VECTOR (The Weaver Series Book 3)

by Vaun Murphrey

  Malcolm’s sister Melody’s voice rang in our head as we waited and I pulled the memory forward to sift through her steady confident words:

  Melody regarded me either thoughtfully or warily, it was hard to tell which, and her eyes said she was thinking even as her mouth responded, “Secrets, however long they are kept, usually still manage to be brought to light. The best you can hope for is that you’ll be in control of when a secret gets out, not if it does.” I could see her eyes snap back into focus in the here and now and then she continued, “I trust the Council as far as I can throw them. If and when they find out about Cassandra’s ability, expect them to find an excuse to either ‘protect her’ or proclaim her a hazard and lock her away to ‘protect us’ then use her abilities at their discretion.”

  As the recollection ran its course I let it slip back into its former resting place with a feeling of unease. Silver caught my thoughts and sent a tight private line of reassurance my way. “They’ll never be able to hold us. Don’t worry about the Tribunal, Cass. We’ll sort it out.”

  I slung back, “We’ve got too much at stake. All they’d have to do is threaten someone we care about. You know that.”

  My twin’s mind tightened like a screw as she pondered my worry. “Violence isn’t always the answer…and yes I know how strange that is coming from me.” Her mental mirth was harnessed so not an inappropriate bit would escape out to the Harris’s, but it was there all the same. “Maybe if we make the Council need us enough they’ll do whatever we ask. It’s all a matter of holding the proper cards and using perception to our advantage.”

  We both lapsed back into silence but this time it was a busily thinking one. Perhaps that was why the blast of heat from Cora Harris took us by surprise.

  One second Silver and I were silently drifting, tethered to James and Kara, waiting patiently for one of the Harris women to say something, and the next our essence was inundated with a fiery searing blast of pain. Instinctively we reached for the Lees with our minds because we could hear them cry out in panic. Silver only meant to protect them and her intentions were good but in her haste we all combined. There was no beginning, there was no end. In a frightening replica of a cloud of lost memories all of our minds flowed into an enormous sphere of swirling thoughts and colors.

  The pain ceased but our inner turmoil had just begun.

  Corinne, silent and frighteningly cold as ever, blocked her mother’s weaponized outburst with her ice-ball essence. “No, mother. You will stop or I’ll make you stop.”

  Cora screeched in barely coherent words, mind lost to rage. “She killed him! She killed him and I’ll kill her!”

  Corinne’s blue iciness intensified as it became apparent she wasn’t going to back down. Like a sheet of the protective veneer that had guarded our physical selves, a visible sky blue tentacle shot out whip-fast to circle but not touch Cora’s blood red presence. The lasso of light flattened horizontally then vertically to enfold the pulsing scarlet inferno. Her mother fought back with a wordless single-minded determination that I no longer had time to watch.

  A gaseous swirl of James rammed into my train of thought, derailing it as flashes of life intruded that weren’t mine. The unintentionally shared memory was a benign remembrance of a childhood fight with Kara over a favorite toy. I redirected my attention to our unpleasant set of circumstances. We were all drowning in each other.

  Mentally I shouted at Silver over the cacophony, “Pull out and tow Kara. I can tow James and then maybe we’ll regulate.”

  I zoomed up. There really is no up or down in the Web but if I thought there was an up there was. The little scattered bits of my essence that had oozed to mix with our foursome came reluctantly. Tickles of foreign thoughts tried to grow and take over my sense of direction but I focused solely on the ‘me’ to ward them off. At the last second I hooked into the brilliant lush green of James to carry him with me. In my mind’s eye I pictured a cell made of gas splitting apart to replicate itself. That didn’t exactly fit the bill but it was the closest natural process I could think to mimic.

  We were all going to be extremely vulnerable until our essences could coalesce into our separate selves. I spared a moment to check on Corinne and Cora but they were gone. Silver had her ‘hands’ full with Kara but I’d be asking her to check the Web as soon as we were all realigned. Heavy vibrations of fear crashed into James from where he was still intermingled with his sister.

