“You don’t remember what it was like before,” Jason went on as if I hadn’t said anything. “No one has ever been happy around me. No one has ever loved me. They all wanted to use me, since I was a little kid. I’ve been shuffled all over the place, taught to be efficient, taught to be smart, taught to be brutal. And if I succeeded, people were kind to me, and they pretended to care about me. But they never did. No one did. Anton didn’t. Hallam didn’t. You didn’t.”
“Jason, I do care about you.” I pushed myself up on one elbow.
“No, you don’t,” he said. “If I took the power away, if I stopped influencing your mind, you’d leave again. And I’d rather have fake love than no love at all. I know none of it’s real. I know all these people are only near me because I’m forcing them to be shiny, happy people. But before you showed up, that was enough. Because I was convinced that someone like me would never get any real love. But with you lying next to me like this, right now, your eyes glowing, after I know I forced you to help trample ten men to death earlier...”
“They deserved it,” I said. “They betrayed you.”
“Right,” he said. “That’s what I do when something threatens me. I kill it.” He clenched his fists around the bed sheets and pulled at them, drawing the sheet tight between his hands.
I put my hand over one of his fists. “Jason, you’re a good man. You’re not a killer.”
He laughed hollowly. “Killing is what I’m best at.”
He seemed so sad. I wanted to take that sadness from him. If only I could make him feel as good as he made me feel. I didn’t know how.
“Seeing you again reminds me of the way I used to feel,” he said. “Like things were real. Like I was real. Like I could be a normal person. All that time when we were apart, everything got fuzzier and fuzzier. You loved me before. You made me a real boy. And then you took your love away. And I was just a wooden puppet again. Except there wasn’t anyone to hold the strings anymore. No Sons. No danger to escape. No Edgar Weem. I thought that if I could make a place where everyone was nice to me and nice to each other, it would be easier. And it was. But when I look at you, I remember what it was like when things were real. And I miss that.” He looked at me again.
I felt my happiness begin to slip away again, like it had by the river. Fear crept up my spine, digging its claws into my belly. I tensed up, realizing what had happened tonight. Jason had killed more people, and he’d used me to do it. He’d used other bodies to kill, but it didn’t mean Jason was any less of a murderer. I squeezed his hand. But I hadn’t been lying earlier when I’d told him I cared about him. I did. “Jason,” I whispered.
He shook his head. “No, I see it in your eyes. You’re horrified by me.”
I opened my mouth to speak, but no sound came out. I did feel horror, but it didn’t mean that—
My head felt fuzzy and warm as tendrils of pleasure wrapped themselves around me. Familiar bliss. I yawned. “I feel sleepy.”
“I can’t risk it,” he said. “I just can’t. I’m sorry.”
“Mmmm,” I agreed, closing my eyes.
“I don’t ever want you to leave.”
“I won’t,” I said.
* * *
~kieran~
It was raining, and Chance was yelling his head off. I couldn’t blame the kid. We were both soaked, but it wasn’t that cold outside. It didn’t get too cold in July, even at night, but we sure as heck weren’t warm either. I held Chance’s squirming body close to my chest as I trudged through the downpour, looking for shelter.
We’d walked away from Cumberland originally, because I’d been trying to get distance between myself and the men who’d attacked me—along with their mysterious leader, whoever he was. But now, out in the middle of nowhere, with nothing but trees for shelter, I was heading back the way we’d come, walking along the silent road with a baby in my arms. In the rain. I really expected to see a house somewhere. From Azazel’s memories, she’d considered Cumberland a more populated area than most of the surrounding places. But Azazel didn’t recognize anything about where we were now. We must have gone someplace that she wasn’t familiar with. We needed someplace out of the rain. I’d take an abandoned house. Hell. I’d take an abandoned shed. I didn’t know how much longer I was going to be able to handle Chance’s yelling his head off.
The truth was, I was beginning to feel really stupid. Why had I run off like this with no plan? Sure, I wanted to find Azazel, and I wanted to give her powers back. But I had no idea where she was. I was wandering around with a baby in a strange place. We didn’t have a lot of food left either.
