by Dee J. Stone
One of the soldiers curses, stepping back. Another moves forward, all confident.
“Kale,” X says. “Take her down before she kills those soldiers.”
“On it.”
As he does that, something creeps up on my side. A shadow. Heading toward us. It’s a guy dressed in costume. He’s got a wicked grin on his face as he lifts something over his head. A steel block. He aims at me. I want to move, but my limbs are locked in place. I look at Kale and X for help. Their backs face me.
“G-guys!”
They turn around and charge at him, tackling him to the ground.
The guy jumps up and holds out his fists. X is about to punch him, but Kale says, “I’ve got this.”
A few seconds later, the guy slumps to the ground.
“I had him,” X says.
“It was safer to knock him out.”
X peers over to where the other woman was melting things. She’s out cold. “Let’s check for more villains, then we’ll get out of here.”
Chapter Eighteen
As we near the bookstore, I see something pacing in front of the door. It’s small and has red, spiky fur. It looks like...
“Furball!”
The cat lifts its head. Her eyes widen. Just looking into them, I know it’s her. I’ve dreamed about her eyes since forever. They’re green and big and so cute.
I rush over to her. Kale and X follow. “Are you sure it’s her? I can’t read her mind.”
“It’s her. I know it.”
She’s alive!
Furball meows. I wrap my arms around the tiny cat. She’s so soft and fuzzy. I want to squish her to my chest. I don’t, though. She wouldn’t like it.
She looks around like she’s scared someone or something will come after her. “It’s okay,” I tell her. “You’re safe here.”
She meows again. Then she leaps out of my hold. Her body gets long, and hair, legs, and arms pop out. She’s human again. Just like in my dream last night, her eyes are ghost-like. Her face and arms are dirty and covered in mud. She looks like she hasn’t eaten in days.
She jumps into my arms, hugging me tight. It’s exactly how it happened in my dream. I just stand there, my eyes probably bigger than the moon as she squishes herself against me. It’s real this time, so much realer than in my dream. I’m for sure going to pass out.
As quickly as she hugged me, she frees herself just as fast. Her gaze drops to the ground.
“Are you okay?” Kale asks her.
Wrapping her arms around herself, she nods.
“You’re alive! You’re here!” That’s what comes out of my mouth. I’m lame. Of course she’s here. We all can see that.
“How did you find this place?” Kale asks.
Her eyes go to me for a second, then back to Kale. “I had a dream. Stretch told me where he was staying. I came here.”
Kale gapes at me. Is he thinking what I’m thinking? That we had the same dream? How could that be?
X is quiet, but I can see his wheels spinning.
Furball looks at us, confused. “What?”
Don’t tell her, I say to Kale through my mind. Not until we figure this out.
“We’re so glad you’re okay,” Kale says. I give her a huge smile. “Let’s get inside,” he continues.
“What’s…what’s in there?” she asks. “Is it safe?” She bites her lip as tears fill her eyes.
I reach for her hand. She stares at it, but doesn’t move. She won’t even look at me. My shoulders droop so low my knuckles almost sweep the floor. After all the crap we’ve been through, I still disgust her.
But she hugged me, so I don’t really understand…
“Yeah, we met up with the others,” Kale says. “We’ll explain more on the way inside.”
She nods slowly.
Something catches in my nose and I sneeze. Furball and the others jump back. Damn it. Sometimes I forget how allergic I am to her. “S-sorry.” I wipe my nose with my sleeve.
We walk toward the steel door. Inside the dark hallway, Kale tells her everything—how we found my parents’ house, how we fought villains to protect the humans. She smiles at that, but not to me. Sigh…
Kale talks about Samson finding us. “He’s been searching for everyone,” he says. “Just like we were. Only a handful of us weren’t taken.”
Furball hugs her arms again and her eyes light up with hope. “The triplets?”
Kale shakes his head. Her face falls.
We continue walking until we reach the last steel door. Furball takes it all in. “What’s this?”
“Where we’re living,” I explain.
Her eyebrows furrow.
I reach for her hand. “Just trust us, please.” She doesn’t take my hand. Sigh again…
“My parents and the others are inside,” Kale says. “They’re safe.”
Her eyes look skeptical. Kale focuses his gaze on her, probably talking telepathically or showing her images. It doesn’t take two seconds for her to leap toward the door.
As we did with the other doors, the three of us use all our might to heave it open. Samson’s standing on the other end. His face reads rage. Oh, crap.
“We found Furball, Dad. She was outside the building.”
Samson moves closer to Furball and hugs her. “Kelly,” he says. “I’m glad you’re safe and well. You must be hungry. Tranquility will give you some dinner and show you to your room. After that, I’d like to have a few words with you.”
“Okay.”
Samson rubs her shoulder. “Welcome.”
“Thanks.” Her voice has a tremor in it. Even though she’s safe, she must not feel like she is. I can’t imagine—and don’t want to think about—how difficult and scary it was for her to be all alone. She’s not a stray cat and doesn’t know how to survive on the streets. But she managed. She’s awesome. So brave and strong.
Samson’s in the middle of talking to us. Something about instructing us to drop by his office later today. He has that look on his face. The one where we know we’re in serious trouble.
