Claire

The storm came out of nowhere.

Well, okay technically it came out of the sky. There had been no indication it was going to storm when Claire left her job, though. The sky had been clear and dark blue as night fell; now it was pitch black with the occasional flare of lightning for variety. Rain fell in pelting sheets and the wind buffeted her little blue Honda hard enough that she had to maintain a white-knuckled grip on the wheel just to stay in her lane. There had been no storm in the weather report; clear skies had been predicted all week.

Thunder rumbled in competition with the drum line of the song playing over the radio. The drummer didn't stand a chance against nature's wrath, and neither did Claire's radio's reception. The speakers erupted in a burst of static just as lightning flashed again, nearly blinding the young woman. She slammed on the brakes, forcing the car to screech to a sudden, tooth-jarring stop. She could barely see past the hood of her car and after images from the lighting danced across her vision.

Claire needed to find someplace to wait out the worst of the storm. She would drive into a ditch at this rate; she was only lucky there wasn't anyone else driving along on the little side road she'd chosen. Her sudden stop might have caused a wreck if there had been.

Surely there was a driveway or a shoulder somewhere. Claire inched her car forwards, searching through the pouring rain and pitch blackness for any safe point to stop. She wasn't making it back to the college campus in this.

During a brief lull in the lightning, Claire's headlights reflected off of the little shiny orange sticker on the edge of a guardrail. Claire decided that would have to do; there seemed to be a bit of a gravel shoulder there. With luck, no one would come barreling down the road at high speeds. She pulled her car to the side, barely able to hear the crunch of gravel under her tires. As the car turned, there was a flash of lightning so strong it bathed the whole curve of the road in near daylight brightness. Claire could see the guardrail, the edge of a small ravine, and a crumpled pile of material that almost looked like a person.

No, it couldn't be a person. It was just a discarded jacket or a tarp or something. Claire turned on her high beams to get a better look before her imagination took over. She had to check and be sure it was nothing because otherwise, the uncertainty would haunt her for days.

That was a hand.

Raised against the sudden brightness of her high beams, a hand moved feebly to protect their face. The headlights reflected off the bright blue cloth of a jacket and illuminated a pale face, dark hair, and not much else. The pouring rain obscured all detail.

Claire yanked the keys from the ignition and slammed her door open. She had not struck the person; she would have felt the impact. However, someone must have. She couldn't see another vehicle so whoever was lying there on the ground, next to a guardrail, had to have been walking and been hit. She couldn't imagine any other reason someone would be lying on the gravel next to a ravine in a storm like this. She had to help them.

She skidded around the front fender of her car and slammed her hip against the guardrail to stop herself. Water was running through the gravel in little rivers, ankle deep in many places. Icy rain pelted down her neck and shoulders as she leaned forward to get a better look at the person.

It was a kid. A young boy, she thought, based on the short hair and the shape of his jaw. Details were hard to make out in the harsh light and shadows of the headlights and the storm. He was small, though, and hurt. Hurt bad.

Claire knelt in the gravel next to him, ignoring the icy water and the way the gravel ground into her kneecaps even through her thick denim jeans. She reached out to touch the boy's shoulder. He flinched back violently, bringing one hand up palm out, defensively. The other hand rested on the ground next to him, arm shaking from the strain of keeping him sitting up. He slumped over a little as that arm gave out, and would have face-planted into the muck if Claire hadn't reached out to catch his shoulders.

He whimpered a little in pain or fear or both. It was hard to hear the sound over the driving rain and continuous thunder. Claire shifted so that her arm was around his back, and levered his arm over her shoulder.

“I'm going to help you,” she promised, pointing to her car. “I'll get help, but we have to get you out of this storm!”

She only hoped she wasn't doing more harm than good by trying to move him. He was sitting up, sort of, so that had to mean his spine was okay. Right? She tried to remember what her first aid class had said about that. She knew you weren't normally supposed to move the victim of a hit and run, but she thought leaving him to drown in rain was just as bad. So she had to get him into her car, and then call for help.

His mouth moved. She thought he said something, but she couldn't hear him. His voice was too faint. Maybe he was just trying to breathe.

“I'm going to hope that was you agreeing,” Claire said. “Because I can't hear you. I can barely hear myself. But we have to move.”

She braced herself and straightened up, slowly and carefully. The idea was she would take most of his weight. He struggled to stand, feet slipping in the mud. The hand not wrapped over her shoulder clutched at her sweater. His face somehow paled even further, despite being almost paper white already. He trembled in her grip, and his breath came in short, sharp gasps. Claire leaned in, trying to offer some warmth as she turned them both towards the car.

“Just a few steps,” Claire said, “We can do this. Come on.”

She mumbled comforting nonsense as they moved one shaky, slippery step at a time to the back door of her car. It wasn't a huge distance. She'd made it the first time in like three seconds. This felt more like three hours.

Finally, finally, they reached the back, driver's side door. Lightning flared and thunder crashed, even before the after images had faded. They weren't just in a storm, they were in the heart of the storm. Claire glanced up nervously even as she pried at the car door. If lightning struck the ground near them, they were dead. At least the car would provide some protection.

