Free Nen by Sean Ding Page A

Gupta who was chatting with the two children beside the plunge pool, “Gupta is injured and he shouldn’t really move so much.”
    “But aren’t you guys walking with him?” Henry said in an outright thoughtless and selfish demeanor.
    Johnny was sitting on the ground not far from Paul and after he heard what Henry said, he got on his knees and grabbed Henry by the throat. “You stinking bastard. Another word from you-”
    “Let go of him, Johnny.” Paul cried out as he pulled Johnny back. Johnny let go of his grip on Henry’s neck unwillingly. He took a step back and stared blankly at Henry who had started wincing and then shuddering uncontrollably.
    “What the hell, are you faking it?” he questioned as he could not believe that he had possibly caused any harm to Henry’s neck.
    Henry’s face had turned blue and his hands back circled vigorously, seemingly trying to retain balance. His hands went to his own neck and to the surprise of everyone, he suddenly arched backwards and fell on his back. Like having a seizure, Henry was twitching and shaking violently on the ground. He seemed to be coughing but there was no sound coming out of his mouth. His face was contorted and he looked like he was out of air and had something lodged in his throat.
    “What’s going on?” Johnny cried, not knowing what to do.
    Sarah was down on one knee holding Henry’s head up and looking into his twisted mouth. With amazing dexterity, her arms went behind Henry’s back and sat him up in an upright position. “Lift him up!” Sarah shouted to the men around her.
    Paul and Johnny came forward and grabbed Henry’s arms. In one swoop, they lifted him up so that he could stand on his knees while Sarah moved behind Henry to perform the Heimlich maneuver or abdominal thrusts.
    Sarah’s fiancé Kevin, Mr. John Chan and Kenso-san came running towards them and soon a circle of people were standing around Sarah and Henry.
    Dr. Sarah performed five cycles of the Heimlich maneuver which did not seem to dislodge the blockage in Henry’s throat. Realizing that something was amiss, Sarah quickly laid Henry down on his back again and started tapping his chest, his back and his neck. Next, she placed her ear against his chest and listened. By then Henry was no longer struggling and his face was as black as coal. Sarah started to perform cardiopulmonary resuscitation on Henry while the others looked on.
    “Come on Henry,” Sarah cried as she threw her weight on Henry to compress his chest. In between the chest compression resuscitations, she would pinch his nose and blew air into his mouth and checked his pulse. She did cycles of that for more than five minutes before she finally stopped.
    “He’s gone. I’ve done more than what was required.” Sarah sighed and wiped the perspiration from her forehead using the back of her hand. The glow in Henry’s eyes was long gone but his eyes were still wide opened. Sarah helped Henry closed his eyes with her cupped palm. She then took another minute or so to examine Henry’s neck and chest before she stood up and looked into the baffled eyes of the others.
    “Choked to death but there was really nothing down his throat. It’s really weird.” Sarah said with weariness and despair. “It is also possible that there was something in his throat at first but it somehow vanished.”
    “Was he chewing gum or eating something?” Kevin asked his fiancée.
    “No, dear, we were talking to him and he did not seem to have any food in his mouth.” Sarah said.
    “Yeah, he was making those sarcastic remarks and I…and I killed him.” Johnny blurted. His eyes were red and watery.
    “No, he did not die of your grip, Johnny. I saw what you did and trust me. That clutch of yours could not even kill a chicken.” Sarah said.
    “Could it be possible that the air around here contains poisonous elements that are slowly killing us?” Mr. Park asked hysterically, “This place was totally sealed up for the