“I’m okay, but you’re hurting my hand.” His laugh felt shaky. “Please, Tracy, go tell them I’m awake and ask if Aren’s been found again.”
She squared her shoulder and sniffed. “I can do that.” Tracy stood and took a deep breath before going out to seek more answers for him.
Kaden sat in the tiny bed and fiddled with the sheets as he realigned his memories. He knew what news Tracy would come back with. Aren’s not going to be found among the other injured. She’s not safe at home either. The return trip came back to him. For the briefest moment, before the world had imploded on his head, he had stood alone in the center of the room.
He shivered even though he was very warm with the late sun coming through the window. I left her.
Hope flickered inside his heart. Maybe she could’ve been transported somewhere else. That thought made him uncomfortable too. Yeah, into a wall, the middle of Australia, or two thousand feet above the school?
He’d only had a few chances to test his abilities and none of those had included dragging anything along, let alone another person. Aren changed everything. His eyes followed the second hand on a wall clock. If she hasn’t made it back, I have to move quickly.
Tracy entered the tiny room once more, trailed by his dad and two policemen. Tracy’s face told him everything.
The police spoke up before Tracy could launch into one of her usual breathless rants. “Son, did you see anyone strange or out of place at school today?”
Kaden laughed. “Yeah, me. I’m the new kid.”
His dad frowned at him. “Kaden.”
The first policeman spoke up again. “This isn’t a joke, young man. We believe someone set off an explosive at your school. You were caught in the middle.”
The other one stepped in. “How well do you know Aren?”
Kaden raised an eyebrow. “Well enough to know she had nothing to do with this.”
“She’s the only one missing, which makes her either a suspect or…” He trailed off.
“Or what?” Kaden didn’t like the tone they’d taken.
“Or the target, son.”
“I’m not your son,” Kaden almost snarled. “I’m barely his.” He jerked a thumb at his dad.
Before his dad could say anything, Kaden stopped him. “Dad, this is important, how long have I been here?”
His face was red and he was looking back and forth from his son and the police. “What? You were in and out for a while. We thought you might have…well, you were delirious. Kept saying strange things. That was yesterday afternoon. The doctors are going to have to run some tests before you go home. And these men will have more questions. Bomb in a school. Such a small town. Why did I drag us here?”
Tracy chose that moment to jump back in. “They’re practically accusing everyone, Kaden. Jerks!” She nodded at the cops who gave her a dirty look. “Yeah, I mean you. Don’t act all surprised. You grilled me like I’d cobbled together some C4 in my easy bake oven. Ridiculous if you ask me, which you did.”
“It’s fine, Tracy, everything will be just fine.” He patted her hand even as his mind raced with the details. Aren’s been alone since yesterday.
“I have to go! It’s been way too long already. I don’t even really know how it works once I’ve come back, time wise that is. Does it keep running?”
His dad put a hand on his shoulder to keep him from getting out of bed. “What? No, son, they have more tests to run and more questions before we can leave.”
Kaden pushed his dad’s arm away. “You can’t be touching me when I go.” He pulled open his Egg, waving images around the interior. He wasn’t sure what he would find. Can I arrive when and where I left?
“I think he’s still delusional.” Kaden didn’t know who had said it. He didn’t care.
So many things were unsure to him even as the image of a clearing solidified in his head. He reached out and felt the warm, almost familiar tingle flow through him as he allowed his mind to surge away from this place and this moment into the terrifying darkness between realities. The sense of incompleteness and lack of body overtook him, banishing all fear, all emotion.
He emerged from the dark tunnel into the clearing at night, lit only by the two moons and the dim swirl of red nebula, shrouded by leaves. He caught sight of the desk and a litter of miscellaneous junk from the classroom strewn around it.
He stared for a moment before his brain caught up with what he saw. Good. If that’s here, Aren must be too. But she was nowhere to be seen. She wouldn’t go into the creepy forest, would she?
He glanced around at the deep dark between the trees. She would have to be crazy to go in there. Unless she had no choice. A cool breeze ran through the leaves, lifting a few papers off the tall grass.
Kaden shivered and looked down. “Really? Naked again?”
Whatever magic Aren had managed last trip didn’t work this time. How had she done it?
“Aren and clothes.” He knew which one he wanted to find first, but he felt ashamed for it. Clothes, if possible, and then Aren. He looked around for his most likely direction to find one or the other, seeing nothing but trees.
A figure separated itself from the darkened woods and stepped into the moonlight. Kaden blinked, instinctively covered himself with his hands, and called out. “Aren?”
The voice that returned to him was not the girl’s. It was masculine, though light and airy, with an accent that sounded similar to an Irish lilt though filled with malice. Inhuman eyes glimmered in the darkness, brimming with hateful mirth. “No, the human girl is gone. You will deal with me.”
Evandrel reluctantly let the human girl descend into the realm below where he could not follow without invitation. The Dwaros and the Keitane had long been friends, but that friendship did not allow for trespass.
The human girl also did not seem to have the power to flit to and from like the human male. Evandrel knew he was better off letting her go and waiting for the boy to return. It still irked him that he had not been allowed more time to study her. She had appeared an interesting specimen.
