Burning Midnight

by Will McIntosh

  “What stops Holliday’s bodyguard from shooting whoever’s holding the Golds? It’s hard to burn marbles after you’ve been shot,” Hunter said.

  There was a crash outside the bathroom. The door to their room had been kicked in.

  “Take them,” Hunter said to Sully.

  “Sully,” Dom said, his tone a warning.

  Sully looked at Hunter, then down at the Golds. Burn them? Him? Whatever they did, he knew it would be monumental; it would change him and his life forever. Was that what he wanted?

  The truth was, Sully had never dreamed of being extraordinary by burning spheres. It seemed like a cheat, just like stepping on someone else’s throat to get where you wanted to go was a cheat.

  “I don’t want them.”

  Hunter lifted the spheres toward her head, then paused, looking at Sully, waiting for his okay.

  “Hunter, I’m warning you.” Dom stepped toward her.

  Dom and Mandy were right—it wasn’t Hunter’s decision to make. But there was no time for democracy. There was no time for another plan. Sully nodded. “Do it.”

  Grunting from the pain of keeping her injured arm raised, Hunter touched the Golds to her temples.

  “No.” Dom dove at Hunter. Sully reached out to block him, but Dom barreled past and knocked the spheres out of Hunter’s hands. Hunter screamed in pain, clutched her left arm as the spheres hit the floor. Sully grabbed Dom’s arm and yanked him away from Hunter just as the bathroom door crashed open, knocking Sully against the sink.

  The tall, lean bodyguard stood in the doorway, aiming a handgun at them. Everyone froze.

  Raising his hands over his head, Sully knelt. Very slowly, he picked up the fallen Golds.

  The color was dimming.

  Sully gaped at Hunter, who had sunk to the floor, and tried to wrap his mind around what she’d just done.

  Still holding her arm, Hunter looked up at Dom. “I’m sorry. I’ll find a way to make it up to you. I promise.”

  Holliday appeared behind the man with the gun. He stared at the spheres in Sully’s hands.

  Sully underhanded them through the doorway; they thumped to the carpet, rolled past the two men. “They’re all yours.”

  Holliday watched the Golds roll to a stop. He looked up at Sully. “You’re dead. All of you.”

  A jangle of terror ran through Sully. “A hundred witnesses saw you chase us here.”

  Holliday pointed at him. “Shut up. Don’t say another word. Not another word.”

  Hunter inhaled sharply. Her eyes went wide. “Oh, God. What—” She glanced around, her head snapping left, right, up, in quick succession.

  “Hunter?” Sully knelt beside her.

  “What’s happening?” she breathed. She covered her face with both hands.

  Holliday was standing over them, one shiny black shoe inches from Sully’s knee. He grunted. “Maybe she did me a favor.”

  Hunter screamed from deep in her throat. It was the sound of someone in hell.

  Sully touched her face. “I’m here.” There was something wrong with her skin. It had a strange pallor.

  Mandy leaned in close. “Jesus. What’s wrong with her?”

  It wasn’t just her skin: her hair was also lighter. Her eyes were almost glowing.

  “We have to get her to a hospital,” Mandy said.

  “No,” Hunter said. “Take me home. I want to go home.”

  “Jesus. That’s one messed-up girl.” Holliday bent, studied Hunter up close. Sully wanted to shove him away, but the bodyguard with the gun was watching from the doorway.

  He flinched as Holliday patted his back. “Like they say, you broke it, you bought it. Good luck. I’ll be in touch.”

  As Holliday walked off, Hunter clutched Sully’s wrist. “I want to go home.” She clenched her eyes. “Oh, God, make it stop.”

  As gingerly as possible, Sully reached under Hunter’s arms. “Dom, get her legs.”

  Dom slid one arm under her legs, then slipped his other arm around her back. “Just let me have her. We’ll move faster if I take her.”

  Sully handed Hunter off.

  As he did, he saw her skin was worse. It was bad enough now that he could see what was happening.

  Hunter’s skin was turning gold.

  CHAPTER 23

  Dom drove like a bat out of hell. The sound of the engine filled the car as they flew past vehicles on Route 10, the burned Gold spheres rolling around on the floor at Sully’s feet whenever Dom changed lanes.

