by C. C. Bolick
With each destructing particle, there must be a way to release the energy safely. I couldn’t just collapse the field on itself as I did before.
Or maybe I could. If I could get time to go slowly enough, the neutrons were effectively stationary, and my methods from before would work.
As time moved closer to zero, so did my chances of stopping this bomb safely. At some point, I realized Mama no longer flew with me. Fear of being alone caught me off-guard. The powerful burst was enough to set the neutrons into motion.
I’d set the bomb off too soon.
The fear grew into a mighty cloud as I felt myself losing control. I felt the neutrons firing in every direction. Instead of setting off the bomb and then collapsing it on itself as I did before, I wrapped my arms around the bomb.
“What are you doing?” Mama yelled from faraway.
“Stopping the explosion,” I yelled back.
“You’re not strong enough to absorb the energy.”
Well, it wasn’t like I could die. And this task was meant to help me build my power. I gripped the bomb tighter. Time was crawling at a pace so slow Mama’s words seemed to stand still.
I held tight as the neutrons expanded in my grip. Then I closed my mind as if closing my fist and the level of energy rose to infinity.
Some of the energy burnt itself out in the form of a bright light while I defused the bomb. Some of the neutrons slammed into me, causing my body to pulse. I sped around the planet, making ten rounds, then a hundred.
Before I knew what had happened, I’d circled the planet more than a thousand times and the bomb was no more.
What I felt before had been only a taste of this new power. When I finally stopped, Mama appeared by my side.
“Your light is fading.”
“I’m getting tired.”
“Don’t let yourself burn out.” She took my hand. “I’ll get us back to the base.”
I nodded as the world around me faded. Sleep, I needed sleep.
When I opened my eyes, we stood in the operation center.
“The bomb is gone,” Tyler said. “Somehow Paleris has scrambled the signal. ETA is two minutes.”
“It’s no longer there,” Mama said. “They don’t know you got rid of the bomb.”
“Rena?” Erin whispered as she watched the screen. “She said she would stop it.”
“Release the power,” Mama said. “Target the base’s electrical system. Now, or you’ll fade with it.”
I held out my hands as if fumbling in the dark for the generators I knew existed underground. With a startled cry, I expelled everything I could and felt the lights around me go dim and then burn so brightly I had to close my eyes. The force brought me to my knees.
“That was strange,” Skip said. “The power readouts inside the base just hit a red-line max.”
“What does that mean?” Erin asked.
Skip laughed. “First, it means Rena must have stopped the bomb. Second, we just dumped enough power into the grid we won’t owe a bill until 2045.”
Chapter Seven
Rena
I was revved, energized. I wanted to see Travis. If I could ask Mama to help us communicate… Travis could see her. Yes, she could help me reach him.
Unfortunately, when I turned around, she was gone. People moved around the room in a flurry as they tried to verify the bomb had indeed disappeared from their radar.
“Erin.” When she didn’t look my way, I approached and waved a hand in front of her face. She didn’t notice me.
Had I expelled all of my energy when I followed Mama’s order? Now I really was alone.
Where had Mama gone? Maybe back to Bethany’s body. If that was the case, I’d probably find her with Dad or Alfie.
Earlier I’d avoided Travis since I didn’t want to see him in pain. Maybe it was time to get over my issues. Yeah, I was dead. But he was hurting worse than I’d ever seen. If I doubted his feelings before, I didn’t doubt them now.
The look on his face before I left the conference room flashed in my head. I’d never seen him so close to losing control. He couldn’t afford to lose control, not with the world ending tomorrow. We had to figure out his dad’s plan including our part in all of this.
Some of my part was clear. A series of tasks to build my strength like Mama and the two of us could save the planet. How to stop a star from collapsing? That part was a little hazy.
If only I could talk to Travis. Even as I pictured his face, I knew my power wouldn’t take me to him. I’d drained my strength and had no idea when the gas tank might refuel. I could only hope it would be less than twenty-four hours.
