In the center of the room were three big round wooden planters, spaced six feet apart. The left-hand one had what looked like a rose bush, the right-hand one, some kind of grass, and the center one, ivy on a little trellis.
A woman in a black jumpsuit and combat boots walked from the far side of the room to stand beside the right-hand planter She put a gloved hand on the planter’s rim.
She looked Chinese. Her long black hair hung in a braid down her back.
I swallowed. My stomach felt like I swallowed a ball of lead.
The air in here was moist, like standing in a hothouse, despite the only plants being the three in the planters in the center of the room.
I looked at Winterfield. “I’m expected to fight her?”
“Don’t be stupid, Brandt. Like I said, this is a test.” He nodded at the woman. “Go to her. We’ll watch from the sidelines.” He and Sanchez went to a corner, crossed their arms, and waited.
Great, I had my own peanut gallery.
Medico Blue entered the room, and joined them. The peanut gallery was getting bigger, and now I had my own EMT on hand. Medico Blue being here meant someone could get injured, unless she just liked to watch. My money was on her being available to give first aid.
Damn Winterfield.
I took a deep, slow breath but my stomach still felt like lead. I forced my legs to march toward the center of the room.
She watched me approach. Smiled at me.
“Good morning, Ms. Brandt.” Her accent sounded Philadelphian. I’d had a friend growing up who had come from our nation’s capital, Philadelphia, and this woman sounded just like her. You could almost hear the liberty bell, the joke around school used to go.
She had to be an American—maybe her parents or grandparents were refugees from China, after the destruction of Beijing and Shanghai in the Three Days War, half a century ago.
“Hi.” I shifted my stance. The flooring felt spongy and metallic at the same time. “What’s your name?” I asked her.
She ran a hand along the planter’s rim. “Sorry, I’m not allowed to say.”
“Not even your Empowered name?” Assuming she had one—she was probably Hero Council, although some members didn’t use an Empowered name most did. She wasn’t hiding her face, and most Hero Council Empowered didn’t. “We’re the opposite of masked bandits,” went the Hero Council line.
She gave me an apologetic look. “Not even that.”
Figured. “So, what happens now?”
“You use your power.” She pointed at the sharp-bladed grass in the right hand planter. “Reach into the sawgrass here with your gift, feel the sawgrass growing, taste it in your mind, tremble with it as it sways fractionally in the air currents.”
I frowned. “I don’t taste plants with my power, I hear them in my mind.”
She walked around the planters to stand beside me. “That’s because you are still numb to the greater part of your power.”
“It’s how I am. Numbness isn’t part of it.” My neck flushed with heat and I took a step back from her.
“There’s no need to get angry. I am here today to show you the depths of your power.”
Great, another helpful person telling me I didn’t know my so-called gift like I should. It had always worked this way for me—it wasn’t like my power was a world-beater.
“I’m not getting angry,” I said, unclenching my fingers. But I was. She was irritating me.
“No, of course not.” She pointed again at the saw grass. “Please extend your sense into the grass.”
I did as she instructed, half closing my eyes. The grass whispered sandpaper murmurings in my head.
“What does it taste like in your sense?” She asked. “When you taste it, you will know how to grow it.”
Taste it? That was crap. There was nothing to taste. “Nothing at all. I told you, I can’t taste a thing.”
“You can, if you try.”
I shut my eyes. Taste what? My irritation made it hard to concentrate. “I don’t need to taste the grass, as you put it, in order to make it grow.”
“Do you ‘make the grass grow,’ or spur it to growth, encourage it to grow?”
I unclenched my fingers again.
“Same difference.”
“Is it? That’s your challenge—to understand the difference. Tasting the grass with your awareness will give you more control, and control is the key.”
Screw this. She wanted me to grow the grass, I didn’t need to “taste” it to do so, so grow it I would.
The air felt rich in nitrogen and carbon dioxide—this room must have a higher mix in the air. The soil was rich with nutrients and moisture. I urged the grass to pull nutrients from the soil, and inhale CO2.
