The Seven

by Sean Patrick Little

  Sarah flipped through the pages, looking at nothing in particular, but frowning as she did so the other nurse wouldn't think she was confused. "Wow...that's...unusual. What am I looking at?"

  "The cryo-gel basically made his muscles freeze out to the point where he shouldn't be able to feel them, but he seems to still be generating some muscle activity. It's pretty amazing. I guess that's the chance you take when you turn a kid into a genetically enhanced killing machine."

  "You sure it's not some sort of adverse reaction to the cold?"

  "Eh...pretty sure."

  "Is there a way to check it? Make sure he's not in pain or something?"

  "Nope. The only way to check would be to shut down the foam distributor above him. If that happens, the foam will steam away in time and he'll slowly gain feeling in his extremities. Once that happens, I'm pretty sure he'll destroy everything in this room. One of the grunts told me he can pick up a truck and throw it the length of a football field."

  Sarah bit her lip. Shut off the foam gun and Andy is free. She checked the contraption on the ceiling and traced its power conduits across an I-beam to a small converter box on the floor along the wall behind Andy. She could make a sprint. She'd probably be able to hit the converter box hard enough to crush it, severing the cables and disrupting the power flow. It would take some time to get the unit back online and in that time, Andy could get free...but the guards would come after her. And they must have some sort of foam agent that can travel, otherwise how could they have stopped Andy in the first place, Sarah reasoned. She cursed under her breath.

  "What was that?" the nurse asked.

  "Oh, nothing."

  "Talking to yourself is the first sign of insanity."

  "So is working here," Sarah blurted. She froze. She shouldn't have said that.

  The nurse looked up at her and then broke out into a guffaw. "You got that right!" She went back to looking at her charts, still chuckling. Sarah blew out a low, slow breath of relief. She slid into a chair and pretended to be going over a chart, but in reality she just stared at Andy. She watched his eyes, closed again, and screamed at him in her mind, trying to let him know that he would be all right, that she would help him.

  The world around Sarah erupted in a haze of red emergency lights and blasts of a metallic alarm klaxon. She leapt off her chair. "What is that?" Soldiers began yelling orders and scrambling for weapons and vehicles.

  "Lockdown," the nurse said. She opened a drawer and pulled out a handgun. "You stay here. Keep the door locked until I come back."

  "What's happening?"

  "Hard to say. I need to talk to the guard on post duty. Could be that those freaks are back to rescue Lumpy over there." The nurse bolted from the office slamming the door behind her.

  Andy's eyes were open. Sarah stared at his eyes. He flicked a glance in the direction of the nurses booth and looked away, then suddenly looked back. Sarah couldn't help but smile. Andy winked one eye at her.

  The nurse ran back and banged on the door. Sarah let her in. "What's the story?"

  "They just found one of the nurses from the hospital ward. She'd been knocked out and left in a closet in Dr. Cormair's room. That means the girl that we thought ran away could still be on base somewhere using that nurse's security badge to get past clearance points."

  Sarah's heart began racing again. "What happens now?"

  "They're going to start scanning badges until they find the badge that the nurse lost. Then, they're probably going to shoot the girl with the badge. At least that's what I'd do. If she showed her face in this warehouse, I'd probably volunteer to stomp the mud hole in her back."

  Sarah couldn't stop herself. She engaged her powers---just a little bit. She used a short, powerful burst to launch herself forward, swinging her fist up into the woman's double-chin. The woman's lower jaw snapped up into her upper jaw with such force that her incisors cracked in half. The woman's eyes rolled up into her head and her body went slack and rolled forward into Sarah's arms. "Mud hole that, you fat bitch."

  She dragged the woman's body to the bathroom in the corner of the small office and sat her on the toilet. She tugged the badge from the woman's chest and tossed her own pilfered badge into the tank on the back of the commode.

  A soldier in a black beret and holding an assault rifle was banging on the door when Sarah walked out. She opened the door for him.

  "Catch you in the can?"

  "Yeah. Bad timing, I guess." Sarah flushed red.

