“You guys know her?” Adara asked when she noticed Calder had waved back.
“Yeah, that’s Ira, Medea’s daughter—totally badass and totally hot. Since her job is only to guard Periculand, she doesn’t care when we’re out after curfew. Although, she did tackle me last year when I tried to drown this kid…and I actually enjoyed it.”
Adara’s eyebrows shot up, but she couldn’t find any words to respond to that with. Instead, she focused on the faint hum overpowering the noisy crickets. “Is this fence electric?”
“Yes,” Nero answered.
Even though Adara had heard him, she reached her hand, still stained with red from a secret source, toward it, anyway, just to check. Her fingers were about to collide with the electric metal when Nero suddenly slapped her hand hard enough that an involuntary cry of pain emitted from her throat.
“What the hell was that for?” she demanded, clutching her rapidly-reddening and swelling right wrist. Sharp pains sparked through her bones, and she wouldn’t have been surprised if it were fractured.
“I kinda wanted to watch you electrocute yourself, but then not really,” Nero said, shrugging his muscular shoulders as his vision settled languidly on the gate. Adara swore under her breath as she cradled her injured arm against her stomach.
“This security is insane,” she muttered, glancing briefly up at the guard, Ira. “Guns, electric fence… Bet my brother’s the only one who could get past it, and he’s too much of a perfect prick to even have the desire…”
“He’s fallen into the illusion, that’s why,” Calder said, staring broodingly at the object of restriction before them.
Adara pivoted toward him with an expression like she’d just discovered an exciting new species of animal. This was the second time he’d mentioned the illusion, which meant he truly did believe it as much as she did.
“They whisk us away to this school—what seems like a fairytale land, really—where we can start over and have powers and be above the rest of society, but then look at us.” Calder swatted his hand toward the fence. “We’re trapped here. They say this fence is here to keep out the Reggs who want to harm us, but that’s not really what it’s for. They’re trying to keep us in because they think we’re dangerous—they want to control us.”
Adara’s eyes slivered, but her voice was impish as she said, “You don’t trust the oh-so-transparent Angor Periculy?”
“I have no reason to trust that mysterious bastard,” Calder retorted with much less jauntiness. “He’s never spoken to me. All I see of him is this man who thinks he’s a god—a man who thinks he can just cage us all in here and that we’ll worship him for it.”
“Well, any man who employs Mr. Grease as his second in command must be a little nutty,” Adara reckoned, and when Calder glanced at her sideways, she added, “Fraco is Mr. Grease, if you’re too dumb to see the connection.”
One side of his mouth twitched upward as his gaze remained on her. “You’re odd, Stromer. You insult the people you like and the people you don’t like.”
“You think there are any people I like?” Her laugh was a mixture of sarcasm and nonchalance that, to her delight, puzzled him even further. “You really are as stupid as your hair makes you look.” He touched his man-bun self-consciously, and her lips curled. “Tell me, Pixie Prince, if this fence is only to keep us in and there’s no one who would ever want to break in, what’s that out there?”
Calder ripped his blue eyes away from Adara to follow her gaze past the metal bars, where a pair of headlights shone in the distance. The approach of the oncoming vehicle was swift, and the security guard now wielded her gun with much more apprehension than before. Adara felt a ripple of excitement in her chest, even at Ira’s alarm.
“Get back to the Residence Tower now!” she shouted down at them.
Nero didn’t budge, except to crack his knuckles. “Finally, something interesting is happening.”
“I’m serious!” the guard yelled in clear panic. “If you’re not going to safety, at least go get Fraco and tell him Wackos are at the gates! One of you, please—”
“Oh, yes, I’m sure Fraco will ward off the intruders with his overwhelmingly repulsive oiliness—” Adara said, but she was cut off when Calder grabbed her left arm and began to yank her backward.