“Here we go,” Claire said, half guiding half pushing the boy into the back seat. She scrambled in behind him and pulled the door closed, leaving them in a little metal cocoon of relative dryness and silence. At least she could hear herself speak. She knelt in the floorboard and leaned between the front seats to turn the car on, and more importantly turn on the heater because the poor child did not need to develop hypothermia on top of whatever injuries he had. If he wasn't already hypothermic and in shock. Who knew how long he'd been out there?

The boy huddled in the seat, as far from her as he could get. His back pressed into the corner formed by the seat back and the door, he drew his knees up to his chin and wrapped his arms around his legs.

“I, ah,” Claire cleared her throat. “I'm sorry I just grabbed you like that,” she said, realizing that technically she was now guilty of kidnapping. “My name is Claire Alexander. I'm just trying to help you.”

He looked up at her. His eyes were dark, pupils blown wide, but she thought maybe they would show green in better lighting. Speaking of which. Claire reached up and turned the dome light on, bathing them both in soft, golden light.

“Here,” Claire said, moving to reach over the back seat into the trunk space. She was glad she had a hatchback, so she didn't have to go back into the storm to reach the supplies she kept back there. She had a first aid kit and some towels. No extra jacket, though. She should add one of those since it was so cold. And maybe a blanket. She handed the boy the largest towel. “Let's dry you off some.”

He stared at the towel, and then at her, and made no move to accept the soft cloth. Finally, she just draped it over his knees and twisted to retrieve her cell phone from the front seat. He needed help; it was looking like he was in shock for certain.

Of course. Her cell was dead. No matter how hard or how many times she pressed the little button on the side it remained a stubbornly dead, blank piece of useless glass and plastic. Perfect. And she didn't have a car charger either; her last one had broken in two when she caught it in the door yesterday.

“Okay,” Claire took a deep breath. She tossed the cell back into the front seat. “Okay, we're fine. As soon as it's safe to drive, I'll take you to the hospital. I think we're only a couple blocks away. Yeah. We'll be okay.”

He frowned and lifted his head a little to stare at her.

“The storm?” his voice was raw and rough, soft enough she could barely hear him.

“It's making it hard to see the road,” Claire explained, “I don't want to risk driving.”

“It'll pass soon,” he said, letting his head loll back against the door.

It didn't look like it intended to pass any time that century to Claire, but she didn't argue with him. Instead, she popped open the latch on her little plastic first aid kit. He jumped at the sound.

“Sorry to startle you,” Claire said, worried. Should he be jumping at every sound like that? Was that a symptom of shock, or something worse? She couldn't remember. “I was just thinking we should get you dried off and patched up, while we wait. Is that okay?”

His brows drew together as he stared at her. “Why?” he whispered.

“You're hurt,” Claire explained. She studied him. He wore a bright blue windbreaker that was totally insufficient for the weather, and most of a pair of battered blue jeans. He was barefoot, too, feet scraped up and muddy. She caught a glint of metal around his wrist. A bracelet, maybe. There was a choker around his neck, a strip of black leather against pale flesh. His hair was soaked close to his head, grimy with gravel dust and mud so that it was impossible to guess its color. His skin was pale, except for the ugly yellow and blue of a somewhat healed black eye. That hadn't happened in a wreck, it was older. Someone had punched him at least two, three days prior.

As he shifted, uncomfortable with her staring, the jacket fell open a little. Claire frowned. There was a bruise there, too. This one was fresh, a purple-black blotch across his collarbone. She couldn't see much of him the way he was huddled into a ball, but she saw enough to know she had to get him help.

“Hey,” Claire moved so she sat next to him on the seat. “I know you're pretty freaked out right now. I know you don't know me, and you're hurting, and you're scared. That's okay. I get it, I do. I just really want to help you. At least let me help you get dry and warm, okay? Can I do that much?”

He blinked slowly and stared at her, and some eternities later his chin dipped in a nod. He twisted a little and let go of his knees, letting his legs fall limply across the seat. His shoulders stayed hunched in as she tucked the towel across his lap and over his bare feet, and then reached for a second towel to wrap over his shoulders.

“I think we should lose the jacket,” Claire said after a moment, “It's soaked and probably just making you colder. Is that okay?”

He leaned forward and offered her one arm. She took that as permission. It took a lot of tugging, muttered cursing, and wiggling, but finally, she had a double handful of soaked plastic fabric, and a bare-chested adolescent. He wasn't wearing a shirt, just the jacket. And... and the jacket wasn't just soaked with rainwater.

That was blood dripping from the material onto her seat. She dropped the thing and looked down to see fresh, crimson blood staining her palms.

She looked at the boy's chest and shoulders. She'd expected injuries; he'd apparently been hit by a car after all. Only... cars did not leave cigarette burns up and down a person's arms. They didn't leave bruises in the shape of a fist all across the chest and stomach of a child. They didn't leave livid, fresh red scars on their bellies, or rope burns or... or any of that.

Ice washed through Claire's veins. Her hands shook and her heart hammered in her chest. She couldn't breathe, couldn't move.

He hadn't been hit by a car. He'd been tortured.