Mercy Strange

by Alisa Woods

  Mercy’s heart stuttered—Tobin was winding up to something. “Swift…”

  “I know.” His finger was to his ear, and he was listening to his FBI chatter while his gaze was still locked on Violet Thorn. “He’s in the building,” Swift whispered to her and Nia.

  Hurry! Mercy silently prayed. The FBI needed to get to Tobin before he set off whatever he was planning.

  On the screen, Tobin had leaned back, looking smug. “I didn’t have billions of research dollars or thousands of research scientists at my disposal. I wasn’t from a powerful High Magick family like, say, the Strange family.” He sneered as he said her family’s name. “What I had was the essence of what magick is… Genius.” The smirk was back. “So, my colleagues, I’ve come to you today to announce that I’ve made a breakthrough. I am the first—the first among adepts of any Talent, the first from any magickal family, any research facility—the first to have decoded one of the great mysteries of our science. Our mystical art.” He paused again, and the smirk broadened into a savoring smile. “I have the key to turn on any Talent in any person. Adept or simple. Young or old. I have decoded the magickal genome, and I hold in my hand an ability like no other before me.” He held up his hand, palm up as if suddenly fascinated by it. “The power is extraordinary.”

  Mercy gripped Swift’s arm and squeezed. “Take her out,” she whispered. She leaned into the ramping-up panic in her chest, knowing that Swift would hear that, too. “Take Violet out now.”

  “What’s your status?” Swift demanded of his cuff mic. His eye twitched as he listened. “They’re almost there,” he whispered to her.

  The crowd had grown still. People were exchanging frowns as if they couldn’t quite believe what they had just heard.

  Tobin turned his hand palm forward, toward the screen. “This power is deep genomic magick. The perfect melding of science and magick and medicine. I can literally reach inside your genetic code…” He reached his hand toward the screen as if grabbing for the audience. His hand loomed large in front of the camera, briefly obscuring his face, then he drew it back and clenched it tight into a fist. “And take any Talent you possess.”

  A small rumble went through the audience.

  “But that’s not the most wondrous part,” Tobin breathed. His eyes glittered as he stared into the camera like the madman he was. Where was the fucking FBI? “I can also give you Talents you’ve never possessed. I can reach into your genome and turn on your grandfather’s Talent for alchemy or your great-grandmother’s Talent for manipulating fire. This technology I’ve developed can—without error—find the magickal Talents you have buried in your genome and turn them on, as easy as flipping a switch.” He paused, and the room erupted.

  “What is he saying?” “How can that be?” “What the fuck is he talking about—”

  “Please!” Eliphas’s amplified voice rose above the din. “What Dr. Raine is saying is… extraordinary… but let’s hear him out.” He raised his hands to the crowd as if to calm them, but to what purpose? Tobin was sending the room into a panic, and he hadn’t even done anything. Yet.

  “Where are they?” Mercy demanded of Swift, but he just shook his head. “I’m shutting this down,” she added, then lurched toward the front tables where Eliphas was still standing with his hands in the air, and Violet was still demurely hunched behind the screen with Tobin’s leering face.

  “Mercy!” Swift grabbed her and short-circuited her focus, just as she opened her mouth to let the whisper come out and stop Violet from enacting whatever foul thing she and her lover, Tobin, had devised. Their scuffle at the front was hardly noticed in the general chaos of the room, but then Tobin’s voice boomed louder above all of it.

  “Do you want proof?”

  Oh, fuck, no. Mercy grabbed hold of Swift’s jacket and held him close, looking him square in the eyes. “Now, Swift.” Either he would do it or she would. He would hear her raw determination, her panic, and every other emotion roiling through her.

  He held her gaze for an instant then shifted focus to Violet, still lurking behind the screen. Mercy turned in time to see her crumple to the floor, curling into a ball of whatever terror or horror or emotional abyss Swift had sent her tumbling into.

  No one noticed.

  “I have proof for you,” Tobin went on, undaunted, and probably unaware that his assistant in this macabre game had just been sidelined. The room was holding its breath, staring at his face looming on the screen. “Every one of you has already been exposed to the unique delivery system of which I am the sole creator and designer—I am the first to give you the Gift which every man, woman, and child on the planet will soon be clamoring to possess. Today, you have the supreme privilege of demonstrating to the world the efficacy of that Gift—my Gift. Together—my genius and your mere presence—we will show that the power to bestow magick is rightfully in the hands of man and not the hands of fate. But first… before I show you how much you have to gain…” He raised his hand again, touching his thumb to his middle finger. “First, you will see how much you stand to lose. Just… like… that.”

  Then he snapped his fingers.

  And a collective gasp shook the room.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Swift felt the moment his Talent died.

  One second, he was keeping Violet Thorn incapacitated on the floor, drowning in a pool of her own misery, and the next… it was like part of him had been amputated. The fear and jealousy and anger thrumming the air had ceased. He could still hear the raucous physical sounds of panic—the whispers and shouts and accusations—but the constant music of his Talent, his perception of the emotional soundscape surrounding him, was gone.

  With the snap of Tobin Raine’s fingers on a video monitor.

