by Minton, Toby
Physically incapable. Just thinking those words threatened to torque his tension to the next level, but Impact wasn't about to let his thoughts get the better of him. Doing so would mean giving in to weakness. Doing so would mean accepting yet another limitation. He wasn't out here to labor under limitations. He was out here to break them.
One step at a time.
Impact opened his eyes and took another deep breath to quiet his mind. Then he started running.
The charge built quickly, the field forming around Impact growing stronger with each stride.
He saw the field, the envelope of genesis energy, for what it was now. He saw the individual particles racing around him as he sped down the trail, each step faster than the last. He could control those particles, if he focused hard enough. He could control the amount of friction they converted. He could manipulate the field, use it to do more than absorb impact damage, more than just change direction.
He rounded a slight curve in the well-worn path, registering the flash of yellow from his marker flag as he did so. Two more turns until the clearing.
He poured on the speed and concentrated on the particles, navigating the narrow path by muscle memory alone.
He could do this. He had done this—once.
He broke from the trees and had only a split second to register the clearing, the cliff edge, and Nikki and Coop standing nearby, then he ran out of ground.
Momentum alone carried him beyond the steep slope, past the rocky shoreline far below, and well out over the water before he started to drop.
Fists clenched, he pressed his arms tightly against his sides and straightened his body out like a bullet as he arced toward the water head-first.
He blocked everything from his mind except the field. Nothing else existed for him. It continued to strengthen as he fell, but not as rapidly as before. Without his feet on solid ground to propel him forward, he had to rely on air friction alone to maintain the charge.
As he dropped, he felt the particles racing around him with gradually increasing speed. Then, true to his blood, he began to manipulate them. He hardened the particles passing under him, shifting them from reducing friction to magnifying it, but not at a single point.
That's where he'd failed before. That's what had almost stopped him from saving Nikki. He used to think of the envelope as a fixed object instead of a torrent of speeding particles. This time he didn't harden a single batch of particles under him only to watch them zip by. Instead, he hardened and released them in a cascading wave matching their speed, his speed, keeping a curved shield of hardened air right where he needed it.
Immediately, his angle shifted. He leveled out as the friction did its work, and he skimmed over the water, barely a meter off the surface.
He was doing it. He was flying—for now.
Teeth clenched as tightly as his fists, he struggled to maintain his altitude, but it was a losing battle. He was used to processing sensory input at a blistering pace, a necessity for his abilities, but keeping up with the particle cascade took everything he had, and even that wasn't enough. Maintaining altitude was leeching power from his field faster than friction could build it. Despite the extra charge he'd built into it with his running start, despite his intense focus, the envelope was weakening, as usual.
For every two meters forward, he dropped another centimeter closer to the water. At less than ten centimeters, water and field collided, and Impact's control crumbled. He skipped across the water like a stone until the field collapsed entirely. Then he cartwheeled into the cold water and went under.
Another failure.
The old voice in his head told him to get to the surface. It snapped at him to swim to shore and go again, but Impact ignored it. Instead he let himself drift under the water, his arms slowly rising up as his body sank away from the light.
Anybody can give up, the old voice told him, but you're not just anybody, are you? If you want to do what no one else can, you have to train like no one else can. Anything less is accepting your limitations—just like Savior expects you to.
With two strong strokes he broke the surface and sucked in air. Once he got his bearings he started for the shore, as he had so many times before.
As he swam he thought about the handful of vows he'd made in his life, the ones where he'd felt the tingle he now knew was his biggest limitation taking hold. Some he was proud of—the defiant shout of a little boy at his father that he wouldn't destroy his favorite bike, the heartfelt promise to Michael that he'd protect Nikki, and somewhere in between, his promise to Elias that he'd make him proud, no matter what it took. Other vows he wished he could forget.
Forgetting wasn't the answer though. This new limitation was nothing but another wall to break through, and breaking walls was what Impact did best. He would break through this wall, he knew, because he refused to fit the mold Savior had made.
He'd considered the possibility that his unbreakable vows could be used to his advantage, but the thought of doing so terrified him. He had no idea what conflicting vows would do to him, but some part of him believed making too many vows would cripple him in ways he couldn't even imagine. Maybe it was the old voice, or maybe something the new voice had shouted during one of its sudden appearances. Whatever it was, he trusted it. This limitation was part of Savior's plan, which meant Impact wanted no part of it, even though it had helped him save Nikki—even though it had helped him fly.
Hence the training.
To break through the wall of his new limitation, he first needed to learn to fly on his own with no help from a vow. Once he'd broken that barrier, he'd head toward the next wall. Then the next.
One step at a time.
Chapter 9
Nikki
"How long has he been doing this?" Nikki asked, hating how breathless and tiny her voice sounded. She cleared her throat like that would help.
Coop laughed. "Hell, he's been at it for weeks as far as I know. We just found out about it a few days ago though. Padre and I spotted him when we were looking for sensor hidey holes."
"What'd he say about it?"
