The Enhanced Series Boxset

by T. C. Edge

  And then, in I step.

  The room I find before me is fairly large and well appointed. Yet all those appointments are functional and not decorative, each item of furniture playing its role. Right ahead, I find a desk with two chairs in front of it. And behind is a third, occupied by the woman my whim has sent me here to see.

  Her features are fairly kindly, and her posture is a little wider and more squat than most Savants. I suppose, even with the most rigorous of training regimes, age does eventually catch up with you. She’s proof of that, her maturing years stretching out her frame and adding some fat to her bones.

  Given her position, she’s also capable of displaying some measure of emotion, or at least attempting it. My sudden arrival, however, has sent a small frown to her greying brows that is far from artificial.

  “And who might you be, exactly? I wasn’t expecting anyone, let alone a member of Outer Haven.”

  Her voice is rather nice, which is another welcome surprise. It’s soft and helps to set me at ease as I allow the door to shut behind me.

  “Sorry for disturbing you, Mrs Humbert. But I am actually a member of the High Tower now, only recently of course, but still. My name is Mrs Shaw, and I’m here to give you a message.”

  She sits up and back in her seat. She’s several metres away from me still, off across the room. Too far for me to manipulate her from here.

  I take a small step forward. Somehow, however, she appears to distrust me.

  “I didn’t tell you to approach, Mrs Shaw,” comes her voice. It’s not so nice anymore, a harshness brewing within it.

  “Of course,” I say, stopping.

  “Now what is this message you wish to give me?”

  I see her left hand hovering towards the desk. Part of it glows with a screen, my Hawk-eyes picking up a flash of red.

  An alarm, maybe? Has she seen through my façade? Is my presence here so unusual to call for backup?

  With my heart-rate beginning to climb, I test my theory by taking another small step forward. Her fingers react by closing in on the screen. Yet her eyes stick on mine, and I wonder if she’s a Mind-Manipulator too, and whether trying to put her under my command was an idea that was never going to work.

  As her fingers continue to slip towards that little dash of shallow red, I take a punt. I need to grab her attention, and it needs to be now.

  “It’s about the assassination of Commander Fenby,” I say.

  Her hand stops. Her eyes narrow. She leans forward just a little, and I take another small step as she does.

  “What about it?” she asks.

  “I…I have information that may help you find the culprits.”

  I’m winging it, making it up on the spot.

  But it seems to be working.

  “And why would you come to me? I am not a member of the security force.”

  I have no answer for her, but I hope I won’t need one. I take another step, my enhanced vision capable of keeping a firm eye on every millimetre of movement she makes.

  Once more, her fingers creep towards the red dash on the flat screen of her desk.

  “Well?” she asks. “Why have you come to me?”

  I have no answer. I need no answer.

  With a sudden swell within my body, the Dasher side of me surges forward, sending me right at her desk with a rush of air that has her greying hair flowing wildly. My movement is swift enough to prevent any sort of reaction, her body stuck in time as I grab her wrist and pull her hand away from the screen.

  As I do so, I grab the other, and watch as her eyes widen gradually as the room moves back to full speed. And just as my Dasher powers shut off, something far more powerful takes its place, and I skip straight into her head in a bid to take command.

  I’m able to do so without much of a fight. This woman is no Mind-Manipulator, just a regular old Savant getting on with her duty. My order flows through her, telling her to sit calmly and quietly and obey my verbal commands. It sinks into her consciousness and I withdraw to find my latest subject under my control.

  And standing there in front of her desk, my eyes drop to the red marking on the screen, and a laugh begins to gurgle up through my body.

  It’s not an alarm at all, but merely a trick of the light caused by the sun, shining through the window at her back.

  She watches me as I giggle and shake my head, just another empty vessel here for me to fill in any manner I see fit. But there’s only a single order I need to give her, a single directive I need to impart.

  And so that’s what I do.

  Task completed, and onto the next.

  The big one is fast approaching.