  "We've had a security breach. I need to see your badge."

  Sarah held out the white plastic card and the guard scanned it with an optical reader on his belt. The reader beeped for a moment and flashed a green light.

  "You're clean," the guard said. "Keep an eye out for any nurses who aren't where they're supposed to be." He paused. "Aren't you a little young to be a nurse?"

  "I'm twenty-one," Sarah lied. "I graduated early because I took summer courses."

  "Really?" The guard gave her a sly smile. "You...maybe want to have a drink in town with me sometime?"

  Sarah flicked a glance at Andy without thinking. "I've got a boyfriend."

  "He must be a lucky fella. Where's he work on base?"

  "What?"

  "Where does he work on base? I was just wondering if I knew him."

  "Oh, he...he's in...in...computers."

  "One of the IT nerds, eh? Figures. They make all the money. Well, if that ever goes south, you let me know, eh? I'll take you out for a celebratory dinner."

  "Oh, you'll be the first guy I call. You can bet on it."

  "I'll hold you to that. What's your name?"

  Sarah balked. She couldn't use her real name and the guard had just scanned a code bar on her stolen badge that probably pushed information to the screen on the reader. "Uh...you know what it is already, don't you?"

  The guard smiled. "Of course. It's on your ID. But it's still polite to ask." The red lights overhead kept flashing.

  "Don't you have to get to work?" Sarah asked.

  "I suppose. I'll see you later, Sarah."

  "What did you say?" Sarah began to shake with fear. How did he know?

  "I said I'd see you later, Sarah." He gestured at her name badge. She grabbed it and looked down. She chuckled to herself.

  "That's right," she said, trying to cover her momentary panic. "Because you read it on my badge..." What were the odds the nurse was named Sarah, too? That had almost been a colossal mistake on her part.

  The guard winked again, spun on his heel, and went to scan the badge of the next soldier in the facility.

  Sarah collapsed into a chair. She couldn't believe she'd actually lied her way out of that mess. Of course, she realized, now Andy has no nurse who knows how to watch over his health while he's in that horrible goo and every soldier on base is looking for a super-speedy teenager. She picked up a chart and walked out of the booth. She went to the front of the block of gelatinous slop that was Andy and looked at the chart. She chanced a glance and could see him squinting down at her. His eyes were laughing, even if the rest of him couldn't.

  "What do you think you're doing here?" Sarah murmured lowly. "Did you come to rescue me or something stupid like that?"

  Andy blinked. A single, very direct blink.

  "You're an idiot," Sarah sighed. "I would have been free and clear now if it wasn't for you."

  Andy rolled his eyes upward as if to say, I am an idiot.

  "Are you okay?"

  A single blink.

  "Does it hurt?"

  Andy rolled his eyes. Sarah couldn't tell what he meant, but she was certain there would have been some sort of silly comment that would have made her laugh.

  "I'm going to get you out of here somehow. Don't even squint at me, Andrew! You came back for me and I'm not leaving without you! You think I'd be able to sleep knowing I left you here to your doom?"

  The foam cannon overhead shuddered and another glob of freezing goo dropped onto Andrew's body forcing him
to close his eyes. Steam rose from the foam and it quickly turned to jelly. Sarah could feel the chill from the material. "I'm going to get you out of this, I promise."

  Sarah glanced around the room. Aside from the nurses' station and the crates and vehicles, there was nothing else on the first level. However, in the far corner of the room, raised up on a platform that jutted out awkwardly, a technician was hovering over a control board, idly watching gauged and occasionally fiddling with dials and switches. If there was going to be a control booth for the foam gun that would have to be it. The only problem was going to be how to get up there.

  Sarah walked back to the nurses' station and grabbed the stack of printouts. She walked back to the corner and climbed a steel rung ladder up to the deck. The control tech gave her a strange look. "Hey, can you maybe turn down the...thing?" Sarah said. "It's messing with these readouts."

  "I have orders to maintain current levels," the tech said. He was a younger man, barely much older than Sarah.