In the distance, I heard the whirr of a car engine.
That was strange. I hadn’t seen a lot of working cars out here. I moved off the road, huddling down with Chance in a ditch in case it was the same crew of people from before. I didn’t want to be seen unless I was sure it was safe.
Within seconds, a group of four cars roared up the road, their headlights cutting into darkness, illuminating the wet road. I could tell from the look of the cars that they were from the OF. No one except people in D.C. had cars that were in such good condition these days. The OF was here. Were they looking for me?
But no. I remembered the dream I’d had. Lily in an office, claiming that there was some kind of big, big powerful person here in Cumberland. Was the dream true? Was that why they were here? If the OF had someone like that, what would they do? I thought about the things I’d heard Lily discussing in her office before I’d left. The OF wanted absolute power and they wanted someone with magical abilities to help them do it. I didn’t think that was a great idea. Also, I kind of needed a car.
I gave it a second of consideration, but then, I just did it. I uncapped Azazel’s power inside myself, letting it bubble up and flow through me. Then I reached out with the power and found the minds of the men who were driving the cars. The power was itching to have them all wreck horribly, but I held it back. “Not yet,” I whispered furiously, concentrating. I needed to talk to these men.
I made the men bring their cars to a halt. I made them shut the cars off, get out, and close their doors. I approached them on the wet asphalt. They stared at me blankly.
Chance was still crying. Irritably, I let the power touch his brain, quieting him instantly. Something in Azazel’s memories flared—a warning. I ignored it.
Droplets of rain splattered against the ground. Wet spots appeared on the shoulders of the suits of the men in the cars. I looked into their eyes. I didn’ t have to ask it out loud. I simply made them want to tell me the answers to my question.
“We don’t know his name,” said one.
“He controls a group of armed men here in the area. His influence is growing,” said another.
Armed men? The power that Lily had talked about in her dream. He was the same guy that I’d been waiting for in that abandoned building. Did I want to save him?
“We now know that he’s based in Bramford, WV, though his power influences this area of Maryland as well,” said another of the men. “We are headed there now to find him.”
Bramford? That was Azazel’s hometown. Maybe there was a reason to check this guy out, after all. I didn’t know if I wanted to save him from the OF, exactly, but I needed to know more about him. Maybe, if he was dangerous, and the OF was after him, I needed to destroy him.
At the thought of destruction, the power inside me perked right up. Smash them up now? it asked, eager.
I was going to take one of their cars. I could simply tell them to walk the other way, but eventually they’d snap out of it if I didn’t keep the power on them, and I wanted to bottle it up. That meant that they’d come after me. I didn’t like it, but...
I let the power do its thing. I didn’t stop to watch. I just got in a car, surrounded Chance with the stuff I’d been lugging and buckled him in, and drove off. I heard the sounds of busting glass and screeching tires in the distance. I could imagine what the power was up to. Within minutes, it floated
back to me. I capped it back up. I knew where I was headed now.
* * *
~kieran~
It didn’t take me long to get to Bramford, maybe forty minutes. When I drove into town, it was dark, and I couldn’t make much out. There wasn’t any point in trying to do anything right then. I certainly couldn’t find this leader guy, who was apparently powerful. In the scant light, I was able to make out that it looked pretty typical of small town America these days. There was a defunct Rite-Aid on one corner, its windows busted out. The courthouse squatted like a dark toad, its pillars covered in graffiti. After my experiences in Cumberland, I didn’t want to try and take shelter in one of the buildings, so I drove through town.
Azazel’s memories told me about a place she used to go to make out with her boyfriend Toby in high school. Judging from her memories, it was isolated—near the woods. There weren’t any houses around it. It seemed perfect.
As I drove there, I mused over the fact that Azazel had never told me a thing about this Toby guy. I sifted through her memories of him. He seemed like a first-rate asshole. Had Azazel ever dated a nice guy? It seemed like both of her boyfriends had been self-centered pricks who’d at some point tried to have sex with her against her will. She wasn’t the luckiest girl on earth, was she?
