I NO LONGER SLEEP WITHOUT NIGHTMARES. Every night I’m stricken by Sarah’s face, there for only a second before it’s swallowed by darkness, followed by her calling out for help. No matter how furiously I search, she’s nowhere to be found. She keeps calling, a scared voice, bleak and alone, but I can never find her.
And then there’s Henri, his body twisted and smoking as he looks at me, knowing our end together has finally come. It’s never fear I see in his eyes, or regret, or sadness, but rather pride, relief, and love. He seems to tell me to go on, to fight, to win. Then, right at the end, his eyes widen in a plea for more time. “Coming here, to Paradise, it wasn’t by chance,” he says again, and I still have no idea what he means. Then, “I wouldn’t have missed a second of it, kiddo. Not for all of Lorien. Not for the whole damn world.” This is my curse, that every time I dream of Henri I’m forced to watch him die. Over and over again.
I see Lorien, the days before the war, the jungles and oceans I’ve dreamed of a hundred times. Myself as a kid, running wild through the tall grass while those around me smile and laugh, unaware of the horrors to come. Then I see the war, the destruction, the killing, and the blood. Sometimes, on nights like tonight, I have distinct visions of what I believe is the future.
My eyes aren’t closed for long before I’m whisked away. And even as it begins, I feel myself entering a landscape I know I’ve never seen before, but still find familiar.
I run down a pathway lined with litter and debris. Broken glass. Burned plastic. Twisted, rusted steel. Acrid mist fills my nose and causes my eyes to water. Decaying buildings stand tall against the gray sky. A dark, stagnant river lurks to my right. There’s commotion up ahead. The sounds of yelling and metallic clattering swell in the thick air. I come to an angry mob surrounding a tarmac where a large airship prepares for takeoff. I go through a barbed-wire gate and enter the airstrip fenced off from the crowd.
The tarmac is marked with small rivulets the color of magma. Mogadorian soldiers keep the crowd at bay while swarms of scouts ready the ship, an onyx orb hovering in midair.
The crowd roars against the fence as soldiers knock them back. They’re smaller than the soldiers, but have the same ashy skin tone. A low rumble grows from somewhere beyond the ship. The crowd hushes, taking panicked steps backwards, while those on the tarmac file into orderly lines.
Then something drops from the hazy sky. A dark vortex absorbs the surrounding clouds, leaving a thick, black discharge in its wake. I cover my ears before the object crashes to the ground, shooting vibrations through the soil that nearly knock me off my feet. Everything falls silent as the dust clears, revealing a perfectly spherical ship, milky white like a pearl. A round door slides open, and a monstrous creature steps out. The same creature that tried to behead me in the rock castle.
A brawl breaks out along the fence, with everyone scrambling to get away from this monster. He’s even more enormous than I remember, with muscular, chiseled features and short, cropped hair. Tattoos crawl up his arms, scars are branded into his ankles, the largest of which stands out on his neck, grotesque and purple. A soldier retrieves a golden cane from the ship, its head curved like a hammer, a black eye painted on its side. When the creature holds it in his hand, the eye comes alive, rolling left and then right, taking in its surroundings, until it finds me.
The Mogadorian scans the crowd, sensing me nearby. His eyes narrow. He takes a giant step towards me, lifting the golden cane. Its eye pulses.
Just then an onlooker shouts at the Mogadorian, furiously rattling the fence. The Mogadorian turns towards the protester, thrusting the rod in his direction. The rod’s eye glows red and the man is instantly ripped to shreds, torn through the barbed-wired fence. Pandemonium erupts as everyone fights to get away.
The Mogadorian returns his attention to me, pointing the rod at my head. I’m hit with the sensation of falling. Weightlessness rises in my gut until I’m on the brink of vomiting. What I see around his neck is so disturbing, so haunting, that I’m jolted awake as though struck by a bolt of blue lightning.
Early dawn breaks through the windows, bathing the small room in the hard morning light. The shapes of things return. I’m sweat covered and out of breath. And yet I’m here, the ache and confusion in my heart telling me I’m still alive, no longer in a dreadful place where a man can be ripped through the small holes of a barbed-wired fence.
