by Dan Rix
The tacks . . . she’d just given away her position.
And she’d stopped swinging the bat. No time to lose. I leapt out and ran at the doorway, picking up speed. For a split-second, air rushed past my ears. Then my shoulder slammed into her middle and crushed her onto the tile. She let out an oomph. I went for the bat, groping down the length of her arm until I found her fist. One by one, I pried off her fingers and yanked the weapon out of her hand—
Her elbow smashed into the side of my head, stunned me. She rolled on top of me, pinning me in the same position as before. No one to save me this time. Before she could bite me, I jerked the bat between us and thrust it up against her neck, driving her back as I scrambled out from underneath her. I lost the bat in the process.
How could I stop her?
I couldn’t beat her in hand-to-hand combat. She owned me every freaking time.
I fled into the den, a desperate panic biting at my heels. She chased me down and I felt her fingers swipe through my hair and close into a fist, yanking my head back. The force tightened my windpipe and ripped open the wound on my neck, bringing instant, stabbing pain. My knees wobbled and gave out, and my hip bumped the bookshelf. Wheezing, I seized the saw by the handle and swung it at her face.
The twang echoed through the house. She yelped and fell back. I dropped the saw and staggered away, clutching my throat against a new spurt of blood. I burst into the hallway and halted. Now what? A half-dozen doorways greeted me, their silhouettes swimming in lazy loops. I was beginning to feel dizzy, too much blood loss. To the right, my bedroom, the linen closet, the foyer. To the left, a bathroom, my mom’s office, my parents’ bedroom. We’d circled the house.
That’s what we were doing. Going in circles. I wasn’t even hurting her. She was slaughtering me.
Suddenly, wind rushed up behind me, and her body smashed into mine. She landed on top of me and knocked the wind out of me, squashing me headfirst into the carpet. I choked on dry bristles and swallowed a lungful of dust. The force of her tackle shook the house on its foundations. I heard her panting above me as she readjusted her weight over my legs, crushing them between her knees. Something cold and razor-sharp pricked my ankle, and a ripping pain slashed across it.
My eyes flew wide open. The saw blade. She was going to cut off my foot. Still choking for air, I strained to heave her off, but my limbs failed and I sank back down, defeated and dizzy from lack of oxygen. The adrenaline had run out, leaving my brain numb. The pain was far-off, and I was only half aware of the serrated steel gashing through flesh and nicking bone. Tears welled in my eyes.
She was cutting off my foot, and I was too weak to fight back.
My mom’s office door scraped open next to me, followed by a deafening thump. The ground shook as a massive object tumbled past me. It took me a moment to realize what.
The heavy crystal bookend—which I’d made invisible and propped above her door—had just fallen to the floor. Our grappling must have set off the booby trap, which was now useless.
But the sound startled Ashley. She stopped sawing, no doubt wary of being ambushed a second time. Her weight adjusted on my back as she peered into my mom’s dark office. It was just the chance I needed.
I shoved off the ground with everything I had, teeth gritted in exertion, and finally heaved her off. I whipped myself into a roll, spinning out from underneath her, then dragged myself to my feet and limped up the hall.
I stubbed my toe on a hard object and fell to my knees, gasping in pain. The crystal bookend. It could be used as a weapon. I hoisted it onto my shoulder and continued up the hall. Every step sent liquid fire to my ankle, and I grimaced through each one.
I understood now. For every wound I inflicted, Ashley inflicted it back tenfold. She was using my own weapons against me, wearing me down, overwhelming me with her superior strength.
My only hope was to take her out with a single blow, before she had a chance to retaliate. Like how she’d knocked out Megan. Which meant I had to surprise her. But how?
I was attacking her blindly, with clumsy aim. I couldn’t drive a knife through her heart when I had no idea where her heart was. Somehow, I had to locate her vulnerable areas without her knowing.
The apparatus.
I’d set it up in my bedroom. I had planned for this. If I could lead her in there, there would be a moment when she came through the doorway when I would know exactly where she was. I would have one chance to deliver a fatal blow.
It would never work.
She would overpower me and hack me to pieces, and then she would eat me alive. A sickening terror spread through my stomach. I lugged the bookend into my bedroom and set it down with a thump. A glance around only deepened my dread. My bedroom was tiny, there were no exits. Once she came in, it would be a fight to the death.
My last stand.
I licked my dry lips and scanned the dark rectangle of hallway. My gaze slid to the solid red blob hovering on the ceiling, projected by the apparatus.
It was still working.
Rain continued to pour, masking all sounds. Now where was she? Noise. I needed to make noise, or else she wouldn’t know I was in here. I tiptoed across the room and kicked my bed frame, which gave a loud squeak, then darted back to the crystal. I readied my fingers on its jagged base, watching the apparatus for movement.
Nothing.
My tongue darted across my lips again, rewetting them. I didn’t blink.
Seconds passed, and a nervous pressure built in my throat.
She sensed a trap. She wouldn’t take the bait. Why would she? I was already bleeding to death, and she knew it. My skin broke out in cold sweat.
The blob moved.
