The Astral Traveler's Daughter

by K. C. Archer

  “But which direction?”

  Pyro snapped his fingers, creating a flame. He watched it flicker and dance toward the left, where the exit created a draft. “This way.” They sprinted down a long corridor. Then, in the dim light of the bunker, Teddy saw the rope. Still attached to the tree outside the Bilco door.

  Relief poured through her. Yates hadn’t taken away their means of escape.

  She lunged for their lifeline and shoved it at Pyro. “Go!”

  “I’ll go last!

  They didn’t have time for this. “Go—it’ll be faster this way.”

  Pyro looked ready to argue, then seemed to understand what she meant. Once he reached the top, he swung around, his body flat on the ground, his arms extended.

  One by one, Teddy, Jillian, and Dara climbed the rope. Pyro grabbed each of them the moment they neared the surface and pulled them up, saving seconds they desperately needed. Once they were clear, he dragged the rope up after them, hid it behind the shrub, and shut the Bilco doors.

  The scene aboveground had changed dramatically. Half a dozen military jeeps rolled through the grounds, prowling for intruders. The Misfits crouched behind what was left of a burned-out wall. They could hide, but not for long.

  “That son of a bitch,” Pyro swore.

  Later, Teddy thought, trying to focus. No sense pointing fingers. Besides, if anyone was going to shoulder the blame, it had to be her. She’d agreed to help Yates. And now she and her friends faced the consequences.

  “There’s an opening in the fence about fifty yards to the west of us,” Dara said. “If we can make it there, we have a shot.”

  Fifty yards. A fast sprint over flat ground roughly the width of a football field. Since Rosemary Boyd didn’t step into the gym without a stopwatch, they all knew exactly how long that took. Ten seconds. Which was nine seconds too long—they’d be spotted.

  “Influence?” Pyro said.

  Teddy shook her head. She still felt weak from what had happened earlier. She didn’t have enough strength to focus on controlling one person’s mind, let alone a troop of armed soldiers. She looked at Pyro. “How about some drama now?”

  He nodded. “Whatever happens, keep moving.” His brow knitted in an expression of intense focus.

  Teddy, Dara, and Jillian angled toward the direction of the fence and knelt in a crouch, ready to run. Pyro swiveled to face the opposite direction. Half a minute passed, then he roared: “Go!”

  Teddy took off, Dara and Jillian racing beside her. She knew she shouldn’t look, but a quick glance back showed Pyro sending a jet of blazing fire toward a truck. Eyes closed, hands up, he looked like a god of old. Teddy swung her attention around, focusing on the path before her. Fifty yards became forty, and then an explosion behind them nearly sent her flying. She didn’t have to look to know he’d succeeded in blowing up the truck. A second later, Pyro was at her side. Shouts filled the air as nearby soldiers tried to extinguish the explosion.

  They’d nearly made it to the fence when the sound of a motor revving caused Teddy to stumble. A jeep gunned into view on her left, a lone soldier behind the wheel. Teddy knew her options were limited: peel off from the others and give them a chance to get away, or freeze and risk them all getting caught.

  She filled her lungs, gathering the last of her energy. But the screech of tires caused her to stumble once more. She watched the jeep swerve hard and crash into a pile of debris. The driver slumped over the steering wheel, unconscious.

  From the corner of her eye, she caught a glimpse of a slender figure emerging from behind a nearby building. They locked gazes for a second before Derek Yates took off in the opposite direction. She vaulted to the fence, caught up with her friends.

  “Was that you?” Pyro asked, breathing hard.

  “No. I think it was Yates.”

  They slipped through the fence and kept running until Sector Three was a speck in the desert behind them.

  The Misfits trekked back through the desert in silence. They found their way to the yellow house thanks to some quick thinking on Jillian’s part (“Birds were basically the first GPS”). When they finally reached the cottage, they found water bottles, which they greedily guzzled. But no Yates. He and his possessions were gone. Teddy interpreted his leaving the water as a sign that he’d known they’d make it back in one piece. That even though he’d abandoned them in Sector Three, he was somehow on their side.

