“You made sure my parents are safe, right?” I’d never forgive myself if something happened to them because of me.
“Yeah, they were transported to a hideout I borrowed not far from here, but even I don’t know where it is. They’ll only tell us the location if there’s an emergency,” Lily said, then turned to Jaiden. “Your father is there too.”
“So what do we do now? Wait for Phil to attack?” Noah asked.
“As soon as someone alerts us of his presence, we’ll go after him. And if he comes here seeking revenge, even better.” Lily got up as someone knocked on the door, and she opened it. A familiar face poked inside.
“Spike?” I said, getting to my feet. “What are you doing here?” I hadn’t expected to see my cousin here.
“Came to help. I brought every tainted I could find, and there are some element preservers and regular elementals too.” He grinned, his gray eyes gleaming, his black hair messy.
“Thanks.” I glanced at Lily. “How many people will be hunting for Phil?”
“A lot.” She grinned. “We’re turning this hotel into a fortress, and the best thing is that the owner doesn’t mind as long as we cover the cost of any damage. He has more hotels on the coast. All he wants is for us to take Phil down.”
“Nice.” This time we should be able to defeat Phil, especially with the help of Spike and his group of tainteds.
“What are we going to do to protect ourselves from Phil’s mind control?” Nick asked. “Last time that didn’t work out so well for us. If he turns us against each other again, we’re going to have a problem.”
“Unfortunately, we don’t have a perfect solution for that,” Lily said. “But we hope those of you who can use mind control will break through any shimmering before the guy reaches your minds. Hopefully, he’ll come to us and our little traps at the entrances will do their trick and weaken him.”
“So we’re basically waiting for him to kill us all.” Kenna rolled her eyes. “I mean, we aren’t really doing anything differently, except adding more people to help us. What if he’s just too powerful and can’t be stopped?”
“Nothing is unstoppable,” Lily said. “And we almost had him at the factory. With more people, especially tainteds, I’m sure we can do this.”
“Right.” Kenna didn’t sound too convinced.
***
“Um, I don’t think our plan is working the way we want it to,” Noah said as he came into the room, and I frowned at him. It had been two days since the video was shown on the local news, but there hadn’t been any signs of Phil anywhere.
“Maybe he’s trying to find a good opportunity to attack. He probably knows we’re preparing a trap for him and that it won’t be easy to take us down,” I said. “And he can’t really come close to the building without us knowing because we have so many people guarding this place. And if he uses his element, any glitch in the cameras outside will alert us of his presence... unless he realized that’s how we track him and can control that ability. But still, even if he doesn’t come after us, someone will spot him somewhere sooner or later, and we’ll be ready.”
“No, that’s not what I mean. Turn on the TV,” he said, and I quickly grabbed the remote. When the TV was on, I saw the French president saying something, but I didn’t understand a word.
“Um, I don’t speak French,” I said. “Is there something...?”
“According to one of Lily’s men, the president is telling everyone that the video was a scam and was intended to frighten the public. They withdrew their decision to help us and are basically saying that the video is fake and meant to undermine the work of a renowned scientist just before his big announcement.” Noah rubbed his face.
“What?” I gaped at him like a fish. “That’s impossible. But why? Did Phil mind-control him?”
“I don’t know. Maybe. But no one has seen him or reported anything.”
“Shit.” I immediately hurried to the door, turning invisible, and dashed into the foyer where Lily had gathered most of her team. Noah followed me, and we materialized in the middle of the room.
“But you can’t actually believe this, Tom. You know who Phil is,” Lily said, standing in front of one of her men who was blinking at her in confusion.
“No, ma’am,” he said. “He isn’t the one we’re looking for. He’s just some scientist. I can show you his photos on the Internet.”
“Tom...” Lily placed her hand on his shoulder. “Listen to me. The guy mind-controlled you.”