  109

  I sit in the apartment once more, alone. The pieces are all set, the pawns advancing. And me, the queen, waits to strike.

  My next move will be checkmate.

  At least I hope it will…

  On the sofa beside me lies a gun. It’s a more old fashioned pistol, one that shoots physical bullets, and not the rounds of pulse energy that are often deployed. I’ve seen a couple like it before, but have never shot one.

  It stares up at me, taunting me, calling for me to caress its handle.

  I take a grip, and flick a little button on its underside, and the end of the barrel alters its shape, a silencer extending. It’s a feature I’ll need to make use of later should I want to do the deed in silence.

  The weapon was easy enough to get. It took time, only, but not much effort. After a fair amount of searching, I discovered a suitable subject alone on my favourite level, wandering through the gardens in order to give himself a little boost of energy.

  He was a member of the City Guard, a normal man besides his single sensory modification. In this case, his sense of hearing was quite powerful, his abilities as a Bat allowing him to never, ever be crept up on.

  I didn’t need to. I just struck up a conversation with the man and found out that he was on a break. For a few minutes, we even walked together around the level, wandering through those beautiful and life giving gardens, discussing with some unexpected candour how little the Savants truly appreciate the place.

  I kept looking for an opportunity for us to be completely alone, and lured him towards some of the heavier canopies provided by a collection of low palm trees on the northern side. There, I first took possession of his mind, and then I took possession of his gun.

  I left him, as I did Ingrid Humbert, without any recollection of my presence, installing in his mind the belief that he’d merely left his side-arm at home or in his private storage unit at the City Guard HQ. By the time he discovers that neither is the case, it will be far too late.

  That was a little while ago. And for the last couple of hours I’ve been here, in silence, just staring at the gun and the clock on the wall, alternating my gaze between the two.

  The time is quickly speeding now, going far faster than I’ve ever known it to go. And with each passing minute, my nerves grow more jangled, my heart thuds more aggressively, and my breathing continues to shallow.

  There’s nothing for me to do but wait. Wait and think. I consider contacting my brother, but turn against the thought. Hearing his voice may do nothing but weaken and distract me. And right now, I need to put my mind to nothing but the thought of pulling that trigger.

  It’s past 6PM now, and in less than an hour, Ingrid Humbert will be rising up in the lift and stopping at level 51. I have no doubt any more in my powers, in my ability to command an order, even one that requires precise timing.

  I’ve been through so much here this last week that I know, unequivocally, that Humbert will be here to collect me. And when those doors open, and she sees me step in, she won’t wonder why, or try to stop me.

  Oh no. She’s mine now, and she’ll willingly lead me up to assassinate her master.

  Assassinate.

  The word flows about in my head, mostly in another form: murder. In an hour’s time, I’m going to kill a man, take a life, send a bullet straight
into a brain.

  Whatever the man’s done, and will do, and whatever I’ve promised, it remains a hard thing for me to compute. Zander taught me that manipulating someone to do something against their nature is the hardest thing or all. And here I am, about to do something that’s as far from my own nature as I could imagine.

  But I will do it. I will pull that trigger, and watch the blood splatter. I will callously watch a man die. Because yes, he does deserve it. And yes, it will save lives.

  But still, that doesn’t make it easy.

  The clock seems to click louder in my head as it sit there. Which is odd, really, because it’s not actually making a sound at all. It’s in my head, the clicking, an endless countdown that’s been there for some time.

  Only now, it’s growing louder, pounding inside my skull as the seconds add up to minutes, and the minutes crawl their way towards an hour.

  The ticking is only broken when Adryan returns. He rushes in quickly and stops before me, his eyes turning straight to the gun in my hand. Surveying my expression, studying me like he did when we first met, and like he’s done so often since, he quickly determines that I’ve done what I’ve had to. That the pieces are in place and ready for the final act.

  He sits beside me in silence, and for a good few minutes no words come. And then, gently, his voice whispers.

