'Let me get the baby.'
'You won't fit.' Before Jesse could say another word, Isabel pulled herself into the van. With the vehicle overturned and lying on the driver's side, navigating through the interior was difficult.
'Isabel,' Jesse called.
His body blocked most of the light coming through the shattered windshield. If the van had been a passenger model instead of designed for cargo transport there would have been windows all the way around. There would have been more light, and Isabel would have been able to peer in through the windows.
'The gasoline smell is getting stronger,' Jesse warned.
Isabel knew that was true. She could smell the change herself. The van was quickly turning into a bomb, and the racing engine might be enough to detonate those destructive forces.
Placing her hand on the van's metal body, knowing Jesse couldn't see what she was doing from his position behind her, Isabel unleashed her power. Part of her alien heritage, part of all of their heritages, was the ability to affect electronic things. The van had electronic parts that controlled the engine and ignition.
Whatever special part of her brain or her senses that controlled her alien powers reached out for the pulse of
the van. She felt the electrical force, then created a surge of energy that raced throughout the van.
'Isabel,' Jesse called. 'I just felt an electrical surge. We can't stay…'
Then the van's engine hiccuped and died.
'Get her out, Jesse,' Isabel said.
'My baby!' the woman moaned. 'Give me my baby!'
'I'll get her,' Isabel promised, but her heart sank when she saw the jumble of boxes and bags strewn across the backseats. She looked for a child seat but couldn't find one. Desperately, she moved boxes, not knowing if she was uncovering the child or burying her farther.
'There she is! There she is!'
Surprised by the woman's voice, Isabel glanced forward.
The woman's face was a mask of blood, and tears streaked her cheeks. But she was smiling. Jesse had almost succeeded in cutting the woman free, and she was able to turn in the seat.
'There's my little angel!' the woman cooed excitedly. 'There's my little Abbie! Come on to Mother, Abbie! Come on!'
Confusion dawned on Jesse's face as he peered past the woman. He looked at Isabel and shook his head.
Isabel's heart nearly stopped. Her immediate thought was that something awful had happened to the baby. Overcoming a preternatural fear of seeing what was there, she turned and looked into the seat.
A child, surely no more than a year and a half old, sat curled up like a fetal ball at the bottom of the seat. Boxes framed her. She had blond wisps of hair and chubby cheeks. A pink bow sat atop her head, matching the frilly dress and
matching underpants. Pink tennis shoes with white laces covered her feet, looking impossibly wide and blunt.
'See?' the woman said. 'That's my baby. That's my little Abbie.' She smiled, then groaned as Jesse continued cutting her free of the seat restraints. 'The doctors said she didn't make it, but 1 knew they were wrong. A mother always knows.'
The oddity of the woman's words barely touched Isabel as she pushed her way into the backseat. 'Hey,' she said to the little girl. 'Are you all right?'
The child glared at Isabel, folding her pudgy arms across her body.
Jesse helped the mother from the van, having to fight against her efforts to help Isabel get her little girl.
Shifting, Isabel reached for the child. Before she could reach her, though, the little girl cocked her head and snarled, baring her tiny white teeth in a feral grin. Surprised by the reaction, Isabel hesitated.
'Isabel,' Jesse called.
Isabel tried twice to speak.
The child snarled and snapped. She looked at Isabel, then pointed a tiny, blunt forefinger. 'You don't belong here.'
Jesse peered into the shadows that filled the van. 'What are you looking at?'
'The baby,' Isabel whispered.
'I don't see a baby,' Jesse said. 'Where do you see her?' He reached forward and moved boxes, reaching through the child as if she wasn't there.
Before Isabel could reply, hesitating as she tried to frame an answer that would make sense, the little girl stood and bolted toward the front of the wrecked van. She scrambled over the boxes and seats on all fours, moving with the lithe leaps of a jackrabbit.
Drawn by the glint of malicious intent she'd seen in the child's face, Isabel followed. She scraped an elbow on a jagged piece of windshield safety glass as she clambered from the vehicle. Outside again, the glaring intensity of the sun hammered her.
'Isabel!' Jesse called frantically. He tried to get out of the van to follow her but struggled with the tight confines.
Dizzy and not comprehending the situation, Isabel watched as the little girl loped up to the stricken woman lying on the ground.
The woman reached up with her hands, unable to get to her feet because of her injuries.
'Mother!' the little girl called in sadistic delight. The child's face split into a gamine grin that looked years older and bloodthirsty.
'Abbie!' the woman whispered. Tears ran down her bloody face. 'Oh god, Mommy didn't want to believe what the doctors told her. Mommy knew you were alive somewhere. I'm so sorry, my darling, that I wasn't there for you.' She beckoned with her hands. 'Come to Mommy, baby. Come to Mommy. Mommy swears we won't ever be apart again. Mommy will always be there for you.'
The child-thing… Isabel could no longer think of the little girl in any other fashion… stood just out of the woman's reach and crossed her arms. 'You killed me, Mommy.'
Pain wracked the woman's features. 'No, Abbie, that's not true! Oh god, that's not true!'
Jesse freed himself from the van and started for the woman. 'She's hallucinating.'
Isabel looked at him, knowing that for whatever reason, Jesse couldn't see or hear the child-thing. He started for the woman.
Afraid for Jesse, not knowing what the child-thing was capable of, Isabel stopped him. 'Call nine-one-one again,' she said. 'Let them know what they're dealing with here.'
Jesse hesitated.
'It would be the best,' Isabel said. 'I'll help her.'
Grimly, Jesse nodded and took out his cell phone. He watched the woman as he spoke, concern tightening his face.
Isabel liked that about Jesse, liked the fact that he cared about someone he didn't even know. Still, she was worried what her dad was going to say when he found out both of them had been together.
'Abbie!' The woman sounded plaintive now, growing weaker from her injuries and shock.
'You killed me,' the child-thing accused. 'You didn't want me enough. You didn't try hard enough.'
Disbelief swept through Isabel as she knelt beside the woman and tried to comfort her. 'It's okay,' Isabel whispered, but she never took her eyes from the belligerent child-thing. 'Whatever you're seeing, whatever you're hearing, it's not real.' Nothing could be that mean or spiteful.
The woman grabbed Isabel's arm in both her hands. 'I didn't kill her! I swear!'
Isabel let the woman hold one of her hands while she smoothed her hair with the other.
'You killed me, Mommy,' the child-thing accused. 'You didn't want me. You wanted Daddy all to yourself. You were afraid you were going to lose him.'
'No!' The woman sounded hysterical. 'It was an accident, Abbie! The umbilical cord got wrapped around your neck! They told me it wasn't my fault! Not my fault!' She looked up at Isabel, holding on more tightly. 'They told me it wasn't my fault!'
'I'm sure it wasn't,' Isabel said.