I pushed my awareness further into the grass, willed it to grow, fueling the growth with my annoyance at my tester and Winterfield.
The green blades swelled and stretched toward the ceiling.
She waved at me. “Not so fast! Slow down!”
The saw grass towered above us. I yanked my power from it, and the grass collapsed into a green tangle, a low screaming in my mind. Pain stabbed at my forehead. I winced, shut my eyes.
Something yanked at my boots. My legs shot out from under me and I banged my tailbone on the floor. God damn.
I jumped to my feet. I’d show her. I cocked an arm back to punch her and my traitor legs were yanked off the ground and I banged my butt again on the floor.
“Call me Flick.” She held her arms wide. She gestured, and my boots moved toward each other. I strained my muscles, fighting to get up, but I couldn’t move my legs. She lowered her hands and the pressure stopped.
My legs spasmed and I rolled on the floor, eyes squeezed shut. Finally, the spasming stopped.
“That’s an example of my power,” Flick said. She could clench my muscles, send me into spasms. I hadn’t imagined an Empowered could do something so precise.
I scrambled up. I wanted to punch the smugness off her face.
“You blindsided me.”
She nodded. “A demonstration. Here’s another.”
She flicked a finger across the room, to a table beside Winterfield, Sanchez and Medico Blue. A half dozen water bottles stood on the table. Flick crooked a finger and one of them sailed off the table and floated to me.
“You look parched.” Her face was deadpan.
“No thanks.” My breath was tight in my chest. Show off.
“Suit yourself.” The bottle went to her outstretched hand. She unscrewed the cap and took a long drink.
I licked dry lips. She wasn’t going to show me up.
I pushed the anger inside me down, forced my voice to stay level. “What’s next?” I sounded like an idiot, but I wanted to pass this test, already, and get on with my mission.
Flick strolled over to the left-hand planter and pointed at the rose bush. It had just begun to bud.
“Taste the potential before helping the rose to bud and flower.”
I sighed. I’d play her game. “Okay.” I reached into the rose bush, listened to its soft, wordless song. Taste it? How the hell could I do that? There was nothing to taste.
Flick continued. “Submerge yourself in your subject’s physicality.” She sounded like a school teacher.
“You’re a TK, right?” I spoke with my eyes still closed. “So, what does a TK know about melding with a plant?”
“Physicality, remember.” I could hear the smile in her voice. “It’s all the same. I must feel what the object is experiencing.”
The rose trembled in my mind as I pushed my awareness deeper into it. Open up. I urged the plant to drink from the air faster, moving nutrients through its body more quickly.
The faintest scent of a rose petal. I pushed, harder. Drink deep I commanded the rose bush. It shrieked in my mind, and I staggered.
The plant died before me, leaves blackening, half budded flowers curling and falling away in fragments.
I'd killed it.
All
because Flick pushed me to taste it. I pushed into the ivy vines on the trellis behind her, extended them.
“Brandt!” Winterfield shouted but I ignored him, concentrated on extending the vines.
Flick smiled, pivoted. The trellis pulled free from the soil. The ivy shrieked, even more sharply than the rose bush had.
I urged it to grow faster, extending roots into the soil. I was going to show her.
The trellis floated upward, the ivy stretching out like a man on a torture rack.
My heart jackhammered in my chest, my breath came in huge, ragged gasps. Pain spiked my temples, but I plunged further into the dead rosebush with my power, found the seeds for life, and willed a new one into being. I had to save the ivy.
Sharp thorns grew from spreading branches in an eye blink.
The newly-born giant rose bush swung branches outward at Flick’s back, inch-long thorns swinging toward her exposed flesh.
Flick pivoted, gestured, and the trellis flew into the rosebush, ivy vines entangling the rose branches.
The ivy vines moved without my command, constricted the branches. I pushed the vines to untangle, but they continued to constrict. How could Flick’s power be so finely tuned? I fought harder to move the vines, but they were wrapped tightly around the branches and between them. I switched to pouring energy into the branches, to saw through the vines, but the branches wouldn’t move.
