Vision

by N. D. Hansen-Hill

  Where's the gun? Where did it go? Zar thought. Her hands were empty.

  It was too much for Dusty. He slammed against the glass, again and again.

  Pointless and reckless, Zar thought, his eyes misting. But he also knew he would have done the same if it had been Merrie.

  At first James thought he'd made a mistake. With Ren bleeding like that, and gas pouring into her room, it was all he could do to concentrate. When the door hissed open at their backs, while he was trying so hard to focus on the office door, he was sure it was just one more overblown reaction.

  Until the figure came tearing in, through the gap. James jumped backwards, and ended up falling over, onto his butt. Zar, taken by surprise, got a swift kick toward the wall. It was Dusty, though, who got the greatest surprise of all.

  He was looking through the glass into Ren's eyes, when they suddenly changed. One hand whipped behind her back and snatched the gun off the desk. Dusty had barely acknowledged the change when he was ploughed into, and knocked to one side. The gun went off, once, twice, three times—its resonance growing louder with each hole in the glass.

  The figure in front was shaking, but still standing. And at the last shot, the man didn't hesitate. He punched his fists through the bulletholes in the glass, and latched onto Ren's shirt. Then, in one swift movement, he yanked her forwards, through the weakened window.

  The next moment, in a shattering of glass, he was flat on the floor, with Ren lying splayed across him.

  * * * *

  “Where?” Erik mouthed it.

  Josh closed his eyes, then pointed toward a section of fence. The damned ACS people had pulled her back away from the gate. He whispered, “What do you think he meant, ‘leave the means up to her'?”

  Erik shrugged. “Probably wants her to use her little talent to scare the shit out of them.”

  “How do you propose we give her the hint?” Josh asked, frustrated.

  “Think. You visited a graveyard with her. Any way to remind her?”

  "Yeah!" Josh said excitedly. His eyes lit up. “Sneeze!”

  Erik looked at him as though he was as mad as the letter writer. “Sneeze?”

  “Yeah!” Josh gave a loudly fake sneeze, that bought instant silence on the other side of the fence. “Told you,” he hissed. There was a rattle, as someone tried to scale the fence from the other side. Josh took a step back, but began to sneeze more desperately.

  Erik shook his head, then joined in. He gave some loudly fake sneezes, too.

  Merrie gave a squeal of something that sounded almost like delight.

  “Took her long enough,” complained Josh.

  The next moment, the squeals were anything but delighted—and they weren't from Merrie. All around there were shouts and shots, car door slamming and running feet. Someone bellowed "Retreat!" and several cars roared away with skidding tyres.

  Josh and Erik looked at each other, then sprinted for the gate. They opened it just wide enough for Merrie to stroll in.

  “They won't have gone far,” Erik warned.

  “How come they didn't take you with them?” Josh asked, wanting to know what she'd done.

  “Don't sound so disappointed!” Merrie retorted. She looked around impatiently. “Haven't you rescued Ren yet?!"

  “We've been dallying. Ten minutes, Josh.” Erik put an arm around Merrie's shoulders and gave her a quick squeeze. “They should have known better than to grapple with you.”

  Josh glanced at her dubiously, then shook his head. “It's that innocent face. Gets ‘em every time.” He sighed, then added incredulously, “Nearly made me trade in my Drepanosaurus. Now, how ‘mad’ is that?” He grabbed Merrie's hand, and led the way in through the door.

  * * * *

  Gas was still pouring into the small office, and now, with the broken glass, into their chamber as well.

  "Get them out of here!" Zar ordered. "The gas!"

  Dusty started to lift Ren out of the stranger's arms, when the man's eyes opened. He tightened his grip. “Get Merrie!” he whispered. He coughed, and his face scrunched almost convulsively. “Didn't think it'd hurt this much...”

  "Wait, Dusty!” Zar said. “Let's do as he asks.” He could see the anger and pain in Dusty's eyes. “I know him,” Zar said.

  And trust him—now.

