely worn off, Clarity still wasn't thinking straight. Her thoughts were a jumble in her mind, like a tangled ball of yarn with no real start or end. Her head hurt from crying, and her limbs were stiff from sitting in the same place for so long, hunched over Johnny. It wasn't long before Rachel came into the room, looking for Clarity.

   The other girl stopped cold when she saw the scene in the kitchen, Johnny's still form lying beneath the crying Clarity.

   "What happened?" Rachel half-whispered, taking another hesitant step closer.

   Clarity could only shrug half-heartedly. Her sobs had calmed a good deal, but her throat still felt too tight. She could hardly get enough air, much less speak. A shuddering deep breath did nothing to help.

   Rachel came the rest of the way into the kitchen and knelt next to Clarity, sympathy written all over her pale face. Clarity could see in Rachel's eyes that she was remembering some sort of grief of her own. Clarity wiped her arm across her eyes, trying to stop the steady flow of tears, but when she remembered the past few weeks that she had spent with Johnny, she realized how much she had taken him for granted. She wished that she'd realized how much she loved him before...

   She couldn't finish the thought. Some foolish part of her still believed that he was alive, even though she knew it was impossible. She supposed her stupid imagination was due to the fact that he was an alien, and her brain somehow made him up to be immortal because of that. She was an alien herself, and she could get hurt just like anyone else, and that thought brought her to the cold reality.

   Johnny was dead. The only person that was truly meant to be with her. Sure, her parents loved her, and Rachel was a good friend, but Johnny was her soulmate, for crying out loud! She could hear the words of that conversation, shuffled around by the time since then, but clear nonetheless.

   How could he be dead?

   She wished she could see his smile again. She wished that she could see his stunningly blue eyes alight with laughter, even if it was at her own expense after doing or saying something stupid, but she knew in her heart that she wouldn't, and that made her tears start afresh all over again. Rachel enveloped her in a hug.

   She felt starkly the difference between her trembling, rocking body and the pillar-still form of Rachel.

   More people came in, but she couldn't really tell which ones they were. The only one she was sure of was Xenia, who was taller than the rest, and a lot darker too. Tears made everything blurry, not caring made it irrelevant.

   Though her hearing seemed to be muffled for some reason, perhaps the crying, she could hear several questions, peppering the air. They wanted to know what had happened, no doubt. What she had tried so hard to stop while they were all doing who knew what. She knew that Sam was there too, because his voice was the most distinct. She could also tell that Benny was present because of his German accent.

   But she didn't take any of the information in as fact. It was all vapor, unimportant.

   She felt the vibrations in Rachel's chest as she replied to the almost offensive breaks in the silence, but by then the world was too quiet and colorless for her to care what they were saying. She could no longer make out definitive shapes, only blurred greyness.

   Then even Rachel was gone. Clarity was alone, sitting against the wall. She felt too cold for the warm kitchen. She wished she could get the days back, so that she could relive them better than she had. She wanted to show Johnny how much she loved him, and it occurred to her suddenly that she never had. She'd never even said the words, not even once. He hadn't either, but it was clear that he did. Painfully clear, now that he was so, so gone. She had never instigated a kiss, and thinking back on her actions, she hadn't really done much of anything to show him that she loved him.

   Had he died thinking she wasn't quite convinced yet? Had she let that happen?

   She couldn't believe herself. She'd been a pretty crappy soulmate. She sank lower down the wall, collapsing in on herself. The only sound she heard was her own sobbing. Her head and chest ached, and her face was slick with tears. A sharp pain shot through her arm. She must have pulled a muscle in her frantic race to help Johnny...

   She cried for a while... a long while, but she wasn't sure for just how long, because at some point, she fell asleep. She was probably crying in her sleep as well, because when she woke up, her eyes were sore, and her nose was still stuffy. Someone had moved her into her room.

   She wondered what they had done with Johnny. Had they taken care of the body without her?

   The thought of them picking up his lifeless form and carrying him away almost made her bread down again, and she had to work hard not to burst out in sobs. No more crying today. He wouldn't want that.

   She slowly got up, and she was surprised at how stiff she felt, especially her neck and the muscle she'd pulled in her forearm. She swung her legs over the side of the bed. The only light in the room was leaking in through the crack of the door, and she almost tripped over her own stuff as she moved to the light switch.

   When she had her finger under the switch, she decided that she didn't need to stay in her room and pout. She wanted to figure out what had happened after she'd lost conciseness. She neglected the light, and simply made her way to the door instead. Her hand paused on the doorknob of its own accord.

   Her feet felt heavy, and her head still ached. The flood of light that came from opening the door didn't help in the slightest, and she almost felt like chickening out and going back to bed, but she was determined to find out what happened. She couldn't be a coward now.

   As she walked, she heard muffled voices coming from Johnny's room. She tried desperately not to think of him as she opened the door and stepped inside, but that plan was ruined when she saw him, lying on the bed. He was extremely pale, and he still wasn't moving.

   Too still to pretend he was just sleeping, too pale to think he was anything but dead. She bit back the tears that prickled the back of her eyes. Sam and Rachel were standing on either side of the bed, and they hadn't looked up when she'd entered.

   She cleared some mucus out of the back of her throat, and she was stunned to find that her throat was sore and raw, as if she'd yelled herself hoarse.

   "What happened?" she asked, her voice a scratchy mess. She cleared her throat again, but accomplished no more the second time.

   Sam looked up, and he seemed pretty surprised to see her. Almost too surprised. Almost—almost anxious.

   "I wasn't expecting you to wake up so soon." He commented far too casually before looking down again. He was studying a screen that he held in the crook of his arm. Every once in a while, his gaze shifted to the slit on Johnny's arm. "We identified a deadly toxin that originated from this cut, but we can't figure out what it is. Just that it's definitely the cause of-" he broke of, his head snapping up, as if afraid that Clarity would maim him for saying that last part.

   She didn't react. She already knew that the cut, and the toxin, were the reason he'd died, so it wasn't much news. She didn't let her eyes stray to Johnny for more than a few seconds at a time, for fear that she couldn't stop crying if she did. She was done with the tears, though she could feel them like a heavy weight attached to her eyes.

   The only lighting in the room came from a lamp on the bedside table, and the screen that painted Sam's face a pale blue. So far, Clarity hadn't seen Rachel do anything, which made it questionable why she was there.

   The air was stale. The door had been closed for too long. She thought she could detect the tang of the poison still lingering in the air. Wooziness crept into her thoughts.

   She was about to say something, but a loud beep interrupted her.

   A second passed, in which Sam took on a very confused expression, and Clarity was about to try speaking again, before another, even louder beep resounded through the room.

   From there, the beeps only got closer together, and louder, until it was one, continuous stream of loud noise. Then it stopped, rather abruptly.

   Clarity opened her mouth, once again ready to ask a question, but this time she was cut off by an entirely different sound; a sound that knocked the breath straight out of her lungs.