The Rogue Agent

by Shiloh White

  “Chloe’s fine, Lucy, but—”

  “Prove it,” I said, cutting him off. I also took the chance to step back from him.

  “I can’t do that now, but trust me; Chloe is okay.” Lucas said, putting his hands out and taking a step towards me. I mirrored him, stepping back again. I didn’t think my whip was going to be much use if he was too close.

  “Lucy, we don’t have much time, so I need you to listen to me—”

  “Listen to you?” I yelled at him. “You were gone! Chloe was all I had left after that. She was young, so I kept her from what you put the rest of us through. What you put me through.” I felt all of those deeply bottled emotions shaking around and bubbling up inside of her. I didn’t think I’d have the chance to speak to Lucas ever again, but I was beginning to realize how much I felt abandoned by him.

  “You have to believe me, Lucy,” Lucas said, taking a step closer, “I wasn’t trying to put any of you through anything. I committed suicide to...” he looked down at the ground for a moment, his hair falling over his face.

  “I did it to protect you.”

  ✽✽✽

  I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.

  “To protect us?” my voice cracked as I asked.

  “After you were gone, things got worse. Mom left because of you!” I flung the paint whip at him, and he dashed around it. His body dissolved into smoke and reappeared to the right of where I attacked. The whip just hit the ground and flew back. I shouted in frustration that it missed. “Lucy, you have to—

  “Dad tried to put me through therapy!” I yelled and flung the whip again, and Lucas dodged. I yanked it back. “You haven’t let me explain!” Lucas yelled. I flung the whip at him again with a loud grunt.

  “You left your chance to explain behind when you left me alone.” I shouted. Lucas disappeared again as my attack reached where he was. I pulled the whip back. When it cracked, yellow paint splattered all over the ground. When Lucas reappeared, he landed right in a spot with yellow paint. He tried to move, but his feet stuck fast to the paint. Sticky paint whip—sweet. I still couldn’t stand yellow, but the Handle was definitely pulling its own weight. Lucas put his hands up in defense, and said.

  “I know I left you alone, but listen, Lucy, you gotta—”

  “No, I’m not going to listen to you. Since I’ve been here, you’ve threatened me, poisoned my friend, and kidnapped my sister. You’re insane! The only thing we need protection from is you!” I flung the whip on “you”, and it launched toward him.

  Instead of trying to move out of the way again, Lucas just stood there and thrust out his hand. A force came out of it that made the whip stopped in mid-air, and me along with it. “Lucy,” Lucas said, putting his hands back up in defense, “I just need you to listen.” He took a couple steps closer to me, and I looked down to see how he was moving. Oh, great. The ground was sucking up the yellow paint from where he stood. This was not good. I wasn’t going to be able to save myself, let alone Chloe, unless I could get free. But Lucas was definitely in control of my Depression Zone.

  “I know it doesn’t make sense,” Lucas continued, “but hear me—AAAAGHGRAH!” Lucas stopped coming towards me and doubled over, grabbing his head and screaming. “You’re wrong!” he screamed. It took me a second to realize this was probably the same thing that happened in Club Insanis. It must have been that old friend. I didn’t concern myself with that.

  I did notice, however, that the grip keeping me frozen started to loosen. My arms fell slowly to my sides, the whip sliding back over to me too. My legs were still pretty stuck, but I wasn’t going to get another chance. I took it, and flung the whip. It connected with his ankle, causing Lucas to scream even louder. I watched as the paint whip spread around his ankle and down his foot, covering it with yellow paint. When Lucas looked up and saw what happened, he tried to dissolve back into smoke. His head down to his waist could do it, but as he got to the leg I had control over, all of the smoke spazzed out and changed back to skin. The paint must have been keeping him from changing.

  In that moment, I wanted nothing more than to use the whip to fling him around until he brought Chloe back. But besides the fact that I probably couldn’t lift him, something stopped me from acting. Lucas driving off that, with Scott in the car; committing suicide just to become a Depression Agent and kidnap Chloe; how could any of that be to protect us? Not only that, but...