  Dusty knew he had no choice but to trust him, too. But, dammit! This was Ren's life. He nodded, and got on one side while James got on the other.

  “Try to stop the bleeding, James.” Zar took off, to find Merrie.

  “Don't forget to find Erik, while you're going,” James yelled. He didn't like the way Ren or the other man were looking.

  They'd no sooner hauled Ren and the man out into the hall, when running feet sounded in the distance.

  “There's a bomb!” Josh's voice preceded them. “Eight minutes!”

  “Oh, grand!" James muttered.

  Dusty took Ren's hand and gripped it, almost fiercely. Stay with me, Kitten. “Thank you,” he told the stranger. It came out more stiffly than he'd intended.

  “Who are you?” James asked bluntly. “And why are you knocking me on my butt sometimes, and saving it at others?” James closed his eyes again and concentrated on stopping the blood from leaving their bodies.

  “Marc Jekkes—” the man whispered. He had bubbles of blood on his lips now.

  James opened his eyes, saw the bubbles, and concentrated harder.

  “From Smythe's office?” Dusty asked warily. He'd spoken to him on the phone a few times.

  “The same.” Jekkes gave a wisp of a smile. “Also known as ‘number eight'.”

  Dusty returned his look thoughtfully. Perhaps he was more perceptive, because he also had a talent that tampered with time. Suddenly, a lot of things made sense to him that hadn't before. “Of course. You're Precognition,” he said.

  * * * *

  Erik was on Zar's heels. “How's Ren?”

  Zar waved him past. “See for yourself.”

  Erik went on his knees next to Dusty. “Oh, shit,” he said. He couldn't tell where one person's blood left off, and the other's began. “What are you doing here?” he asked Jekkes. He'd seen him frequently in Smythe's office.

  “Always a pleasure,” Jekkes said sarcastically, then coughed again and groaned in agony. “Y're nothing like Garris.”

  Erik froze. “What did you say?”

  “Y'r nothing like him. He raised me.” Jekkes rested a hand on Erik's arm, and looked at him intently. “Y're better without.”

  “How did you—?” Erik looked at him through moist eyes. “Who—?”

  Jekkes grinned. It looked ghastly, with the blood running in the junctions of teeth and gums, but Erik didn't notice. “Precognition, Li'l brother.”

  “Oh, fuckin’ hell!" All this time he'd had a brother, and he hadn't even realised.

  "No—don't! Would have hated me. Better off. Hate me enough for us both...”

  Erik reached out a hand, to touch Jekkes’ chest.

  Jekkes recoiled. “Y’ can't. Let me go," he said. He lifted his eyes to Zar. “Ren'll tell you,” he gasped. “I'm not safe."

  It killed Josh to see how all this was affecting Erik. The poor guy was practically sobbing in his soup. “None of us are ‘safe'.”

  Marc didn't argue—he just shook his head. “Get Merrie.”

  Merrie's eyes were dark with sympathy. She dropped on her knees beside him. “I'm so sorry,” she said, as tears ran out of her eyes.

  He smiled. “I knew...'bout this. Give him to me.”

  “Who?” Merrie looked puzzled.

  His smile widened, as though he'd always known her. “Garris. Channel him—from Ren. Hold h'r hand.” He coughed, and nearly choked. “Hurry! Th’ bomb...”

  "Zar!" Josh said warningly.

  Zar knew what he was worried about. It was the same reason he'd insisted Merrie stay out of reach.

  But if it happens, we'll do for her what we were planning to do for Ren.

  It wasn't ter
ribly reassuring. They hadn't been all that sure they could effect a cure. Zar had to admit it: when it came to Merrie, he had far more concern for her safety than he did for his own.

  “I don't want to lose you,” he whispered in her ear. But, at the same time, he could see Dusty's expression. The man was halfway convinced he'd already lost Ren—if not by death, then by Drew Garris’ design.

  Zar's eyes met Merrie's, and she nodded. “I have to,” she said.

