Heart of the Storm

by Michael Buckley

  “I’ll share, but don’t hog it,” she says. “I’m pretty sure I’m going to need some when this is done.”

  She lifts it to my lips, and I take a pull, coughing most of it back onto the floor.

  She works on me for hours. When the lidocaine wears off, as it does very quickly, she gives me another shot. Lima suggests it may be my half-Alpha genetics that are burning through it. It takes twenty-two shots to finish me. She wraps my torso in clean, white gauze, then sterilizes her equipment and puts it away.

  “Hey, I got a souvenir for you,” she says, and holds up a hard, white object that looks like a small, flat stone.

  “What is it?”

  “A fingernail,” she says, then slips it into a small pocket in my pajama pants. “Our time together is finished, Ms. Walker. I have to let DeCosta know I’ve done what I can. I’m going to push for you to go to a hospital, but—”

  “Doctor, do you have family in Panama?”

  “I have a fiancée, and I take care of my sister’s daughter now that she’s gone.”

  “I know you think I’m delusional from starvation and exhaustion. What if I’m not?”

  She pauses at the curtain, studying me.

  “Call them,” I whisper. “Get them to safety.”

  She crosses the room again, reaches into her bag, and takes out her phone, then she pulls the curtain aside and vanishes into the other half of the plane.

  Several minutes later, DeCosta steps into the space. He’s flanked on both sides by soldiers in full gear. He’s smiling. They aren’t.

  “Where are you taking me?”

  “Norfolk International Airport,” he says. “The closest usable airport to Washington, D.C. There you will be turned over to the State Department. I’m told the president is flying in to escort you himself.”

  “Any chance you might unfasten these chains?”

  He smiles.

  “I need you to listen to me,” I say as calmly as I can. “I don’t want to cause any trouble. I just want to find my family and disappear. No one will ever hear from me again.”

  He smiles at me. It’s condescending, like I’m a little girl.

  I’m tempted to tell him the truth like I did with the doctor, give him a chance to help some people escape as well, but this guy is not my friend. He says I’m going to the State Department, but there’s something in his eyes that’s hinting at a lie. If I start shouting about the end of the world to him, I can predict with certainty how it will all end for me. He won’t believe me and when we land, he’ll hand me over to people who will toss me in a padded room and ask a million questions and fill me full of drugs. Then they will ship me off to Trident anyway. No, I’m going to keep my mouth shut and my head down and look for chances to escape. I have to get to my friends and family before it’s too late. I can’t let anything get in the way of saving their lives.

  The plane starts its descent just as the sun clocks out to go home. I can see it through one of the tiny windows. Dusk cuddles up to Norfolk, lending the little homes below its oranges and reds. There’s a lonely skyscraper out there, glowing like a torch. It’s too much for me to absorb. I push back at the tears fighting to escape. America. I’m finally home. There were so many days I was sure I would never see it again. Still, even from thousands of feet above the ground, I can tell something is wrong down there. Where are the cars? The lights? There’s no evidence of a single living soul.

  DeCosta and his soldiers return, pushing the curtain aside. There are three more behind them, each with a handgun drawn and ready. DeCosta holds up a key and grins.

  “Time to go,” he says, then gets to work unfastening me from the ceiling and floor while the soldiers watch, eagerly hoping I’ll make a stupid move. I wonder if they think their guns will expire if they aren’t fired every once in a while.

  “What’s happening down there? It’s deserted,” I ask.

  “They call it the ghostline. The East Coast states that are still in the Union were mandatorily evacuated after the last Rusalka attacks. The president doesn’t want to risk more casualties if they return, and this allows troops to move freely without interference. Civilians are not allowed within five miles of any beach, at least civilians in states that still claim to be part of the United States.”

  “Five miles is not far enough,” I mumble.

  DeCosta looks out the window and squints into the setting sun. “Millions are still displaced, and that’s on top of the people who fled after the first attacks. I’ve heard they are gathered along the fence. I wonder if we can see them from up here.”

  “Yes, there’s always a fence or a wall. That’s how we roll in the U.S.A.”