  “What do you think you’re protecting us from?” I asked, pulling on the whip. I knew I couldn’t lift him, but if the paint was dry around his leg I could probably pull off a chunk of it if he tried anything. Lucas looked up at me with a pained expression, still clutching his head and answered, “From the Voice, Lucy.”

  43. …Two Betrayals…

  “The Voice?” I asked. “What’s that supposed to be?”

  Lucas looked away and muttered, “It said it was my friend, but...” His friend? Didn’t Damian say something about an old friend back at Club Insanis?

  “One day before all of this started, I heard it in the back of my head, and...It promised me things.” Lucas explained.

  “What things?” I asked.

  “Success for one,” Lucas said, a little dreamily. “Remember how I used to play guitar?”

  I nodded slowly. “Well, it promised to make me better.” Lucas continued. “It also promised me happiness.” he added.

  “You weren’t happy then?” I asked, wanting to step closer. He gave me a broken look that I think was him being surprised, but something must have been causing his head pain, so his face just looked sad. “You can’t say you pretended not to notice,” Lucas claimed. “You saw firsthand how Mom was always on me about everything; nitpicking small decisions up to having outrageous expectations for my life.”

  Now it was my turn to look away. I couldn’t meet Lucas’ eyes. He was right about Mom. Almost every time I turned a corner I would hear Mom yelling at Lucas. But what was worse was every time I would walk in, the yelling would stop and the two of them would act like nothing was going on. It frustrated me to no end, but I would never bring it up to either of them.

  “So you see, I just had to listen to it. Anything for a chance at something better.” Lucas said. “But they were lies! It didn’t give me anything. Instead, it took things and made me give them up. Before long, the Voice took control of my emotions and my free will. It started to—” he paused for a second, and his eye twitched. “—make me a slave.” What was that twitch about?

  “It stayed like that for a while; sapping me of my life,” Lucas continued, “until that day.”

  “The day you crashed—err, bought your car,” I said, correcting myself. Looking down at what was my brother, now clutching his head and trapped, I didn’t want to make him feel worse. I still didn’t have Chloe back either, so I figured I should try to keep him from losing it right now.

  “Yeah, that’s it. When we were shopping, the Voice told me how nice you were and asked if I...” Lucas paused, taking his hand off his head. I shuffled backwards, not trying to let him get the drop on me. But all he did was point at me. “It asked if I would give you up too.” My heart skipped a beat, and I gasped. Lucas must have seen the look on my face and stared to shake his head and wave his hands. “Oh, no, you can’t believe I…” he paused.

  “I wasn’t going to do it, Lucy. I told it I had no idea how to do that; convinced it you weren’t worth what I could give. I said everything I could think of to get it away from you.”

  I bit my lip. How could I know if he was telling the truth? Here we were again, after Lucas spent all this time trying to get to me.

  “No matter what I did though, the Voice still wanted you,” Lucas said angrily, grabbing at his head as if he were going to pull something out. “I couldn’t let that happen. So I tried to stand up to it. I wasn’t even upset at Mom. It was the Voice. That’s why I took that drive.”

  “But what about Scott?” I asked.

  “I couldn’t stop him from coming a
long. In fact, I hardly even noticed. You see, I thought when I left, I was in control. I thought I was strong; that I was ending it once and for all. But it was the Voice that made me do this. He wanted to turn me into a Depression Agent all along...” he said as his voice cracked. I bit my lip. Part of me wanted to go to the guy I recognized as my brother, but the sane part of me kept a tight grip on my paint whip. Something about his explanation made me uneasy.

  “So this Voice is why you’ve come after me?” I asked slowly. “Yes,” he said, holding his pointer finger up, “but I’ve had my own plan the whole time; keeping you safe.” Was he serious? This was the second time he mentioned protecting me now, but did he really think that protection was happening here?

  “Are you sure that this is your plan?” I asked him. He tilted his head up at me. “Wh-what are you talking about?”

  “I mean, how do you know this is the way to keep me safe? Couldn’t the Voice be manipulating you again?” I asked. Lucas’ eyes went wide.

  “Lucy, I swear that the Voice doesn’t know about this. I can’t explain it, but I’ve been able to hide these thoughts from him. I’m only here for you.” he said. There it was again. He seemed so sure of this goal to help me. But his actions didn't match up.

