Spellhacker

by M. K. England

  I wrench my gaze away. Can we not do this here? I thought we were done with this fight.

  “Sorry,” I mutter.

  The professor sighs, running a hand through his wispy white hair. “I feel guilty for this part. It took us too long to fully separate and identify maz-15 and to confirm that it caused spellsickness. It took us nearly a year, then another six months to have our findings independently verified by one of the other MMC labs, then another month to get all the data assembled and ready to submit to the board. And in that time, MMC had already done two crucial things.”

  He ticks them off on his fingers. “One: they stepped in and became the world’s saviors. Even though many of their own employees were the first killed, they were the ones to organize community cleanups, assist local governments in creating orphan care programs, donate to public relief funds, bring in outside aid workers from less affected cities, all that.”

  I glance at Ania, who nods along. Her own parents were some of those outside aid workers. “Yeah,” she agrees. “We were just kids then, but I still remember all the shiny happy vid ads.”

  Jaesin barks a laugh. “They used to have MMC employees in uniform visit the orphanages for photo ops with all the poor, sad plague orphans. They loved Remi. Even back then, they were too good-looking for the cameras to resist.”

  Remi rolls their eyes. “Please. They may have loved to point a camera at me, but especially back then, no one wanted to come anywhere near me. Don’t you know spellsick kids have cooties?”

  I wince. Even I had been like that, at first. And then, sometime later, I started keeping my distance again. For different reasons, though. Hormones. Feelings. Attachment is dangerous. Remi was always planning to leave eventually. No point in wanting what I couldn’t have.

  Yeah, clearly that went well.

  The professor’s lip curls. “Yes, they put on quite a public face of goodwill and charity. And don’t get me wrong, they really did do quite a bit of good in those early days, and there were many people at MMC and beyond who truly did want to help. But the very highest leaders at MMC knew from day one that they had somehow caused the spellplague. It was too big of a coincidence to ignore. The plague just happened to begin at station twenty-nine, right as they pierced the inner mantle for the first time?”

  My stomach lurches, and I nearly run for the bathroom again. For the first time, it occurs to me to wonder—was my dad part of the drilling crew that did this? Was he just collateral damage? Did he know what was going on? I don’t remember what exactly he did for MMC, I was too young, but I know he wasn’t a scientist or engineer or anything. Something that made him come home smelling of sweat and dirt and machine oil.

  Until he didn’t come home at all.

  The professor talks on and drives the knife deeper, oblivious to my private crisis. “Everyone who witnessed it was killed instantly, obviously—”

  Obviously.

  “—so it was only too easy to spread the idea that the first big earthquake caused the plague, and make no mention of the earthquake being caused by their drilling.”

  Ania waved a hand to get our attention. “Okay, so you said two things. What was the second thing they did?”

  The professor’s expression darkens. “They’ve been actively making it worse ever since, making the breach wider and deeper every year, training the planet to make more maz-15 and totally ignoring the effects. It’s disgusting. They didn’t manage to kill us all when they released maz-15, but they just might finish the job with all these hurricanes and such. They used the tech we developed to separate maz-15 from the other strains to expand their reach. They built satellite stations all over the world, one in every city, and used that technology to collect more and more maz-15. And why do you think they bothered to do that?”

  I finally find my voice again, clearing my throat to speak past the acid-scraped rawness. “There’s only ever one answer to that question.”

  The professor scowls. “Too right you are. Here’s where the money comes in. They couldn’t sell it directly without revealing their secret, but they could use it to power all of their buildings cheaply and develop new products, protected by their internal patents. All that legalese kept maz-15 tied up beyond reach. Even our lab teams were forbidden from doing anything with it or about it without MMC’s permission. Immediately after the plague, all ten research and development labs were focused on the spellplague problem. But slowly, after we isolated maz-15, the labs were diverted to work on developing new profitable uses for it. Over the next few years, the MMC executive board turned into a dragon perched atop a truly enormous mountain of treasure, and there was no way they were ever going to give that up.”

