by Ramy Vance
Alex realized the park she was sitting in was the same park in which she’d been watching the couple. They were staring at her now. She thought it best to start moving again. Do you know what he’s up to? Vardis?
He has hidden his thoughts and feelings from me since he arrived at the Nest. I didn’t think it was suspicious at the time because it is a habit all telepaths have when meeting new people, but his defenses are high. I’ve never been certain of where he is or what he is doing.
Alex checked her GPS again and headed in the direction of the military base. She still had at least another half an hour to walk.
It dawned her that this was the longest time she’d been alone in a while. It was the longest she’d walked by herself without one of her parents nearby.
You ever get tired of always being around people? she asked Chine.
He chuckled, a rich and hearty sound. Why would you ask that?
I don’t know. I figured you might feel like me sometimes—always having to do things for other people, never getting a moment to yourself. When you do, it’s like you can’t even enjoy it.
My perspective might be different from yours. Dragons, for most of our lives, are very social. It isn’t until we are older and near the end of our lives that we live in solitude, usually away from the dragon realms, doing everything in our power to keep others from finding where our enclave is. It is those dragons, the elders who choose to spend time all alone, who fill the legends and lore of humans.
So, you wish you were around more dragons?
Chine chuckled again, the warmth absent this time and a hint of bitterness taking its place. I have made peace with the sacrifices that must be made until the Dark One is defeated, but yes. Yes, I am often lonely. It is good to be with the dragons from the Boundless, but my family and friends are growing old without me. There are few things that can ease that pain.
Alex thought about what he had said, taking her time. The dragon was right; it was a different perspective.
She enjoyed the closeness she was developing with the members of her team. They were as tightly knit as family, and she loved that.
Alex crossed the street, running to make it before the light changed. She was almost at the base.
There was a sigh in her mind, followed by Chine’s voice. Dustling, you are going to have to make the most important decision of your life soon.
Alex stopped and looked at the sun above her. Clouds were starting to gather, blocking the light. You mean, destroying the shard?
The dragon’s face shone in front of Alex for a second. Only you know what you’ve learned. Those around you—your family, the Boundless, the Nest—will understand your decision, whatever it is. They trust you. Perhaps you should have faith in that trust.
You know, your wisdom makes it really hard to have teenage angst.
It is why dragons are partnered with young mortals. We even you out.
It was good talking to you, Chine. I’ll see you in a bit.
You as well, Dustling.
Alex spent the rest of her walk thinking through what he had said. There were a lot of things to take into consideration, but the dragon was right.
Myrddin and the Nest trusted her.
She needed to believe in that trust.
It was kind of funny. There’d been a moment earlier in the day when Alex had been worried about adjusting to not being special anymore. Then, the moment she started talking to the dragon, all she could talk about was the stress of that weight.
Things seemed to make a little more sense now, even if they weren’t clear, just a cloudy, amorphous blob of emotions. They weren’t bad emotions, and deep down, Alex knew what she had to do: the weapon had to be destroyed. There would be other ways to get rid of the Dark One. Alex didn’t know what they were going to be, but she was certain they’d figure them out.
The base was no more than a block ahead. Most of the houses were empty. Alex figured that was the only way a top-secret military base could have been plopped down in the middle of her town without anyone noticing it. The whole town was probably a shell. Talk about a coincidence.
Or was it?
Alex had never thought about how Myrddin had known to watch her through VR. She’d been playing for years. Just how long had she been a subject of interest to Myrddin and the Nest?
As Alex let these thoughts play out in her head, she started walking near a convoy of military SUVs. There’s no way all this could have been built just to watch me.
She heard a loud click like the sound of a door being unlocked very loudly. It came from the convoy. She looked in the direction of the sound, seeing an SUV’s rear hatch open.
A glowing white orb fell out the back of the SUV. What the hell is that? Alex thought.
Then the orb brightened and there was a loud screech as it exploded outward.
The last thing Alex saw was the brightness of the light as she felt her body rising into the air.
Then all was black.
Chapter Six
Alex woke up in the med-bay of the military base, nurses all around her. They were treating her wounds and Alex instinctively reached out to push them away. They fell to the floor
She looked down at her hands, caught off guard by what she had done. Alex had assumed that the telekinesis she’d experienced in Vardis’ dream was limited to dreams.
Obviously, that assumption was wrong.
The nurses got back on their feet, undeterred by Alex pushing them away. They got back to work, wielding Nest healing devices.
Alex’s body was covered in minor cuts and bruises, and the nurses were working hard at treating them. The wounds on her chest and shoulder from the dream had already been attended to.
Once the nurses stopped bustling about, Alex was able to ask one of them what happened. The nurse explained that the base had been under attack. Multiple bombs on their convoy of supplies had detonated. It was assumed by the upper brass that there was a double agent somewhere in the base who had given away the delivery time.
Alex bit her tongue and didn’t say anything about Vardis.
If she was going to talk to someone about this, it was going to be much higher up the chain. Vardis could be dangerous. If that attack had come from him, there was no telling how many people he was willing to put at risk for his goals.
