“Brave. Like your father.”
“I said let them go!” I shouted, and then I fired a round into the forehead of one of the men who held Ben. Ben kicked the other man trying to restrain him, freeing himself. He then took the man’s gun and shot him before turning on Andrei.
“This is how you play?” Andrei asked.
One moment Andrei’s gun was pointed at my mother, and the next, Felix was on the ground with a bullet in his chest.
“FELIX!” we shouted.
BLOODLUST
Felix.” I whispered, knowing he was already dead.
“Your move, Abigail,” Andrei said. “I have two men remaining, and you have two people as well.” He brought his gun to my mother’s forehead. “Should I shoot her first?”
I regarded Andrei’s two men. One, a stocky dark-haired fellow, held a gun on Ben. A holster under his left shoulder appeared to be for the gun he was holding, but I couldn’t be sure. He might be carrying a second weapon. The other man was covering me. He had a Glock in his hand similar to mine, aimed for my center body mass. In addition he had a SOG tactical folding knife clipped to his belt. Hell, by the look of him he could easily have a tank tucked under his jacket. He was huge.
“All right!” I threw my gun to Andrei. “All right, just let them go. I’m done. I’m spent.” My cover came up behind me and pinned my hands behind my back. I grunted with the pain in my arm and slumped against his chest.
“Let go of her!” my mother shouted, but I knew she was in no position to make demands.
“Open the gate, Abigail,” Andrei said. Feebly I twisted my hands, making a show of trying to free them. In reality, I was searching for my captor’s knife.
“How do you suggest I do that with my hands behind me, Andrei?” I flashed him what I hoped was a sly, sarcastic grin. It might have just looked like an exhausted grimace. There! My hand finally found the knife. I slowly pulled.
He smiled. “You’re not going to trick me into letting you have your hands free. You can tell me what code to enter. A clever move, though.”
“Thank you,” I replied. Andrei might not have heard me, though, because at that very same moment the guy holding me screamed. The SOG tactical folding knife deploys with the touch of a thumb button. I was able to manage it even with my hands pinned at the wrist. I drove the blade into Tank Man’s stomach, and he let go of me, yelping, likely more out of surprise than any actual pain.
A second later he was lying on the ground at my feet. I knew Gideon had done me this small favor, but I didn’t have time to acknowledge it. Ben had taken advantage of the distraction provided by Tank Man’s cries to kick out the ankle of the man covering him, and Andrei had turned his gun from my mother toward him. I hurled my knife in Ben’s direction.
It hit him in the thigh.
Ben’s leg went out from under him. Andrei fired, but the bullet flew harmlessly through the empty air where Ben’s head had been a moment before, when he’d still been standing.
Andrei spat a few unhappy-sounding words at old Dark and Stocky, and then shoved my mother into his arms.
I looked back to Tank Man. I was pretty sure he was dead, and I was beginning to wonder what it was that Gideon had done to him. I hadn’t been wondering very long when someone hit me from behind. I dropped.
“How do you like that?” I screamed as Andrei kicked at my stomach and ribs. “You little…” The rest of his words continued in Russian.
“Stop!” my mother screamed.
Andrei pulled me up by my hair. “I wanted you alive because I wanted to make your father suffer for what he did, but now I think killing you would be much more fun.” Andrei landed another solid kick to my lower back. I was growing faint and dizzy, and thought, idly, that now would be a good time for Gideon to step in. Where was he? Was a hero too much to ask for at such a moment?
I thought I could see him just outside the circle of light from the gate. He looked like he was trying to force himself forward but was held back. I couldn’t make out what was holding him. It looked like, well, like nothing. He was like a mime pretending to push against an invisible glass wall. A mime. Definitely not a hero. My vision swam.
When I managed to get my eyes to focus, I saw Felix’s unmoving body on the ground not far from me. I couldn’t even cry out. I couldn’t seem to find the air. Each breath was a sharp, shallow rasp. Every inch of my body burned. Trying to suppress the pain, I forced myself to stand, but I stumbled and landed on my face.
