Angel Dares

by Joss Stirling

  Camera? Could I disable that somehow? I began searching for a way to reach the light in the corner. Jumping up, I fell back, still a long way short. Damn being small! I’d have to wait until I could float up there—or maybe send a plume of water to do the job for me?

  Turning my back so they wouldn’t see what I was doing, I used my power to wind water up the wall like ivy. It reached the camera but the light refused to blink off.

  ‘What are you doing? We know you are using your power.’

  Like I was going to tell them anything. Disappointed, I let the water subside to its natural level. The camera was waterproof, of course.

  Angel, are you there? Marcus’s voice lanced back into my head, adding to my headache.

  I told you to go away. Oh dash it all—I had to talk to the bastard, didn’t I? He was the only one I could reach.

  Look, I just walked off stage for you.

  Well done, I shot back sarcastically. So you’ve decided saving a life might be worth more than your reputation? I’m honoured.

  OK, if that’s your attitude, I’ll go back on. I might still be able to salvage something of my credibility if I do it now.

  I hate you. I leaned back against the container wall and covered my face with my hands. I really really hate you.

  I’m not so hot for you right now either, Angel. But there was something tender in his tone that undercut the cruelty of the thought. Tell me what I need to know.

  I sobbed, feeling my heart break into little sand fragments and scour my chest as it came out with my tears.

  Angel? OK, I’m sorry. I’m just furious. I don’t want to be one of you—don’t want this gift thing you told me about and I’m taking it out on you. I apologize.

  He wouldn’t have to worry: I’d leave him alone after this. Just tell Will, Victor or Uriel—whoever is closest—that I’m being held in a shipping container somewhere. I don’t think I’m that far from you. They’ve put it on a slipway and it’s filling with water so I have to be in some kind of dock or marina. Footage is being streamed live so the Davis people will get evidence of the existence of savant gifts—maybe if they find the feed that’ll give them a hint of where I am.

  Come again? This is for real?

  Marcus, wake up! This isn’t about you—I’m not grandstanding to get your attention. My life is in danger. As a savant, I’ve promised not to reveal my gift to outsiders and I’m being put in a situation where I’m going to have to break my word. Even so, I’ve limits: I can’t keep out something as strong as the sea for ever. They might end up drowning me because I’ve never tested my powers in this way.

  The sound system crackled.

  ‘Congratulations, Angel. You’ve interrupted the concert, which was being broadcast live by the BBC. The evidence of gifts is mounting—when it all comes out people will know why someone like Marcus Cohen walked out in the middle of a career-making performance. Keep up the good work.’

  My reply was to wade over to stand directly under the camera to make it more difficult for them to film me.

  Marcus, once you’ve told one of the Benedicts, get back on stage. The anti-savant people are compiling evidence against you.

  Marcus told me succinctly what the journalists could do with their evidence. I’ve found Will and Margot. Will’s calling Victor. I then got the impression that someone new—not one of the Benedicts but Kurt, had joined Marcus. I could hear an echo of the conversation through Marcus’s replies.

  ‘What the hell are you playing at? Get back on stage!’ roared Kurt. ‘You don’t do that to your band mates—not unless you’re dying and only then if there’s treatment that’ll save you. Otherwise I expect you to keep going until you croak on stage. That’s what real musicians like us do.’

  ‘Hey, Marcus, bro, what’s going on?’ asked Michael, joining the little ‘let’s-get-Marcus-back-on-track’ brigade. ‘Pete’s just making an apology—saying you were suddenly taken ill. Is that what’s going on?’

  I could feel Marcus balanced on a knife-edge of decision: apologize and return to the stage, letting others handle this, or stay with me.

  ‘Look, guys, someone’s got to Angel—she’s in danger.’

  He’d chosen me—reluctantly, kicking and screaming all the way, but he’d decided I was more important. It was hard to feel grateful.

  ‘How do you know this?’ snapped Kurt. ‘You were in the middle of a song and this brainwave hit you? How the hell do you know what’s up with her?’

