by Ramsey Isler
I reached out a hand as the pen’s upward flight ended and it tumbled end-over-end toward the floor. I grabbed the closest of the semi-solid pen images preceding the flight of the real pen. I squeezed hard, and the ghostly pen popped like a soap bubble. The real pen continued to fall, but when it reached the spot where I’d just popped the premonition pen, it stopped. The pen hung in mid-air, motionless.
“It’s just stuck there,” Newton said. He’d put on what looked like night vision goggles.
“Yup,” I said. “Does that count as catching it?”
“Uh, honestly I didn’t know what to expect when I threw that thing in the air. Let’s just say you pass this one. How exactly did you do that?”
I told Newton everything I had seen, or at least thought I’d seen. He made notes of it all and asked questions when my descriptions weren’t clear. I wasn’t completely sure if I was saying anything coherent since the crisscross drug was still pulsing through my brain and I felt like every two seconds some amazing new sight or sound or sensation was demanding my attention.
“Maybe I should take a break for a while,” I said. “We’ve done enough and I don’t want to push my luck and do something stupid that we can’t fix.”
“Good idea,” Newton said. He went to another one of the many containers we’d transported here and pulled out a flask. Then he grabbed a tiny cup and poured out the flask’s contents. The fluid looked like pink lemonade.
“What the hell is that?” I asked.
“The juice that will make you nice and sane again,” Newton said as he handed the cup to me. “It’ll clean out all the crisscross in your system.”
That seemed like a very good thing for me to take right now, so I grabbed the cup and downed the drink. Sadly, it didn’t taste like pink lemonade. It was more like cough syrup mixed with onion powder.
“So,” I said while frowning from the taste, “what exactly was going on here? I mean, that grid was like . . . it was like I was seeing the energy of the universe. It was like I got a glimpse into something at the core of everything that ever existed.”
Newton smiled. “You sound like a strung out hippie.”
“I’m serious,” I said.
“I know you are,” Newton said. “And your reaction is quite common. But it’s also completely wrong. The grid you saw was a phosphene. It’s a type of optical illusion that’s well-documented, and explainable in pure scientific terms instead of that metaphysical bullshit you were just spouting.”
“So I was hallucinating?”
“Yes and no,” Newton said. “Again, a hallucination is more of a mental thing. Phosphenes are physical phenomena — all about anatomy and physics. The crisscross drug just affected the neurons connected to your eyes. LSD does the same thing. A lot of LSD users report seeing the grid, which has led to a number of users believing that they’re seeing something actually real. But the grid is just a trick of the nervous system.”
“But I was able to interact with it,” I said.
“Now that part,” Newton said, “was a hallucination. That was your brain making stuff up to reconcile all the weird sensations. Between the synesthesia, the phosphenes, and your general ability to sense things through the Rift somehow, your brain just interpreted the grid as a way to focus all those sensations. And that, my magical friend, is astounding. Your mind’s attempts to make sense of the grid have a very tangible effect on your magic.”
“I . . . still don’t really get it,” I said. “Sorry, I’m feeling especially stupid today.”
“That’s okay,” Newton said. “A slight befuddlement is a side effect of coming down from the crisscross. Let me try to rephrase it for you. A grid is order. It’s a system that makes things easily measurable and quantifiable. Orderly patterns are great for getting human attention and, more importantly, focus. Combined with the synesthesia, which is the only way you can even directly experience a lot of what goes on in the Rift, the orderly nature of the grid provides a way for you to focus your mind in ways you couldn’t even imagine before.”
“So you’re saying that as long as I can see the grid and my senses are all jacked up, I don’t need spells?”
Newton smiled and nodded. “You don’t need spells. The spells are just tools to focus your mind in specific ways that produce specific effects. But there are apparently other ways to do that. We just need reproducible cause and effect pairings. We need to know that when you do action x, event y happens. For example, now we know that when you yank on the vertexes on your grid, your mind interprets that a certain way and you can destabilize the molecular structure of objects with your magic. We’ll need you to reproduce that consistently, of course.”
I groaned like a whiny twelve-year-old because I knew where he was going with this. “More experiments, right?”
“Absolutely,” Newton said. “We need to make these sessions longer though. We have to test your limits.”
“We will,” I said. “But it’s only been two days and you’ve been pumping me full of drugs. I need a few hours of normal.”
“Okay. Your call. But it’s just a matter of time until Kellar or our mysterious nightcrafter spy is going to force us to move faster.”
“I know,” I said. “But none of that matters if I don’t have my head right when that time comes.”
“Fine,” Newton said. “What now?”
I thought about it for a second. No ideas came to mind. Then my stomach growled and gurgled so loud that it scared me. It sounded like it was caving in on itself.
“You know,” I said. “I can’t even remember the last time I ate. You think any pizza place will deliver out here?”
“No,” Newton said as he fished out a brand new phone from his back pocket, “but I know a guy.”
CHAPTER 10
I shouldn’t have been surprised that The Pizza Guy was the same guy who had supplied our LSD and our secret transportation to the warehouse. Yet, when he showed up with two steaming hot deep dish pizzas, I couldn’t help but laugh at the ridiculousness of it all.
