“How did he do it?” Ketchup asks, cutting into my thoughts.
Ivy starts trembling, but she doesn’t fall to pieces this time. “It’s hard to explain, but we realized before that if he accepted the pain I carry around and took it in willingly, it wasn’t as hard to control, and it made me feel… better. I don’t know how, but I can hold a lot of pain. He took it all away from me and when he couldn’t hold any more, it just sort of blasted out of him.” She wraps her arms around her body as she shivers in the warm air. “It was terrifying, but he was so relieved it had finally worked. All he could think about was finding the right time to use it against David.”
“He knew,” Ketchup says with a shake of his head. “Zander knew we were planning to go after David, and he thought he could beat us to it.”
Realizing he’s right, a crushing sense of responsibility for this whole mess lands on my shoulders like a bag of bricks. “We have to stop him.”
“Or help him,” Ketchup argues.
“Either way,” Noah says, “we need to hurry.”
Ketchup sighs and scrubs his hands through his hair. “We need help.” Noah raises an eyebrow at him, but Ketchup only shakes his head. “We need more help than just you and Ivy.”
That makes me sigh as well, because I know exactly what kind of help he’s referring to. “Oscar.”
“Will we be able to get in and see him?” Noah asks warily.
“Uh, not through the regular entrance,” Ketchup says. He looks worn out, but his shoulders square up in the face of the challenge. “We better get going.”
I start to move, but Ivy reaches for my arm. I shy away on instinct, but Ketchup is faster. He has her wrist trapped in an iron grip before she ever gets near me. “Don’t touch her,” he snaps.
The hurt still radiating off Ivy increases but, for the first time, I realize that’s all I feel from her. “No, wait,” I say. “It’s… fine.”
“What?” Ketchup demands. Ivy seems confused as well. Noah looks more intrigued than anything else. He steps forward curiously.
“Let her go.” Ketchup doesn’t respond right away, but my pleading look finally convinces him to stop strangling her wrist. Distraught, Ivy just stands there with her hand extended, unsure of what to do. I’m struck in that moment by how different she is. How broken.
Zander has told me about their meetings, how different she is, how he’s forgiven her for what she did, but being in her presence has a different effect on me than his words ever could. She honestly regrets hurting him. A sharp sense of sadness hits me as I realize she really did love him very much. No matter what Zander says, I think he loved her too, but they’ll never be together and, for some strange reason, I’m saddened by that knowledge, despite all the damage she’s caused.
Reaching out, I touch Ivy’s hand, pulling back almost immediately in shock.
“What?” Ketchup demands. “What did she do?”
I can’t stop shaking my head in disbelief. “Nothing. Absolutely nothing.” I stare at Ivy, searching for some kind of hint. “How did this happen?”
“How did what happen?” she asks. There is no sense of understanding in her eyes at all.
“You!” I say. “The pain. It’s gone! I can’t feel it at all. It’s like you’re not even Richiamos anymore. There’s just nothing! You feel like a regular person, Ivy. All the pain is gone.”
Her brow furrows in confusion. “Zander, he… he took it. I just… I didn’t realize it hadn’t come back. I’m so used to shutting it away, I didn’t realize, and I was too scared about him being taken to notice. He took it. He took it all away.” Tears start building in her eyes again as she finally lets herself stop and experiences what life feels like without the immensity of pain she has always carried. The tears roll down her cheeks as she says, “He took the pain away.”
“What does this mean?” Noah asks.
Ivy and I both shake our heads. I’m the one to speak, though. “I have no idea, but we don’t have time to figure it out right now. We have to get Oscar and get to the compound.” I start to turn away, but I reach back and grab Ivy’s hand. She is startled by the touch, but I squeeze her fingers tightly. “We’ll figure this out, okay? Let’s save Zander first, though. Deal?”
“Of course.” Ivy smiles and rushes to the car with me. Five seconds later, we are once again barreling through the streets of Albuquerque at breakneck speed in search of salvation.