But Alex already knew how many people Vardis would risk: an entire universe. What were a few measly human soldiers in the grand scheme of his plans?
As the nurses prepared to leave, one of them leaned over Alex and whispered in her ear, “We took care of your other wounds too. They should heal pretty well. Be safe out there.”
Alex didn’t know what to say, so she merely nodded and smiled, muttering a quiet thank you. Once the nurses were gone, she sat up, preparing to get out of bed.
A loud beep came from her dragon anchor. She looked down at it and saw there was an incoming call from Abby. Alex picked up and said, “Hello?”
Abby’s face shone brightly on the anchor. “Hey! How’s it— Oh, crap, what happened to you?”
Alex brought the anchor closer to her face so that Abby couldn’t see the extent of the wounds. “Oh, you know, just the usual explosion. Nothing too bad. I should be back on my feet in no time.”
“Well, I’m glad you’re sitting down because I wanted to talk to you about the readings I got from the shard. It looks like there might be some kind of living creature—”
Alex sighed as she shook her head. “A living creature residing within the shard with an unbelievable amount of energy?”
Abby gave Alex a confused look. “Hey, if you don’t need me running experiments on—”
“No, it’s not that. Well, you wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”
“Try me.”
Alex tried to sum up everything she experienced the night before into a clear, concise statement. That wasn’t happening. “Okay, so I got pulled into the dream of an interdimensional being and walked through all of his memories, and I saw h
e’s planning on destroying our reality to take out the Dark One with some kind of ancient being that used to plague their planet or something. And now I have telekinesis, and I don’t know how, but my telepathy is also much stronger.” Alex took a deep breath. “Everything is terrible, and I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do, and yeah, it’s all the worst.”
Abby stared at Alex through the anchor screen, her eyes narrow as if she were trying to process everything Alex had said. “Wait, you have telepathy?”
“You’re missing the point!”
“No, I got everything else. Still working through it. Anybody else know about this alien? Or just you?”
Alex shook her head as she shrugged, sending two different meanings. “Well, I mean, Myrddin has his suspicions. And Boundless is pretty much on the same page.”
“So, what’s the big problem? Have Myrddin pull the plug.”
“It’s not that simple. Myrddin still isn’t sure. And I’m only sure as far as I trust dreams, and not even my dream, someone else’s. I can think of a ton of better places to start for proving someone else guilty of wanting to cause interdimensional genocide.”
“Point taken. On another note, how’s the arm holding up?”
Alex looked down at her bionic arm, stretching her fingers out and then making a fist. “Good as the day I got it. Why are you asking?”
Abby pulled up a chart that projected on Alex’s anchor. “You’ve been showing a spike in your body processing draconic fluid. I wanted to make sure you weren’t burning hot or anything. All right, I’ve got to go. You just dropped a lot on me. Gonna try to get that intel to someone who can do something ‘bout it. Stay frosty, snow-girl.”
“Snow-girl?”
“Shut up, I’m not in the DGA because I’m witty. Bye.”
Abby hung up, leaving Alex to her thoughts, which were instantly interrupted by a sarcastic voice saying, “Are you approved for inter-faculty discussions?”
Roy stood in the doorway, gnawing on his cigar. His swagger was a little more tame than usual, no doubt to show that he took Alex’s injuries seriously.
She groaned loudly as she laid back. “Are you kidding me? Am I not allowed to talk to people?”
“Only when it seems like you’re talking about sensitive information. Which I have no doubt you are doing right now.”
Alex leaned over to see if there was anyone behind Roy. “Come in and close the door.”
“You’re joking, right?”
“No.”
Roy stepped into the room and closed the door behind himself. “What do you have for me? Because you’re obviously sharing it with everyone else.”
“It’s not like that. She called me. Abby said she was going to be passing it along to you and Myrddin anyway, but I want you to hear it from me first. I’ve already talked to Boundless about my suspicions about Vardis.”
Roy pulled a seat up to Abby’s bed as he chuckled. “Yeah, you and everyone else. What dirt do you have on the guy?”
Abby couldn’t believe what she’d just heard. “Wait, you make it sound like there are tons of people who don’t trust him.”
“Do you think we’re stupid? We run an interspecies military program that spans nine realms. Of course, no one trusts a guy who just shows up one day and says he has a weapon to kill the Dark One. You have any idea how many insurance scammers Myrddin has had me wade through?”
Alex laughed so hard she had to grab her ribs. “Wait, you’re putting this guy on par with an insurance scam?”
“A scam is a scam. Now, what do you have for me?”
For the second time in ten minutes, Alex had to try to find a way to explain what had happened the night before. Thankfully, she’d practiced with Abby. “Last night, Vardis drew me into one of his dreams via that telepathic link I told Myrddin about. I saw what he was planning to do with the weapon. What it can actually do.”
Roy put his cigar away. “I’m assuming it doesn’t involve needing my social security.”
“No.”
“Good, because I don’t have any. Neither do you, by the way. Myrddin wipes us clean when we sign on, but after this is over, you’re going to have really good credit.”
Alex couldn’t believe Roy was being so flippant. “Are you messing with me, or do you really not care about any of this?”
