Edge Walkers

by Shannon Donnelly

  Turning away, she wrapped a fist around the bag’s strap and lifted it from where it was cutting into her shoulder. “Gideon’s right. So are you, Jakes. You have to find out if we need to…do with Zeigler what we did with...” She swallowed the words, couldn’t talk about what they’d had to do with Chand. She shifted the laptop again. “We also need that doorway home. And we’re on a clock.”

  She slipped into a fast review of her fears—about the Walkers, the Rift, the possibility the barrier between dimensions was being shredded. She threw in enough technical terms that Gideon started to fidget and Shoup hunched a shoulder and Jake’s mouth twitched down. She glanced between the three men as she talked, watched them, knew their patience would snap before hers did—she’d always been good about winning arguments by wearing down obstacles. Shoup stood back from the other two men, his stare kept on the city, tracking the Walkers. Jake’s lips thinned until they almost disappeared. And she knew Gideon had to be thinking not just of Zeigler, but of putting his wife’s dead body into the ground.

  She had bigger targets in mind as well.

  Someone had to stop the Walkers. Too many had died. Too many more might die—Gideon, Temple and his family, her brothers if this went the way it was looking to go.

  The devastation had to stop.

  She couldn’t let it spread and she had an idea about how to end it. She had to act because if you knew a solution and didn’t try for it, what kind of coward did that make you? She straightened, didn’t know if she was up for this, but she had to try—and that meant making sure Jakes and his orders weren’t standing in her way.

  The rain had started to fall in steady light drops when Jakes gave a sharp nod. “Fine. Let’s do it.”

  Letting out a breath, Carrie glanced at Gideon. He touched a finger to her arm, kept her tunic between his skin and hers. Carrie tried for a confident nod back, but she didn’t know if she managed anything other than to look half terrified. Because she was. She was taking a risk not just with her life, but with everything.

  Looking away from Carrie, Gideon held out his hand. “I’m going to need more than a knife.”

  Jakes’ mouth twitched down again, but he nodded to Shoup who pulled out a compact Glock 19. Carrie raised her eyebrows at it—no way was that standard issue—but Shoup handed it over with a humorless smile and two clips, saying, “Trigger’s a touch touchy.”

  Gideon nodded, stuffed the clips in the back pockets of his tattered jeans, kept the gun in one hand, and turned to Carrie. “Ready?”

  She wanted to shake her head ‘no.’ She wanted a reason, any reason, to put this off. But she gave him another quick nod. She didn’t have the spit left for any words.

  She forced herself to take a step forward, but Shoup’s voice stopped her, and she turned back, almost relieved someone would try to talk her out of this. But Shoup reached into another pocket, pulled out something else. Just how much ordinance was the man packing?

  It wasn’t a gun that he slapped into her palm. She closed her fingers on the thick bulk of a battered red Swiss Army knife, its even-sided white cross a reminder of the one Gideon wore. It was the fat deluxe version with a corkscrew, three blades, and two kinds of screwdrivers.

  Shoup gestured to the laptop. “Saves you crackin’ the case with a hammer.”

  “Right,” she said, drew out the word, because she was not letting anyone near this computer with a hammer.

  Jakes stepped up and jabbed a finger in her face. “You stay on track. Because I am not going back with empty hands and men dead for no goddamm reason.” He shifted his stare to Gideon and held two fingers upright to focus attention. “No goddamm stupid heroics.”

  Gideon stared back, his face empty. Jakes seemed to take that for answer enough. With a backhanded slap to Shoup’s arm, Jakes started down the hillside, Shoup on his right. Watching them walk away, Carrie shivered in the rain. Good thing Jakes hadn’t warned her against taking on stupid heroics or she’d have had to lie to him. She wasn’t going to be able to keep lying to Gideon.

  Pushing a hand into her hair to drag back the damp ends, she took in a long breath that filled her lungs with cool air. Turning to Gideon, she let everything out in a rush.