  A thin, swarthy man with a beard enters and hands DeCosta a phone.

  “What’s this?” DeCosta asks.

  “Something is happening at the embassy” is all the man says.

  DeCosta listens to whoever is on the other end and then he drops his phone. He quickly scoops it back up, his face pale, and his eyes both wide and white. He’s staring at me and trembling. I know what has happened in Panama. They have arrived.

  He rubs the space between his eyes as he puts the phone back into his colleague’s hand.

  “I . . . my wife took our son to the beach. Do you have her schedule?”

  His assistant nods. “I’ve already got calls in to them.”

  “Get them on a plane. Tell everyone at the embassy to do the same. They should abandon the embassy.”

  He turns and stares at me, his mouth full of questions he can’t seem to ask.

  The phone rings, and the assistant gives it back to DeCosta.

  “We’re landing. Yes, yes, I understand. Yes. No, everyone goes. Dammit. All right, I’ll send this plane back as soon as it’s fueled . . . Officials and family get priority, then lower staff. My wife’s father is . . . yes, if you can. His number is in my contacts.”

  The soldiers turn their attention from him to me.

  “What’s going on?” one of them presses me.

  I dip my head to avoid their eyes.

  “He’s four years old,” DeCosta continues on his call.

  “Sir, what is happening?” one of the soldiers demands. DeCosta looks up at him. There’s panic in his face as he looks from one soldier to the next, then over his shoulder at the rest of the plane. In every seat there’s a soldier, and they have all turned to listen to his call.

  “Did you do this?” DeCosta asks me.

  I don’t know where the idea comes from or the courage needed to do it, but suddenly my hand reaches out and snatches a gun out of the holster of the closest soldier. I click off the safety like my father taught me, and I point it at DeCosta. The soldiers are too confused, too caught up in their fear that something terrible is happening on the other end of his phone to stop me. They seem trapped in the moment, unsure of what to do next.

  “Listen to me. When we land, I want you to arrange it so I can walk away. I have nothing to do with what’s happening in Panama. I don’t want anything to do with it, either.”

  I hear soldiers falling out of their seats, shouting at me to drop the gun. They rush down the aisle and into the tiny space just as the wheels touch down on the runway. Everyone falls into one another, and when the brakes lock, we’re all knocked to the floor. In the chaos, I drop the pistol. It skitters under a row of seats and disappears.

  The pilot’s voice crackles on the announcement system as he welcomes us to Norfolk. He asks that everyone please stay seated while military personnel take their positions. He has no idea what is happening on his plane.

  DeCosta gathers himself and orders the soldiers to give him the keys to my chains. He unlocks them with one hand while holding the phone to his ear with the other.

  “We have to get everyone off this plane now,” he shouts. “Tell the pilot to refuel immediately. We’re going back to Panama right away.”

  Sweat pours down his face and rolls into his eyes. He frantically wipes them with his sleeve, then gra
bs me by the arm and pulls me down the aisle just as Dr. Lima leaps up to block our path.

  “You have to be gentle with her,” she demands.

  “Take your seat, doctor, or I will have you arrested,” DeCosta shouts.

  She bites her lip, but steps aside. As we pass, she slips something into my hand that’s cold and hard.

  “Thank you,” she says. I turn and watch her as I’m dragged toward the exit. All the while, I squeeze her strange gift, too frightened to open my hand to take a look. It’s made of metal. It feels like a key. Has she given me a chance?

  DeCosta pushes me through the doorway and out into the mean-spirited winds of Norfolk, Virginia. It’s brutally cold here due to a super-frozen chill coming off the water that bellies up to the runway. My pajamas are as thin as paper, and I’m trapped in a shiver that won’t go away. Snow is on the ground a foot high, making it hard for airport employees to push a flight of stairs on wheels into place for us to descend. Waiting for me are a hundred more soldiers. Sprinkled among them are police, firefighters, and men in White Tower uniforms like the ones worn by Trident employees. I roll the key in my fist. It doesn’t feel much like a chance anymore.

