Chapter Text
It was going to rain later. Ezra could smell the damp, earthy scent hanging insistently in the air, bringing with it a chill that sunk under his skin.
Ezra ducked his head, keeping his eyes on the sidewalk right in front of him as the strange pricking sensation at the base of his skull grew stronger. When he’d left the house, he’d thought it was just because of the cold, but it had only grown worse with each step he’d taken away from home.
He stopped in his tracks, his breath catching in his throat as something cold and sticky seemed to spread across the surface of his brain. A sharp tingling feeling shot down his spine, startling a quiet gasp from him.
Glancing over his shoulder, Ezra scanned the street behind him. It was almost deserted, and no one seemed to be paying him any attention, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that someone was watching him. He knew there was a word his parents had used for the weird feelings he got. Intu…intuition? Whatever it was, they said his was stronger than most people’s, and now it was screaming at him.
He wasn’t safe here.
Ezra forced himself to keep moving, walking faster this time. Zare’s house was only a couple blocks away. If he hurried, maybe he could get there before Zare and Dhara left for school and they could walk the rest of the way together.
That cold, sticky feeling sank deeper into his head, like it had formed claws that were digging into his mind. His heart began pounding as he started to run, desperate to put as much distance between himself and whoever or whatever was watching him.
As he rushed down the sidewalk, something slammed into him, pinning his arms against his sides. A hand came down over his mouth as he was dragged off the sidewalk and into an alley, pulled back until he came up against something solid. He bit down on the hand, only for its nails to dig into his face.
“Don’t scream.” The woman’s voice was soft, like she was trying to comfort him. “If you can manage that, I’ll make this as painless as possible.”
Ezra kicked the woman in the shin, scratching at her arm as he tried to twist out of her grip. She tightened her grip until Ezra could barely breathe, his ribs creaking as her arm pressed across his chest. As he went limp, the woman lifted him off the ground, carrying him deeper into the alley. His eyes widened as he saw the car she was carrying him toward, it’s trunk hanging open like the mouth of a monster about to swallow him whole.
“Let me go!” He could barely hear his own voice past the hand that still covered his mouth tightly. “Please!”
The woman didn’t say a word. She just threw him into the trunk, slamming it closed before Ezra could even try to escape. He slammed his hands against the roof of the trunk, screaming at the top of his lungs.
“Someone help!”
Ezra gasped as the car lurched and began to move. He frantically clawed at everything he could reach, kicking and screaming until he felt like he couldn’t breathe. A tight feeling formed in his throat as his skin grew hot. The air suddenly felt so much thinner than it had just seconds ago.
As the car kept moving, Ezra’s desperate struggle to claw his way free began to grow weaker, until he found himself lying still, tears trickling from the corners of his eyes. This didn’t feel real. It couldn’t be happening. But every time the car stopped or hit a bump, the jolting of the floor beneath his back hammered in the fact that it was real. He was really here. He was being kidnapped.
At long last, the car stopped and the engine cut off with a shudder. Somehow, Ezra could feel the woman walking toward the trunk. Ezra braced himself, preparing to jump out as soon as the trunk opened. But when it did, he didn’t get the chance.
The woman grabbed Ezra’s arm, her nails digging in like needles as she dragged him out of the trunk. Ezra fought against her grip, but she just held on tighter and dragged him toward her.
“Help!” Ezra scratched at the back of the woman’s hand, but she wouldn’t let go. He looked around frantically, searching for anyone who could help him. But they were standing in an empty parking lot, the dark gray asphalt stretching out around them like a void. No one was going to save him.
The woman threw Ezra through the open door of the car into the back seat. Climbing in behind him, she pinned him down against the seat, her hands gripping his wrists as her knee pressed down on his chest. For the first time, he finally got a good look at her face. Her brown eyes were surprisingly soft as she looked down at him. Her dark hair hung around her face, just long enough to brush against Ezra’s skin as she leaned in too close.
A fresh wave of tears began to flood from Ezra’s eyes as he struggled. He wanted to scream, but he couldn’t remember how.
“Please,” he said, his voice shaking. “Just let me go.”
“I guess I didn’t need to make this painless after all,” the woman said, her voice low as she leaned in close to Ezra’s ear, her breath tickling his skin. She smiled, and Ezra could see teeth so sharp they didn’t look like they belonged on a human.
Ezra whimpered, kicking against her legs. She just shifted her weight, pinning his legs down. Harsh sobs tore their way out of Ezra’s throat. He just wanted to go home.
“I’ve been watching you for a long time, Ezra Bridger.” Ezra’s skin crawled as the woman gently trailed her fingers down his cheek, her touch lingering on his neck. “Do you have any idea just how special you are?”
“Please,” Ezra gasped, forcing the word out between frantic gulps of air. He could barely see the woman’s face anymore as his vision blurred.
“Shh.” The woman’s voice was too close to Ezra’s ear, so close it nearly drowned out the sound of his own crying. “This won’t hurt for long.”
Something sharp pricked against his neck. Ezra cried out as it pierced his skin, sinking into his flesh. Through the haze of pain, Ezra could only just think straight enough to realize that she was biting him. He could do nothing but scream as she held him in place.
When she finally released her hold on him, Ezra’s head was pounding. His stomach churned, threatening to vomit as the world around him spun. Just breathing seemed almost impossible now as every part of his body grew heavier by the second.