“C’mon,” he urged, his eyes darting toward the lights now close enough to illuminate the blue highlights of his dark hair. The vehicle was large—possibly an oversized van—and it advanced on Periculand’s gates like a white-eyed monster. “We don’t want them to see us. We’ll take them by surprise, if they manage to get in—”
“They’re not going to get through a gun and an electric fence—”
“Just leave Stromer out in the road,” Nero commanded as he followed Calder’s lead to crouch behind the finely-trimmed shrubbery that lined either side of the street. “She can be bait. While the Wackos eat her, we’ll strike—or, you know, we’ll just wait ‘til she’s dead and then we’ll defend ourselves.”
Adara rolled her eyes at him as she adopted his position and squatted behind the bushes, squished between the two boys eagerly anticipating some action. Nero stretched his bulky arms while Calder conjured a decent-sized orb of water in his hands. Adara merely massaged her aching right arm and silently cursed Nero and his brute strength.
The unfamiliar vehicle was parked on the other side of the gate now, and from their hiding spot, Adara could see it was a black van that blended in with the darkness around it.
Ira had her gun pointed at the front windshield as she shouted, “I know you’re Wackos! Back away or I’ll shoot!”
From the driver’s side window, Adara could just barely see a head stick out, but the face was unclear with the blaring headlights accompanied by the dark of night. “Call off the reinforcements—tell them you were imagining the threat! Oh, and while you’re at it, open the bloody gate,” a male’s voice commanded rather sassily before the head dissolved back into the van.
Nero snorted derisively, but upon seeing Ira lower her gun, his confidence wavered. When the double gates swung inward soundlessly, Calder’s ball of water dropped onto Adara’s Converse while the larger boy tensed at her other side.
“British people,” she grunted as she awkwardly tried to shake the water off her shoes in a crouched position. “They can get people to do whatever the hell they want just with their melodious voices.”
“More like he can get people to do whatever the hell he wants with his mind controlling Affinity,” Calder grumbled, his words nearly drowned out by the sound of the van doors flying open.
They ducked lower behind the bushes as figures hopped out of the van and strolled through the open gates, weaponless. The three intruders that left the van were all dressed in purely black leather with ski masks covering their hair and faces.
The first to stroll in had a female’s body, tall and athletic with slight curves. The second was a male’s, equally as tall but with an arguably thinner frame and a long face beneath his mask. The third’s gender was uncertain, but he or she was a monster. With a height greater than the other two—and possibly even greater than Nero’s—it stomped through the open fence in a wobbling fashion, and its body, though seemingly fat, was solid, strong, and coordinated.
Nero’s fists clenched toughly, but the set of his jaw was uneasy.
“Let’s attack them,” Adara mumbled through her teeth.
“No,” Calder hissed firmly, gripping her left arm before she could stand.
“What do you mean no? They’re Wackos. Let’s kill ‘em—”
“Police station’s that way,” the male Wacko said, halting Adara from further discussion. His long arm pointed in the direction of the white buildings not too far in the distance, the heart of the town glowing lightly beneath the canopy of stars.
“We’re not here for the police officer,” the female Wacko barked. “We were sent here with strict orders, Josh, and we’re following them. Stop thinking about the past and st
art thinking about the future, will you? Let’s go. The tower’s this way.”
“I can see it,” the male Wacko, Josh, muttered as he followed reluctantly behind the female. The monstrous being bounded after them at a leisurely pace, exuding an aura of cool carelessness. Ira still stood on top of the platform, her posture relaxed as she stared out into the distance, as though the Wacko van wasn’t sitting at the open gates. Adara, when she glanced at the boys on either side of her, saw her two companions were frozen in place with unreadable expressions.
“Oh, c’mon. When you’re up against measly primaries, you two are tough shit, but now that there’s a real threat, you’re just going to sit here like a bunch of cowards?” she questioned, her voice still quieter than usual but with much more zeal than before.
“No,” Nero growled, rising from his crouched stance with a cautious glance back at the van.
