The BETA Agency

by Maxwell Coffie

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about. But you’d better pray I don’t get out of here, Puppeteer,” I whispered, vehemently, “I’ll spend my dying breath putting you in the ground.”

  His eyes twinkled wildly as he laughed. “Good. I’m counting on it. Whoopsie, time is up. Looks like I overestimated how much time you had. I really do need to fine-tune this thing.” The scalpel in his hand was suddenly a circular saw. It started to spin.

  My bladder pulsed.

  “Don’t worry,” he chuckled. “This will only hurt a lot.”

  The saw came to my face.

  I screamed.

  CHAPTER 56

  I had never been slapped so hard. I came to, thrashing. The team was holding me down.

  “Ey, ey, breeze sweet,” Kay was saying, shushing. “We got you. We got you.”

  We were near a source of daylight, because I could see their faces. They were wearing gas masks.

  King looked the most worried. “Some kind of toxin was released into the corridors. Are you alright?”

  It took me a moment to calm down. Even then, I could not stop trembling. I felt clammy, and my eyes hurt. On my cheek, there remained a vague sensation—a ghost of a ghost of a feeling—the moment when the saw had first whisked away at my flesh. It had been so real. Too real.

  “You can take off the masks,” I managed to rasp. “The gas, it was only meant for me.”

  “What do you mean?” Po asked. “How do you know that?”

  “He told me.” I swallowed. “In my head.”

  Then I explained, to the best of my recollection and understanding, what the Puppeteer had done to me.

  “That’s cold,” Kay whispered, stunned. “Didn’t even know that was possible.”

  “What did he say to you?” Po asked.

  I started to say something, and then stopped. I wasn’t sure if I could repeat the Puppeteer’s question—not to King and the rest of the team at the same time.

  “I can’t remember,” I mumbled.

  “That’s very helpful,” Po said, and I frowned at her.

  “But something is wrong,” I said.

  “What do you mean?” King asked.

  “I mentioned this to you in Floris, remember? In the span of a few weeks, he’s exhibited two new, highly advanced techniques. This is from the man who used the same old technique for thirty years: he either hacked off your face, or he spelled you to do it yourself. Suddenly, he’s possessing dead bodies and hijacking memories? That doesn’t seem strange to any of you?”

  “You think he’s up to something?” Kay asked.

  “Something happened to him, during that period King was at the psyche facility,” I said. “He’s been preparing for us. He’s been preparing for this.”

  King looked at me. ”Why?”

  “I don’t know. But does it matter right now?” I said. “Does it matter why he prepared for this?” I forced myself back to my feet. “We’re here. He’s here. Somewhere.” I balled my fists. “Let’s find the son of a bat, and take him down. When we have him at our feet, we can ask questions then.”

  Imp whistled approvingly.

  “Are you alright though?” King asked me, his expression laden with worry.

  “I’ll be alright when I’ve kicked that psychopath’s rump into the dust,” I said.

  Po seemed to be fighting back a smile. “You heard the woman. Let’s finish this.”

  There was an opening at the end of the corridor, letting in a soft breeze. We armed our instruments, and proceeded into the light.

  CHAPTER 57

  We were inside the arena, underneath the Rim’s red skies. There was no grass, no equipment, only dust, enclosed in a myriad of weathered, broken stands. Sporadic gusts whipped up the red clay, and sent it twirling around in small, listless twisters.

  “The base is underground, right?” I asked.

  King nodded, and gestured at us to follow him. We had just started towards the centre of the field, when there was an explosion of static and feedback.

  “Hello?” A voice echoed from hidden speakers. “Is this thing on?”

  We froze. “It’s always jokes with this guy,” Po grumbled.

  “Welcome, Mister King and associates. I cannot adequately stress how much you have been missed. Especially you, King,” boomed the voice. “Of course, I must confess that since we last had the pleasure of speaking, there have been others. But as I told you before, nobody understands me like you. Everyone else your agency sent was boring. Safe. Dumb as muck. I wanted you back so badly, but I was sure our little dance five years ago had severed that relationship. But, well, here you are, and an admirable show of bygones it is.”