  “You lied to me. You’re turning me over to White Tower?” I shout over the wind and the plane’s humming turbine.

  “No, they’re here to provide security and to assist in your questioning,” DeCosta says.

  “You mean torture,” I shout. I want to punch him in his face, but I just can’t see how it would help.

  “Lyric, this isn’t about you, at least it wasn’t when we got on the plane. They want your family and friends,” he shouts over the wind.

  “What? Why?”

  “They’ve caused a lot of trouble since you vanished. Your friend Rebecca is on the FBI Most Wanted List. They want to use you to bring them in.”

  His assistant hurries down the stairs to join us. His phone is in his hand, and his face is terrified.

  “Have they found her?” DeCosta begs.

  “Not yet,” he says. “Electrical power is down across the eastern coastline. Phone lines are failing. All nonmilitary planes have been grounded.”

  DeCosta turns to me and grabs me roughly. “If you know something about this, you should say it.”

  “I just want to be left alone,” I cry as I pull away.

  “I can make that happen, Lyric, I’ll talk to them. I’ll show them that you are valuable, but you have to stop what’s happening.”

  “I can’t stop it,” I say.

  His assistant hands him the phone again and gives me another opportunity. I shove my shoulder into DeCosta so hard he stumbles forward, down the stairs. I’d love to watch every painful bounce, but he’s just my distraction. As he falls, I take the key, bend down, and open my shackles. They slide right off, and my feet are free. I take the steps two at a time, leaping over DeCosta and onto the tarmac before dashing through the confused soldiers. I manage to weave past seven of them before I feel arms wrap around me from behind. Four of my stitches snap, maybe more, and my back becomes a bonfire. Two more hands grab my legs, others my shoulders, and we all crash down on the hard black ground. A knee presses down on my neck, and everyone is shouting at me to stop resisting.

  “Let her up,” a voice says. It’s one I haven’t heard in a long time. Samuel Lir is standing over me. The last time I saw him, he was taking his first steps out of a wheelchair he had been trapped in for nearly three years. Gangs attacked him back home when they discovered his father was an Alpha. My dad found him stuffed under the boardwalk like a sack of garbage and got him to a hospital, but they could only do so much to help. He couldn’t walk, couldn’t take care of himself, couldn’t even speak. He needed a feeding tube and a ventilator. They shipped him to Trident, along with his parents, and gave him a glove. It changed him in unexpected ways. I saw the results not long before I left. Now he’s standing unassisted with the confidence of a man. He’s strong and lean, the boy he would have become if he hadn’t been victimized. He’s wearing a White Tower jumpsuit, and wrapped around his palm is the same metal glove, now glowing like a star.

  “Lyric, don’t make this harder than it has to be,” Samuel says.

  He doesn’t have to tell me whose side he’s on. It’s obvious, and it breaks my heart. I grew up with this kid. We had playdates and sleepovers and took baths together when we were four. He was like a brother to me, and he’s just like me, half human, half Sirena. It makes the betrayal sting all the more.

  “Sorry, I can’t help it. It’s always the hard way with me,” I say. “I think it has to do with where we grew up, Samuel. Why are you here?”

  “I’ve been sent to secure your transfer to a safe location.”

  “You mean Trident, right? Did she send you?” I ask him, referring to Pauline Bachman, the woman who now runs the camp. “How did you manage to avoid being one of her experiments, Sammy?”

  “You’ve got her wrong, Lyric. She helped me out of my wheelchair and off the feeding tubes and the catheters. She hired people to help me learn to talk again. I can do all the things I did before the Alpha came,” he brags, though the word Alpha has a particularly angry sound in his mouth.

  “And she taught you who to blame? Right?”

  “You think she brainwashed me? Lyric, I might have been trapped inside a broken body, but I could see everything that was happening around me. Monsters invaded our neighborhood!” He turns his attention to the soldiers. “I said let her up!”

  They do as they’re told and get me on my feet.

  “You can’t blame the Alpha for what happened to you. Human beings hurt you, Samuel.”