Instead of taking myself to Travis with my thoughts, I followed an agent who was headed for the elevator out of the op-center. However, it took riding the elevator with fifteen separate passengers before the doors opened on his floor. I ran to his room and barely missed the doors closing.
At the door to his room, I stood dumbfounded. The door had been ripped from the hinges and sat propped against the frame at the perfect angle for me to slip into the room. Only one person had enough strength to cause this damage. Angel must have forced her way in.
Inside, Travis lay across the couch.
“Sleep,” he mumbled. “Please let me sleep.” Travis threw an arm over his face. Why didn’t he turn off the lights?
Seeing him made me feel happy. We’d find a way to make this work between us; I wasn’t ready to give up. “If you sleep, I can find you.”
After a few minutes of tossing and turning, he stood and walked into his bedroom. I moved out of his way. On the bed, he lifted his phone from the nightstand and navigated to a picture of us from our day at the hotel. The top corner of the screen showed ten forty-five, which meant I’d been dead for three hours.
He stared at the phone.
“Hurry up and go to sleep,” I said.
“I didn’t know,” he said. “I have the power to see the future and I didn’t know Van was going to shoot you. This is my fault.”
His words brought a smile to my face, at the same time I filled with dread. No one could reasonably place blame on him for my death, but leave it to Travis to find a way. We didn’t have time for his guilt trip.
He placed the phone on the table and I swatted the case. The phone barely moved, but it did move. Instead of looking at the phone, he stared at the ceiling.
Okay, maybe that meant my powers were rebooting. I didn’t feel tired anymore. Actually, I felt like I wouldn’t need sleep for days.
“Where are you, Rena?”
“I’m right here, Double-oh-Seven.”
“Erin said you came back. Why haven’t you come to see me?”
Irritation rose within me. Didn’t he think I’d try? “Go to sleep, Travis.”
He rolled over and pulled a pillow over his head. I watched for several moments before approaching the bed. Reaching for his soft brown hair, I felt desperate for a way to help him relax. Anything to wipe the pain off his face.
Travis rolled out of the bed and to his feet before I could touch him. Between the bedroom and the kitchen, he used every swear word I knew. Cussed himself, our situation. How he sucked as an agent and how the universe was working against us.
He cussed the queen for ruining his life and Van for taking me away. He cussed everyone who had lied to him—that list took a while.
I tried to get his attention by spinning one of the chairs at the bar, but the back felt like it weighed a ton. Again, I tried with all my energy and the chair turned slightly.
Travis glanced my way and stared at the chair for a long moment.
“It’s me, you idiot,” I yelled. “I’m standing right here.”
Instead of looking at me he walked to the chair and knocked it over. The chair slammed against the floor. Then Travis picked up items from the counter and threw them at the far wall. A metal coffee mug, an unused plate that shattered. He swore as the threw every loose item he could put his hands on.
His anger
peaked as he stormed into the living room and ripped his favorite pictures from the walls around the couch and shattered the glass on the floor. With a huff, he glanced around at the mess and went back to his bedroom. In the lower drawer of the table next to his bed, Travis removed a small bottle of dark liquid.
Liquor. I knew before he opened the bottle and took a drink. Dad had kept a bottle like that in the table next to his bed, though much larger.
Dad’s drinking had ruined my life after Mama died. Travis, of all people, knew my deep hatred for alcohol.
He removed the lid and tipped up the bottle. When he lowered the bottle, he choked and wiped the tears that had filled his eyes. Travis sat on the bed and leaned back against the headboard.
I loved Travis more than I ever thought possible, but I couldn’t stand to watch his destruction. Tears filled my eyes. Before he could take another drink, I knocked his phone from the table.
He paused with the drink near his lips. “You’re here, aren’t you? You finally come back and what do you see? Me drinking.” He laughed. “Go away, Rena. You don’t want to see me like this.”