We found an abandoned house bordering a conservation area a few miles from Lake George. The kind of house Henri would have loved: isolated, small and quiet, offering security without any personality. It’s one story, the exterior painted lime green while the interior is various shades of beige, with brown carpeting. We couldn’t be luckier that the water hasn’t been turned off. By the heavy dust in the air, I can only assume it’s been a while since anyone lived here.
I roll to my side and glance at the phone beside my head. Having seen what I just did, the only thing that could take it all away is Sarah. I remember the time in my room when she’d just returned from Colorado—the way we’d held one another. If I’m allowed to save a single moment with her then I choose that one. I close my eyes and imagine what she’s doing at this very moment, what she’s wearing, who she’s talking to. The news reported that each of the six school districts surrounding Paradise absorbed a portion of the displaced students until a new building is built. I wonder which of them Sarah’s attending, if she’s still taking photographs.
I reach for my cell phone, the one prepaid and registered under the name Julius Seazar. Henri’s sense of humor. I turn it on for the first time in days. All I have to do is dial her number to hear her voice. It’s that simple. I press the familiar numbers one by one until reaching the last. I close my eyes, take a deep breath, then turn the phone off and flip it shut. I know I can’t punch the tenth number. Fear for Sarah’s safety, for her life—and all of ours, too—stops me.
Out in the living room, Sam streams CNN with one of Henri’s laptops on his thighs. Luckily Henri’s wireless internet card, under whatever pseudonym he chose at the time, still works. Sam furiously scribbles notes on a legal pad. It’s been three days since the mess in Tennessee, and we only arrived in Florida last night, having hopped aboard three different semis—one of which carried us two hundred miles in the wrong direction—before jumping a train that brought us here. Without the use of our Legacies—our speed, Six’s invisibility— we would have never made it. It’s our intent to lie low for a bit and let the news dissipate. We’ll regroup, start training, and avoid any further mishaps like the one involving the helicopters at all costs. First order of business, find a new car. Second order of business, figure out what to do next. None of us really knows for sure. Again, I feel the enormity of Henri’s absence.
“Where’s Six?” I ask, stumbling into the living room.
“Out back swimming laps or something,” Sam replies. The one cool thing about the house is the pool in the backyard, which Six immediately filled by directing a heavy rainstorm overhead.
“I’d think you’d want to catch a glimpse of Six in her bathing suit.” I nudge Sam.
His face reddens. “Shut up, dude. I wanted to check the news. You know, be productive.”
“Anything?”
“Aside from now being considered an accomplice and having the reward for me increased to a half million dollars?” Sam asks.
“Oh come on, you know you love it.”
“Yeah, it’s pretty cool,” he says, grinning. “Anyway, no, nothing new. I don’t see how Henri kept up with all this. There’re literally thousands of stories every day.”
“Henri never slept.”
“Don’t you want to go check out Six in her bathing suit?” Sam asks, turning back to the screen. I’m surprised by the lack of sarcasm in his voice. He knows how I feel about Sarah. And I know how he feels about Six.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I see the way you look at her,” Sam says. He clicks on a link about a plane crash in Kenya. One survivor.
“And how do I look at her, Sam?”
“Never mind.” The survivor is an old woman. Definitely not one of us.
“The Loric fall in love for life, man. And I love Sarah. You know that.”
Sam looks over the screen of the laptop. “I know you do. It’s just that, I don’t know. You’re the kind of guy she’d go for, not some math nerd obsessed with aliens and outer space. I just don’t see how Six could fall for someone like me.”
“You kick ass, Sam. And don’t forget it.”
I walk out the rear sliding glass door leading to the pool. Beyond the pool lies an overgrown yard enclosed by a brick wall offering privacy from anyone who might wander by. The nearest neighbor is a quarter mile away. The nearest town is a ten-minute drive.
Six zips across the water, skimming the top like some water-borne insect, and beside her, going twice as fast, is a platypus-shaped mammal with long white hair and a beard—I have no idea what animal Bernie Kosar’s copying. Six senses me and stops at the edge, pulling herself halfway out of the water and resting her arms on the deck. Bernie Kosar jumps out and returns to his beagle form, shaking himself dry and covering me with water. It’s refreshing, and I can’t help but think how nice it is to be down South again.
