Jacky nodded. “Go ahead. They're too damn uptight to be dangerous.”
“I don't know, I saw her do pretty well earlier.” Her voice was shaky.
“We are breaking a lot of our rules by meeting with you… and the boy.”
“Teen, pal.”
“Technically, you're not a teen until you're thirteen, right?” Beth asked.
“Yeah.” Sullen green eyes, muddied from the dim surroundings, narrowed on her.
“Are you able to go places others cannot?” Merrick's attention was focused on Madeline.
She nodded, cupping her elbows.
Merrick's shoulders dropped. “Why is it you keep your ability secret?”
“Because he'll beat me when I come back.”
“Who?” Merrick's eyes cut to hers. “That unscrupulous male who struck you?”
Madeline didn't respond and stared at her hands instead.
“He will not hurt you again,” Merrick promised.
“That's what adults say, but then they make her go back.”
Her chin kicked up. “I'm almost eighteen, then I'll be free.”
Beth wouldn't have guessed the girl was nearly eighteen cycles—almost a woman.
That she had survived what Beth had witnessed was even more amazing than the rest.
“These guys are Dimensionals.”
Madeline's face jerked up. “Really?” She turned to Jacky. “What color are they?”
Jacky cleared his throat self-consciously. “That's kinda what it looks like—color, but… it's a hard thing to describe.”
“What are you saying?” Beth asked.
“He's a Sensitive,” Jeb said with certainty.
“No,” Jacky said, clearly not appreciating a term he was unfamiliar with.
“He's an Aura Reader,” Madeline offered.
Merrick looked at her.
Okay, so different names for the same thing, Beth decided.
“You see… what?” Merrick asked.
Jacky shrugged. “I see… color around people.”
“Like a halo.” Madeline laughed.
Beth liked the way her laughter chased the fear that hung on her like a bad smell.
“Do you need a reflection to jump?” Beth asked.
Madeline's brows came together. “Ah—no.”
“How do you”—Merrick spread his hands—“go to another world?”
Madeline shrugged. “I don't know exactly.”
“She goes a lot when Chuck starts in,” Jacky said.
“Is that true?” Merrick asked.
She nodded, not meeting his eyes.
“Okay,” Merrick began. “First, you're not a Dimensional or whatever this sector calls it.”
Beth opened her mouth, but Merrick drilled her with a be quiet look.
Fine.
She crossed her arms and blew hair out of her face to keep her words to herself.
“I am Jeb Merrick, and this is my partner, Beth Jasper.”
Madeline looked at them both.
“I'm Maddie DeVere and this is my friend, Jacky Caldera. He—he was the little brother of my boyfriend, Chase.”
A heartbeat of weighted silence passed.
“What happened to Chase, Maddie?” Beth asked.
“He died last year in a car accident.”
Merrick inclined his head in understanding. “Pre-hover.”
“Huge fatalities,” Beth replied.
Jacky and Maddie looked at each other.
“Definitely aliens,” Jacky said.
“Not exactly…” Beth said with a small smile.
“What are ya called then? I mean, if you're like Maddie?”
She noticed Merrick had skipped over the Eleventh Directive smoothly. They’d done a lot of that of late.
“Reflectives.”
Eleventh: do not divulge your identity.
We’ve blown that all to Hades.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Jeb gazed at the younglings and immediately corrected himself.
No matter how naïve Madeline appeared, she was just over two years younger than Jasper, not technically a youngling.
It was hard to wrap his mind around. He flicked a gaze Jasper's way and back to Madeline.
“So you're saying that you guys come from places I've gone?”
Jeb shrugged. “I don't know where you've jumped. However, if I were to guess, I'd say there are some sectors you've escaped by sheer luck.”
Madeline shook her head, dark-brown hair sliding over her shoulders, her eyes a little wide.
“No,” she glanced at Jeb and Jasper. “I've been somewhere scary.”
“What's a sector?” Jacky asked.
Jeb raked a hand through his hair. He was digging their grave deeper with each word he said.
“There are thirteen sectors—worlds. Like this one.” Jeb pointed outward.
When the pair turned with his motion, they looked out over nothing but the twisted metal of the roof on top of a small shed.
“We inhabit Sector Ten—Papilio.”
The boy and young woman were silent for a moment.
Then the boy said, “So… you guys hop planets and beat people up?”
Jasper sighed.
“No, we police sectors that have used their advancements to the detriment of those who live under their rule.”
“So someone gets intelligence, like the whole inoculation, gives people a little power then uses them.”
The boy’s presumption was basically correct.
“You kicked Chuck's ass, the clown stepdad from hell.”
What Jeb heard was: the abuser's name was Chuck and he was from Hades.
Beth read his expression.
“He's not actually from Hades, Merrick. They use similar expressions.”
“Not so similar,” Jeb countered in vague disagreement.
“Do you guys speak English?” Jacky asked, giving Jeb a sharp look.
“Latin,” Jasper admitted reluctantly.
“Wait a sec,” Madeline said. “You—I knew something sounded familiar.”
