The Snow Swept Trilogy

by Derrick Hibbard

  "Mae, it is your destiny. You are God's gift to the world, the catalyst with the power to destroy the evil in the world without blame. People will rally together, order will rise from the chaos. You are an angel, Mae."

  "No, Daddy," Mae said, and she hugged him tightly, her tears wetting his shirt and tie. "I loved you so much."

  She pushed with her mind and separated the particles that made his body. He was gone, instantly vaporized. She leaned forward, her forehead on the wall of the elevator where her father had been just a second before. The sobs racked her body and soul and she sank to the ground. As she slid, a scream erupted within. A million memories, hopes and dreams in that cry.

  In her mind, that secret place, she pushed for the last time. A wave of incredible power, more than she'd ever mustered before, exploded outward. It destroyed everything in its path.

  Chapter Fifty-Four

  The gunshot boomed in a burst of fire and smoke. At the same instant, both Ryan and Morales were thrown upward toward the ceiling, like falling in reverse. The bullet went wild, punching a jagged hole in the wall behind Ryan. They flailed, the sudden thrust upward catching them both by surprise. Morales lost his grip on the Desert Eagle and it went skittered across the ceiling. Every object in the room and piece of furniture not nailed to the floor flew with them, everything falling up and crashing against the ceiling.

  A tremendous CRASH thundered through the room, followed by a low rumbling sound that reverberated from the very foundation of the building. The room tilted on its axis, swaying violently toward the looming cliffs. The heavy wooden desk hit the ceiling, then bounced into the window. The glass fractured, but didn't break, cracks spreading outward. As the room tilted, more furniture smashed into the glass, and both Ryan and Morales felt themselves being pulled in that direction. Ryan grabbed hold of a light fixture to keep from sliding, but Morales had no such luck. He dug his fingernails into the plaster, trying to slow his slide toward the fractured windows. The lights flickered, the bulbs first sparking and then exploding, and the room went dark.

  The room suddenly righted itself as the building swayed back into place. The force pressing everything to the ceiling slowly decreased and they were suspended for several more seconds before dropping back to the floor. Ryan saw the glint of gun metal as the Desert Eagle floated by, and then he was falling. He landed with a crunching thud and felt the wind knocked out of him. Morales crashed to the floor and smashed an end table that was bolted next to the couch.

  The gun hit the ground closer to him and Ryan scrambled toward it. He snatched it from the ground and turned to the place where Morales had fallen, but Morales was gone. Ryan spun around the darkened room, the gun outstretched before him, but Morales was nowhere to be found.

  A shuffling sound came from a bedroom, through a doorway just beyond the place where the large desk had been. Ryan turned toward the sound, holding his breath and listening for anything more. He pointed the gun in that direction and waited for Morales to show himself.

  Another shock wave pulsed through the building, and Ryan could almost hear Mae screaming, as if her cries flowed with the wave of energy, propelled it forward. The walls bowed outward and pieces of floorboards ripped away, ragged projectiles. The room swayed violently to the side again, more furniture crashing into the wall of windows. Morales leapt from his hiding place in the bedroom, using the momentum of the tilting room to propel his body into Ryan's.

  Ryan's head snapped back and he saw stars as he was pummeled forward to the floor. Before they could hit the ground, they were thrown into the air, smashing into the light fixture on the ceiling. Morales kept hold of Ryan and they struggled, punching and hitting each other, suspended in the air. Morales screamed as he pummeled his fist into the side of Ryan's head again and again, each time causing an explosion of stars in Ryan's vision. He elbowed Morales in the chest, bucking his body to free himself from the crazy man's vice-like grip. They spun, and Morales shifted his body until his arms were around Ryan's neck, and he was squeezing tightly. Ryan's vision blurred and darkened, and he gasped for breath before remembering that Morales' Desert Eagle was still in hands.

