ASK Part 11

“So, Shayne, what are you going to do now?” Arlene said, yanking Ginny up by the arm with her left. Ginny yelped, but Arlene put the blade back to her throat with her right and growled, “Shut up!”

“Please, I’ll do whatever you want. Just please let my sister go,” I said.

“Don’t do that, Shaynie!” Ginny said.

“Shut up!” Arlene said again.

I tried to think fast. I had the knife in my pocket. But if I tried anything, Arlene would jam the blade into Ginny’s throat. God, please help us, I prayed.

If I could just get her away from Ginny, then maybe I could stab her.

“Arlene, you know, I know who you are. I’m a danger to you. When we get rescued, I’ll tell everyone who you are and what you’ve done. You won’t get away with killing the people you have here.”

“Oh, you think so? By the time anyone gets here, you all will be dead and buried, and I’ll tell them that I’m Caroline Tyler, the only survivor from the cruise crash.”

“Well, you might as well just kill me and get it over with. It’s not like if you kill me, it would be a bad thing for me. I know I’d be in Heaven.”

“You think you’re so brave, don’t you? Well, you know what? I think I’d rather let you see your little sister suffer and die before I kill you.”

She pulled the knife away from Ginny’s neck and would have jammed it into the lower part of Ginny’s side, except Ginny jerked to the left and Arlene got her right hip instead. Ginny screamed and tried to pull away, but Arlene kept a firm grip around her middle and the knife in her hip. Blood ran down Ginny’s leg.

“Stop! Why are you doing this to her? She didn’t do anything to you!”

“I already told you. The more pain I cause you, the happier I’ll be,” she said, glaring with the blue eyes that no longer hid behind green contacts.

My mind raced. What could I do? At least Arlene’s blade wasn’t at Ginny’s throat any more. I pulled the knife from my pocket and unsheathed it. I ran at Arlene and tried to stab her, but she jerked away, putting Ginny in front of the blade. As Ginny cried out from the knife Arlene still held in her leg, I stopped just in time to not stab Ginny.

“Just let her go and fight me. She’s only ten,” I said.

“You think I care how old she is? My son was younger than ten when I killed him.”

“Well, maybe you don’t care about your family, but I care about mine. Leave her alone and deal with me. I’m the one you want.”

“Okay, fine. Since you’re so eager to die, I’ll kill you first.”

“Let Ginny go.”

She yanked the knife out of Ginny’s leg. Ginny screamed. Arlene shoved Ginny to the ground and lunged at me. A more intense fear than I ever felt in my life gripped me. I saw this woman kill her own family and knew she killed so many others.

She tried to stab me, but I dodged it and tried to stab her. She saw it coming and dodged.

I kept trying to stab Arlene, but her skill surpassed mine by far. But another idea struck me. If I could get her closer to the edge, maybe I could force her over the side. The fall could kill her. I backed up and moved to my left, closer to the edge.

I stood only about a foot away. Thinking of forcing her over the edge made me think of Rupert. Arlene caught me by surprise and I didn’t dodge fast enough. Her knife got me in the lower right arm. I screamed in pain and grabbed my right with my left as my knife went flying over the edge. Arlene smiled.

“Well, little girl, this is the end. Any last words?”

“Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends,” I forced out.

“How admirable. Now, goodbye.”

I braced myself, ready for my only chance. I put out my arms and when she came at me, I pushed her to the left with all my might, but not fast enough. Pain seared my other forearm. “Ow!” I yelled. I drew back, expecting her to finish me off at any second. But to my surprise, I heard a scream. I looked up to find Ginny beside me.

“Where’s Arlene?” I asked.

“We pushed her over the edge.”

“Thank you, Ginny!” I said, grabbing her in an embrace and ignoring the pain in my arms.

She wrapped her arms around me and we both thanked God for His deliverance. Then, I caught sight of her leg. Blood saturated the right leg of her shorts. I pulled my shirt off, leaving on my tank top, and tied it around Ginny’s leg.

“Ginny, you got a tank top on?” I asked.

“Yeah.”

“Rip your shirt in half and use the halves to tie up my arms.”

“Okay.” Ginny pulled the shirt off and did as I instructed. My arms stung really badly, but the cut on my left arm wasn’t too bad and had already stopped bleeding for the most part.

Suddenly, I remembered.

“Oh, Ginny,” I said, but couldn’t go on.

“What?”

“Do you know about Natalie?”

“Yes,” Ginny said, tears welling up in her eyes. “Arlene told me.”

I wrapped my arms around her. She hugged me back. I started crying, too. We cried for about ten minutes.

“Ginny, I think we should stay up here tonight, to let your leg rest, but tomorrow, we should go down.”

“Okay.”

“I wonder how I ever believed Rupert did it. I can’t believe I didn’t recognize Arlene right off.”

“Oh, Shaynie…Rupert.”

“I know. He was a cool kid.”

“I liked him, Shayne.”

“I’m sorry, Ginny.”

I hugged her. She started crying again and I felt bad for bring Rupert up.

“Well, thanks for fixing my leg,” Ginny said after a few minutes as she lay on the ground.

“Thank you for saving my life,” I said, lying beside her.

“Good night, Shayne.”

“Good night, Ginny. I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

When morning came, we started our struggle down the mountain. Not only did I have the fear of heights to deal with, but I also had to help Ginny with her leg despite my wounded arms.

When we reached the cave, we found a surprise. Rupert poked his head out. “Hey, guys.”

“Rupert!” Ginny and I shouted.

We went into the cave and threw our arms around him. He winced. We both pulled away.

“Thank God you’re alive! How badly are you hurt?” I said.

“My side hurts a lot. I think I broke some ribs. And my arm hurts a whole lot, too.”

“We thought you were dead!” Ginny exclaimed.

“Well, I was lucky enough to land on that ledge, and I crawled into the cave,” Rupert said.

“But where’s Arlene?” I said, now afraid that if Rupert survived the fall, Arlene had.

“She’s dead. I wouldn’t have done it if I didn’t have to! See, this knife fell from the top of the mountain and landed on the ledge, so I grabbed it. I heard Arlene screaming as she fell, but then, she caught hold of the mountain and climbed up to this cave. So, I … I killed her,” Rupert said. “Killing someone wasn’t what I expected. I always watched movies where killing the villain was amazing. But, to know that you stopped a person from living…She had a knife, though, and when she saw me, there was so much hatred in her eyes, and then she came toward me. I had to kill her or she would have killed me. But when I stabbed her, her eyes went all wide and she started gasping and I felt awful.” Rupert sounded close to tears.

“Don’t feel bad, Rupert,” Ginny said, putting her arms around him.

“It was completely self-defense!” I exclaimed. “And she was so evil. You know she killed all those other people. Now she can’t hurt anyone else. You shouldn’t feel any guilt for killing her.”

“But what if I get put in jail after someone finds us?” Rupert said.

“I don’t think they would put a kid in jail for defending himself. Especially when she was a convicted killer.”

That seemed to comfort him a bit. He took a deep breath. “Well, after I killed her, I pushed her over the side. So, she’s down there somewhere.”

When we reached the bottom of the mountain, after some searching, I found Arlene, covered in blood and very much dead.

“You know what, guys? I think we should bury her and mark the grave ‘ASK’,” I said.

-Shayne