I don’t regret going out there and doing what we did. Yeah, the antidote didn’t work, but at least we tried. And we saved some normies from those villains, too.
Kale lowers his head. “Sorry, Dad.”
“I’ll see the three of you later.” He heads down the hall to his office. X’s gaze follows him.
All four of us stare at each other. Furball has a curious look on her face. “Why’s he mad at you?”
She still won’t look my way.
Kale shrugs. “Eh, was nothing, really.”
Someone’s going to need to update her on everything that’s happened. Not me, ‘cuz she can’t stand my guts. I mean, she did jump into my arms, but maybe she was just relieved to see us.
She and I have our eyes locked on each other for a few seconds before she pulls away. I shift from one foot to the other. If I stay in a position for too long, my body gets into all these different shapes. I don’t want that to happen in front of her.
“Kelly.” Tranquility walks over to Furball and hugs her. She murmurs how happy and relieved she is to see her. I watch Furball’s tense body relax, all Tranquility’s doing. “Let’s get you something to eat and settle you in.” Tranquility leads her to the kitchen.
When they’re out of earshot, Kale turns to me. “What the heck was she talking about with all that dream stuff? How did you have the same dream?”
Maybe we’re meant to be together and that’s why we’re sharing dreams.
“X?” Kale asks.
He’s looking at something ahead.
“X?” I poke him in the shoulder.
He blinks.
“Whadya see?” I ask.
He looks around. “We can’t talk about it here. Let’s go to our room.”
Once we get there, we plop down on our beds.
X gets up and paces around. “I think I might have an idea why the humans aren’t taking the antidote.” He paces harder, tappi
ng his fist against the wall. “I think they’re controlled not to take it.”
“You think everyone’s being controlled,” Kale mumbles.
“I’m serious this time. I think Vlayne’s controlling the humans not to take it.”
“No,” Kale says. “When we tried to give it, we flew back. Like there was a shield or something. Besides, Vlayne can’t control billions of people. No one’s that powerful.”
“Us being thrown doesn’t prove they’re not being controlled telepathically,” X says. “She could have a strong mental block that shoves anyone who gets close.”
“Okay,” Kale says. “Then how’s she controlling so many people?”
X stops pacing and sits down on his bed. He presses his palm to his forehead.
Kale’s eyes widen. “I know how she’s doing it.”
“How?” X and I ask together.
“What’s the one thing we can’t figure out? Something Vlayne did that even my parents can’t figure out?”
“Why she released this virus,” I say.
He snaps his fingers. “Exactly. We’ve got no clue why she’s not waiting until she has the cure. It’s because she doesn’t want to slowly kill the humans. She wants to kill them instantly, but she needs to make sure there’s no way for the normies to get the cure.”
X stands up. “So she’s using this virus, which affects all the humans around the world, to control them not to accept the antidote.”
Kale nods.
Oh, man. That means no matter what we do, the humans will never take the cure.
Kale says, “What do we do about it?”
“I overhead Samson, Cindy, and the Elites talking in the conference room,” X tells us. “They’ve gathered people and are ready to attack the Blades.” He heads for the door. “We need to tell them what we figured out.”
Chapter Nineteen
Barging into a room full of Elites when they’re in middle of an important discussion isn’t a great idea. Samson’s eyes are hard. Cindy’s mouth is pressed shut.
“You need to leave, boys,” he says.
I’m about to back toward the door when Kale says, “It’s important.”
Samson sighs. He turns to Cindy. She tells everyone to leave the room. Once they do, the guys and I sit in the chairs across from them.
“What is it?” Samson asks.
Kale opens his mouth, ready to tell them, but Samson beats him to it. “I’m disappointed in you. Stealing an antidote from the lab? Walking around New York injecting humans? What were the three of you thinking?”
His face is red. The vein on his forehead pounds. Cindy doesn’t appear as pissed as him, but I see the tension in her eyes. She’s trying to remain composed.
“We thought something was wrong,” Kale explains. “We thought someone was…um…”
“Controlling you not to give the antidote to the humans.” X shrugs. “Guess we were wrong.”
“But we know why the normies refuse the antidote,” Kale says. “It’s because Vlayne’s controlling them not to.”
“We—”
“That’s why she released this virus, Dad. Somehow it’s controlling them not to take it.”
“We need to get to the non-infected humans and give them the cure,” X says. “Before the virus spreads to them.”
Samson and Cindy are quiet as they stare at us.
“Dad? Mom? Did you hear us? I mean, I know it doesn’t make any sense, but it kinda does, you know? It’s so Vlayne’s type to do something like this.”
X gets to his feet. “We need to get the antidote to the virus-free humans.” He makes for the door.
“There are no more clean humans,” Cindy says. X turns around.
“Huh?” I ask.
Cindy motions for X to take a seat. He doesn’t, just crosses his arms over his chest.
“We presumed Vlayne is using the virus to control the humans to not take the cure,” she says. “After trying it on human after human with no success, we came up with that conclusion. Regina teleported us to countries that we knew weren’t infected yet. We offered them the antidote, but just like the others they wouldn’t accept it. Within seconds, those humans showed symptoms of the virus. We realized the humans were infected long before symptoms showed. This means Vlayne released the virus earlier than we thought. Humans who unknowingly carried the virus traveled all over the world, which caused the virus to spread from continent to continent.”