“You better not be killing my dog out here,” I say. I catch myself staring at her perfect shoulders, her slender neck. Maybe Sam is right. Maybe I am looking at Six the same way he does. I want more than ever to run back inside, turn on my phone, and hear Sarah’s voice.
“More like he’s killing me. The little guy swims like he’s totally healed. Speaking of which, how’s your head?”
“Still hurts,” I say, running a hand over it. “But nothing I can’t handle. I’m ready to start training today, if that’s why you’re asking.”
“Good,” she says. “I’m getting antsy. It’s been a long time since I’ve trained with somebody.”
“You’re sure you want to train with me? You know you’ll probably end up hurt, right?”
She laughs, and then spits a mouthful of water at me. “Oh, it’s on,” I say, visualizing the surface of the pool and forcing a blast of air over it. Water rushes towards her face. She dives beneath the surface to keep from being splashed, and when she comes up she rides the crest of a huge wave that nearly empties the pool, bringing her towards me. Before I can react she moves away, but the wave keeps coming, knocking me over and sending me crashing into the back of the house. I hear her laughing. The water recedes to the pool, and I stand and try pushing her backwards into it. She deflects my telekinesis, and all at once I’m upended and sailing through the air upside down where I flail helplessly.
“What the hell are you guys doing out here?” Sam asks. He’s standing at the sliding glass door.
“Um. Six was talking smack, so I decided to put her in her place. Can’t you tell?”
I remain upside down, hovering four feet over the pool’s center. I can feel Six’s grip around my right ankle, and the sensation is the same as if she were literally holding me up with one hand.
“Oh, totally. Got her right where you want her,” Sam replies.
“I was about to make my move, you know. Biding my time.”
“So what do you think, Sam?” Six asks. “Should I let him have it?”
A smile breaks across Sam’s face. “Take it away.”
“Hey!” I say just before she lets go and I fall headfirst into the water. When I resurface, Six and Sam are laughing hysterically.
“That was only round one,” I say, climbing out. I peel off my shirt and slap it to the concrete. “You caught me off guard. Just wait.”
“What happened to being tough and rugged?” Sam asks. “Isn’t that what you said when you buzzed your head?”
“Strategy,” I say. “I’m just giving Six a false sense of security, then when she gets comfortable I’m going to pull the rug out from under her.”
“Ha! Yeah, right,” Sam says, then adds, “God, I wish I had Legacies.”
Six stands between us in her solid black one-piece bathing suit. She’s still laughing, and water runs down her arms and legs as she leans slightly forward and twists her hair to ring it out. The scar on her leg is still discolored, but it isn’t nearly as purple as it was the week before. She whips her hair back over her head. Sam and I are both mesmerized.
“So, training this afternoon then?” Six asks. “Or do you still feel like I might get hurt?”
I puff my cheeks and release the air slowly. “Maybe I’ll take it easy on you. I mean, that scar on your leg still looks kinda nasty. But, yeah, we’re on.”
“Sam, is that a yes for you, too?”
“You guys want me to train? Seriously?”
“Of course. You’re one of us now,” Six says.
He nods, rubbing his hands together. “I’m in,” he says, grinning like a kid on Christmas morning. “But if you just want me for target practice, I’m going home.”
We start at two o’clock, but by the look of the gloomy sky I don’t anticipate training for very long. Sam bounces on the balls of his feet, wearing gym shorts and an oversized tee. He’s all knees and elbows, but if heart and determination could be counted, I think he’d be nearly the size of the Mogadorian I’d seen aboard the ship.
To start, Six shows us what she’s learned of combat techniques, which is far more than I know. Her body moves fluidly and with the precision of a machine when she throws a kick or punch, or when she does a back flip to evade an attack. She shows us how to counterassault and the merits of skill and coordination, and drills the same maneuvers until they come instinctively. Sam eats it up, even when Six pounds him backwards and he flips head over heels or has the wind knocked out of him. She does the same to me, and even though I try laughing it off like I’m playing around, I work my hardest and she still kicks the crap out of me. I can’t fathom how she learned all this on her own. After my mouth is filled with grass and dirt for the second time, I realize just how much she can teach me.
