Track 51

Veni's weighted red coat flapped in the wind as he looked from the spiraling helicopter miles in the distance to a window a few stories up in The Tower. 

Marcello stared down at the man who he had just seen blow up the helicopter. The same helicopter Zoe was in. It had all happened so fast. A spear of light had shot from the man, and instantly hit the helicopter. 

As he made eye contact with the man below, Veni felt cold, sticky, and electrical. Although his eyes were intelligent, they radiated a deep hatred as they bore into Marcello's. 

Veni watched as another man, taller, wearing a black leather jacket, walked up to Marcello, pulling him away from the window. 

Veni looked at the ground, seeing the ethereal breadcrumb trail that spawned, leading him away.

Kholwa coughed, spitting the taste of smoke out of her mouth. Opening her eyes, she saw Zheanni above her, clothes in tatters. The outside of the large yellow bag she took from Zoe was damaged beyond recognition—burnt and ripped up. If Zheanni hadn't covered her, she guessed she would be dead. Grinning down at Kholwa, she was happy to see that Kholwa was only a little dazed. 

Shrapnel and one of the helicopter's blades had embedded themselves into the street. Pieces of smoldering, spinning wreckage were strewn around the area. 

Kholwa looked at her in awe, "You saved my life."

Zheanni went to pull Kholwa to her feet, but when she grabbed her outstretched hand, Kholwa yelped in pain, pulling back and grasping her forearm. "Ow! I think I broke it."

Zheanni looked around; they had plummeted hundreds of feet, bouncing off an office building and then landing on the street. "How'd this even happen?" 

"We both felt it. I think we were sniped out of the sky by someone." 

"Those people!" Zheanni snarled at the thought. "First, they killed Poatan, and now they're trying to slide on us all. This shit is a conspiracy!"

"Maybe…" Kholwa said. 'That energy signature…It was familiar but different. I just get the feeling that it was unrelated to those bodyguards earlier.'

"Fuck!" She had taken out her phone to call Conor, but the screen had been shattered in the fall, "Ayo, we're missing someone, aren't we?"

"Oh yea, the white-hair girl," a grim look crossed Kholwa's face, "Oh…yeah..."

Kholwa got to her feet, and they both ran around the blasted helicopter, looking for Zoe. 

Zoe wasn't sure where she was. She focused on what she could identify. For one, she was in pain. A lot of pain. Not excruciating, but it had felt like… 'I survived a helicopter crash,' she remembered. 

With much effort, she activated her energy, the orange glow illuminating the crumpled metal box around her. 

Zoe yelped. Suddenly, a fist punched through the wall of metal, coming inches from her face before retreating. Looking through the hole was Zheanni, "Ah, you're still alive." Using her hands, she ripped open the hole, making it large enough for Zoe to go through. 

Conor strolled through the automatic glass doors of the hospital with Mitani fumbling after him, clasping the smoothie to his chest. 

The front lobby was absolutely packed, as it was annually since the Festival of Wealth was created. Drunken injuries, overdoses, bullet wounds, and probably fights. 

Nurses, like worker bees, rushed from person to person, placing their pollen. 

Heads turned as Conor moved through the lobby. 

Mitani walked closer to Conor, seeing the awestruck take their phones out for pictures. 

None of the nurses seemed to care or notice as Conor and Marcello walked through a set of doors that led deeper into the hospital. 

Seemingly by instinct, the nurses and doctors rushing down the hallways would give Conor a wide birth, shimmying along the walls of the narrow halls instead of risking getting too close to him. 

"Out!" Conor ordered, seeing a nurse hovering over Antwan's bed. 

She glanced in surprise at the two standing in the doorway. "Do you know the patient?" 

Conor stepped aside the door, gesturing for her to skedaddle. 

Mitani stared wide-eyed at the nurse, hoping she would somehow hear and understand his thoughts, 'DON'T TEST HIM!'

"I- I'm going to leave now," she said, looking from Mitani's expression to Conor's, before awkwardly slinking out of the room. 

"Alright," Conor stood over Antwan's bed, seeing the man with his eyes closed. If it weren't for the fog on the inside of his oxygen mask, Conor would have assumed at first glance he was dead. His chest barely rose with each breath. Gently prying his eyelids open with his fingers, he saw the brown-bloodshot eye staring back. A blood vessel had popped in his eye, turning the whites of his eyes a bloody red. "Jeez," Conor mumbled. Antwan's head had been completely shaved. The doctors had given him multiple staples and stitches—ugly wounds that littered his skin. 

Mitani stood a few feet behind him awkwardly, not wanting to interrupt anything. Finally, he spoke, "So… How do we actually feed him?" 

"What do you mean?" Conor turned. 

"It's not like he can eat this without choking—he's in a coma."

"Oh." Conor looked back at Antwan, realizing the issue. 

"Wait, what's that?" Mitani crouched next to the bed, reaching around it to grab an end of a clear, bendy plastic tube. 

"That's gotta be how they feed 'em. Yeah, that's right…they use feeding tubes."

"Um…so," Mitani looked from the tube in his right hand to Antwan. "I don't suppose you know how to insert a feeding tube?" 

"When in doubt," Conor took out his phone, looking up: How to put feeding tube into guy in coma. "Let's see…" he muttered, scrolling. "Ah!" He said after some minutes. 

"You actually found something?" Mitani was legitimately shocked. 

"Of course." He snatched the tube from Mitani and propped his phone against Antwan so he could watch the video at the same time as he was inserting. "We can skip past all the gloves and other safety shit here…"

Mitani cringed hearing that. 

He propped the bed up and removed his oxygen mask. After a deep breath, Conor pulled open Antwan's mouth and plunged the end of the tube deep down his throat. 

Mitani felt like gagging, watching what looked like multiple feet of that tube go into Antwan. 

"Alright, pour it in," Conor ordered, once he felt like he'd gone deep enough. 

'Here goes nothing,' Mitani thought as he poured the drink down. He watched as the purple concoction slowly made its way through the tube. 'Please work! Please work! Please work!' His eyes kept flashing back to Conor, it had been almost twenty seconds, and nothing had happened. He knew it wouldn't be long before his patience turned to a murderous rage. 

Antwan's eyes shot open, and he doubled over, coughing uncontrollably. 

"Woah! Hold on, calm down, bruh!" Conor tried to hold him down as Antwan thrashed around, yelling incoherently. 

Being forced to activate his energy to hold him in place, Conor ripped the feeding tube from his mouth and threw it to the ground with a wet splat. 

Mitani let out a breath that he felt he had been holding for minutes on end. 

Antwan looked around the room, confused. He scratched his head, as he did so, the staples and stitches fell out of his skin—Mitani's Soul Food had healed every wound. He blinked, realizing his dreads were gone, "What the…Conor?" He looked at him, then to Mitani, "What the hell?"

"Yeah, bro, you were gone for a bit, but you're all good now."