  “I didn’t tell them everything, but I’m not sure I should tell you, except I can’t do this without your help. But you want the Walkers gone and I think I know a way to do that. Maybe.” She let go of her hair, let her shoulders slump and hitched up the strap for the bag with the laptop so she could better shield it from the wet. “Now, you want to call Jakes back and tell him I’ve lost my mind, because, given what I’m thinking, I might have. Or are you with me on slamming the door on every damn Walker?”

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  To be honest, I’m not sure what we did. Except to blow every last line of defenses. Which is why you have to let us out. There’s only one chance for all of us and it’s an all or nothing gamble. — Excerpt Gideon Chant Interview

  Gideon stared at Carrie, watched her squint against the rain. She leaned to the right a fraction, the weight of the laptop dragging on her, but her chin had lifted and her eyes gleamed, fear and determination mixing into a bright edge. A minute ago she’d seemed almost reasonable, outlining a plan that might work. But he remembered when they’d first met and she’d tried to bolt out the door with no idea of what waited for her. Did she have any better an idea now?

  He glanced out to the city, to the lights sparking closer. He thought of his hunts—the ones that had gone well, and the ones that damn near killed him. He looked at Carrie again, certain of one thing.

  “If you’re going to get us both in trouble, it’d better be away from the caverns.”

  She frowned and opened her mouth to give him more good reasons—it seemed she always had more logic than he could use. He could see the words lining up behind her eyes. Before she could get them out, he grabbed the strap to her sack and started down the slope, pulling her with him.

  “I know what I’m doing,” she muttered.

  “Let’s make sure the Walkers don’t,” he told her.

  They kept to a narrow track until they were halfway down the hillside. Gideon turned off the path there, climbed over boulders and scrambled down loose rock. He kept glancing back to make sure Carrie followed. The rain kept up, light but steady. Carrie slipped once and he grabbed her hand. Startling at his touch, she caught a sharp breath but he didn’t let go. Neither did she. His heart kicked up, knocked his ribs. The wind pushed into them, stronger. Nothing else happened.

  The air didn’t sizzle. The Rift didn’t open. Their connection wasn’t that strong. Not yet. Or maybe the rain could dampen it. It didn’t matter so long as he could keep hold of her hand, small and fine-boned in his grip. He tried not to notice how good it was to have that contact with her, how her warmth kept the chill off his back. The sound of her breathing behind him reminded him he had a reason to keep living now.

  The ground leveled, buildings rose around them, swallowed them into a protective grace that hid the Walkers from view. The structures gave them some shelter from the rain that was starting to come down faster now. Carrie pulled away, struck out ahead of him, her stride long and sure.

  He watched her, fell back to give her the lead. He trailed behind where he could keep an eye out for Walkers. Carrie stopped every now and then, glanced around. He knew she still must be dealing with memories not quite her own. Most of what she’d gained from the rings would fade. Some would integrate into her own experiences—in a few hours, she wouldn’t know which images were her own and what came from the rings. It had been like that for him. When a rock skittered loose, he called out a halt to her. And once the wind—crying through empty buildings—shifted to carry the warning rot of dead meat that meant Walkers on the move.

  They skirted the city center, kept to shadows that lengthened under the dark pewter clouds. Gideon hoped like hell the Walkers did follow them, and were moving away from Temple’s people. If they didn’t…well, Carrie’s idea, wh
atever it was, had better work.

  And he’d better find out about that.

  Catching her tunic, he tugged, stopped her. He gestured for her to follow him into the ruins of a small structure that still had windows and most of its roof. They climbed over fallen stones and Gideon found a place where you could watch the street below, with two exits—up and into the next building or down into a narrow alley. Rain pattered down harder now and had started to carve rivulets into the street.

  Carrie pulled out the laptop and Shoup’s Swiss Army Knife and started to open the case. Hunkering down next to her, he asked, “Just what makes you think you can close the Rift? Really close it? And stuff the Walkers back into it?”

  Glancing up, she met his stare, her eyes darkened by wide black pupils. She bent over the laptop again, started unthreading screws. “It’s complicated. And theoretical.”

  “Meaning you don’t really know?”

