Sweat trickled down Zoey’s forehead. “I’m not sure I want to do this anymore—”
“All operatives must get scanned. If you don’t move, and stop talking you should be fine—but I can’t give any guarantees. Now, please, no more talking. I mean it.” Agent Franken lowered his hood and started to punch buttons on his computer screen.
“EDDIE?” said Agent Franken through his visor. Zoey understood ready.
“No,” she whispered and stood as still as she could.
Through the haze of blue, she could see Agent Vargas in the mirror. He smiled and gave her a thumbs-up. She strained to stop shaking, but the mirror terrified her. It was going to hurt.
Just as she was beginning to feel like she might pass out, the humming from the mirror intensified, and a blue beam blasted from the mirror and hit her. Stunned, she couldn’t move even if she had wanted to. She couldn’t even blink.
The blue beam stretched until her entire body was covered in a semitransparent blue energy. She watched her eyes in her own reflection, which looked as petrified as she felt.
A sudden coolness washed over her like a cold shower, and her skin bristled as if millions of insects were running over her. Her eyes burned, and she wanted to blink, but she couldn’t. Then the coolness became a hot, stinging pain.
Her body was on fire. She watched as her reflection was pulled and warped like a gob of pre-chewed gum. She stretched abnormally long, then her face elongated, deformed, and her eyes bugged out like a fly’s. She tried to scream, but her mouth was like lead. She couldn’t open it. Her vision went dark, and she couldn’t breathe—she was going to die. And then all at once, her matter broke apart—the mirror sucked it in like a vacuum—and everything around her disappeared.
Chapter 7
Attack of the Killer Fairies
Zoey opened her eyes. She was standing on the exact same spot, as though nothing had just happened—as though she had not just been eaten by a giant freaky mirror. The mirror looked as it did before, but without the traces of the blue light energy around it. It was still humming, but it was dimmed and looked almost peaceful. She checked herself out in the mirror, and her reflection moved with that same eerie one-second time delay. She moved her arms, feet, and wiggled her fingers—all still functional. It appeared that there had been no mirror-port accident. She hoped there hadn’t.
“Can I move now?” she asked, feeling a little dizzy.
Agent Franken removed his hood. “Yes, you can move away from the M-Mat if you want.”
Zoey turned away from the mirror and walked over to the cubicle faster than she had anticipated.
“Did it work? I mean, did the mirror-port work properly on me? Is all my matter intact? There are no pieces of me somewhere in Africa?”
She checked herself again. She looked normal enough.
“More or less,” answered Agent Franken, matter-of-factly.
Zoey couldn’t tell if he was joking or not. “What? What does that mean?”
Agent Franken ignored her. “Off you go now. I’m a very busy man. I’ve got many pressing matters to attend to.” He giggled at his own joke and began typing on his computer, one finger at a time.
Before Zoey could ask more questions, Agent Vargas swung a duffel bag over his shoulders and steered her away from the cubicle.
“You did just fine, Zoey,” said Agent Vargas. “It takes lots of courage to face the M-Mat the first time, and you did well. Now, we need to get a move on. Your fellow operatives are waiting for us in the main hall,” he said and pointed to her pocket. “Earplugs in.”
Zoey complied and twisted her earplugs back in. She and Agent Vargas crossed the room through a variety of explosions and blasts and made for the exit.
All the students were waiting for them, including Tristan and Simon.
Tristan ran up to her with half a smile, and Zoey felt her face go red. She still couldn’t believe she had asked him so bluntly about having a girlfriend.
“So…how did it go? Not too painful I hope?” he asked, his smile widening. His dark eyes searched her. She looked away quickly and pulled out the earplugs.
“It hurt a little, and for a moment I thought I was going to die,” she said. “But it was more like weird than painful. It was the weirdest thing I’ve ever experienced.”
“If you thought that was weird, it’s going to get a whole lot weirder now,” said Simon as he joined them. He stood chewing a mouthful of gum with his hands in his pockets.