“We’re going,” Calder agreed as he straightened. “We know you love to be the center of attention, but don’t get us caught, Stromer. Let’s move.”
22
Wacko Attacko
“Why are we running through the grass and the trees instead of on, you know, the paved road right over there?” Adara demanded through exaggerated breaths. As expected, Stromer lagged behind Calder and Nero as they jogged through the brush scattered beside the driveway leading to the training school. The three Wackos they trailed had increased their pace as they neared the Residence Tower, and Adara, with her swollen wrist clutched against her chest, was struggling to keep up.
“I thought you had an Affinity for plants, Stromer?” Calder called back at her in a whisper as he hopped over a fallen tree that, a moment later, she nearly tripped on. Normally, he was a fast runner, but he still wore Adara’s constricting sweatshirt, making his movements awkward and strained.
“Oh, you know that was bull!” she hissed.
Calder snickered to himself, but Nero was in too much of a crabby mood to conjure even a crude laugh. The three Wackos turned right to dash toward the school’s campus, and Nero, at the lead, began to veer toward the road.
“We didn’t want the British Wacko in the van to see us, and we don’t want those three Wackos to see us now,” Calder informed her, glancing back again, not at her, but at the gate that was far enough away that he could only see the van’s headlights blaring against the black backdrop. Nero, without thinking they might still be seen by the van, darted out into the street, and Calder unquestioningly followed.
“You know,” Adara huffed as she staggered after them, “I bet those Wackos…were talking about going to find Mitt. He said he accidentally…killed a Wacko before coming here. Bet they want…revenge.”
“Oh, you mean the douche who arrested me?” Calder clarified, raising his eyebrows back at her. “Wish these Wackos would have gone to kill him, if that’s the case.”
“You tried to drown a presidential candidate, if you’ve forgotten—”
“I flicked water at him, and he was a dick—”
“Shut up, both of you!” Nero barked, his dark eyes glaring at them for an extra moment before he continued to jog after the Wackos. Calder and, surprisingly, Adara remained silent after that, but neither failed to shoot snooty and slightly comical expressions back and forth.
“What do you think they want in here?” Adara asked once they’d reached the glass doors of the Residence Tower. The Wackos had just stormed in, still unaware of the three students trailing them, and Nero had his large hand on the door handle now, ready to open it. “Do you think they’re gonna kidnap someone? I hope it’s Kiki. Maybe we should go casually suggest they do kidnap Kiki, even if she isn’t their target—”
“If they’re trying to kidnap someone, they’re not going to find them in here,” Nero said gruffly. “Everyone’s still at JAMZ.”
“Mm, right. That’s unfortunate.” Adara nodded to herself for a moment, her droopy bun bobbing on top of her head as she did. Calder eyed her skeptically, and apparently Nero was, as well, because when she looked back up, puzzlement consumed her expression. “What? Is my hair really that horrible? I’m too lazy to fix it, even if it’s bothering you that mu—”
“Why aren’t you telling us to go get help?” Nero questioned.
“Help?” Adara repeated, genuinely nonplussed.
“Yeah. You’re the girl here—you’re supposed to insist we make rational decisions,” Calder said slowly. “We’re about to approach the Wackos who just broke into this town and might want to kidnap or kill someone. Aren’t you going to tell us this is a poor idea?”
Adara’s lips twitched into a frown as she considered. “Well, no, I probably won’t tell you that. Since we missed JAMZ, I’m sorta itching for a fight.”
“We’re not gonna fight them.” Nero flung the glass door open with such strength that it nearly shattered; he then stalked through, giving the impression that he wouldn’t have cared even if it had burst into a million pieces. Calder knew he wouldn’t have.
“What do you mean we’re not gonna fight them?” Adara whispered, shoving past Calder as Nero stomped toward the spiral stairs.
“We’re gonna see what they’re up to,” he responded quietly, “and if we like what they’re doing, we’re gonna join them.”