“So, who exactly is The Guy?” I asked while I sat cross-legged on the cold concrete floor and chowed down.
“Can’t tell you that,” Newton said through a mouthful of cheese and crust. “We have a gentleman’s agreement. I don’t talk about him, he doesn’t talk about me.”
“Oh come on,” I said. “It’s not like he’s going to know.”
“But I will. That’s the thing about the spy biz, Kal. If you want to get good at keeping secrets, keep secrets.”
“Fine. You know what? I think you just don’t want to tell me because you want to keep him all to yourself.”
Newton’s phone beeped before he could answer that. He checked the screen.
“I have a new office email,” Newton said. “It’s from Cecil.”
“That’s odd,” I said. “Why is he contacting you?”
“Because you haven’t been checking your messages. Unbeknownst to him, that’s because your phone is in a dump somewhere and shattered into a hundred pieces.”
“Oh,” I said. “Well that’s actually true. Completely forgot about that. Why didn’t you get me a new one?”
“No time. This one already took me hours to scrub and install countermeasures on by hand. And since we don’t have the hotel’s Wi-Fi to piggyback on anymore, I had to do all sorts of unseemly things to get an untraceable cell signal. Anyway, Cecil says he wants you to call him immediately. Very important business.”
“He’s probably back from getting his adulation for killing Mater,” I said. “He’ll want a status report.”
“You can use my phone,” Newton said, “But with all the countermeasures, the call quality isn’t exactly the best.”
“I needed some fresh air anyway,” I said. “I’ll head out to a payphone a couple miles away and call him from there.”
“What are you going to tell him?” Newton asked.
“That we’re making progress,” I said. “But that’s it. No details.”
“And if he asks for details?”
“I’ll tell him he wouldn’t understand any of it anyway.”
“That sounds like a good way to offend him.”
I shrugged. “What’s he going to do, fire me?”
“You’ve got a point there,” Newton said. He chewed his lip for a second. I could tell the gears were churning in his head. “Maybe I should come with you.”
“What? No. I’ll be fine. Besides, I could use some alone time.”
“Oh,” Newton said. The way he said it made me feel like a pile of shit.
“No, not like that,” I said. “You know I enjoy spending time with you. You’re like . . . the only person on the planet I can talk to. But it’s been a really crazy week and I need to reset.”
“Okay,” Newton said. “But take this. Just in case.”
He handed me a little plastic vial of clear liquid. Wasn’t hard to guess what it was.
“It might come in handy if you find yourself in a bind,” Newton said.
“Newton, I’ll be right back.”
“Take it.”
I took the vial from his hand and stuffed it into my pocket. Then, for some reason, I hugged him. Don’t know why. It just felt like the right thing to do. He stiffened in surprise. Then he relaxed and let his arms settle into a light embrace. I felt the skin of his face pressed against mine.
“I’ll be right back,” I said. Then I left.
* * *
“Where the blazes have you been?!” Cecil yelled at me through the static-filled and sticky handset of the one payphone still standing in this part of the city. His voice was a mix of anger and fear, but I detected a smidgen of relief in there too, so I wasn’t that worried.
“I was running from shadows,” I said. “Had to lay low for a while. What’s up?”
I could hear Cecil take a deep breath then exhale. “Please tell me you didn’t inform anyone about that little slip of paper with an address on it.”
“No. Of course not. Why?”
“We’ve received some disturbing intelligence,” Cecil said. “One of our undercover operatives spotted someone in the area near where the . . . packages are.”
“Who?”
“A certain young lady who is very dangerous and very angry with you.”
Madison. I suddenly understood why Cecil was so upset. Now it was my turn to panic. My voice cracked as I blurted out, “When did this happen?”
“This morning,” Cecil said.
“What the hell is she doing there?”
“I don’t bloody know,” Cecil said. “The location of the packages is outside of the Rift zone, so she’d have no power there. Maybe it’s just coincidence. Maybe she’s looking for something else. I can’t see how she would know about our plans there. You disposed of the information I gave you, right?”
“I’m not an idiot,” I said. “Nobody got any information from me. That means somebody on your team leaked it.”
“They’re not my team,” Cecil said. “They’re Dominique’s. She put all this in motion and she handpicked the people involved. I would get rid of them but that seems even more risky at this stage. This is why we can’t tolerate even the slightest signs of a traitor in our midst, Kal. Trust is everything in this business.”
“Dominique’s not a traitor,” I said. “But someone in the organization is. And that someone might have given up the location. That needs to be fixed.”
“And I will look into it,” Cecil said. “We still don’t have all the information here. The only reason I reached out to you is because I had to make sure you didn’t slip and tell anyone. You didn’t, right?”
“No. I didn’t even tell Newton. I ripped the note to shreds and flushed it in a random restroom.”
“Good,” Cecil said. “That makes my job easier. I will investigate all avenues here, Kal. But promise me you won’t do anything rash. The location is well outside of the zone so the packages should be safe from anything outside the ordinary. We have the situation under control, but if you show up there it could get cocked up very quickly.”