The sun is threatening to dip behind the trees as we roll to a stop in a hidden spot behind the hospital. Nobody says anything as we slip out of the car and approach the only service doors standing solitary in the wall. Flanked by dumpsters on one side and a loading zone on the other, we slip up next to the doors.
Ketchup pulls a card from his wallet and looks over at me. “Let’s hope this hasn’t been deactivated yet.” He swipes it through the card reader, and we all hold our breath. The red light flashes, but refuses to make the switch to green. Sighing, I step forward. I really don’t like the idea of leaving the door open to anyone who might want to come in or out, but I can only hope they’ll get it fixed before anyone dangerous escapes. Well, you know, other than Oscar.
Taking the door handle firmly in my hand, it only takes a small burst of energy to break the locking mechanism and pull the door open. I really have no idea if what I just did set off a silent alarm somewhere, so I just start running. The route I memorized months ago to get Oscar out of here the first time is engrained in my mind, and I follow it now. Ketchup, Noah, and Ivy speed along behind me, only skidding to a halt behind me when I hold up a hand to warn them of wandering hospital staffers.
Due to the fact that we’re closing in on dinnertime, the halls are relatively empty. We only have to hide twice before reaching the floor where Oscar is housed. I’ve never actually been to his room, as our visits are usually carried out in the secured visitation room, but I know his room number. I pause at the door leading to the patient wing and feel a sudden, discomforting sensation.
Looking back, I glance at Ivy, but I’m not sure if it’s coming from her or not. I shake it off and push into the hallway silently. The others are quite a bit less silent, but we hurry through the halls as best we can. Every step we take, the sensation gets worse. The noise from the patient rooms echoes down the hallways. I want to cover my ears against the yelling and thrashing, but I can’t risk not hearing someone coming up on us. I push away the sounds of insanity as we step into the first hall.
Suddenly, the noise lessens. I jump when I look to the side and see two patients pressed up against the rectangular, reinforced windows, their wild eyes staring behind me at Ivy. When I glance back at her, she seems as unnerved as I feel. Ketchup and Noah just look plain freaked out, but Ketchup pushes me forward. I keep taking step after step, finding it impossible to ignore my rising hunger. It sweeps in from the front, from each new set of patients’ rooms we pass. I take in their hunger, but the worst temptation is slowly building behind me. In Ivy.
I look back again and see her expression hardening as she has to focus more and more. I don’t have to ask her what’s happening. I can feel the pain building inside of her, replacing everything Zander took. I don’t really understand what’s happening, but that familiar knowledge that being around Ivy is going to get me in trouble start clawing its way over my skin. I do everything I can to block it out and pick up my pace.
The room numbers fly by as the grenade of pain keeps building behind me. I’m gasping for breath and control by the time I finally make it to Oscar’s room. I nearly trip over my feet when I find him already waiting at the door, clearly expecting us. I reach for the handle, but he snaps it open on his own. I can’t tell whether he broke it like I did the exterior door, or if he just knows how to bypass the security. I don’t particularly care either.
It’s a huge relief when he grabs my hand and starts towing me down the hall in a completely different direction. I’m getting close to either blacking out or losing control thanks to Ivy’s presence,
but Oscar’s tight grip on my arms seems to be helping. In fact, it seems to be helping quite a bit. I look up at him, but he’s too focused on guiding us out of the hospital to comment. I can’t even tell you how we got out so fast. I’m too disoriented by the time we get out to ponder anything deeper than getting as far away from Ivy as I can.
“What is going on with her?” Ketchup snaps, pointing at Ivy. “Van was fine being around her when we got here. Now, she’s about to lose it!”
Oscar begins shoving everyone toward the car, but he does deign to explain as we scramble away from the building. “Ivy is a sponge.”
Well, he kind of explained. Maybe. My head is swimming in the delectable pain pouring off Ivy.
“She’s a sponge? What the hell does that mean?” Ketchup demands.
“Like she’s absorbing their pain?” Noah questions. He seems utterly confused by the notion.
Oscar pushes me against the car door, but doesn’t open it just yet. He looks at Ivy and gestures at the trunk. I expect her to fight, but she only nods. Before she obeys, though, she looks up at Oscar, pleading for answers. “What did you mean about being a sponge?”