Zoey frowned at them both. “What do you mean?” She didn’t want to have to go through another M-Mat again; one time was enough, at least for the day.
Simon opened his mouth to answer, but he was cut short by Agent Vargas.
“All right people,” the agent’s voice boomed through the hall. “Into positions—you know the drill. Hurry up, hurry up, you can do better than this.”
The students scurried and formed a line in front of a large golden mirror. A flashing neon sign above the mirror read Australia. A small computerized panel to the right of the mirror looked like an alarm control.
Following the example of the other operatives, Zoey stood last in line behind Simon and Tristan. She tried to act like this was totally normal for her, too, even though she had no idea what was happening. She eyed the golden mirror suspiciously, a feeling of dread growing in the pit of her stomach. She knew she could never look at a mirror the same way ever again—not after her mirror-port experience.
Agent Vargas checked his watch. “Five seconds too long. Marks will be deducted, ladies and gents.” The disappointed students groaned.
He strolled along the line of students, observing them intensely, and then he stopped beside Zoey. “Here…this is your DSM.”
He handed her a round metal compact. She immediately recognized that it was the same type of compact she had seen Agent Lee and Tristan use before they disappeared.
She took it carefully and inspected it. Its silver edges gleamed in the light. It had the same ring dial with the engraved numbers on the surface, and a needle pivoting above a map. It was surprisingly light and felt cool against her palm.
“It’s like a compass,” she said.
Agent Vargas smiled. “In a way yes, it is very much like a compass, but better. The DSM, or double-sided mirror, is like a smaller portable version of the M-Mat. Operatives and agents use them for transport. It reflects your true self on one side, and your final destination on the other. It uses the mirror-port’s energy pattern, and your own fingerprint, to mirror you to and from the hive. It takes years to make one DSM. They are very valuable so don’t lose it.”
Zoey clasped her DSM tightly. “I won’t.”
She saw Stuart turn around at the head of the line and give her an evil grin, like he was planning something. She glowered back at him. She pocketed her DSM securely, in case he tried to steal it. Maybe he would give her a reason to smack that smile off his face…
“Good,” said Agent Vargas with a contended smile.
“Each major city around the world has mirror-port anchors, which are just like area codes. Just as Agent Franken explained, mirror port anchors can be any reflective surface—a glass window, a lake, a pond, or just another mirror—any reflective object in a fixed location can be prearranged to be an anchor point.”
He raised his arms and pointed to the wall of mirrors. “Each mirror here in the main hall is a port to a country around the world. Within these countries you’ll find their major cities. If we need to mirror-port to a small town or to a new location, then the hive in the nearest location will conjure up a new or temporary anchor for the job. You following me so far?”
“Yes.” Zoey was aware that everyone’s eyes were on her. She nodded her head, even though some of the information was still a little cloudy.
“Please remember,” Agent Vargas raised his voice, “—and this goes for all of you—be as still as you can when you use your DSM. Movement can cause you to mirror-port to an all-together different location. Mo
re importantly, be careful not to mix your image in the DSM with reflections from other normal mirrors. That can be catastrophic. This is not a toy. Use it responsibly.”
He walked over to the golden mirror and typed something into the small side panel. There was a loud buzzing. Then a green light above the mirror lit up, and Zoey heard a click. Agent Vargas stepped away. “Let’s go, operatives—we have a job to do.”
One by one the operatives stepped into the mirror and disappeared. The green light flashed each time, as though it was giving them the okay to pass. Agent Vargas had positioned himself near the front of the line and said, “GO! GO! GO!” as each operative next in line came to the front.
Zoey watched Stuart step easily into the mirror. He didn’t even flinch, and for some reason it made her angry. When it came to Tristan’s turn, he turned around and said to Zoey, “See you on the other side.” And with that, he walked into the mirror. It rippled for a moment and then swallowed him whole.
