“You’re safe now.” I helped her to her feet. “I have to get you out of here.”
“Nicely done, bro.”
Phillipe.
I turned to face the barrel of his magnum. “And like a nasty Herpes flare up, here you are again.” I pulled Delacroix behind me.
He chuckled. “You always were a funny kid.”
“You always were a human being. What happened?”
He lowered his weapon to my chest. “It’s complicated. But you’ll understand soon enough.”
“Ah, yes. The Age of the Sixth is upon us, yada, yada. I got the spiel from your pal, Heinie.”
He seemed surprised. “Heinrich? Where is he?”
“I don’t think he’s going to be joining us. Something he ate didn’t quite agree with him.” I hiked a thumb at Delacroix. “Just let her go. She’s got nothing to do with this. It’s between you and me.”
“I’m afraid I can’t do that, Dagger. I have to see this through to the end.”
“No matter whose life it costs? Even Mom’s?”
Splinters appeared in the smug mask he wore. He lowered the gun a few inches. “What happened? You got out. Didn’t she?”
My fingers pressed against my eyes, wiping the very real moisture. “I don’t think she’s going to make it.”
He moved closer, squeezing my shoulder. “I’m sure she’s going to be fine. She has to be.”
In a flash, my hands shot out, gripped the gun, and spun Phillipe around, the crook of my elbow jammed against his windpipe. I tried to rip the gun free, but his grip was like iron. In a matter of moments, he’d break free.
I twisted my head to Delacoix. “Grab … Alexei’s … gun …”
Her shocked face disappeared from my peripheral vision.
Phillipe was slithering from my grasp. “You’ve … learned … unh … well … little … brother …”
My elbow squeezed tighter. “How long have you … and Alexei … been partners?”
A half-chuckle, half-gasp escaped his lips. “He’s not … my partner.”
Cold steel touched the back of my neck.
“I am,” Delacroix said from behind me. “Now release him, or you take a formal reprimand right through the back of your skull.”
I froze. This couldn’t be happening.
Phillipe slipped from my choke-hold and pulled the gun from my numb fingers. “I’ll take this for safe-keeping.” He pressed a button on his watch. Two Reich agents burst through the door on the opposite side of the tower. Each had their weapons’ red laser sights trained on me.
Delacroix stepped from behind me, every streak of fear wiped off her face. And I thought I was a good actor. “So now you know.”
“Yeah. I know that my teacher’s a scheming skank. Tell me, is this little tidbit going to be on the midterm?”
She sneered. “Actually, consider it more of a final, at least for you and Mr. Dimirov.”
Alexei. I glanced at his still unconscious body, the body I’d beaten to a pulp. How could I have hurt him like that? My heart shriveled. He’d been trying to prevent the Reich’s plan and I’d screwed everything to hell. I moved toward him.
Delacroix shoved her gun in my ribs. “I wouldn’t do that.” She snapped her fingers at the two ghuls. They picked Alexei up and dragged him away like a rag doll.
I turned to her. “You know, I always did think your class sucked.”
Phillipe lowered his head, a thin smile threatening to spread across his lips.
She shoved the barrel of the gun in deep, pushing me ahead. “What better way to serve your detention than to witness the Age of the Sixth first hand? Move.”
I could think of plenty of better ways, but this time, I kept my mouth shut.
****
Alexei and I dangled from a pulley anchored to a beam on the roof top, twenty feet directly above Dighton Rock. Delacroix’d hidden the artifact right here at Montefuego this entire time. So that’s what teachers did on those planning days.
“Proceed with final systems prep,” she barked at the two Reich agents who’d trussed us up.
They scurried around the stone, connecting cables from it to a computer terminal interface. Phillipe watched from a few feet away. His eyes scanned the rooftop, his bottom teeth grinded his upper lip. It was the first time since our reunion that he seemed nervous.
He should be. I was still breathing.
