All of the Garde were occupied with other Harvesters. Einar sighed. He reached into his attaché, pulled out his blaster and fired a concentrated burst of energy. Kopano ducked as the red-tinged beam sizzled by his head and right into the Harvester’s face.
Einar’s weapon was far from nonlethal; the Harvester fell dead, his face a charred mess. The blaster was Mogadorian in origin, a little collector’s item from the invasion. Einar relished any chance he got to use it.
“Who are—?” Kopano started to ask, his fists up.
“I’m your only friend,” Einar said, getting closer. He reached out to Kopano with his Legacy and filled the boy with feelings of affection and trust.
“Right!” Kopano said. “Yes! Good to see you!”
“All these people want to hurt us. All of them,” Einar said. “Hurt them before they can hurt us.”
Anger. Einar made it flow through Kopano. It was a simple chemical reaction—lower the serotonin, pump up the adrenaline. Especially easy with males, actually. Kopano’s eyes widened, his lips curled into a feral snarl, his fists clenched impossibly tight.
With a roar, Kopano whipped around and clotheslined the nearest Harvester. While that man gasped for breath in the dirt, Kopano lunged at a Caleb and punched the clone so hard that its head spun 180 degrees before it disappeared.
“Good boy,” Einar said.
Emotional manipulation. It wasn’t the flashiest Legacy, but it had its uses.
Kopano plowed through another pair of clones, then pummeled a fleeing Harvester. Everyone in the battle—Garde and Harvester—was now paying all their attention to the Nigerian.
Well, not everyone.
Einar took a moment too long admiring his handiwork. Something thudded at his feet. A glowing rock.
“Shit,” he said.
He felt a yank on the back of his jacket and let his body go limp. Just as Ran’s bomb exploded at his feet, Einar flew backwards on a telekinetic tether. He landed in the road, scraping his elbows. He’d been pulled backwards by Rabiya, who was hiding behind the tire of the broken-down station wagon they’d used as a roadblock. An unconscious Harvester was slumped next to her.
Einar cringed, fingering a tear in his jacket.
“I’m all dirty,” he complained.
“Yes. But you aren’t blown to pieces, so there’s that,” Rabiya scolded.
The two of them flinched as a motorcycle flew overhead, the bike obviously propelled by telekinesis and glowing with Ran’s kinetic energy. It fell right in the midst of the Harvesters riding in circles around the fight and exploded, knocking a few of them off their bikes and driving others to retreat.
“This is going poorly,” Rabiya observed. “We should have waited. It would’ve been easier to take her with the Peacekeepers than with these other Garde.”
“Hindsight,” Einar replied with a dismissive wave. “Besides, we don’t know if she was planning to return to the Academy. They could have been running away.”
Einar peeked out from behind the car. By the van, Kopano’s berserk rampage was slowing down a bit. Normally, it took a few minutes for Einar’s control to wear off, but the attack from Ran must have shaken his Legacy. He concentrated on Kopano and amped up his adrenaline, his rage, then smiled when the Nigerian smashed the heads of two Harvesters together with renewed ferocity.
“Kopano! Hey! What are you doing?”
That must be Caleb. The real Caleb. He stood in front of the larger boy, trying to calm him down. He couldn’t have known what Einar had done to Kopano’s mind, how it would take time for him to come down from the manipulations.
Kopano grabbed Caleb by the front of his shirt and flung him back-first into the windshield of the van. The glass crunched and spiderwebbed as Caleb bounced off it, tumbled over the hood and landed on the back of his head in the road. A moment later, the clones crowding the battlefield blinked out of existence.
“We make our move now,” Einar told Rabiya. “Get our exit ready.”
“Hurry, please,” Rabiya said. She extended her hands. A blue glow started to emanate from her palms.
Einar slipped out from behind the car, blaster pointed ahead of him. With the clones gone, he could see Taylor leaning over one of her friends. Who was that? He couldn’t tell and it didn’t matter. She was unconscious or dead. Probably dead, based on the dark red scars that covered her face and neck. One of the damned Harvesters must have burned her up. Taylor was focused on pouring healing energy into her, but from Einar’s perspective the effort seemed wasted.