When it came to her turn, she halted in front of the mirror. She was still frightened. She forced herself to look at her reflection. Her movements were seconds off, just as they had been in the great mirror in room 1B. She was still not comfortable with the eerie time lag. She could feel Agent Vargas’s eyes on her. The other operatives had all stepped through like it was nothing. She couldn’t back down now.
Bracing herself, she closed her eyes, lifted her right foot, and stepped into the mirror.
Immediately, she felt her body was being pulled every which way like an elastic band. Then her feet left the ground, and she was floating. She twisted horizontally and vertically. Air flapped against her face. She smelled the ocean, then wet earth and hay. She strained to keep her eyes shut—she didn’t dare open them, for fear of being sick.
And then as fast as it had started, it stopped. Her feet touched solid ground again. Her heart beat widely in her ears. Did someone call her name?
She opened her eyes. The world around her was spinning. She recognized Tristan’s face. His lips were moving, but she couldn’t hear him. Her ears rung as though an explosion had gone off inside her head. Her surroundings spun faster and faster. Her stomach twisted—she was going to be sick. She couldn’t be sick in front of Tristan. She turned around quickly, took a few steps, and puked.
As she was hunched over, a pair of black shiny boots appeared next to her.
“Here, rinse your mouth with this,” said Agent Vargas. “And don’t worry, everyone’s sick the first time, even the best of agents—even me.”
He was smiling and holding out a bottle of water. She was horrified that everyone had seen her be sick, but she felt much better. A cold sweat trickled down her back, and she gladly rinsed her mouth.
They stood in an open field. The low moon cast gray light over everything, and a cool breeze refreshed her. Tall power lines like giant metal T’s were arranged neatly in a single row that spread out for miles on either side of a great valley and melted into the darkness. She could hear pops and zaps in the distance as a sequence of miniature blue lightning bolts from the top of one of the power lines illuminated the night sky. Then they stopped, and the sky was absolutely dark.
A lopsided old barn stood open under the shadows of the power lines. Its doors lay on the ground in rotten wood planks. Half the roof had caved in. All the windows were smashed, except for one, which glinted in the moonlight. Zoey recognized the glass as the reflective surface of the anchor point. They had just mirror-ported through the old barn’s window. She felt amazed and lucky to be part of something so extraordinary. Normal kids didn’t travel the world using mirrors. She smiled. This beat any fancy airplane ride. This was awesome.
“Take this,” said Agent Vargas. He took the empty water bottle from Zoey and gave her a large canister instead.
Zoey took the canister. It looked like a large hairspray can. The label read, “Skedaddle Anti-Fairy Spray, your # 1 repellent.”
She chuckled as she shook the canister. “Seriously? We’re going to spray this on fairies? Actual fairies?” She shook the can again. “Does this stuff actually work?”
Agent Vargas looked up towards the power lines. “Of course it works! It’s the best fairy repellent there is. You’re going to need it.”
“No way.” Zoey started laughing and only stopped when she realized that he wasn’t kidding. She looked around. Everyone else had canisters in their hands, too.
Stuart smiled at her confusion, and she did her best to ignore him. Even though she had no idea what was going on, she wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of thinking that he knew more than she did. Whatever the canisters were used for, she would use them just like the others. She kept her mouth shut and waited.
Agent Vargas had seen her confusion as well. “Fairies are hostile mystics, Zoey. They sneak across into our world illegally and plague us with mischief—nothing worse than fairies, if you ask me. Nasty creatures.”
“What do they do that’s so terrible? Aren’t fairies small and cute with colorful wings?” Zoey tried to imagine evil fairies, but she couldn’t imagine beautiful creatures with butterfly wings being evil. In all the stories she’d read, fairies were good. Every girl wanted a fairy, even her.
Agent Vargas looked up towards the power lines. “Have you ever experienced a black out? A power outage when nothing electric works?”
Zoey remembered when they lost power at the orphanage. It was always a treat. They would light up candles and read spooky stories to each other until late at night. They were her favorite memories.
“Yes,” she said finally. “Lots of times.”