“We don’t have time,” Oscar growls.
“Please, just answer that one question,” she begs.
In a huff of irritation, Oscar stomps over to her and grabs her chin, nearly lifting her feet completely off the ground as he forces her to meet his eyes. “Pain is a living thing, needing someone to inhabit. It seeks a vessel, a home, someone capable of holding great amounts and harboring it until it can be used, turned, made into power, for good and noble purposes… or in the pursuit of wicked glory that comes only when the price is too high to be paid without destroying more lives than it was born from in the beginning. You are the vessel. We are the crafters. You must choose before the end for what purpose your life will be spent. You must choose between life and glory, and you will only get one last chance to choose.”
Oscar snaps his hand away from her face as if touching her causes him pain. Ketchup and I look at each other, more confused than ever, but Ivy only nods as if everything he just rambled made complete and perfect sense. Maybe I don’t even want to know. I think Ketchup must come to the same conclusion, because he pops the trunk and leaves Oscar to close the trunk lid on Ivy.
We’re miles away from the hospital before Ketchup finally says, “How did they not know we broke into the building? I thought for sure that when Van broke the back door handle, someone would come running.”
“I deactivated that alarm shortly after arriving at the hospital,” Oscar says calmly.
All Ketchup says in response to that is, “Oh.” Noah just shakes his head.
I can still feel Ivy all the way in the trunk, but it’s dull enough to handle for now. I reach over and grab Ketchup’s free hand. He squeezes me back, but keeps his eyes on the road. Tension saturates the car to the point that I feel like I can hardly breathe. Ketchup notices it too, but Oscar seems oddly comfortable. Ketchup and I both jump when he finally speaks again.
“Either we have been betrayed, or Isolde is more ingenious than Ivy anticipated.”
My head whips around to see a seemingly random car following us on the highway. I almost start to argue with Oscar when I catch site of the speedometer. Ketchup is edging past one hundred miles per hour. Every other car on the road is left in our dust. All but this one SUV. Ketchup switches lanes to bypass another slower driver, and the SUV matches us move for move.
Sinking into my seat, I say, “What do we do now?”
I see Oscar shrug in the rearview mirror. “If the Eroi and Godlings want to fight, I say we let them have at each other. I couldn’t care less whether they destroy each other out of stupidity, so long as we get Zander out alive.”
“And Annabelle,” I add.
He only shrugs. “If we must.”
The atmosphere settles back into its painful silence after that. There is no arguing with Oscar, and really no point to it, anyway. I can’t say I disagree with him. I’ll do my best to save Annabelle, but Zander is my priority. The emptiness slowly begins to creep back into my soul as I contemplate what it will take to get my brother back. Ketchup looks over at me with worry in his eyes as my body goes unnaturally still, but his concerns fade into the background as my objective embraces the emptiness.
Chapter Thirty-Four: Supernova
(Vanessa)
“What’s the plan, Nascar?” Oscar asks Ketchup in his usual bland drawl.
As Ketchup shift into park and takes his hand off the wheel, he smirks. “Why ask me? You’ve always got a plan, right?”
“I always knew you were smarter than you looked,” Oscar says. He tosses Ketchup a rare grin before turning serious. To everyone else, he says, “The compound will no doubt be locked down. Unless someone managed to make off with detailed schematics recently, I suggest we get in the opposite way Van got out.”
Everyone turns to look at me. The emptiness that had begun to overtake me when we first set out has receded enough that Ketchup isn’t looking at me worriedly every five seconds anymore, but it didn’t go far. I don’t look at anyone in particular as I say, “I went over the wall.”
“How?” Noah asks.
“I jumped. Not the whole way at once, but I don’t think everyone will be able to make it over the way I did.”
Oscar hardly looks disappointed. “Well, I guess it’s the front door, then.”
“What?” Noah snaps. “Do you really think that will work?”