  How was that even possible?

  Swift shook his head, trying to erase the feeling of being muffled by the absence of emotional sound. Mercy had released him, but she was staring, mouth open, at Violet Thorn as she unsteadily rose from where she’d crumpled to the floor. The room was in utter chaos. People were up out of their seats, shouting at each other and the screen, Eliphas vainly trying to establish calm up front, the FBI screaming in Swift’s earbud. Mercy was stalking Violet like a dangerous animal, creeping up on her one step at a time. Swift could see Mercy’s mouth moving, even if he couldn’t hear her words in the cacophony of the room. She was trying to stop Violet, but her whisper magick was having no effect.

  Because it was gone.

  He could see the panic on the attendees’ faces as they each were discovering, one by one, that their Talent—the thing they relied upon for their work, their entire careers in med-magick—had been snuffed out. His brain was still reeling—how had Tobin gotten through to everyone, even him—when a louder bang grabbed his attention. It came from the screen that still showed Tobin’s face, only his smug expression had been wiped away by fury. Shouts came through the speaker. FBI! HANDS IN THE AIR! NO MAGICK! But Tobin just lurched to standing—all Swift could see was the man from the shoulders down, but that gave a spectacular view of the volley of magickal energy he let loose. This was no ordinary crackle of blue but some purplish plasma and orangish fire. Screams rang out from the screen, riveting everyone in the room, then shots—

  They all watched as Tobin’s body jerked rapidly and fell from view.

  The entire room froze.

  Except for one form—Violet. She was making a run for the door.

  Swift’s sidearm was out in an instant. “Freeze!” he shouted, swinging it toward her. “FBI! You’re under—”

  Violet flicked her hands at him, and a blue-white stream of electrical energy arced through the air and connected with Swift’s gun. The lightning bolt zapped through his body and flung him in the air, whiting everything out in a sudden static that overloaded every sense. He barely felt his body land among the chairs, collapsing them and tumbling to the floor. He could see nothing—the world had turned electric white. He couldn’t hear or feel. The only sense he had was tas
te… and it was only burnt ash in his mouth, choking him. He couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t move. And now that he wasn’t moving, blocked off from anything and everything, even his Talent gone, unable to tell him if anyone was near…

  Was he dead?

  The suffocation of zero sensation roared at him. If only he could move. Just as the panic set in, he was suddenly in motion. Something, someone—hands, he could feel them—were turning him over and laying him flat. He had this weird sense of body location, a distant feeling of pressure on his chest, someone touching his face…

  The sound came back first. “Oh my God, no, please…” It was Mercy’s voice. Then his vision swam back, a muddy pool of white mist that cleared around her beautiful face, looming over him. Someone else was pushing on his chest, but Mercy leaned above him, one hand on his forehead, the other on his chin, tilting his head back. She dropped her mouth down on his, and he thought for a moment she was kissing him, but then she blew air into him… and that’s when his brain figured out they were trying to resuscitate him. The next moment, his lungs sucked in air, sudden and hard and painful. Whoever was on his chest eased off, and Mercy pulled back. He was gasping so hard, he couldn’t speak, so he just reached for her. That was a disaster, his hand just flopping around, but she gave a small shriek—for joy, he hoped—and then put both hands to his face.

  “Holy magick, Swift.” Tears shone in her eyes. “I thought we’d lost you.” He probably owed his life to her. The CPR hadn’t hurt at the time, but as his senses came roaring back… Holy fuck, everything hurt.

  “Wha…” His tongue was definitely not working. He tried to swallow and rise up at the same time. The swallowing just made him choke, but that heaving actually helped with getting up to sitting.

  “What are you doing?” Mercy growled at him. “You were fucking dead a moment ago. Lie back and settle down!”

  “Mkay.” But he meant he was okay not that yes, he would lie down because he needed to know what the hell was happening.

  Mercy scowled but shifted from yelling to helping by slipping her arm around his shoulders and keeping him from keeling over. Damn, whatever Violet hit him with hurt like hell. Which a niggling part of his brain said was all kinds of wrong, but he couldn’t think about that right now.

  Nia knelt down near him and used the edge of her jacket to pick up a still-smoldering hunk of metal. “Your gun took the worst of it.” She cocked a look at Swift. “The others weren’t as lucky as you.”

  Others? But as Swift blinked to clear his still-blurry vision, he could see people gathered near the doors, where two bodies lay, faint smoke rising from them. The security officers—undercover FBI—in the hall…

  Mercy lifted her chin to Nia. “That was military-grade magick.”

  “Oh, hell yes, it was.” She let Swift’s mangled gun drop back to the carpet. “They had no time to draw their weapons or use their Talents. Although, if they’re like the rest of us…” She just shook her head. “They probably didn’t realize their Talents were gone until it was too late. I doubt anyone could stop her.”

  The muffled silence of Swift’s Talent zoomed back to his awareness. He still could hear nothing. Not the concern evident on Mercy’s face. Or the palpable anger rolling off Nia’s straightened shoulders. The emotional soundscape of the room was silent.

