Glass

95. Ch12 S8

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INDEX | Chapter 12 | Scene 1 | Scenes 2 & 3 | Scenes 4 & 5 | Scenes 6 & 7 | Scene 8 | Next Scene → Coming soon.

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Previously: Misty gets arrested by the PG after she freaks out at the party, and Luke makes a deal with Victor Morgan for her freedom.

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The General leaves, taking the oxygen with him.

At once it feels like I’m suffocating. The air is too still, the recycled taste of filtered metal is sharp on the back of my tongue. The supple Lonsdaleite cuffs are smooth and cool, but tight, and they pinch every time I shift, and the chains rattle ever so softly. I go still, forcing myself to relax every muscle, just like in training.

Cathy’s big brown eyes are on me, patient and steady. She sees. She knows. I used to like it. I used to think it was wonderful to have someone just understand, but this time I’m not sure it’s a good thing. In fact, this time I think it’s bad.

Cathy’s head tilts slightly.

“Comfortable?” She asks, her voice smooth and syrupy with a cold undercurrent that makes me want to cringe. A muscle in my neck tenses in response, my fingers twitch involuntarily. Her eyes snap there instantly, like she felt it first, her piercing gaze catching the smallest detail. The corners of her mouth curl just a little.

“Two years, huh?” she says, her voice light but precise. I keep my eyes down, focusing on the tiled ground, memorizing every scuff, anything to keep me grounded in the moment. “Heard you’ve been talking. College?” Her shoes, shiny black kitten heels, click softly as she shifts her weight, and I can’t help but track her with my ears. She notices that too.

“Did you really think integrating that would help you?” She steps forward, her shoes clicking in my head. She crouches, just enough to bring her face closer to mine. “We both know that’s not meant for you.” I blink, she taps the tab and stands up, pacing slowly, clicking more.

“Thought you could leave it all behind, start over, play normal. Like you’d ever be anything but this?” She scoffs.

I clench my teeth so hard my jaw aches. Her tab pings, as my energy spikes, and she taps it into silence. I exhale, trying to cool off, but the embers flare in my chest, burning hotter with every word.

She gestures lazily at the chains and the bolted chair and grins, sharp and triumphant, her eyes glinting with predatory delight.

“There it is. Proof, that you’re where you belong. Same place, same mistakes. You were never meant for the main stream, Misty. But you’re not really mad at me, are you?” Her voice is softer now, coaxing, almost kind as she walks around and stands behind me. “No, you’re mad at yourself. For all of it. For Tom. For Luke. For every poor soul who thought you’d be worth the risk.”

The heat roars in my chest now. I press my hands hard against my thighs, nails biting into skin. Don’t react. Don’t react.

She leans in close, her breath brushing the back of my neck.

“That fire of yours,” she says almost reverently. “It’ why they’ll never trust you. Try as you might, that first accident you had cemented the notion in their minds that you’re dangerous.”

Don’t react.

“They’re out there, you know? Your friends? Your little empath buddy.” She says. My breath catches, and instinct closes off my side of the sync a little harder. Her smile sharpens, cutting deeper.

“You’re blocking him too, just like you block the Doctor,” she says, her tone dipping. She tilts her head, studying me like I’m a specimen pinned to a board. “That’s cute. Few people ever learn that kind of control. Just one more thing to set you apart, make you different.”

Don’t react. Don’t react.

“But that’s the thing, isn’t it?” she says, stepping forward again. Her shadow stretches across me long and sharp. “Control only works until it doesn’t. It’s exhausting, holding everything down. That’s what happened at the party, isn’t it?”

I don't move.

Her voice drops lower, like she's sharing a secret. “Poor little Misty, trying so hard to fit in. Pretending you belonged. But you couldn’t keep it together, could you? All that effort, and one little spark was all it took to blow it up. But maybe it wasn’t all your fault.” Her eyes gleam with mock sympathy. “Maybe the violence, the anger—it’s been conditioned into you like everything else. Maybe you can’t ever leave it behind. You ever think of that? How home follows you no matter how far you run?”

