The Duals (An Urban Fantasy Thriller)

by Karen Hayes

  His footsteps resume, approaching this time. I scramble down a couple of flights, dive into a small doorway and press my back to the wall. Not a great idea but better than nothing. Greene is unlikely to notice me here unless he deliberately looks around.

  I'm right: he scuttles down the stairs blindly, his open black jacket billowing in his wake. I wait for a while, then hurry after him.

  Downstairs, he said - does that mean that Chris has escaped? Excellent. I'll find him and we'll leave New York, just as we originally planned. We'll find a place which is far and safe from Hermetis, Adam and his crazy experiments.

  Greene reaches the ground floor. The slamming sound of the emergency exit door echoes around me, rebounding in the stairwell.

  I don't need to hide anymore.

  I run as hard as I can. Finally, I lean my shoulder against the painted steel of the emergency door and turn the handle.

  The door opens. This isn't the exit but a small dark room with two more doors: one opens onto the fire escape, the other into a small side street. That's where Greene's gone: I can see his outline through the glass. He's shouting something, then turns a corner and disappears from sight.

  I dash after him. Greene hurries toward a window cleaner's platform swaying in the air. One of the platform's ends rests on the road while the other is hanging high in the air: the cables must have broken.

  There's somebody lying on the platform, groaning and trying to scramble to his feet.

  It's Chris! No way!

  Greene slows down to a walk, rubbing his hands together. He's about to set something on fire.

  Or someone.

  Chris?

  "Don't move," I say.

  It works. Greene lowers his hands and gives me a vacant look. I can sense his mind resisting: he's not stupid, after all. Still, I know a thing or two by now, too. I keep him firmly under my control.

  Chris stands up, scrambles over the platform's jammed gate and jumps onto the road. He looks awful. His body is scratched raw, his T-shirt torn, his pants filthy.

  I run over to him, grab his shoulders and look right into his face, "You okay?"

  He nods and turns toward Greene, apparently intending to break his neck.

  A powerful force rams me in the chest, throwing me away from the building. My back hits a parked car; I slide down its side to the ground. My vision blurs. The pain is excruciating.

  Chris is shouting at someone. I struggle to focus on Greene. His mind is evading me, trying to wriggle out of my control.

  This has to be Trace. He's the only person who can do this.

  That's right. There he is, hurrying past the parked cars with Heaven in tow.

  Chris staggers toward them but he's too weak, I can feel it. He can barely stand on his feet. There's no way he can take on both of them.

  "Stop them," I tell Greene.

  Not good enough. I'm too weak. His hands jump erratically in the air. He turns his head from side to side, then forces a smirk as if trying to shake himself free from my control.

  Trace is almost upon us. He raises his hands, about to fling Chris through the air.

  "Stop them!" I scream, fastening my grip on his mind.

  Now it works. His body shudders as if electrocuted. He frantically rubs his hands together like someone desperately trying to get warm, then slams his fist into the flat of his other hand.

  Several cars next to Trace and Job explode in flames. The blast is so powerful it almost blinds me. The cars' windows burst as the vehicles slowly sink on their melting tires. One car explodes. The fiery blast wave throws Trace and Job through the air.

  A fire alarm goes off in the building. Water starts pelting its panoramic windows from the inside. Trace is struggling, trying to scramble back to his feet while Heaven lies motionless - unconscious or dead even.

  I can sense Greene's suffering. His breathing comes in ragged gasps as he tries to wriggle out of my control. His face is beaded with sweat.

  I've just made him hurt his own partner. Cruel, I know. Still, I had no choice. It was them or us.

  The wailing of approaching police sirens echoes in the distance. I stagger back to my feet. So does Chris. He grabs me by the shoulders and forces me away, his face tense, his lips pursed in a thin line, his split cheek bleeding. He's covered in soot. The veins on his neck are bulging.

  I'm trying to run as fast as I can but still I lag behind, so he's forced to drag me along. There's blood on my sleeve from his wounded hand.