  So that’s what we’re really up against. All this time, I had thought Kyrkarta was just a struggling city trying to bounce back after a disaster, doing its best to adapt and salvage its reputation, held aloft by the goodwill of the few who could afford it. Apparently, though, it’s a criminal empire built on ten years of lies and death, bound by one company, controlled by a handful of people exploiting its citizens for bottomless profits.

  Maybe we should just burn it down.

  The professor spreads his hands and shrugs, helpless. “And that’s where we are today. MMC has their money, their power, and their secrecy. At this point, even if someone does tell the truth, who would believe them? Their reputation is ironclad, and they’ve got law enforcement and governments all over the world eating out of their hands.”

  Jaesin shakes his head and runs a hand through his hair. “We really don’t stand a chance, do we?”

  “No. None,” the professor says, sounding defeated for the first time.

  Ouch. Don’t pull your punches, old man.

  A thump, then a loud crash sounds from above our heads. Professor Silva’s head whips up, eyes wide.

  “I’m fine!” John’s muffled voice calls through the floorboards, followed by another clang. The professor sighs and shakes his head.

  “Put some damn pasta in the pot and get out of the kitchen, you menace,” he yells up.

  A beat of silence.

  “Where do we keep the pasta?”

  The professor drops his face into his hands.

  “Oh, for the love of—you’re a bloody genius, John, I’m sure you can figure it out by process of elimination.”

  The whole thing is so hilarious, so sickeningly heartwarming, that it manages to crack through some of the heavy awful despair hanging thick around us. Remi finally meets my gaze for the first time since the train, their hand over their mouth to stifle a laugh, their eyes crinkled. I smile back, a helpless tug in my chest. I wish there was a cure for this, too.

  Ania grins, but her smile fades when another crash sounds overhead, louder this time. The professor throws his arms up and stalks back toward the staircase.

  “Damn it, John, just put everything down and I’ll—”

  Somewhere above us, a door bangs open, and John yelps.

  Professor Silva’s eyes go wide, and he bolts for the stairs, already summoning maz to his hands.

  “John!”

  Twenty-One

  THE FOUR OF US DASH up the stairs after Professor Silva, Remi and Ania already calling firaz to their hands. Jaesin’s fists clench, prepping to strike. We burst into the upstairs laboratory and out into the hallway, and as we round the corner into the kitchen, the professor stops dead in his tracks.

  Two people block the kitchen doorways, dressed in solid black unmarked uniforms and holding woven maz at the ready. A third holds John, with an arm wrapped around his throat.

  Professor Silva’s hands drop to his sides, shaking. MMC left him alone for eight years. Eight years . . . until we brought them here. Because of course it has to be MMC. Yet another disaster caused by us, one way or another.

  “You four,” the woman holding John says, looking past the professor to the rest of us. “Release your maz and kneel on the ground with your hands behind your head. I’m sure I don’t have to actually tell
you what will happen if you don’t.”

  She increases the pressure on John’s throat, and he makes a harsh strangled sound, his eyes bulging. But through it all, he manages to shake his head, ever so slightly.

  “Okay,” I say. No choice. These men didn’t ask for us to drop in and wreck their lives. They’re happy. Healthy. Living out their days together. They don’t deserve this. “We’ll comply.”

  I shuffle forward where they can see me fully and turn to look at the professor as I pass. His gaze is hard, his mouth tense, determined. Just like John, he shakes his head. I don’t get it. Why don’t they . . .

  Then I realize. Yes, these men are happily spending their days researching and napping. They’re also the men who built an entire underground bunker beneath their house. Two of the most accomplished and brilliant scientists of their time. And their faces say they aren’t letting this go without a fight.

  I shrug, playing up the defeated look, then turn back to the others. “Just do it, everyone, okay?”

  I wink, turn back to the commandos, and slowly lower to my knees with my hands behind my head. I’m useless as a combatant in this kind of situation, but there’s one thing I can always do: piss people off.

