by Lan Chan
She reared back as the manifestation tore through her body. Her fingers were still clutched around my throat, her pain vibrating through me like a gong. If that was what I had to feel every time the electricity sparked, I would have tried to get rid of it. Instead, Izzy welcomed the pain. Anything was better than the complete lack of feeling that she had to endure every day of her life.
The door burst open. A half-dozen armed soldiers charged in with their guns raised. Izzy whirled on them. Her head snapped between the soldiers and us. Abigail appeared by my side, frantically undoing my bindings. It was a wonder the soldiers didn’t just start shooting. They were locked in place, mesmerised by the sight of Izzy standing upright for a start, and by the fact that she was a one-woman lightning rod.
All over her body electricity whirled as she screamed and laughed. She took a step towards the soldiers. Abigail undid the straps around my feet. “Hold it right there,” the soldier closest to Izzy ordered. He raised his gun.
“Hold your fire,” Claudia shouted. She ran into the room with more guards behind her. The whites of her eyes were huge as she took in the scene. “Isabel! Contain yourself.”
There was no containment possible. What I’d said to Izzy earlier was now coming to fruition. She couldn’t keep the nanobots from sparking out of control. Claudia’s attention fell on Abigail and me. Abigail had just undone the last strap around my left ankle that was keeping me tied to the slab. I pushed myself up and immediately felt like I was going to regurgitate everything inside me. Restrained by the anti-psi cuffs, there was nothing I could do to protect us. Not that I had the physical energy.
The hairs on the back of my neck stood on end as Izzy’s electricity expanded. Claudia stumbled backwards. Thrust into a situation they could never have trained for, the soldiers raised their rifles. Turning my back to them, I grabbed Abigail. They would try to shoot Izzy regardless of the fact that she was sparking out of control. Without knowing whether she also possessed my EK, I couldn’t take the chance of Abigail getting shot.
What I didn’t count on was that my weakness meant that instead of shielding her like I’d anticipated, I essentially fell on top of her and dragged us like rag dolls to the floor.
Two hot shards of metal pierced me in the shoulder and the hip. A scream tore from my lips as gunfire thundered around us in unison with the roaring of the electricity. I curled my arm around Abigail’s body, trying to keep her safe. She shuddered inside my arms. Her reserves of stoicism were drained. Unrestrained fear filled the corners of my mind as she retreated back into the link.
Half-blocked by the tables, the soldiers couldn’t get a clear shot at us and they weren’t willing to move about the room because of Izzy’s electricity. We couldn’t stay like this for long. The quality of the electricity Izzy was producing was starting to degrade. On the other hand, I didn’t have enough energy to really move. Not if I needed to continue shielding Abigail.
Bullets ricocheted off the tables as the soldiers inched closer. I made a decision. We had no choice.
Abby, I thought to her. Give me as much of your telepathy as you can.
In my mind, she screamed her doubt. I was fragile, and where a normal alpha esper could contain as much energy as she could generate, she wasn’t sure if I would live through it. Neither was I, but what other choice did we have?
Trust me. Through the link she could tell I was grasping for any scrap of hope I could clutch. Still she did as she was told. One moment I was a puppet whose stuffing had come undone. The next there was enough strength in my legs to take a running start at Izzy. She staggered when she saw me coming for her. As she sidestepped, I reached out and threw my arms around her.
The electricity engulfed us. Its swirls flashed so brightly that the rest of the room was burned from my sight. A million voices called out to me, reassurances that I was coming home. Our bodies spasmed against each other, and then the most beautiful sounds filled my ears: The familiar popping of anti-psi technology as it overloaded and dropped to the floor.
40
The vital link snapped taut as soon as the anti-psi bracelets short circuited. Zeke’s mental signature was beside himself until he realised I was contactable. Beautiful forest green flooded into my mind. The link shimmered and split in two. Zeke’s thoughts settled into one. Abigail’s in the other. I clutched at his with cold relief.
We’re coming, he sent.
I know. There was no need to discuss anything else. In the aftermath of the Geelong incident, we’d discovered the link could be used as a homing beacon. As long as we could stay in contact, we’d be able to find each other.
What made me catch my breath was the other mind piggybacking against his. With the link exposing us completely, Ryan contained his to a single flutter of relief. I felt his question settle over me.
She’s okay, I thought. And then my focus disintegrated back into reality.
As the black dots from the blinding flash of light disappeared from my eyes, the first thing I saw was more guards spilling into the room. Distantly, I was vaguely aware of Izzy collapsing. I wasn’t afforded the luxury of doing the same, even though my body protested every inch of movement.
“Hands in the air!” one of the guards shouted behind black-rimmed glasses. Psi-Ops or Claudia’s men? I couldn’t tell for sure. He wore black para-military fatigues and carried an assault rifle. There were no distinct Psi-Ops marking on their clothes. Usually they loved to announce themselves.
I stared at the weapon in his hands and wondered if he was the one who shot me. Now that the adrenaline was wearing off, my shoulder and hip were killing me. It was all I could do to stand upright, and even then, I was favouring my right side.
“Abigail,” I called, ignoring the guards and soldiers around me. “Come here.”