  "How did you get into that thing?" I ask, meaning the window washing platform.

  "I fell."

  "You fell?"

  "Fell from the window. Trace pushed me through it. I landed on that thing. Then I worked out how to bring it down."

  We start running on a road free from traffic until we come to an intersection.

  A car's beams blind us. I lunge aside but Chris keeps walking toward the car as if about to ram it. His face is a mask of grim determination.

  The car - a cab - brakes sharply right in front of him. The driver leans out of the window. "WTF do you think you're doing?"

  Silently Chris yanks his door open and throws the man out of the car.

  "Jump in!" he snaps at me.

  I hurry to climb into the passenger's seat. Chris takes the driver's seat and slams the door. The car screams off.

  "We'll take the Lincoln Tunnel," Chris says, yanking on the steering wheel and stepping on the gas. "First we'll get to Jersey and then-"

  A tall white figure rises in our headlights, blocking the way. Chris swerves. The light falls on the person's face.

  It's Diana. She stands there calmly, watching us. The car spins. With a terrible screech, it hits the wall of a building and crumples its side.

  Chris yanks at the wheel. The car flips over.

  "Sarah!" Chris shouts.

  The airbag his me in the face. I'm being spun, tumbling and falling apart.

  This is Alaska all over again.

  The old familiar panic floods over me. I shield my head with my hands, trying to scream but I can't. I don't see anything, I can't even breathe. The seatbelt digs into my ribs, crushing them.

  Then it's all over.

  I'm hanging in my seatbelt upside down. Chris next to me is not moving. Blood drips from his forehead onto the car's deformed roof.

  Approaching footsteps crunch over the broken glass. The sound jolts me awake. I struggle to get out but my seatbelt is jammed.

  The footsteps approach the broken window. I stare at a pair of laced-up combat boots.

  The person leans down and looks into the window. No points for guessing who it is.

  Diana points a long-barreled handgun at me.

  I stare into the gun's black mouth. It seems to stare back at me.

  A short manicured finger pulls the trigger.

  The world turns dark.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chris

  "SARAH!"

  I swerve in my seat trying to shield her with my body - only to fall on the rock-hard floor.

  The upended car, the burly woman who blocked its path, the girl in the passenger seat next to me, the wailing of the engine and the screaming of the brakes - everything's gone, erased from my mind.

  I'm lying on the floor. I've fallen from my bed. The room is a concrete box fifteen by twenty feet, with gray walls and ceiling.

  My heart is pounding in my throat. My mouth is dry. My forehead hurts. In fact, everything hurts: my ribs, my left knee as well as shoulder. My left arm doesn't move properly, either.

  That's all right, Chris, I say to myself. You've made it. You've survived the crash. You seem to be relatively in one piece. Apparently, they've pulled you out of the car wreck. Now you have a totally different set of problems.

  One problem, even. You seem to be locked up in one of the Agency's black prisons.

  Rubbing my elbow which is still hurting from my fall, I sit up on the floor. That's when I see Sarah wrapped in my jacket, lying on a bed by the o
pposite wall.

  I jump to my feet and look her in the face. She can't be asleep, surely! How can she sleep at a moment like this?

  I shake her by the shoulder. She mumbles something and tried to turn away to the wall. I take her little chin and turn her face toward me.

  She looks so miserable that my heart clenches. She's had it tough, you can see that. Dark circles line her eyes. Her cheeks are sunken. A large bruise is spreading over her cheekbone. She's lost a lot of weight compared to when I first saw her - and even then she wasn't particularly chubby.

  She groans in her sleep, throwing her head from side to side. Her eyes move under her closed eyelids. Still, she doesn't wake up. Instead, she heaves a sigh and turns toward the wall.

  Okay, let her sleep. She needs to digest everything that's just happened.

  I get to my feet and hobble across the room, gingerly feeling my ribs, then touch my forehead. A long strip of band aid is taped across it. Ditto for my left palm: it hurts when I try to move my fingers.