  “Come out, you coward,” King roared.

  The voice ignored him. Or maybe, it could not hear him. “Which brings me to the newcomer amongst us. Welcome, Miss Arra Everglade. Or should I say, Miss Fey Watters 2.0.”

  My jaw tightened.

  King turned to the team. “I know she’s not Fey.”

  I expected Po to tell King that they’d known all along. Nobody said a word.

  “They really went out of their way to get you, didn’t they, Miss Everglade?” the voice continued. “You look a lot like Watters. You even act like her—brave, impulsive, strong-headed. A bit of a slap in her face, if you ask me. All of you, especially you King, are only saying that your precious Fey can be replaced. But hey, beggars can’t be choosers, right? I’m just glad that we get to dance one more time, King. Nah demoor, e ju-t’reh myh, you know? Miss Everglade knows what I mean.”

  King looked at me.

  “He used the same proverb when we talked,” I explained.

  “In conclusion, welcome again,” the voice said. “And enjoy the show! No, wait.” He laughed, like a mad man, and whispered, “That’s your line.”

  Feedback. Static. Silence.

  I frowned. “What does that proverb mean?”

  Imp looked up at me, and slowly said, “Doomed man. Respects time.”

  “A doomed man respects time?” I repeated.

  Po frowned. “That doesn’t sound ominous at all.”

  “Is it just me, or is the ground moving?” Kay said.

  We went silent for a moment. I looked down. The clay was rippling, trembling, shifting.

  An uncomfortable thought occurred to me. “Um,” I said, staring at the quivering dust. “Does anybody know what’s underneath this clay? Are we or are we not standing above a makeshift burial ground?”

  I watched the others, as the implications of my words sunk in, and realization dawned on their faces.

  Po sighed. “Oh, muck.”

  All around us, the dust gave way as bony hands broke out of the earth. One by one, skeletons pulled themselves to the surface, till we were surrounded by an army of mortal remains. Wind whipped up the clay, swaddling their bare bones, and clumping it into makeshift flesh.

  “That’s new,” I muttered.

  “Where is he getting these spells?” King grumbled.

  “Here they come,” Po warned.

  One of the corpses let out an unholy scream. Then, they all attacked.

  We jumped into our cyclone formation, a bolt of mana already leaving my fingertips before I was in position. I unleashed a rapid fire of powerful mana bolts at the onrushing mob of undead. Every bolt that made contact turned a corpse into a pile of dust. I kept firing rapidly, desperately, until I began to wonder if the monsters were simply being resurrected every time. The numbers weren’t falling. The damn things just kept coming, and coming, and coming, and then one of them got too close for comfort.

  I broke through its face with my fist, and then proceeded to slice through the corpses with my blades. I swung left, right, spun around and delivered a straight kick; whirled right back around, and took one corpse’s head off. Some more mana bolts. A little more slicing. One punch thrown in for good measure.

  They just kept coming.

  “There’s too many of them,” Po screamed

&
nbsp; “Heads down, I’ve got it,” Kay ordered.

  I punched off a few more corpses, and got on my knees. A giant hammer swung over my head, exploding a healthy number of corpses into dust. The hammer swung a few more times. The creatures were sent flying and screaming.

  When I stood up again, we had some breathing room. Kay was wielding the most ludicrously oversized hammer in his hands, made entirely out of orange light.

  “Your instruments can shape-shift mana?” I asked.

  “Eh-yuh.”

  “Cosmic.”

  He grinned.

  “Break time’s over,” King said, because the corpses were closing in again.

  I returned to blasting, punching, and slicing through the undead. As I did, it became increasingly clear what a tremendous waste of time this was.

  “This isn’t working,” I complained, just before half a dozen corpses jumped me and pinned me to the ground. I tried to wrestle them off, but I could feel more of them piling on as I struggled. “Muck-dammit!”

  Someone swatted my attackers off, and lifted me out of the pile by my ankle. I stared upside-down into Kay’s face.

  “Thanks,” I mumbled.

