Nerve

by Kirsten Krueger

  “Closer,” was all Olalla gave him.

  “That’s why you worked with them for years—why you didn’t kill them sooner. You were waiting for Hastings to arrive here so you could use him to incriminate Angor.”

  She snorted humorlessly. “I’m beginning to think you insist on embarrassing me, Tray. I had no idea Angor even had a son—but discovering that fact was what set my plan into motion. I’d waited for the best method of execution for years—there were just so many options. As soon as I met Hastings, though, I knew he had to be Angor’s son, and I knew he had to be the one, no matter what his Affinity was. After convincing Aethelred to let me search through Fraco’s precious files, I discovered Hastings’s Affinity and felt as if I’d been blessed. The perfect Affinity for an assassination.”

  That’s why his file looked like it had been tampered with! Ackerly thought with enough volume to overpower everyone else’s mental voices. Eliana remembered he and Adara had sifted through Hastings’s file a few months ago, and as the memory replayed in Ackerly’s mind, she also recalled the day she and Hastings had personally met Olalla.

  Eliana had never seen the resemblance, but as someone who had worked with Angor for years, Olalla must have recognized Hastings’s similarity right away. After briefly meeting them, she had departed with Aethelred for a discussion that had probably led to her forcing him to believe he wanted to let her snoop through Fraco’s files. In a few short weeks, her plan had formed, and the devastation of the election had set it into motion.

  “Some minds are harder to dupe than others,” Olalla explained wistfully. “It took me longer than it should have to harness Hastings’s beliefs. His mental abilities were so strong—I could only manage to infiltrate his thoughts when we were within a very close proximity.

  “I was lucky that Angor summoned Hastings to his office that day. I’d been able to sneak into his mind from afar when he’d been out in the field with you all, his friends”—Olalla gestured toward Tray, Lavisa, Eliana, and Hartman—“but the force of my Affinity was so weak from that distance. If Hastings had not already been bound for Angor’s office that afternoon, he might have ignored my nagging little voice. It is easy for me to block thoughts and memories and emotions, but planting new ones is trickier. Some people are not susceptible to persuasion, especially when their beliefs are already so firm.

  “Thankfully, Hastings was always suspicious of Angor, and he had no clue the man was his father. It was not a far leap for him to conclude the mysterious principal was secretly an evil Wacko who needed to be eliminated,” Olalla finished, a wicked smirk curling onto her lips.

  “Oh shit.” Hartman scrambled to sit upright, despite his injured leg. “You wanted to kill Angor? And you wanted to use his son to do it? That’s sick—the bad kinda sick.”

  “Angor deserved to die by his son’s hand,” Olalla stated, not with any bitterness or passion, but as though it was an irrefutable fact. “He deserved to die looking into his son’s eyes, knowing his son wanted to kill him—”

  “Except he didn’t,” Eliana cut in, shaking her head. “He didn’t want to kill Angor, and he killed himself instead. You failed.”

  Olalla rotated slightly but refused to turn her back to Danny—or even Tray. She was powerful mentally, but either of them could have demolished her physically. Half of the Affinities here could have defeated her with little effort. If they all banded together against her…

  Even Olalla had said her Affinity had limits. There was no way she could slip her outlandish beliefs into hundreds of minds at once without anyone questioning it. The issue was coordinating an assault of that magnitude without Olalla foreseeing it. Eliana had spoken into William’s mind, but it seemed unlikely that she could project her thoughts onto the entire mass of people, especially when the ability was so new…

  …or maybe not an ability of hers at all. Yes, William had looked directly at her, and yes, he had lowered the gun when she’d commanded him to, but Olalla had walked over at that exact moment—with the intent of making William kill himself. What if he’d happened to look at her when it had really been Olalla speaking into his mind?

  Frustrated and depleted, Eliana reluctantly refocused on the mind controller. She certainly didn’t wear the face of someone who had failed. There was too much confidence etched in her features and laced in her voice.

  “Did I fail?” Olalla challenged, mimicking Eliana’s dejected thoughts. “Angor isn’t dead, but he watched his son die, and now he’s watching his beloved city burn. He was imprisoned within his own jail, betrayed by the Reggs he always trusted. Over the past few weeks, I’ve realized his death would have been much less satisfying than his continual suffering.”