  “No. Get away from me,” Hunter said, pushing at the air with her right hand.

  Sully kept holding her. He didn’t know what else to do. She wasn’t sick, didn’t have a fever. It was like she was lost in another world and couldn’t get out.

  “What is that? What is that? No.” She pressed her hands over her ears. If her left arm still hurt, she wasn’t showing it.

  Mandy held a water bottle out to Sully. “See if you can get her to drink.”

  Sully took the bottle, put it to Hunter’s lips. She knocked it out of his hands, sending the water spraying.

  Her skin glistened. It wasn’t as bright and lustrous as the Gold spheres had been, but the rich hue seemed to grow sharper by the minute.

  The spheres were supposed to do something. They were supposed to give Hunter some wonderful ability or shower gifts upon the world. All the Golds had done was drive Hunter crazy.

  “Assuming the car isn’t impounded for us speeding, it’s going to take about thirty-two hours to get home,” Mandy said. “Maybe we should stop halfway.”

  “If we take four-hour shifts, how many shifts is that each?” Sully asked.

  Mandy looked up, calculating. “Three, more or less.”

  Sully shook his head. “We can do that. Let’s drive straight through.”

  Mandy nodded. She studied Hunter. “What if it gave her the ability to read minds? What if she’s in a thousand people’s heads at once, and it’s too much?”

  That was a possibility. Hunter seemed completely overwhelmed.

  “I can’t see this,” Hunter muttered. “It’s impossible. Impossible.”

  Hunter was going to have to stay with Sully and his mom when they got back. He’d better let Mom know. He pulled out his phone.

  “Did you find it?” Mom asked as soon as Sully said hello.

  “We did, Mom. But there’s a problem.” He told her about Holliday showing up, had to talk fast to convince her not to call the police immediately when he told her about the guy with the gun.

  “Mom, listen. Listen to me. Holliday didn’t get the Golds. Hunter burned them.”

  The line went stone-cold silent. Then Mom whispered, “Oh, my God. What do they do?”

  Sully looked at Hunter. Her head lolled to the left, then flopped to the right as she stared, terrified, at nothing. “She’s turning gold, Mom. Her skin, her hair, it’s all gold.”

  “I don’t understand. How do you turn gold? What does that mean?”

  Sully took a deep breath. “You’ll understand when you see her.”

  —

  When Dom pulled into the Garden Apartments parking lot, Sully felt such relief his chest hitched like he was about to cry. It was three a.m., but Mom came bursting out of the building door before Dom could turn off the ignition.

  Mom opened Sully’s door. “Let me see her.” She reached in, pulled back the hood of Hunter’s coat, and gasped. “Oh, my God.” She lifted Hunter’s chin so she could see her face.

  Hunter’s skin shone as brightly as the Gold spheres had. Sully was sure if he could hold a pre-burned Gold to her face, the colors would match perfectly.

  Hunter let out a scream that sank into Sully’s bones. Her golden eyes flew open, but she was seeing something entirely different from the rest of them. Something terrible. Something unspeakable.

  “She needs to go to a hospital,” Mom said.

  Sully eased out of his seat while keeping Hunter upright. “One look at her and they’ll call the police, an
d the police are going to call the FBI or the CIA.”

  Dom came around the car and lifted Hunter.

  “She’s not sick,” Sully said. “The Golds are doing something to her. A doctor isn’t going to be able to stop it.”

  He and his mom followed Dom toward the door. Mandy ran ahead to open it.

  “Then we should call the FBI,” Mom said. “They’ll be able to get her to someone who can help her.”

  “No one even understands what these things are.” Sully gave his mom a pointed look. “If they take Hunter away, she’s never coming back. You understand that, right? They won’t ever let her go.”

  Mom shook her head. “I shouldn’t have let you go. I’m a terrible mother. I’m the worst mother in the world.”

  “No you’re not, Mom. This is Holliday’s fault. Everything would have worked out fine if it wasn’t for him.”

  CHAPTER 24

  When Sully woke, Hunter was standing pressed against his bedroom wall, perfectly still, her head against the Kate Upton poster. His mom’s white penguin pajamas hung from her, way too big.