As Einar scuttled towards Taylor, Nigel strode into the road and started to scream.
The decibel level was like nothing Einar had ever experienced. He doubled over and vomited, his head spinning. It felt like his eyes would bulge out of his head. The Harvesters who had remained standing during Kopano’s assault now fell over, writhing and clutching their ears.
So did Kopano. In fact, he took the brunt of Nigel’s scream. The attack seemed designed to bring him down.
Hand shaking, Einar managed to lift his blaster just high enough to shoot Nigel in the leg. The searing pain surprised him and cut off his scream. Nigel fell to his knees, but immediately started to get back up. Einar grabbed a rock with his telekinesis and flung it at Nigel’s head. The blow wasn’t enough to kill him, but it made certain that he wouldn’t cause any more sonic disruptions for at least a few minutes.
Einar felt a tugging sensation across his knuckles. A second later, his blaster was ripped out of his hand. He glanced to his right and saw Ran Takeda. Unlike the Harvesters, she was still on her feet. Einar glanced around for Rabiya but didn’t see her. She must have gone down when Nigel screamed. Einar struggled to his knees and watched as Ran stalked towards him.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
A bullet grazed Ran’s shoulder. She dove for cover behind the van as Reverend Jimbo stepped onto the scene, his six-shooter blazing. He came with a small contingent of Harvesters. They seemed more concerned with gathering their injured than with pressing the fight against the Garde.
Thanks to the reverend’s distraction, Einar was able to scramble to his feet. The way to Taylor was clear. She’d been affected by the scream, too, and was wiping her eyes, trying to gather herself so she could go back to unsuccessfully healing her dead friend.
Einar pulled a tranquilizer gun from his attaché and shot Taylor in the neck. She slumped over.
“Finally,” Einar muttered.
Einar raised a hand, hoisting Taylor up with his telekinesis. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Ran poke her head out from behind the van. He fired a dart in her direction, unsure whether it found its mark.
“Rabiya! Are you ready?” Einar yelled as he turned. He couldn’t be sure she heard him. The ringing in his own ears was thunderous.
The girl was back on her feet at least. Her headscarves were a mess, blood dampening one side of them. She must have fallen and hit her head on the station wagon’s bumper.
Rabiya extended her hands and focused. A stream of cobalt-blue energy flowed from her palms and struck the pavement. Slowly, the energy coalesced into a craggy pyramid of stone.
Loralite. Rabiya could produce the stuff at will. Now, all they had to do was envision the stone tucked away in Einar’s backyard, touch the Loralite and they’d be out of this mess.
“Deceivers!” Reverend Jimbo shouted. Einar could hear his booming voice even through the intense ringing. “We have been infiltrated by the abominations!”
The reverend had seen Rabiya using her Legacy. He’d likely also surmised that Einar was the one floating Taylor through the air.
The reverend pointed his revolver at Einar. Quickly, Einar yanked Taylor to him so that he was carrying the girl over her shoulder.
The reverend squeezed off a shot. Einar brushed it aside with his telekinesis.
He started to fire again.
Einar gripped the man’s arm with his telekinesis and twisted. The arm snapped at the elbow. Jimbo screamed. He still manag
ed to pull the trigger.
But the gun was aimed under his own chin.
The leader of the Harvesters collapsed, his head blown apart. His men recoiled in terror.
Einar couldn’t deny the satisfaction he felt at that.
He reached the stone just as Rabiya finished creating it. “Can we please get out of here?” she asked. She held out her hand to Einar. “Your place, right?”
The detached wheel of a motorcycle flung with telekinetic force struck Rabiya in the stomach. She doubled over and fell backwards. Einar glanced over his shoulder, saw Ran charging an object, saw Caleb stirring on the roadside, saw Nigel struggling back to his feet.
He looked down at Rabiya, catching her breath, now too far away from the stone. He started to reach out with his telekinesis.
A glowing rock floated in his direction.
One of the last Harvesters dove on top of Rabiya. He grabbed her and smashed her face into the pavement.
It was all happening too fast.