I thought of myself out of the room. It didn’t matter where, but I had to escape.
That he chose the drink over me felt worse than the fact I couldn’t touch him.
* * * * *
The med-level was far from my favorite floor of the base, but I needed to see Rachelle. Inside her room, she lay across the bed in a similar white gown as I wore during my stay there. She looked so peaceful, as if she’d sleep forever.
During my short time at the agency, we’d become fast friends. She’d encouraged me to fight to stay who I was and not let any of the government bureaucracy change me. Her power was special—she could affect the temperature though sometimes she struggled to control it.
When Rachelle used her power, it destroyed her mind bit-by-bit. Although she knew the damage would be unrepairable, Sylvia still sent her on the mission to the sun. Rachelle used her power to save everyone on that ship, including me, Van, and Agent Dallas. That last burst was more than Rachelle could handle.
Looking back, I wasn’t surprised Sylvia hid the truth about Rachelle’s condition and encouraged her to go on the mission. If she could abandon Rachelle to face a permanent coma, it was no surprise she did nothing to save me.
To Rachelle’s side, a machine beeped with a steady stream of pulses from her heart. The lines looked normal enough; the sheet covered her still form up to her chest. Her arms lay at her sides. An IV port hung from the crease of her arm near her elbow. The IV pump wasn’t connected.
“You too?” Behind me, Erin entered the room.
“You can see me now?” I asked.
“Yes.”
Back in the operation center, I noticed she’d changed out of the jeans and t-shirt she wore on the plane, though I was too busy with the bomb to consider the implications of her new position. She looked the part of agent, not doctor. How had Sylvia known Erin would have what it took to step up?
Why make her acting director? Sylvia had dozens of agents with more experience. Why was keeping Erin at the agency so important?
Tyler.
Was Sylvia trying some twisted psychology to get her to stay for Tyler’s sake? On the plane, Erin had been set on leaving Atlanta for good. She’d only come back for my sake.
No, I told myself. Sylvia wouldn’t put Erin in a position she couldn’t handle for Tyler’s sake. No one heartless enough to let Van kill me would care. Plus, her grandson left because he betrayed the agency and almost got Travis killed. Travis had insisted that no one would accept Tyler back. But seeing him at the conference room table and in the op-center—no one looking on would think he didn’t belong here.
There had to be a good reason for Sylvia to step down as director and place her duties on Erin’s shoulder.
Erin touched Rachelle’s hair. “I’ve done everything I can. No matter what test I run, I can’t find anything wrong with her.”
“Maybe she’s tired,” I said.
“She’ll be lucky if she can sleep through tomorrow.”
“Is that why you left the base? You were afraid you couldn’t save her?”
Erin turned and revealed the tears lining her eyes. “That’s part of the reason. I thought with Rachelle I could make a difference at this agency.”
“Sylvia told you that other doctors had reviewed the case. The chances of you finding something they missed were almost nonexistent.”
“It’s not fair that she has to give everything to save the team. She might never wake up.”
“Since when is life fair?”
“I’m so sorry, Rena. I’m complaining about Rachelle not waking up and you have given everything. I keep forgetting you’re dead.”
“That’s hilarious. First Travis starts drinking and now you forget I’m a ghost.”
She put a hand on one of Rachelle’s. “I know you don’t like people drinking, but you’ve got to give him some understanding. Do you realize what he’s had to deal with?”
“Yes,” I reluctantly said.
“I don’t know why Sylvia gave me this promotion. There’s nothing more I can do for this agency.”
“In the op-center, you seemed in control. You worked with Tyler as if… Well, you know why that seems crazy.”
Erin nodded. “I realized we didn’t have time to deal with the past. I gave orders, he backed me up, and you stopped the bomb. I guess together we all make a great team.”
“See, that’s what makes you different. Most people couldn’t deal with the shock. You don’t think you can make a difference here, but I do. Doesn’t my opinion count?”