“Get up!” Andrei shouted, and once again he pulled me up by my hair.
“You—!” Andrei paused. We heard a gunshot, and the man holding my mother lay on the ground. When Andrei looked to see what had happened, I rammed my fist into his jaw.
“Take this.” Gideon’s voice was close in my ear. I couldn’t see him, but I could feel him place a gun in my hand and gently close my fingers over it. I felt him brush the hair from my eyes. No time for this.
I rushed over to Ben.
“This is gonna hurt.” I swiftly pulled the knife from his thigh and threw it at Andrei; it landed in his shoulder, and he cursed. I raised my gun. “Don’t!” I shouted as he went to remove the knife. “Leave it!” I fired a warning shot over his head that came so close it ruffled the cuff of his shirtsleeve. He did as he was told.
“Abigail, it’s over. He’s not going to hurt you anymore.” Gideon was beside me again. I knew that the worst was over, but I wasn’t done with Andrei.
“You have talent and strength. I actually like you,” Andrei said with a smile.
“Too bad I’m going to kill you.” I rested my finger on the trigger.
Logan and my parents shouted as one, “No!”
Reinforcements had arrived.
“Abigail, don’t!” My father came over to me and placed a reassuring hand on my shoulder. I didn’t lower my gun. “Abby.” He pulled me against him as Logan pointed his own gun at Andrei’s head. He kissed me on the top of my head, and then went to attend to my mother.
“Agent V,” Andrei smirked. “That’s a nice little girl you’ve got here. She single-handedly took out all the men I brought.” Still the horrid smile. Still the dead eyes.
At the sight of his wickedly happy face I stormed over to him. I struck him in the chin with the butt of my gun.
“Abigail, stop. We need him for questioning,” Logan said. “We couldn’t get in through the front gate because you initiated lockdown, so we had to go around the house. We’d have been here faster, but it seems you didn’t need our help.”
“Didn’t need your help? Felix is dead!”
“One person,” Andrei scoffed. “You took down all my men and—”
I clocked Andrei again. His nose started bleeding.
“Abigail.” My father pulled me away from him.
“You took him and his men down?” Logan’s eyes were wide. “We’ve been after him for years, and you got him in one night?”
“I guess now you can send me a freaking thank-you card,” I said bitterly, and turned away from him. I had no doubt Gideon deserved a card as well.
Andrei started laughing, “She is adorable and I—”
The bullet I fired at Andrei hit him in the same arm where I’d stabbed him. He screamed.
“Abigail!” My mother’s voice was low and hoarse. When I turned to face her, she was staring at me as if she didn’t know who I was. I didn’t know who I was either, because just a short while ago I’d been freaking out that I’d killed someone, and now I actually yearned to kill Andrei.
“You’re quite dangerous, aren’t you?” Gideon asked. Hearing his disembodied voice should have bothered me more than it did.
“He doesn’t need his arm for interrogation, does he?” I asked my father. Everyone was now looking at me as if they didn’t recognize me. I figured they were just used to lovely, obedient, good-girl Abigail. Bloodlust Abigail scared them.
“Honey, calm down. You’re safe. You’re all right, and we are here,” my father said, slowly
and calmly.
“Safe?” I shouted at him. “I took a bullet to the arm, I’ve had people beat the crap out of me in my own home, and I had to endure this psychopath here calling me adorable. I’m safe?” Fatigue and pain came over me in a wave. The adrenaline was slowly wearing off. I’d killed people. I had killed! The stickiness of the blood on my skin made my head spin when I remembered where it had come from.
“Abigail, I…”
I shook my head. “Congratulations, Father. I guess now you can come home.”
“I never wanted any of this.”
“You wanted a killer! Well you’ve got one. Take a long look, Father. This is me now.”
A me that didn’t scare me as much as she should.
