Without another word, he melted into the ground and disappeared into the dirt. Jennie laughed, her connection to Baxter remaining strong as she followed his signal. As long as she could feel him, he’d be safe.
He popped back up about thirty feet from her and shook his head. “Nothing yet. It’s all just packed dirt.”
“Keep looking,” Jennie instructed.
Baxter obeyed, making a show of diving into the dirt as if it were a swimming pool. Jennie laughed as his fingers met over his head and he submerged himself in the earth. She once again followed until he resurfaced.
“Nothing.” He wiped his brow.
“Keep searching,” Jennie called, struggling to talk between laughing fits.
This time Baxter pretended he was walking down a staircase, his body descending into the dirt.
Jennie followed where he went, ensuring she was connected to him at all times. After twenty minutes of searching, Baxter’s head poked up like a gopher from a burrow.
“I’ve found something,” he informed her. “Some of the tunnel has held up. Come and see.”
Jennie crossed to Baxter and allowed the earth to claim her. For a few seconds, all she could see was darkness, and all she could smell was earth. Then, a chamber came into sight. It was smaller than it had once been, but still somehow structurally sound. Torches were lit along the walls, although Jennie couldn’t understand how or why. Someone was definitely living down here.
Baxter was already waiting at the entrance to a tunnel on the far side of the chamber. While Jennie had grown familiar with a lot of the tunnels and their direction during the time she’d spent down here, she never believed she’d seen the full extent of the tunnel system. Who knew how far the tunnels had stretched beneath this ancient site?
Not only did the tunnel extend far beyond what she’d believe to be possible, but there was still power here. Jennie sensed a spectral pulse around her. She didn’t believe that this could solely be the residue of the battle, so she kept her hands poised to go for her weapons. She was ready for whoever made themselves known to her.
After a short while of ducking through the tunnels, they came across voices. The hairs on the back of Jennie’s neck were already on end. She had sensed they would be here, but she didn’t know who exactly they were yet.
Jennie met Baxter’s eyes. She placed a finger on her lips and closed her eyes, trying to sense who was around. The signatures were strange, something she hadn’t experienced before. They were definitely spectral, but she wasn’t sure she’d met these particular specters.
The voices faded into the distance. They followed after them, sneaking through the tunnel until the voices grew louder.
Jennie reached a corner and poked her head around. Thanks to the firelight that edged the tunnels, she could make out around two dozen specters sitting around the room. Benches had been created from indentations in the earth, and if it hadn’t been for the fact they were underground and worms were crawling through the walls, Jennie could easily have mistaken the room for a bar.
There were no drinks, but the patrons were clearly at ease. They spoke of old times, occasionally falling silent as conversation expired. Jennie watched them eagerly, not quite believing what she was seeing. All the specters wore the uniform of the SIS.
“Forgotten soldiers,” Baxter whispered. “From the battle?”
Jennie supposed they were, although she had never seen this kind of behavior before. Why would they have confined themselves to the tunnels? They weren’t poltergeists.
She broke away from cover and entered the room. All eyes turned to her, and immediately the smiles slipped from their faces.
“You,” a man cried out, rising to his feet. His face showed a mixture of alarm, concern, and anger.
A woman who’d been in her mid-thirties when she died rose to her feet and glowered at them both. “You have a lot of nerve coming back here.”
“We knew you would,” added another. “We knew you’d be back.”
Jennie placed her hands in the air, palms out in defense. “I’m not here to cause trouble. I didn’t think any of you would still be here. Why are you hanging around in a filthy old tunnel?”
“What else is there to do?” the first man replied. His beard was dark, and a bullet wound showed the place where he had been shot. “The world has changed for us. We’re too far from home, and a deranged maniac is out there laying waste to specters. You saw the machines we brought with us. You saw how those specters were exorcized. It’s safer to stay here where no one can find us than risk going out there and ending it all.”