Roy threw his hands up defensively. “No, no, not at all. I’m not bothered by you telling me that you got information on Vardis from a psychic dream. Honestly, it’s not the weirdest thing I’ve heard today. It might be the most normal thing.”
Alex was surprised. She hadn’t been expecting to hear that, and it was probably the best news she’d gotten all day. “Wait, you believe me?”
“Of course, I believe you. Myrddin already knows you have a weird-ass link with Vardis. Did you think he hadn’t mentioned it to me? One of the first things you learn in PsyOps is that dream-to-dream contact is a valuable form of espionage.”
Alex nearly leaped up at Roy’s words. She hadn’t been expecting to be believed so readily. “So, we can go get him and put a stop to this whole—”
“Hold on. Before you get your hopes up, dreams are the same as most other espionage, which means it needs to be validated. I can’t make decisions based on anything that doesn’t have three or more sources.”
Alex stared at Roy, almost unable to comprehend what he was saying. “You’re telling me we have to sit here and wait until Vardis shows us that he’s trying to destroy the whole universe?”
Roy stood up and ruffled Alex’s hair, which made her want to grab his arm and snap it off. “No, I’m not saying that. What I’m saying is that we’ve got a plan in motion in case Vardis tries anything. Trust me, we’re not going to let him have free rein on this one.”
“Okay, so when do we go?”
Roy looked down at Alex, glancing at her wounds. “You aren’t going anywhere for the time being. Nurses said that you have pretty extensive injuries. Two of those are much more serious than the rest and were patched up before the accident.”
Alex didn’t think she was going to get Roy to budge on the topic and decided to try another tack. “What was that explosion? The one that took me out?”
Roy’s face became serious as he nervously scratched his beard. “We’ve been trying to figure that one out. All we could find was shrapnel, and we’re trying to—
“It came from Vardis. He was responsible.”
Roy laughed uneasily and said, “Okay, I know he is under suspicion, but that doesn’t mean we have to blame him for every single thing that—”
“Trust me, Roy. It was him. He knows what I saw last night, and he wants to keep me from stopping him. What better way than putting me in the hospital so that I can drown in bureaucracy?”
“What? You never even have to touch the paperwork.”
Alex started to get out of bed. Her chest and shoulders still hurt, but they were manageable. “I can’t believe I’m arguing about this with you. You’re not putting me on the sidelines. If Vardis is out there, I’m going to be as well.”
Roy tried to shoo Alex back to her bed. “Hey, hey, hold on. You still need bed rest. You’ve been going nonstop since the last mission, and even I’m starting to think you might need time to recuperate.”
“Are you saying I can’t do my job?”
Roy shook his head as he backed away. “No, I’m saying you’re very high-strung at the moment. This is something we can take care of, so maybe stop trying to hold the world on your shoulders.”
“I’m not stressed out, Roy! There’s—”
Alex was cut off by a siren blaring through the military base. “What’s that?”
Roy pulled up his HUD and scrolled through a few messages. “Shit! The base is under attack.”
“By what?”
Roy looked up for a moment, his eyes searching for an answer. “They don’t know yet. But it looks—”
The lights in the room started to flicker. Alex went to grab her shirt, and her hand
stopped moving. She struggled, but nothing happened. Then she was thrown against the wall as if someone had picked her up and tossed her.
Roy stopped in his tracks and stared at her. “What the hell is going on?”
The light fixture from the ceiling ripped off and flew toward Alex, who was barely able to get out of the way in time.
Glass skittered all over the floor as Roy and Alex backed away from the fixture. “Vardis,” Alex growled.
Chapter Seven
The lights went out, and Alex and Roy stood in the darkness.
Another light fixture came flying at Alex, and she jumped to the right, dodging it. “We need to get out of here,” she shouted.
Roy looked around the room as the lights tried to flicker back on. “What’s going on?”
“I have no idea, but I know we can’t stay here to find out.”
Alex hit her dragon anchor, causing her rider armor to pour over her skin. That was better. Now she felt like she was ready to get down to business. She opened and closed her bionic fist as she headed for the door, then whipped it open and stepped forward, Roy close behind her.
They two of them stepped into a lab, the one Alex had seen in Vardis’ dream. The only difference was, this time the lab had five Vardises.
Not aliens of the same species, five Vardises.
Roy drew his pistol and aimed at one of the aliens. “Okay, no. We need to stop now, and you need to tell me what the hell is going—”
Before Roy could finish his sentence, his feet lifted off the ground. His eyes went wide as he flew across the room, hit the wall hard, and crumpled to the floor.
Alex didn’t hesitate. She drew her scythe, aware that the energy was coming from her and not from the dragon anchor. She dove forward, slashing at one of the Vardises, who faded into a white mist when it was hit. She went on the next, managing to catch it with an uppercut before she was gripped by a psychic hand and tossed at Roy.
She smashed into the wall and fell on her back, rolled over, and shook Roy back into consciousness. It was surprising that hitting a wall was enough to knock Roy out. Alex had seen him walk away from injuries that made the psychic attack look like a mosquito bite.