I groaned. Exhaustion slammed into me, and I dropped to my knees.
The world dimmed. I fell to the floor, rolled onto my back.
Blue-gloved hands ran along my sides, and arms. Medico Blue knelt beside me. Behind her clustered Flick, Sanchez and Winterfield. Flick and Sanchez looked concerned, while Winterfield shook his head in disgust.
“You pushed yourself too hard,” Medico Blue said. Soothing warmth filled me, and the pain fled.
She and Sanchez helped me to my feet. My strength returned, faster than I imagined possible.
The rose bush and ivy were a snarled mess.
“What now?” I asked Winterfield.
He looked at Flick.
She shot me a sympathetic glance, turned back to Winterfield.
“Mathilda must connect with herself in order to grow in her gift. Until she does, she will remain where she is.” Her tone was matter-of-fact.
Winterfield nodded and looked at me. “You hear that, Brandt? You are your own worst enemy.”
Thanks for the insight. I gave him a cold smile. I never would have guessed.
“Experience is the key,” Flick added.
“If it doesn’t kill her first.” He nodded. “Thank you, Flick.”
She and Medico Blue left.
Sanchez and Winterfield spoke in low voices for what felt like forever.
The room suddenly seemed chilly. Nausea swam up from my roiling stomach and a cold sweat ran down my back.
I had failed the test. They would send me back for life.
Winterfield stared at me, his gaze hard, ice blue eyes unblinking. I looked away.
“All right, then,” Winterfield finally said. “You’re in, Brandt. God help us.”
“But I blew the test.” That didn’t make sense.
“I expected you would.”
“Then why--”
He cut me off with a gesture. “We needed an expert assessment, and we wanted to see how you behaved under pressure. And you desperately needed a lesson. From now on think more clearly before acting.”
Sanchez came over. “Like I said, we can help you grow into your power, but it will take time and, besides, we don’t want to make your old associate, Silco, suspicious about how far you’ve come. Your improvement needs to seem natural, not forced.”
Assuming I survived it.
And didn’t kill anyone in the process.
Chapter 5
Afterwards, Sanchez and I went over contact procedures again in my room. I had to memorize phone numbers, code words, and the address for my new place. It was an abandoned house in North Portland, in a depressing part of town.
I started to argue with Sanchez again about having to move out of Ruth’s, but he wouldn’t budge.
“I don’t make the rules,” he said. We sat side by side at the little desk in my room.
“Mister Sanchez,” I began.
“Alex, remember?" He interrupted with a bright smile. "I’m only a few years older than you, after all. Besides, you need to think of me as a low-level crook rather than a Support agent.
I still couldn’t image Mister Charming here as a scummy lowlife type, but that was why they were called agents, I guess.
I struggled to remember how long I’d been in this prison-like place. It seemed like a month, but my confrontation with Raphe Hatcher’s little gang had been on Tuesday afternoon. Sanchez—Alex—had said I’d been unconscious for eighteen hours, so I woke up Wednesday morning. So it was only Thursday afternoon.
“I need to get to Ruth’s place. She’ll be very worried.” Not that she’d show it, but it would be eating at her inside.
He scooted his chair back, faced me. “You need to meet with Silco before that.”
“Why?” I wanted to check on Ruth and the twins, before having to go meet weaselly Blender.
He didn’t answer right away. He put the files back in his little folder.
This was screwed. What was the point in making my family think I was lying dead in a ditch somewhere any longer than I already had?
“All I can say is that we believe your best chance to be admitted into the Scourge cell Silco belongs to is for Mutter and the cell to believe you ran off already, and are becoming desperate.”
I began pacing the tiny room. “Do you think Silco knows about my, uh, fight with Hatcher and his people?” Near murder was more like it. I shouldn’t weep over nearly killing a bunch of nasty gangers—they had it coming—but still, why hadn’t they just backed down?