Whether it was because my voice had gone sub-zero cold or because she was waiting for a chance to run, Abigail was by my side in an instant.
Take another pill, I told her. Part of our plan had been for her to steal the bottle of Second Sight from the doctor. She didn’t have to be asked twice.
“I mean it,” the guard said. “Put your hands in the air or we’ll be forced to shoot.”
I cocked my head to the side. Abigail clamped her arms around my waist and I tried not to wince and look less tough in front of the soldiers. “The way I see it, you’ve already had your shot. Now it’s my turn.”
They began offloading as soon as I finished speaking. Abigail caught on and lent me as much telepathy as possible. I only needed a little boost because the electricity from Izzy supercharged my mind, if not my body. The air became peppered with so many bullets they looked like flies trying to swarm a barbeque on a hot day. The bullets shot out of their weapons at near impossible speeds. Halfway between us, each bullet stopped mid-air as though they had become caught in glue. The bullets continued to rotate slowly.
Electricity itched at the back of my mind even as a trickle of blood warmed a trail from my nostril to my upper lip. I flicked my hand and the bullets scattered uselessly to the floor like marbles.
“I would run if I were you,” I suggested. Some of them did. Most seemed to think if they couldn’t get to me with guns then they would do so with their bodies. I cursed when the first one charged towards me. He was twice my size and running at full speed. My aching body was too slow to dodge. Instead, I concentrated on pushing Abigail out of the way. The soldier collected me in his momentum. He pushed me back a few strides before I gathered the electricity and used it to knock him out.
Poor guy literally didn’t know what hit him. Neither did I. The overuse of power had me on my knees. I had to jump not to be a landing cushion for the guy as he fell. While my display of telepathy had been impressive, they soon learned that I wasn’t all that I was advertising. Physically, I was weaker than a lamb.
Casting about for some other way to defend myself, I heard Abigail scream. One of the men had her in a fireman’s hold and was trying to escape out the door with her. I tri
ed to reach out for his mind but slammed into Abigail’s inside it. Void. There was nothing there for us to control.
Seven massive men barred my view of the soldier who had taken Abigail. All I could think as they closed the circle around me was that I told her it was going to be okay. That I’d protect her. I was an overpowered brat with a big mouth, but there was one thing I took pride in, and that was keeping my promises. I ground my teeth even as my hip screamed that I couldn’t be moving.
“Time’s up,” the stubbly soldier in front said. For sure he was one of Claudia’s. He was missing a front tooth, and no Psi-Ops agent would be caught dead looking like that.
“It was up a long time ago. Yet here I am.”
The electricity came from the furthest reaches of the vital link. From where Abigail was screaming my name and wanting me to help her. It whipped through the air and roared like a lion before snapping against the bodies of the soldiers. I fell to my knees at the same time they did. My breath came in short gasps. When I pressed my hand to my side, it came away soaked in blood. How the hell did I even have any more?
Abigail’s link wavered. I travelled with her mind through darkened doorways. She beat her fists against the back of the man who held her, but even with her legs working, she was nowhere near strong enough to hurt him. Suddenly he came to a halt.
Light burst forth on the other side of the corridor. “What the—?” her captor shouted.
She was in a terrible position to see what was happening. All I knew was that she was falling. Her hands came out to cushion the fall and then the quiet ping of a silencer went off.
No! I screamed in her mind. But she was squirming away and too busy to pay me any attention. She managed to get out from under the body of the man who captured her and ran a few metres before someone else snatched her in his arms.
If I was a terror, there was no word to describe the utter bravery of this kid. In the midst of a situation where anyone else her age would have disintegrated, she continued to fight. She fought like someone who had lost and then gained something important, and there was no way she was going to lose it again. In the end, though, her size worked against her. The man who caught her barely noticed she was trying to kick him. He had her pressed against his hip. When she finally looked up into his face I almost had a heart attack.
She’d escaped one ghost only to be caught by another. The Shadowman made a forward motion with his free arm. Out of the shadows melted an army of wraiths. They glided through the tunnel back towards me. What fresh hell was this?
41
The foot soldiers streamed through the door like ants on a carcass. In no time they had the room surrounded. I tried to push myself up so that I was at least sitting, but it was a pathetic attempt. The best I could do was lie awkwardly on my left side. Even then my shoulder felt like it was going to shatter. Which was probably exactly what was happening.
The Shadowman entered the room like he was strolling in the park. Four foot soldiers kept a close eye on his person at all times. Their faces were all half-covered, but Shadowman was the only one with the voice modulator so he could speak.
Abigail continued to try and escape. In my mind, she wanted me to shoot electricity at him. I would have done it too if I had anything left in me. Zeke’s vital link was growing stronger, but he was at least another ten minutes away.
“So,” Shadowman said. “Spectra. How am I not surprised?”
I wasn’t even shocked he knew I was Spectra. “Let the kid go.”
“Or what? You’ll crawl all over me? Be quiet for once in your life. I have business to attend to for now.”
More than a little insulted, I had my mouth open ready for a snappy retort when a pair of foot soldiers came in with a struggling Claudia in their arms. A splatter of blood was caked to her forehead.