  The room was now tipped almost completely on its side, paused at a sickening angle with the wall of windows below them. Beyond the windows were the rocky, snow covered cliffs. The implications of what he was staring at failed to register because Morales was killing him. Morales was winning, choking the life out of him.

  Below, furniture piled up against the glass, and the web of cracks extended, inches at a time. Ryan tried to maneuver the gun so he was pointing it at Morales' head, but the angles were wrong and he wasn't thinking clearly. Black spots materialized before his eyes, the darkness at the edges of his vision tightening. Absurdly, he thought of old cartoons he used to watch on Saturday mornings, the ones that ended when the blackness closed on a shrinking circle.

  Th-Th-Th-Th-Th-That's all, folks!

  Morales grunted, jerking Ryan's neck and head, wrenching sideways and applying even more pressure. Ryan could feel Morales’ muscles flexing, closing off the oxygen and crushing his trachea.

  Another pulse of energy swept through the building, driving both Ryan and Morales upward, smashing into the cabinets of the kitchenette, the doors of which were hanging open and spilling their contents.

  Ten seconds.

  Ryan figured that was as long as he could continue staying awake, unable to breathe. He dropped the gun and it whirled away from them both. His hands dropped limply to his sides and he stopped struggling.

  Morales continued to squeeze, breathing savagely, grunting with the effort to end a life.

  Something cold touched Ryan's hand. He felt along the thin surface of a blade. He spread his fingers and felt several knives lined up perfectly in a felt case. They were in an open drawer, and they would have fallen out but for the slots they were wedged into.

  Ryan pulled one from the drawer, wrapping his fingers around the handle. Ryan's eyes were closed, the energy to keep them open and continue fighting having finally faded away. His body jerked, and he knew that the end had come. With the final, involuntary jerk of his body, he swung his closed fist backwards and buried the knife into Morales' shoulder.

  The man screamed and let go of Ryan. At the same moment, the entire building jerked to the side, a fantastic explosion of sound and energy, ripping apart the walls, twisting the metal beams. The shockwave seemed to change direction, pulling back towards the ground, towards the cracked windows.

  Absently, Ryan realized that it wasn't the shockwave pushing them down, but gravity pulling. Ryan and Morales fell down. Ryan hit the protruding kitchenette cupboards, and it stopped his fall. Morales, less than half a meter away, missed the cupboard and fell all the way to the windows.

  His back smashed into the glass and he stared up at Ryan. Their eyes locked for only a second before the windows shattered. Morales, and all the furniture that was piled against the glass, fell to the cliffs below. Ryan watched Morales body disappear into the darkness and the swirling snow.

  Ryan laid against the counter, staring down at the cliffs and trying to make sense of what he was seeing.

  The building twisted, metal screaming in protest. Wood and metal framing popped and cracked as it ripped apart. Another pulse of energy shuddered through the building.

  She was doing it, he realized. She was bringing it down, the entire building, on the heads of Il Contionum.

  He had to get to her. Ryan didn't know whether this was destroying her, whether the shockwaves of energy were rending her mind and body apart. No matter what, he had to be with her. If this was the end, he needed to be with her.

  He looked up at the entrance to the suite, now directly above him, and saw a clear path of walls, shelves, furniture bolted to the floor, and doors, all of which he could use like a ladder to climb to the door. He started slowly at first, but his confidence grew, and soon he was climbing faster and faster. When he got to the door, he looked back over his shoulder at the
room, and his stomach turned. The perspective was all wrong, a topsy-turvy scene that was difficult for his mind to accept.

  In the corner of the sitting room he'd first been brought to, he saw the soldier who'd been guarding the front door, unmoving, his weapon wedged beneath his body. Maybe knocked unconscious? he wondered, but his thought was interrupted by another crunching roar. The building rocked on its foundation. It was falling apart, twisting into itself, and he had to find Mae. He opened the door and pulled himself into the hallway, which was on its side as well, the light fixtures that used to be hanging from the ceiling now lining the wall.

