The Haunting of Renegade X

by Chelsea M. Campbell

  “Why did it have to be her? Why did you have to try and sleep with Sarah?”

  “Hey. That’s not what happened.”

  “What did she even see in you? I mean, you’re...”

  “What? I’m what, Perkins?”

  He gestures to me with one hand, as if that explains anything, and then lets it drop to his side. “I don’t know, X. You’re kind of a jerk. When I first met you, I didn’t even get why Sarah was friends with you, let alone why she would have actually gone out with you. And now... I feel so stupid. You’ve made out with her. You didn’t even care about her, but you two were going to sleep together.”

  “I never said I didn’t care about her.” The cold and damp that’s soaked into my sweatshirt is starting to get to me. I wrap my arms around myself, but it just makes it worse.

  “But you were using her. That’s not caring about somebody.” He looks at me like he doesn’t even know who I am. Or maybe like he knows exactly who I am. Like he thinks he does, anyway.

  “Yeah? Well, she was using me, too. And don’t look at me like that, because you weren’t there. I wanted to be her boyfriend, okay? I wanted to go out to dinner and hang out and stuff. But she didn’t.”

  “Why? Because she just wanted to sleep with you?” He scoffs in disbelief.

  “It wasn’t like that. I think she liked me, too, but she wanted to treat it like an experiment, because...”

  “Because she’s Sarah,” he says, sighing a little.

  “It seemed safer that way. And I went along with it, because I liked her, and I thought she’d change her mind. About me not being her boyfriend. I’m not saying I was completely innocent, but I wasn’t with her for that. I don’t think she really was, either.”

  Riley makes a face and folds his arms. “Great. So you guys actually liked each other. If you hadn’t realized you were in love with Kat, I never would have even met Sarah. Or you.” He says it like that last part might not be such a bad thing.

  “Don’t be like that.”

  “Like what, X? Like I just found out that you and Sarah were going to sleep together? I know I wasn’t going out with her then, and I know I hadn’t even met you guys, but...” He covers his face with his hands. “It still hurts. She was going to lose her virginity with you. I thought that was something she’d only wanted to do with me. That us doing that together was... Don’t laugh, okay?” He moves his hands away from his face so he can study mine. “I thought it was special. That it was something just between us.”

  “It is. Look, she didn’t really want me. She saw the X on my thumb and thought I was some superhero.”

  He raises his eyebrows, like, Aren’t you?

  “And she...” I run my hands through my hair. They come back wet and cold. “You can’t laugh about this, either, but she thought I looked like the Crimson Flash.” Ugh. I cringe just saying it.

  “But you do.”

  “Shut up.”

  “X, he’s your dad. Of course you look like him.”

  “I don’t, okay? I mean, yeah, maybe a teeny, tiny bit. We have the same hair color. And the same eyes. Big deal.”

  “And the same superpower.”

  “Minor details. I wouldn’t go around saying I look like him.”

  “Even if you do.”

  I shrug. “My point is, Sarah thought I was somebody I wasn’t. She didn’t know me well enough to know she was getting someone like me instead of someone like you. And even if I hadn’t figured out my feelings for Kat, it still wouldn’t have worked with Sarah. She watches The Crimson Flash and the Safety Kids with a straight face.”

  He frowns at me, and I think he’s going to argue that there’s nothing wrong with that, but then he says something way worse. “How do I know I can even trust you, X? How do I know you’re who I think you are?”

  “How can you ask that? You know me.”

  “I thought I did, before tonight. But then I find out all this stuff about you, and now I don’t know. You knew Pete for years. You two were way closer than we are, and you still did really horrible things to him. You guys were best friends, and if he couldn’t trust you, then how am I supposed to?”

  I hate that he’s questioning that. My throat gets tight and my stomach feels like there’s a rock in it. “It’s different.”

  “Yeah, right.”

  “Me and Pete were never that close.”

  “But you knew him for years. We’ve only known each other for five months, and we’ve only not been trying to kill each other for two of them. If that. So...”