  “Get it away from me.” Her eyes were wide, her dark-gold lips trembling.

  Sully slipped out of bed.

  “No. Stay away. It’ll get you.” She looked to her left, then back at him. “Don’t you see it?”

  “Hunter, there’s nothing there. We’re alone.”

  “Oh, no, we’re not.” She laughed, panicked, her throat tight. “Oh, no, we’re not alone.”

  She’d gone crazy. Maybe the Gold was supposed to do something else, but it had been too much. It had driven her crazy.

  “What do you see?” Sully asked.

  “It’s like…” She looked to her left again. “I can’t describe it. Can’t you see it?”

  Mom appeared in the doorway. “How is she? How are you, Hunter?”

  “Wait a minute,” Hunter said. “I know why you can’t see it. It’s not out there. It’s inside me.” She clutched her chest. “Oh, God, get it out of me.”

  Mom stepped close to Hunter, brushed her cheek with the backs of her fingers. “What’s inside you, sweetheart?”

  “I don’t know. Get it out. Please get it out.”

  Mom took Hunter’s hand and tried to lead her to the bed, but Hunter pulled free. “I can feel it moving around. Oh, God, it’s trying to talk to me, but it has no mouth.”

  CHAPTER 25

  Sully held the spoonful of Campbell’s chicken noodle soup to Hunter’s lips. “Hunter, you have to help me. If you don’t eat, we’ll have to take you to a hospital. We won’t have a choice.”

  Her eyes a thousand miles away, Hunter opened her mouth ever so slightly. Relieved, Sully slipped the spoon into her mouth, which closed around it. “There you go. Good girl.”

  Sully couldn’t take his eyes off Hunter’s skin. It shone, reflecting the kitchen’s overhead light. She was terrifying and breathtaking. El Ángel come to life.

  Her arm seemed better. Either she’d only bruised it or the Golds had healed it.

  “I think I want to die,” Hunter whispered. “If I decide for sure, will you help me?”

  Sully slipped another spoonful of soup into her mouth, fighting against the despair threatening to swallow him.

  “We’ll get through this,” he said. “I love you, you know?” His own words startled him. He’d never said that to anyone besides his mom.

  Hunter’s eyes focused on him. “You do?” She nodded. “That’s nice. No one’s loved me in a long time.” She sounded like a little girl, the way she said it.

  Sully kissed the side of her head. “Whatever this is, fight it, okay? Don’t let it beat you. You’re a ninja.”

  “Yeah,” Hunter whispered, as if that was the best idea she’d ever heard. “I am a ninja.”

  She was the only one who’d had the courage to burn the Golds. Maybe living on a razor’s edge her whole life, she was the only one desperate enough for the sort of salvation you could only find in spheres. Sully suspected it had never been about money for her. It had always been about the spheres themselves.

  CHAPTER 26

  When Hunter let out a tight shriek, Sully realized he’d dozed off on the couch. He checked the clock: 3:22 a.m. Hunter was sitting on the floor, rocking, one hand over her eyes.

  “I don’t want to see any more colors. Anything else. Show me anything else.”

  Looking bleary-eyed, Mom came out of her room in a bathrobe. “Why don’t you sleep for a couple of hours?”

  Sully desperately wanted to take his mom up on the offer, but she’d been up with Hunter most of the night before.

  They could really use some help, but that would mean Dom or Mandy, and it was possible Dom’s dad would never let him leave the house again, except to go to school. Sully had missed the entire week; he refused to leave Hunter for a minute, and Mom hadn’t once suggested he should.

  Mandy’s parents had no idea about any of what had happened. They still thought she’d spent those three days at Virginia Tech. Now she was back at school.

  Hunter inhaled sharply. She stood, looked around for a moment, then disappeared into Sully’s room. Sully and Mom watched the doorway until she reappeared, carrying two Army Green spheres, a couple of commons that were just about the end of Sully’s stock. She returned to her spot on the couch, drew up her bare legs, and rested the spheres on her knees.

  “How are you doing, sweetie?” Mom asked.

  Hunter stared at the spheres.

  “She doesn’t need a doctor,” Mom said. “She needs a psychologist. She reminds me of a soldier coming home from combat.”

