“Last ones tried to eat Ralphie,” she answered as the rodent came scampering out of her sleeve. “Plus, it’s much easier to feed your thesis project when they eat oats, not animals. Reconstruction on Lilac took four months of immobility. But we’re happy now, aren’t we, Lilac?” She bent down to kiss the tiger on the nose, and it responded by rolling onto its back, pawing up into the air as she rubbed its side. Slowly, Lucio reached down to pet it and stopped, terror flashing across his face.
“What— what else did you do to them?” he stammered, backing away. “It understood your words, didn’t it? It understood my words!” He stared into the tiger’s eyes, then flinched, looking towards Taylor in a sudden panic. “What the Hell, I can feel its mind! It’s an animal. I shouldn’t be able to do that. It shouldn’t be nearly on the same wave as us. What— what other experiments are you working besides flight?”
“It’s perfectly natural,” said Ennia, standing up. “All of this is. It’s the natural order of things, just moving faster. Now relax, and we’ll finish getting you acquainted. Then you need to go before I change my mind. Or they do.”
Lucio hesitated then slowly approached the tiger, which leapt back onto its feet. But immediately, its expression softened, and it purred, rolling under his hand just like it had for Ennia. Moving slowly, he swept his left leg over its back, his knees on its ribs while it knelt for him, his hand grasping the shoulder blades, bunches of fur poking out through his knuckles. And he nodded to me, his face still slightly white.
“We’re ready, then?” I asked to the group. Each of us had our own tiger, except for Arial, who floated alongside us, and Darian, who shared one with Lola but had borrowed Slugger’s power to make her light. Underneath me, the tiger stirred, and I felt its muscles hardening under my thighs, stretching the leather straps that held my pack in place taut. And around the group, each of them nodded, while Lola marched her tiger to the front.
“Then let’s get moving,” I said. “We’ve got plenty of ground to cover. Lola, you lead. Zeke— I imagine your danger senses are on fire right now, but let us know if you sense something new.”
“Just how I like ‘em,” he answered, resting a palm on his tiger’s head.
“Now,” I said, looking towards Ennia. “How exactly do we take off?”
“You just ask,” she said with a grimace. “They’re more than capable.”
“Fine,” I answered, drawing in a deep breath, then feeling ridiculous as I shouted to the oversized cats, “Then up on three. Ready? One, two, three, up!”
The ground lurched as my tiger leapt forward, powerful muscle propelling it in a bound that covered at least ten feet. My hands gripped deep into orange as it bounded forwards again, then a third time, our pack moving in a flash, then launched itself into the air. My stomach turned as the world below rapidly fell away, the upwards acceleration pushing me down, my legs clamped tight around the tiger’s torso. Its roar was joined on either side, the blast sending flocks of birds fleeing through the trees in spasms of color. Power surged through the wings as they beat air away, and we lifted upwards, clearing the tops of the trees with ease.
Darian whooped as his tiger resumed the lead, and we pulled a slow arc, circling around Ennia from high above. She waved, and Zeke extended a hand back towards her, almost in a salute. Then we were gone, leaving the Blenders far behind, gaining speed as the land raced away below us. Following the strip of broken trees that seemed to extend without end into the distance, as the tigers wove with a laughing Arial in the air.
And beside me, as we started our flight, Lucio began to shout.
“SC! They’re alive!” he yelled above the wind, pointing down towards his tiger and slapping her shoulder.
“Of course they’re alive! Look at them! They’re moving, aren’t they?” I laughed.
“No, I mean not animal alive, people alive!” he shouted back, and in front of him, Lola turned in her saddle.
“Do you really think that hollow bones would be enough to lift tigers and us into the air?” she said, her voice barely making it over the rushing air. “No, these have aid. Only humans can have powers, only humans have the aural capacity, the spirit. But when I go to the other side, I see their shadows too. Tiger shadows.”
And for a second, I remembered Ennia’s rodent, which had seemed to float in the air for a second. As if someone else had held it there. Or it had held itself there. Then Lola continued.
“Which is why you must be careful around a Blender. Because what they can blend in, they can also blend out. And that is the true reason why they are so feared.”