The rain begins a half hour later. A light drizzle at first, but soon the skies open, sending us indoors for cover. Sam paces through the house throwing kicks and punches at phantom enemies. I sit in the chair, my fist around my blue pendant, and stare out the front window for a very long time, simply watching it all happen while remembering that the last two storms I saw both raged because Six told them to.
When I turn back I see that she’s sound asleep in the corner of the living room, curled around Bernie Kosar, holding him in her arms like a pillow. It’s how she always sleeps, wrapping herself into a ball on her side, her features losing their sharp edges.
The white bottoms of her feet are aimed right at me, and I use telekinesis to lightly tickle the bottom of her right foot. She twitches it as though shooing a pesky fly. I tickle her again. She twitches her foot a little harder. I wait a few seconds and then, as softly as I can, I tickle the length of her foot, from her heel up to her big toe. Six pulls her foot back and kicks her leg straight out, the telekinetic force of which sends me flying into the nearest wall, leaving a hole revealing the interior wires and studs. Sam charges into the room and jumps into the perfect fighting position.
“What happened? Who’s here?” he yells.
I stand, rubbing my elbow, which took the brunt of the hit.
“Jerk,” Six says, sitting up.
Sam looks from me to her.
“You guys are ridiculous,” he says, retreating back to the kitchen. “Your flirting just scared the hell out of me.”
“Scared the hell out of me, too,” I say, ignoring the flirting comment; but he’s already gone and doesn’t hear it. Am I flirting? Would Sarah think that was flirting?
Six yawns, raising her arms to the ceiling. “Still raining?”
“Totally, but look on the bright side; the weather saved you from any further bruises.”
She shakes her head. “The tough-guy routine is pretty tired, Johnny. And don’t forget what I can do with the weather.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” I say. I try to change the subject. I hate myself for flirting with another girl. “Hey, I’ve been meaning to ask you: who’s the face in the clouds? Every time you whip up a storm I see this crazy, ominous face.”
She scratches the bottom of her right foot. “I’m not sure, but ever since I’ve been able to mess with the weather, it’s always the same face that appears. I assume it’s Loric.”
“Yeah, probably. And here I thought it might be a crazy ex-boyfriend you’ve yet to get over.”
“Because obviously I have a weakness for ninety-year-old men. You know me so well, John.”
I shrug. Both of us smile.
That night I cook dinner on a rusty but serviceable grill left on the back patio. Or try to cook, I guess. Since I took home economics with Sarah in Paradise, I’m the only one who knows how to make anything remotely resembling a meal. Tonight: chicken breasts, potatoes, and a frozen pepperoni pizza.
We’re sitting on the living-room carpet in a triangle. Under the blanket Six has draped over her head and body, she wears a black tank top, and her pendant hangs in full view. The sight of it returns my mind to the vision I had. I long for a normal dinner around a table and a normal night’s sleep where I’m not tortured by my Loric past. Was that what it was like on Lorien before we left?
“Do you think about your parents a lot?” I ask Six. “Back on Lorien, I mean?”
“Not that much anymore. I can’t even tell you what they look like, really. I remember how it felt being near them, though, if that makes any sense. I think about that feeling quite a bit, I guess. What about you?”
I pick at a burned slice of pizza. I resolve never to cook frozen pizza on the grill again. “I see them a lot in my dreams. Which is really great, but at the same time it tears me up inside. Reminds me that they’re dead.”
The blanket slides off the top of Six’s head and rests on her shoulders. “What about you, Sam? Do you miss your parents right now?”
Sam opens his mouth and closes it. I can tell he’s considering telling Six that he thinks his dad was taken by aliens, abducted when he went out for milk and bread. Finally he says, “I miss them both, my mom and dad, but I know that I’m better off here with you guys. Considering what I know about everything, I don’t think I could be at home.”
“You know too much,” I say. I feel guilty he’s eating my terrible meal on the floor of an abandoned house instead of feasting on his mother’s food at a dining-room table.
“Sam, I’m sorry you got caught up in this with us,” Six says. “But it’s nice that you’re here.”
He blushes. “I don’t know what it is, but I feel a weird connection to the whole situation. Can I ask you something? How far away is Mogadore from Earth?”