He examined the knife to take his mind from her slow escape. A gift from a Dwaro is not something I ever expected to hold in my possession. It hummed and sang with a fierce intelligence of its own. Light coursed through the etched patterns like blood through veins. Evandrel didn’t need to lean on his gift to know that much power had been poured into the blade.
He made a couple quick passes through the air. The knife whistled as it sliced the wind. “Not a bad trade. A living Dwaro blade in exchange for a skinny human girl. Even better if the boy shows up without that Dwaro to interfere.”
He laid the knife on a stone and the blade sank down into the gray rock. Evandrel thought for a moment that the Dwaro must have tricked him with a falsehood. “That treacherous little creature!” Evandrel snatched at the handle. The blade came up and the stone split in two. “Ah. I should not have doubted the Dwaro.”
Evandrel picked several long strips of bark from the ground and shoved them in his mouth; the easiest way to alter something not of himself was to make them of himself in some way. Speaking words of power in his head as the sun set, Evandrel could feel the bark bend and twist in his mouth.
Evandrel had thought the process disgusting once, when Hasla had spat out a glimmering jewel, still slick with saliva, but now it felt natural, right. As darkness fell over the clearing he pulled a supple sheath from his mouth that would contain the blade and keep it from sinking into the depths of Ealdar. He slipped the knife into the new sheath and strapped it across his chest where the blade sang to him of peace, solidarity, and the long patience of stone.
Evandrel closed his eyes, breathed deeply, and allowed the song to sooth him. If the boy returns, I will have my answers. The Keitane sent his senses out as a net throughout the clearing. I will be more prepared this time. He waited long hours, aided by the long patience of the blade.
Evandrel didn’t sleep, but his mind drifted just above the edge of unc
onsciousness. When he felt a tugging at his net, he sprang to his feet, alert. The tiniest of particles that made up the universe began to vibrate in the clearing. Strange.
He focused all his senses on the anomaly. The air and dust in the clearing shifted on the minutest level, swimming with purpose toward the center of the clearing. They moved quicker and quicker until they were too fast for even Evandrel’s highly tuned senses. Particles spun in space and then slammed together in a blaze of light that forced Evandrel to withdraw his heightened senses for fear of burning his mind.
He layered barriers and filters to protect his senses and looked back to see a form coalesce in the middle of the madness. The light, heat, and power were swallowed up in the process of creation. Elements blinked in and then out of existence and the human boy, Kaden, stood in their place.
Evandrel stared in shock. This felt different than the last time the human had appeared, but still completely alien and more powerful than any magic he knew. The arrogance of this human! Evandrel stepped into the clearing, his anger warring with the song of patience that the blade continued to sing.
Chapter 16: Dragon Intervention
James sat in the little café and frowned down at his coffee. He stirred it slowly without thought. It had long ago gone cold.
The café felt like something found on the main street of some tiny town, complete with the greasy food and sticky vinyl booths, but James wasn’t fooled. He’d always been a special person and had a hard time forgetting that he sat several floors beneath the desert, even if the windows gave a convincing view of a small sleepy town in Anywhere, USA.
He couldn’t forget that labs and white corridors surrounded him. He knew a five minute walk to the north would take him to the park, but the fluffy clouds and blue sky above it were illusions too. He also knew guards with guns blocked a dozen different doorways. These weren’t things he could forget anywhere or anytime, except in the BOCS.
James smiled. Despite the crazy world he now lived in, he felt happier than he’d ever been. My projects are going well. My supervisor is beautiful, just about perfect, and showing plenty of interest in me. My best friend’s down here with me. And I can lose myself for hours in my work and then see real results. Something in the back of his head kept whispering warnings. He tried his best to ignore that voice.
The bell above the door dinged. It wasn’t the most popular restaurant in the complex, but there were a few regulars. James looked up and smiled at Angie. He waved her over.
“I don’t know why you like this place so much, James.” She slid gracefully into the seat next to him and picked up a fry from his half eaten plate. “There’s this Italian place just around the corner with better atmosphere and better food…hmm…though these fries aren’t bad.”
James cocked an eyebrow at her, happy to have her next to him in the now much warmer booth, but also surprised that she’d not sat across from him as usual. She reached over and smoothed out his crooked eyebrow with the softest touch.
“Mike’s meeting us. Would you rather I sat by him?”
Her touch sent shivers down his spine, but he tried hard not to show that her briefest touch could have so much effect on him.
He smiled down at her warm, green eyes. “I think Mike would like that, actually.” His smile turned to a grin.
She gave him a mischievous grin back. “Maybe I should move then, if my presence is so uncomfortable.” She punched him lightly in the arm but made no motion to change seats. Instead she picked up another fry.
James breathed in, absorbing the after-rain scent of her skin along with lilac touches from some lotion, perfume, or shampoo. Better than anything, that smell.
“Okay, fine. I guess I’ll put up with you…” James sighed heavily, “…this time.”
She turned her head sideways at him, raised a hand, and pointed a fry at his nose, menacingly. “Listen here, bud—” She had deadly looks when she wanted to, but James could see a twinkle of humor in her eyes.