"Padre?" Coop shook his head. "Not a whole helluva lot. You know how he is. I tried to get him to bet on how far out Cue Ball would get before splashdown, but he just gave me that look. You know the one."
Nikki turned away and bit her lip to keep her smile in check. She knew the look all right, but not because she ever received it herself. Not being a big talker, Sam used looks where normal people would shout, or make a joke, or give somebody a solid cursing. He had a host of looks that all meant something different, but not everybody could read those differences like Nikki, especially not Coop.
She dropped her gaze to where Impact was swimming hard for shore and an uneasiness crept over her as she watched him. "I mean Impact, not Sam. What did Impact say?"
"Told me to mind my own business." He shrugged when Nikki looked back at him. "Said he'd done it once, he could do it again, only better. He's been at it every day since."
Nikki stayed silent, for the most part, as they watched Impact try and try again for the better part of half an hour. Coop kept up a steady monologue that was strangely comforting. Nikki had been keeping to herself, a lot. Apparently she'd been craving living company and something interesting to watch more than she'd realized.
Eventually though, boredom got the better of her. At least, that was her excuse when Coop asked why she was leaving. The real reason she couldn't watch Impact was something she couldn't fully nail down herself. Explaining it to Disney was out of the question.
Watching Impact race off the bluff got her stomach and caused her heart to skip every time. In any other situation, she'd call that a win, but seeing him drop toward the rocks below, level out at the last second to glide over the waves, then crash into the water—sometimes nearly halfway to the mainland—was twisting her up inside in a way that made no sense, like her body was remembering something her mind couldn't, or wouldn't.
So she bailed.
>
She retraced their long route back through Sam's garden, and thanks to her not-so-focused attention, she accidentally crushed a tiny green shoot poking up through the loose, mounded soil in one of Sam's rows. She spent a couple of minutes trying to repair the damage, but it was no good. The tiny stalk was bent in the middle. Every time she straightened it up and thought she had it balanced, it flopped back over. The weight of its single round leaf was too much for it to bear.
She finally accepted that plant repair was not in her skill set and opted for concealment. She mounded the dirt up past the weak point, nearly covering the shoot completely, and made a hasty getaway.
Sam wouldn't be fooled. She was sure he'd find the injured plant eventually and know somebody had violated his sanctuary. By then Nikki planned to be anywhere but within sight of the garden. The thought of Sam looking at her with disappointment in those restless brown eyes did her stomach about as much good as watching Impact had, which was its own kind of worry.
She headed back inside by way of the back door, hard as it was to spot in the failing light. She didn't have a destination in mind. Instead, she let her feet run the show and wandered the bunker lost in her own jumbled thoughts. And her own they were. Michael hadn't made an appearance since her run-in with the Runners.
The emptiness that came with not hearing his voice was starting to make itself known. She could feel it growing just out of sight, clinging to her like a shadow. Only, this shadow had claws, teeth, bad breath, a chip on each shoulder, and a raging eating disorder. That last trait was her one light in the darkness. Every bit of happiness her shadow monster gobbled down came right back up when Michael reappeared. She just had to endure its binging until then.
She didn't realize where her autopilot was taking her until her feet stopped outside a closed door. Without looking around, she knew right away where she was, even though this door looked like every other door in the bunker—dull gray metal, rounded edges, and thick enough to stop a rhino. She knew where she was because this particular door had an unmistakable aura. Standing this close, Nikki was acutely aware that this door separated her from something that scared the crap out of her.
She had to face it sooner or later, Michael kept telling her, but he never forced the issue. That told her all she needed to know. He was scared too, for his own reasons.
She raised a hand to knock but caught herself at the last second. Narrowing her eyes, she stared at her hand like it had betrayed her. She hadn't made the decision to knock. That was the last thing she wanted. What was wrong with her? She wanted to blame Michael, but she couldn't. She still had her head to herself.
Nikki jerked her arm back, turned on her heel, and started back down the hall toward her room. She was growling at herself so loudly as she stomped off that she didn't hear the door unlatch and swing open behind her. Nor did she hear the voice calling after her, at first.
"Nikki, wait," Kate said loudly enough for it sink in.
Nikki froze, outside and in. If the thought of Kate earlier had made her stomach spin, hearing her voice whipped up a full-force hurricane. She willed the turmoil out of her expression as she slowly turned to face the older girl.
They just stared at each other for what felt like an eternity.
"I've gotta go—" Nikki started, at the same time Kate said, "I'm sorry I've—"
They both stopped and stared at each other. Kate looked like she was itching to get something off her chest but she nodded for Nikki to go first. Meanwhile, Nikki was fighting an overwhelming urge to bolt. With what felt like an epic feat of will, she made herself stay put and said, "What were you saying?"
Kate smiled, but it was just shy of convincing, and her eyes darted away again before she said, "I'm sorry I've been avoiding you. It was—I've been selfish."
Nikki felt like she'd been gut-kicked. She searched her suddenly empty head for the right thing to say, but all she found was a big pile of guilt and no way to express it. Somehow Kate had reached into her head and pulled out Nikki's suppressed feelings to use against her. Nikki had been in more fights than she could count, but not once had she felt this defenseless.