  “What are you talking about?” Pyro protested. “Bastard didn’t care if we got caught.”

  Teddy wasn’t so sure. She’d seen how he’d intervened with the jeep. And it couldn’t have been an accident that he’d left the rope behind. Yates didn’t do anything by chance. Every move he made was calculated twenty times over.

  “You’re actually trying to defend him?” Jillian said.

  “I’m just trying to understand what happened out there,” Teddy said.

  “Yeah,” Dara replied. “The guy ditched us to save his own skin.”

  Teddy shook her head. Derek Yates was a pragmatist. He’d brought them to Jackpot because he needed their help. But not for breaking in to Sector Three. Obviously, he was capable of doing that on his own. So he must have lured them there for something else. According to Dara, Yates had bolted when the alarm sounded. Not even a moment’s hesitation. As if he’d been waiting for it.

  As if that was exactly what he’d planned.

  “We were a distraction,” she said.

  Jillian looked at her. “What?”

  “That’s why Yates needed us. Not to break in to Sector Three. If anything, we held him back. We were there to distract the guards while he slipped off to do whatever he was actually there to do.”

  Dara blinked. “Holy shit.”

  Teddy gnawed her bottom lip, thinking. “I don’t know what he’s up to, but he wants something from us. Or, rather, me. Otherwise he wouldn’t have given me the necklace—or a way to contact him.”

  Pyro extended a hand to Teddy. “If I were you, I’d burn that address he gave you. The guy’s bad news.”

  The subject of Derek Yates wasn’t one they were likely to ever agree on. Teddy turned the conversation to the logistics of returning to Angel Island. Before they left, Jillian took a minute to fuss over Teddy’s finger, rinsing her cut and wrapping it in gauze from a first-aid kit Pyro kept in his truck. Then the Misfits drove back to the diner, picked up Dara’s car, and headed back to Highway 93.

  Hours earlier, Teddy had been filled with reckless, agitated excitement. Now she felt drained and deflated. Visions of what she’d seen in the operating room at Sector Three hovered at the edge of her mind—a shadow she wasn’t ready to acknowledge. Not until she understood what had happened. She purposely volunteered to drive the rest of the way with Jillian, just so the sound of her friend’s chanting would provide a distraction from her swirling thoughts. She’d come to Jackpot for answers. But when she finally saw the waters of San Francisco Bay on the horizon, she wasn’t any closer to finding them.

  CHAPTER SIX

  THE NEXT DAY, MONDAY, THEY all overslept.

  “What about your circadian rhythms?” Teddy growled at Jillian.

  “I’m sorry my internal alarm clock failed,” Jillian replied, rolling off the couch. “It’s not like my body has spent the last forty-eight hours in a stress-induced environment or anything.”

  They staggered around, heaving their belongings—and all of Teddy’s “research” (air quotes were Dara’s, of course)—into duffel bags. Dara dropped the key in the mailbox for the landlord. Then they piled back in her car and drove to the docks. Pyro resigned himself to making a trip to Tiburon to gather his things from his friend’s place at a later date.

  They reached the dock and rushed to catch the ferry that would shuttle them across the bay to Angel Island, home of the Whitfield Institute. As the boat carried them toward school, Teddy couldn’t help but think of her first year at Whitfield . . . and the first Whitfield student she’d met. When Molly Quinn had i
ntroduced herself on the ferry, Teddy had believed Molly was in control of herself, of her power. That turned out to be far from the truth. If Teddy had learned anything over the last year, it was this: things were never as they seemed.

  And where was Molly now? It was a question that once looped over and over in Teddy’s thoughts. But as she’d looked deeper into her past, and her mother’s, she had let one investigation supplant the other.

  The ferry bumped against the dock at Angel Island, jostling Teddy from her thoughts. She grabbed her gear and trudged the half mile to the campus with her fellow Misfits. The Whitfield Institute sat atop a hill behind a massive iron gate topped by an arch engraved with the school’s name. To a casual observer, it looked exactly as it was presented on the official website—a facility for law enforcement training. Whitfield’s mission as a training ground for psychics remained a top-level secret. Even within the federal government, few knew the true nature of the facility.