  “You wanted to kill and now torture this man because—because you’re pissed he made a deal with the Reggs?” Tray demanded, his tone turning aggressive as he took a few steps toward her. Eliana swore she saw the woman flinch. “You’re pissed he created this town for Affinities under the only conditions he could—by agreeing to train us for war? Children shouldn’t be soldiers, but Angor isn’t evil. He was willing to sacrifice his son to save the rest of us. You can’t pretend he’s wrong for that when you were the one that led to Hastings’s death.”

  “So much drama here in Periculand,” Danny enthused. “I would end it all now if I weren’t so utterly entertained. And here I thought Angor had gone rogue, attempting to kill some Reggs. This is devious, Cosmos, even for you.” His tone was more fervent than admonishing. There was no remorse when his vision trained on William’s corpse. “I assume you’ll seize Periculand as your own?”

  Her lips curved shrewdly. “Periculand’s always been mine. The Rosses were too incompetent to notice my influence, and I’ve always had a way of making Angor forget about our disagreements. I won’t discredit him too much—there were many times his mental shields were too intense for me to fully penetrate, but he would be nothing without my charisma and diplomacy. There would be much less peace between Affinities and Reggs without my role as ambassador these past few years.”

  “Peace?” Naretha spat, stepping out from the crowd. “Do you call the research facilities peace? They torture Affinities. The Reggs don’t deserve peace. They deserve war. We can’t just stand aside—”

  “Nor can we defeat them by brute force. We have powers, but they have numbers.”

  “Yeah, and we have Danny. If you didn’t notice, he just destroyed half of your town without breaking a sweat. This was a fun little warm up for him. We can easily overthrow the Regg—”

  “Naretha, dear,” Danny interjected, stroking a finger down her cheek, as if that would calm her. Eliana felt the woman’s temper flare even brighter. “Let’s not argue. We came here for Ashna. All other issues can be discussed in a more formal meeting. Though, I can’t guarantee it won’t end with similar results…”

  Flashing a grin, he gestured toward the flaming Physicals Building, and Eliana’s jaw clenched at Olalla’s careless smile.

  “We had our differences in the past—your father and I—but I hope we can begin on a new slate, Daniel. Periculand and the Wackos need not be enemies any longer. You may have ruined this town, but from the ashes we’ll be reborn under new leadership.”

  “Yeah,” a gruff voice sounded, jolting Eliana where she stood. She’d forgotten Nero lingered beside her, hunched over and clutching his wounded arm. Even though his gait was clumsy, he shuffled toward the center of the circle, declaring, “My leadership.”

  The challenge hung in the air for only a few seconds before Olalla released a snicker. “You believe you have more influence in this town than I do, Nero? Well, you don’t need my Affinity to determine that. Just look around—who here would follow Nero’s leadership?”

  His instability didn’t stop him from glaring around at his peers, forcing them into submission with those stern eyes. Many of his followers slipped forward, the acid-spitter and Jerry Watkins sticking out conspicuously with their unwavering loyalty. But even though Demira as
serted her allegiance, Nixie didn’t move. She gnawed on her lip, wondering how to proceed with Nero’s imminent loss. With a normally functioning body, he could have crushed half of Olalla’s bones with one blow, but the bee stinger had weakened him.

  “The Rosses let you play, Nero, but you aren’t cunning enough for a position of real power.” Gazing around the throng, Olalla elevated her volume to say, “Nero was the only student in Periculand who knew Angor’s Affinity, but he never divulged the information. He was the only one who could have freed Periculy from jail, but he didn’t because the Rosses gave him authority—and Angor scares him.”

  “N-no,” Nero sneered as his friends gaped. “Nothing scares me—I don’t know Periculy’s Affinity!”

  “You did, until my useful little primaries alerted me of the fact that you knew it.” Olalla shot Tray a smirk. “I thought I’d covered everyone—blocking all memories regarding Angor’s Affinity. He was always secretive, as I’ve said, so it wasn’t a hard task…until I realized he’d used his Affinity on a student, during our little visit to the police station. If you hadn’t let me tag along, Tray, you might’ve been able to weasel it out of Nero—you might have, at least,” she amended with a sly glance in Eliana’s direction. “Nero was too stupid to realize the weight of the knowledge he bore—the way in which he could have used it to his advantage. He possesses the strength of a leader but lacks the wit.”