  I reached out to Kurt through my link to Marcus. He’s telling the truth, Kurt. I really really need some help here. I sent him an image of the container rapidly filling with water—up to my waist now at the shallow end, probably over my neck at the lower side.

  Victor sprinted up to Marcus and grabbed him by the elbow. ‘Where is she?’ His normally cold demeanour was cracked, revealing the magma of fury just below the surface.

  Let me speak to Victor, I told Marcus.

  Marcus shook Victor off and paced, holding his fingers to his temples. How do I do that?

  I think you have a gift to act as a bridge—that was how I was able to talk to Kurt. You may not have realized it but you two must have been communicating on some instinctive level just below full-blown telepathy. I remembered the natural collaboration between the two when playing. Through music I guess. It all follows if one of your gifts is to be a strong telepath.

  How does that help you?

  Link with Victor—or ask him to link with you. I’ll be able to join in.

  This all must have looked very strange to Michael and the backstage crew: Marcus pacing with his head in his hands, Kurt looking as though someone had dropped a lighting bar on his head, Victor close to prising the answers physically from Marcus.

  While we had been talking, Margot had quickly devised a plan to salvage what she could from disaster. She started rapping out orders. ‘Michael, go back and apologize—say you’re having technical difficulties. Marcus got hit by a blast of full-volume feedback from his earpiece and can’t sing until his hearing recovers.’ Closing her eyes, she must have unleashed a little of her power because the sound system started popping and crackling, howling with electronic distress. She pointed at the backstage manager. ‘Get your men on the problem. It’ll be something to do with the incompatibility between our equipment and yours. Tell the crowd the concert will resume at the earliest possible moment but it is unsafe to continue for both them and the performers.’

  Kicked out of indecision by her sergeant-major manner, the stage manager called his crew to get on to the task.

  ‘So sorry, Mr Cohen, if you were inconvenienced,’ he said. ‘This has never happened at Rockport before.’ He hurried away to the sound booth, gabbling further orders on his walkie-talkie.

  ‘Victor, she wants to talk to you via me,’ Marcus said awkwardly.

  Will put a hand on his shoulder. ‘Welcome to the savant world, Marcus. Just hang in there: Angel is relying on you.’

  Marcus gave a jerky nod.

  Victor reached out to touch Marcus’s forehead but my soulfinder reared back. ‘Whoa, what’s this: the Vulcan death grip?’

  Victor almost snarled with frustration. ‘It helps me find your mind. Hold still—this will feel … strange.’

  Miles away locked in a container, I suddenly felt Victor in my head as clear as my own presence. It was nothing like the frail connection to Kurt; Victor had moved in with all his possessions and was sitting with his feet up in my living room so to speak, probably holding the damn TV remote. If I felt this at one remove, I couldn’t even imagine what Marcus was experiencing. Flattened like doormat, probably. Victor didn’t bother with questions; he just rooted through my recent memories and took all the relevant data. He then stepped back a little, retreating to a less intense connection.

  You’ve no idea where you are? Can the sea tell you anything?

  Good idea. I put both hands into the water and stretched out my senses. The sea didn’t perceive the coast as a hum
an—it was like looking at the photo in negative. I could sense some shapes, some textures, nothing coherent.

  Concentrate, Angel. There has to be something.

  No shit, Sherlock. I left the margin of the water and sought for clues out in the deeper waters. The seabed shelves here very rapidly—I think this must be the deepest harbour in the area—figures if there’s a dock. It’s got to be big enough to have machines to move containers. I felt something else—something disturbing the water. There’s some kind of outflow here too—industrial or a sewer. What about Brigport itself? There’s a dock here that gives the festival its name—used by smaller container ships, I think. It’s round the headland from Brighouse-by-Sea.

  Are you sure?

  I bit my lip, conjuring up a map of the south coast of England. No. I was out of it while they were moving me. I could be anywhere. There are lots of dockyards.

  Can we work this out by a process of elimination? How far does your telepathy usually stretch?

  I’m not a strong telepath—a few miles at most. But my guess is Marcus is a strong one.