Chapter 73
We stopped for lunch at a stream far below, letting the tigers graze and gorge upon water while Zeke unpacked some of the supplies from Taylor and spread them across a thin sheet draped over a rock. Arial floated out to the center of the stream, carrying a water pump and filtering from where it was clearest, tossing the bottles into the water when they were full for me to drag back with force points. Concentrating, I pulled a tendril of water upwards with a force point, startling her when it wet the end of her ponytail, and she retaliated by throwing an empty bottle at me, which bounced off my head with a thunk.
“Now how come Taylor didn’t introduce us to these while we were visiting him?” said Lucio, picking up and demolishing the head of an enormous stick of broccoli with a single bite. “Tastes just like chocolate. Feels just like chocolate. But healthy!”
“I’m not sure how much science would back up that claim,” said Lola as Lucio chewed down through the stalk. “It’s not exactly natural. Besides, some of the weirder Blender foods can make you sick if they aren’t tested well.”
“Ennia says it perfectly fine and she knows more than you,” Lucio answered. “Either way, I’ll risk a few extra calories for chocolate veggies. Best day of the trip so far. New favorite food, fantastic shots of the forest from the air, and Lilac and me have really bonded. I usually hate cats!”
From the grazing area, Lilac raised her head, giving Lucio a long stare, curling her lip to display the curved white teeth.
“Just kidding! Way better than dogs, way better!” he said hurriedly, then whispered to us. “I don’t care how much Ennia thinks she’s made Lilac a vegetarian, that cat’s all about fish. After a few dozen memories of picking koi out of Taylor’s table with me, I think I’m her best friend.”
“You know, you could just try being nice to her the old-fashioned way,” said Lola, rolling her eyes, a move she had picked up from Darian after Lucio’s statements. “Make a real memory or two.”
“I’ll keep that in mind for friends who can’t bite my hands off. But for those who can, what’s wrong with a little accelerated development? Really, it’s no different from what Ennia is doing. Besides, who’s to say I haven’t done it to you too?”
“Who’s to say five of my people aren’t surrounding you right now?” Lola retorted, and Lucio stiffened, and her voice resumed a lighter pitch. “But relax, they aren’t. At least not five.”
We finished the portions that Zeke set out for us quickly, our stomachs neither full nor empty afterwards, and he rolled the sheet back up to put in his pack.
“Best part about Blender food is you’ll never catch someone with scurvy,” he said, leaning back against the rock and closing his eyes, letting the reflection of the sun play across his face from the water. “Made them damn useful on ships back in the day; makes them damn useful now so I don’t have to carry any of you.”
“We’ve been holding up,” I answered, sitting down to observe the scenery. A hundred feet in front of us, mist welled up from the stream from where a small waterfall tumbled down, and Darian was hopping rock to rock with Lola to investigate. Far enough away that I could barely hear their words, but close enough to hear their laughter as they splashed each other, Lola dodging by jumping to the other side and Darian by using Arial’s flight. Around the clearing, the trees pressed in thick, obscuring sunlight mere feet beyond their ranks, moss clinging
to their fronts like clothing. Lucio was now wading into the water with Lilac, pointing out the flashing shapes of minnows in the shallows, prodding the uncertain tiger catch her first real fish. Behind him, Slugger touched boulders embedded in the stream bed, absorbing enough of their mass until they popped out of the muck, started to float, and chased Lucio upstream.
I smiled on the bank, forgetting for a moment just why we were here, feeling Arial sit down behind me and lean against my own back.
“Seems like this is how it always should be,” I said, tracing a force point along the surface of the water, watching ripples spring up below where the invisible object glided. I contracted it suddenly, puffing water up as steam underneath, ascending in a ring until the wind broke it apart. I’d noticed the effect the other day from the side of the ship, but the trick was difficult at any distance— for it to work, the force point had to be just above the surface of the water. I swept it across the surface, trying to form a line of steam, but the water quickly gurgled and sputtered instead of misting upwards.
“That’s what we’re fighting for, isn’t it?” Arial answered, her hand grazing my forearm. “If every day were like this, with the world as it is, it would just be a lie. A loan of happiness from the future. The interest on that would be nasty.”
