by Jody Wallace
He didn’t respond. Maybe he’d traveled around, trying to find Karen.
She tried again. “Zeke. Adi. Anyone?”
Like a faint breeze, a response tickled her hair. “You.”
Maggie whipped around. A vertical, clear space against her barrier filled in like an oil slick polluting the ocean. What the heck had that been, a dreamer? One of the guards? A new kind of wraith? Or was it Karen? She didn’t have enough experience to answer her own questions.
In moments, all she could see was black. It was distressingly familiar. She was used to it, used to seeing darkness and achieving little in the dreamsphere. She just wasn’t used to…
Wraiths surged en masse. They walloped her like an elephant’s foot stepping on a soap bubble. Maggie nearly collapsed.
Shields. Damn. Her own shields protected her, not Zeke’s. Hold, Maggie. Hold. She could do this. Should she try to wake up? She was supposed to support Zeke. Where was his conduit, Adi’s conduit? Anybody’s conduit? Why was the trance sphere empty of anything but her and a billion wraiths?
What if…what if Karen was trying to vigil-trap or kill Zeke? What if she already had?
Maggie locomoted in a widening circumference, holding her protections as well as she could. Search pattern. She needed a conduit, a trace. She spiraled through blackness and wraiths, their putrid odor and snarling cries her only companions. She wasn’t moving fast enough to escape them. Only geolocation informed her when her noncorporeal self exited the facility area.
At least she could figure that out.
At five miles west, give or take, Maggie spied glitter through the blockade of wraiths against her wobbly barrier. Manifesting conduits glowed red. The paler sparks made this one a locked conduit. She probed and sought the signature.
Zeke. Thank God.
Relieved, she called to him, hoping he’d supplement her shields. She was proud she’d maintained this long, but it could end at any moment. She’d shrunk her safe zone as snug as she could without endangering herself. The barrier was modulated to keep wraiths out, not to keep dreamers in. It wouldn’t block her fingers or feet from straying outside and getting chomped off.
That wasn’t an issue in the sleep sphere. The threat of death and dismemberment motivated her to greater efforts, the way Adi said she motivated Zeke.
With all these wraiths, he might need her to motivate him more.
“Zeke, I’m here.”
He didn’t respond. She couldn’t see a thing, but she could sense him. His signature. The tangible tugged her. She drifted through the yawning blackness and came up against a wall.
What was it? Zeke? She pushed forward hopefully.
The wraiths thinned between her barrier and the wall. She took another step, shuffling from side to side like sandpaper in hopes of dislodging them. The creatures remained—wispy, oily shadows. The compression between her barrier and the invisible obstruction dispersed their monster forms, but not the threat they posed.
They didn’t need the appearance of vampire teeth to kill. She’d best be careful.
Maggie squinted through the semitransparent wall of wraith gunk into the clear area ahead of her.
Zeke, a blond woman in his arms, stood in the center of a large, strong shield. That was what she’d bumped into. Their colors were more vivid than Maggie was used to, since her experience was of the grayed-out sleep sphere. Zeke and the blonde—Karen, surely—seemed vital and full of life.
Jealousy vented inside Maggie like a geyser. The way Zeke held Karen, his biceps bunching, his fingers splayed across her back. His head bent toward hers. His whole being seemed focused on embracing this woman who’d once tried to kill him.
Karen and Zeke had been lovers. They had a tangible. Karen’s sobs reached Maggie’s ears with a harsh cadence.
“Zeke, dammit!” Maggie punched the edge of her barrier. The strands of squalling wraiths trapped between the shields clustered at her fist.
One of them gashed her. She snatched her hand back. Blood dribbled down her wrist.
Crap. That would be there when she woke up.
The pain was nothing compared to the fact Zeke stood right there—right there—and she couldn’t get him to notice her. He was completely absorbed in Karen.
The woman twined her hands around Zeke’s neck. Maggie could see her tremble. She wasn’t beautiful. She was hospital-gowned, emaciated. Her yellow-gold hair hung in lank rat’s tails. But her face glowed with joy.
“You saved me. You saved me. I was afraid I’d never…” Karen choked out the words.