  Rubbing my shoulder, I walk over to the rusty steel door. It has neither a handle nor a keyhole. A weak flat light glows above it. I stand in front of a surveillance camera which is poking its black eye from the corner opposite and gesture to whoever's watching. As in, I'm awake and ready, time to discuss a few things.

  An idea strikes me. I hurry back to the bed and check my jacket pockets, trying not to disturb Sarah. Predictably, the Taser is gone and so is my wallet.

  As I do so, I notice a small steel grate in the wall by the ceiling above the bed. I step on the edge of the bedframe and check it out. It's an air vent, so narrow I can't even stick my hand in it.

  I jump down and pace the room like a trapped animal.

  "Where are we?"

  I turn round. Sara's sitting on the bed cross-legged, rubbing one eye with a clenched fist and pressing the other hand to her chest.

  "No idea," I reply. "We're locked up."

  "Are we in jail? Or..." she presses the other hand to her chest. "The Agency. It's them. I think they've done something to my powers."

  I walk over and sit next to her. "Are you sure? It could be because of the accident," I try to take her by the hand but she won't let me. "Give it some time. Once you're properly rested-"

  "No! You don't understand!" Sarah shakes her head. "All this time I felt my powers here, right inside me. And now there's nothing."

  I look her in the eye. I take her hand, cover it with mine and try to focus on what she's feeling.

  She doesn't flinch. "You haven't changed though," she murmurs.

  "Why should I? We're still partners, aren't we? We're duals."

  "That's right. You feel the same. But what happened to my powers?"

  She swings her legs over the edge of the bed and jumps to her feet, reeling from the effort. She must be terribly lightheaded. I hurry to support her by the waist. Staggering, she too grabs at me, careening more and more until she loses her balance and slumps into my lap.

  She closes her eyes. Neither of us move. We just sit there in the muffled silence of our concrete box, her arms draped around my shoulders, my hands resting on her waist. Her breathing touches my face.

  Her profile looks strangely different. She's beautiful. Really. Not red-carpet superstar beautiful - no, her beauty is more, how can I put it... more understated? Subdued? No, it's not that. Her beauty comes from within: her inner strength, her personality.

  Why didn't I notice that before? I never got the chance, I suppose. We were on the run all the time, too busy fighting and arguing.

  "Did I tell you why I stopped seeing my father?" I ask her softly.

  No idea why I would want to tell her about it now. Probably, it's to right all the little wrongs, all the misunderstandings that kept piling up between us.

  She gives me a wary look. "I don't think you did."

  "When I was twelve years old, there was an attack on our house. Some armed men broke in and held my parents at gunpoint. I still don't know why they did it. They might have tried to kidnap me. Or it could have had something to do with Dad's business. No idea. Well, Dad confronted them and one of them killed Mom. He shot her dead."

  Once again I remember the icy void in the masked man's eyes. I grind my teeth. I hate him so much. If I could strangle him with my bare hands, I would.

  "Dad knew why they came. Mom died because of him and his shady deals. He never bothered to explain. That's why I can't see him anymore. I'm so sick I don't think I could face him. That's why I couldn't ask him for help. You can say what you want but I just couldn't do it."

  Her gaze softens. It's not wary anymore: instead, it's filled with understanding, sympathy even.

  I don't need her sympathy. But the understanding... I could use some of that, I suppose.

  "Since then, I was always alone," I say. "I still lived with Dad but we sort of drifted apart. Which is the reason why I don't really trust anyone. Sorry if I drove you crazy with my paranoia and all that but... it wasn't because I-"

  I cut the phrase short because she's now staring at me long and hard as if she's never seen me before. She draws herself closer and lays her hands on my face. Her lips are close; too close to think about anything else.

  An electrified silence fills the room. The air seems threaded with a thousand high-voltage wires.

  I know what she wants. I can feel it. And so can she. From this moment on, there're no secrets between us. She's closer to me than the blood in my own heart; closer than the air in my chest.

  I draw her to me by the waist and kiss her. Sarah closes her eyes and leans toward me. Her lips taste of strawberry gum. Its smell seems to have permeated her entire skin.