  “We’re friends, okay?”

  “And I’ve seen how you treat your friends.”

  “No, you haven’t.”

  Riley gives me an incredulous look.

  “It’s true. I might have known Pete for a long time, but that doesn’t mean...” I take a deep breath. “I don’t know if me and him were ever really friends.”

  “That doesn’t make it okay. All the stuff you did.”

  “No, it doesn’t.” I glance over at him, then away again. “But you’re not Pete. You can trust me.”

  “Why? Because you say so?” He shakes his head.

  “Because... Because it’s...” I hesitate, struggling to find the words. “I mean, I...”

  “You know what, X? Forget it. Let’s just go down there and get this over with. You can figure out whatever lie you were going to tell me later.”

  “No, just listen, okay? Maybe we’ve only been friends for a couple months. Maybe really only a few weeks. But we’re...” I squeeze my eyes shut, then open them again. I hate that I actually have to say this. Especially since Riley’s not exactly my biggest fan right now. “We’re already better friends than me and Pete ever were.”

  “Yeah?” His eye meet mine, studying my face. Then he sighs, and his shoulders slump. “I just really wish I could believe that.”

  Chapter 8

  WE GO DOWNSTAIRS, BACK to the top floor, where Pete’s waiting for us.

  “I knew you’d be back,” he says. He doesn’t fire any lasers yet, but he keeps them trained on us. “What did you think you were going to do? Fly away?” He laughs.

  I hold up my hands. “I did what you wanted. I told the truth. Now let us go.”

  “And I told you, you’re not calling the shots tonight. You tried to leave.”

  The lasers charge up.

  “You tried to kill us!” Riley shouts. “What were we supposed to do?”

  “You were going to leave, but it’s an awful long way down, isn’t it? I should know.”

  I swallow, remembering the fall and imagining what it would have been like if I hadn’t saved myself. If I couldn’t. “I didn’t want you to fall, Pete.” But I didn’t want to die, either. “You have to know that.”

  “I don’t have to do anything! But you. You have to do what I say!”

  Several lasers fire at once. Me and Riley both drop to the floor, avoiding getting hit. Singe marks line the walls. We get up and start running.

  “You can’t talk your way out of this!” Pete screams. “You twist the truth and you lie and you manipulate everyone, until you’ve got them eating out of your hand, but not me. Not this time!”

  A laser just misses me.

  “X,” Riley says, tilting his head toward an electrical outlet on the wall.

  Lightning tingles in my hands, ready to zap it, but Sarah said that wouldn’t work. I make it go away, but I’m not sure what I’m supposed to actually do. And trying to figure it out with lasers aimed at my head isn’t making it any easier.

  Riley shouts at the ceiling. “Like you haven’t been twisting the truth and manipulating us this whole time! Yeah, Damien screwed up. Probably a lot. But you screwed up, too!”

  All the lasers point at Riley. He’s buying me more time to figure this out, and I can’t afford to waste it.

  “You weren’t there,” Pete says, sounding deadly serious. “And if you think he hasn’t been doing the same things to you, then you’re delusional.”
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  I hold my hand up, toward the socket. I’ve never done this before, but Sarah seemed to think it was possible. Well, possible in the imaginary game we were playing. But it doesn’t really matter, because either I can do this, or Pete kills us. And I do not want that to be how I die, and I sure as hell don’t want it to be how Riley does.

  “Oh, yeah?” Riley makes a dismissive sound. “I know he’s awful. I didn’t need you to tell me that!”

  Gee, thanks, Perkins. That’s just what I need to hear while I’m trying to save our lives.

  I can’t feel the electricity in the wall, but I crank mine up and imagine drawing more of it toward me.

  “I saw your face,” Pete says. “I saw how horrified you were when you found out some of the crap he’s pulled. Don’t tell me you already knew!”

  “He broke my finger! He fought with me, he did everything he could to get me out of Sarah’s life. He’s lied to me. He’s tried to manipulate me.”