  “And you have both?” Tray questioned dryly.

  “You tell me.” She didn’t even have to lock eyes with him for her Affinity to begin its work. The warping of Tray’s mind was no different than the simple change of an opinion, so subtle Eliana wouldn’t have recognized it elsewhere. One moment he leaned toward Nero’s side, and the next he saw “reason” and realized Olalla was the better choice.

  “Do I possess the strength and wit to rule this town?” she prompted, tilting her head in mock wonder.

  “Y-yes,” Tray answered as his furrowed brows leveled out. “You’d make a better leader than Angor or the Rosses—or Nero.”

  “You little piece of—” The brute began to snarl, but then his beliefs abruptly morphed as well. With a muted expression, he said, “I think you’d make a great leader as well.”

  “Well then, it seems unanimous,” Olalla announced, looking toward Danny, as if his word would be the deciding factor. Eliana knew otherwise. If Danny voiced dissent, he’d be quieted as quickly as the two boys. The Wacko leader sensed it, too, because for once, his lips remained sealed. “As the official Principal of Periculand, I’d like to thank you, Daniel Mayer, for the little distraction you caused here tonight.”

  As she indicated to the outcome of the explosions, the Wackos’ faces all scrunched with confusion. Danny schooled his features into neutral acceptance of the praise, but Eliana felt his unease over her unexpected gratitude.

  “The little battle gave me the bit of time I needed to finish up a project I’ve been working on. Fraco,” she beckoned, and he scurried into the center. “My crown.”

  “Crown?” Apparently, this was bizarre enough to break through whatever beliefs Olalla had planted in Tray’s mind.

  “Damn, she’s gonna be a queen.” Hartman practically drooled as Fraco handed her the crown. From afar, it looked like a simple, silver tiara, but when Eliana squinted, she saw it was truly a compilation of wires and antennae, disguised to be beautiful.

  Its appearance was inconsequential; it was the crown’s function that mattered. For as soon as she placed it on her sheen of purple hair, the very fabric of the air changed. Eliana felt the toxic waves leaking into her brain, echoing through the minds around her in a deafening chorus.

  Much of this night will be forgotten to you, Olalla’s voice careened through every present consciousness, the words a lullaby to influence this nightmarish fate. But I want each of you to remember my power—not my Affinity, per se, but the consequences I am capable of inflicting. To you all, I will have my peace Affinity, but you’ll be wise not to test me.

  William Ross committed suicide tonight, not because I killed his wife, but because he knew he failed in his mission to eliminate all Affinities. The citizens of Periculand and the Wackos are still alive, and they are allies now, a force the Reggs will fear above any other.

  Students in Periculand will continue their training, not to fight the Wackos, but to annihilate the Reggs. We will train ruthlessly, and we will not stop until every Regg is in chains or in the ground.

  Angor Periculy is evil. The man tried to make his son murder me, Olalla Cosmos, with his Affinity that mentally forces others’ muscles to move. His legacy will be one of shame and contempt, and anyone found conspiring with the man—or attempting to free him from the confines I plan to ensnare him in—will endure the same level of torture as he. Be wise.

  The command tugged at Eliana’s mind, but as the speech ended, she didn’t feel particularly compelled to believe any of it. She still glared at Olalla with hatred. She still saw her as the woman who’d murdered Hastings—the woman who now planned to turn Eliana’s friends into mindless robots.

  No one else saw it this way, though. Mental shields had deteriorated almost entirely, rendering everyone’s collective thoughts palpable and coherent. They all drank Olalla’s lies, and they would drown in them.

  All except Nero’s mind reader, Jerry Watkins, who now glowered at Eliana, his pink eyes harboring more emotion than she’d ever seen from the dull boy.

  Focusing on Watkins seemed silly, because he wasn’t the only person immune to Olalla’s deception. Every citizen of Periculand was spellbound, but the Wackos, although dazed, hadn’t retained Olalla’s explanations as reality. Many of them side-glanced William’s body and remembered how the woman had convinced him to take his own life.