“But I was in here the whole time,” Tom insisted. I stepped forward, and before anyone could say anything else, I let a shimmering thread shoot out of me and slip into his mind. Some of his brain signals were darkened, so I turned them white again. When I pulled my element out, Tom scratched his head.
“What was that?” he asked. “For a second there, I thought our target was a scientist. Why?”
“Phil mind-controlled you,” I said. “I fixed the damage. Luckily it’s not permanent.” Could Phil choose when to make his mind control permanent or did it have something to do with the amount of energy he had when he was doing it?
“But Tom was here the whole time. How could Phil have gotten inside right under our noses?” Lily ran a hand through her hair, looking around, as if she wanted to find someone guilty among people around her. No one answered.
“What if he’s still here?” Kenna asked, holding a cup of water in her hand. “What if he’s pretending to be one of us? If we were wrong about him not having that ability, then he could be anyone!” She took a sip of her drink and nearly dropped the cup, swaying on her feet.
“Kenna!” Nick yelled, catching his sister before she could fall. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah.” Kenna stared at the water pooling around her feet. “What happened?”
“I don’t know. You almost fainted or something,” Nick said. “Does it have anything to do with Phil?”
“Phil?” A frown creased Kenna’s brow. “Who’s Phil? You mean that scientist?”
Everyone gaped at her in shock, and my throat constricted. Lily spun around, probably looking for an intruder. Some of her men pulled out their guns, eyeing everyone around them with suspicion.
“Is he still here?” Noah asked, and I let my element roam through the room, hoping it would rip someone’s disguise away, but the shimmering on the ground caught my eye. It was faint, but it was there, right in the puddle of water.
“Guys!” I yelled while everyone argued that they weren’t mind-controlled or that their bodies weren’t fake. “Everyone shut up!” Finally, the chatter died down and they all looked at me. “It’s the water,” I said. “There’s something in the water.”
“The water?” Lily’s eyebrows shot up, but then she snapped her fingers. “Someone get a sample of that. Now!”
“Kenna, where did you get that cup?” I asked. “You were mind-controlled.”
“I... I just picked up one of the cups and poured some tap water.” She scratched her temple. “Can you undo the mind control?”
“Yeah.” I quickly healed Kenna’s brain signals with my element while Lily rushed to check the water. Jaiden and I went after her, and when one of her men opened the faucet and started filling a glass with it, we could see slight shimmering in it.
“Is it different?” Lily asked, and I realized she couldn’t see any of the shimmering.
“Yeah, it’s shimmering, like an element.”
“Does that mean Phil somehow got his element in it? Does he have a water element? Did someone actually make that water serum for him?” Lily inspected the glass, then put it down. “We have to analyze this. I want to know what kind of water this is and what’s inside it.”
Jaiden eyed the glass carefully. “I don’t think it’s elemental water. It’s almost as if there’s a thin shimmering layer over it.”
“So Phil spread his element through water and whoever drinks it gets mind-controlled into thinking that he’s not the bad guy here?” Lily’s hand fl
ew to her chest and she gave us an incredulous stare.
“It seems so,” Jaiden said. “The good thing is we can reverse that mind control.”
“Unbelievable,” Lily breathed. “How is he spreading and keeping his element in it? He would have to be nearby for this to work, right?”
“I don’t know how his magic works,” I said. “Maybe he can actually tie his element to water and make it stay even though he’s no longer connected to it.”
“But if the president and everyone believes his lies, then... he poisoned a whole lot of water with his element. That’s a huge amount of power,” Lily said.
“Yeah, which means he could be weaker right now. We should try to find him,” Jaiden said. “It’s our best chance. Even if he’s the most powerful elemental to ever walk this planet, his energy levels have to be low after this. That’s why he’s in hiding.”
“Lily!” Noah burst through the door. “We have a huge problem.”
“Another one?” Lily threw her hands up. “Now what? Is the world going to end?”