I guessed there was me. Maybe I was nice, but there wasn’t much use for a nice guy in Azazel’s world. I was useless to her. If only there was some way to give Zaza back her memories and not give her back the burden of this power. I knew it was eating her up inside. I could feel that when I used it, it was violent and efficient. It craved destruction. So I knew why Zaza hadn’t wanted to use it. I understood. But it was different for me, when I used it. I guessed it had similar effects. But it wasn’t affecting me. It wasn’t changing who I was. The problem with Zaza wielding this power was that there was too much darkness pooled up inside her. She’d been through too much, had to make too many decisions that had made her hard and cruel. When she released the power, it enhanced the darkness already inside her. The two forces—Zaza’s darkness and the power’s darkness—fed off of each other in some kind of symbiotic cycle. I could protect her from that, if I could keep the power. And then there would be some reason for me to exist in her life. I could help her.
When I finally reached Azazel’s old make out spot, I parked the car and turned the key. Chance was sleeping, snug in the back seat. I lowered my seat. I was wet. All my stuff was wet. But I was going to need to get some sleep if I wanted to find the leader tomorrow.
I shut my eyes.
I was dreaming almost immediately.
In my dream, I was me, not Azazel, which was always nice. I was sitting alongside the river. There were heads on sticks lining the riverbank. The heads were fresh. They still dripped blood from the place where their necks had been severed from their shoulders. Their eyes were open. They gazed blankly out at the river.
I stood up and looked around. There was no one around except me.
“We would take you,” said a voice.
I nearly stumbled as I looked around, trying to locate the source of the voice.
“We would chew you up and spit you out.” The voice was coming from one of the heads. It was a head belonging to man with black hair. His eyes had been gouged out, so there was nothing but red gore above his hooked nose. When his mouth moved, blood dribbled out of the side of his mouth, running down his chin. “We could find plenty of things to use you for.”
I had a sudden urge to knock the head off its stick. For some reason, I didn’t like being addressed by a dead person. And I didn’t like looking at the gory head either.
“All of our vessels are nothing more than insects,” said the head. “Without our power, that’s all you are. A harmless, annoying little fly. We could make you so much more. We could make you a god. Use us. Let us out.”
The heads all spoke at once. “Let us out.”
I felt sick to my stomach. I backed away from the row of heads, staggering up the riverbank.
I emerged onto an old road, cracked in places. Weeds grew between the cracks. There was a woman standing in the middle of the road. She was wearing a hooded robe. When she saw me, she lowered the hood so that I could see her face. I didn’t recognize her, but Azazel did.
“Agnes,” I said, but I said it with Azazel’s voice.
“I will kill you myself,” she said.
From behind me, the heads chorused, “Let us out.”
I spread my hands, and I felt power surging through me, lighting my body up with a fiery flood.
“Kill you!” Agnes snarled.
“Don’t mess with me, bitch,” I replied, thrusting my hands forward at her, releasing the power.
It caught her in the stomach like a cannon ball. She made an oomphing noise, and then she exploded. Bits of her flesh rained down on me, thudding against the cracked road.
I awoke to the sounds of rain on the roof. The sun was rising.
* * *
~kieran~
On my drive back into town the next morning, I noticed a hand-painted sign by the road. It said, “Guns. Ammo. Will trade for food and supplies.” I pulled over. Having the power of ultimate destruction was handy, but it was also pretty messy. I thought that having a gun might be a good way to protect myself without making everyone kill each other in extraordinarily disgusting ways.
I had made a little sling to carry Chance in out of an old sweatshirt I’d brought along, so I pulled that on and settled Chance inside. He was happy, gurgling the sound, “duh,” over and over again, which was his favorite thing to do recently. If Chance had a dad, undoubtedly I’d think he was saying “Da-da.” But I’d never tried to get him to say that or to call me that. So maybe kids didn’t really say “Da-da.” Maybe they just started making noises and kept making them if they got encouragement.