  Had Danny trained them in this art? The Wacko leader seemed unfazed himself, but…how?

  “It pleases me to finally witness a Principal of Periculand who has the same ideals as our organization,” Danny said, his words spoken fluidly but judiciously. “Perhaps there will be more development to this alliance in the future. For now, we’ll leave peacefully…once we have my sister in our grasp.”

  “Oh, Daniel, I might have let you have her if you weren’t so oblivious.”

  Olalla’s eyes flew beyond his shoulder, to where Ashna crouched within the crowd. Eliana had forgotten all about her plans and motives. With Olalla’s real nature exposed, Danny seemed more of a gnat than a beast.

  “Your sister has been here this entire time and you’ve failed to notice her. How imprudent of you. I think for your lack of focus, I’ll keep Ashna for myself. Her abilities intrigue me, to say the least.”

  Anyone remotely close to Danny staggered back when his body literally began to glow. The black leather encasing his skin swelled, and any visible tattoos turned from black to the color of incandescent flames.

  In the same moment, however, every one of Periculand’s Affinities assumed an offensive stance, threatening the spark of another battle.

  Eliana knew it would be fatal, and she sensed the Wacko leader knew it, too, even if he couldn’t read minds. After the tentative peace that had been proposed, igniting another brawl seemed foolish. He could have incinerated them all, Olalla included, but his horde would be among the charred, and Ashna, the very prize he sought, wouldn’t survive.

  For a solid minute, the decision warred in Danny’s brain, his thoughts open to Eliana now when they had been guarded before. Surrendering had never been an option for him, but if he didn’t give in now, he would lose. To walk away would give him the chance to return with an even greater force—to kill Olalla without sacrificing his followers—to demolish her in a way that even her cadaver would remember, if there was even a body left afterward.

  Besides, though Eliana didn’t know the specifics, Danny had a bargaining chip back at the compound that he was sure Olalla would trade Ashna for.

  “We’ll be in touch,” he stated vaguely, as he dipped his chin and then spun on his heel,
signaling his minions to follow. Every one of them did—even Naretha, who looked as if she’d rather stick around and tear through Olalla’s flesh with shards of salt.

  “Thanks for killing the Regg guards for me!” the mind controller called after them with a self-satisfied laugh. The Wackos ignored her completely, marching through the hole in the fence with impressive restraint. If Eliana had an army behind her, she would not have walked away, not until Olalla’s head was on a spike.

  The flames throughout town finally started to die down, but it seemed as though they’d descended even deeper into hell. Periculand was eerily silent now without the Wackos, and the space before the Residence Tower was strangely empty without their presence. Perhaps Eliana felt alone because any form of diversity—singularity—freedom—had disappeared with the terrorists. Now it was only her, Jerry, and Olalla—numerous Olallas.

  “Nero.”

  The brute stumbled forward. Her influence hadn’t warded off the effects of the bee-stinger’s venom, but he still stared down at her attentively.

  “I believe you want to apprehend Ashna, don’t you?”

  “No,” the girl growled, backing away as she held up her hands in defense. It was then that Eliana realized a fourth personality dwelled here: Ashna’s. Somehow, with her infinite Affinities, she possessed the ability to deflect Olalla’s manipulation, and the new principal knew it. “Don’t touch me!”

  Ashna threw up a force field that momentarily inhibited Nero from reaching her, but the shield didn’t encompass her entire body, and so the acid-spitter and Demira snuck behind and grabbed her, Dave burning her arm with his acid and Demira encasing her torso with a metal chain.

  “Here.” Olalla chucked a pair of handcuffs at Nero, and he turned just in time to catch them. From this angle, Eliana couldn’t study them very well, but they were definitely more advanced than normal shackles, and Ashna groaned in pain the moment they were slapped onto her wrists.

  “Glorious.” Tipping her head back toward the sky, Olalla closed her eyes. The clouds and smoke had dissipated, paving the way for the stars, but even they didn’t shed any light on this situation. Periculand would have been better off if Danny had leveled it completely, or if everyone had combatted Olalla and died in the process. Hastings’s fate seemed humane compared to this.