  At the far end, near the elevator doors, the hallway had been bent in two, the axis at which the top of the building was wrenching apart. The space beyond was a jagged hole, what had been the elevator shaft. He ran toward it as the building swayed too far to keep standing. It felt as though it would fall any second.

  When he reached the shaft, it was bent and twisted, but there was still a clear path down. The access ladder along one side was intact in some areas, ripped away in jagged shards in others, but between what was left and the debris, he should be able to make it. He began climbing down. The building groaned and raged, its structure barely holding together.

  Chapter Fifty-Five

  Mae heard voices behind her. She was still in the elevator, or what was left of it. The metal sides had been blown out, twisted into ragged pieces like the corpse of a pipe bomb. She turned and saw soldiers and lab technicians running toward her. They were shouting at her, some with weapons drawn, and likely had no idea what they were running into.

  The connection in her mind to everything in the world around her had not yet been severed, and she thrummed the connection, pushing against it until the hotel lobby imploded. Chunks of concrete and metal fell from above, the walls pushed inward, and the entire area crumpled in on itself, blocking her off from anyone who would hunt her. She curled into ball on the floor of the elevator. The music that had played when it was still a functioning elevator still pumped from the speakers, but she tuned it out, ignoring everything.

  Instead, she focused on the sounds of bluejays on a summer day. She smelled honeysuckle and rain. Her back was wet from lying on the damp lawn beside the tire swing, and she looked up through the leaves of the maple tree at the sun in the clear azure sky.

  "Mae!"

  She turned and saw Ryan lying next to her, and smiled.

  "Mae." He said her name again, but the Ryan lying with her on the wet grass hadn't spoken.

  She opened her eyes and looked up. Ryan was crawling through the access panel at the top of the elevator. His face was pale and scared, sweat dripping from his hair and forehead. He breathed a sigh of relief when he saw her look up at him, and he dropped into the elevator beside her.

  "Hey," she said, reaching up to him. He took her hand and tried to pull her to her feet, but she shook her head, no. She was crying and smiling at the same time, pulling him down to her.

  "But we have to go," he said. "The building's coming down!"

  "No," she whispered, and her eyes were pleading with him to just lay with her, just for a moment. He sank to his knees, and then curled his body around hers, holding her close to him. She could feel his heart and his breath, the warmth of his body, even amidst her racking sobs.

  "We have to leave, Mae." He ran his fingers through her hair and kiss her head.

  "I can't," she whispered. "I'm a monster, Ryan."

  "No, you aren't," he said, pulling her close and pressing his face against her head. His lips brushed against her neck as he spoke, his words warm on her skin.

  "You are the most amazing girl I have ever met," he said. "You’re funny and kind, you are more brave than any person I know—and I wreck cars with a bunch of idiots for fun."

  She laughed and ran her fingers over his arm.

  "I've never met anyone like you. You think about things in a way that I've never even considered. Life with you has been an adventure, and I never want it to stop."

  "But they aren't going to stop," Mae said. "They will never stop hunting me because I'm a weapon."

  He considered this, and they lay there for a long time, breathing in sync.

  "Then bring it down," he said. "Bring it all down and stop them from hunting forever."

  Her body relaxed at this. Peace.

  The smell of static intensified in that broken elevator car. Warm air.

  "I love you, Mae." He kissed her ear, and they held each other.

  "I love you too."

  Chapter Fifty-Six

  Dennis Johnson opened the door to his apartment, exhausted from the whirlwind of events that day. It seemed every news and media outlet wanted a piece of him, ever since that poor girl was killed in the lobby of Paul’s hotel. The girl had mentioned Paul, and when the bosses at the Gazette got wind of it, Dennis was the go to guy. He was, after all, Paul’s assistant and possibly his closest friend.

  Dennis himself had been at the hotel, knocking on Paul’s door, just a few hours before the girl had been shot. For the first day and half after their heated discussion at the café by their office, Dennis had assumed that Paul was in his room, licking his wounds and nursing a bottle of Wild Turkey. Probably sucking on those disgusting cinnamon candies he was never without. On the second day, Dennis had called Paul’s phone, but his call went straight to voicemail. He called a few more times that day, but got the same result.