The cool wind bit into my half-naked body, giving me the shivers. Before strapping us onto the pulley, the ghuls had stripped our shirts off and tied the still unconscious Alexei and me back to back, our hands secured behind us. I pressed against him, absorbing his warmth against the cold, wondering if it was the last pleasant sensation I’d experience before the end came.
His long, thick fingers found mine, interlocking with them, squeezing tight.
I turned my head, tilting it into the crook of his neck. God, how I wished I could see his face. “Lex. Are you okay? I really screwed up. I’m so sorry I hurt you.”
His body trembled, shoulders heaving. The poor guy was having a seizure. “Hang in there. I’m going to get you out of here and to a doctor.” Maybe he’d suffered brain damage. But if that was the case, why was he chuckling?
I pulled my fingers free. “Just what the hell is so funny?”
His laughter subsided. “Take it easy. I’m not laughing at you. It’s just that, you’re actually worried about me. That’s so adorable.”
“Pathetic is more like it.”
“Nuh-uh.” His fingers found mine again. “I like. Very much.” He squeezed.
I ignored the tingle. “So you’ve been faking unconsciousness this whole time?”
“Not the whole time. I did pass out for a bit but decided to milk it once I came to and saw what a fix we were in. Which reminds me, can you work your fingers into my underwear?”
“Do you really think now’s the time?”
“I swiped a pocket knife off one of the guards while he was dragging me and stashed it in the lining in back. Your fingers have better access.”
I smiled. A dude after my own heart. If we could get our hands free, we could cut the pulley line and drop in on Delacroix’ party. I groped the elastic band and pulled the blade free. “So what are you, some kind of double agent?” I pressed the blade to our bonds and began to cut.
“Yep. My assignment was simple: go under deep cover, infiltrate the Reich, and keep tabs on Delacroix and Heinrich. But there was an unexpected complication.”
I paused in mid-saw. “Yeah? What might that be?”
“You, Dagger Beaumont.”
I shrugged and continued slicing. “You mean you were afraid I’d make you expose your cover.”
His head shook against mine. “That’s not what I meant. I meant you, the person that you are. From the moment I laid eyes on you, and the more I got to know you, all I wanted was to keep you safe. That’s why I knocked you out with that trank dart. I’d just found out Delacroix’d ordered a raid at your agency and I didn’t want you anywhere near it. And at the dance—”
My right hand popped free. “You knew I’d follow you out, that’s why you called to me, so I wouldn’t vanish with the rest. But how could you let them do it? All those people. Gone.”
“Relax. That missing page of Il Evanidus you found. I substituted a forgery. Everyone who vanished at the dance during the test run hasn’t made the complete transition. They’re in a holding pattern but still have a chance.”
“Nice work.” I tore my left hand loose and started working on his bonds.
He sighed. “Unfortunately, my cover got blown in the process and Delacroix’ now in possession of the real deal. I was trying to get her to give it to me when you kind of interrupted.”
“Sorry.” I slashed his left hand free.
“But if we can get down to that control panel we can reverse the process with the code I have in my pocket and bring everyone back.”
“And then destroy the device before Delacroix goes postal on the world.”
“Exactly.”
I smiled. “Impressive.” I glanced below us. “The teacher and the brother are mine. Do you think you can handle the two ghuls?
“Excuse me, but I’m not a rookie.”
“No need to get defensive, but I did kinda kick your butt earlier.”
“Ha! You mean I let you kick my butt. I’m not that much of a wuss.”
I sliced through the last of his restraints. “Oh, really? Then why didn’t you fight back?”
“I think the answer to that is pretty obvious.” His fingers grazed mine again. “By the way. How did a nice guy like you get mixed up in all this spy business?”
I chuckled. “If this mission pans out, you may get to hear the prequel someday.”
“It’s time.” Delacroix’s voice boomed from below. “Initiate activation sequence.”
I clenched Alexei’s hand. “Let’s finish this.”
I hacked through the pulley line, sending us plummeting toward the enemy.
****
We plunged in an arc, our fall cushioned by the two Reich ghuls we knocked from their stations at the computer terminal.
