She let out a wail and sank to her knees.
“Take his feet!” Reese gasped. “Help me calm him down!”
The boy’s feet were thrashing. Somewhere, Diane found the inner strength to grab them and hold them. The boy’s body kept twisting, jerking, but it lacked strength.
“It’s not gone,” Reese said, willing Diane to get it, to understand. “It’s holding on too tight. He doesn’t want it to go, so it’s still in there. But I wounded it. We have a few minutes.”
Reese got out of her crouch onto her knees and leaned over the boy’s face, arresting his twisting head with her eyes. “Hold still,” she commanded. “I want to talk to you. Listen to me.”
“Who?” the boy spat. “Who do you want?”
“Alex,” Reese said quietly, but firm. “I want Alex. Let him talk.”
For a moment the boy’s eyes clouded over, and then someone was there—insolent, angry, but more scared than before. Younger. Human.
“Freak,” he said. “Let me go.”
“Tell me what happened to you,” Reese said. “I want to help. I can help. Talk to me.”
The skinny face grimaced, but the eyes were still angry. “I don’t want to tell you nothing.”
“Do you want to be free?” Reese asked, quiet, insistent. “Really free?”
“You been talking to Dr. Smith? I will be free, soon as I get the hell away from him. And people like you.”
“That’s a lie,” Reese said. “You’re already enslaved to something else. You know that. They may tell you they’re giving you power, but they’re not. They’re making you a slave. You can get free from them, Alex. We can help you.”
The eyes reclouded, and the expression changed again. Its fear, and its youth, was gone. Otherwise it was nearly identical.
“He doesn’t want your help,” the demon said.
And it was true.
Suddenly Reese’s sword was back in her hand, and she held the tip of it to the boy’s chest. He ceased twisting and trying to get away, instead lying horribly still on the pavement.
Diane closed her eyes. Not looking. Or she might have been praying that no one else would see either.
“Do you want to keep playing this game?” Reese asked.
“You won’t keep hurting the boy.”
“It doesn’t hurt him as bad as it hurts you. You, I can maybe drive right out.”
“You can’t. I won’t go.”
Reese shrugged. “Your decision.”
She raised the tip to strike down.
“Stop!” the boy’s voice screamed out. “Don’t!”
“Then tell me something,” Reese answered. Sweat was pouring down her face. “Tell me where to find the rest of you. You’re branching out. Where’s the hub?”
“You’re the one who attacked the core,” the demon said. “We almost killed you.”
“I think I gave as good as I got.”
“But you didn’t win. You can’t win.”
Reese pressed the sword down. The boy screamed.
Diane let go of his feet and was at Reese’s side, hand on her arm. “Reese,” she said calmly, “let him go.”
“I’m cornering a demon,” Reese said through gritted teeth.
“I know, but it’s in a boy. You’re going to do damage. Let him go.”
Reese looked up and met Diane’s eyes. Her own were full of pain, full of anger. Diane was calm.
Sucking in a breath of air, Reese let go of the hilt. Her sword evaporated.
She still held the boy’s shoulders. He was quivering, but no longer twisting and struggling to get away. His eyes were still the demon’s eyes, laughing and taunting. But the body was the boy’s.
“Hey!” Reese heard a shout from across the yard. “What’s going on over there?”
She glanced up. A teacher. “Diane,” she said. “Please. A seizure. Tell them the boy had a seizure. It’s true.”
Diane nodded and stood, walking calmly toward the teacher. Reese looked back down at the boy, at Alex, for what she knew was the last minute with him.
“Please tell me something,” she whispered. “Alex. Tell me something.”
“They’re going to get your friend,” the teen whispered. “They’re trying to get him.”
“Who? What friend?”
“Her son.” He closed his eyes. “They already got him at the warehouse.”
Diane and the teacher were drawing closer. She was trying to stall him, but she couldn’t do so beyond reason.
“Alex,” Reese said, more urgently now, “I can drive it out. But you have to want to be free. You have to choose it. Just tell me that you’re choosing it, and I’ll help you.”
He kept his eyes closed and shook his head.
The teacher was there, kneeling over Alex and trying to lift his head.
“We saw him from across the street,” Reese said, slowly withdrawing, slowly standing. “We tried to help.”
“Thank you,” the teacher said. “We’ll call an ambulance.”
Reese nodded. “I think he’s out of danger.”
“Still, we need to get him checked out.”
Check away, Reese thought. You’re not going to find the real problem.
She had known what she was facing, and even she hadn’t found the real problem.
Other school authorities were arriving. They surrounded Alex and talked to him, but he didn’t respond. Reluctant, she and Diane walked away.
They got back into the car without saying a word.
And just sat there.
“You said yourself, Reese,” Diane said finally. “He has to choose it for himself.”
“I thought we could at least force something out of the demon. They’re cowards. Not hard to break, usually.”
“Maybe it’s more scared of something else than it is of you.”
“Likely,” Reese conceded. “In a hive they have to work together more than usual; there are power structures and things.”