  With a barely noticeable sigh, she eases herself away and lays her hands on my shoulders. Her soft cheek touches mine. I can hear her breathe, I can feel her heart beat against mine. Our gazes lock.

  Slowly she lowers her eyes. "They must have done something to me, I'm sure. Possibly, to you too. My powers are gone."

  I want to tell her that I don't give a damn whether she can control other people or not. I'll still like her. It might actually be for the better. Forcing others to do something against their will can't be such a good thing, after all.

  The door creaks wide open.

  There's been no noise outside, no sound of a lock opening, no footsteps in the corridor. It just swings wide open on its rusty hinges.

  Sarah jumps, startled. I look up. A middle-aged man walks into the room. He's rather short and dressed in a buttoned-up business suit. He must be about sixty years old. His silver hair seems to glow in the weak light. His face is gloomy with a heavy stare emitting from under his bushy snow-white eyebrows. His glare is piercing; he seems to see right through you.

  A woman in a pant suit follows in his wake, stopping to the left of the doorway. Her hair is closely cropped. The light falls on her face, revealing a huge black eye.

  Another man enters and stands to the right of the door opposite her. He's huge. That's the guardian who was posted at Andy Hill's mansion, the one I Tasered and who then disappeared, dragging the woman guard away with him.

  For a few moments we just look at each other.

  Finally, Sarah breaks the silence, "You took my powers away."

  The woman cracks a crooked smile. The giant doesn't say anything. His face is like stone, his eyes so small and empty you can't read anything in them.

  The gray-haired man is equally impassive; still, his gaze betrays power. So does his voice when he finally speaks,

  "We've injected you with a special serum."

  "A serum," Sarah repeats, rising from my lap.

  "A very weak one. Its concentration is only one percent."

  I stand up too. We face them shoulder to shoulder... if you disregard the fact that her skinny little shoulder is almost level with my elbow.

  "What does that mean?" I demand.

  A new voice resounds in the corridor,

  "General, I thought we had an agreement. I need to t
alk to him first."

  The sound of the voice sends a hot wave up the back of my head.

  It can't be. Impossible! And still it's him.

  "One percent means that your powers will return in a few hours' time," the gray-haired man who's just been addressed as General turns around and walks out of the room. I can hear his voice coming from the corridor,

  "Sarah, we need to take you for a medical. Don't worry, it's a routine check. You've suffered a lot in these last few days. We need to make sure you're okay. Chris, Diana will take you to the interrogation room."

  He walks away. The familiar burly blonde steps into view, Taser in hand, followed by Ramiro.

  "Out, both of you," she says, pointing her Taser. "You to the left, you to the right. Move it!"

  "Not now," I whisper to Sarah who is dying to give her a piece of her mind. "Let's see what it's about first."

  Oh yes. I need to know! They should tell me what the hell my father Two Face is doing here.

  Only now that I've heard his voice in the corridor do I recognize the logo on the scanned documents from the memory stick. So stupid. That was the logo of Brana Technologies.

  Leaving a perplexed Sarah behind, I step out into the corridor and walk toward an open door, followed by the Agency workers' watchful stares.

  My head buzzes like a disturbed beehive with all the thoughts. I'm trying to rethink what I thought I knew, shuffling the pieces of the puzzle and trying to put the picture back together.

  Absent-mindedly I brush the door frame with my shoulder, then stumble over the steel table which is bolted down in the center of the room. I struggle to focus. Finally I walk around it and sit down. I lay my clenched hands on the table in front of me and stare at my fists, still thinking hard.

  Someone knocks softly on the door. The following sound of footsteps is even softer. The person's breathing is barely audible.

  Silence.

  "Hi," the voice says.

  I raise my head.

  Dad is leaning palms down over the table, looking at me. He's much shorter than I - in fact, he's a very short man. An unassuming suit; no tie.

  He looks older but not too old. Maybe a couple more lines on his face, his slicked-down hair slightly thinner. Maybe.