“Get the hell off me!” When she saw me, her face contorted into such a hideous mask I almost shied away. The foot soldiers brought her out in front of the Shadowman. The soldier on the left kicked out her legs so that her knees bent and she ended up kneeling in front of the Shadowman.
“So you thought you could use a drug to take control of my city,” Shadowman said.
“It’s not your city!” She spat a wad of blood on the ground. “You think you can just take whatever you want from the rest of us? You think we’re afraid of you? How does it feel to have something of yours used against you.”
It took me a few seconds to realise she was talking about me. “For God’s sake! For the last damn time, I am not his.”
The Shadowman ignored me. He peered at Claudia with a distinct lack of emotion in his granite eyes. It happened so quickly I didn’t even have time to see it coming. One of the foot soldier’s stepped forward and drew a knife across her throat. The gasp spat blood at the Shadowman’s feet but he didn’t move to avoid it. The foot soldiers let go of Claudia and her body slumped in a heap.
Abigail screamed. Her view of the wound was head-on. Why she didn’t close her eyes was beyond me. She started to thrash against the Shadowman in earnest.
Abby, stop, I begged. Who knew what this psychopath would do if given the chance. Zeke and the others were only a few minutes away. She didn’t know this, though, and her fragile mind couldn’t comprehend what had happened. To my utter horror, she reached out and grabbed a fistful of the flexible mask on the Shadowman’s face.
“No!” I screamed. But it was too late. The Shadowman turned his body to the wall just as Abigail yanked. Though the mask didn’t slip completely off, it was enough for her to get a partial look at his face. She’d never be able to identify him, but it was still too much.
Everything around me stopped. My vision pinpointed to the slow heave of his shoulder blades. Unknowing what she had done, Abigail kept struggling.
The Shadowman repositioned the mask on his face. He handed Abigail over to the foot soldier on his left. When he turned around, there was nothing jovial in the way he stalked over to me.
“Don’t,” I begged. “She’s just a kid. She doesn’t know what she’s doing.”
I let my mind soar through the room, trying to get a lock on his. The tightest wall of anti-psi tech kept him safe. Just not from hysterical children. Though I couldn’t get a lock on him, I did brush up against a mind that I knew.
“Callum?” The man who was holding Abigail gave me a slight nod. So he’d made it where he wanted to be. While searching for my mother, I ended up joining a bare-knuckle fight to become one of the Shadowman’s foot soldiers. Though I’d won the tournament, I learned that Shadowman killed my mother. Needless to say I didn’t accept his offer. But Callum, my last opponent, had proven skilful. It seemed he’d gotten exactly what he wanted.
To my surprise, Callum reached up and unclipped his mask. “Hey, kid.”
In his arms instead of the Shadowman’s, I thought Abigail had lost some of her edginess. But when I checked her mind, I saw that Callum had her in a mental hold. His telepathy was slightly stronger than hers, and he was much more experienced. He used his mind to keep her quiet. I wasn’t naive enough to think that was all he was capable of.
No one was allowed to see the Shadowman’s face. He was notoriously paranoid. It was no wonder considering he’d just murdered a Queen in cold blood.
“Please. You don’t have to do this.”
“I’ve killed men for much less,” the Shadowman said. “She’s seen my face. There’s nothing to be done.”
“She only saw part of your face!” Why the heck was I trying to negotiate with him? Because I had nothing else to throw at him. If I could just stall for time. But I was outmatched yet again. Shadowman knew the others were coming. His foot soldiers began to strategically withdraw until the only ones left in the room were his four bodyguards.
“I swear to God if you hurt her I’m going to kill you with my bare hands.”
“Defiant to the last,” Shadowman said. “I look forward to the day when you’re strong enough to take me on. Until then…”
Callum’s arm shifted. “No!” I said again. “Wait. Are you really going to do this? You’re going to sink to murdering children?”
“Rules are rules.”
“The rule to take down a King is trial by combat. Not kill at will. If you hurt her, you’re going to have to get rid of me too, because if you don’t, I’ll send them all after you.”
He shrugged. “That just means you’ll have to die too.”
Check mate.
I was so unbelievably stupid. Why couldn’t I think of another way out of this?
“What if you wiped her memory?” I suggested eagerly. “Callum’s strong enough to do it.”
“She’s almost equal to him in strength,” Shadowman said. “There’s every chance that she could resist. Besides. This isn’t a negotiation.”
But I was a dog with a bone. “Surely one of your other bodyguards is an alpha?”
They remained mute. I resisted the urge to burst into tears.
“None of mine can do it. And even if they could, what’s in it for me?”
“What do you want?”
That was when I knew I’d made the real mistake. Son of a bitch!
Shadowman stepped forward until he stood right in front of me. If I reached out, I could touch the bloodied tip of his boot. He crouched down, not caring at all that I might try and lash out at him. We both knew I was completely incapable of hurting a fly at the moment.
“Be careful what you ask for,” he said.
“Tell me what you want.”
“That easily?”
I nodded.
“You hardly know the child. Or is it her brother you’re so frightened of hurting?”