“And power structures don’t like to be betrayed,” Diane said.
Reese lowered her voice. “He did tell me one thing.” She swallowed. “They’re going after Chris. They already have somehow.”
Diane’s whole body tensed, electrified. “What? They can’t have! I would know.”
“Chris isn’t Oneness,” Reese said quietly. “The connection isn’t there; something could have happened and you wouldn’t feel it.”
“He’s my son,” Diane insisted. “I felt what happened to Douglas; I feel what happens to Chris. Oneness isn’t the only strong tie in this world.”
Reese took the rebuke. And added, “And we would know if something happened to Tyler. As long as they’re together . . .”
“I’m sure they are,” Diane said.
And Reese knew that surety, that confidence, was as much a bluffing, determined kind of hope as it was any real knowledge. But she let it go. Better to think that they were together, and so Chris was connected to the Oneness and they would know if something really bad happened to him.
But this at least confirmed one thing: their disappearance wasn’t just random, and they hadn’t just gone on vacation and forgotten to tell anyone.
“Alex . . . I think it was Alex talking to me, not the demon . . . said something about Chris and the warehouse. But I’m not sure what he meant. The core isn’t there anymore.”
“They would have gone there, though,” Diane said. “If Chris came into town because he wanted to find the hive, which I think he did, they would have gone back there because it’s the last link.”
“But there’s no reason to go back there,” Reese argued. “They cleared out.”
“Just because a hope is futile doesn’t mean you’re not going to follow it up,” Diane said. “It’s been driving him crazy, doing nothing.”
Because of Reese, they both knew but didn’t say. As long as the hive was out there, Reese was both in danger and unavenged, as far as Chris was concerned, and all of her grief and pain didn’t have a reaso
n, a victory attached to it. He’d been going nuts trying to make the world right for her.
Not an easy task, making the world right. The Oneness had been trying to do it for centuries.
“I just wish we’d learned something more concrete,” Reese said, leaning her head forward and resting it on the steering wheel. “We can go back to the warehouse.”
“Hmm,” Diane said.
“What?”
“You said you wanted a way into the school, right?”
“Yes,” Reese said. “But I’m afraid this is as close as we’re going to get.”
“Do Oneness kids go to school?”
“Sometimes,” Reese said. “Why?”
“How old are those twins?”
“Tony and Angelica? Too old. I don’t know. Maybe eighteen.”
“So maybe not too old,” Diane countered. “Especially if one of them needed remedial schooling.”
Reese’s eyes lit slowly. “Wait. Maybe you’re right.” The thought of either of the twins playing undercover student made her want to laugh, even in the midst of so much awfulness. She had a feeling they’d be more than the school bargained for. All she would need was to find them an address in Brass so they could attend the school.
“Better yet,” she said slowly, “why don’t we put them into the children’s home?”
“Say what?”
“That home is in danger . . . serious danger. And the twins would need an address in Brass to be able to attend the school. If we can convince Dr. Smith to take them in, they can go undercover at the school, and watch out for the children’s home, and keep a close eye on Alex. Maybe even help him. It’s perfect.”
“What if Alex’s . . . demon . . . recognizes the twins like it did you?”
“Then some of the plans won’t work. But they can still protect the home and maybe get through to Alex somehow. Either way it’s a step in the right direction.”
Reese took a right, headed for Lincoln and the cell house there. She hadn’t planned that, but it seemed a better idea than going to the warehouse.
Or maybe, despite her ardent protestations that the demonic core had cleared out, she was still too afraid of that place.
“Speaking of Alex and steps in the right direction,” Diane said, “is there a reason you abandoned your first plan? Follow Alex and hope he leads us to others?”
“I don’t know. No. I saw him and changed my mind.”
They drove on and crossed a highway, taking the rural route to the city.
“Are you okay, Reese? I know things have changed for the better, but . . .”
Reese cut her off. “If you’re asking whether I can control myself enough to be on a mission like this, the answer is yes.”
Diane was silent for a minute. Then she said, “Actually, I just wanted to know if you were okay.”
Reese’s eyes filled with tears. “I lost so much. I’m trying to come back.”
“But you’re not back yet.”
“No.”
Diane looked out the window. “Sometimes things take time.”
“Why did you stop me back there?” Reese asked, choking down something in her throat.
“Because of a memory. I remembered myself when Douglas was killed and Mary held me back. I never realized before she didn’t do that just for me. She was trying to protect those kids. They were just kids, you know, the murderers. I think Mary hoped they could be helped somehow, in time to prevent the tragedy. That her brother could deliver them of the demons or Douglas could stop their attack. And she thought I would get in the way and maybe do something awful, and then I would be guilty for the rest of my life for killing children.”
She paused.
“Maybe she was right.”
“Thank you,” Reese said quietly. “You were right. I would have done damage.”
“You’re welcome.” It was awkward, stilted.
“I’m not sure what happened to me back there.”
“When you really go through something,” Diane said slowly, “it can get into you, and it turns into this thing that moves you sometimes, makes decisions for you, and you don’t even know why.”