The door dinged again and Mike stepped inside, shaking water from a light jacket in his arm. He carried with him an odd burnt smell, like fried electrical circuitry.
“Seriously! It rains every time I walk through that blasted park. We’re inside a building. Why can’t they just water it like normal people?” He ran a hand through his wet hair as he slid into the booth across from them. “Do we have to imitate the weather just because we can?”
James chimed in. “Yes, of course we do.” He used his best commercial voice. “Here at Omegaphil Laboratories we strive to do the impossible, the weird, and the annoying—because we can!”
All three laughed at his joke. James eyed the rapidly growing puddle where Mike leaned a moist elbow on the table. “Really, Mike, the rain isn’t too bad, if you don’t break the heart of one of the local weather girls.”
Angie’s head snapped up and she turned a shaking fry on Mike. “No. You didn’t?”
Mike snarled as he spoke. “This place is worse than a small town sometimes. Everyone in everyone else’s business.” He shook a soggy finger at James, flicking water everywhere. “Cindy was fun, but it was time to move on.”
Angie gasped. “You’ve only been dating for two weeks. I thought you were both having a lot of fun. You’re lucky she didn’t chase you through the park with lightning bolts. I would have.”
“Yes, but you’re more bitter than she is. And she did. One hit inches from me. I think I’m deaf in my left ear.” He stuck his finger in it and twisted then looked down when he saw Angie’s face. “Sorry Angie. I didn’t really mean you were more bitter.”
“It’s fine, Mike. We aren’t here to discuss our problems though, are we?”
James had given up on his cold coffee and now struggled with his thick shake. “Why is the straw so small? It’s like they want you to fail.” He looked up and froze with another question on his lips about why Angie might be bitter as he took in the intent looks on his friends’ faces.
“What? Why are you two staring at me? You told me—wait, what is this?” James didn’t like being out of the loop.
Angie looked at Mike and then back at James. “This is an intervention. We’re worried about you. You spend too much time working and you seem a little obsessed lately.”
James smirked. “Seriously? My boss is getting after me for working too much? I’m fine, really. I feel great and you two worry too much.”
Mike chimed in. “Yeah, James, you look great, but you still spend too much time in the BOCS. I should know. I held the record before you showed up and you’ve blown that out of the water. You need to spend some time out here with us.”
“What am I doing right now?” A hint of anger bled into his voice.
Angie broke back in. “Yeah, but that took some convincing. We don’t want to upset you or anything, just want you to know that we’re worried and we’re here for you.”
James shook his head. This wasn’t what he’d expected when he’d agreed to come here today.
Angie set a comforting hand on his knee. “James, we’d like to see you more. I’d like to see you more. These seventy hour work weeks aren’t healthy, no matter how well you feel. You aren’t sleeping. You aren’t eating. I don’t like it, not as your boss and not as your…friend.”
James couldn’t stay angry, not with Angie’s hand on his leg and her eyes pleading with him. He also hadn’t failed to notice the use of “I”. She wants to see me more.
“Maybe you’re right. I just want to get some of these things done and I have more ideas every day.”
“That’s great, James, but they’ll still get done, just more slowly. You’re stuck in the complex for the first year, but you aren’t stuck in the BOCS that whole year. Join me, us, for dinner now and again. Take a walk in the park. Enjoy what we have down here every now and again.” She looked up at him through her eyelashes, her green eyes pleading.
“Okay, okay. You’re both overly dramatic. You know that? Didn’t need to ambush me. I’ll spend more time w
ith you, but do we have to invite Mike?”
“Hey!” Mike chuckled. “You need me. Count me out on those walks in the park though. Not safe for anyone near me. Stupid rain.”
Dr. Stephens flipped through the graphs that flickered in the air in front of him. “This isn’t possible. This all happened last night?”
The tech pulled up a multicolored screen showing a jagged line moving from the bottom left hand corner and climbing with peaks and valleys to the top right corner. “Yes sir. See here, the first spike began at 3:27am and the bandwidth climbed from there.” The young man pulled up another screen with a similar descending line. “And here, the access dropped off at 5:11am.”
“Do we know who did this and how? I thought our system couldn’t be hacked.” Stephens shook his head. He knew he’d have to tell Vander about the breach. And that will be unpleasant.
“We know who, but we’ve no idea how, sir.” He shuffled through more graphs and images, each one flashing across the holo screens, until he found what he looked for. “The hacker accessed the neural network and only tampered with one person’s projects. No one logged in. No one was even inside the BOCS. We—”
Dr. Stephens cut in. “I thought the neural interface didn’t work outside the BOCS?”
The tech looked Dr. Stephens in the eyes, visibly shaken. “It doesn’t. We have sensors that keep tabs on where every employee is in the building. The system doesn’t allow access to the BOCS outside those white walls, but somehow he convinced the system that he was in two places at once. It’s amazing sir.”
Dr. Stephens leaned forward and squinted at one of the graphs. He asked the question even though he thought he already knew the answer. “Who?”
The Crystal Bridge (The Lost Shards Book 1) Page 13