My breath catches, my mind stutters, caught on the phrase. Home follows you. It’s a flicker of something too big to grasp, too close, too familiar.

“But I don’t need psychic talents to read you. Every twitch, every breath, every glance you fight to suppress… Your breathing shifted after I said 'home,' by the way,” she shows me her teeth like the sharks at the aquarium. “You think you’re stone, but you’re glass.”

Her gaze pierces right through me, sharp and jagged like those selachian teeth, “And glass shatters, Misty.” She stares into my eyes, deadpan, then her lips twitch like she hears it—that brittle snap of something unseen fracturing in the distance, as if the aquarium glass is breaking, water spraying through the cracks.

“You’re scared,” she whispers into my face, her breath hot. “Not of me. Not of this place. You’re scared of them. Of what they see in you. Of what happens when you let them in. Like it happened all those years ago when you ran away from Telera. You lose someone every time, don’t you?”

I slam my walls tighter, locking everything down. She tilts her head slightly, scoffs and turns away. Her shoes click twice against the floor, her posture relaxing as she steps back toward the door.

“Don’t worry,” she says, her voice light and airy again. “When it all falls apart—and it will—I’ll be here. Just like now.

The door opens and fresh air floods the room. Logan is here and Luke. I inhale sharply, lungs aching from the release. I didn’t even know I was holding my breath.

The General walks them in, slow and steady, handing Luke a set of keys with a nod that feels too casual for this moment. He looks triumphant, as though he were surveying a field of battle, rather than handing over a prisoner. Logan watches from beside him, a weight in his eyes that I don’t want to name.

Luke crouches, the chains clinking as he fusses with them. The pressure on my wrists releases with a sharp click, but my muscles are so tense that it takes a minute for me to react, as if my body can’t understand the sudden freedom. I have to force myself to move as they fall.

Luke’s hand presses gently on my back. A steady pressure that grounds me.

“I’m sorry.” I tell him as he helps me up, my stiff legs all but set in stone. He doesn’t answer, just walks me past the General and then out, into daylight.

* * *

The white leather sofa is too soft. My muscles sink into it like I’m being swallowed whole. Every shift feels like I’m under 5G’s again, like it has to be calculated and compensated for before it can happen. I put my hands in my lap, laying limp and useless.

The air tastes like dust and old paper, wood and leather polish. It’s hot, too hot in here, with the fireplace going, but Luke likes it. doesn’t make it any less stifling. My breath comes short and shallow. I have to remind myself to slow it down every few minutes.

“This is exactly what Morgan wanted, Luke!” Logan’s voice cuts through the fog in my head.

“I know. But what choice did we have?” Luke’s tone is controlled but not exactly calm. It feels odd on him. I’ve only seen it once before—right after the sense sync.

“Choice? You wanna talk about choice again?” Logan scoffs pacing of front of the shelves. His hands flex and curl at his sides, fingers twitching, with every spike of his barely leashed energy. I can almost feel my own fingers twitch in sympathy—skipping the gym today was not a good idea, my energy is brimming.

“That’s not what I meant.” Luke says.

They’re loud. Too loud. Every word hits another crack into my glass walls.

I press my nails into my palms and focus on the sensation, the dull pinch enough to keep me present. I know why we’re here. It’s all my fault.

If I’d just kept it together at the party. If I hadn’t let the anger take over. But it was so sudden. I still don’t know where it came from.

Cathy’s words twist in my head again, like Teag’s knife when he was disappointed. “Control only works until it doesn’t. Holding everything down is exhausting.”

I grit my teeth. She’s not here, but she’s still here.

"Maybe it’s been conditioned into you, like everything else."

She’s like James inside my head. Like I’ll never be rid of either of their ghosts breathing down my neck.

"Maybe you can’t ever leave it behind. Home follows you no matter how far you run."

I breathe in too fast and choke on it. Home follows you.

No, I shove the thought away, but it won’t budge. Even now, Telera is still home. Where my family was, where Chrys was.

I close my eyes and suddenly I’m back at the party. The lights, the music, the way those drinks made me feel. I feel the rush of heat beneath my skin, too strong to control. It was like… What?