“It would.” I sighed, trying to sweep my force point across the water again, achieving a thin trickle of smoke. “But when this is all over, we’ll have plenty of these days.”
“Every day,” she said, her voice betraying her smile as Darian and Lola returned, their hair and clothes soaked while their cheeks were bright red. Lucio had wrangled a fist-sized fish between his fingers and threw it upwards to Lilac, who stood on her two back legs to snap it out of the air, then spat it back into the water with a look of confusion. And Slugger was now making leaves so light that they floated upwards for several seconds before remembering their weight and falling down towards the earth. He spun once, surrounded by dozens of leaves moving like the gel in a lava lamp, and they rotated with him, a flurrying vortex of activity. Then he stopped, staring at the center of the twister, his head cocked to one side and expression perplexed.
“That time?” I asked Zeke as he stood.
“That time,” he answered, walking back over to his tiger. The rest of us joined him, mounting the beasts, our noses already in the sky. With a command, we launched upwards, and I watched as the trickling stream fell away all too fast and the laughter turned from reality to memory. Though as we soared upwards, it felt like we left something behind in that clearing. But usually when things are left behind, the pack feels lighter.
Chapter 74
There’s a serenity to flying. A peacefulness that, so far above the ground, the world enters into silence except for the whispering of wind and the beating of wings. A feeling of being beyond the reach of earth, of being separate, above order. A safety so palpable that, several times, I was lulled to sleep by the warm sun, the breeze keeping me cool, and trusting Arial from a dozen feet below to catch me if I fell. When I was awake, a sense of purpose strengthened my spirit as I stared into the distance for the landmark Lola suggested, a tree so tall it made the rest of the forest appear like its children.
I would wait from my lookout, watching for it to appear. Calm. Pensive.
And completely unprepared.
“Skyward, skyward!” Zeke screamed suddenly, his eyes wide and wild as the group turned in unison. “Move! Skyward!”
We noticed the first tree trunk that rocketed through space two seconds too late, just after it slammed into Lilac’s wing so hard that she erupted in a spray of crimson. The tiger yowled as she sailed downwards, and Lucio screamed as the force catapulted him off her back, spinning so fast he became a blur and his shout morphed into a ululating siren. He plummeted as another tree trunk soared through us, narrowly missing Darian and Lola as it nicked the wing tip of their tiger. The tiger spiraled but started to recover quickly, roaring as it saw its sister fall, fury rushing through its orange eyes. Darian leapt off to lighten the load, catching himself with the stolen power he still retained from Arial.
Below, Lucio continued to fall, his scream losing volume as his desperation increased. He flailed, his clothes flapping like a sail around him, one of his shoes already missing from the impact. With a snap, a dark orb flashed into my hand, as he was already too far for a force point, but he was still beyond my range of control. I could try throwing it at him, but it was far more likely to consume him than save him. Instead, I dug my heels into the side of my tiger, turning downwards just as Arial streaked past me, her hair streaming behind her like a dark cape as she accelerated.
I turned as I pursued her, scanning the jungle for the source of the projectiles, the sea of green revealing nothing until I saw a flash of sunlight. A reflection of a diamond arm as it sliced clean through bark and wood, felling the tree, as a second figure launched it with a flick of his hand. My pulse quickened as the dot rapidly grew, nearly filling my entire field of vision before I threw my hands up, screaming as I flung two black orbs towards it. With a clap, I brought my hands together, wrenching down on space before me, the world elongating around me as reality contorted, my vision stretching and compressing at the edges. Then I felt something pop, and there was only a square sheet of blackness in front of me, a plane of darkness with no tolerance for other matter.
The sheet obliterated the tree like a pencil sharpener, renting the wood apart as if it were already paper, and the field bucked out of my control, forcing me to release it as it exploded into the light of a small star. A wave of energy threw my tiger backwards, nearly tossing Zeke from where he had easily dodged the last projectiles, and I blinked the stars from my eyes as my tiger took control of the pursuit. Powdered wood rushed to permeate the air, filling my lungs with each breath, and I coughed over the taste of sap mixed with pulp. Next to me, I heard Slugger joining me in the fall, and as my vision cleared, Lacit took aim once more. This time, a hundred feet below us, where Arial clutched a panicked Lucio and struggled upwards, nearly still as they fought the pull of gravity.