A pattern of fuzzy lines wriggled across the ceiling. Interference. The laser was shining through dark matter. An anxious twinge passed through my heart, which began to pound. I lifted the crystal above my head and aimed for the empty space in the center of the doorway.
But I hesitated.
In the red light I caught a flash of detail, magnified a thousand times.
A fingernail? My knuckles tightened on the crystal, catching it before it dropped.
She was sweeping her hand through the doorway, checking for traps. If I threw the crystal now, it would strike her wrist harmlessly. My arms wobbled under the crystal’s weight. I couldn’t hold it up much longer.
More fuzzy lines crawled through the projection.
Still, I waited. How would I know when she was in the right spot? According to the apparatus, an arm and a face looked the same. Sweat beaded on my brow as I watched the ceiling, hardly daring to breathe.
Then I saw another faint pattern, this one unmistakable. Long, crisscrossing strands of hair.
Her head was right in the laser. Now!
I swung the crystal down as hard as I could, using up the last of my strength. It hit Ashley’s temple with a dull crack, sending a shockwave up my arms and no doubt whipping her head to the side. Then came the thump of a body hitting the floor.
I stooped over her and probed for movement. She lay still, but she was still breathing, and now she was beginning to stir. A jolt of panic. More . . . I had to do more. Frantically I hoisted her up by the armpits and clinched my elbow around her throat. She began to wheeze. I tightening my hold, clamping her neck until her breathing cut off completely. My body began to tremble, descending into a state of feverish anxiety.
I was killing her.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” I whispered into her hair, now wet with her blood and my tears. “I’m so sorry . . . ”
I held her there long after she was dead, cradling her body in my arms and sobbing into her hair.
Then, without warning, her invisible body was gone.
My hands clasped together, closing on empty air.
I jerked back, startled. I swiped through the air, but there was nothing there, no sign of her. She’d vanished right out of my arms. Poof. Gradually, my pulse settled down.
She was a phantom to begin with, and finally she was gone.
I heard a moan from the kitchen.
I found Megan sitting against the fridge, clutching her head.
“We got her.” I dropped down next to her, breathing heavily. Too exhausted to think. The oven clock caught my eye.
5:42 a.m.
I’d been wearing dark matter for twelve hours, longer than I’d ever worn it before. I picked at my fingernail, eager to strip it off. After tonight, I was never putting it on again.
“Thanks for saving my life, by the way,” I said.
“My head hurts,” Megan muttered.
“You probably have a concussion. We should call an ambulance.” Despite scratching at my thumbnail, I couldn’t open a seam. I tried harder, digging my fingernails into each other.
“There’s a body on your front porch,” she said. “I’m fine, Leona.”
“No, I want this to be the end,” I said, still scratching. “I want to tell them what we did—what I did—and I want to give the dark matter back to the Air Force . . . and I want to tell Emory. I’m done with this.”
“Why are you still invisible?” she said. “Take that stuff off.”
“I’m trying,” I muttered, digging under my fingernail, trying to open a hole in the dark matter. Where the hell was the seam? It had fused to my skin.
“I’m serious, take it off,” she said.
“Megan, I’m trying.” Growing desperate, I raked at my knuckles, tearing off the top layer of skin. The dark matter only sank deeper, soaking into my flesh.
I pulled my hand back, and a panicky shiver slipped down my spine.
“I can’t get it off,” I whispered. “Megan, I can’t get it off.”
“What are you talking about?” She faced me. “Of course you can get it off.”
“No, I can’t.” Breathing fast, I picked at the tip of my nose. In the past, I’d been able to get it off at my nose.
“Did you try your nose?” she said.
“What do you think I’m doing?” I hissed.
“Are you pinching?”
“Yes, I’m pinching. It just feels like my own skin. It’s not lifting up like it normally does.” Suddenly frantic to get it off, I scratched harder, and my fingernail pierced the skin. “Ow!” I yanked my hand away.
“What?” she said.
Blood beaded on my upper lip and dribbled into my mouth, warm and salty. I touched my lip and held up my trembling finger. The blood was invisible.
A knife. I needed a knife. I scrambled to the silverware drawer and wrenched it open, and my fingers closed around a steak knife. I lifted it out.
Megan backed away. “Leona, what are you doing?”
“I’m cutting it off me.” Angling the pointy end against my forearm, I clenched my jaw and shoved. The knife sliced into me, and I gasped. At once my hand faltered and I nearly dropped it, but I had to press on, I had to get it off. Lightheaded from the pain, I slid the blade along under the skin, helpless against the shivers racking my body. The blade slid another inch, and a whimper slipped from my throat. I pried up a tiny flap and angled my arm to peek under the knife. Nothing. No blood, no wound. I was invisible all the way through.
“Let me try,” said Megan, stepping toward the knife. She reached for my arm.
Only her fingers passed right through me.
At the sight, my lungs constricted. I drew air in thin gasps.
Then the knife fell through my hand and clattered on the floor, making me jump.
“Wait, where are you?” said Megan, feeling around blindly.
“Megan,” I stammered, “I’m . . . I’m fading away.”