  “Okay, MMC Zombie McDoucheface, what’s the deal? You really gonna beat up on a couple of sweet old men just to get to us? Pretty damn low, my friend. Preeeeetty low.”

  The woman holding John curls her lip in a sneer, and the two guarding the doors shift on their feet, irritated. Good. I push on.

  “We must be pretty special if you followed us all the way out here. I’m feeling kinda valuable right now, aren’t you, Ania?” I say, glancing back at her. She nods, hands behind her back, the picture of an innocent princess. That draws the guards’ eyes to her, while Jaesin slowly slips a knife off the kitchen counter and tucks it up his sleeve.

  “And so,” I continue in my most obnoxious voice, “if we’re so valuable, then there are a few things we can assume. One, you can’t kill us right now. You have to take us alive.”

  “False,” growls the man guarding one of the doors. I quirk a little smile at him that I’ve been reliably informed is incredibly smug and irritating, and the man’s expression darkens. I summon every ounce of nerve I can muster, despite the fear liquifying my knees. False. They’re here to kill us.

  “Ah well. Reason number two is still true, though. MMC apparently has something big to hide. Do you even know what that is, Gary?” I ask the next soldier, whose name is probably not Gary. “Did they tell you what you crossed a contaminated wasteland for? Do you even know what they’ve done? How they’ve poisoned the world? I bet you don’t. You wouldn’t be here otherwise. Unless you’re a total jerk. Are you a total jerk, Gary?”

  Behind me, Jaesin snorts. I grin, relieved I can still make him laugh even at a time like this.

  “Yeah, I thought so. Okay, how many things has that been so far? That was one, two . . . three!”

  And thank the stars for this amazing crew, which has been together long enough to know the drill, because on the count of three I drop to the ground, and Jaesin launches himself over me, knife in his hand, followed by two flaring spells, one silvery blue and one bloody red. The silver one hits John square in the chest and spreads like crawling sparks over his whole body—a shielding spell, so that when the goon holding on to him tries to make good on her threat, the knife slides harmlessly through the air a half inch from John’s throat. The second spell hits her in the arm, burning through cloth and skin with a sizzle like bacon in a pan, followed by the scent of charred meat.

  Jaesin is in full fearsome warrior form, finally in a situation where he can use his skills to the max. He feints a slash at a guard’s face, then slams a boot into the man’s kneecap instead, taking his legs out. It’s Professor Silva, though, who finishes the takedown. Without John being used as leverage, the man snaps back into focus, his expression fierce. Maz from his laboratory leaps down the hallway, twining around him in bright, writhing tendrils. His hands spin in complex patterns, weaving something intricate and multicolored, more and more maz flowing into his grip with every second.

  He needs time for whatever he has planned. I’m not much of a fighter, but I don’t need to be to give him that.

  I rise up from my knees to my toes and dart forward to cut off not-Gary, who fires arrow after arrow of tight, sharp aeraz in Remi’s direction. Hell no, you will not. Remi blocks them with shield after shield, but their face is starting to drain of color, a clammy sweat matting their dark hair to their forehead. The fight to get here was too much, and they’re near collapse.

  Not on my watch.

  Mimicking Jaesin’s move from earlier, I run at the guy and swing my leg in a low arc, going for the kneecap. And miss, horribly, getting our legs hopelessly tangled together in the process.

  We both go tumbling to the floor, locked together at the knees, but apparently it’s enough of a distraction. A sharp crackle, a whiff of ozone, and the man slumps on top of me. Out cold. I pull myself out from under him and glance up to see Remi’s tired but victorious smile.

  Then I catch sight of John, shaking and clutching his chest at the feet of the hostage taker as she fights off blow after blow from Ania. I shove the passed-out man the rest of the way off me and crawl to John, beckoning to him. He reaches a trembling hand out to me, and I manage to yank him out of the fray, our backs up against the lower cabinets, just as Professor Silva brings the fight to a dramatic end. He whips his maz into a frenzy, higher and higher until the air fills with a hum, a vibration, almost sizzling in the air between us—then lashes out with both hands. The maz shimmers with reds and golds and burnt orange, rushing forth in a great glowing stream of energy that slams into both remaining soldiers, knocking them instantly unconscious.

