Rocket - Chapter 7
Naida - US/Mexico Border
The earth released her at sunset like a grave spitting out something it couldn’t digest. Naida pushed through twelve feet of caliche that flowed around her body, emerging into desert darkness with her senses already screaming warnings across enhanced perception that painted the tactical situation in perfect clarity.
Six heartbeats. Professional spacing and weapons discipline.
And one voice that made her hands start burning before her brain could catch up to what her body already knew.
“Noviecita, I know you’re out there.”
The endearment cut through survival instincts like a blade finding scar tissue. Her enhanced hearing mapped the perimeter, six men positioned around her limestone shelter. Coyotes operating with capture parameters because their merchandise still had value if properly recovered.
But all of that knowledge dissolved beneath the psychological impact of that single word spoken in that particular voice. Noviecita. Little girlfriend. He had said it so many times, in that safe house, in that bed, that her body had filed the word under the same heading as his hands, and it answered the word now the way he had trained it to. That was the obscene engineering of him. He had made his voice foreplay, wired the low patient register and the pet name and the gentleness laid over the threat straight to the response, so the cold part of her could only step back and watch the warm part go to work the instant he started talking. It had done this both times his voice reached her the night before. It did it now, with him close enough to smell.
And tonight there was the other heat alongside it, the one with no name yet, waking low in her palms and twined so tight to the first that she could not have said where the wanting stopped and the burning began. The same buried place fed them both. His voice was already foreplay. Her body just didn’t know yet that the climax it was building toward this time would be his.
No. Fuck no. Not him. Anyone but him.
“Come out, mija. We’re not here to harm you. We just want to talk, like old times.”
The tactical radio chatter had stopped completely, replaced by the intimate tone of someone who believed he understood exactly what kind of psychological pressure would make his target cooperate. Carlos had come personally because this wasn’t business anymore. It was about reclaiming what belonged to him. His best student. His noviecita. The one who got away.
But Carlos Mendoza had never factored vampire abilities into his recovery calculations.
Yellow wall. That’s all. Just yellow concrete at eye level.
The fragment hit her like a slap and disappeared just as fast, leaving her disoriented against the limestone ridge. Her hands burned hotter, heat spreading up her wrists without any conscious decision to make it happen.
“I know you’re scared, mija. I know you’re confused. That’s what happens when merchandise gets lost in the desert. But Carlos is here now. Carlos will take care of everything, just like before.”
Carlos. Just like they said. He, he taught me...
She couldn’t finish the thought. Her brain wouldn’t let her get close to those weeks, wouldn’t let her examine what happened in the safe house with the cheerful yellow walls and the Disney princess blankets. That happened to someone else. Some other girl. Not Naida.
The heat in her hands intensified.
“You killed some good men, noviecita. Men with families. Men who were just doing their jobs, trying to bring you home safe. But I understand. You’re acting out, defying me. But you have my attention now.”
His voice carried the same patient condescension she remembered from before. The same tone he’d used while explaining why submission was her only choice, why cooperation was survival, why learning to please customers was the difference between comfortable captivity and systematic destruction.
“Remember our special times together, mija? How patient I was with you? How gentle?”
Disney princesses. Faded stickers on the window. The girl, face down on the mattress, had counted them, screaming, trying to make it to one hundred because if she counted high enough maybe it would stop.
Wait. Those are the same stickers she counted when...
The fragment broke apart and Naida pressed harder against the limestone, breath coming fast even though she didn’t need to breathe anymore. The burn in her palms was building toward something she couldn’t name, couldn’t control, spreading like her blood was evaporating from the inside.
Kill him. Burn him. Make him scream like he made you.
“I brought your favorite candy, noviecita. Those little Mexican lollipops with chili powder you used to love. Remember? You’d ask so prettily when you wanted something sweet. ‘Por favor, Papi.’ You had such good manners when you tried.”
Chili powder. The taste hit my mouth like a memory made physical, except it wasn’t just chili powder, there was something else mixed in, something...
No. Don’t think about that. That happened to some other girl. Not her. Not Naida.
“I know you remember, mija. I can hear it in your breathing. You’re thinking about our time together, aren’t you? About all the lessons I taught you?”