  Suddenly Maggie was there in all of her soft orange glory. The calm radiating from her presence wasn’t cool, it was welcoming like a hug. Relief rippled through us all.

  Her voice rang out solid. “Holy moly guys. How did you get this way?”

  Just having my aunt near bolstered all of our confidence and James stopped being something to be dragged. He collected slowly into a semblance of his former green orb. We could see James’ connection reaffirm itself to Kara’s still scattered mess and as it did, her violet intensified to what I imagined was the consistency of oil. Parts of Kara began to attract other parts until she was a rolling ball of lavender. Upon closer inspection I saw the firmness had come from two connections—James on one side and Silver on the other.

  Maggie’s astonishment turned to fascination as the doctor in her peeked out. “This is a first. I didn’t even now we could do that. How’d you get all mashed together in the first place? Corinne woke up frantic…well, frantic for her. She said her mother needed to go straight to the infirmary if we still have one, then she told me you guys needed help. What happened?”

  James beat everyone to the punch. “Cora hit us with something. It felt like being scalded in a bathtub full of acid. Corinne attempted to block most of it but we were pretty dazed and Silver tried to shield us even further by pulling us into herself. After that it was a blur. If I had to compare it to something I’d say somebody fried us in a pan, then threw us in a blender.”

  Maggie was thoughtfully silent before she said, “Well, the timing sucks.”

  I could feel her thought that for Kara it was especially bad timing. The girl finally got her guts back to venture into the Web, and then this happened … bad timing indeed. Silver made headway getting her centered but frazzled didn’t even begin to cover Kara’s state. Guilt rammed me like an angry mountain goat from my twin’s direction. She’d be torturing herself for this mishap for a long, long time. Joy, joy.

  My aunt hazarded the question, “How do you feel? I don’t know what I could do if anything, but you guys look mostly recovered. I made Gerome pull over. We need to get back if you can manage.”

  Kara didn’t even wait for anyone before she left. We could still see her lavender and violet essence as it bobbed peacefully between James and Silver but her mental signature was reduced to almost nil.

  James said sourly, “One of us managed.”

  Chapter Fifteen: Cleanup Crew

  When I opened our eyes the physical world seemed raw and foreign. James still gripped our legs across his lap and Kara sat behind us in the seat. The air currents shifted as she moved. Tiny whimpers of sound escaped her.

  The hands holding our knees together released and I swung our legs down to the floorboard with a hollow thump.

  Reb and Ray were staring at us over the seat back. Ray was worried, but Reb was merely curious. Maggie lifted her light orange lashes to immediately look at her offspring, gathering them to her side. I smiled before they flopped on their bottoms at their mother’s silent urging.

  Malcolm murmured to Gerome, “They’re all in the now but Cora. We need to be on the move.” In the enclosed long cube of the van’s interior his voice carried like thunder.

  The engine fired up and Gerome made one last head turn to make sure we were all mostly okay since it was obvious Kara was having issues, then he put us back on course to the compound. Out the left side we could see the blur of a few buildings in the distance.

  Emergency lights flashed, visible even to the unenhanced vision of my fellow passengers. I could see the red of
a fire truck, the blue and white of an ambulance and the black and white of multiple police vehicles.

  Silver picked up our arm and draped it over Kara’s shoulder tentatively. The taller slender girl shrugged down to drop her head on our right side, snuggling into our neck to sniffle. James threw a long arm over the back of the seat to rest a palm on the fine hair sprouting out of her messy ponytail. She shivered so Silver tugged our wadded up coat from where it was wedged between our bodies and tossed it over her bare legs.

  Corinne’s protective veneer of energy was absent. Idly, Silver wondered if she’d needed to pull it back to fight Cora.

  James grew still then withdrew his hand from his sister’s head to turn in the seat. His voice was low and dangerous as he directed it at Corinne. “How long have you known about your mother?”

  Even with our back to the icy blonde I’d have guessed her face betrayed nothing, but I was beginning to assume that was when she had the most to hide.

  Voice emotionally vacant, she said, “A bit.”