  She wanted to trust Jekkes. Jekkes, who wasn't, by his own admission, “safe". Zar wondered whether he was making a mistake. “Do it,” he murmured.

  “Four minutes,” James said quietly.

  Marc spoke to Erik. “When Merrie—” He curled up against the pain, but when Erik reached for him again, he shook his head. “Af-After she touches us, strength'n Ren—so she can chase him.” He flinched. He looked at Merrie and saw the doubt in her eyes. Once again, he smiled. “You c'n do this, Merrie,” he whispered. “I've seen you.”

  “Three minutes,” James warned.

  “Marc—” Erik began, in a last effort to convince him. “We could go now. All of us—” It came out like a plea.

  "No." It was firm, and it came from Valterzar. He squatted down next to Marc. “Prophecy's the preserve of saints,” he said quietly. It was as close as he could get at this point to a thank-you.

  Marc grinned again—that gruesome, death's-head smile that held no real joy. “That's wrong,” he gasped, but there was understanding in his eyes. “Jus’ gives the devils time to plan.”

  "Do it, Erik,” Zar ordered. It was what Erik needed, and Zar knew it was his purpose in this—to give Erik an opportunity to act, without having to live with the guilt.

  “Le’ me take the Dev'l wi’ me...” Marc chuckled, then his face contorted. "No-ow..."

  Zar remained at Merrie's side, next to her and Ren. God, he prayed, let this work...

  He guessed he wasn't the only one praying at the moment.

  Erik was weeping silently as he laid his fingers against the hole in Ren's side. He closed his eyes, and tried to tune it all out. In the end, though, there was just pain and trying to end it—his own, Ren's, his brother's.

  “Three minutes,” Jamie whispered.

  The place came alive. Refrigerators and freezers unclasped and slammed open, spilling their contents out onto the floor. The cryogenic containers popped their lids, exploding out their reproductive payload like the semen that was part of their contents. A particularly nasty autoclave seemed to focus in on Josh, and he ducked below the bench. "Do something, James!"

  James did, and things got worse. Stools began to fly around the lab, breaking glass showered down on them like rain. In the background, there was a creak and then a hiss, and fog swirled in around them.

  "Uh-oh," James said.

  The stiff, frozen body of Drew Goeritz drifted their way, his eyes white and fixed, and the blood still flash-frozen to his form. Even Zar nearly lost it at that one, until a chuckle from Jekkes told him their plan was working. In the next moment, the corpse toppled over in a meat-brick type thunk against the ground. Zar couldn't imagine the head surviving a fall like that with all the facial features intact.

  Marc Jekkes began to curse in furious gasps and moans that brought Merrie out of her absorption. As he called her a cunt and a whore, Zar reached over and grasped his throat. Merrie flung herself against him. "Don't, Zar!”

  “But I could stop him,” Zar told her coldly. Garris had done it to them all. Again and again and again. The anger inside Zar was coiling, almost as though Garris’ presence was a trigger. “I could stop his heart—or stop his breath...” His face was livid with hate.

  Dusty didn't hesitate. He reached across Ren, and punched Zar in the nose. “Get some control!” he snarled.

  Zar shook his head like a dog coming out of water. He caught Dusty's eye, a trace of shame in his own. “Thanks,” he muttered.

  When Erik opened his eyes again, Ren was looking at him. “I'm so sorry, Erik,” she whispered.

  Erik took her in his arms, burying his face in her hair. “So am I,” he whispered.

  “Time to go,” James warned. He looked at Zar who nodded, still with that trace of embarrassment in his expression. “Don't sweat it, Zar,” he said. “But try to have more control next time.”

  The rumble started when they were barely outside the door, and spread with the speed of an express train. "Run!" Zar yelled. He gave Josh a shove forward, grabbed Merrie's hand and took off, toward the gate.

  Dusty swung Ren over his shoulder and booted Erik in the butt. "Get him moving, Jamie!" Unwillingly, Erik began to do a kind of floaty-half-run, while Ren yelled at Dusty to put her down.