Baxter appeared beside Jennie. A few of the spectral SIS agents flinched. “Brendan Koa is gone. We ended his tyranny weeks ago. He’s no longer a threat.”
“But you are,” the woman growled through gritted teeth. She advanced on Jennie. “What do you want from us? To finish the job you started? Is that what you do? Clean up your mess weeks later and track down every last specter.”
Jennie furrowed her brow. “Are you serious? I worked with the SIS for years. Are you telling me you don’t know how I work?”
The bearded man barked. “All we know is you’re a threat, and the queen wanted you removed. Since you’ve delivered yourself so eagerly into our laps, perhaps we can oblige.”
Jennie sighed. She knew that look. Unfortunately, words were useless once a mind had been set and the rest of the group had fallen in line.
They closed in on her and raised their spectral weapons. Jennie drew her own guns, then tossed them behind her, eliciting raised eyebrows from the majority of the group.
“If you really want to do this, let’s at least make it fair,” Jennie declared. “Oh, who am I kidding? To make this fair, you’d have to cripple me, and there’s no time for that. Go on, then. Bring me your worst.”
To Jennie’s surprise, it was the woman who was the first to attack.
Chapter Fifty-Seven
Washington DC, USA
The woman caught Jennie by surprise, slamming her fist into her cheek.
Jennie was knocked backward, but Baxter caught her and nudged her back into the fray. Jennie returned the punch to the woman’s face.
The woman yowled in pain and fell to the floor. The others rose around her, and everyone came at Jennie at once.
Jennie found a small gap to slip between them and twisted out of the way of their hands. She came out the other side and kicked a man close to her, causing him to bowl into three others. By the time her foot was back on the ground, another had recovered and came at her.
Jennie ducked out of the way of his fist, then twisted as she noticed another man firing at them. The gun boomed, but the shot found only air. Jennie raced toward him and aimed for the pistol.
Before she could get there, a body smashed into her side. Jennie was knocked off her feet, and three agents jumped on her. Her vision was filled with spectral agents as they attacked her body, throwing flurries of punches. Jennie sighed and closed her eyes, knowing that now was the time to use her powers. She gave an almighty shout and focused her attention on the three.
The cells on her waist glowed brightly from the collected power, and a moment later they shot off her, smacking into the ceiling. They fell on top of their comrades, giving Jennie a chance to push herself to her feet.
Baxter busied himself with four of his own opponents, throwing hammer-fisted punches and picking specters off the floor. With one hand, he threw a specter into the nearby wall, where he slid down and struggled to get back up.
“Keep it up, Bax!” Jennie shouted.
“Always do,” he replied.
The woman launched from behind and grabbed Jennie around the neck. The specter with the pistol aimed as the women held her still. Jennie grimaced and fought against the woman who was surprisingly strong.
“A word of warning,” Jennie gargled.
“What’s that?” the specter replied, glee in her voice.
“I’d suggest you move out of the way,” Jennie finished before d
isconnecting from the specters and becoming material.
The gun fired. The bullet sped through the chamber. A spectral bullet from a spectral pistol. The bullet passed straight through Jennie and entered the woman’s stomach. She was knocked into the wall, a large hole decorating her gut.
Jennie turned spectral, crossed to her, and grabbed her by the throat. “I warned you.”
Another shot fired. Jennie had planned it. She turned material once more and the bullet found the woman’s head, exploding it like a cantaloupe dropped from a great height.
The man with the pistol gasped and dropped the weapon. “I’m so sorry!”
Jennie fixed him with a cold gaze. “It’ll grow back. She’ll be fine. You, however, won’t be.” She raised a hand and latched onto the specter. One moment he was standing, the next he was floating off the floor, his legs kicking wildly in the air. Jennie swept her hand to the side and he went flying with the movement, crashing into the wall on the far side of the chamber.
There were only a few left with the guts to fight. The nearest to Jennie was only further fueled by what he had seen.
So cute, Jennie thought. No matter how much time mortals spend around specters, they still believe that they’ll be the one who is different from all others when they die. Let’s see how that plays out for you.
