The Kind

Chapter Five

Behind the hospital, if one knew where to look, one could find a not disappointingly small park, with not entirely uncared for gardens. Although no one was paid to maintain it, some of the more long-term residents spent their leisure time tending the flower beds. In the early morning hours the dry grass and the few thin trees blew unfettered in the wind, and a single couple walked the field in a slow arc.
Viktor held his arm around Sarah, careful not to pressure her side but ready to catch her if she needed him. For the most part, Dr. Carlisle wasn’t pleased when she had insisted she was well enough to walk about, but he was a friend and had seen her through enough injuries from her training to believe her when she swore to be careful. Besides, it didn’t take a doctor to know there was something urgent they needed to talk about – something that wasn’t going to be aired inside the hospital.
Sarah took a tentative step forward, carefully adjusting her weight so the footfall didn’t hurt her bruised – but thankfully not cracked – ribs. She’d had hours to think about the events from the day before, and through it all one question had risen to the surface above all others.
“Who was she?” she asked softly. It was the usual paradox: the question she didn’t want to know the answer to, but could never be happy until she did. “What’s her name?”
Viktor’s arm was still around her shoulders, but his eyes were on the grass. “Her name is Viralynn. She’s someone I knew, a long time ago.”
“Knew, how?” Same paradox.
“We worked together, at first. But it was complicated.”
“Complicated because, you were together?”
“In a manner of speaking.” If his eyes left the grass for a moment, she didn’t see it. She stopped walking and turned so that he had to face her.
“The time for talking in riddles is over, Viktor. I need straight answers.”
Viktor sighed and ran his hand through his hair. His eyes had travelled a million miles away, and if she didn’t know better she would have sworn the rest of him was about to follow without his feet leaving the ground. Her hands were on his shoulders now, instinctively trying to keep him with her.
“Viktor, talk to me,” she urged. Silently she prayed that the courage would not desert her until she had the answers she needed.
“Ok, I will tell you how I knew her, but first there’s something else you need to know.”
Sarah wasn’t prone to rolling her eyes, but it was her turn. “Very well, what is it?”
“It’s about the fight you had, about why you couldn’t beat her.”
If bending over didn’t hurt as much as it did, Sarah would have succumbed to the impulse to rub her ankle at the memory of the bone-shattering kick. In the corners of her mind she replayed the strange fight. The way the woman moved, so fast and without any sound. The way she dodged Sarah’s attacks, like she knew what she was doing before she did. 
“She was… a better fighter, that’s all.” Despite herself, she felt her defensive emotions rising. “I’ve never seen anything like it before.”
“You haven’t seen it before because it doesn’t exist. At least, it’s not supposed to.”
“What are you talking about? What do you mean she doesn’t exist? She existed enough to put me in here didn’t she?”
“She isn’t human.”

Sarah fought the urge to laugh and scream simultaneously.
“Sarah, listen to me. If anyone can understand this, it’s you. You fought her, there’s no better proof than that.”
“You’re crazy. You can’t just stand there and tell me she isn’t real, or isn’t human!”
“I can because it’s true. How do you think she moved that fast, or knew your moves that quickly.”
“Training! Anyone can do that…”
“Not like her. And what about when you kicked her?”
“Body armour!”
“She wasn’t wearing any.”
A bench a few steps behind just about saved Sarah’s life, at least that’s what it felt like to her when she fell into it. Her palms came up to her face and saved her the trouble of looking at him as the insane words flowed of their own will.
“So she’s a what, alien, vampire, ghost?!”
“Nothing like that. They are near-humans. Some think they are the next evolution, what humans will become given enough time. They’re called the Kind.”

Inside the large, busy hospital, Sarah felt very much alone. She was back in her room, and Viktor was gone. Somewhere deep within her the voice of reason told her to get some sleep, but that was impossible now. Everything she’d seen, felt and heard was spiralling through her mind. She felt as though she were running, running through a forest filled with fog. Viktor was in that forest somewhere: if she listened carefully she could hear his voice calling her. But every time she looked for him, the fog got thicker, until she felt utterly blind. In those moments his voice stopped calling her name, and started instead to rant about things she didn’t want to hear, and couldn’t bring herself to believe.
Her clothes from the day before were folded on the chair across the room. Sarah pushed herself off from the bed and began to change. Her hand stopped when it reached the pocket of her jeans. Inside was the note, the one Nikki had given her, the same one her mysterious attacker had apparently left behind after she’d finished destroying the gym. Sarah stared at the two initials. The signature at the bottom, V… for Viralynn, she decided. But the one at the top was less obvious. The note was addressed to someone called S. Something Viktor had said made her doubt the S stood for Sarah. Tentatively, she reached for her phone.