Why could she see Karen?
Come to think of it, why could she hear Karen? Maggie hadn’t matriculated yet, and neither had Karen. Adi’s rationale for sending Zeke into the sphere was that only Zeke had a chance of assessing Karen because of it. Maggie should only be able to hear and see Zeke.
“You think you deserve saving?” Zeke asked Karen harshly.
“Please,” Karen begged. Her mind-voice seemed as meager as her body. “I’ll do anything.”
Maggie scrambled for explanations. For her to hear the conversation, her oration with Lillian must not have been a fluke. Karen must have achieved oration ability too, or none of this would be possible.
Perhaps Zeke was better at teaching oration than shields, if both she and Karen had—
No. Maggie didn’t want to have any commonalities with Karen beyond the ones she couldn’t escape.
“Give me one reason why I shouldn’t leave you here to fade. After what you did.” Zeke had to know Maggie and Adi could listen in. Why was he ignoring Maggie—did it have anything to do with Karen?
“I’m so sorry. I can’t… I don’t know how to explain. It wasn’t me. It never was.” She began to cry so desolately her excuses turned to gabble. When the sound from Karen’s waterworks escalated, the wraiths outside both Maggie’s and Zeke’s shields churned.
“You killed civilians. Children. You tried to kill me.”
If he felt that way about Karen—suspicious and angry—why was he comforting her? Frustration made Maggie’s barrier vibrate and wane. Desperate, she bobbled her shield against Zeke’s, careful not to let any appendages break through. Would it catch his attention?
Dammit, she had a tangible with him too. She paced his perimeter and guided her bubble into his line of sight. Wraiths boiled around her, trying to get to her, never letting up.
She yelled in her head. “Zeke. Zeke. Zeke. Look at me. Dammit, are you blind?”
It didn’t have an effect. He was captivated by the woman in his arms. It was like Maggie didn’t exist in the same sphere as Zeke and Karen.
“Where is she?” he demanded of Karen. He didn’t sound friendly—but he didn’t thrust her away, either. He held her. With that much contact, the tangible would be coursing through them both, magnetic and compelling. Sexual.
Maggie felt like a wraith herself, growling and enraged.
“Who, the vigil?” Karen managed, her voice scratchy. Clever. A mind voice had no throat to become scratchy. She had to be directing her mental voice to sound like that—thin and pitiful—on purpose. “Below. She’s below.”
Far off, as if it were an echo, Maggie sensed the vigil’s signature. Adi was coming. Adi would know what to do. Maggie ought to be able to communicate with her, exercising her new ability. Then Adi could tell Zeke Maggie was here—and to quit hugging on Karen.
“Not Adishakti. I can read her. Where is my student?” Zeke snapped.
“You’ve been allowed another student? After me?”
Zeke hesitated before answering. “Yes.”
“I sense no one but the vigil. The one who looks for me. I can’t get through to her, nor her to me. They prevent it.”
“I know my student’s here. I brought her here. I should be able to sense her, and I can’t.”
“They hide s
ignatures,” Karen said. “Camouflage. They can do that if you’re weak.”
“They who?”
It was Karen who finally ended the embrace. The blonde glanced fearfully around, cowering into herself, as if expecting an attack at any moment. “The monsters. If they’re hiding her, the student must be like me.”
Were the wraiths—monsters—keeping Zeke apart from Maggie? Or was Karen? Maggie knew she wasn’t doing it. She also knew the wraiths had never managed to hide her from Zeke before.
Of course, she’d never been alone in the trance sphere before.
“Maggie isn’t like you,” Zeke said. “She’s nothing like you.”
“Nothing at all?” Karen’s watery gaze met and locked with Maggie’s. She’d never seen such abject terror on anyone’s face—not even her own, in the mirror, the night she’d become an alucinator and almost died. “I was weak. I was weak. They aren’t what we think they are. They’re so much worse.”
“Bullshit. You’re crazy, Karen. Everyone knows it.”
“Is she weak?” Karen seemed to be asking Maggie, not Zeke. “They’ll exploit her if she’s weak.”