  “They’re like sperm and egg,” Hunter said.

  “What?” Sully asked.

  Hunter gestured at the spheres. “They come together inside you.”

  Just the thought gave Sully a crawling feeling. “You’re saying they give birth to something inside the person who burns them? I’ve never heard that idea before.”

  Hunter turned her luminous gaze on Sully. “It just popped into my head.” She looked at the ceiling. “You know what?”

  “What?” Sully asked.

  Still staring at the ceiling, Hunter stood. Sully and Mom followed as she dragged a chair from the kitchen and set it in the little hall that connected Sully’s room and the bathroom. She climbed onto the chair and pushed away the panel that covered the crawl space in the ceiling. Hoisting herself up, she disappeared.

  There was nothing up there. Sully had checked it out once, but the space was just a latticework of two-by-fours over dusty insulation.

  “Hunter,” he called, “what are you doing?”

  She didn’t answer.

  “If we took her to a psychologist, do you think we could get him or her to promise to keep quiet?” Sully asked.

  Hunter reappeared before Mom could answer. She dropped onto the chair and hopped down, holding a Ruby Red. White, even teeth. Rarity level two.

  “Where did you get that?” Sully asked.

  Hunter pointed up. “Under the insulation. In the corner.”

  Sully peered into the dark. “How did you know it was there?”

  Hunter followed his gaze. “I don’t know.”

  Sully’s heart began to beat slow and hard. She’d found the sphere as if she knew right where it was, like she had built-in sphere-detecting radar.

  “Oh, my God,” Mom whispered.

  “Do you think you could find another like that?” Sully asked.

  Hunter frowned in concentration. “There’s a Lemon Yellow not far away.” She pointed. “That way.”

  “Oh, my God,” Mom repeated, pressing a palm to her forehead.

  Sully fetched Hunter’s coat, pulled the hood up to hide her face. “Let’s see if we can find it.”

  He had no doubt they would. The mystery was solved. Gold: the ability to locate other spheres. In a million years he wouldn’t have guessed.

  Hunter gasped.

  “What is it?” Mom asked.

  “I know where there
’s another. No—two more.”

  Sully grabbed his coat.

  —

  They should have brought a bag. Sully’s arms were so full of spheres he couldn’t open the building door. Giggling, he set them on the stoop as gently as he could. A Lavender rolled into the bushes. He would get it later.

  Inside, they piled the spheres on the couch. Mom was shaking. “My God, this is better than if you’d sold the Golds. Except for what it’s done to Hunter.”

  Hunter looked like she was about to throw up.

  Sully touched her back. “How are you feeling?”

  “I’m here and I’m not,” she said. She pulled off her parka, swept her brilliant hair away from her face. “I don’t know how to describe it. I get these flashes. Shafts of color that make the strangest sounds. Then I’m moving very fast, going on and on. Sometimes I think something and it makes no sense. It’s not even words.”

  Mom was listening intently.

  “You seem to be a little better, though,” Sully said.

  Hunter shook her head. “I don’t think I’m getting better. I’m getting used to it.” She pressed a palm to her chest, tilted her head, as if straining to hear something. “I can feel it inside me. I can hear it.”

  “What?” Sully asked.

  “It. The Gold. It’s inside me, and it’s never coming out, because it can’t.” She pressed both hands to her face. “It can’t live on its own. That’s why they always give us something: they’re paying rent.”

  Mom sat next to Hunter. She’d gone very pale.

  “You’re saying everyone who’s burned spheres has something living inside them?” Mom asked.

  “It’s beautiful, in a way. If you think about it just right, at just the right angle, it’s beautiful.”

  Sully wasn’t sure he could find that angle. He wasn’t even sure he believed Hunter. Then again, there was no denying the dazzling hue of her skin. It was as if she’d become half Hunter, half sphere. Or half alien.

  The idea made his skin prickle.

  Hunter drew her legs up and hugged them. “It wants me to see this as a beautiful thing, but I’m not sure I can.”

  Sully looked at his mom, trying to sense what she was making of this. Was Hunter delusional? Or was she communicating with whatever had been born inside her when she burned the Golds?