Savant

9: In Which I Just Hang Out for a While

Was it the stress that unlocked it? Was it the poison? The shock of being thrown off a building?

All I knew was that some secret door at the back of my skull swung wide open and the noise poured into my brain in a single moment: a barista brewing espresso four blocks down, a businessman welcoming a prostitute into his hotel room, a cat mewing, a rat chewing, pens scratching on paper. I heard every whisper, every shout, every squealing tire and slamming door and spilling water within a five-block radius. Snatches of conversation like papers in the wind blew through my head, most of them in Japanese, but there were some I could understand.

"...extra wasabi on that?"

"Sorry, wrong number!"

"...reverse the polarity of the..."

The sound hit me like a piano falling on my head, like concrete pouring into my ears. It made my brain heavy. My vision blurred and darkened and my head rolled forward, bumping into the concrete, too overwhelmed to even try to think.

I was clinging to a palm tree amidst a tsunami. The noise of the city rushed incessantly through me, bringing tears of pain to my eyes. The burning in my arms was nothing, nothing compared to what was happening in my head.

Get a grip, Jen, I told myself. I struggled to lift my head. Push it out. My lips pulled back from my clenched teeth as I strained to turn off the noise that was crushing me from the inside out. I imagined rows of doors and myself slamming all those doors, shutting out the world, closing off the sound. I imagined stuffing cotton in my ears. I imagined silence, sweet, deep, perfect silence-and then I heard him.

Diego. Eleven floors down-I realized I could pinpoint the sounds, know exactly where they were coming from the way I could look at a chair and know exactly how far from me it was. Diego was breathing, simply breathing, and I'd know the sound of his breath anywhere. He was awake. Conscious. He began to whisper to himself, "This is all my fault. God, what have I done? I should have known, should have seen the trap... Colin! You bastard!" and my heart broke to hear the agony in his voice. He whispered my name, then fell silent.

I noticed that as I'd focused on him, the rest of the noise had faded away. It was almost at a normal level. As I pulled away from Diego the noise began to crush in again, a garbage compactor of sound closing on me, but now I knew how to control it. I tuned in to Diego again, and the walls of noise receded. Keeping my ears tightly focused on him, I let out a long breath and shut my eyes, taking a moment to simply bask in the near-silence.

What is happening to me?

One thing was clear: I was capable of more than I had imagined. So was Nina. So were we all, I guessed. Not such a failure anymore, Dr. Dillard. Not that he'd ever have a chance to find that out. I shuddered as the image of my bullet shattering his face burst through my mind. Had I meant to shoot him or had it been an accidental reflex? Was I a murderer? I didn't know. I did know, however, that if I survived this day I would spend many hours contemplating that question.

For now, I had to stay focused on not ending up like the late Lionel Dillard. What time was it? How long had I been wallowing in the waves of sound? My internal clock was off; I couldn't mark the seconds between falling off the roof and now.

"...Jenna..."

My head shot up.

"Hold on Jenna..."

It was Nina. I could hear her-and what's more, I think she knew I could.

"Nina?"

"Train's coming, Jenna. Listen. Do you hear it? Choo-choo!"

My lips curled into a half-smile. Why hadn't I thought of it myself? I didn't need my eyes; I had another sense just as strong now. But how does Nina know that? And how did she know-Ah, screw it. I could ask her those questions after I'd rescued her and Diego. Right now, I had to focus on saving my butt.

I listened, pulling the focus of my hearing from Diego-he was back to murmuring to himself-and turning it to the south, toward the train station we'd walked out of less than an hour ago. It took a moment to sort through the layers of noise, but then I found it-the train. It was a roar contained in a metal box, steady and monotonous. Then, as I listened, it changed. The engine noise rose, grew stronger. The track began to vibrate as the train moved forward. I shut my eyes and imagined it pulling out of the station, gathering speed. In my mental image, there were numbers suspended all around the train-speed, distance, acceleration. They flipped and spun as the train picked up pace like the numbers on the screens at Wall Street.

My train was coming. I just had to last until it arrived.

My left hand slipped first, having succumbed to the poison's paralyzing effects. I cried out, the nails on my right hand nearly ripped from their beds, as I desperately tightened my grip. My life depended on those five fingers and their ability to resist the poison for the next moments.

The cry called the attention of the men on the roof, who must have found Dillard's body and gone hunting for me. Wonderful. On the other hand (ha ha) I could now reach my earpiece.

"Diego-" What could I say? Suddenly all the things I things I needed to tell him, like the fact that Dillard was dead, like the terrible truth about my past, like the astounding new ability I'd just discovered-raced out my mind. My tongue turned to a useless brick.

All I could manage was, "-I will be back for you." Then as my right hand began to slide free and he babbled in my ear ("Don't do it! Are you crazy? I love you-just stop!"), I desperately reached with the other and managed to grip the ledge with it. According to my calculations, I had to last for ten more seconds, but the guys overhead had already heard me. It would be pretty hard to miss the 120-pound girl hanging by her manicure with nowhere to go.

10... 9... 8...

And sure enough, here they came. Their heads poked over the edge, looking for some inexplicable reason outward-as if I might be suspended in mid-air, Superman-style-before they caught on to the more probable conclusion and looked down. At me.

"Clever thing," said Solomon, as the other two laughed. "You are tricky, I'll give you that."

"Gee, Solly, you make a girl blush," I replied.

...7...6...5...

"You shot poor old Dillard," said one of the others in a strong Italian accent.

"He pushed me to it," I said, totally serious, but they laughed uproariously.

...4... 3... 2...

"Just shoot her," said Solomon, suddenly losing interest. The others shrugged and angled their guns at my face, all traces of humor vanishing from their expressions.

"Ciao, bella," said the Italian.

...And go!

The mental timer in my head that had begun counting down two minutes ago went off like a siren, blasting my thoughts with all the tenderness of a chainsaw through metal. At the same moment, the men above opened fire.

I let go.

I dropped.