Reese smiled and nodded, sadly.
“You know, that’s one reason I was so angry with the Oneness for so many years,” Diane went on. “I thought, when I became Oneness, that kind of thing couldn’t happen to me anymore. But it did.”
“We aren’t perfect,” Reese said. “The only difference between the Oneness and everyone else is we’re tapped into something beyond ourselves for strength. We don’t think we can be human all on our own.”
“You’re right.”
“We.”
Diane smiled back. “We’re right, then.”
Two hours, a visit, and a phone call later, and they were back in the office at Dr. Smith’s children’s home, with the door shut and Dr. Smith regarding them with a seriousness almost displaced by scepticism. The twins sat alongside Reese and Diane, both looking like they were itching for some kind of action.
What action they expected in a psychologist’s office was anyone’s guess.
“I know you believe in the soul, Dr. Smith” Reese was saying. “That’s what you study. and you’re good and wise about that. But do you believe in the supernatural? In the spirit world?”
“I’ve reserved judgment,” Dr. Smith said, still eyeing them all with suspicion.
“Well, if we’re not asking you to completely give up reserving it, I guess we’re asking that you play along for a little while. What we saw in Alex’s eyes wasn’t just mental illness. And we have dealt with it before. I believe you’re a target, sir, and the danger is not small. We can help.”
He cleared his throat. “I just don’t know. Demons—I like you, miss, but with all respect, you haven’t been completely upfront with me from the beginning. This morning when you first arrived you were just potential donors—”
“In our defence, we didn’t say that. Susan assumed it. I just asked to see the home.”
“Very well. But you took some time to set her straight.”
“Until I met you, I didn’t know for certain that you weren’t a man who tried to bully a boy away from his mother, and not exactly through the usual channels. Can you blame us for being careful?”
“I suppose not.” He eyed the twins again. “They’re a little old.”
“Surely you’ve had eighteen-year-olds here before.”
“Not on this kind of short notice. And we’re nearly full.”
“Which means you do have a little room.” Reese spread her hands. “Please, sir, just give us a chance. If the costs are an issue, we’ll find a way to pay their room and board.”
They had debated, on the way here, whether to be upfront with the good doctor or try to convince him that the twins were actually in need of a home—and were a year or two younger than they actually were to boot. They’d decided in favour of truth.
The Spirit, in which they dwelt, seemed to favour truth. Lies were characteristic of the enemy. Which didn’t make them seem less attractive in a case like this—but prior experience won out, and they opted to be honest.
Diane had been dubious of the plan and looked more unimpressed with it by the minute.
To all their surprise, it was Tony who broke the stalemate.
“Sir, you’ve been dealing with this Alex kid for a while, right?”
Dr. Smith assented.
“And you’ve probably seen some kids like him before?”
Yes.
“And I’m guessing that you have lots of science and formulas and things for everybody, and every condition, and that these kids don’t always fit those. Because you’re dealing with something beyond that, and you don’t know what.”
He smiled, a small smile that spoke worlds about how much headway Tony was making. Reese marveled at the man’s open soul. There was no pride here preventing him from being convinced: if someone could show him that he was wrong, he would not only acquiesce but smile while doin
g it.
“That’s all true,” he said.
“Well, that’s what we want to help you with. That something beyond. And maybe we can show you some things that will help you with other kids too.”
Dr. Smith stood. “You win,” he said. He fixed them all with a stern look—genuinely stern. “You two will agree to abide by all house rules at all times. If you feel it’s necessary to do something outside the rules because of this mission of yours, you will discuss it with me or my wife first—I will be sharing all this with her, so she’ll know everything I do. And you all will put the safety and well-being of the other young people here first. That includes Alex. And ‘well-being’ doesn’t just mean that I don’t want you to get anyone physically hurt or killed. I am doing everything I can to give everyone here a leg up in life. I don’t want anything interfering with that. Many of these kids are still fragile. Do you understand?”
“Yes sir,” everyone but Diane said in unison. She nodded.
“This is not just talk. If you do not do what I’m asking, I will pack both of you out of here, and I will call the police on all of you.”
Reese stood and held out her hand. “We are fully in agreement,” she said. “The kids matter to us too. As do you. This is a special place. We only want to protect it.”
The sternness left his face, and he shook her hand. “I hope that’s true. Against much of my better judgment, I like you and am inclined to trust you. But I wanted to make the terms clear.”
“As you have.” Diane and the twins stood as well, and each shook the doctor’s hand.
“How long until you two can move in?” he asked.
Tony grinned. “Our bags are in the car. We’re ready. Oh . . . and when’s our first day of school?”
* * *
Chris and Tyler sat waiting at the long kitchen table, dwarfed by its size and totally unattended, for close to twenty minutes. Chris was getting twitchy, and angrier by the minute; Tyler just felt confused. The contrast to the days before couldn’t have been stronger: there was no tending now, no soup, no smiling, laughing women. The only thing that was the same was their awareness that they were being watched.
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