  “If you’re only here for me, why have you spent your time terrorizing other Depression Zones?” I asked.

  “I couldn't have any suspicions against me,” Lucas quickly explained. “The Voice needed to believe it had total control of me, otherwise it would turn me over to the other Agents.”

  “You mean Agents like Damian, who tried to kill me? What would they do to you anyway? You’re on the same team as them!” I pointed out, pulling on the whip.

  “I didn’t plan for some of Damian’s shenanigans, but believe me, Lucy, it was all part of the plan to keep you safe from the Voice!” I tried to believe it could make sense; that he was really here for me. But some part of it wasn’t clicking. And this Voice thing? Was that supposed to explain that crazy attack he had in the Club Insanis? Or teaming up with Damian; the crash; kidnapping Chloe; all of it? Unless...

  “One more question,” I said, pulling harder on my paint whip. Lucas nodded quickly, looking up at me. “I need to know...” I looked away, steeling myself to speak.

  “Did this Voice tell you to go after Chloe?”

  Lucas opened his mouth to say something, but no words came out. He hesitated.

  “Lucy, you don’t understand—” he finally said, trying to rise to his feet. I yelled and yanked the paintbrush back, and the whip literally pulled his paint-covered foot out from underneath him. It broke off like a piece of an old statue, and I flung it aside with the whip. Lucas cried out and fell back onto the ground.

  “Wait, Lucy—”

  “Tell me,” I said, cutting him off, “was it part of your plan to turn Chloe into a Depression Agent like you?” I took a step closer and arched my arm, ready to fling my paint whip again. Lucas tried to stand up, holding out one hand towards me to guard him. The only real difference it made was that it was harder for him to get up. It was pathetic to watch. “You don’t understand, Luc—”

  “What don’t I understand, huh?” I said, my voice filling with anger again. “It sounds to me like this “Voice” in your head is just your own.” Lucas stopped trying to get up, looking at me with disbelief. He didn’t say anything, so I kept going.

  “You went crazy and wanted to be convinced it wasn’t really you, so you had to make all this up.” I told him. “Or maybe I’m wrong and there’s another insane explanation, I don’t care. Either way, you can’t be doing this to protect me or Chloe from anything!” I flung my whip at him, yelling at him as it flew, “Every effort you’ve made to protect them has just messed us up more!”

  The whip wrapped tightly around Lucas’ neck. Just like his foot, the paint slowly spread in both directions; up to his chin, and down his neck to the top of his shoulders. Lucas grabbed his head like he did before, and started yelling at the top of his lungs from the pain—or, that’s what I thought I heard at first. But after a couple seconds of that, I realized he was screaming “You’re wrong” over and over. Lucas shook his head side to side and his body arched backwards, and the paint stopped spreading. I looked down at the paintbrush to see if I was out of paint or something—did it ever run out of paint in Handle mode?—but I couldn’t tell.

  I felt the ground around him begin to rumble. All of a sudden, a force of energy shot out from Lucas, splattering the paint off his body and onto the ground. As the force reached me, it knocked me backwards onto the ground and shoved the air out of me. I got up as quickly as I could and saw all the yellow paint on the ground get swallowed up into the grayness.

  From there, it only got worse. Lucas’ body burst into Depression Agent smoke and sank right into the grayness below, creating an area of darker gray where he moved. He began to shuffle around the room, his voice echoing “You’re wrong!” over and over until it sounded more like a cry of pain. He stopped right in front of me, and his voice echoed clearly. “I had it backwards the whole time. You are wrong, Lucy! The Voice is right; you aren’t worth saving.”

  Then he charged me.

  ✽✽✽

  Definitely not a good time to shout “I knew it,” but I was thinking it the whole time. A crazy Depression thing had to be involved here. In his right mind, there’s no way Lucas would get caught up in any of this.

  Unlucky for me, his right mind was not where he happened to be right now. Lucas was underground in the grayness, swirling around me like a shark circling in on its target, a.k.a. me. I kept a tight grip on my paint whip, waiting for him to try anything.