  “No sweat.” He smashed a few more corpses, and set me down.

  “Looks like we have no choice,” King said. “We need to break some seals here.”

  Everyone else seemed to agree.

  “Seals?” I blasted three corpses and frowned at Po. “You didn’t teach me anything about breaking any seals.”

  “That’s because it would’ve been a waste of time,” Po snapped. “You can’t learn something like that in a few weeks.”

  Kay cleared some of his attackers with a swing of his hammer. “Remember our mana control lesson? The water canal metaphor?”

  I nodded.

  “Yeah, well,” Kay said, with a small smile. “Breakin’ your seal blows your canals wide open. Stand back.”

  I obeyed.

  “Alright guys,” King said. “We’re going with team attack one, Desert Storm. Positions!”

  Po, Kay, and Imp formed a triangle around us.

  “Imp.”

  Imp got on one knee. Suddenly, his entire body began to glow blue.

  “Cover him,” King ordered.

  Kay and Po threw bolts left and right, trying to keep the corpses at bay.

  The glow around Imp grew brighter, and brighter. My eyes widened, as rubriq grew down his sleeves, and his arms. Fire began to lick at his fingertips. Then, Imp drew his bow, and an arrow of roaring sapphire flames took form. He pointed up at the sky, and let out an ear-piercing whistle.

  “Fire!” King yelled.

  The arrow rocketed up into the red expanse.

  “Po, Imp, retreat. Your turn Kay.”

  Po and Imp jumped back to join us, whilst Kay’s gauntlets exploded with orange light. Kay’s rubriq started to grow inwards from the edges of his face. He slammed his hands together, and commanded, “Monolith, execute Glass Pyramid.”

  Immediately, walls of tinted light rose out of the ground, forming a triangular enclosure around us. Above us, Imp’s arrow lit up the skies in a flash of dazzling electric blue. The fraction Kay’s barriers were complete, Imp’s arrow came back down—in the form of hundreds of scorching projectiles. It was raining fire.

  I watched speechless, as the corpses run, screamed, and smashed into each other, burning in a fantastic display of hysterics.

  “Po, you want to finish this?” King said.

  Po nodded. “Gladly.”

  The walls of light disappeared, as Po instructed her instrument, and I heard its name for the first time: “Levina, One Thousand Flickers.”

  Green sparks of electricity danced down her body, as she stepped forward. I could see the rubriq creeping up her neck. She was there. And then, she was not. In one blink and a wink, her form had flickered in over a hundred locations around the area simultaneously, and she was back. She rested her dust-covered staff on her shoulders, and turned to face us.

  As if on cue, every single corpse in the field crumbled to the ground, leaving behind dying embers where they had stood. And just like that, there was silence. They were gone. All of them.

  I didn’t realize that my mouth was open.

  “Nice,” King said.

  I looked at the others. The excess rubriq had disappeared off their skin, and they looked fatigued. Imp was hunched over, panting. Po was lying on her back, gulping down air.

  I returned my gaze to King. “No seal releasing for you?” I joked, weakly.

  King smiled “Only if you don’t mind being burned to a crisp. And anyway, the job’s done, isn’t it?”

  I looked around the field. Large sections were either charred, or still on fire.

  “Understatement of the year,” I said.

  “We should find the Puppeteer now,” King said. “There should be a hatch around here somewhere that leads underground.”

  “I don’t even know if we can face him anymore,” Po said, slowly sitting up. “We’re drained.”

  “That may be,” King said, “but he must’ve needed an obscene amount of mana to activate a spell like that. He should be drained too. I still think we can do this.”

  The rest of the team looked sceptical.

  “Look, I know we’re not feeling very confident right now.” King looked us each in the eye. “But I have faith in this team. I always have. Sure, he has a lot of new tricks up his sleeve—“

  I noticed something. “Um, King?”

  “Just let me finish. I am more than confident that we can handle anything he throws at us. This day—“

  “King…”

  “No, I’m almost done, I promise. This day, we end a thirty year reign of—“

  “King,” I snapped.