"I—I can't imagine how much you've been hurting," Kate said. The slight wince, quickly smoothed out, and the catch in her voice just drove the knife deeper. "I should have been there for you instead of—"
"Stop! I mean—" Nikki rubbed both hands over her face and growled into them, partly because she finally knew what this gesture felt like from the loser's side. She was so bad at this. Making nice with words was so not her thing.
"You can't apologize to me," she said through her hands. She dropped them and took a quick, borderline angry breath. "That's just…dumb."
Not her thing at all.
Kate started to respond, but Nikki held up a hand and gave her the eyebrow hike. Kate's surprise almost came with a smile, which helped Nikki settle her thoughts, a little.
"I know where your room is," Nikki all but snapped. "I could have come knocking at any time. I was the avoid…er, not you." At least the words were finally coming, screwed up as they were. "I can't believe you would even try to—I mean, I'm not the one who—You got shot in the head, for crying out loud," Nikki barked.
Well, they were sort of coming.
"Why would you apologize to me?" Nikki finished in as close to a normal tone as she could manage. Shouting obviously wasn't helping her express herself.
Kate just hugged her arms around herself and worried her lip, just like she had in the dream. In fact, she was wearing the same outfit she'd been wearing in the dream and had her hair pulled back the same way. The combination was enough to give Nikki a dizzying sense of déjà vu.
"Because I know what you've lost."
It was the look in Kate's eyes more than her words that did it. Everyone else at the bunker had avoided that look for months. They'd looked at Nikki like nothing was wrong, let her bury the pain the way she wanted. Not Kate. Her eyes were full of sympathy hidden only by unshed tears.
As easily as that, Nikki's defenses crumbled. She couldn't get a word out in response. She could barely breathe past the sudden tightness in her chest.
In her mind she was back there again, with Michael's broken body on the ground under her, his face somehow both peaceful and strong even after all he'd suffered. He looked like he could open his eyes any second. But he didn't, no matter how many times she played it over again in her head. He never opened his eyes. He was gone.
Because of her. Because she had been selfish and reckless enough to go clubbing when people were hunting for her. Because she'd thought only about what she wanted—her own insatiable craving for a good time. Because not once had she considered how her actions might affect other people, not even the only person that really mattered to her.
Nikki opened her eyes. Her emotional spiral had squeezed them shut without her knowing. It had also called Michael out of hiding. He wasn't saying anything, but she could feel him with her. She could feel his mix of longing and anxiety with Kate right there in front of them. It was so strong it almost masked his disapproval at Nikki's guilt party.
Almost.
She looked up at Kate and somehow felt even worse. The poor girl looked positively twisted over Nikki's lapse. Her eyes looked haunted and so filled with pain and confusion that Nikki wondered just how bad she'd looked, or how much of her self-flogging had been out loud instead of in her head.
Nikki didn't know what to say, and Michael apparently wasn't going to help.
"Nikki," Kate breathed, fixing her gaze firmly on her own feet, and then squeezing her eyes shut like she was fighting her own battle, which didn't make sense. The guilt was all Nikki's. It was her burden to carry. She wasn't about to share.
"He's really gone, isn't he?" Kate's voice was barely a whisper, her question sounding a little too much like a real question for Nikki's comfort.
It was all too much. The three-way emotional whirlpool was more than Nikki could stand. And Kate's question, exposing the fear
Nikki had ignored for months—way too much.
Nikki turned to flee and nearly plowed into Ace, who looked over her head at Kate with concern and then down at Nikki like she'd just kicked a puppy, which made Nikki break eye contact before she lost the already sliding grip she had on her guilt train.
"Everything all right?" Ace asked, but whether she was talking to her or Kate, Nikki had no idea. Nor did she stick around to find out.
She pushed past Ace and walked away as quickly as she could. She didn't look back, even though the urge was crushing, thanks to Michael, and she didn't stop until her heavy door was shut firmly between herself and the rest of the world.
Chapter 10
Elias
Elias knew he was being overly cautious, but he surveyed the empty street again anyway to make sure they were alone. The dark, debris-strewn road between the crumbling buildings was empty as far as he could see in either direction. In fact, in the hours since they'd started surveilling their target, only one two-man patrol had walked past, or what passed for a patrol here.
The small shack they'd been watching since sunset was in a no man's land, a block-wide off-limits buffer running the length of the border between the city and its free zone. With no power or running water under their sagging roofs and no other comforts to speak of, the abandoned buildings in the buffer held no appeal for city dwellers. Some might slip in occasionally to deal in contraband or sample elicits, but otherwise the buffer had nothing to offer aside from a possible security infraction flagged on their ID chips.
But with standing walls, more than one room, relative privacy, and even the thin hope of a partially intact roof, the buildings had plenty to offer zoners, especially those bumped from the overcrowded free zone hostels. Those desperate enough to risk detention crept in under cover of darkness each night to squat in their unofficial dwellings, which should have made them easy pickings for regular patrols from the city armed with even short-range scanners.