Disinfectant smell mixed with sweat. The girl’s arm pinned down against the bed, his weight on her, no movement no matter how hard she tried. Fullness and pain and burning, and she had stared at cartoon princesses, screaming, biting, counting, counting.
That’s my arm. Those are my hands trying to push away...
No, no no that wasn’t me that was the merchandise that was the girl they were training I wasn’t there I left I...
Fire erupted from her palms in a sudden burst that scorched the limestone and sent waves of heat rolling through the desert air. The manifestation lasted only seconds before guttering out, but it left her shaking and weak and terrified because she didn’t know how to make it happen and didn’t know how to stop.
“There it is.” Carlos’s voice carried satisfaction rather than fear. “I knew you had something special in you, noviecita. That’s why I took such personal interest in your development. You were always meant for greatness.”
The radio crackled with nervous chatter from his team, but Carlos shut them down with a single word. Professional Coyote adjusting his recovery strategy based on new intelligence about the asset’s capabilities. He’d spent weeks educating her and applying correction procedures. Some little fire trick of hers wasn’t going to make him forfeit months of psychological conditioning.
“You think you’re dangerous now, mija? You think a few tricks make you something other than what you are?” His voice hardened slightly, losing some of the false gentleness. “I taught you what you are. I taught you your purpose. And I can help you remember if you’ve forgotten those lessons.”
He taught me. No. He taught the girl. The one on the mattress. Not me.
“You learned to be so grateful, noviecita. Remember? ‘Gracias, Papi’ after every lesson. You had such a sweet voice when you thanked me properly.”
Chili lollipop taste mixed with something else, something bitter, snot-like, hot, and wrong. His voice from above, “good girl,” and the girl saying “gracias, Papi” because that was what earned candy, what made lessons end, and she had been trying not to gag, trying to swallow.
I said that. My voice. I tasted that. I swallowed...
The heat in her palms exploded into full flame, supernatural fire pouring from her palms in waves that made the previous burst feel like a match compared to a furnace. Heat waves distorted the air as fire streamed through her fingers, responding to psychological triggers in ways that bypassed conscious control entirely.
“That’s it, mija. Let it out. Show Papi what you’ve learned. Show me how strong you’ve become.”
Show him? I can’t even stop it. The flames just keep coming and the memories won’t stop, his hands, fuck they’re all slamming together faster and I can’t...
“I was so proud of you, noviecita. My best student. You understood exactly what merchandise was supposed to do, how cargo was supposed to behave. You were special.”
Yellow walls. Disney princesses. Disinfectant, fullness, pain, burning. The bitter snot-like flavor mixed with mango and chili powder. His hands on her hips. His voice explaining her value. The girl on that bed had looked up at him, red-rimmed eyes, disheveled hair, saying gracias Papi with that empty defeated voice, trying to be good, trying to earn the candy, trying to make it stop.
That girl looks like me. That girl has my hair, my hands, my...
“You were my best student, noviecita. You understood exactly what you were for.”
And it all slammed together in perfect high-definition clarity.
Not the girl on the mattress.
Not merchandise being trained.
Not some dissociated victim I watched from safety.
ME.
It had been her body. Screaming, thrashing, biting the pillow until her teeth bled. Leaking fluids running down her thighs in thick globs.
Her mouth had said gracias Papi. Her throat had swallowed mango chili lollipop mixed with bitter wrongness while he explained her market value.
That was ME...
Her scream tore through the desert night as heat exploded from her palms, a dam breaking, every moment of dissociated trauma claiming her body all at once. The burning wound that was always hers finally recognized, and it poured out of her in waves of supernatural fire that turned the desert night into a furnace.
Fire roared through the creosote in torrents, streams of flame that incinerated everything within thirty feet. The manifestation transcended anything remotely human, power channeled through eighteen-year-old recognition into devastation that transformed the limestone ridge into an inferno visible from kilometers away.
Her scream cut through the roar of supernatural flames, not the helpless sound Carlos remembered from the safe house, but the sound of someone who had finally said it out loud.