I think back to when Henri blew on the seven glass orbs, how they came to life. Soon we were looking at a floating replica of our solar system. “It’s a lot closer than Lorien is, why?”
Sam stands. “How long would it take to get there?”
“A few months maybe,” Six says. “Depends on what type of ship you’re flying and what type of energy it uses.”
Walking in circles, Sam says, “I think the U.S. government has to have a ship built somewhere that can handle that distance. I’m sure it’s a prototype and top secret and hidden under a mountain that’s hidden under another mountain, but I was just thinking about what would happen if we couldn’t find your ship and needed to take the fight to them—go to Mogadore. We have to have a Plan B, right?”
“Sure. What’s Plan A again?” I ask, biting my tongue. I can’t fathom fighting the whole planet of Mogadore on their own turf.
“Getting my Chest,” Six says. She pulls the blanket back over her head.
“And then what?”
“Training?”
“And then what?” I ask.
“We go find the others, I guess.”
“It just sounds like a bunch of running and not much of anything else. I think Henri or Katarina would have us doing something more productive somehow. Like studying how to kill certain enemies. Do you know what a piken is?”
“Those are those huge beasts that destroyed the school,” Six says.
“What about a kraul?”
“Those are the smaller animal things that attacked us in the gymnasium,” she answers. “Why?”
“In the dream that I had in North Carolina, when you and Sam heard me speaking Mogadorian, those two names were mentioned, but I’d never heard of them before. Henri and I simply called them ‘the beasts.’” I pause. “I had another dream earlier.”
“Maybe you aren’t having dreams,” she says. “Maybe you’re having visions again.”
I nod. “It’s hard to tell the difference at this point. I mean, these dreams felt the same as the visions I had of Lorien, but I wasn’t on Lorien during these two,” I say. “Henri once said that when I have visions it’s because they hold some sort of personal significance to me. And that’s always been true—the past visions were always of things that had already happened. But I think what I witnessed in my dream this morning . . . I don’t know. It’s like I was seeing it as it was actually happening.”
“Wicked,” Sam says. “You’re like a TV.”
Six crumples her paper towel and tosses it up in the air above her head. Without thinking I set it on fire, and it wilts into nothing before landing on the carpet. Then Six says, “It’s not impossible, John. Some of the Loric have been known to do it. That’s what Katarina said, anyway.”
“But the thing is, I think I was on Mogadore, which, by the way, is just as disgusting as I imagined it would be. The air was so thick it made my eyes water. Everything was desolate and gray. But, how did I get there? And how could this one huge dude on Mogadore seem to sense when I was there?”
“How huge?” Sam asks.
“Huge, like more than double the size of the soldiers I saw, twenty feet tall, maybe more, far more intelligent and powerful. I can tell just by looking at him. He was definitely a leader of some sort. I’ve seen him twice now. The first time I was overhearing information relayed to him by some little peon, and it was all about us and what had happened at the school. This second time I saw him as he was preparing to board a ship; but before he was on it, one of the others ran up and handed him something. I didn’t know what it was at first, but just before the ship’s door closed, he turned towards me to make sure I could see exactly what it was.”
“What was it?” Sam asks.
I shake my head, ball up my paper towel, and burn it on the palm of my hand. I look out the back door at the setting sun, a blaze of orange and hot pink like the Florida sunsets Henri and I watched from our elevated porch. I wish he was still here to help make sense of all this now.
“John? What was it? What did he have?” Six asks.
I lift my hand and grab my pendant.
“This. These. He had pendants. Three of them. The Mogadorians must have taken them after each kill. And this massive leader guy, or whoever he is, he put them around his neck like Olympic medals, and then he stood there just long enough so I could see. Each one was glowing bright blue, and when I woke up, mine was too.”
“So are you saying it’s a premonition, like you just saw your fate? Or could you have just had a weird dream because of how stressed out you are?” Sam asks.
I shake my head. “I think Six is right and these are all visions. And I think they’re all happening right now. But the thing that scares me the most is that when that guy got on that ship, there’s a good chance he was headed this way. And, if Six is right about how fast a ship can travel, it won’t be very long until he’s here.”