“But the video of me injecting that kid,” Kale says. “That only happened a few days ago.”
“Yes, but we assume the ShadowBlades altered the time and date on that video to make it appear as though the boy was infected much later than he had been.”
“But why would Vlayne do that?” I ask.
“In case we had the antidote,” X says. “She didn’t want to risk us giving it to the humans before she had a chance to infect them all.”
“Yes.” Samson rubs his temples. “I should have expected this. I should have immunized the population as soon as I…”
Cindy takes his hand. “We couldn’t have known, Sam. The antidote was synthesized after she released the virus. Half the world was infected by then. We couldn’t have foreseen this.”
My left foot twitches, banging into the leg of the chair. I wrap my long fingers around my knee to calm it down. “So…no one’s left? Everyone’s infected?”
“Unfortunately, yes.” Samson sounds like he’s got no energy left inside him.
Now my other foot shakes. “What do we do?”
“We go after the Blades,” X says. “We get Lindsay back and capture Vlayne and force her to take her hold off the humans.”
Samson raises his index finger. “You’re not going anywhere.”
“Dad! I want to free Lindsay.”
“No,” he snaps. “This is a mission for your mother, myself, the Elites, and our agents.”
“That’s so unfair!”
“We almost lost you,” Cindy says in a soft tone. “We won’t lose you again.”
Kale huffs, sinking down in his chair. X crosses his arms. Am I the only one who’s relieved by this news? Sure I want to do whatever it takes to help the normies, but we don’t have to go after Vlayne. Samson, Cindy, and the others can handle it. I don’t want to die a second time.
“The three of you are dismissed.” Samson eyes us closely. “And I expect you to be well-behaved.”
“When are you going?” Kale asks.
“Not until tomorrow. We need to gather a few more agents.”
“We can help.”
“Kale,” Cindy warns.
“But I can help knock the Blades out.”
“End of discussion,” Samson says. “And I don’t want to hear another word of this. Is that understood?”
We don’t answer.
“Boys?”
“Yeah, Dad,” Kale grumbles. “We got it.”
***
“We are so going on that mission.” Kale sits down on his bed.
“What?” I say. “But your parents said—”
Kale shrugs. “This was our mission to begin with. I saw the location in Scar’s head. So what if Vlayne planted it there? The point is that I was the one who found out about it. Why do my parents have to shut us out?”
X grunts from the floor where he’s sitting.
I twist my fingers around each other. “You can’t really blame them, though. I mean, look at it from their point of view. Can you blame them for wanting to protect us?”
Kale snorts. “We’re going on that mission. I’m going to save Lindsay.”
I don’t think I can say anything to change their minds. I get why it’s important for us to go. I don’t want to sit here doing nothing. But what if we die? “How?” I ask.
“We follow them,” X says. “I don’t care how many agents they’re gathering. We need to be there, too.”
He’s right. The more people we have on our side, the better. In case something goes wrong, we’ll be there to help.
“Samson and Cindy will be mad at us,” I tell them.
“Yeah,” Kale says. “But as future leader of the KOJ, it’s my duty to help take down the most wicked, powerful villain in the world.”
When he talks like that, it makes me nervous. A little excited, too. But mostly nervous.
Chapter Twenty
Kale’s parents, Shifter, Regina, Stone, and their agents are in the conference room, discussing last-minute details. We’re in our room and Kale connects us through our minds so we can see what X sees. Regina is going to teleport all the Elites to Staten Island. And it’s up to me to make sure the guys and I get there. “Ready, Stretch?” X asks.
I inhale, then exhale. Try to calm my nerves. I can do this. I flatten my hand so it fits under the door. I keep my gaze on the Elites to make sure they don’t see me. My arm is shaking as it makes its way down the hall.
My hand slips under the conference room door and I find my way to Regina. I’m going to have to be careful not to draw attention to myself. When I reach her, I latch on to the back of her boot. She doesn’t seem to feel anything.
Kale and X grab my hands.
On Samson’s cue, Regina does her thing. Less than a second later, we pop into Staten Island. Right in front of what looks like an abandoned building.
I quickly let go of Regina’s boot, and the guys and I duck behind a dumpster. I’m panting so hard I’m going to collapse.
Awesome! Kale says. We did it. You okay, Stretch?
My chest’s heaving so hard. F—fine. Really fine. Despite almost peeing myself, that felt kind of good. To help the guys and prove to myself that I can do something brave.
The Elites creep toward the building. Samson’s got his hands raised, ready to attack. Cindy’s hand is on the side of her head, and Stone has his fists in front of his face.
At once, things leap out of the shadows. They’re people dressed in red and orange uniforms and matching masks. Blades.
They waste no time attacking the Elites. Samson smashes a few against the wall. They keep coming at him. Cindy tries to knock them down, but it looks like they’re resisting. Regina teleports to evade her Blade, but he seems to know each step she takes and shoots ice at her.