“I am sorry,” Einar said to Rabiya, although he was sure she couldn’t hear him. He touched the Loralite stone and, with Taylor, teleported himself to safety.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
ISABELA SILVA
BIG BOX—STOCKTON, CALIFORNIA
ISABELA AWOKE SLOWLY, GROGGILY, LIKE SLIDING out from a pleasant dream. Her muscles were stiff, her back sore. It felt like she’d been sleeping for a long time. Where was she? In bed at the Academy? Back home? She smelled breakfast. Her mother must be cooking. She yawned luxuriously.
Someone gently shook her shoulders.
“Isabela. Isabela.” Ran’s voice. “Wake up, now. It is time to go.”
Isabela snapped awake. This cold metal slab beneath her, it wasn’t her bed. And she wasn’t alone.
She sat up sharply, her back cracking, a rush of wooziness pumping through her head. Ran crouched in front of her. The Japanese girl’s gaze was, as usual, completely inscrutable.
But Ran had seen her. Of that, Isabela could be certain.
“It is okay,” Ran said. “You’re safe.”
Isabela touched her cheeks. She ran her fingers over leathery furrows, the patchwork border of skin grafts, puckered scar tissue. She brushed her hand over her scalp, the spiky bristles where her beautiful mane of hair once grew. Her eyes widened, locked on Ran, and she stifled a scream.
Then, she shape-shifted. Isabela put on her old face, the one from before the accident. The burn scars melted away, her skin smoothed out, her hair grew in. Ran watched with her head tilted, saying nothing. Isabela wondered if the other girl was capable of registering surprise.
“You saw me,” Isabela said flatly.
“Yes.”
“You weren’t supposed to.”
“The others, too,” Ran said, glancing over her shoulder at the van’s closed back door. “At first, we thought you had been injured . . .”
Isabela put her face in her hands. Months of keeping up appearances—literally and figuratively—wasted. They would talk and she would become an object of pity, undesirable, disgusting . . .
She peeked out through her fingers. Wait. There was something more happening here. They were in the back of the stolen Academy van, except it wasn’t at all in the condition Isabela remembered. A warm wind blew in through the missing windshield. There were blood splatters on the floor. She noticed that Ran’s shoulder was wrapped in a fresh bandage.
“What . . . what happened?” Isabela asked.
“We were attacked,” Ran said. “You were shot with a tranquilizer dart.”
Isabela touched a sore spot on her neck. “Jesus Christ.”
“A young man—we think he was Garde—took Taylor. Teleported her away somewhere using a Loralite stone.”
Isabela’s mouth dropped open. “No. That doesn’t make any sense.”
“We are trying to decide what to do now,” Ran continued. “To begin with, we are getting rid of the van. That’s why I woke you.”
Isabela rubbed her eyes. “Where are we?”
“Stockton, California.”
“Ugh. Why? If we were attacked, why don’t we go back to the Academy?”
Ran reached past Isabela. From under the driver seat, she grabbed a broken weapon. A crossbow-looking rifle. The shock-collar thing. One of the guns the Peacekeepers had used against the Garde in the Wargames event.
“The people who attacked us had these,” Ran said. “They could be working with the Peacekeepers. We don’t know. Nigel and I do not feel safe going back there. And Caleb and Kopano . . . well. They want to go after Taylor.”
Isabela brushed a hand through her hair. “Where are they?”
“Outside,” Ran said. She nudged a plastic shopping bag in Isabela’s direction. “We got you a change of clothes.”
Isabela looked down at the bright blue bag. The logo said Big Box—a huge chain of American stores that sold supercheap versions of everything from underwear to guns. With great trepidation, she peered at the clothes within. A boring T-shirt and a terrible pair of mom jeans.
“These are awful.”
“They were the best we could do.”
Isabela sniffed. The cute and strappy dress she’d worn for their night out was ruined, smudged with grime and stained with blood. It was just one thing after another. She touched her wrist where, luckily, Simon’s translator bracelet remained secure.
“Let me get changed,” she said.
Ran nodded and turned to exit the van. She paused, half glancing over her shoulder.
“You are using your Legacy all the time,” Ran said.
Isabela frowned. “I haven’t figured out how to do it when I’m sleeping. Obviously.”