“Maybe.” She half-smiled. “Twenty-four hours and my time will be up.”
I remembered how tired she’d sounded on the plane. “Maybe then you can get some sleep.”
“I was wiped out until you got in my head. Now I feel like I can go for days without sleeping. How about you? What will you do when the world is over?”
“Hopefully we’re successful and the world doesn’t end. If it does, I don’t know what happens to me next.”
“Could someone die if they’re already dead?”
“Maybe I cease to exist.” A chill came over me as I approached the bed and stared into Rachelle’s sleeping face. “Do you remember when you talked about the moral implications of my mother taking over someone’s body?”
“Yeah.”
“What would you say if I borrowed someone’s body? Say, for instance, a person in a coma?”
“I’ve been wondering the same thing since I walked through the door.”
“It would only be for a little while,” I said. “Then I could see everyone. They could see me. I could touch Travis again.”
She gripped Rachelle’s hand. “I keep thinking if I squeeze her hand enough, she’ll squeeze back. If only there was something I could do. If someone can get inside of her head...”
“My mom tried. She couldn’t find Rachelle. She described her head as a series of empty halls.”
“No one fully understands why her power destroyed her mind. Or why the healing properties of Angel’s blood didn’t bring her back. I guess there’s always a downside to having a power.”
I laughed. “To unlock mine, I had to be dead.”
“It could have been worse.”
“I don’t see how.” I put a hand on Rachelle’s head and Erin stepped back. “It’s worth a shot.”
“You’re on your own with this one. I’m not sure about this from a doctor’s standpoint or acting director.”
“This may be my only chance to communicate with Travis. I’ve got to talk to him before he really does hurt someone.”
Erin closed the door and then the blinds. “You think he’s capable of killing?”
My stomach churned at her words, though I was sure the feeling wasn’t real. I closed my eyes and tried to remember how I broke into Erin’s head.
* * * * *
Travis
Rena was dead and I could never change that. Had she come to my room to see me? If so, she must have realized I was no longer the person she fell in love with. There was no going back now. I changed out of the clothes I’d hastily put on this morning and into one of my suits.
I put my gun in the holster inside my jacket. Then I slid on my sunglasses. Better if no one saw how close I felt to falling apart.
At the elevator, I pressed the buttons for the isolation floor. How long would it take them to stop me? On a whim, I tried to teleport but nothing happened. No powers yet, but the clock was winding down on their return.
I could wait no longer to see the look in Van’s eyes. If he was crushed under the weight of guilt for Rena’s death, as Sylvia said, I had to know for sure.
At the isolation floor, I walked down the long hall. After being locked in one of these rooms, I’d rather be almost anywhere than on this floor. But I’d make this walk worthwhile.
The hall was empty; if I moved quickly, no doctors or nurses would notice me. Each window to my right and left held a prisoner locked behind an electronically sealed door, most with a power the agency was unable to control. The rooms consisted of white walls and floors, along with a bed that had no sheets. Exactly how I would expect a mental hospital to look. Less than a week ago, Sylvia had me captured and placed in one of these rooms. Now wasn’t the time to figure out which one.
About five rooms down to my right, I stopped before a four-by-four square of glass that was nearly impossible to shatter. Inside, Van sat on a bed wearing the same white outfit given to all guests of the isolation floor. The outfit was perfect to make anyone on the outside think the patient had escaped from a mental institution.
He stared at the window as I stared through the thick glass. While an observer from outside could see in, he couldn’t see out. Telling myself that didn’t stop the chill from climbing my neck as he watched the glass. I pushed the feelings away. Emotions got good agents killed.
I couldn’t shake the feeling he stared at my face.
Next to the door was a control pad. The lighted number keys would give anyone with the code entry to this room. I doubted any of my codes were still active, and I felt sure the moment I typed in one of those codes someone would notice me. Glancing up and down the hall, I wondered how soon one of the staff would see me.