“Then what did you mean, Luke?” Logan throws his arms wide, pulling me back to the present. His eyes flick to me for a half second, too fast, like I distracted him somehow. I glance away, eyes snapping back to the ligature marks on my wrists.

“Why did you quit the PG in the first place? You told Tom and I that it brought out the worst in you, that the demands of the job made it hard to look at yourself in the mirror. You think it’ll be any different this time?”

“It doesn’t matter.” Luke says, his voice sharpening again, with no trace of the usual controlled silk now. “I made the deal.”

Silence hits, sharp as a blade. For a second, Logan’s whole frame stiffens, like he’s going to lunge. His eyes narrow. His shoulders draw back. I feel him suppress the energy surge.

“You didn’t tell me that.” It’s not a shout this time. The quiet tone is worse.

Luke doesn’t respond, just stares, face blank, eyes steady.

“You made the deal?” Logan’s breath comes hard through his nose. He spins away, muttering something under his breath that I don’t catch. My eyes flick up, watching the back of his head, and for some reason, that sight — his back turned, the way he shifts like he can’t stand still — makes something ache inside me.

“You can’t fix this, Luke.” Logan says it like a warning. “You think you’re in control, but you’re not. You never were.”

His words hit something raw inside me.

Control. Holding everything down is exhausting. I thought I had control. I thought I could be like Luke — cool, steady, untouchable. Stone. Marble polished to silk, not glass.

My hands are shaking. I ball them into fists, pushing them into my lap.

I don’t realize I’m staring until Luke turns to look at me. His eyes land on mine, and suddenly I’m hyper-aware of everything about myself — the way my shoulders are curled forward, the way my fingers pick at my sleeve, the way my heartbeat sounds too loud in my ears.

His expression shifts. Barely. Just a flicker. His mouth presses into a line that isn’t quite a frown. “You’re safe now,” he says softly, and something in me twists so hard I have to press my nails into my palms to keep from flinching.

Safe.

I’m not.

I’m not safe.

I’m free, but I’m not safe.

And I can see it now. The weight sitting on Luke’s shoulders, heavier than it was before. The way his jaw locks like he’s holding everything together with his teeth. The choice he made wasn’t about him. It wasn’t even about me.

It was about what they could take from him.

My chest tightens, as it starts to make sense. I’m free because he’s not.

I’m free because Luke signed away something he didn’t tell us about. Something I’m not sure he can get back.

I press my hands together, fists against one another in my lap, fingers curling tight. Do something.

“What if we leave?” I form the words with my lips. Pursing, opening, tongue on the roof of my mouth, teeth on bottom lip… Each sound resonates clearly, like shards of glass shattering as they fall.

My eyes flick up. “Logan thinks I need training, maybe it’s time I take him up on it. At the cabin we’d be off their radar.

Luke crosses his arms, frowns. “Don’t mistake running away for taking control, Misty. You should know by now that it never ends well.”

Logan steps closer, his eyes locked onto me lit up with a glimmer of approval.

“I didn’t give them me so you two could go off playing survivalists—”

“That’s not it.” I say, cutting him off before he can continue. “At the party, I didn’t just lose control. Something Cathy said about home following me made me think about it. When I ran from TTH, my friend Chrystelle was killed. She was special, empathic. My first sense sync. I felt her die, the sync snap. When that Carol girl provoked me… I’m not sure, but I think, maybe Chrys is still alive. I was channeling her somehow.”

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Next Time: Luke is gone, and Misty and Logan are on their own. In the mountains Logan sets a torturous pace for training focused on flow and expression to help Misty come to terms with her frightening power, and Logan thinks they could leverage their sense sync in battle.

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Author’s Notes:

Yes, it’s a cruel cliffhanger, sorry but I’m over my ten minute reading time limit so I have to cut you off.

As you can see, the stakes are higher than ever for all of them. Luke is forced back into military service, and Logan and Misty are off on a new adventure. And just what does the possibility that Chrys isn’t dead mean for our favorite characters?

Happy speculating. That’s all for today.

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Until next time.

- Jenny*

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