Light glinted off of something above him. Knife, a panicked voice in the back of his mind told him. That’s a knife. She’s going to –
“Open your mouth,” the woman said, still in that sickly sweet voice.
Ezra just barely managed to shake his head, whimpering quietly as even that small motion made the pounding and spinning in his head worse. But he was too weak to resist as she gripped his jaw and pried his mouth open.
She pressed her bleeding wrist to his mouth and Ezra gagged as the taste of blood flooded across his tongue. It filled his mouth until he was forced to swallow it just to keep from choking.
“That’s it,” the woman said, her free hand gently stroking his forehead. “Just drink.”
Tears burned at Ezra’s eyes as he kept swallowing the blood. The more he drank, the more he needed it, like he would just vanish if he didn’t drink more.
By the time she pulled away from him, Ezra’s stomach hurt so much he wanted to throw up. He squirmed in the woman’s grip, but he was too weak to break free.
“L-let go,” he said, his voice barely more than a whisper.
“Hush,” the woman crooned. “It’ll be over soon.”
No sooner had she said it when the pain began to spread out from his stomach, the dull ache crawling through his entire body. Suddenly, the pain exploded through him, like frozen metal being pressed against his skin from the inside. His back arched as he screamed, his heels scraping against the seat as he frantically kicked at nothing.
Gripping both his wrists in one hand, the woman pressed her other hand over Ezra’s mouth, muffling his cries. Tears clouded his vision as the pain grew worse and worse, ripping through him until his eyes rolled back and everything went dark.
As Ezra slowly drifted back into awareness, the world around him was swaying. When he forced his eyes open, he could see a blank gray surface. With a sinking feeling of horror, he realized that he was back in the trunk of the car. Tears stung at his eyes as he took a deep breath, trying to tell himself not to panic. It did no good. Within seconds, he was sobbing, kicking frantically at the roof of the trunk and screaming.
Even as his ears rang, a sound cut through the haze of Ezra’s panic. A clang and a creak of straining metal. Ezra froze as a sliver of dim light appeared. A gap where the lid of the trunk had cracked open just a little.
Ezra didn’t stop to think about why it had opened this time. He just kicked again, sobbing in relief as the gap grew wider. With another kick, he heard a loud snap and the trunk burst open. There was a screech of tires on pavement and Ezra was slammed against the lip of the trunk as the car stopped abruptly. Seizing his chance, Ezra leapt from the trunk and ran.
The rain pelted at his face as he raced down the sidewalk, the cold night air slashing at his skin as he ran faster than he had ever run in his life. He could hear footsteps slamming against the pavement behind him and didn’t need to look back to know that the woman who’d kidnapped him was following him.
He turned a corner only to find himself in an alley rather than on another street. Looking back over his shoulder, he saw the woman turning the corner behind him. There was no chance to double back now. Ezra raced to the other end of the alley, his eyes locking onto a gap at the edge of the chain link fence that stretched across it. He could feel something snag at his sleeve, but it didn’t catch. Once he reached the fence, he shoved himself through the gap, holding his breath and trying to make himself as small as possible as he wedged himself to the other side of the fence.
“You’re not getting away that easily.” There was a rattle as the woman spoke, and Ezra looked back to see her climbing the fence. He turned on his heel and began running again, out onto the next street.
His heart sank when he saw that the street was deserted. He had no idea what time it was, but it was late enough that no one was out here.
But their cars were.
Ezra raced up the street to buy himself a little more distance, then dropped to the ground, dragging himself beneath a car parked on the street outside a house. He held his breath, squeezing his eyes shut as he listened harder than he’d ever listened in his life.
There. Footsteps hitting the pavement, hard. She’d dropped down from the fence. And she was coming closer.
“I know you’re here,” she said, her voice so sickly sweet that Ezra’s stomach churned. “You can’t hide from me that easily.”
Ezra’s eyes burned as he fought to hold back tears. He couldn’t make a sound, not now, not when she was so close. He bit down on the inside of his cheek, tasting blood in his mouth, but forcing himself to stay quiet as those footsteps drew closer and closer and –
A sharp ringing sound cut through the air and the footsteps stopped. A moment later, the ringing stopped and he heard the woman’s voice again.
“Yes?” she said, sounding as though she was speaking through gritted teeth. There was a brief silence and then she spoke again. “I’ll be there.”
Ezra slowly let out the breath he’d been holding as he realized she’d been talking on the phone.
“This isn’t over,” she said. Ezra flinched as he realized she was speaking to him again. “I have plans for you, Ezra.”
Slowly, her footsteps faded until Ezra could no longer hear them. Still, he stayed where he was, waiting, listening, just in case. At long last, he crawled out from beneath the car to find the street deserted.
Hurriedly wiping the tears from his eyes, Ezra began running again, going the opposite direction than the way the woman had left. He didn’t care if it was the right way to get home. He just wanted to put as much distance between himself and the kidnapper as possible.
Ezra kept running, shivering as the rain pelted down on him, until he began feeling dizzy. He stopped for a moment, one hand leaning against the concrete wall of a building, and looked around, searching for anything familiar. His eyes narrowed when he spotted an old brick building across the street. He and his mother had passed it on the way home from somewhere once. They’d passed his school not long after.
He took a step forward, only to stop again as a wave of nausea settled over him. His stomach growled and he realized seconds later that his hands were shaking.
Ezra gritted his teeth and shook his head. He was so close to getting home. If he could just make it there, everything would be okay.
Once he got home, this would all be over.