  “Oh come on,” King sighed. “I’m trying to inspire over here.”

  I pointed. “Is that inspiration enough?”

  King and the rest of the team turned to see what I was seeing: five enormous cubes of grey, rising out of the clay, a waterfall of dust cascading down their sides. Rubriq appeared on the faces of the cubes, and lit up vivid crimson.

  Po exhaled loudly. “Just when I got comfortable.”

  The cubes rose up to the sky, spacing out to assume the outline of a cross. Then, without warning, tornados formed around us, lifting up the clay and delivering it to the cubes; so much so that soon, there was no clay beneath our feet. We were actually standing on plain sand.

  I stared up at the form towering over us. “Is that what I think it is?” I asked, incredulous.

  “I have to give it to him,” King said. “I am impressed.”

  Every ounce of clay had congealed around the cubes, connecting them with massive columns to form a colossal humanoid. It glared down at us with glowing red eyes. It roared.

  Kay sighed. “Now that’s just plain cold.”

  The sand giant lifted its hand…and brought it crashing down.

  CHAPTER 58

  Flying. I’d always imagined my first time differently.

  The giant’s hand had come down, exploding against the ground, throwing me into the air. I landed hard on the other end of the field. My ears were filled with a high-pitched whine. My vision blurred, and shuddered erratically.

  A hand touched me, then King’s face appeared over mine. He was yelling something. He pulled me up.

  Behind him, the giant was recollecting itself—literally. Its hand was reforming out of the dissociated clay.

  King threw me over his shoulder, and flitted us away to another end of the field, where Po, Imp, and Kay were waiting. They were dusty, beaten up. Imp’s leg was torn, and bleeding profusely.

  My hearing was returning: “Muck, muck, muck,” Po was saying, as she tried to stop Imp’s bleeding. Her palms were glowing with reconstructive mana. “That thing’s going to kill us!”

  “It’s not going to kill us,” King said. “Focus, Po. How many cubes rose out of the clay? Four?”

  “No, five,” I said.<
br />
  Kay nodded. “I counted five.”

  “I think that thing’s almost done reassembling,” Po warned.

  “The cubes were spelled. They’re obviously the driving force behind this thing. We just need to attack those cubes,” King rattled. “We should also spread out. Makes it harder for it to target us. Po, Kay, start attacks on its midsection.”

  Po was done sealing Imp’s wound. She and Kay nodded, and flitted away.

  King turned to me. “Arra, I’m going to go help them, but I need you to do something very important. One of the cubes is buried in the monster’s head, and Imp can shoot it down. But he needs someone to carry him to higher ground for a clearer shot. Can you do that?”

  I nodded.

  The sand giant’s deafening roar echoed down again.

  “See you soon.” And King was gone in a flicker.

  “Come on.” I helped Imp onto my back, and headed for the stands. Damn, I thought. He was a lot heavier than he looked.

  I climbed over some ad boards, and then up the old chain fence separating the spectator seats from the field. As I climbed, I heard an explosion behind me. I hoped it was one of the giant’s cubes. I landed on the other side of the fence, and immediately, a sharp pain shot up my right ankle.

  Muck, I swore in my head. That long fall from earlier had hurt me after all. But I couldn’t fail Imp now. I couldn’t fail King.

  So I ran up to the tiered stands, and forced myself up the stairs. With every step, my ankle screamed out in protest. I ignored the pain, and kept climbing.

  “When we’re high enough,” I panted. “Just whistle.”

  Imp tapped my shoulder, and pointed to my left. I turned my head.

  There were about a dozen clay creatures, in the likeness of serpents, headed our way.

  “Ugh, come on,” I said, and muttered, “We just can’t catch a break, can we?” And I stepped on it.

  But the clay serpents were fast. I tried to flash flit, and almost tripped the second time; flitting up stairs with extra weight was tricky. Two serpents appeared at my side. I disintegrated them with mana bolts. Imp helped out, blasting away the slithering nuisances when they got too close. One of them nipped at my heel, and I lost my balance. I whirled around just in time to blast the serpent away before Imp and I toppled to the ground.