  On the third day, Dennis visited Paul’s room at the hotel and was dismayed to find that Paul was not there. Even then—and Dennis kicked himself for believing it—he thought Paul had gone to visit his ex-wife, or maybe he’d just skipped town and gone to the beach. To get away from the cold.

  But now, it was looking more and more like Paul had been right about his conspiracy theories all along, and that he’d been killed for digging too deeply. Dennis felt ashamed for not helping his friend, and despite all rationality, he hoped Paul was still alive somewhere, still kicking.

  “You okay?”

  It was his wife’s voice, coming from the dark living room, just beyond the kitchen. Dennis turned on a light and saw his wife just lying there. She always did that when he got home late, waited on the couch for him to come home. Usually she read, but after everything that had happened that day, she was probably too upset and anxious to read.

  “Yeah, I’m okay.” Dennis put his bag on the kitchen table and opened a bottle of water.

  “I saw you on TV,” She said. “Any word on Paul?”

  He shook his head and joined her on the couch. She held his hand, but neither of them spoke for a long time. Finally, she stood and excused herself to the restroom. Dennis continued sitting there for several seconds, thinking.

  In all the excitement that day, he’d neglected his day-to-day routine, including his responsibilities at work. He got up from the couch, pulled his laptop computer from his bag and placed it on the table. He sat down and began scrolling through his email.

  One email caught his attention immediately. It was from Paul, and it was sent earlier that day. Paul was alive. Dennis’ heart raced and he held his breath as he opened the email and read the short message.

  It took several seconds before he realized that someone else had sent the email using Paul’s account. A girl named Heather Gardner. A few more seconds passed before he made the connection.

  The girl who’d been shot at Paul’s hotel. She had been on Paul’s email account, but how was that possible? A thousand questions whirled, and he saw that the email contained several hundred megabytes of data. Documents with names he didn’t recognize. Thousands of them.

  He read the message again, slower this time, realization finally setting in.

  Dear Dennis:

  I hope you are the right person to receive this. From what I understand, you were close to Paul. He is dead. I don’t know where his body is, but he was killed for asking questions. He was killed for uncovering truth. You need to finish what he started. Maybe truth is the
most important thing of all.

  -Heather Gardner

  ANONX^17

  Chapter Fifty-Seven

  When she was just a girl, Mae's father taught her a way to escape her fears, to escape dark times or loneliness. A trip to escape.

  "Paper and ink," he said, tapping her forehead and smiling. She giggled in that way only little girls can laugh with their fathers.

  "Imagine a blank piece of paper in your mind, white, clean, full of possibility."

  "Okay," she said and closed her eyes.

  "So you have the paper, it's your mind. Take a pen and draw a line down the middle of the page. Ink. Whatever color you want."

  In her mind, she drew down the piece of paper, cutting into that blank reality, and from that line, the world opened. From there, the world was whatever she wanted it to be, and she escaped.

  As the building crushed her hunters, crumbling and twisting into itself, she imagined that blank whiteness in her mind.

  Paper and ink, and the world opened. They stood in the street watching the building crumble, the only building on the street to have been affected. Plumes of smoke and fire cut into the night among the falling snowflakes.

  Ryan held her hand as they watched people evacuate from the resort directly across the street. Long evening gowns trudged through puddles of dirty water, ashes smearing across the superfine wool of tuxedo jackets. Important people fleeing into the night.

  Mae pulled Ryan away from the crowds, feeling safe for the first time in her life. The hunters were dead and could not hunt her anymore. They fled together, the entire world for the taking.

  Paper and ink, and they were in the backyard of her childhood home, swinging on the tire from that old tree, lying in the grass and listening to birds and crickets. At night they explored the eternal sky and stars together, and fell more deeply in love.