“What?” Jacky asked, walking over to an old camping light and pulsing it on with his thumb. “Awesome! Still works—sweet!”
His enthusiasm was contagious. If things hadn't been so dire and their return so important, Jeb would have enjoyed conversing casually with Threes for the first time.
Normally, he and a Reflective partner were in foreign sector for only twenty-four hours before returning to Papilio for a day's respite. If the next jump’s purpose wasn't collecting intel, it was reconnaissance, or—in the case of the latest jump—completing a small but critical mission.
Bright light surged through the space, and Jeb took in upturned milk crates used as makeshift furniture, the lamp that burned brightly, and a small—what is that? Jeb broke from the group and walked to the small box.
He opened it, releasing a smell that was so awful, it made his stomach turn. Jeb coughed into his hand, slapping the door shut again.
“That's rank, man!”
“It's an old fridge,” Madeline said evenly, and Jeb could see she thought he was a dipshit.
He felt like one.
“Anyway,” Madeline began, “I'm catholic, and I’ve heard that word, Papilio. I know what it means. It took a while, but my mom's made me go to mass since forever, and there was this Sunday school teacher that had little stickies…”
Beth frowned.
“Little pieces of paper with a sticky edge to attach to stuff,” Jacky explained.
“Hmmm,” Jeb said, palming his chin, listening.
“So one of the stickies was stuck to a butterfly.”
“You're from the butterfly world?” Jacky asked. With disbelieving snort, he laughed. Then he guffawed, holding his ribs.
“That's wicked funny.”
Jeb didn't think so. “They're a sacred insect on my world.”
Jacky got quiet. “Okay, I don't wanna dis you, my man, but butterflies?”
He flapped his hands near his shoulders.
“They identify Reflectives at birth,” Jasper said.
Madeline sat up from her perch on the plastic crate. “Really?”
Jasper nodded.
“Are they pretty?” she asked.
“They are beautiful,” Jeb said without a hint of embarrassment.
“So you kick-ass military guys”—Jacky turned to Jasper—“and girl…”
Jasper smiled.
“Get picked to be Dimensional by bugs?”
“Technically, they're insects,” Madeline said.
“Yeah, whatever. It's too weird for words.”
He was giving Jeb a speculative look.
“I think it's neat,” Madeline said.
“Nobody says that anymore, Maddie.”
“My mom does.”
Jeb felt the silence.
“You're concerned about your parent.”
Madeline exhaled in a rush. “She works grave so Chuck'll sleep it off or tear the house up. He won't get her.”
This time. No one said it, but Beth was certain they had all thought it.
“Your mother works in the evening,” Jasper clarified, and Madeline nodded.
“She is safe until she returns.”
Madeline drew her pulse out of the pocket of her denims, swiped her thumb, and sat silently for a moment. “Nine hours, thirty minutes, and five seconds.”
Jeb scrubbed his face. “Does she—is she Dimensional?”
“Too old.”
The mother of a daughter as old as Madeline would not be in that segment of the population affected by the Zondoraes’ intervention. Only adolescent younglings inoculated with their chemical concoction manifested the assortment of paranormal talents these younglings possessed.
“Chuck doesn't have dick, except access to the nearest bottle.”
Jeb frowned at the crude tongue on the boy, but the information was good to know.
“I have an idea,” Jasper said slowly.
Jeb had been stewing over the inevitable: Jude Calvin's arrival because of the botched mission. He was open to reasonable suggestions.
“If Madeline doesn't need a surface, I can act as a sort of focus, and we can get home—tonight.”
Jeb shook his head. “Sounds good in theory but what if something goes wrong?”
“She's Reflective, Merrick.”
He turned on her. “No, she's not. She doesn't need a surface, Jasper—she just jumps.”
“They've done something. Messed with a process.”
“You mean, you guys didn't get a shot? No one made you this way?” Jacky asked.
Jeb shook his head again. “No. We are born Reflective.”
“I'm doing this jumping, but you need…?”
Jasper looked at Madeline. “We need a surface that reflects to jump.”
“There are varying degrees of finesse, of course.”
Jacky gave a low whistle. “So those ass cracks, the scientists—”
Madeline cocked her head to the side. “Zondorae.”
Jacky snapped his fingers.
“Yeah, those butt munches. They're the ones that gave us the special sauce then ran off with their pathetic peckers…”
“Jacky—God, quit!”
“It's true, Maddie.”
“Yeah, but you're not being a very good example of our world or whatever.”
Jeb's thoughts turned to the corrupt law officer and Chuck, the female beater.
He said in a low voice, “I don't think he's the worst of what we've seen in Sector Three.”
“That's what you call Earth?”
Jeb nodded.
“Let's go, Merrick. We can explain things to Rachett.”
“You mean I can.”
Jasper had the grace to look embarrassed.
“I don't want to get anyone in trouble,” Madeline interjected quickly.
Mind made up, Jeb decided returning with a Three who was a Reflective—or at least this world’s version—would be the order of the night.
What is the Three expression?
Better to beg for mercy.