  Aside from the guard checking identification at the gate, the campus appeared deserted. Which could mean only one thing—opening-day assembly was already under way. Teddy and her friends hurried to Fort McDowell and into the auditorium, slipping into seats in the back.

  Clint Corbett, dean of students and Teddy’s mentor, stood at the microphone. He paused, noting their late arrival, before continuing his speech. “Sometimes a student’s desires and skills are perfectly aligned,” he said, holding his hands in parallel as illustration. A former football player, Clint knew a speech was never great without accompanying hand signals. “But sometimes they’re not. And our goal, of course, is to guide you to the position that will enable you to use your gifts to best serve your country.”

  During their time at Whitfield, Clint explained, they’d spend each semester training in different divisions (in addition to their regular coursework of military tactics, seership, and casework). First up: Secret Service. Clint stood in front of a PowerPoint slide listing the different law enforcement tracks available to Whitfield students: DEA, FBI, NSA, Department of State, Treasury, or Defense, Military Intelligence, Homeland Security. He explained that while students would have the opportunity to indicate their top three choices, the faculty ultimately made the final call.

  Teddy tried not to roll her eyes. If her fate were left up to Sergeant Rosemary Boyd, she would be working for City Sanitation. In Juneau, Alaska. In truth, Teddy knew little of how the selection process worked, and she only half listened as she scanned the panel of instructors sitting onstage.

  Because there, right next to Boyd, was Agent Nick Stavros, Whitfield’s FBI liaison.

  He looked up as if sensing her focus. Their eyes locked, and the hope that the months away would have dulled the, ugh, feelings she had for him turned out to be just that: a hope. Nick Stavros still made her feel things. Want things. But what, exactly? She wasn’t sure of the answer herself. Because even if she got it, knowing her, knowing her life, she’d just mess it up.

  He turned away, breaking their eye contact. But not before she read the look that shadowed his almost too perfect, almost too handsome face, a look that was all too familiar to Teddy Cannon: disappointment. She wondered if he’d be able to put aside his feelings when it came to selecting students for the FBI track. Had she ruined her shot before she’d even stepped in the ring? She couldn’t let that happen.

  She returned her focus to Clint as he introduced a new instructor, Special Officer Joan Wessner, who would be leading their Secret Service training. Early thirties, with ruler-straight black hair and a sharp jawline. Everything about her read tightness and precision.

  Just what I need, another stickler for the rules on my case.

  Teddy noticed a slight stiffness in Wessner’s gait as she leaned in to the mic, sharing a few words about the value of Secret Service work. Forget everything they’d seen in the movies and on TV, she explained. They weren’t just goons in aviators, black suits, and earpieces, hovering in the background at press conferences. Whether the people they protected lived or died was a direct result of how well they performed their duty. On that somber note, the assembly ended.

  As they left the auditorium, students relinquished their cell phones and other devices that connected them to the outside world. A grumble sounded among the new recruits, but Teddy and her friends understood that for security purposes, they had to be cut off from social media and other electronic communications. The temptation to post a selfie on Instagram was a risk that the Whitfield Institute couldn’t take.

  From there they went to an informal meet-and-greet in Harris Hall—a rare chance for upper and lower classes to mingle. Teddy glanced around the room and saw the group of star students who liked to call themselves the Alphas—Ben Tucker, Zac Rogers, Henry Cummings, Ava Laureau, Liz Lynch, and finally, Kate Atkins, Teddy’s old nemesis.

  They exchanged a cool nod. Even though she and Kate had reached an uneasy truce at the end of last semester, Teddy knew better than to let her guard down around a competitor. Kate Atkins would do anything she could to get ahead.

  Clint’s deep baritone broke through the chatter of students catching up about their summer vacations: “My office, Teddy. Ten minutes.”

  Teddy sighed. They’d all shown up late. Why was she always on the chopping block?

  She dropped her duffel in the lobby of Harris Hall, then walked—slowly, stretching those ten minutes—back to Fort McDowell and trudged up the familiar staircase to Clint’s office.