“Join them?” Adara’s head spun wildly back toward Calder, who now grinned as he followed behind her.
“Ah, there it is—the rationally appalled female in you has taken hold, Stromer,” he mused before adding more blandly, “I’m not sure why you’re so surprised, though.”
“I know you two have about as many brain cells as Fraco’s had girlfriends, but joining a group of terrorists? Even I don’t want to get involved in a deep sea of crap like that, and you’re both aware that I love to get involved in all kinds of crap.”
Nero exchanged a look with Calder from where he stood on the first step. “Knock her out and throw her in the dumpster? Or would you like to do the honors of drowning her?”
“Oh, please,” Adara droned, rolling her eyes before she slammed through Nero to begin her ascent up the stairs. “If you two are really going through with this insanity, I want a front row seat—and if this means you’re both gonna run off with a terrorist group and I’ll never have to see you again, I am not going to stop you. Trust me.”
“Move a little faster then, will you?” Nero commanded as he pushed her from behind.
She scurried up the spiral staircase, groaning audibly and slowing when they reached the first floor. “Why isn’t there an elevator? Ugh, I am getting fat. Curse you, Periculand, and your delicious donuts! I bet Angor’s master plan is to fatten us all up and—”
“Shut up, Stromer.” Nero kicked her calf, and she grunted, stumbling up the steps. Calder barely restrained a chuckle. “You are such a hazard—”
Adara stopped moving abruptly, and it didn’t take long for the boys to realize why: the sound of voices filled the corridor above. They were on the second floor now, but through the opening into the third, Calder could hear arguing and the reverberations of that monster’s stomps.
“He’s in room 302,” the female’s voice said softly, causing Adara to twist her gaze back toward her companions with bulging eyes.
“Seth and Hastings are in room 302—”
“There is no way in hell we’re joining them if they’re looking for Hastings,” Calder said. “I’m not really interested in the idea of a brutally bloody death.”
Adara’s reddish eyes lit up indignantly. “You know Hastings’s power?”
Calder shrugged, hoping she could see his casualness beyond Nero’s broad form. “I think it’s fairly obvious.”
“Kick down the door,” the female ordered on the third floor.
“Or we could just knock,” the male drawled lazily. “I’m sure he’ll answer if he’s awake.”
The female’s voice was wrought with aggravation. “Can’t you tell if they’re awake?”
“No, because there’s no one in there. There’s no one in this enti
re building, actually, if you’re wondering. Perhaps if you’d listened to me on the way here, you’d know I felt more consciousnesses dwelling underground than in this tower. But…there are three people following us and they’re waiting in the stairwell.”
“What?” the female roared, but before she could peek down at them, Nero had charged past Adara and bounded up the stairs three at a time. Like a geyser, he burst from the spiral stairwell and landed lithely on third floor with a giant bang.
Hurrying up the steps, Calder saw the three Wackos had assumed fighting stances, their faces still hidden by the ski masks but their eyes all narrowed defensively. The female’s eyes were the palest shade of pink while the male’s were an odd combination of bright blues and black; the monster’s were the color of a murky swamp.
“This is not your territory, Wackos,” Nero began to snarl, but the monster had no care for his words because it had already charged at him like an enraged bull.
Nero, almost as if he were…afraid, froze just long enough for the monster to ram him and send him flying into the door of room 305. He smashed into the painted white metal, denting it and tearing it off its hinges. The monster stomped over to him and yanked him up by the collar of his shirt, but before it could begin to pummel him, a burst of water encased its head.
Smirking effortlessly, Calder climbed to the third floor, one hand outstretched toward the monster, keeping the orb of water around its head. His other hand flew in the direction of the other two Wackos, dousing them both in water. With the sudden and rapid movement of his arms, Adara’s tight sweatshirt ripped at the seams, creating large holes beneath his armpits. That was probably the worst thing that had happened thus far.
Blood: An Affinities Novel (The Affinities Book 1) Page 29