  "Please? I'm supposed to finish these tests before...termination." It was hard to choke out the word.

  He scowled, but reached out and twisted a dial slightly. Sarah made a mental note of which one it was. She glanced out at the warehouse and made sure no one was watching. She jumped to speed in an instant and cracked the tech across the temple with a high-speed rap of her knuckles. The tech rolled back off his chair and hit the floor. Sarah twisted the dial all the way until it wouldn't twist anymore. Then she pried it off the terminal.

  Sarah walked back to the nurses' station, sat in a chair, and watched the foam cannon. There were no more blasts from its nozzle. She watched the goo recede from around Andy's eyes, and then it drew back from the rest of his face. No longer impeded by the jelly, she watched him inhale deeply, his nostrils twitching and his chest expanding. More gelatinous gunk sloughed from his shoulders as he did. It would only be a matter of time before Andy could move again.

  Then they would leave. Together.

  Kenny huddled in the back seat of the minivan. John was driving---extremely fast---and Indigo was riding shotgun. In the middle seat, Holly was sitting primly, having a silent conversation with her new friend, Bat. The little vermin had been allowed to ride inside the van with them and Holly had let it sink its claws into the upholstered ceiling. It creeped Kenny out, the way Holly's eyes glazed over when she would tap into that place in her brain that allowed her to talk to animals; her eyes glowed a rather disturbing white, like someone with advanced glaucoma. Kenny just sat in the back, his hand in the pocket of his windbreaker grasping the handle of the Beretta.

  As John guided the van back toward the Home and the town the Trust owned, Kenny felt the familiar itch in his brain when they crossed pockets of Wi-Fi and longed to reach out and scan the 'Net. Keeping John's words in his mind, he didn't. He resisted the urge to jostle through some firewalls and probe people's secrets. He tried to focus on the fact that when they reached Amboy, when they ran into the soldiers of the Trust, that he might have to take someone's life.

  In his history classes, he was always taught that loss of life was just a part of war. It was one of those things that happened. In philosophy classes, they had lengthy discussions about war. What if it was part of a grand, karmic scheme for someone to die in a war? Would taking their life still be bad if they were meant to die? Kenny tried to convince himself that if he had to shoot someone, it was part of that grand karmic scheme. Like John said, though: It was all well and good to think about it; it would be something entirely different to have to squeeze a trigger and watch someone fall.

  None of them really spoke on the way to Amboy. Indigo had a map on her lap and uttered directions to John every so often, but other than that, only the radio filled the silence. They listened to the news broadcasts and listened for stories about a strange birdwoman, or about gunshots in the Pennsylvania Dutch country, or even about everything that went down at the Home two nights previous. Nothing was reported.

  Morning had broken shortly after they began driving and eventually, gnawing hunger pangs hit the group. As soon as they passed an open McDonald's, John pulled over. The Golden Arches lay outside of a sleepy little town just east of the Pennsylvania border. The four of them walked into the restaurant and up to the counter, disheveled and tired. John leaned over to Kenny and whispered, "I'm glad I've seen them do this in the movies." He walked up to the counter and smiled at the woman standing at the register.

  John cleared his throat, surveyed the breakfast menu for a moment and said, "I will take four number two value meals with large orange juices."

  "Will that be all?" the woman asked.

  "I don't know. What do you guys want?"

  "Same," said Indigo.

  "Sure," said Kenny.

  "I'll only have three of them," said Holly.

  "Is this some kind of joke?" asked the register-lady.

  "Only if you don't get them quickly enough," said John. "We're starving."

  It took some convincing, but eventually they were given their meals, and each carrying trays laden with food, the four of them moved to the booth farthest from the counters and tucked into their meals.

  "I've been thinking," John started through a mouthful of hash browns and orange juice. "I think I've got a plan."

  "Give it to us," said Indigo.

  Kenny looked over at John and raised his eyebrows. "How can you have a plan? Do you even know what we're going up against?"