“Unlikely. Remember, Support sanitized the area.”
My jaw tightened. “That’s right, you had me under surveillance the whole time.”
Alex wasn’t the asshole Winterfield was, he actually looked guilty. “I am sorry. Procedure is a harsh mistress,” he said in a low voice, and in a way that sounded like a quote out of a Support Agents training manual.
I forced myself to take a slow breath. “Okay. I get it. It wasn’t your choice.” It was a lot harder to stay mad at him than Winterfield.
He smiled. “Thanks. We really do want to help you.”
Sure, help me so that I can help you, but that was the way things worked.
I shrugged. “I’m ready to get started when you are.” The sooner I met up with Silco and told him I wanted in, the sooner I could convince Ruth and the girls I was alive— by showing up and then promptly moving out. It all sucked, but at least I wasn’t in prison. I wasn’t going to lose this chance to help them.
Not this time.
Leaving wherever this was turned out to be its own kind of rigmarole. In the cramped bathroom I changed into the clothes I had worn when I confronted Hatcher’s gang, including an undamaged version of my shirt. When I emerged, Winterfield and the red-headed woman who had brought me lunch yesterday were there with Sanchez in the now crowded little room.
The woman carried a helmet, something like a deep sea diving helmet, only there were no viewing ports. She put a breathing mask over my face first.
“Filters,” she explained. She held up earplugs. “We need to isolate you, so that you have no idea of where you are when you leave.”
“Gee, thanks.”
“Procedure, Brandt,” Winterfield said. “If you don’t know, you can’t spill it.”
Paranoid much, Winterfield? I thought, but kept my mouth shut and let them fit me with the earplugs and the face mask, and then thick, rubber gloves that went way past my elbows.
Down came the helmet and the world went black. I was put on some kind of dolly and strapped in. The dolly began moving.
I lost track of how many times my stomac
h lurched. I went up, at least it felt like I went up.
Into a vehicle—a truck? Time passed.
When they released me from Special Corrections I never imagined I’d be doing spook stuff like a real spy. Okay, so I was a snitch. Okay, so Winterfield called what I was doing “infiltration,” but a spy was a spy. Heroes didn’t get wrapped up in all this crap and hauled God only knew where. Yeah, I didn’t exactly have a cheerful attitude at that point.
Ghosts came to me while I was blind and deaf. Tanya, and the Professor. He may have been crazy smart, but he was a kind dude, too, and where had that got him? Dead. There were the other Renegades. All dead now. Except for Gus. I didn’t want to think about him, so I thought about my family.
Ruth was tough, but beneath it all she cared. She was kind, and where had that got her? Dying is where.
It was easy to be in a black funk when everything was black. I suddenly realized I wasn’t moving any more.
Someone tapped me on the shoulder.
My straps were removed, followed by the gloves. I flexed my arms.
The helmet came off next, and finally the mask. I took in a breath of unfiltered air, air thick with the mingled scents of pine and fir trees, leafy shrubs still dormant, and moss.
I opened my eyes.
It was nearly pitch dark. My eyes began to adjust to the gloom.
A greasy looking dude in a hoodie and torn jeans sat beside me, looking like a homeless man.
I blinked. He was pretty handsome for a streeter.
“Alex?”
He shook his head. “I guess the disguise needs to be tweaked.”
I shrugged. “I’m good with faces.” Besides, it was either going to be him or Winterfield, and I’d bet Winterfield never pulled on scummy old clothes.
“Could have been me,” Winterfield said up front, sitting in the driver’s seat. We were in a cargo van, with heavily tinted windows.
“He didn’t look old enough.”
He ignored the jibe. “We wanted you to see Agent Sanchez incognito here. We’re in a rest stop south of Wilsonville. Your vehicle is parked outside. A Dodge Dasher.”
“I have a car?” I’d never owned a car of my own.
Empowered: Agent (The Empowered Series Book 1) Page 6