  She lifted the back off the laptop, sat staring at wires and circuits and he wondered what she saw there. Did she know the names of each part, did she see patterns that eluded him?

  Closing one blade and pulling out another, she started to poke into the guts of the laptop. She pulled out a larger part, held it in her palm. “Power’s fried.” Looking up, she pushed the battery at him. “I keep thinking about why the two of us can open a Rift that works both ways, but the doorway in my lab seems to be one way. There’s got to be a reason for that—maybe something on this side is stopping it.

  “And I keep thinking about how current will flow, taking the path of highest conductivity. But, if you push enough current through something that doesn’t have the capacity to carry it, you can short the connection—instead of punching a lot of small holes like the Walkers do, we need one big one. With luck, it’ll implode—it’ll seal the holes in the Rift.”

  “Luck? Haven’t had much so far.” He took the power supply from her. Gray, flat, it didn’t look like much. But he could see scorch marks on one end. He looked up from it and at Carrie, and he knew he wasn’t going to like her next answer, but he had to ask anyway. “How sure are you that this big hole of yours won’t rip everything apart in a big way?”

  She hunched a shoulder. “There’s always a chance for things to go wrong. For mistakes. Which is why I keep trying to come up with a plan B. So far, we’re a little limited with choices.”

  He couldn’t help it. His mouth quirked. “A slow end with the Walkers or maybe you give us a fast one instead?”

  She glanced at the laptop, took back the power supply. “I don’t have any certainties. I’d feel better if I could run the calculations outside my head. I’d even sacrifice this doorstop for a slide rule.” She looked up again, put her elbows on her thighs. “You know words—someone…a friend once told me I should look up the real definition of that word.”

  “What one—sacrifice? Why? Are you thinking of making one?”

  “No. No. I…I’m not sure I believe giving up something important ever gets you anything better. I wouldn’t do it with my work and…well, I’ve never given up on anything.”

  Gideon shifted, pushed at a rock with his foot. “That’s what it’s come to mean—giving up something to get something. But the roots…it comes from Latin. Sacer, or sacri…holy. And facere—to do. It once was about making actions into sacred rites. We changed the meaning, made it about a bargain—offer blood to appease the gods, or try and make a deal somehow with the deity of your faith.” He glanced at her and smiled. “Baseball didn’t help the change in definitions with sacrifice hits.”

  “So my belief system is informed by religion…and baseball?”

  “To some folks, they are the same.” He smoothed a hand over the laptop she held. “I’d have liked taking you to a Giants game.”

  Throat closing tight, Carrie sat straighter. Her lips parted as if she meant to say something and regret darkened her eyes. Before she could speak, the scrabble of rocks from outside froze Gideon. Holding up a hand, he rose, crept back to the gaping doorway. The rain had eased, drizzled onto puddles left behind. Thunder rumbled, distant and low. He held still, listening.

  There were still a few burrowing animals who had survived and Gideon hoped like hell that sound had been one of them and not a Walker. Stepping out, he put his face into the wind, caught the scent of nothing more than damp air. But if the Walkers were downwind, he wouldn’t smell them until it was too late.

  Going back to Carrie, he gestured for her to rise. “We should keep moving.”

  She nodded, fit the back to the laptop again, twisted in two screws to hold it in place. Rising, she looked at him. “Temple’s lab?”

  He knew what she was asking—he could guess the request she’d hidden in those simple words. Will you help? Will you get me there? He was pretty sure that’s what she needed from him—protection. Someone to hang onto her while she balanced the universe on the edge of oblivion and maybe dragged it back from that edge. No wonder she hadn’t wanted to tell Jakes about this—it went about a hundred miles beyond Jakes’ orders. It went even further beyond anything sensible.

  “What’s the rest of it?” he asked. “What haven’t you told me?”