  “Hey,” she said, poking her head inside his open office door. “You wanted to see me?” She sent another zing to her mental shield, making sure the electric barrier that surrounded her mind was up in full force. She may have been exhausted, but she wasn’t an idiot. Clint Corbett was a powerful telepath.

  Clint shoved aside the papers he’d been working on. As Teddy stepped into the room, she couldn’t help but check him over for traces of what had happened last year, when Clint had been shot by Brett Evans—a student who had betrayed them to join the Patriot Corps. She had used her newly learned telekinesis to slow time and alter the bullet’s path, changing the trajectory from Clint’s chest to his shoulder. He still looked like the former college linebacker she’d met all those months ago in the Bellagio, but his movements were more measured, as if his recovery was taking longer than he liked.

  “How are you feeling?” she asked.

  He raised his arm above his head, showing how far he could extend it. “I’m in PT three times a week. But I didn’t call you in here to give you a report on my shoulder mobility. Why were you late?”

  She slipped into the chair. It didn’t feel great to be back in the so-called hot seat. Didn’t feel great to be starting this year on the wrong foot, especially with Clint. Despite everything that had happened between them, despite the fact that she wasn’t sure she could trust him, his approval still meant a lot to her. Though Teddy would rather run ten of Boyd’s obstacle courses than admit it.

  “It’s kind of a long story,” she said.

  “I have time,” Clint said.

  She ran the moves in her head. Lie to him? Tell the truth? Neither was a great option, so she decided she’d do a little bit of both. She sent another pulse of energy to her shield and said, “We were following a lead. Hoping to find Molly. But, well, it didn’t pan out.”

  “Like you followed a lead last year, Teddy?”

  Yes, she’d screwed up before, but that was before. She made a face and didn’t bother to reply.

  After a beat, Clint turned and opened a drawer in the file cabinet behind him. He pulled out a thick folder. “I’ve been doing some research, too,” he said. “I’ve managed to identify another member of the Patriot Corps, based on some incidents in the late nineties.”

  “What kind of incidents?” Teddy went through her mental Rolodex. There was the earthquake in Los Angeles that she was convinced had a paranormal cause. The Ukrainian assassination. The freak train derailment in Portugal. And then the bombing in New York . . .

  �
�A series of vigilante bombings. One of the members of the Patriot Corps was captured on camera, exiting the building just before the bomb exploded. With this new lead, we have a clear directive for how to proceed with our investigation.”

  Teddy shifted forward in her seat, her heart beating erratically in her chest. This was a game changer. They had a name. A solid lead. Someone to track down. “Who?”

  “Marysue Delaney.”

  She stared at him. Then laughed. Because at first her mind couldn’t process what Clint was saying. And if she laughed, somehow she could turn his words into what she was sure they must be: a joke. “You . . . you can’t be serious.”

  “I’ve confirmed it with other officials,” Clint said. “It’s definitive. I’m sorry.”

  He reached into the manila folder and withdrew a single black-and-white photo, placing it on the desk in front of her. This was an elaborate joke, Teddy knew.

  But Clint wasn’t smiling. Reluctantly, Teddy lifted the photo: a woman, dressed in a pale blouse and slim skirt, her dark hair caught in a ponytail, walking away from a high-rise office building. Her features were contorted, her body tense. Nonetheless, Teddy recognized her.

  Teddy set the photograph down and allowed her gaze to wander Clint’s office as her mind raced, frantically searching for explanations. All right, maybe this wasn’t a joke. But it must be a misunderstanding. Teddy thought back to the vision she’d had of her mother running down the Sector Three corridor, so full of righteous fury. It was impossible to believe Marysue had become a willing participant in the PC. None of it made sense.

  She looked at him. “Clint, you knew my mother. You were friends. You can’t believe—”

  He paused to tap his index finger against the photo. “Facts are stubborn things.”

  “It’s not a fact, Clint. It’s a photograph. We don’t know the context. Maybe it was just a coincidence that she was there at all.”

  “A coincidence? Please.”

  “If you took a picture of Molly last year, you’d think she was guilty, too.”