  A beat of silence. Then Professor Silva quickly weaves another, less complicated spell, one for each of the assailants. He presses the shadowy, faint weaves into each of their foreheads, where the spell crumbles away like it was never there.

  “That should keep them out for a few hours,” he says, his face stern but his voice trembling. “Let’s get them outside.”

  Together, we manage to haul all three of the MMC guards out through the front door and lay them out side by side, just inside the house’s wards, though not without knocking over a shadow box of pinned butterflies and a ceramic elephant statue. That done, the professor’s arms fall to his sides, and he meet John’s eyes with a tight, tremulous frown.

  John nods with a watery half smile, and the two crash together, holding each other so tight it honestly hurts my heart to look at them. They clutch each other with shaking hands, whispering with heads bent while the rest of us avert our eyes from their private moment. I can’t even imagine how terrifying that must have been for them. I glance to my left and catch Remi looking at me, their face pale, expression raw. They make an aborted movement toward me, seeking comfort, maybe. My heart leaps into my throat, and I somehow try to move closer and pull away at the same time. The result is a total standstill, and before I can get it together, they turn away.

  Finally, the professor and his husband break apart, but stay linked by the hands as we all head back inside. The professor looks around the front room, studying each photo as if seeing it for the first time, then turns to us.

  “Thank you for what you did back there. It’s a shame we’ve had so little time together, but I’m sure you’ll want to be moving on after all that.”

  I look to Remi to let them make the call about traveling, and they nod.

  “Yeah. We don’t want to bring anything else down on you, and after what we’ve learned, I think we have some work to do. Right?” they say, looking around at the rest of us.

  “Right. We have to do something about this,” I say, as solid and confident as I can. “We’ll never be able to live our lives otherwise. They’ll always be after us. We could never go home.”

  “And they’re still hurting the planet, too,” Ania says. “How many people
are hurt, or killed, or have their lives ruined by these constant disasters? We need to get into MMC and stop their drilling operation. If they don’t screw up and cause another spellplague, then it’ll be the earthquakes that kill us all, or the hurricanes, or the volcanoes. This world will tear itself apart.”

  My eyebrows shoot up. “Wow. You aren’t normally the one for going in with guns blazing. Not that I disagree at all—just surprised. In a good way.”

  She shrugs primly. “Well, there’s finally more at stake than just our pocketbooks and the chance to have some fun with my ware. Remember who my parents are? When people need help, all-out guns blazing is what we do.”

  I laugh, and it sounds harsh and strange after all that’s happened. After everything that’s gone down among us all.

  Ania continues. “Besides, there might be a cure for the spellplague out there. If there’s even a chance, we should take it. Let the world know and see what happens. You know I’m in. Jaesin?”

  Jaesin’s brow furrows as he looks us over, concerned-dad face on, but he nods. “I’m in. We have to do something, right? Otherwise we just go into hiding forever.”

  “And that sounds so boring,” Remi says, then smiles grimly. “I think you’re gonna need someone who’s already spellsick down there to do some dirty work right at the source of the plague. Plus, I love you, Ania, but I think this is gonna take some on-the-fly weaving under pressure.”

  Ania holds up her hands. “Hey, I know my limits. I’m the math, you’re the poetry.”

  “Wow, that’s kinda beautiful,” I say, drawing faint grins from all the others.

  Our eyes meet, the four of us, and for the first time in days—maybe weeks—it feels like we’re on the same page.

  The professor frowns, but nods. “Please be careful. Getting into one of MMC’s most heavily guarded facilities won’t be easy. The drill site is deep underground, and only the executive board has the codes to unlock the drill’s controls. I’ll bet anything it’s heavily guarded. Just . . . take care of yourselves. You know now how vicious MMC can be.”