  She straightened the strap to the laptop bag, held it with both hands. “The door from my lab—we had a power spike when it opened. I told you about that. That has to be the problem. Or that’s part of my theory, too. I think too much power is pushing through from the other side to here. It’s like a fire hose that’s turned on—the power keeps pushing through to here, but won’t let us cross back. But I think…I have Temple’s memories, and I think that the device he set up and tried to use to rid this world of Walkers, I think it’s a dampening field. That image came through, and I think I can use it to make the doorway to my lab work both ways. Once we’re back…well, I have equipment on that side. And we’ll have help.”

  Gideon shook his head. “Sounds like even more theory.”

  Carrie’s smile twisted. “More like guesswork. But you said it yourself—something drives the Walkers out of this area twice a day. I think it’s a burst from Temple’s last device. I saw...well, you know what I saw in the rings.”

  He did. He’d seen Temple’s memories of that as well. He had forgotten half of them, but he had not forgotten the price of Temple’s last effort to save his world. Ten had died, four of them taken by Edge Walkers.

  Frowning, Gideon started for the doorway. He stopped, glanced out at the empty street, and looked back at Carrie. “You’re going to take it apart, aren’t you? Temple’s device.”

  She hefted the laptop, stepped over the rubble to his side and leaned past him to glance down the street. “To be honest, I won’t know until I get in and we find out what other memories those rings put in my head.”

  “They fade.”

  Jerking straight, eyes wide, she stared at him. “What?”

  “The memories. They’ll last a few hours. Only a few will stay with you for any longer—and there’s no way to tell which ones stay and which go.”

  “Crap. We really do have to move. Come on.”

  He grabbed her wrist before she could get out the door. He wasn’t letting Carrie head into anything on her own. “Slow. Quiet. We bring Walkers on us, memories won’t matter.”

  Nodding, she let him ease out the door first. He checked the streets, picked a direction that seemed quiet. He led now, darted between buildings, avoided even the hint of a sound. The skin between his shoulder blades twitched and the hair lifted on the backs of his arms with static charge. Walkers were near.

  At the next street corner, he glanced behind them, leaned close to Carrie and whispered, “They’re coming.”

  Carrie nodded. She glanced at him, the lines on her forehead tight. He saw the same knowing reflected in her eyes—the fact that Walkers were near was good news and bad. Good to know where the Walkers were at last. But like Jakes had said, not much fun being the prey on this hunt.

  Gideon hurried forward. He heard Carrie’s breath ragged and r
asping behind him. They dodged down empty streets, their boots too loud on the wet, paved streets. He stopped before the gaping doorways to the tallest tower—Temple’s lab.

  Carrie followed him inside.

  He stopped to give her eyes time to adjust to the gloom. He no longer seemed to need that. Taking her hand, he led her to the back and to the stairs. He knew where he was going. He’d been here once before, and he still had his own bits of Temple’s memories. He could only be thankful the bodies were gone by now. Dust and shadows covered the bloodstains from those who had died here. But, in his mind, he could still see the spattered walks, the drained, shredded corpses. In case scattered bones remained, he stepped carefully over any obstacle.

  They went down, not up, two flights, and the weight of earth and building closed overhead in a way it hadn’t in the crystal caverns. At last they stepped into an open room. And Carrie pulled off the messenger bag and looked around at Temple’s lab.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  Just what kind of technology did you use to get here? [silence] What were your intentions coming here with explosive devices? [silence] You do know this will go easier on you if you cooperate. [silence…unintelligible word] Shut it down, Sergeant. Time to let the Homeland boys deal with this towelhead and see if they can get anything out of him. — Transcript of Interview with Person Known as “Temple”

  The walls glowed softly and Carrie tried not to think about the dried bloodstains she’d glimpsed on the stairs. She pulled in a breath and let it out—one thing at a time. She put a hand to the cool stone walls and thought of the chemical phosphorescence she’d seen in the caverns—the walls here had that same faint eerie green glow. A similar, stronger light lit the single pedestal in the center of the room, and an opaque carved cylinder as long as her forearm rose up from the dark metallic base. She went to it and searched her memories, her fist tight on the strap of the bag. Nothing surfaced—no so much as a single image. Gideon prowled the edges of the room, his footsteps a soft echo.