  Tried to?

  “And he’s selfish, like you said. I knew all that before I ever stepped foot in here.”

  Electricity from the socket flows from it over to me. It’s working. I try pulling harder, because something needs to happen, and it needs to happen now. Because Riley’s diversion can’t last much longer, and, to be honest, I’m not sure I want to hear any more of it.

  “But that’s only one side of him, because he’s also—”

  “Hey!” Pete shouts. “What are you doing?!”

  A laser fires at me, but I manage to dodge out of the way without breaking my connection with the wall socket. I focus on making it hurry up, and then suddenly the electricity stops. The wiring must have burnt out, just like Sarah said. There’s about half a second where I feel this huge wave of relief, because I did it, Pete’s finally gone. And then another laser almost hits me.

  “What the hell was that?!” Pete screams. “Did you think you could hurt me?!”

  More lasers fire, and we take off down the hall again.

  “It didn’t work!” I tell Riley. Not like he didn’t know.

  “Sarah said it has to be a main line!”

  “And that wasn’t?”

  A laser nearly blasts him, but I push him into the wall, out of the way. He glares at me, like I did it for fun or something.

  “We need something that has more power,” he says.

  “What else has more power?” I duck out of the way as a laser hits the wall, leaving a singe mark. And then I know what I have to do.

  Riley grabs my arm. “No, X!”

  “Do you want to die tonight?!”

  “If you draw more power through the lasers, they’ll—”

  “I know!” They’ll be more powerful. Pete already cranked them up, and if I do this, they’re going to be deadly. But what choice do I have? “Just don’t get hit.”

  “You’re going to get hit! He knows what you’re trying to—”

  “Look, I get it if you don’t want to be friends with me. After everything I’ve done, and after all that stuff you said, I don’t even know why you ever were.”

  “X, I didn’t—”

  “I know you don’t trust me! But you have to trust me on this.” Because it’s our only hope. Because I don’t know what else to do.

  I hold my hands up and draw power from a laser on the ceiling.

  It twitches, repositioning itself to point right at my heart. Or maybe I should say Pete repositions it.

  “Back off, Damien,” he says. “You’re ruining this for me. I wanted to watch you try and get down all those stairs. But don’t think I won’t shoot you.”

  I pull harder. Sweat prickles on my forehead and down my back.

  Pete fires one of the lasers at the wall, and it does way more than just singe it this time—it blasts a chunk out of it.

  “If you shoot me, Pete, then you’re just as bad as I am. Because I got you killed, right? You were only in that situation, trying to murder me and my friends, because of what I did to you.”

  “Shut up! You don’t get another warning shot!”

  But if he was going to kill me, maybe he would have done it already. Maybe. “This whole thing tonight is about how you’re so much better than me, right? So if you kill me—”

  “Man, I’ll still be better than you, because at least I’ll have done it myself!”

  Pete fires a laser. And it’s not a warning shot, but it’s not aimed at me, either.

  It’s aimed at Riley.

  I move without thinking, because I don’t need to. There’s no question of what I’m going to do. I break the connection with the electricity, making my lightning die down, and I lunge at Riley. I push him out of the way right as the laser hits.

  It feels like a hot knife slices into my shoulder. It just barely hits me, and it hurts like hell, but it doesn’t blow me up. I’m still in one piece. And so is Riley.

  “X! Watch out!”

  I twist out of the way of another blast. I hold up my hand to finish this. “You’re not going to kill me, Pete! And you’re not going to kill anyone I care about!”

  “You think you can hurt me?!” Pete screams. “You think you can come in here and just—”

  “Yeah, I can,” I say, right as I draw one last surge of electricity out of the laser.

  The lights go off. Everything powers down. And then Pete finally shuts the hell up.

  Riley takes the stairs down.

  I take the elevator shaft.

  Which is pretty much the last thing I want to do tonight, especially after everything we’ve been through. But my only other options were taking the stairs, which wasn’t going to happen, or trying to fly off the roof in the wind and the rain, which was really, really not going to happen.