Karen’s pupils shrunk to pinpricks, and Maggie’s theoretical bones turned to water. Was there truth to the babbling? Was she weak?
Was that why the wraiths tried so incredibly hard to get to her?
“Leave Maggie out of this. You expect me to believe anything you say? All you do is lie,” Zeke declared. To Maggie, he sounded like someone betrayed, someone hurting. He crossed his arms, his face a beautiful mask.
His gaze passed right over Maggie when he inspected the walls of his shield.
She resisted the urge to jump up and down and wave. For one, she’d pop out of her safe zone and into the wraiths. Her finger throbbed in warning.
For another, Karen was watching. Karen knew she was there. Maggie was sure of it.
“Maggie, is it?” Karen asked, her voice silkier. “Another woman. Do you care for her?”
“Never mind her.” Zeke rubbed his hands on his jeans. “Have you been killing the other dreamers? Sending wraiths after them?”
Karen finally turned back to Zeke. Maggie could no longer see the woman’s face. “I don’t control them and can’t stop them. You have to get me out of the dreamsphere. They want to use me to—”
A blob on the other side of Zeke cleared a path through the wraiths. Maggie could hear Adi’s hail.
“Zeke, I would like an update. I can sense Karen’s signature. This is the first time I’ve been able to, but I also observe formed wraiths, which is troubling. It means she may be near breaking.”
Perhaps it was Karen’s fault the wraiths weren’t formless instead of Maggie’s regression to total, frightened newbie. Good to know.
“Karen’s here,” Zeke broadcast.
“I’m here too,” Maggie sent.
Yet despite the fact she had no trouble hearing Adi and Karen, her hail to the vigil had no effect.
Zeke and Adi continued as if Maggie weren’t there. “Karen has no conduits, Adi. Says she’s innocent. Supposedly isn’t sending the wraiths to kill patients.”
“I had hoped I could assess her myself, but I suppose not,” Adi responded.
“I’m not killing people. I’m trapped.” Karen started crying again, hiccupping and pawing Zeke’s arm. “The only reason I can communicate it’s because it’s you, Zeke. Just like I told you. Only you.”
“Or you think I’m a sucker and finally came out of hiding,” he said bitterly.
“Tell her, tell the vigil, to please, please help me. Help me. The monsters can use me. They can use any weak alucinators. And the strong, they can weaken. They’ve started with the other dreamers. Absorbing them. Looking for channels. You have to get me out and keep me out, no matter what happens.”
Zeke laughed harshly. “You’re never leaving here.”
“Fine. Murder my body. At least it will stop them. I should have died the first time,” she wailed.
“Are you speaking with her?” Adi asked. The wraiths around Maggie—and around Karen and Zeke—hadn’t dispersed enough for Maggie to see the vigil. “Where is Maggie? There are no conduits but yours and mine.”
Maggie had a fine conduit. She’d locked it, and she could sense it. Adi and Zeke should be able to as well. She could sense theirs. Why were they blind to her?
“I don’t know.” Zeke sounded exasperated. Angry. “No sig. No tangible draw. Karen says wraiths can camouflage our signatures and could be concealing Maggie.”
“Not possible. Wraiths are not sentient, and nor are they curators. Perhaps Maggie left.” Adi didn’t sound as poised as she had. After counseling Maggie for two months, she knew Maggie wouldn’t disobey her orders to support Zeke. Or try to support Zeke.
“They have an intelligence we wouldn’t consider human, but they have it,” Karen said. “And they have…they have a leader.” Karen’s mind-voice dropped to a whisper. “Explain to your vigil. They’re like aliens. We already knew alien and monster myths were due to manifestations. Is it such a stretch?”
“First tell me where Maggie is,” Zeke demanded.
“They must have found her for him,” Karen said. “I’m so sorry. Pray that they kill her instead of use her.”
“She’s not dead,” Zeke snarled.
“Who’s not dead?” Adi asked.
Maggie’s shield chose that moment to falter, really falter. Wraiths slid between her and Zeke, cutting off her view. She felt them squeeze her barriers until she thought the pressure might pop her in addition to her shield.