UPSIDE DOWN
Gideon
What are you doing?” I demanded when I appeared in my room and saw Valoel peering through a scope. The scope is a device that straddles the boundary between the physical realm and the magical one as completely as we angels do ourselves. It had a few glass lenses, and a complicated array of physical buttons and switches, but also made use of the portals between worlds. With a scope, it was possible to see anywhere, anywhere at all. With all the possibilities to draw from, it should have been impossible for me to guess what Val was looking at through hers. It wasn’t, though. I knew she’d seen me, and had seen what’d just happened at Cells Mansion.
“I’m watching Abigail,” she said, and stepped away from the scope. “I’m rather surprised you helped her.”
“How is she doing?” I pushed her aside and looked through the lens.
Abigail lay still on her bed with an IV attached to her hand. What parts of her weren’t covered in bandages were dark with bruises. A silent doctor stood nearby, flipping papers on a clipboard.
I aimed the scope into her living room, where her mother was crying. Her house was filled with people in uniforms walking briskly around, each person busy with some task.
“Why did you help her?” Valoel asked as I turned the scope back to Abigail.
“I didn’t do much. She got the bad guys herself.”
“I think you did plenty.” Valoel snapped her fingers, and everything she’d seen through the scope played back for me as though I were watching a movie. Abigail had killed some of those people. If I hadn’t seen it myself, I wouldn’t have believed she could even hurt a fly.
Abigail didn’t need a hero, so it was a good thing I wasn’t one. Still, how had she managed to survive that attack on her own?
“Did you do something?” I asked Val. I shot her an accusatory glance and she quickly looked away. “You did something.” I recognized the guilty look in her eyes.
She kept her eyes on the floor and answered, “I did nothing.”
“You helped her. You’re the reason she was able to fight off those men before I arrived.”
“Gideon, that girl can take care of herself.” She wouldn’t admit to helping Abigail, being her guardian angel when Tristan wasn’t around. “Fine. I helped her because she’s the only creature you don’t hate, and I didn’t want her to die. But she didn’t need much! I told you, she can take care of herself.”
Suddenly, I knew she’d had something to do with my not being able to move when I’d wanted to kill Andrei for kicking Abigail. I’d had to watch it all happen from mere feet away, unable to do anything.
“Val, you stopped me from killing that Andrei. You kept me from helping her when she needed it most!”
“Gideon, I couldn’t risk you exposing us. I’ve already had to erase you from the cameras around her house.” I wanted to argue, but I didn’t.
“How were you able to stop me?” I asked curiously.
“We are angels Gideon, we have the power to do that sort of thing.”
“I know, but plenty of creatures—and angels—have tried to stop me and failed. You did, and you did it from planets away.” Looking at Valoel, I was starting to wonder just how powerful she might be.
“How did it go with Daligo, anyway? Did you and Tristan find answers?” Valoel switched to another topic. I guess I was getting close to something she didn’t want me closer to.
“No. Daligo doesn’t know any more than we do about how or why we can hear each other’s thoughts. He’s plenty nervous about it, though.”
We’d arrived at the palace just as Daligo was dismissing a guard, and he’d been surprised to see us both there looking civilized.
“Don’t smile, we didn’t come for tea, we need answers,” I’d said as soon as we’d both taken a seat.
Tristan had told him the reason why we were there, and he’d actually seemed to be surprised by the development.
“Hear each other’s thoughts?”
I was annoyed that he was just parroting our questions back at us. “Want us to spell it out for you, or are you just playing dumb?”
Tristan glanced sidelong at me when I said this as if I’d committed a crime. I knew he would never talk to the king in such a tone. I thought the tone was warranted..
“I have no idea why you two are experiencing this,” Daligo had finally come to himself only to say something that made sense but didn’t help us in anyway.
“Well, that’s a waste of our time.” I stood up, and started heading out.
Tristan followed. “I’ll go and try to find answers from my parents.” I hoped he had better luck with them than with Daligo, but I had my doubts.