“Well, that’s fairies’ work,” said Agent Vargas. “Although Mutes might think that power outages are caused by storms or animals accidentally short circuiting the fuse box, that’s not the case. Fairies love to cause power outages. Fairies feed on electricity you see, and we need to stop them. They can destroy an entire city’s main powerhouse in only a few hours. They could wipe out a whole country’s power system in a week. Can you image a world without power? Don’t be fooled. Fairies are hostiles and extremely dangerous. It’s our job to spray them and bag them.”
“Bag them?”
Agent Vargas dropped his duffel bag, unzipped it, pulled out a large black garbage bag, and threw it to Zoey.
She caught the bag easily. “Bag them with this?”
She stood with the bag in her hand, not really knowing what to do with it.
“That’s right. We bag them and take them back to the hive with us. Everyone, grab a bag.” He stepped back and waited until everyone had a black bag.
“Operatives, we need to move fast. The fairies are already mutating, and we all know what happens when they do. Spray cans at the ready, boys and girls. There’s a prize for the one with most bagged fairies. Move!”
He marched across the field towards the power lines. With their spray cans in one hand and bags in the other, the operatives traipsed across the field after the big man.
Zoey walked alongside Tristan and Simon. “Have you guys done this before? Spray and bag fairies?” She noticed that Tristan had two more cans in his front jean pockets.
“This is our third time,” answered Simon. “I bagged three, but Tristan’s the real champ—holds the academy’s record for Most Bagged Fairies ever on one assignment. Stuart wasn’t happy at all. You should have seen how his ugly face went all twisted. I thought he was going to cry. I bet he cries like a girl.”
“Hey!” said Zoey, with mock anger.
“Sorry,” laughed Simon. “But I bet he does. Today it’s going to be me, you’ll see. I’ll get them all! Whoa!”
He waved his spray can like a weapon. He used awkward martial arts moves, like someone with no real experience who’d watched too many Kung Foo movies.
Zoey caught Tristan staring at her. She smiled at him, but he looked away. Perhaps he was still embarrassed because she had asked if he had a girlfriend. He didn’t look offended or put off. In fact, he had a tiny grin on his face that
hadn’t been there before, like he was pleased about something. And she thought she knew what that was…
Zoey focused on the task before her. Tristan was obviously very good at spraying and bagging fairies—whatever that was—and she wanted to be just as good as him. So, even though she was a little self-conscious, she tried to stay close so she could learn from him. She’d always been very good at standing back and observing.
They reached the base of power lines and the operatives spread out. Blue electricity winked at Zoey from one of the power lines. She looked up. Even in the night’s black sky she could see fairies. There were hundreds of them. At first they looked like birds sitting on the power lines, but the closer she got and inspected them, it was clear that these were not birds.
They were the ugliest creatures she’d ever seen. These were not the beautiful fairies she’d imagined. They were size of house sparrows and were covered in filthy brown fur. They had veiny, bat-like wings, pointy ears, and large, wet, yellow eyes. They glared at her from above with hairless, gray-colored faces that were twisted and wrinkled like dried up raisins. Some had tails, while others did not. Some clung upside down like bats with sharp talons, while others sat cross-legged. They were all biting and tearing apart the electric wires. They ripped at the lines with sharp, pointy teeth, and chewed and swallowed the electricity like it was a spaghetti feast.
Transfixed, she watched as a little fairy the size of a humming bird ate away at a large wire. It swallowed the wire like slurping a noodle, burped loudly, and then it grew, doubling in size. It was now as big as a crow.
“Hey, did you see that?” said Zoey as she pointed to the fat fairy. “That one just grew! I saw it, it like got twice as big!”
Tristan stood at her side. “Quick, use the spray before they get too big for us to manage them.”
“Huh?”
Tristan covered the fairy that had just grown with a blast of semitransparent mist. It froze instantly, as though it had been squirted with liquid nitrogen. It fell to the ground like a rock. Immediately, Tristan picked it up and was about to put it in the bag when Zoey grabbed his hand.
Mystics #1: The Seventh Sense Page 8