  He is—exceptionally so. And Brigport is the nearest container port?

  I think so.

  Then we’ll go with that. Hang on, Angel. Try not to give anything away until you have to.

  Did you hear the ‘No shit, Sherlock’ comment earlier?

  Yeah.

  Well, ditto that with brass knobs on. I was shivering with cold. Hurry up.

  He sent the impression of a salute through our connection. Yes, ma’am. I see you’ve lost your fear of me.

  Nah—just too freezing to care right now.

  He dropped his end of the link and released Marcus from his … well … possession I’d suppose you’d call it. ‘Brigport—we think she’s there. Let’s go.’

  Will nodded. ‘Uriel’s fetching Margot’s car.’ He kissed Margot’s cheek. ‘Keep the excuses coming. Stay safe.’

  ‘You too,’ she replied, letting another squawk burst from the speakers.

  Marcus ran after the two Benedicts. ‘I’m coming with you.’

  Victor raised a brow at that demand. ‘Haven’t you got a concert to finish?’

  ‘We’ve got technical problems, didn’t you hear?’

  ‘You don’t need to do this. Angel doesn’t expect you to abandon all this—you’ve made your priorities clear.’

  ‘I know she doesn’t—but I’m your link to her, aren’t I? Her … her soulfinder. She’s only hearing all this because I am communicating with her somehow in my head.’

  ‘True.’ Victor gave him an assessing look. ‘But you messed that up, didn’t you? I saw how you treated her.’

  ‘Vick, he’ll be useful—especially if we’re wrong about where she is,’ added Will. ‘It’s not the time to discuss what’s going on between them.’

  ‘OK, Marcus, saddle up. You can ride with us.’ Victor opened the front passenger door. Alex was already in the back with Summer and Misty. ‘Not the whole gang. Girls—out!’

  Summer and Misty just glared at him.

  ‘We’re wasting time,’ warned Uriel.

  ‘There’s a third row of seats,’ said Alex persuasively.

  If I hadn’t been so numbed by the icy water I would have chuckled at Victor’s furious expression in the face of my friends’ rebellion.

  It’s my army riding to the rescue, Victor, I told him, nudging our link back open. And I want my friends.

  I could feel Marcus flinch a little as I added that thought. He could see that I didn’t regard him as a friend: I wasn’t sure what he was just then, but friend wasn’t one of the terms in contention.

  Victor flicked a contemptuous glance at Marcus. ‘Get in.’ Marcus and Will climbed in the rear. They hadn’t even buckled in as Uriel floored the accelerator.

  It was tiring to maintain the link to Marcus so I let it drop for the moment while I mustered my strength. If they didn’t get to me soon I was at serious risk of exposure of the other sort. Could I call a warmer current to me? I rejected the idea as using too much of my power. I needed to have something left in the locker for keeping myself breathing. OK, I’d swim. Movement got the blood flowing and took the chill off the water.

  There’s not much room in a container to do widths but I splashed from one end to another.

  ‘What are you doing? Is this how you exercise your control over water?’ asked Davis.

  No, this is just how I exercise. Let him wonder what I was up to: I had no reason to answer. After a few minutes of swimming, I tried to put my feet down and discovered that the water level had gone over my head. There was about a metre left between the roof and me. I floated on my back and drifted over to the camera. It was set behind a wire cage—no way I could get to it to switch it off.

  But I could stop them seeing me, couldn’t I? I had to have straw for brains not to have thought of this before. Recalling what I was wearing, I debated between leggings or tunic.

  Tunic.

  I wriggled out of it, grateful for my foresight to wear a strappy top underneath. Swimming back to the camera, I gave Davis a final cute smile and wrapped the sodden tunic around the camera cage.

  ‘What are you doing? Take that cover off immediately.’

  ‘Why don’t you come in here and make me?’ I sang out sweetly. It felt so good to get one punch back in after having been beaten into this position by these savant-haters. I began to sing Kurt and Marcus’s song, ‘Stay Away, Come Closer’.

  ‘I’m warning you!’