  Flying very slowly down the dark, creepy elevator shaft, with only a flashlight app on my phone for company, is pretty terrifying, and not something I ever want to do again. It’s only slightly less terrifying than being dropped in an elevator that Pete was controlling. Either way, I think I’ve had enough terror for one Halloween. And pretty much the rest of my life.

  I meet up with Riley on the second floor, and he turns invisible and scouts ahead to make sure we avoid any police, who are trying to figure out what the hell’s going on. We stop at the security room on the way out, and I zap all the computers, destroying any footage of us. A lot of stuff was burnt out anyway, so it shouldn’t be too suspicious.

  By the time we make it back to Riley’s car, it feels like a week has gone by, but according to his clock, we only got here a little over an hour ago. We still have almost thirty minutes to make it to Sarah’s.

  I climb into the passenger seat, while Riley gets in the driver’s side. He turns on the car but doesn’t move. Rain pounds on the roof and on the windshield, and even though I’m kind of soaked from walking the two blocks over here, it feels good to be somewhere dry.

  “Perkins. Let’s just—”

  “About what I said in there.”

  “Don’t tell me you didn’t mean it, because you did.”

  “Yeah, I did.”

  “Oh.” I swallow. I mean, I knew that, but I still expected him to try and apologize or something. “Okay. Great. At least I know where I stand.”

  “No, you don’t. Pete didn’t let me finish. What I was going to say was that you are all of those things, but you’re also loyal, and brave, and you’d do anything for the people you care about.”

  “But you don’t trust me.”

  “I... You risked your life for me, X.”

  “It just got my shoulder. I’ve had worse.”

  He shakes his head. “You didn’t know it wasn’t going to kill you. It could have killed you, if it had hit in the wrong place.”

  “Just because you can trust me to save your life doesn’t mean you can trust me in general.”

  “I was trying to say all that before you saved my life.” Riley flips on the windshield wipers, but he still doesn’t start driving. “I shouldn’t have let Pete get to me.”


  “I did all those things to him, though. I mean, I didn’t steal Kat. But I knew he liked her—I just didn’t care.”

  “That was the past. It was between you and him. You’ve never been anything but trustworthy to me.”

  I raise an eyebrow at him.

  “Since we’ve been friends, that is. I couldn’t picture you telling Pete about hearing a ghost.”

  “Nope. And if I had, there’s no way he would have gone with me to check it out.” And he especially wouldn’t have been the one to suggest it.

  “So, I believe you. About things being different. Maybe Pete couldn’t trust you, but you obviously couldn’t trust him, either. You can trust me.”

  “Okay, but I get it if you don’t—”

  “I’m your friend. I want to be, I mean. If you still...?”

  “Yeah, of course I do, Perkins. But after everything you found out tonight...” I sigh. “I don’t get why you’d still want to hang out with me.”

  “Because I like you, X.”

  I wait for him to say something more complicated than that, but he doesn’t. “That’s it?”

  He shrugs. “People are more than just a list of all the bad things they’ve done. We’ve been through a lot together, and I’d like to think that counts for something.”

  “It does. But... you’re not mad?”

  “Well.” He lets out a deep breath. “I wouldn’t say that. But who you were with Pete... It’s not who you are now. It’s not who you are with me. So maybe I’m still upset about some things, but the truth is, you’re my friend, and nothing that happened tonight is going to change that.”

  Chapter 9

  WHEN WE GET TO Sarah’s house, it’s obvious we’re the first to arrive for her party. There are no extra cars out front, and Sarah answers the door before we even get a chance to knock. Though that might have more to do with Heraldo, her Great Dane, barking at us from the backyard than it does Sarah not having anything to do.

  I check my phone, just in case we got here too early, but it’s 7:16.

  “You’re late,” Sarah says, standing aside so we can come in.

  “Fashionably late,” I correct her.

  “One minute doesn’t count as fashionable.”