“You worked for the Cabal? When?”
“Not recently,” Lee said. “I helped overthrow a couple emperors during the Roman Empire. Second time around, they didn’t pay me, so I killed the guy they were trying to get in, and took power myself.”
Haley looked up at me. Her expression probably meant, “Is he serious?”
Continue reading Counterattack: Part 3
Haley and I listened until they finished the meeting, but they didn’t have any more bombshells. Not that anything could trump the bit where Russell Hardwick had scanned the relevant bits of Red Lightning’s version of the working Impregnator plans and was handing them out to his people.
Probably at that point, people more competent than we were would have tracked down the engineers Hardwick had assigned the job, deleted their files, recovered the original journal, and scared them away from even trying to reconstruct them.
Continue reading Dupes: Part 5
In my mind, I tried to get Daniel’s attention, and succeeded.
+++
Me: Don’t tell him about the Impregnator. Pass it on.
Daniel: Got it.
+++
He did, and everyone looked at me.
Continue reading Decisions: Part 11
Marcus started to show Cassie the clips, but once he started Jaclyn showed up, and then as he backed up to find the start for her, Daniel stepped out of the elevator.
We decided at that point that we were better off waiting for everybody.
Continue reading Decisions: Part 10
“Here’s a thought,” Daniel said. “Does anybody want to nominate anybody else?”
“Looking for a nomination?” Vaughn asked.
Daniel shook his head. “No. I’m willing to do communications, but keeping track of what people are doing, using prescience to sense future attacks, blocking them with telekinesis, attacking people, passing messages, and coming up with plans all at the same time sounds overwhelming. For me, just being in a crowd can be bad.”
“I think Nick could do a good job,” Haley said.
Continue reading Decisions: Part 4
Daniel and I spent the rest of the night playing video games on the big screen. Even if the novelty had long since worn off, it beat the TV my family had at home by a long shot.
It felt good.
After a week that included being chased, attacked in my own bed, and ending a second prom night in violence, Guitar Hero and Tony Hawk seemed like a simple, relaxing way to finish off the week. It was made more relaxing by sending Isaac Lim an email about the original Power’s death instead of calling him.
It couldn’t last.
Continue reading Decisions: Part 3
Unsurprisingly, I didn’t sleep very well after that.
I dragged myself through the next day, almost falling asleep in study hall, barely staying awake during lectures. When it ended, I could at least console myself with the fact that it was Friday and I didn’t have any other demands on my life — probably.
Something did nag at my mind though. I thought I might have forgotten something. I just hoped it wasn’t important.
Continue reading Rivalry: Part 11
I spent the rest of the night doing homework, and I was at it till eleven o’clock.
After I stuffed my books back in my backpack, I sat at my desk, staring at the screen of my laptop. It sucked. I didn’t have time to do much more than go to bed. Cassie could probably stay up for days with no effect, but if I didn’t start sleeping soon, I’d sleep in class.
I might be able to get away with reading a few chapters of a book — provided I didn’t get involved enough to finish it. Then I might find myself going to bed at four in the morning.
I considered opening up the laptop again. Haley or Daniel might be online.
Continue reading Rivalry: Part 10
“You bet. We’ll pass on whatever shows up,” Vaughn said. “Right, guys?” He looked over the rest of us.
I thought about replying. It seemed like a good idea, but maybe not immediately. I had time. Then I thought about it a little more.
+++
Me: We might be a little too calm.
Daniel: Crap. I was concentrating too hard on resisting him. You’re right.
+++
Continue reading Rivalry: Part 9
When we got back to the jet, I pulled the alert’s GPS data up, and headed toward downtown Grand Lake.
We flew westward through the sky, toward the sun as it moved lower, beginning to dip into Lake Michigan.
I gave them the short version of what Cannon had said as we flew home, but we didn’t get to really discuss it. Including the time it took to start the jet, it took ten minutes to get there.
We were too late, but in the best possible way.
Continue reading Rivalry: Part 8