  “Are you ready?” he asks.

  I dip my chin and say: “Yes,” with all the decisiveness and finality I can muster.

  And then I turn my eyes to his and ask: “Are you?”

  The question isn’t about him having to kill, but about leaving this place, leaving this building. He’s never stepped foot beyond the dividing wall, never walked the streets of Outer Haven. Just as much as mine, his world is about to change forever, one way or another.

  He nods like I did, and says: “I’ve been ready for a long time, Brie.”

  I know he has. For many years. Ever since his wife was taken from him he’s waited for this day, bided his time, worked from the inside in a bid to see Cromwell fall.

  And now, that effort has reached its zenith. And it’s time for me to act.

  Standing from the sofa, I take a long breath and begin to pace. I have to shed some of this nervous energy, to make sure my hand is steady when it pulls the trigger.

  I find myself moving to my room and looking upon my parents’ faces. Taking the picture off the wall, I whisper in the quiet: “Give me strength,” before kissing them both, folding the photograph in two, and depositing it into my pocket for safekeeping.

  I migrate from room to room as the time grows near, checking the clock each time I pass it. The minutes move like lightning, each circuit of the apartment seeming to strip several of them from the countdown.

  Adryan watches me and tries to offer some calming words, my agitation rising fast now. All over my head, the doubts spread, the worries and fears trying their best to throw me off course.

  I don’t give voice to them, don’t let them settle. I shake them free and pace harder, until Adryan halts me with his strong arms and firm gaze. Those silver eyes smoulder at me, and his presence helps to calm me. He doesn’t need to speak. Just that look in his eyes is enough to help me refocus.

  And when he does speak, this time it’s just a soft whisper.

  “It’s OK, Brie. You can do this. I’ll be right here, waiting for you.”

  He smiles a gorgeous smile, and draws me into his chest, and through one eye I glance again at the clock and find that it’s time for me to go. Releasing me, he moves to the sofa and collects the gun, before gently fixing it to my belt and concealing it beneath my shirt.

  It looks so odd, hidden beneath my current attire, and yet in my mind I’m wearing the rugged clothes from back home. I’m dressed as Zander might be, or one of the soldiers of the Nameless, wrapped up in black and looking fierce.

  In my head, I’m dressed like warrior, like an assassin.

  In my head, I’m dressed to kill.

  We walk to the door in silence, and Adryan turns me to him again. His lips move in, but not to mine. They glide across my forehead instead, before he fixes me with a final stare, his hands attached to my shoulders.

  “Finish this, Brie,” he whispers. “Finish it.”

  And with no response, no words forming in my head, I turn and open the door, and drift out into the corridor. Moving around the curved passageway, I head straight for the northern side, for the exact lift I ordered Humbert to take.

  I walk like a Savant, rigid and cold and upright, acting almost on autopilot now. The floor is quiet, although a couple of lifts open as I pass, people returning home from their workplaces and barely passing me a glance.

  Deep in my head, I hear a fluttering voice, and turn away from it. I can’t be distracted now, not now.

  I reach the northernmost side, now directly beneath Director Cromwell’s residence 50 floors above me, and stand before the lift. I check my watch a final time and know that Humbert will be arriving in moments only, her timekeeping precise enough to have her arrive at the exact instant I specified in her office.

  When I hear the whirring of the motors, my pulse gallops harder. She’ll be here in seconds, and I’ll step in. And only half a minute or so later, the doors will open on level 99, and I’ll be face-to-face with Cromwell.

  In a single minute, or maybe two, all of this will be done.

  It hardly seems real.

  The whirring grows a little louder, and then I hear the mechanism that controls the doors click, and they slide right open. The interior appears, and before me I see Ingrid W. Humbert, standing in the centre, barely registering my arrival.

  I step inside. Humbert’s voice issues a new command.

  “Level 99,” comes her soft but empty voice.