  He swallowed down more of the chalky taste. “Your Talent,” he tried to say to Mercy, but just coughed.

  She shook her head, eyes dulled. “I’ve wished for years for it to…” She looked away. “Didn’t think I would miss it.”

  He automatically reached for her. She was right next to him on the floor of the conference room, among the scattered chairs and milling, dazed scientists, but he needed more… his hand on her arm, some contact, something to replace that sure knowledge of what she was feeling in that moment.

  She looked back at him and grimaced. “I didn’t mean for you to go after Violet. I mean, I did, but I didn’t think…”

  He squeezed her arm. “My job.” His mouth was working again.

  “But you nearly died.” Her face was scrunching up with the attempt at not crying. Maybe. Or was she angry at him for trying to stop Violet? Normally, he could hear everything she felt—now he was half blind, stumbling through.

  “S’okay,” he mumbled, not sure if that was the right thing to say. Holy fuck, was he going to spend the rest of his life like this? Bumbling through—

  “My friends.” Eliphas’s voice cut through the dazed noise of the room. “I know this is all a shock. I’m in shock like the rest of you.” He stood in front of the table where the screen still displayed Tobin’s room. A SWAT FBI jacket obscured the view for a moment. “All of this is startling and disturbing and almost too difficult to believe.” As he spoke, Eliphas used one hand to slowly collapse the screen back into the briefcase Violet had brought. She’d never touched the thing—Swift had been watching her the whole time. She never moved a muscle. Tobin had activated the switch—and by a fucking snap of his fingers. How was that even possible?

  And now he was dead.

  “But Dr. Raine, for all his faults, for all his…” Eliphas rested his hand on the closed briefcase for a moment, almost in benediction over it, then looked back at the crowd—a crowd that had left their dazed wandering to pay attention to him. “For all his obvious insanity,” Eliphas continued in a hushed, almost reverent tone, “he did accomplish something extraordinary.”

  “What are you saying?” someone shouted from the back. Swift didn’t need his Talent to hear the anger in the words.

  Eliphas spread his hands. “You feel it, don’t you?” He stepped forward from the table, approaching a disheveled woman—a scientist by the standard adept clothing she wore—and gently took one of her hands. “The absence.” He peered into her eyes. “The Talent you’ve had all your life is now… missing.” The woman pulled her hand away and stepped back. Eliphas spread his arms wide as if embracing everyone in the conference room. “You all feel it. Don’t you?”

  The murmur then the silence were all the answers he got.

  “Dr. Raine was… misguided… in his fervent attempts to decode the mystical art of the magick that dwells in each of us.” Tobin lowered his arms slightly. “But he was not entirely wrong to make the attempt. I’ve long said that all the Talents are accessible to those who believe—who worked to bridge the veil and access their higher Magick. Even for simples, the unfortunate ones of our world. And clearly, the exciting science produced by Tobin Raine, however ill-gotten, represents the leap forward I have been foretelling would come. My divination has never led me astray.”

  Eliphas’s words sent a shiver through him—Swift couldn’t be sure if it was just the shock of being blasted nearly across that veil between life and death or what. But then Mercy flicked him a look. If a man like Eliphas Storm got hold of the bioweapons Tobin Raine developed—

  “I know, I know.” Eliphas’s hands were up, placating the murmurs of the crowd again. “It seems impossible. But can’t you see it, my friends? Every last one of us deserves to have the Talents you were born with… and so much more. The tyranny of your DNA, the fate of your biology, is not immutable. It need not rule over you, determining your status in this world, any longer. From all my studies, all my travels… I know the impossible is merely that which we have not yet dared to dream.”

  Nia glanced down at where Swift was sitting and rolled her eyes. Mercy’s expression was pinched. Swift felt well enough to maybe stand, and walking out on this particular bullshit of Eliphas’s had some appeal, so he tried to grab the seat of a nearby chair and hoist himself into it.

  “I realize you are scientists…” Eliphas continued.

  Mercy scrambled to help him, but he was fine, except for a burn on his hand, which cried out its complaint. And which was in the shape of his service weapon.

  “And that your faith is not yet realized into its fullest form…”

  Eliphas really needed to read the room. And shut the fuck up
.

  Swift leaned back in the chair he’d managed to climb into—every muscle of his body complained about every movement. Outside, in the hall, a couple med-magick medics hustled up with their bag of equipment and a stretcher. They stalled out and stared at the fallen bodies that Violet had blasted with her military-grade magick. The clothes were still smoking. Which reminded Swift… he dug the earbud out of his ear. It was shorted out and not working anyway. He dropped it on the carpet.

  “But before the healers come in to tend to your physical wounds,” Eliphas continued, “you can borrow my faith, gentle friends. For I believe in your divine right to those Talents you cherish… and so much more.” Then the man closed his eyes and raised his hands above his bald head and, in apparent benediction over the crowd, he began to whisper. Swift squinted at him—fucking lunatic—and he couldn’t quite make out the words, but then a woman from the far side of the room gasped.

  She had a small ball of magickal energy floating above her hand.

  Swift leaned forward in his chair to get a better look. “What the—”