I brushed his tiny nose with my finger. “Duh-duh-duh to you too,” I told him.
“Duh-duh-duh-duh- duh ,” he chirped in response, grinning at me.
The sign was in front of an old farmhouse, with several rusting cars in the front lawn. The porch was crowded with various bits of lawn furniture and toys. There were five or six trash cans sitting in front of it, all overflowing with trash. As I approached the house, I heard loud barking. A large black lab came bounding out from behind the house, his tongue hanging out of the side of his mouth. When he saw me, he growled.
I wasn’t afraid of a black lab. They were big, dumb dogs who were generally easy tempered. Instead, I held out my hand to him and said, “Hey there, big guy.”
The dog growled again, but approached me cautiously. He sniffed my proffered hand for a few seconds.
“You’re a pretty one, aren’t you?” I said, reaching up to stroke him behind the ears.
He quieted immediately, letting me pet him while he panted loudly.
“Sunshine!” yelled a voice with a thick hick accent. Great, another guy from Deliverance , I thought. I looked up. Sure enough, there was a man with a huge beard in a dirty white t-shirt on the porch. He wore a ball cap cockeyed on his head. He had bushy eyebrows. “That’s a stranger, Sunshine. Damned fucking dog.”
I waved at the man on the porch. “It’s okay. I only stopped because I saw your sign and I’d like to possibly trade for one of your guns.”
The guy shoved his hands into his pockets, surveying me. “Piss poor watchdog,” he said. He spat sideways.
Seriously? He had chewing tobacco? Who had tobacco products these days? And besides, how much more stereotypical could you get?
He gestured with his head for me to come over. “What kind of gun were you looking for?”
Well, that was kind of a problem, wasn’t it? I knew very little about guns. Desperately, I searched Azazel’s memories for information on guns. She knew less than me, apparently. She could aim one and shoot it, but she had no idea what they were called. “Uh...a handgun, I guess.”
The man nodded. “Yeah. Lots of folks are worried about protecting them
selves these days. Alls I got is a Beretta subcompact and a Glock compact.”
Great. What the hell did that mean? “Which one do you have more ammunition for?” I asked.
“You don’t know shit about guns, do you, boy?” the man asked me.
“I know enough,” I said. I had carried an assault rifle when I’d worked for the OF last year, and I’d known how to load it, clean it, and shoot it, but I’d worked with Azazel, and she had magical powers. I’d almost never had to actually shoot that gun. Beyond my experience with the OF, I’d shot a gun a handful of times. I didn’t have terrible aim. I wasn’t an expert, but I wasn’t a complete idiot either.
The man spat again. “I don’t know. Something tells me that if I barter you a gun, you’ll shoot off your own foot. Or maybe you’ll accidentally shoot that precious little bundle you’re holding there. Your girl send you out looking for guns? Tell her next time to keep the baby.”
I glowered at him. “There’s no girl anymore, okay? There’s only me. And him. And I want a gun. I’ve got food. Let’s make a trade.”
The man looked a little sheepish. “I’m sorry about your girl,” he said. “Stay here. I’ll be right back.” He disappeared into the house for a few minutes and returned with a small gun and a box of ammo. “So what were you thinking of trading?”
I told him what I’d thought.
He laughed. “You’re going to have to do a lot better than that, boy.”
Screw it. I didn’t have time for this. I uncapped the power inside myself. As it bubbled through me, I warned it, No killing this guy. Just want the gun .
The power sighed, almost pouting. But it let me send a tendril of magic to the man’s head, convincing him to hand over the gun and the ammo.
“Thanks,” I told the guy. I pulled out the food I’d brought to trade and set it on the porch. I wasn’t going to steal from the guy. We shook hands, and I headed back to the car with my new gun. I didn’t recap the power yet. I wanted to get in the car before the guy realized I’d somehow convinced him to give me a gun for less than he’d wanted.
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