  The doors close, shutting me off. A part of me wants to tell her to stop, to let me out, but I say nothing. The lift begins to rise, and my lungs start to fill and spill with a renewed ferocity.

  And in my head, that fluttering voice sounds again, this time harder, louder, but still indistinct.

  It’s Zander. I can’t hear him, my mind all over the place.

  Report! I think I hear him say, his voice blurred. Brie…report!

  It makes no sense. He knows the plan. There’s nothing to report yet…

  I shut my eyes and picture his face, and the pathway between our minds opens up. And suddenly, surging into my head, his words come out loud and clear, clattering into my mind.

  And I realise, in that moment, he wasn’t saying report.

  He was saying abort.

  ABORT, BRIE, ABORT! he shouts, his words clear and deafening now. HE KNOWS YOU’RE COMING. IT’S A TRAP!

  A panic surges through every part of me. I turn to Humbert and my mouth opens and prepares to call for her to stop.

  But it’s too late. The lift is already slowing, stopping.

  And the door is opening.

  110

  All goes suddenly quiet. Ahead of me, the doors reveal darkness, a darkness even my Hawk-eyes have trouble seeing through.

  I blink hard and the room begins to grow in focus, a wide expanse ahead. My heart attempts to climb up my throat as Zander’s voice echoes in my ears, and into the silence, I whisper: “Take me down.”

  Humbert doesn’t react. Because she doesn’t have time to.

  From nowhere, two figures materialise, pouring inside the lift from the left and right. My instincts take over and I activate my Dasher powers, ready to defend myself as the shapes loom.

  But they loom too fast, my powers doing nothing to slow them. And as they come into view, and I see the dark cloaks and shining eyes, I know that they’re very much like me.

  Hybrids. Stalkers. The agents of Artemis Cromwell.

  In a flash of speed they scoop me up, each taking an arm. I kick out with my legs, thrashing and twisting and coiling my spare limbs, but it has no effect at all.

  Not on these warriors, these hunters.

  Not on these men d
esigned to kill.

  I’m dragged from the lift and into the wide room, and see that it’s filled with nothing but a large table and chairs, the rest of it silver and chrome and lifeless like everywhere else here.

  My voice surges from out of me, calling hopelessly for help, pouring forward to issue some aimless command at the old lady in the lift to give me some aid. It has no effect at all, my mouth quickly gagged by a mask and my arms forcefully dragged behind my back and locked in restraints.

  As my body is contorted, I turn my gaze on one of the Stalkers and find his otherworldly eyes staring back. I flash an order inside him as quickly as I can.

  ATTACK YOUR PARTNER. KILL YOUR PARTNER. SET ME FREE!

  A slashing palm ends my attempt, the man’s open hand connecting with devastating force on my cheek. A stab of pain cuts through the skin and flesh, leaving a terrible sting as a set of blacked-out goggles are quickly fixed over my eyes, blocking my ability to use my powers.

  I’m forcefully shoved forward, and hear a chair being moved. I’m pushed down into it, and then, suddenly, the four hands leave me and I hear the two men step off to one side.

  Silence falls, my gasping breath blocked by the gag. I turn left and right and attempt to stand. A rush of air blows from the right and I’m dragged straight down again, my legs tied and wrist restraints fixed to the chair.

  I struggle for a few more moments, screaming at the top of my lungs through the mask that covers my mouth. No sound escapes, only my heartbeat and the struggling sounds of my limbs giving any voice to the room.

  But soon, my thrashing ends, my limbs locked tight. The logical side of me calls for me to stop, but it’s not really reason or logic that directs it.

  It’s defeat. It’s failure.

  I’m about to be killed.

  I go still, and wait for the inevitable. A bullet to the head, most likely. Quick and easy and clean, that’s the way these people like to do things.

  Nothing happens. Only silence reigns.

  And then, it’s brief reign ends.

  Footsteps sound, tapping gently against the cold floor. They come from afar, ticking like a slow clock, creeping nearer, growing louder.