“Don’t you get tired?”
Isabela rubbed the scratchy fabric of her new T-shirt between her fingers. “Of course,” she said. “My tolerance is getting better and better, though.”
“It seems . . .” Ran paused. “I am sorry. It seems like it would be difficult.”
“Walking around the way I am, the way I really am . . . that’s harder than any amount of shape-shifting,” Isabela said quietly.
Ran nodded once, opened the door and hopped out of the van.
Isabela exhaled slowly. She’d spent almost a year hiding her true self from her classmates, cultivating the image of the girl she was before the accident. Now, all her hard work had been unraveled.
Not to mention, Taylor, who Isabela begrudgingly had to admit was her closest friend, had been kidnapped by some psychopaths. This, too, was unacceptable. Taylor, who had seen her real face already—who had kept her secret and not judged. Taylor, who should be here now, who would know the right stupid positive thing to say to make Isabela feel better.
Dressed in her ugly Big Box clothes, Isabela emerged from the van. They were parked in a dingy alley behind a shopping center. Ran sat on the bumper of the van. Nigel stood a few feet away, a small bandage on his head and a larger one on his calf. It heartened Isabela to see that he’d been forced to abandon his punk rock attire for a pair of cargo shorts and a too-big Mickey Mouse T-shirt, which he had ripped the sleeves off of. Kopano stood at the end of the alley, keeping watch, his face as dour as she’d ever seen it. Isabela wrinkled her nose; the pungent aroma of warm trash emanated from a nearby Dumpster.
“Couldn’t you have found a less disgusting place to hide out?” she asked.
“That’s funny,” Nigel said. He smiled at her in a way that she’d never seen before. Usually, his smiles were mocking or smug, but this one . . . it was as if he were smiling at a three-legged dog.
The pity. Already they were starting in with the pity. Kopano stared at her hard, like he was trying to see through her disguise, checking for seams. She snapped her fingers at him.
“Stop looking at me like that,” Isabela snapped. “What do you think? That if you cross your eyes you will be able to see my real face? You already saw enough.”
Kopano simply looked away. “Sorry.”
Nigel cleared his thr
oat. “Listen, love, you don’t have to hide yourself from us, we’re your fri—”
Isabela rounded on him. “Hide myself?” She gestured at her body. “You think this is for you? That I do this for your benefit? Pah.” Isabela spit on the ground. “This is how I like to look. It’s my choice.”
Nigel held up his hands. “All right, all right.”
“Did it happen during the invasion?” Ran asked.
Isabela threw her shoulders back and sighed. “This is the only time we will talk about this, okay? After this special bonding moment, you will never comment on my appearance again, unless it is to pay me a much-deserved compliment. Understand?”
They all nodded.
“It happened a month before the invasion,” Isabela said. “I was at a warehouse party. Something caught fire. There were too many people. I was stuck and . . .” She shrugged. “When John Smith called us all to action, I was in a hospital bed, my body wrapped in bandages. I did not care about the invasion or what happened to the world. I only hoped that one of these aliens would come heal me. They did not. But I was given the next-best thing.”
“Fate,” Kopano said quietly. “You got exactly the Legacy you needed.”
“Fate? Luck? Who cares?” Isabela tossed her hair. “Is that enough sharing? Do we not have more important things to worry about?”
“Yes,” Kopano said. He looked down at his feet. It was strange to see the cheery Nigerian brooding. “We must find Taylor.”
Isabela raised an eyebrow, turning to look at Ran. “You said she got kidnapped. Teleported?”
“Yes.”
“They were Harvesters,” Kopano said grimly. “Taylor must have told you about them coming to her farm.”
Isabela nodded. “The whore who shot me didn’t look like some religious nut.”
“We think she came with the tosser who teleported away,” Nigel said. “She created a Loralite stone. Her friend took Taylor, left her behind. Harvesters attacked her. Snatched her up while we was making our escape.”
Isabela put her hands on her hips and looked at Ran. “Why didn’t you just kill them all?”
Ran looked back at her, but said nothing. It was Kopano who grunted, shoving away from his spot on the wall. “We should go find Caleb. He’s been gone too long.”