That happened to ME. Not to merchandise. Not to some dissociated other girl. To ME. To Naida. My body. My rape. The violation he taught me to thank him for.
Oh fuck I can’t stop the fire. I can’t stop burning I can’t...
Carlos’s tactical radio crackled with panic as his men watched their target transform from escaped merchandise into something that belonged in nightmares. Professional Coyotes trained in human trafficking and border security had no protocols for dealing with teenage girls who manifested supernatural abilities.
“Base, we need extraction! ¡Ya! Repeat, requesting immediate...”
“Cállense! Hold positions!” Carlos’s voice carried absolute authority over radio channels. “It’s just pyrotechnics, phosphorus she picked up from the dead contractors. She’s still just a girl who needs to remember my training.”
But his voice had lost some of its confidence, and Naida could smell fear mixing with the smoke and burning creosote. He was approaching with the measured stride of someone who’d never failed to bring escaped girls back to productive service, but his heartbeat was faster now, his breathing shallow.
The fire continued pouring from her hands as she moved toward his voice, supernatural abilities feeding on the recognition she could no longer deny. Each step forward meant admitting more, admitting the weeks of systematic rape, admitting the psychological conditioning, admitting whose body he’d used and broken and trained for commercial exploitation. Hers.
“Noviecita, that’s enough. You’ve had your tantrum. Time to come home with Papi. Time to remember that you belong to me.”
I belong to him? Like I’m still merchandise. Like recognizing what he did to me doesn’t change the power dynamic.
But it did change things. She wasn’t dissociating anymore. She was present in her body, her body that had been violated and trained and broken, her body that was burning from the inside out, her body that was pouring supernatural fire across the desert because she’d finally admitted what happened to her.
“I remember everything.” The words cut through flame-roar with supernatural clarity. “I remember the yellow walls. I remember the Disney princess blankets. I remember how you taught me to say gracias, Papi after every fucking lesson.”
The profanity felt deliberate now, not defensive armor but psychological warfare against someone who’d taught her that good girls didn’t use bad words unless they were being punished for other infractions.
“I remember the lollipops. I remember the taste of chili powder and mango mixed with...” She couldn’t finish. Couldn’t say it out loud. But the fire intensified, feeding on the memory she’d finally claimed as her own.
Carlos raised his rifle, but the weapon’s metal components were already warping from supernatural heat. He recovered into a firing stance and squeezed the trigger anyway, the way a man holds onto a script when the room has stopped following it.
“You’re sick, noviecita. This is, this is desert madness. Come with Papi. Let me help you remember who you really...”
“I remember who I really am!” Fire poured from her hands in torrents. “I’m the girl you raped for three weeks! I’m the merchandise you trained! I’m Naida and you made me say I was grateful while you, while you...”
The flames roared higher as recognition completed, as every dissociative barrier collapsed beneath her admitted truth.
That was ME. My body. My rape. My violation. MINE.
She was moving with vampire speed now, launching herself through walls of her own fire toward the voice that had whispered instructions about submission in safe house darkness. The flames followed her trajectory, turning the desert into a furnace.
The impact sent them both tumbling across superheated limestone, her supernatural strength overwhelming his tactical training as fire spilled from her hands without conscious direction. Carlos’s rifle clattered away into darkness while his radio crackled with increasingly desperate extraction requests from team members who’d watched their operation transform from routine recovery into supernatural warfare.
“Noviecita, stop! You don’t understand what you’re doing! I was protecting you! Training you! Preparing you for...”
“¡Me violaste, cabrón!” The words tore out of her with the fire, half-Spanish, half-English. “You RAPED me and then made me thank you for it! You raped me and gave me candy! You raped me and called it TRAINING!”
Saying it out loud, admitting it, claiming it, owning it, made the fire explode with renewed intensity. Heat poured from her in waves that melted metal and turned limestone to slag, supernatural abilities feeding on finally-acknowledged trauma until fire became physical manifestation of every violation she’d dissociated from.
Carlos’s screams rose against the roar of the flames as fire reached every piece of exposed flesh. But Naida couldn’t stop, couldn’t control it, because the fire came from THAT place, her fire, her body weaponizing what they’d done to her.