“Stop them,” Delacroix shrieked.
Alexei wasted no time. He seized one ghul by the neck and flung him chest down onto the nearest pointy spire lining the roof top. The ghul exploded into fluorescent particles, carried away by the wind.
The second ghul pounced on me, pushing my head aside to bare my throat. I grabbed one of the power cables from the nearby terminal and ripped it free, shoving the frayed and sparking end deep into the ghulish mouth. His eyes bulged. His body did the happy dance from hell before it burst into a fireball.
Grabbing his weapon from the ground, I rolled and sprang to my feet, aiming the luger point blank at Delacroix’s forehead. “Step away from the terminal.”
She looked amused, but didn’t move.
“I don’t think you should talk to your teacher like that, little brother. Drop it.”
Phillipe cocked his weapon behind me.
Damn him.
“Unless you want Dagger to be an only child, I suggest you drop it,” Alexei said, aiming the gun he’d snatched from the first ghul at my brother.
Now it was my turn to be amused. “Looks like you lose, Delacroix. I shoot you, Phillipe shoots me, and Alexei shoots him and disarms the device. Game over.”
A faint vibration pulsed under my feet, which quickly transformed into a series of tremors.
The sounds of horns and emergency sirens blared from beyond the parapet walls, followed by loud crashes and screams. Gashes of blinding light appeared in the sky, as if gigantic claws were tearing into the very fabric of the earth.
Delacroix laughed. “It’s too late, Mr. Beaumont. Il Evanidus is already online. Look.” She pointed at the monitor.
The display showed nine very familiar satellites orbiting the earth.
“The Defense Satellite Communications Systems Phase III. You’ve hacked into the Air Force Space Command’s network.”
“And implanted the code revealed in Il Evanidus.” Delacroix grinned. “The DSCS transmissions are beaming the magnetic properties of the three triangles all over the world. Now witness the largest mass disappearance in history.”
The rips in the sky grew larger. The howling wind increased in intensity. Lightning streaked across the horizon.
With each flash I saw faces. Cassie’s. Marco’s. Alexei’s. Felanie’s. Aristede’s. My classmates, even the Max Zimmermans and Kara Drakes.
And my mother’s face. Pale. Dying.
Let Phillipe kill me. As long as I put down this delusional bitch first.
I put pressure on the trigger. “Guess we’re getting a sub on Monday.”
“Dagger!” Alexei yelled.
Three shots rang out.
But they weren’t from my gun. And they hadn’t hit me.
Two bullet holes smoked from Delacroix’s chest. She looked down at herself, then back up, confused.
I whirled. Phillipe was standing behind me, his gun still aimed at Delacroix, spent cartridges at his feet. He had shot her. He looked at me and smiled, then collapsed to his knees. Blood seeped from a wound at his side where the third shot had hit. I hunched down, cradling him in my arms.
Alexei ran over. “I didn’t mean to fire. I thought he was going to kill you.”
I brushed the hair from Phillipe’s face. “Lie still. It’s going to be okay.”
“Actually, it’s not,” Delacroix responded.
What the fuck?
I turned. She was still standing upright as though nothing had happened.
I shifted Phillipe into Alexei’s arms. “Watch him,” I whispered.
“You can’t kill me,” Delacroix announced. “I am eternal. Recurring throughout the ages.”
I rose to my feet. “I get that. You’re a really, really old hag.”
A small translucent figure appeared beside me.
Ginny.
“She told us the same thing, a long time ago,” Ginny said. “She wanted to be the leader of our colony. Even carved her name into a tree.”
The tree with the CRO carvings at Roanoke. Of course.
There was an ear-splitting crack. The sky above was covered in slashes, revealing another landscape underneath, a seascape actually, as if this world has been wallpapered over another. Despite the missing puzzle pieces I could see a large island. The same island I’d visited when Phillipe injected me.
“Do not let her take us away. We’re happy now,” Ginny said.
“I won’t, Virginia.”
“The Age of the Sixth has arrived.” Delacroix shrieked.