“Leona? Where’d you go? What the hell?” Her expression turned to alarm, and she turned around and felt along the counters. “You’re still here, right?”
“You can’t hear me,” I whispered.
“Leona!” she shouted, shuffling into the dining room to look for me.
“No, stay . . . don’t go,” I begged, chasing after her and reaching for her back. My invisible arm passed right through her like I was a ghost. With a sick feeling, I tried to touch my own torso. There was nothing there. Just empty space, where my body should have been.
I peered around my dark house, terrified.
I’d stayed invisible for too long.
I was disappearing.
I was being swallowed by dark matter.
The little voice in my head said, And you taste good, Leona.
The saga continues . . .
Click here to begin book three in the Translucent saga.
Ash and Darkness
It’s called dark matter, a living substance secreted by a meteorite that can make people invisible. Sixteen-year-old Leona Hewitt has been wearing it for twelve hours. It should be every teen’s fantasy—unbeatable pranks, a front row seat in her crush’s bedroom, a place to lick her wounds all alone. And it is . . . it is.
Until she can’t get it off.
In an instant, the fantasy becomes a nightmare. She’s stuck like this, invisible. Scratching at it, burning it off, cutting her skin off with a knife—nothing works. Dark matter is eating her, consuming her body like a bacteriophage and leaving behind a ghost.
But when she wakes up in her bedroom, seemingly back to normal—only to find the city outside abandoned and ghostly quiet, she realizes she’s been transported to an impossible parallel realm. Electronics barely function, food turns mealy and rotten, fire snuffs out in seconds . . . and the only signs of life are the clues to a strange riddle left behind by a dead girl.
Click here to begin Ash and Darkness, the bewitching third installment in the Translucent series.
If you could go back in time to save a life . . . you would do it, wouldn’t you? This scene is from my new Timeloopers series.
To save Cory’s life, Iris had to travel back inside the machine herself. Nothing else would work.
Her heart gave off sickening tremors. She stabbed her pencil through the crime scene tape, severed the ribbons, and her sweaty fingers went to the latch, unclicked it. The front panel swung open, revealing the musty interior of the machine.
The sharp odor of disinfectant wafted out, stung her nostrils. And beneath that, ammonia. Her upper lip curled.
At last, her eyes adjusted to the darkness, and a wave of goosebumps ascended her arms.
A dusty black box. Empty. Three feet wide, three feet deep, six feet tall.
Room to stand or sit. Not to lie down.
Nine hours in there.
A nervous shudder seized her body, and her lungs fought to draw in oxygen.
She couldn’t do this.
No way.
No fucking way.
But she had to.
Her throat worked through a dry, painful swallow. But . . . travel back in time? What would that do to her body? To human tissue? Surely it would rip her apart, not to mention the horrible paradoxes, the risk of running into her past self . . .
Oh God.
There would be two of her at the same time—a past and a future version. She would have to hide until the other one went back in time on her own accord. What if the other one didn’t? What if she changed something, and the other version didn’t get into the Chronos? She’d have to hide forever, live as a ghost . . . or would she have to kill the other version of herself?
No, no, no, she had it all wrong. Paradoxes like that couldn’t happen, she’d get feedback and wouldn’t be able to stop the other version of her from going back in time.
Wait. She was that other version. Right n
ow, at this very moment, another Iris was out there praying that she got in the Chronos.
She didn’t have a choice.
Nine hours in a coffin. Well, it couldn’t suck any more than a transatlantic flight . . . could it?
Yeah, just like flying to Paris.
Except she didn’t have her Kindle. Lost in the fire. Which meant nothing to read, nothing to entertain herself. The boredom would drive her insane. And nothing to snack on, nothing to drink, nowhere to go—
Her eyes flew wide open.
“Oh, hell no . . .” She yanked out her phone. The clock still read 8:13 p.m.
Still time.
It changed to 8:14. One minute.
Frantic, she glanced around the teachers’ lounge, counting off a minute in her mind. One . . . two . . . three . . .
Up against the wall, a table bore a microwave, an ancient coffee maker. Underneath the table squatted a mini fridge.
Bingo. She scrambled across the room, yanked open the fridge. No power. Just empty racks.
Seven . . . eight . . .
“C’monnnn,” she moaned, slamming the fridge. Back in the shadows, something wobbled. Its glint caught her eye.
An empty Gatorade bottle.
Good enough. She grabbed the bottle and sprinted up the stairs, burst into the dark hallway.
Eleven . . . twelve . . . thirteen . . .
She made a beeline for the first science lab, for a sink, wrenched open the bottle cap, shoved it under the faucet.
Twenty . . . twenty-one . . .
With a crank, water gushed into the bottle and overflowed onto her hand. Done. She capped it off, and darted back to the basement, the still air whistling past her ears.
She pulled to a stop in front of the Chronos, gasping for breath, hadn’t even reached thirty. Not bad. The track team could suck it.
Still panting, she climbed into the Chronos—like climbing into a broom closet—and pulled the front panel shut behind her. The pitch black made her gasp.