“The local cops are gathered outside and they’re ready to attack. It looks like Phil convinced them we’re the enemy here and they want to arrest us. If we don’t come out willingly, they’ll open fire,” Noah said.
“Phil wants to get rid of us and make sure we don’t do anything while his energy is low,” I said. “I should go outside and heal the cops’ minds.”
“That’ll take too much time.” Lily shook her head. “And if he controlled their minds personally, maybe their signals are shriveled. We can’t stay here. Gather everyone. We’re getting out of here.”
“But what about Phil?” Jaiden asked.
“We don’t know where he is, and even if he’s in the area, we can’t avoid a bunch of people who want our heads. Everyone who drinks that water will want to protect him because they think he’s some awesome scientist,” Lily snapped. “Everyone move! We’re going to use the back exit. Any tainteds who can carry someone with them should turn into air and fly out of here. We meet thirty miles north from here, and I’ll take us to our hideout. Just need to make the arrangements first.”
“Okay, let’s go!” Noah clapped his hands, and we all rushed outside. I found Marissa and Sam, and grabbed their hands, transforming us all into air. As we flew out of the hotel, I spotted at least fifty armed men surrounding the building, and a group of men were carrying two big boxes.
“Element blockers,” Jaiden said, whizzing past me. Great. I increased my speed and hoped everyone would get out in time. A small fight broke out at the back of the building when some of the cops noticed Lily’s men trying to sneak through the door, but someone successfully used their air to send the guards flying.
Everyone quickly got into the cars, including Lily, and I lurched forward, flying out of there as fast as I could. As I crossed over to the other part of the city, I noticed more cops and boxes. It seemed that the whole city would soon be full of element blockers. Phil was probably somewhere here, but he didn’t want us patrolling the city or coming at him with our elements. I gritted my invisible teeth. Phil had won one more time.
Chapter 21
“Oh God, I think I’m going to be sick,” Kenna said as Phil’s smiling face appeared on the TV screen. We’d been in Lily’s hideout for two weeks now, and apparently by now everyone believed Phil was the man who wanted to save the planet with some super serum that would ensure we had water for centuries to come. Even Lily’s friend who’d lent us the hideout had been under mind control and almost hadn’t let us through, but I’d managed to heal his mind.
“The good news is that the element blockers have been removed from the city,” Lily said. “The bad news is that everyone out there is now going to protect Phil no matter what because he’s everyone’s favorite person in the world.”
We’d tried to remove his influence from the water and stop its distribution, but we hadn’t found an effective way to do it, and leaving a whole city without water was a terrible idea. Our president had wanted to speak with Lily, but she purposely ignored his calls.
“What should we do now?” Noah groaned. “He’s surrounded himself with people, and if someone attacks him, we can expect them to defend him... unless we heal his mind control, which he might notice, so he’ll know we’re coming after him.”
“He’s actually throwing a party this afternoon,” Marissa said, shaking her head. “I can’t believe this guy. Is he trying to rub it in our faces that our plan backfired or what?”
“Maybe there’s a way to get to him,” Jaiden said, and I raised a quizzical eyebrow at him. “There are a lot of people around him. We could pretend we’re guests at his party. Maybe someone he’s never met before,” Jaiden said. “If we can get close to him, maybe we can attack him.”
“We could bring some sedatives. Slip them into his drink or stab him with something when he doesn’t expect it.” I tilted my head. “But what if he recognizes us? Or if he has a way to tear our disguises to shreds?”
“If he’s still spreading his element through the water, maybe he’s weak,” Jaiden said.
“He’s probably going to check your minds first, so he’ll recognize you,” Lily said. “I don’t think that would work, and you’d be at serious risk.”
“We could switch with some scientists. Maybe mind-control them to go inside, talk to him, gain his trust, then come back out, and we can take their image and get in. If Phil checked their minds already, he won’t do it again.” I cracked my knuckles.
“What if he can feel if someone’s using their element nearby? Or if someone sees you and tells him? Or if you don’t have time to figure out what those scientists were talking about with him and you say something wrong?” Lily asked.