  “Frightened human beings, Lyric. Those things came without an invitation. They camped on our land and ran through the streets terrorizing people. They were spying on us too. They’re all criminals. I can’t blame people for being afraid when they found out what I was.”

  “Samuel, you can’t believe that. Our parents are not criminals. They loved us. They turned their backs on what they were sent to do. All of them did. Where are they now, Sammy? Where are your parents?”

  He lowers his eyes to avoid mine.

  “Samuel? Tell me!”

  “She told me you would do this,” Samuel says. “You’re playing games with my head, trying to confuse me. I’m not going to let you!”

  There’s a sound behind me followed by shouts from the soldiers. They open fire on something I can’t see, but there’s water everywhere, coming across the tarmac like a flash flood. I look to Samuel, seeing his glove fully ignited, but his face is as surprised as mine. He’s not responsible for this.

  A wall of ocean water smashes into the soldiers around me, knocking them down and dragging them across the ground. A second attack takes out nearly twenty-five heavily armed men. Suddenly, my odds of escape are looking a little better, but who is making it happen?

  I turn toward the waterline and see a figure with jet-black hair rising out of the waves. Next to him is a young girl, then another boy. Soon, there are nine of them in all, each riding a spout that shoots into the air. I know all their faces; Chloe, Maggie, Finn, Sienna, Harrison, Brady, Renee, Jane, and the boy with black hair, Riley—​all kids from Trident, each with a glove just like the one on Samuel’s hand.

  “Open fire!” one of the men shouts, but he’s drowned by a tidal wave that sweeps him into the sea. When the other soldiers start firing, a wall of liquid slams into them, knocking them about and breaking their guns. The massive army that met me when I landed is dwindling by the second.

  “No!” Samuel shouts, and he raises his hand. Water rises up, eager to be commanded. He launches it at the children, missing Chloe by inches. He fires half a dozen shots more, but they all miss. He doesn’t seem to have the control I would expect. His aim is way off.

  Riley rides a wave until it eases him to the ground in front of me. With a flick of his wrist, he whips liquid at some approaching soldiers, sending them flying across the tarmac; spouts smack into more of
them with crippling strength. Riley gives me a smile and extends his free hand.

  “Want to get out of here?” he says. I am so ready to go, but water on the ground rises up, swirls into the shape of a fist, and comes down hard on his chest. Samuel limps to his feet, his glove a supernova of light and heat. He sends an unending torrent at Riley that keeps him from defending himself.

  “Leave him alone, Samuel,” I beg.

  He’s so caught up in his anger he doesn’t even turn to face me.

  “He’s like us, Samuel,” I shout. “We should stick together. We need each other more now than ever. There’s something terrible coming this way, and you have to help us fight it.”

  “You probably sent it, traitor,” he growls.

  “Fine, Sammy. I tried.” I kick him on the side of his knee. It’s a dirty trick, but it has always worked in the past, and to be honest, growing up where we did, he should have seen it coming. He screams and falls to the ground, cradling his leg to ease the pain. He lifts his gloved hand and aims it at my face, but Riley is there, pointing right back at my former friend.

  “We are trying to save the world, Lyric,” Samuel shouts.

  “I don’t want to live in a world that she’s trying to save,” I say, then turn to Riley. “Do you have a plan?”

  He looks out at the hundreds of fresh soldiers rushing to stop us, then gives me the cocky smile I have been dying to see for months.

  “Run.”

  I throw Samuel one last look, hoping to see a change of heart, but he’s still bitter and determined. I take Riley’s hand and we sprint toward the shore.

  “I’m coming for you,” Samuel shouts at me.

  “That wouldn’t be a good idea,” I shout back.

  Running is hard with handcuffs, and a few more stitches pop in my back, but Riley helps the best he can. He shouts to the other children, and they follow, shooting torpedoes of water toward the approaching army.

  “Can you swim?” Riley asks as we near the water’s edge.

  I hold up my hands so he can see the shackles, then take the key still pressed into my palm and unlock them. They clink when they hit the ground.