Vicious

At the hotel, Victor reads the news article accompanied by Eli’s picture. It describes how Eli saw the robber enter the bank and followed him after having a bad feeling. The robber, an EO, was killed, but Eli was uninjured. Though Eli’s picture is grainy, Victor recognizes his smile. It’s exactly the same smile Eli used to flash in college “because Eliot Cardale hadn’t aged a day” (83).

At Lockland, Eli comes back to himself, feeling okay despite the circumstances. He decides he needs a drink, so he and Victor head to the closest bar, where they get inebriated. On the walk home, Eli trips and cuts his hand open on some broken glass. As they watch, the wound heals on its own. All the way home, Eli tries and fails to make himself bleed for more than a few moments. Victor panics, realizing that Eli’s EO abilities will relegate Victor to little more than a sidekick. Rather than going home with Eli, he heads into the night “to plan his next attempt at death” (89).

In his hotel room in the present, Victor stares at the picture of Eli. Though Eli hasn’t aged, the years have changed him, and Victor wants more than ever to watch Eli suffer. The article calls Eli a “hero,” which makes Victor wonder if that makes him a villain. After some thought, he decides “he could live with that” (93).

The day after Eli’s NDE, Victor returns from class to find Eli “carving up his skin” and watching it heal (92). Eli is certain God, rather than science and chance, gave him the ability, and he desperately wants to know why he received regeneration as a gift. Victor announces his intention to try his NDE again. Eli argues Victor should wait until he’s better from the previous attempt, but Victor thinks Eli doesn’t want him to try again at all. Victor pretends to agree and goes to his room, where he sneaks out the window to go to a party.

At the party, Victor finds an unoccupied bathroom, where he lays out a stolen EpiPen, his phone with an unsent text to Eli, and seven lines of cocaine. Before he can start the process, Eli arrives and stops him. Eli makes Victor promise not to attempt an NDE alone again before leaving him to clean up. When Eli’s gone, Victor sends a text that says “save me” and the dorm’s address to an unidentified person, later revealed to be Angie.

In her bed at the hotel, Sydney listens to Victor’s even footsteps. After a time, they fade to stillness, and she goes to investigate. She finds him asleep on the couch and settles in to watch him, as if the lines of his face “would rearrange and tell her all his secrets” (101).

After texting Angie, Victor climbs out the window and waits for her to pick him up. The “save me” text plus an address is a code they devised freshman year when one needed the other to bail them out of a situation. Though they haven’t used the code in years, Angie remembers and goes. Victor has her bring him to the engineering labs, explaining his theory and plan.

Angie refuses to help until Victor tells her about Eli’s attempt. She feels betrayed, and Victor concocts a story about a pill he and Eli invented that will make the process work. Since Victor’s taken the pill, it has to be done tonight. Angie believes the story and straps Victor to the table so she can administer electric shocks to his body. She starts on the lowest setting and turns the shocks up a bit at a time until the “only thing Victor could think of was the pain” (109). Victor’s heart lurches, and everything stops.

While Sydney watches Victor sleep, the news article grabs her attention. She recognizes Eli’s picture, and it makes her feel “like she was drowning, again” (112). Reaching for the article, she brushes Victor’s leg, startling him. He grabs her, and pain radiates through her as if “every one of her nerves was shattering” (113). Unable to do anything else, she screams.