“Yeah,” I said. “I get it.”
Cecil let out a relieved sigh. When he spoke again, his voice wasn’t as tense. “How about we set up a rendezvous? It’s been a while since you’ve given me a briefing.”
“Not a good idea,” I said. “People are looking for you. They want revenge.”
“I’m sure they do,” Cecil said. “But I know a thing or two about keeping myself alive.”
“Then you know we need to be careful about meet-ups,” I said. “Give me time to figure out a safe way to do it. I’ll contact you tomorrow.”
“Good,” Cecil said. “Tell Newton to keep an eye out for messages. And why aren’t you answering your goddamn phone?”
“Long story,” I said. “Just message Newton for now. He’ll forward it to me.”
“And you trust him?” Cecil asked. It wasn’t accusatory. Just a simple question. Cecil just wanted to be sure I was sure. But the inquiry rubbed me in all the wrong ways.
“More than I trust you,” I said.
“Good,” Cecil said. “I’ll let you know if there are any updates.”
I hung up and left the payphone immediately, but I didn’t leave that conversation behind. As I power walked back to the warehouse, my mind ran wild with paranoid thoughts. Cecil was of course hoping that I’d keep my word and be reasonable. But he didn’t know what I knew. He didn’t know about that encounter with Kellar and Madison at the Empire State Building. Kellar said he would set a trap for our mutual enemy, but I couldn’t discount the possibility that he might use my parents as bait in that trap. Maybe he wanted to lure the spy with something tangible they could use against me.
Countless scenarios, moves, and counter-moves ran through my head as I trudged ever closer to the warehouse. Without even realizing it I had started a slow jog. My worry had pumped me full of nervous energy. Adrenaline flowed freely through my veins, quickening my breathing. Then I stopped. Clarity hit me, as hard and sudden as a blind side tackle.
I really only had one viable option. I had to get to my parents before anyone else did.
* * *
I’d memorized the address of the safe house, but I didn’t know how to get there. The location was somewhere in Pennsylvania. I’d need better directions to figure out how to get there as fast as possible, and for that I’d need to hop online and do some recon. Unfortunately I didn’t have any computers I could trust. I had no phone, so that was out. My computer at my triangle house certainly wasn’t a good idea, nor any of the computers at the NATO office. So I did something I hadn’t done since I was in high school — I went to a library.
I lucked out and the nearest library hadn’t closed yet. I used to hit up libraries a lot in high school; they were convenient places to browse without my parents meddling. The libraries also had a huge collection of graphic novels I could read for free, which was a blessing for my meager teenage budget.
Since this particular library was closest to my old job, I’d been there plenty of times and knew exactly where to go. I accessed the computers on the second floor without any hassle. At this hour it was just me and a few dudes who looked like they might be homeless.
I opened a browser window and quickly searched for the address I’d etched into my memory. A top-down map came up pretty fast. I studied it from every available view, even looking at the street level. As I did this, I replayed my conversation with Cecil in my head. I kept returning to the most important thing Cecil had said: the safe house was outside of the Rift zone.
I hadn’t realized this earlier because I hadn’t bothered to look up the address on a map. But now that I could see the satellite view of the house and its neighborhood, Dominique’s original plan became apparent. To keep my parents safe from nightcrafter threats, she’d put them about ten miles out from the last measured edge of the Rift. I didn’t have access to Newton’s map, but after months of looking at it and ensuring its accuracy,
I had a pretty good mental image of it. The Rift had only spread to the easternmost parts of Philadelphia, and this place was far to the west. There was no magic there. So what were Kellar and Madison planning to do? And, more importantly, what the hell was I going to do out there?
All this work we’d been going through to make me a better nightcrafter was useless. Without magic I was just another average guy, maybe even below average. The only good thing about this was that any other nightcrafters in the area wouldn’t have magic either. But they could have other resources. Hell, they could have a squad of elite ninjas at their disposal for all I knew.
As I searched the Web for more information, I got a better picture of my target area. It seemed like a nice spot, and it had a relatively large Asian American population so my parents wouldn’t seem out of place. It was also close to all sorts of government facilities. Dominique had planned this out well.
But her careful planning posed one big problem for me: Philadelphia was a two hour drive from New York City even under the best traffic conditions and taking a train was only slightly shorter. I wasn’t sure I had that kind of time. Madison had showed up at the safe house just hours ago. It would stand to reason that if she and Kellar were going to do something, they would strike tonight. Darkness wouldn’t bring them magic, but it would bring them camouflage and fewer witnesses. Every minute wasted meant more time for Kellar and Madison to do whatever it was they were planning. So ground travel wasn’t my best option. Neither was getting on a plane, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t still fly.
Kellar could fly. Maybe I could too.
I’d never done it before, but I felt confident I could do it now with help from Newton’s crisscross. I fully understood the risks of going into a potentially deadly situation with drugs in my system, but I had no choice. I had to get my mom and dad out of there, and quickly.