“Baxter. Wrench,” Jennie instructed.
The wrench flew through the air. Jennie caught it in one hand and thunked the man on the head. His eyes rolled up and he fell onto his back. When the next man came, Jennie used the momentum to catch him in the stomach on the backswing.
The weight of the wrench was impressive and dragged her around. As she turned, someone launched themselves onto her back again. Jennie threw herself back, using her attacker as a cushiony landing. When they were on the floor, she rolled sideways and climbed to her feet. She held the wrench over the specter and quickly examined the room.
This was the last specter with any fight in them.
“I think I’ve made my point,” Jennie stated, the wrench still above the specter. “Thank you, Vegas, and good night.”
She dropped the wrench the same way she’d seen celebrity stand-ups and musicians drop the mic on a thousand TV shows. The specter held out her hands before her but was unprepared and dazed from her encounter with the ground. The wrench slipped past her arms and found its bed on her face, sinking into the skin and leaving a dent.
Baxter threw one last punch to an agent he was caught with before that agent fell unconscious to the ground. Jennie picked up the wrench and tossed it back to him with some effort.
The bearded agent pushed himself to a sitting position. “I never believed you’d be as strong as they said you were. I thought it was all rumor and hearsay.”
Jennie latched onto the specter and dragged him to his feet. She pulled him toward her and held him in her grasp, a few feet from her hands. “Be careful who you underestimate,” she commanded. “That will be your undoing. Now, tell me the real reason you’ve been hiding in these tunnels.”
“We’ve already told you,” the woman on the floor replied. Her mouth was slightly caved in, so her words were slurred, but she managed around it okay. “We were afraid of what’s happening outside. We heard the rumble of machines for days, weeks even, and remained hidden. We couldn’t risk being vacuumed up by the Umbra’s machines.”
“Plus,” the man took over, “We hoped you’d find your way back here. You left one of yours behind, didn’t you?” He gave Jennie a knowing look.
Jennie’s brows knitted together. “Where is she?”
The man didn’t reply, he simply looked over his shoulder.
Jennie let him go. The man dropped to the floor and folded to his knees.
She strode past him and toward the end of the chamber, where a crude arch led further into the tunnels. With Baxter beside her, they took up the width of the space as they wandered toward the dark.
In this tunnel, no flames were lit. Jennie took a torch from the wall and carried it with her, ignoring the groans and complaints from the agents behind them.
Baxter turned over his shoulder. “What if they shoot us now our backs are turned?”
Jennie shook her head. “They wouldn’t be dumb enough to try.” She paused. “I hope.”
The tunnel stretched farther than Jennie imagined it would. Impossibly, much of this structure had survived the blast. She guessed that they must be quite a distance from the memorial, trailing past the grasses and back into the city. After a few winding turns, she picked up a spectral signal ahead.
“Careful,” she warned Baxter, extending an arm. They approached more slowly as a light flickered into existence ahead.
The smell of cooked meats and other strange aromas caressed their nostrils. The air held a strange mixture of bitter, sweet, and sour notes. Jennie and Baxter worked their way toward the light, and soon a small chamber came to light.
The firelight flickered in shades of green and purple beneath a large cauldron. The heat rose in ripples, distorting the air around the specter dancing around the cauldron with her eyes closed, deep in her own thoughts.
Jennie and Baxter watched from the mouth of the chamber, entranced. A wave of guilt washed over Jennie as she recalled the last time she had seen Susannah, standing beside Hendrick with her face set and stern as they prepared to take on the Umbra’s army in the halls beneath Alexandria.
A lot had happened that day. There had been too many people to count. She could recall Susannah’s face as she battled the possessed army but could not remember seeing her after the event. When all was said and done, Jennie was ushered onto her next project. Life moved so fast.
The cauldron bubbled and responded to her chants. Occasionally Susannah would wave her hands over the pot and add an ingredient—Lord only knew where she had gotten them—and the bubbles would grow and pop and roil.