  ‘Threats are a bit redundant, don’t ya think? I’m already locked up to drown in a shipping container. You should’ve thought a little more about how to play your cards, holding some back. There’s nothing more you can do to me.’

  I could hear a bump and a rasp on the speaker as if someone was grappling for the microphone.

  ‘No—that’s going too far!’ The protest sounded like Jennifer. ‘This is just a test—no one was to get harmed.’

  ‘It’s the only way. We’ve gone too far to back down now.’

  ‘Not too far. We’ve not done anything incriminating; there’s just the word of a girl that she was abducted—most people think she’s half-cracked anyway.’

  Thanks, Jennifer.

  ‘Then there’s no evidence to link us to the next stage either—nothing to stand up in court anyway, even if the savants know the truth. The live-streaming is only going to our supporters—the savants will never find it.’

  ‘No … ’

  ‘I’m overruling you on this. I’m sending the order.’

  The silence that followed was ominous. I sensed that in this case Jennifer was my ally and I needed her to win the argument. ‘Hey, Jennifer, I’m going all wrinkly here. A joke’s a joke, right? Time to let me out and we’ll forget this ever happened.’

  Davis, not Jennifer, came back to the mic. ‘I was hoping we could do this without resorting to extremes.’

  I half-choked on horrified laughter. ‘This isn’t extreme?’

  ‘But if you won’t show live on camera the kind of behaviour I found on your phone, then I’m going to have to up the stakes for you. It won’t matter if we can’t see what you’re doing inside—we’ve cameras on the outside that will record enough for our purposes. You can’t escape us.’

  I felt the container lurch again. ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘We’re winching you up on the crane.’

  That was good, wasn’t it? Up was out of the water.

  ‘Then we’re going to lower you into the deep water of the harbour so the container is completely submerged. When you survive that, no one will be in any doubt that you have extraordinary powers.’

  The container began to sway free, water slopping from one side to the other, bashing me against the wall. I clung on to the camera cage to keep anchored. The water level was receding but that would be only temporary.

  ‘Stop!’ I screamed. ‘You’ve got to believe me, Mr Davis: I don’t know that I can survive that. In fact, I’m pretty sur
e I can’t.’ Arms at full stretch, I had to let go and drop down into the water. ‘You must be crazy to think I can stop the sea.’

  ‘Angel, Angel, I have every confidence you will rise to the challenge. We need a spectacular demonstration and this is going to be amazing.’

  Are you getting what this madman’s saying, Marcus? I asked my soulfinder, knowing he had been a shadow at the back of my mind for some time now.

  I can’t believe what I’m hearing. What are you going to do? He sounded much closer.

  Hope my cavalry arrives. Can you see me yet?

  We’re just turning into the port now.

  Look for a crane working this late on a Friday night.

  Angel, it’s a busy place, working under floodlights, twenty-four seven.

  Then—I don’t know—try to feel where I am. Is anything off—a single container over open water?

  Oh hell, I can see you!

  His alarm was not reassuring. I caught a confusing glimpse through his eyes. A rust-red container was swaying on the end of cables at the far end of the furthest pier, no ship underneath it to accept the delivery.

  Can you get to me in time?

  Victor’s cutting through red tape with Alex. The guys are ordering people to do what they ask.

  Mind powers and persuasion: yeah, those two would make quite a team.

  Hurry, please.

  Angel, just hold on.

  With a sudden lurch, I felt the cables spin out their full length. The container smacked the surface, paused a fraction of a second, and then began to sink, the weight of metal and half a load of water pulling it down.

  Marcus!

  We’re almost with you. Someone must have tipped off the guy controlling the crane that we were on our way.

  ‘You bloody maniac!’ I screamed at the microphone. ‘I hope you rot in hell for this.’

  Silence. Davis had either fled his post at the monitor or he had cut communications.

  One end of the container nosed down further than the other and the water rebalanced, leaving a pyramid-shaped pocket of air up in one corner. Silently, it slipped down in the dark waters of the harbour, taking me with it.