  In the end, Dusty and Ren ended up being tossed over the gate, and Erik and James were rammed right into it. The first thing Erik could hear, when his hearing came back, was Jamie saying over and over, “Sorry, Erik. You okay?”

  Valterzar limped over, and checked Erik for broken bones. “You gonna live?” he asked, amused. “If you're not, just tell me—”

  “Yeah—Merrie's already warmed up,” Josh said.

  “If it helps, Erik,” James told him, “right now, you look more like Zar than you ever did to the rest of your goddamn family.” It took Erik only a moment of focussing on Zar's swollen nose and darkening eyes to understand.

  “Good thing,” Erik mumbled. “For a few minutes there, I thought maybe I'd lost it all.”

  Dusty told him seriously, “Not a chance. I could still go back,” he whispered, “and see what I could do—”

  Erik shook his head, and told him, just as seriously, “Not this time, Dusty. Marc could have played it other ways. This was the way he wanted it.” Erik looked at the group of them: Zar with his blackening eyes, Ren in ripped and bloody clothes, Merrie rumpled and stitched, Josh with his hair singed and standing on end, and Jamie still wearing the remnants of Garris’ lab bench. “Besides,” he admitted, and a slow smile broke out across his face, “you guys are about all the ‘family’ I can take.”

  The sound of fire engines wailed in the distance. Zar and James helped Erik to his feet, but it was Dusty who insisted on hauling him out the gate. “I owe him one,” he said with a grin.

  “One?” Josh scoffed. “Try a dozen.” He gave Erik an irreverent grin, then rolled his eyes as Ren and Merrie each gave Erik a kiss on the cheek.

  Erik sagged a little, and Zar came up on his other side.

  “You want I should help you the way I did before?” James offered.

  “No, thanks,” Erik said quickly, with a trace of alarm. “Some other time.”

  Zar's lips twitched.

  The seven of them limped back through the gate, and out to the waiting car.

  Behind them, the fire crackled and roared, interspersed with hissing, sizzling, thuds, booms, spatters, and clangs. At one point, a sound like a firecracker's whine rose shrilly, before being cut off abruptly, in another plastic-smoke-belching blast.

  Not one of them looked back.

  Epilogue

  Charles Smythe looked at the letter, then, pessimistically, switched on his computer. It was dead. A blank screen. All the computers at Symtech had been similarly affected. The official explanation was that a surge had come through, but Smythe knew better. The letter in his hand had been explicit enough.

  It was from Marc Jekkes. It seemed he was Drew Garris’ son. None of their background checks had picked it up—probably because Garris had arranged it that way.

  It made Smythe wonder what else had been arranged by Garris. Jekkes, by his own admission, had been a member of Valterzar's Cluster. Smythe wondered how many others had infiltrated Symtech, with Garris’ recommendation.

  Gooseflesh danced across his skin as Smythe considered Jekkes’ power, and how likely it was that he and his department had been manipulated. He held Jekkes’ letter at a distance, as though afraid to bring it too close.

  "...the Cluster Project is dead, and so am I. Symtech will be dead
shortly, too. So, my Friend, will you—unless you vacate these premises by 3:38 pm."

  Smythe looked at his watch, then packed his briefcase swiftly with essentials from his desk. On his way down the hall, he pulled the fire alarm.

  His car was nearly out of the lot when he saw it in the rearview mirror. The building seemed to shiver, then exploded in a mass of flame. Bits of metal, wood, and glass rained down on his car. Once again, the gooseflesh travelled across his skin. There, but for the grace of God...

  No. God had nothing to do with this.

  Nothing at all...

  He exited the lot, without a backwards glance.

  Acknowledgements

  Many thanks to Cindy Bardell, Barbara Small, Mary E. Gray (a.k.a. Meg McKenna, author of Seaswept), Theresa King (Theresa's work has been published in an anthology, Out of the Shadows, at www.shadowpoetry.com), and Jocelyn Guerette (romance novelist) for their helpful feedback.

  * * *

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