When I left, I had gone to visit D, and then I’d gone to hunt. After that, I had decided to pay Abigail a visit, and I’d arrived to find her under attack. Wow. Had it all been only a few hours ago? It seemed years.
“Look, Val, I need to go back, in case those people return for her.” I was shocked to realize I sounded like I cared, more shocked to realize I did. “I should never have left in the first place.”
“Relax, Gideon. She’ll be fine.” The moment Valoel said this, I felt as if a weight had been lifted from my shoulders.
If only Tristan had been there. Wait. Tristan!
Tristan, Abigail needs you. I said to Tristan in my head. I was sure he was still in Lumens.
Why? What happened?
I allowed what Valoel had shown me to fill my thoughts.
Oh, my God. Why didn’t you call me sooner? I was asking myself the same question.
And before I could exhale, Tristan was on Earth. I saw the inside of Abigail’s bedroom through his eyes.
She doesn’t look good, I thought when I saw her. She was battered. Her face was grossly swollen, and yet she seemed smaller just now than she ever had.
“I’ve stabilized her for now,” I heard the doctor say to Abigail’s father as the two ducked into the hallway. “I’ve given her something to help with the pain as well, but she’s going to need more than we can do for her here.”
You need to heal her, I thought loudly at Tristan.
I can’t. If I do it without her knowledge, she might go into shock. To heal her, I’d have to reveal myself to her, and it’s against the law.
“The law? Are you kidding me?” I said aloud. “You’ve interfered plenty before today.” This wasn’t a time to go all noble. Under the circumstances, I didn’t think it necessarily was noble.
You said that the only person who could be hurt by our revealing ourselves was Abby. She’s already hurt. The other times you’ve interfered mean nothing if you don’t help her now.
“So you don’t have feelings for her? Not even a little?” Valoel asked from beside me, making me even angrier.
“Don’t start with me, Val.” I thought of Abigail, and found myself in her room.
Tristan actually moved to put himself between me and Abigail when he saw me.
I’m not going to hurt her, moron, I thought.
I can never tell whether you’re planning to give her roses or push her off a balcony.
Yes, Tristan had answers to everything. I decided to ignore him and rematerialized beside Abigail. Her eyes were closed, but I could tell she wasn’t asleep. Tears ran
down her cheeks, and when I saw them, I felt something. Was it sadness?
In an attempt to dry her tears, I placed my right hand tenderly on her cheek. The moment my hand touched her skin, her heart started racing, and she opened her eyes.
“Gideon?” she called, looking around her.
I turned to Tristan, and we exchanged surprised looks. I knew she couldn’t see me.
“Gideon, I can feel you. I know you’re here,” she said again, and then slowly I made myself visible. She went to reach for my hand when she saw me, but that tugged at the IV, and she thought better of it.
“How did you know it was me?”
“Whenever you’re close to me, my heart races.”
Oh. That was… weird.
“Abby.” I stopped, because I couldn’t bring myself to ask how she was feeling. I touched her cheek again. Her skin felt warm, and for a second, I debated on whether I ever wanted to take my hand away.
“I’m sorry I pushed you away,” she cried.
I didn’t understand why she was apologizing for being angry with me for my rudeness. I was pretty sure I should be the one apologizing.
“I’m going to make you feel better.” I patted her hand. “Don’t freak out, OK?”
“Don’t,” she protested as more tears slid down her cheeks. “I killed and hurt those people. I deserve every bit of pain I’m in.”
“That’s a terrible thing to say, Abigail. Those people were trying to kill you.”
“Does it matter? They’re dead, and I’m not. And Felix is gone.”
I suddenly realized I could have saved Felix, but I had been so focused on making sure nothing happened to Abigail or her mother that I had let myself forget there were two more people there she cared about.
Tristan, heal her now. She’s already seen me. You’re not helping anyone by trying to keep a secret now. Heal her!
Wait. You’re not going to hurt her? Tristan seemed surprised. Yeah, I was surprised too, but at this point how I felt was irrelevant.
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