After a few minutes of watching this strange dance, Jennie cleared her throat.
Baxter tensed beside her. While he had finally gotten used to Jennie’s strain of spectral magic, he was clearly uncomfortable in the presence of this self-proclaimed witch.
Susannah froze on the far side of the cauldron. She opened her eyes and spun to face the pair with a knowing smile on her face.
“What are you making?” Jennie asked, as casually as if she were asking a neighbor the weather forecast.
Susannah’s head tilted, the action twisting her face into a grotesque mask. She was considerably older than the pair of them or, at least, had been when she died. “Beef casserole.”
Baxter’s brow creased. “Specters can’t eat.”
Susannah grinned. “I know that. You know that. But those wretched agents out there don’t know that. If you keep yourself busy brewing things and making it seem as though you have a nefarious purpose, they leave you be. Funny, isn’t it? Those juvenile specters don’t know the first thing about specterdom, even though they spent a good portion of their life fighting it. I guess you don’t understand it until you’re on the other side.”
Baxter nodded his head in agreement.
Jennie took a cautious step into the room. “Why are you here, Susannah? Why did you stay in this hole?”
Susannah swiped a digit through the boiling concoction before sucking the mix off the end of her finger. Despite the heat pouring out of the cauldron, she showed no sign of pain.
Her eyes fixed on Jennie’s. “Come on, dear. You’re smarter than that. If you were going to waste time with stupid questions, I would’ve put out a lawn chair and relaxed. You know the answer. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be here.”
“I had a hunch,” Jennie replied. “I didn’t know for sure.”
“You wanted to chase my trail,” Susannah stated. “You hoped that enough of my spectral essence would remain behind, and you thought you could follow it like a bloodhound to find me.” Her eyes narrowed. “But why?”
“I thought you knew?” Baxter commented innocently.
Jennie chuckle
d. “It’s true that I went to the place where I thought your power might be strongest, and I hoped you’d be here, sure. But I didn’t expect to find you here. Why did you come back? You spent months down here hiding. Why return to your place of confinement?”
Susannah’s eyes drifted into a dreamy, far-off gaze. “It’s funny, but ‘prison’ is defined by the mental state of the prisoner. When I had no choice but to exist down here, it was torture. Now that it’s of my own volition, it’s a comfort and a home.”
She studied the pair of them standing in the entryway. “After the battle with the Shadows, I could already sense that there was going to be a rounding up of the specters. Any spectral force who had fought within that skirmish was to be rounded up and questioned by the SIA and logged in some notebook by someone or another. The moment I could sense the tide was turning, I fled, moving as fast as my spectral body would allow me until I was free on the surface again.”
Her eyes were glassy. “There were camera crews and police and a thousand pairs of eyes watching that old factory. I slipped out the back and into the night, knowing that I couldn’t be a statistic. Specters like me, those who have maintained their powers from their mortal bodies, we should exist in the shadows. I know the power that could be squeezed from me if I was caught by the enemy, so I went into hiding. I found the one place where I had existed in peace for the longest, and I made it my home.”
Baxter forced his eyes away from the hypnotic bubbling pot. “And what a home you’ve made it. I love what you’ve done with the place.”
Jennie elbowed him and laughed.
“It may be nothing to you,” Susannah replied. “But after several centuries of moving from basements to abandoned churches and more, at least no one would think to look for me here.”
“Except us,” Jennie replied.
Susannah nodded. “Except you.” She studied them once again. “The only thing I don’t understand is why you’re here. Your battle with the Shadows is ended. To what do I owe this unexpected pleasure?”
Baxter spoke before Jennie could. “If you knew the battle was over, why didn’t you tell the agents out there? They’ve been in hiding for weeks, worried the Umbra would get them.”
Agents, Agreements and Aggravations: In Her Paranormal Majesty’s Secret Service™ Book Three Page 44