For some reason, Ketchup grins. “Yeah, actually, it will.” He looks over at me, but I don’t return his excitement. “They want Van back, not to kill her. They’ll attack, for sure, but we’ve got two Godlings and a Richiamos to distract them from you and me, Noah.”
Noah doesn’t look thrilled, but he doesn’t have any other ideas, so he finally agrees. “Fine. No point in wasting time, then.”
We’re still a ways away from the compound, but we get out of the car and leave it behind to make sure it doesn’t get destroyed or seized in the likely event that we’ll need it to escape. We all know the Eroi are still out there somewhere but, like Oscar, I couldn’t care less what happens to them at this point. Ivy is only slightly more unbearable than when we put her in the trunk, so I keep my distance and we all break into a run. It doesn’t take long to the reach the outer edges of the compound property. We slow and begin creeping forward at a more careful pace, but as we get closer, a strange hum or noise tickles the edges of my hearing.
Knowing Oscar is the only other one capable of hearing it, I turn to him and ask, “What is that?”
He shakes his head, but picks up his pace in response. The others don’t hear it until we’re less than half a mile from the compound walls. Their heads all pop up in response to the strange howling and occasional cheering. Our pace slows even further as we get in sight of the main gate and see it practically unguarded.
“It sounds like the crowd at one of Zander’s games,” Ketchup says.
Slowly, I shake my head.
Taking off running, fear rips through me. I can barely see as my vision narrows, and my blood starts pumping like mad. Someone shouts at me as I approach the main gate, but I don’t slow. A blur of metal speeds at me from behind, but I dodge it with barely a thought. All I can think about is getting to Zander. I have no clue whether he’s fighting David already, James, or the entire compound! All I know is that he won’t win this fight on his own. I push and shove people out of my way, sending them crashing into the other spectators, and burst through the wall of people in time to see a cataclysmic detonation of light throw Zander and James apart.
I’m stunned speechless as I watch my brother stagger up to his feet, cross the torn up courtyard, and approach James’ body. I don’t gasp like the others when James moves, because somehow, I knew the second the blast threw them apart that Ivy was right. This isn’t the Gift.
This won’t end the war. It won’t end any war. It will only start them.
&nbs
p; As Zander collapses, the emptiness shuts everything else down. Someone screams at me to stop when I start running, but it fades away to nothingness as I reach for my hunger. James is only halfway to his feet when I barrel into him. His breath blasts out of him as we both hit the ground. I struggle to get control of the situation, but James’ arms clamp around my body too quickly for me to escape. I kick and punch, trying to free myself, sinking my teeth into his forearm, but nothing I do is enough.
Zander is suddenly on top of us, his fist slamming into James’ chin, spraying blood across my face. The coppery smell overwhelms my senses, but I refuse to let him win. All I need is to get to my knives. I stop trying to escape his grip completely and start wriggling enough that I can get a hand to my knife, wedging my elbow into his gut as he tries to climb back to his feet. It doesn’t have nearly the impact as Zander slamming his fist into his sternum. I hear the crack, and think it must have done enough to free me but, a second later, my help disappears as some other Godling lemming levels Zander in a mad rush.
The emptiness holds my desperation at bay, but logic tells me I can’t hold James off for long. This isn’t what I was built for. It isn’t what I trained for, either. I make one last effort to get to my knives, but James suddenly gains his feet and I find myself dangling a foot above the ground with his arm slowly crushing my throat.
My fingernails claw at his skin as self-preservation kicks in, but I feel oddly detached from my impending death. The only abstract thought I can really hold onto is that this wasn’t how it was supposed to end. The idea sticks with me as I kick at his legs viciously and crane my neck to bite his arm. My mouth is full of blood, my feet on the verge of breaking from the power behind my kicking, before I remember that day in the hallway.
The hint of fear that not even the emptiness could fully suppress drops away as my fighting ceases. For some reason, I start counting, waiting for what I know will come. I get to seven before a jarring blow lessens James’ grip, and I drop to the ground gasping. I’m the only one not surprised to find Noah standing over a dazed James with a thick, metal bar in his hands.
Wicked Glory Page 28