“Jaiden, does your father still have that serum he gave you? If we all took it, no one would be able to stop us,” Nick said.
Jaiden shook his head. “Maybe he could recreate it, but I don’t know. It might take too much time.”
“Can you just turn yourself into another person or could you do it with someone else?” Marissa perked up. “I mean, could you turn me into someone else?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “We never tried. Why?”
“I was thinking maybe you could transform me and someone to make us look like some scientists, and mind-control us to ensure everything looks fine to Phil. We could even drink water to prove that we’re under his control. Then we could switch in the restroom, and you could take off our disguises,” she said. “Then we would be able to agree what to say, and we wouldn’t have to waste time on explaining anything.”
“Yeah, but what if he checks twice? Or if he realizes what’s going on?” Lily chewed on her lower lip. “There are many things that could go wrong, and so far, everything we’ve tried has gone terribly wrong at some point.”
“But if only four of us go, it won’t be too much of a disaster even if he figures it out,” I said. “What will he do to us? Kill us in front of everyone? Even if he mind-controls them, it’s still a lot of work. And his elements could be getting weaker because of all the magic he’s been using. Even cameras seem to work without a problem around him now.”
“That doesn’t mean he’s weaker,” Lily said. “He’s probably able to control when his element affects cameras and devices around him and when it doesn’t.”
“I know, but we have to try something,” I said. “We can’t hide here forever and wait for him to make a mistake or hope that he runs out of energy. And even if we can’t change anyone’s appearance aside from ours, Jaiden and I are still going.”
“Fine.” Lily clasped her hands, looking at me. “But your mom will kill me when she finds out I authorized what might be a suicide mission for you.”
“I’m going to talk to my parents, and I’ll need something strong that’ll knock Phil out.” My mom and dad wouldn’t be pleased, but I had to do this. Hopefully, my mom had some super awesome tranquilizer that would work on Phil. His element shouldn’t give him sedativ
e resistance, anyway, but he’d been pretty good at dodging our attempts of taking him out since he could probably sense and deflect anything flying toward him. We’d have to be really, really close to him to be able to stab him with a needle. Hopefully, this time he wouldn’t see us coming.
***
“Are you sure this is going to work?” Noah asked as we stopped our van in an alley two blocks away from the hotel where Phil’s party was being held. Marissa and Jaiden were sitting opposite me, along with two scientists who had actually been invited to the party and were supposed to discuss the serum with Phil, but since they’d traveled from Los Angeles to get here, they hadn’t had a chance to drink the contaminated water and had been glad to receive Lily’s call. Once we’d explained the situation to them, they decided they’d rather let us pretend to be them than go see Phil themselves.
“I’m not sure about anything anymore,” I said. “But if you need encouragement, sure, it’s so going to work.”
A smile tilted Noah’s lips. “Okay, I’ll take that.”
“What do you want us to do?” one of the scientists—a woman with dark hair and blue eyes—asked.
“You just sit here and let Jaiden and me run our element over you,” I said. “You won’t feel a thing.”
The woman looked at her partner, a guy with blond hair and green eyes, and he shrugged. “Okay,” she said. “I’m still not sure what you’re going to do.”
We sort of avoided explaining how exactly we’d be pretending to be them. “Don’t worry. It’s going to be fine.”
The woman nodded, and Jaiden and I let our elements slide over their bodies.
“Marissa, Noah, come on,” I said, taking Jaiden’s hand, and we got out of the van. “Thank you so much for doing this,” I said to the scientists, who smiled at us. When the van drove off, I turned toward Marissa. “Let’s try this.” I’d already applied mind control protection as best as I could before we came because I wanted to make sure it wouldn’t be done in hurry. I didn’t know if it would fool Phil since it hadn’t really worked out last time, but I was hoping it would be fine as long as he wasn’t trying to control them.
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