*
Jeb had trouble navigating the narrow and shallow tunnel that led out of the partially submerged pile of old motor vehicles. Something similar had existed on Papilio, but the old machines had been reduced and reused for clean-burning fuel two hundred years before.
Jeb’s small band poured out of a diminutive opening, and Jeb straightened. He put a hand to his back as he arched into a stretch after the stooping walk through the tunnel.
“Sucks to suck,” Jacky said, surveying Jeb trying to un-cramp.
“Jacky, put a cork in it,” Madeline said.
“Nah, it's fun to stick it to the big guy.”
Jeb's eyes narrowed on the youngling. He was almost more trouble than he was worth.
The new moon cast the landscape in nearly total darkness. As Jeb's eyes adjusted to the night, he could make out just enough of their environment to avoid plowing into everything that rose up into the sky ten meters high. There was perhaps a two-meter-wide random pathway between the two mountains of collapsed metal debris.
He and Jasper made their way to the center.
“This is where we part ways, Jacky,” Jeb said.
“No way, dude! You're not my dad,” he said critically to Jeb.
He and Jasper made their way to the center.
“You're not a Reflective.”
“He's a Sensitive,” Beth acknowledged.
“So?” Jacky said.
“Your kind sees us.”
“You've been outed in the past so I get penalized because some clowns ratted on you?”
“Your kind is not well-liked. You would not be welcome in Papilio.”
“Yeah? I've got a boatload of charisma. Wait till they get a load of my charm.”
“Is he always like this?” Jasper asked.
“Only when he's awake,” Madeline quipped.
“I feel responsible for you. We're breaking every directive in The Cause just by taking the girl. You would be…”
“Bad,” Jasper said.
Jeb could only shrug.
“Yes.”
“I want Jacky to go,” Madeline said in a quiet voice.
“Know this,” Jeb warned. “Time moves differently from one sector to the next. There is no guarantee what year it will be when we return. As much as a season could have gone by here.”
“You have to decide,” Jasper said.
“My mom…” Madeline said.
Jasper shook her head.
“You can't defend yourself. What makes you think that you can protect your parent? Why is this something that you feel is your responsibility?”
The standing water in Madeline's eyes welled, and she sucked in a breath.
Female tears.
The night had just sunk to an all-time low for Jeb.
“My father…”
“Chuck?” Jeb asked.
“No way, not that dick,” Jacky interrupted, and Jeb held up his hand for silence.
“Whatever,” he muttered, kicking a small pebble with his sneaker.
“No, my dad died when I was five.”
Her voice warbled, and Jeb swallowed. He had not noticed the color of her eyes until just then; they were a midnight blue kissed by violet. The light from the streetlights slanted across her face in unnatural brilliance.
“He made me promise to take care of my mom.”
“He couldn't have meant for you to be her champion,” Jasper said quietly, placing her hand on the girl's arm.
Fat tears chased each other down her face.
“Maybe,” she whispered, “but I meant it.”
Those large eyes closed then opened, blinking away a sadness that would never leave her.
Merrick saw Jasper's face and understood that the emotions of this young female, mirrored some of her own.
*
They linked hands.
“What do I do?” Madeline
asked, her lower lip rolled into her mouth, her teeth gnawing on it.
Jasper squeezed her hand.
“Close your eyes, and Merrick and I will guide the jump. We need you to—”
“Kick-start the whole tamale,” Jacky said.
“Are we really taking him?” Jeb asked.
“Yup!” Jacky said, rocking back on his heels, swinging longish sweaty hair out of his eyes.
Jeb made a noise in his throat.
He wasn't sure what would be worse: Rachett's fury at the fucked mission or the Threes he was returning with.
It was a toss-up, but Jeb was betting the extras would get them roundly punished.
They stood, hands joined.
Jeb could hear the breathing of the younglings, and Jasper's was predictably smooth and measured.
They were taking a risk by using a Reflective with no experience, no locator, and no reflection to get them back home.
Jeb heard Jacky shift his weight impatiently, and that's when Jeb felt the first stirrings of heat.
Power.
It climbed his legs and made him gasp when it exploded inside his throat, warming his body like a deep-burning fire. His eyes sprang open.
Jasper's hair lifted from her body with what appeared to be electrical charge.
Madeline's eyes blazed like captured blue stars.
She threw back her head and gasped.
Jeb clenched Jasper's hand.
“Focus,” he said through gritted teeth.
“I am,” Jasper answered, just as fiercely.
When the sliding hold on the world let go, they were plunged in the familiar pathway.
Jeb tucked Jasper against him and fought to retain his hold.
His anxiety was a knot in his stomach. If they were lucky enough to land on Papilio, he would have to face whatever discipline came his way—and do his best to shield Jasper.
*
Jeb was tossed out like a tumbleweed onto the unforgiving street of his home quadrant of Barringer.
The air in his lungs punched out of him as Jasper was flung on the softer moss that lined the sidewalks.
Jeb assessed his environment.
The air was colder, and he knew immediately that they had lost a good deal of time.
He lurched to a sitting position, his lungs filling again. He sucked in the pure air of Papilio and relished it for the two seconds before Jasper and one of the younglings joined him.
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