  Waves of frustration rolled as James hissed, “And you didn’t think anyone deserved to know? Has she hurt anybody else?”

  Curtly, Corinne said, “No. Calvin was the only casualty.”

  Our ears perked up. What did that mean? We’d thought Shiva was the reason for Calvin’s psycho killing spree. Granted Silver hadn’t seen any black tendrils in our assailant’s Web presence before she killed him, but at the time we hadn’t even known what to look for. Was Cora’s strange talent to blame for her son’s psychotic behavior?

  In a clipped, sharp tone James asked, “What do you mean by that, Corinne?”

  Road noise and the creak of the van’s taxed suspension filled our ears and I could picture her trying to decide what answer would be best. Tension pulled the already strained atmosphere so thin, Silver started to unconsciously slow our breathing pattern in response.

  David took his forehead away from the glass. At his sudden movement we were reminded of his presence. His fingers were still entwined with Corinne’s and I noticed the knuckles on both their hands were white.

  The night nurse drew his bushy eyebrows in before giving a warning to James. “Ease up.”

  At the sound of his voice Corinne realized they were still physically connected. “What my mother can do is usually subtle, like erosion or the minute shift and grind of a glacier. Today was…different.” Her monotone was enough to put a person to sleep as the words issued robotically from her mouth.

  James gripped the seat back so tightly the vinyl screaked. His tone was softer with an undercurrent of impatience as he said, “What did you mean about Calvin then? If it was so subtle then how could Cora cause his death?”

  Anger pooled her features toward the center of her face as Corinne snapped, “I didn’t say my mother caused his death, I said Calvin was a casualty. Your little girlfriends over there killed my brother.”

  James chided, “In self-defense, Corinne. You saw the memory.”

  Her little explosion of emotion ended as abruptly as it had begun and her narrow shoulders slumped in defeat. “I saw it.”

  The brakes on the van gave a high pitched squeal. Out the windshield we could see the gate still intact but the perimeter was beyond breached. Using the gate was politely ignoring the devastation in a quietly insane attempt at normality. The sections of the chain link fence that the funnel cloud had gone through were twisted and turned upon themselves into piles of metal fishing net. Security was an illusion when Mother Nature turned on you.

  Kevin Smith manned the ‘entrance’ again. His eyes searched out the passengers in the van just as they should until his gaze reached Corinne’s and stopped. I craned our neck awkwardly to the side to observe her vivid blue iris as it glittered with a new emotion like an ice cube melting in the sun.

  Gerome was oblivious to the silent exchange as he cleared his throat in the driver’s seat to get Smith’s attention. “Anything Malcolm and I need to know, Kevin?”

  Silver whispered under our breath, “Corinne and Kevin sittin’ in a tree…”

  A foot kicked the back of our seat and I felt my sister twist our lips over our teeth in amusement at Corinne’s irritation. James smacked our thigh with the back of his hand and Silver raised our head from its resting place on Kara’s to wiggle her eyebrows.

  A little chuckle escaped from the female Lee snuggled into our side and she straightened to wipe the tears from her cheeks with her forearms. Our vacant shoulder was a little bit colder.

  Kevin blushed as if he’d been caught at something and stood to attention as he answered Gerome through the open driver’s side window. “I let in the emergency response vehicles because I figured it’s what you would’ve done. Above ground it looks like we lost about half the houses, the school, the general store, seventy five percent give or take of the vehicles and worst of all…the Facilities offices with all our tools to repair at least some of the damage, sir.”

  Malcolm huffed. “Ya did good, Kev. Forget the ‘sirs’, we’re past all that.”

  Gerome gave a nod. “Leave the gate and jump in. We’ve got to get everyone organized and out of here for the night.”

  Maggie spoke up. “Not before I check out Cora at the infirmary we’re not!”

  Malcolm sighed then turned to my aunt. “After that then, bossy.”

  My uncle wisely kept his thoughts to himself. Malcolm and Gerome together could be an odd combination at times. They complimented one another as if they were meant to be one being but their personalities remained precisely divided. Maggie bickered with both of them as if she had two husbands.