She did want to support Zeke—but she couldn’t even greet him. If she didn’t get out of here, fast, she’d never be able to support anyone again.
She knew the science. Exiting the trance sphere wasn’t like finding your conduit and letting yourself slide home. You had to shove the entire sphere away from you.
Maggie pushed with her mind like the wraiths were pushing her. The walls of her buffer sank in, crushing, crushed.
The shield burst. Maggie screamed. The darkness swirled and agitated as the wraiths attacked. “Zeke!”
But they didn’t rend her.
She felt the revolting surges of their invasion. Her body convulsed. Oh God. This was it. Maggie thrashed with every part of her and felt sickening, rotten flesh tear beneath her fingers. She heaved. Struggled. She knew she couldn’t affect wraiths in the dreamsphere, but she wasn’t going to die without a fight.
She wanted to kill them the way they were killing her.
Her foot caved something in and stuck in goo. As she yanked free for another blow, fire blazed through her limbs.
She yelled again. Kicked. A skull like an eggshell crunched under her heel.
A wraith shrieked, so high and agonized she shouldn’t be able to hear it. Madness churned around her in explosions of scarlet and white.
Her ears buzzed with agony. Her vision tunneled. Right before everything went black, she looked up. And saw Karen smile.
Chapter Seven
The shriek jagged through Zeke’s brain like barbed wire. What the hell produced a sound like that in the dreamsphere? He ducked instinctively and thickened his shields. Secure. Karen’s spectral body remained erect, her attention engrossed in a disturbance outside the barrier.
“Adi, you okay?” He didn’t ask Karen. Maybe the noise would pop her head like a water balloon.
“Locating disruption.” Instead of avoiding the trouble, Adishakti sailed toward it, toward the section of his shield where wraiths burbled like a demented tar pit.
God, he hoped it had nothing to do with Maggie. His best guess was she hadn’t been able to find him after he’d piggybacked her into trance and had woken herself up. It shouldn’t be hard for her to wriggle free after two months’ experience in the dreamsphere. Maggie wasn’t a coward. Nor was she foolhar
dy.
“Is it Maggie?” he asked Adi.
“I don’t think so.” Adi seemed frustrated, confused. “Tracery of a conduit. It’s gone now. I don’t know if it was active or locked.”
The noise shut off abruptly. Karen hadn’t stopped staring. He peered at that section of his barrier. It settled into the same lumpy, threatening apparitions as everywhere else. Karen attracted as many wraiths as Maggie, but these monsters took form, which Adi had explained as Karen’s nearness to breakdown.
The wraith’s cognizance—and the existence of a leader—was another issue entirely.
“What are you looking at?” he asked her. “Your friends out there?”
“My torturers,” she said, her voice wobbly. “Oh, God, Zeke. They’ll use her as a portal to attack the terra firma. Can’t you see? Tell your vigil.”
“Nobody’s attacking the terra firma. If Maggie was here, she knows how to lock conduits.”
Karen rushed the edge of the shield as if she could stop the wraiths—or would be willing to help Maggie. When Karen had been his student, he hadn’t mentored any others. While the upturn in neo awakenings had already been underway, he’d told himself it was because he needed to devote himself to his prized L5 disciple. His lover.
He might have thought he loved Karen at one time, but he’d never imagined she was perfect. Her jealousy had been notorious and volatile—more proof of her imbalance that his peers had spotted and he’d ignored.
“Listen to me.” Karen whirled and grabbed him, or tried. He fended her off. “Tell the vigil we’re all in danger now that they’ve taken your student.”
When he’d located Karen tonight, she’d kept boohooing and collapsing like a ragdoll. He hadn’t wanted to touch her, but he’d had to hold her upright to get her to talk. The drag of their tangible felt more like undertow than the delicious connection it was with Maggie.
“Fat chance. Maggie’s not here.” He was certain of it. After two months feeling Maggie so deeply, how could he not feel her now? “She’s awake.”
“She’s manifesting, and they’re hiding her. Oh, God. It’s started. They’ll move her body around like they did mine in Harrisburg so you can’t stop it.”