  Then Lucas stopped swirling and charged straight towards me. I swung my paint whip at him, but he zoomed right past it. I tried to pull it back, but as soon as it touched the ground the paint got sucked up into the grayness, leaving me with a dry yellow paintbrush. I looked back up at Lucas, getting closer by the second. I was about to get out of the way, but I hesitated. If I jumped now, he’d change direction and get me.

  One Mississippi...two Mississippi...He was coming up fast. I shifted from foot to foot, waiting for the right moment. He was almost right underneath me. I waited another second, which took so long I thought he got me. Then I dove out of the way just like I’d seen Lieutenant Hollister do against my Fragment. Lucas charged right past me and kept going. Perfect timing.

  I stood up and eyed the dark spot in the grayness where he ended up. His shadow swirled around into a circle and spun around for a minute, and then he stopped. He was turning around. I backed up as he came at me again. How was I going to fight back when I couldn’t reach him? Dodging wasn’t going to last forever.

  Lucas charged at me and I dove out of the way again, or at least, I thought I did. Instead of shooting past me, he slowed down and reached his arms up out of the grayness. My heart dropped. Why’d I have to jinx myself about dodging? Lucas caught my right foot and my whole body’s momentum, causing me to trip. I struggled to get free, managing to get up to my hands and knees. Well, knee, since Lucas was pulling my other leg.

  I pushed off my hands to get further away, but instead of going up, my hand fell right through the ground! I tried to pull it out, but it was like pulling my hand out of a giant vacuum; a losing battle. It must have wanted my yellow paintbrush. I was tempted to let go, but it was all I had.

  “You could have prevented this, Lucy, if you would have just trusted me!” he yelled behind me. His voice was clear now, and not all echo-y like before. I turned my head as far as I could manage with my hand stuck and my foot held captive, and saw Lucas coming all the way out of his shadow. That was why. He kept a close hold on my right ankle as he crawled out. “Now you and Chloe are just going to have to—” I’d heard enough. This was my chance, while he was still climbing out. I shoved my free leg backwards, as hard as I could.

  A sickening POP let me know I connected. Well, that and Lucas yelling out in pain. I turned and saw him let go of
my leg to clutch his nose, and rose to my knees. I yanked my arm free, complete with paintbrush and fresh cuts that went straight through the jacket sleeve to my arm. I shoved the paintbrush into my jacket pocket, putting it back into the paint canister while also keeping my eyes on Lucas. He was also on his knees, clutching his nose as blood trickled down from it.

  “I didn’t know Depression Agents could still bleed,” I taunted him. Lucas only chuckled. I looked closer at the blood and saw why: The blood started to change into wisps of smoke as they dropped from his hand. The wisps flew up to his leg and formed a new foot where my whip tore the old one off.

  “We can still turn things around,” he said, pushing himself to his feet. He took a step towards me, his body morphing back and forth between smoke and his actual body, like it did on the swing. I stood up, pulling my paintbrush back out. The fresh paint stretched out into a thick whip again.

  “Woah, wait!” Lucas held up his hands in defense. “That was him; that was the Voice taking over! I swear I’m not him.” He sounded genuine, and a little scared. It caught me off guard. I couldn’t help but lower my whip a little.

  “Lucas, I—”

  “We can still prove him wrong, Lucy! We can escape, while I still have control.” Lucas said, looking behind him. There was nothing there but grayness. “The last time you tried to escape, it only got you here. Chloe and I aren’t going anywhere.” Lucas grabbed his head and yelled. “AGH! You need to stop being such a foolish little sister and trust me!” As he yelled, the Zone around us shook like an earthquake. At first, I thought it was Lucas, but he looked just as shocked as I did. He didn’t let it faze him, though. Lucas ran at me, one hand on his head and the other reaching for me. With each step, his body slowly morphed to a smoke form.

  I flung my whip at him, an uneasy feeling filling me as I made the movement. The Zone shook again, and everything felt like it was moving through molasses. A little ways in front of me, Lucas was frozen where he stood; half of his body solid and the other half swirling around in smoke. Then he started to fall forward, before my whip even reached him. He hit the ground in slow motion. I looked around as fast as I could turn my head for anything that might have caused it, but I saw nothing.