I aimed the gun at the platform supporting Dighton Rock, right above Delacroix. “Make that the Age of the Eighty-Sixth for you.”
I emptied my clip. The artifact came tumbling down, crashing through her skull and into the computer terminal. The hieroglyphs on its surface flashed, releasing a burst of mystical energy. Gooey liquid oozed from Delacroix’s wound, pooling into a pattern by her lifeless body.
DELACROIX
Her name spelled out in blood.
The letters began to pulsate, disappearing, one by one.
ELACROIX
LACROI
ACRO
Until only three were left.
CRO
The same three letters which could have been left by the elements ravaging a tree, or a small child, who hadn’t had enough time to erase her nightmares.
The sky was already mending, the tears folding in on themselves, covering that other world.
I looked where Ginny had stood, but she was already gone.
“Goodbye, sweetheart.”
Rushing to what was left of the control panel, I inputted Alexei’s codes. The device sparked and died. Had it worked? Gazing over the wall, I had my answer.
Students flocked out of the main entrance, still in their dancewear, pointing at the streaks in the sky which were fading fast.
“We did it, Lex.” I turned.
Phillipe was gone.
Alexei was lying on his back, rubbing blood from his forehead. I raced over to him. “What happened? Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. Your brother hit me and took off.”
Movement at the far corner of the roof top caught my attention.
Phillipe was climbing onto the ledge.
“Phillipe!” I shouted, taking off after him.
He turned to me, balancing on the ledge. Apparently his wound hadn’t been as severe as we’d thought. “Don’t come any closer.”
I raised my gun. “Get off the ledge. Now.”
“You still don’t understand, little brother. It was never about the Age of the Sixth for me. Delacroix and Heinrich were tools, nothing more.”
“What are you talking about? What could have been so important that you betrayed your own family and took up with those monsters?”
“Did you ever ask yourself where all those that vanished ended up? Where Delacroix and the Rei
ch would get their army from?”
“Get down now.”
“I needed them to activate Il Evanidus to open the gateway. The gateway to our past. To our home. That’s why I shot Delacroix when I did. Once she’d initiated the process, the rest of her delusional plan was irrelevant.”
“I don’t want to hear any more of your lies. Get the hell down now or I shoot.”
“That place you saw when I injected you. It wasn’t a hallucination or a dream I caused you to have. It was a genetic memory passed down through our bloodline. A memory of our ancestors from Poseidonis. The continent of Atlantis.”
I lowered the gun. “What are you talking about?”
“Someday you’ll understand, little brother. And when you do, you’ll know where to find me. Tell Mom I love her. Both of you.”
Then he stepped backwards off the ledge.
“Phillipe. No!”
I sprang onto the ledge, just in time to see Phillipe disappear through the last of the tears in the sky, which sealed behind him.
For a second I teetered on the edge.
Then Alexei was pulling me back, and we both collapsed on our backs, staring at the clear and starry sky.
I turned to him. His eyes were closed. He was so beautiful. And brave. And he really cared about me, and I really cared about him, too. He was going to be okay. We were going to be okay. I reached out and held his hand. Gazing at the stars, it felt like we were the only two people on earth.
****
I’d torn myself away from Alexei just as soon as the lockdown had been lifted, and rushed down to DUST medical.
“Drink up, Mom,” I said, holding the straw to her lips.
She took a few sips of water and motioned me to take the cup away. I set the glass down on the tray, which I then swiveled away from her hospital bed, careful not to upset the IV stand. Smoothing the covers over her, I sat beside her and took her hand.
“You don’t have to make a fuss over me, Daguerre.” Her voice treaded above a whisper. “I’m all right, really.”
“Actually, those blood transfusions coupled with Mama Mayhem’s healing potion worked like a charm.” I smiled. “And I kinda like fussing over you. It’s different.”
She reached out a trembling hand and brushed the hair out of my eyes. “I kinda like it too.”
“I should let you get your rest, Mom.” I stood.
Dagger Page 19