And the body he had built answered the only way he had ever taught it to. It did not care that the cues had inverted, that the screaming was his now, the helplessness his now. The wiring he had soldered into her ran the same program it always ran when he was the one making those sounds happen, and it ran it at his writhing, at the wet ruin of his voice coming apart in the heat, and carried her over an edge she had not chosen and could not stop any more than she could stop the fire it was twinned to. She felt it from the cold place she watched everything from, felt her dead body finish on his screams the way he had trained it to finish, and understood with flat clarity that this was the last thing he would ever take from her, and that he was taking it while he burned.
Even now. Even killing you. The thing you made still works. That’s the last lesson, isn’t it. That’s what I carry out of here instead of you.
I’m burning him and I’m burning me and I can’t pull it back I can’t STOP...
Fire consumed everything in its reach, his tactical gear, his radio equipment, his flesh. His screams lasted longer than they should have, professional Coyote learning exactly what kind of education his best student had internalized during her time in the grave.
And through it all, Naida felt herself weakening. The fire wasn’t just consuming Carlos, it was consuming her blood reserves at a frightening rate, draining strength with every wave of supernatural flame. Her body was burning itself out from the inside, using her as fuel for destruction she couldn’t control.
When the screaming finally stopped, nothing remained of Carlos Mendoza except ash scattered across glass that had once been limestone and sand. The desert wind picked up his remains and distributed them across thorny wasteland while Naida collapsed to her knees in the center of devastation that extended in perfect circles around her position.
Weak. Spent. Hollow.
The fire guttered out, leaving her shaking in the sudden darkness. Her hands were clean, no blood, no burns, but she felt violated all over again because the fire had come from THAT place. The place where they’d raped her. The wound they’d carved into her soul.
She’d killed him by admitting what he’d done to her. By finally claiming her own violation. By recognizing that it was her body on that mattress, her voice saying gracias Papi, her mouth tasting chili powder and bitter wrongness.
That was me. That happened to me. I can’t pretend it happened to someone else anymore. I can’t dissociate from my own rape.
The fire made me admit it. And admitting it meant experiencing it all over again.
In the distance, extraction helicopters approached, but they were arriving to collect bodies rather than cargo. The radio chatter had stopped. The hunting operation had collapsed into emergency evacuation as merchandise demonstrated capabilities that exceeded all operational parameters.
Naida tried to stand and nearly fell. Her blood reserves were devastated, burned away in the inferno she couldn’t control. She’d fed well before sunset, two solid kills, full strength, but the fire had consumed it all in minutes. Left her weak and spent and barely able to move.
The helicopters’ searchlights swept across the desert, painting the scene of Carlos’s death in harsh white light. Glass craters. Ash patterns. And one teenage girl kneeling in the center of destruction, too weak to run, too devastated to care.
She’d won. Carlos was dead. The man who’d raped her was nothing more than ash in the wind.
But victory tasted like violation because she’d had to claim her own rape to manifest the fire. Had to admit it happened to her. Had to stop dissociating and own the truth.
That was MY body. MY violation. MY trauma.
And using that wound as a weapon meant reopening it, living through every minute of it again while the fire poured out.
I killed him but I can’t ever do that again. I can’t. Even if it saves my life I can’t feel that again I CAN’T...
The helicopters were getting closer. She needed to move, needed to burrow, needed to get underground before they arrived with fresh tactical teams and heavier weapons.
But she could barely stand. The fire had taken everything, her blood, her strength, her psychological defenses. Left her shaking in the desert darkness while Carlos’s ash blew away on the wind.
She crawled toward the arroyo system on hands and knees, too weak to walk, too devastated to process what had just happened. The helicopters’ searchlights swept closer, but the caliche would hide her if she could just reach it before they did.
The earth swallowed her whole twelve feet down.
Her last coherent thought before day-sleep took her was already fragmenting at the edges, her mind beginning to construct protective distance from memories too terrible to carry:
Maybe it didn’t happen like that. Maybe I imagined the worst parts. Maybe...
The caliche closed over her and consciousness fled, taking the fire’s clarity with it.
© 2025 E L Frederick | Published by Veridian Studios