  "I can guess. I figure there's got to be a single main gate, heavily guarded. There might be a sniper. There'll be a main barracks that soldiers will pour out of the second someone trips the alarms. I bet there'll be some weapons that are meant to neutralize Kenny's telepathy, Indigo's telekinesis, and Holly's animal powers."

  "No weapons to neutralize you?" asked Holly.

  "I'm not bulletproof. A well-placed shot I don't see coming will neutralize me without a problem."

  "So, how are we supposed to get in the gates without setting off the alarm, find Sarah and Andy, and then get the hell out?" Indigo blew her hair out of her face with a petulant huff.

  "I can get into the compound; I'm sure of it," said John. "The only problem is going to be getting the three of you into the compound. If there's only a main gate, we're going to have to find a way to disarm the alarm before we charge the gates."

  "I can do it," said Kenny. "It's a snap. Just get me to a computer that controls the alarms and I'll have them off inside of a minute."

  "No, Ken," John started, but Kenny cut him off.

  "Hey---if this isn't a call for me to use my powers, I don't know what is. They put them in me for a reason. This is what I do. Get me over the wall, I'll shut the base down."

  John scowled.

  Kenny stared him down. "This is what I do. If I am eventually going to lose my mind, I might as well do some good first." Kenny could see John fighting it over in his mind.

  Eventually John conceded. "Okay. I'll get you over the wall. Your job will be to disable the alarms, blow their computers, and nuke everything else, okay?"

  "Computers, alarms, communication relays, I should be able to nuke all of them."

  "I'll lead the assault on the main gate, then," said John. "Holly, I'll need you for diversions. How many animals can you gather?"

  "I can issue a general distress call and see, but until we get there, I won't really know. I can only work with what's around me."

  "Can we stop and get some?" asked Indigo.

  "What?"

  "Animals. If you can control them, what's to prevent us from stealing a panther from a zoo? We could load it into the van."

  John looked at Holly. She shrugged. John said, "That's so crazy it might actually work."

  "Where is a zoo near Amboy? Or a farm?"

  "There's open country all over Ohio, we could probably find something wild," said Holly.

  "But, something offensive, something weapon-grade like a big cat?"

  "Maybe," said Holly. "There was a cougar near th
e shelter. There are reports of big cats in places big cats aren't supposed to be every year. Ohio does have a cougar population. They're not that easy to command, though. They're really independent. I think maybe a gorilla or something more social might take orders better."

  "Well, there was that gorilla farm right next to the Home. We could stop there," said Indigo.

  Holly's mouth dropped open, "There was a gorilla farm?"

  "Of course not, ditz! Where are we supposed to find a gorilla? A cat could hide behind a seat! You can't hide a gorilla!"

  "Hey---keep it down," said John. "People might think we're insane."

  "As if ordering enough food for a football team makes us normal."

  "Indigo, hush." The look in John's eyes silenced her. He was exuding the aura of a leader; it seemed to ebb off of him in palpable waves. Kenny felt like he would be willing to do whatever John asked of him. Kenny wondered if maybe that was part of John's genetic alterations or if it was just something inherent and inexplicable within him. "Whatever you can do to help, Holly, whatever you can bring to the party will be good. You're going to serve like an archer. If nothing else, you'll be able to find insects and birds, right?"

  "Always. Except in winter. No bugs then."

  "Then, we'll take what we can get. Swarms of insects. Plagues of locusts, if possible. Rain bees down on them. Whatever you can get, throw at them. Hit them from a distance with your pets."

  "What about me?"

  "You are going to be the heavy artillery, Indigo. You're going to have to use your telekinesis to take out any soldiers in front of us."

  "I won't kill again," said Indigo.

  "You don't have to. Just push them away. Keep your emotions in check and you won't have any accidents."

  "Just keep them in check...sure. You make it sound easy."

  "When we get there, Holly will start gathering her armies and running recon with Bat. Indigo, you'll stay hidden. Kenny will go over the wall with my help. After that, you're on your own, Kenny, for good or bad. No heroics, Ken. Don't overuse your powers. Take out the bare minimum of security and then get out of there."