“Slugger!” I shouted, extending a hand. “Make me lighter, now!”
Without hesitation, he reached over, and our fingertips brushed— but just our fingertips were enough. A dizzying sensation filled me, as if my insides were being poured out, and every cell of my being reduced to a fraction of their mass. I dove from my tiger, my hands outstretched towards Arial and Lucio, racing to close the gap as Lacit prepared to fire. The trunk was loaded like a bullet into the chamber, Blake cutting at just the right angle for the shot, and Lacit raised both hands, doubling his power in a shot far faster than the others.
A whoosh filled my ears as I generated a black orb, feeding it the powdered wood from the air to provide rapid growth, pushing all my power into enlarging it. My clothes smoldered as sunlight began to bend towards me, as if a giant magnifying glass were just overhead, streaming into the orb faster than I could control. And as the tree prepared for impact, I launched the orb, sunlight spiraling from around it like liquid fire as I refused to release it from under my control, my muscles clenched so tight, they threatened to split.
The orb and tree never collided, but I had never intended them to— instead, the darkness passed just above the trunk and I pivoted, swinging it in a circle just above Arial and Lucio, fighting the shape of the field as it urged to pull them inwards as well. Like a slingshot, the tree rocketed around the edge of the orb, pulling an impossibly tight orbit before its momentum carried it the way it had came, streaking as a missile back towards Lacit. Just before impact, Blake dived to the side, the acre of trees around the crater blowing backwards as they were uprooted, a cloud of smoke swirling upwards from the pulverized earth.
I released the orb, too large now for me to control, the ringing in my ears intensifying as it erupted, casting Lucio and Arial to the side like puppets. Then the shockwave reached me, knocking the breath away from me as it blew me upwards, my clothes acting like a
parachute and my neck snapping backwards as it threw me into the sky. Still light from Slugger’s touch, I rode the wave, the tigers becoming mere dots below, my skin damp as I sailed through a cloud. And the world turned white while my consciousness turned dark.
Chapter 75
Darkness.
I am the darkness.
In front of me, I saw Peregrine encapsulated in ice, drifting far away. I saw Larissa’s arm obliterated by my doing. And I saw the orb I had thrown at Lacit pausing just in front of him, and I shuddered as I imagined it crashing through him in a tornado of powdered flesh and bone. Goosebumps rushed over me as I tried to flee, to leave the monstrosity of death I had created, to hide what I had become. To accept that I was a killer. That I had done it before, and I would do it again.
But then I saw Arial and Lucio clutching each other as they fell, and the trunk careening towards them again, but this time, I was too far away to touch it, too distant to affect it. Helpless as they collided, their life stripped away in an instant by Lacit, who laughed even as my orb consumed him. And they were gone, forever gone. Obliterated as one might eliminate a pest, without a care for who they were, for what they meant, for what they still might do. As if there were nothing but objects, without thought, without humanity.
Screaming, I fed Lacit to the orb, ripping him apart, destroying him with a simple flex of my power, my guilt forgotten. And as he disappeared, Lucio and Arial reformed, the trunk running in reverse away from them, their deaths undone.
A killer. I was a killer. Am a killer.
But I would kill for them.
I am the darkness.
I awoke as I glided back through the cloud, the moisture stealing my body heat away, shocking me back into reality with a shiver.
I had planned to catch hold of Arial in the lighter state Slugger had given me, then fly with her to safety. Instead, I now fell alone, my breath coming in quick gasps in the thin air. In a panic, I created an orb above me, trying to slow my descent, but the feeling was like trying to pull myself upwards with one hand with a rope held by the other, and the orb simply fell with me instead of negating my weight. And using a force point, the effect was the same— useless—except to pull a funnel of cloud behind me like a thread spooling down from the sky. A marker of my location as my mass returned, increasing my terminal velocity as it fought a winning battle against the air drag. I spread my arms and legs, trying to balance as wind ripped past, whistling through the holes that sunlight had burned clean through my shirt to blister the skin underneath.
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