  James leaned out from our seat to open the van’s sliding door and let Kevin in. Predictably he headed to the back where David, Corinne and an unconscious Cora sat. They were all pretty slender, so Kevin was able to make room between David and Corinne.

  In muted tones while James closed the side door, Kevin asked, “Your mom gonna be okay?”

  I couldn’t resist the impulse to crane our neck and see our petite blonde nemesis react to her lover’s question. For my trouble we received a perturbed frown from Kevin. He motioned with a cracked bloody knuckle for us to mind our business so I turned to the front without comment.

  Kara wasn’t sniffling anymore and surprised everyone with a breathily low sing-song, “K-I-S-S-I-N-G…”

  James snorted in amusement and then tried to cover the leaked humor with a cough. After all, the situation was serious.

  David spoke up from the back, trying to pitch his voice to carry all the way to Gerome. “Where exactly are we supposed to take over three hundred people unannounced?”

  Maggie gave a humorless laugh. “You know my husband and his secrets. He probably built a whole new compound as a backup without telling anyone.”

  Malcolm’s arm stretched out to push against the side of Gerome’s seat as he turned to speak. “Not exactly but close. You knew the plan Maggie you just didn’t know the details. With David compromised it’s probably better that we kept you uninformed. You talk too much.”

  Silver whispered an ‘uh oh’ as the exposed skin on the side of our aunt’s neck began to turn red.

  Maggie practically yelled back, “Are you saying I don’t know how to keep a secret?”

  Gerome looked sideways at Malcolm as the van started to move toward the knot of emergency response vehicles clustered around the infirmary. That one glance said it all.

  The big man’s hand caused a crater in the firm foam of the driver’s seatback as he softened his tone. “No, that’s not what I said, woman. Quit trying to pick a fight because you’re stressed out. You do your thing and we’ll do ours. You don’t see Gerome telling you how to run your clinic and I stay out of Melody’s business at the school.”

  Maggie growled, “You better turn around and shut your face before I slap the lips off it.”

  Malcolm snorted. “You’re just mad ‘cause I’m right.”

  The van’s brakes squealed as we rolled to a bumpy stop. James di
dn’t wait for Gerome to put the gear fully in park before he leapt off his seat to hunch awkwardly by the side door and slide it open. He jumped down to the hard packed dirt and straightened with a relieved expression. David bulled forward from the back before anyone else could get out and motioned to Reb and Ray to follow him. Maggie made a shooing gesture and two little curly heads bounced down like balls of youthful energy.

  Ray turned solemnly to his mother. “No hitting, mommy. Play nice.”

  Reb ignored everything and everyone else to whine at David. “I’m hungry, David. What you gonna feed me?”

  The fatigued looking night nurse smiled as the three of them moved away toward the front doors of the infirmary. His response was lost as the wind gusted and blew his words away. I was sure they’d be raiding my aunt’s desk drawers.

  Maggie turned serious rather than angry to point an index finger at Malcolm. “I’ll deal with you later.”

  She avoided Gerome’s eyes all together and I wondered how the mad had gotten transferred to her husband. My uncle recognized it and scowled at his friend in consternation before opening the driver’s side door. Malcolm sighed and threw his head back into the headrest in frustration before he got out of the van to follow our uncle. The two men disappeared around the edge of a glossy red fire truck just as they began to speak intensely.

  James poked his upper body in the interior and to ask Kevin, “Can you carry Cora inside? Corinne, you need to get out of the way.”

  Expression clamped drum skin tight, Corinne’s voice lashed out, “I’m not leaving her side. I need to be close in case she wakes up.”

  Silver doubted it was for emotional comfort. Whatever the little blonde had done to her mother to protect us all was probably keeping her unconscious and contained.

  James grimaced and opened his mouth to respond in kind but Kevin beat him to the punch. With a hand on her forearm, Kevin loomed over her in the seat to murmur, “I’ll be careful with her. Just climb down and let me get your mom out, okay?”