Allie's War Season One (70 page)

I nodded, watching the approaching helicopters.

Seconds later, sound came pounding into the alcove where we crouched. At first it came from the helicopters alone, then a whooshing noise ricocheted between buildings, soft at first then deafeningly loud. Revik tensed beside me. I barely recognized the flash of a pair of U.S. fighter jets, right before they fired.

The first missile hit the front helicopter and exploded.

I flinched back, unable to tear my eyes away even through Revik’s shielding arm. I watched as black smoke mushroomed up out of the tilting cockpit. Fire billowed out even as the second one came to its end a breath later.

I watched uncomprehendingly as gravity began to take its toll only a few hundred feet from the roof where we perched.

Rising abruptly to his feet, Revik withdrew towards the small stairwell, motioning the others back towards the access door even as I heard the crash and grind of metal and glass. I still sat there, numb, as the two helicopters completed their falls, smashing down into whatever had the misfortune of lying on the street below.

I could feel the seers inside the cockpits, dying.

I was still standing there when someone grabbed my arm, dragging me towards the open metal door. I didn’t realize until then that they’d all gone inside, that I was out there alone. When I glanced back at Maygar’s face, he only yanked on my arm harder, his eyes and mouth exuding impatience.

With a last look at the sky, I retreated back indoors with the rest of them, even as the jets’ trails flashed by in tandem overhead.

INSIDE THE BARRIER, winds whip, throwing to and fro the lit strands of billions of interconnected beings.

The height of the Pyramid stands over London, bending and crushing living lights as members of the Org, the Brotherhood...the Rooks...dive in and out of buildings, through lights and connections, in and out of military and paramilitary and homeland security agents for three different nations. SCARB ran operations by now, even over the local authorities...and even over the Sweeps, their more bureaucratic counterpart tasked with enforcing the Human Protection Act. Both departments had more seers than humans in their ranks these days, of course, but even the human authorities wanted that fact kept from civilians.

Human beings could be so reactionary, after all.

Above the mass of uniforms, vehicles and weapons, two light bodies stand alone, watching.

One directs no small part of the larger organism.

He does this in the background, using pieces of his mind and light that no longer need to pull from the bulk of his waking consciousness.

The other, standing next to him, is his oldest friend.

She’s shielded,
Xarethe comments.
Likely by Elan’s boy, Maygar. Or those kneelers back in Asia. Maybe even by Dehgoies himself, by now...

You are sure that Dehgoies is here?
Galaith says.

Her only answer is a shrug as she stares out over darting forms.

He is alive, then,
Galaith breathes, unable to hide his relief.
Terian only took him from me. Likely to use him to get what he’s after...

The other seer doesn’t answer.

Both of them watch as drones weave a dense, Barrier structure over the tall, white building, focusing primarily on the top floor. The net will push the Seven out. It will keep any out who might try to help them from the Barrier. They will tackle Dehgoies’s construct, following that. Everything done by the Org is systematic, by the numbers.

It is the reason they are so rarely taken by surprise.

Xarethe asks,
Isn’t it more of a risk, to kill her now? What if she simply returns?
She studies Galaith’s light through the Barrier’s dark.
We could bring her in alive now. Dehgoies, too. If we have her mate, she will have little choice but to cooperate with us. We could use her to bring the war when we’re ready. On our own terms...

Galaith smiles wryly.
You are assuming this war can be controlled. War can rarely be controlled my friend...and a Displacement even less so than most.
His light follows the swarm of drones.
And anyway, the Bridge and Alyson are not precisely the same creature. Beneath her surface personality there exists a drive...a pre-programming, if you will. It is very difficult to persuade such an influence. She is not the Bridge so much as possessed by it.

...
Still,
he shrugs, gazing back out over the cloak woven by his drones.
She was the first choice to fulfill this role. That does mean something.

Xarethe thinks about his words.
Can it be stopped? In your opinion, Protecting Shield...is it able to be restrained?

Galaith nods slowly in return, pensive.
Yes. I think so.

And Dehgoies?

Galaith chuckles.
Ah, Dehgoies. What will we do with him?
The smile turns affectionate.
He deserves partial credit for all of this...
He extends a hand over the cloud of drones.
But Terian was wasting his time. It was not a temporary shield that we put on Dehgoies’s mind when he left...we broke him entirely.

He sighs, exuding pale light in a fountain.

He is purely an invention of the Seven now. More dead than alive...at least in relation to that which he once was. No...
he says almost regretfully.
We have nothing to fear in him, old friend.

Xarethe doesn’t answer.

Peace,
Galaith says.
It requires constant work, yes?
His dark eyes burn like coals.
...I want no more talk of Displacements, or prophesied wars.

And Terian?
she ventures.
He is one of the Four, is he not?

Galaith’s eyes flash as he turns.

He is,
he says, watching her face.
Does that surprise you, old friend?

Somewhat, yes,
she says.
Does he know of it?

Galaith’s light form smiles cryptically.
I believe he is beginning to suspect...

And what will you do with him?
Xarethe persists.
Does it not worry you, that he might start this war, even without your Bridge?

Galaith smiles once more, clasping his light hands at his back. After a pause, he turns, meeting the gaze of the other.

I promised my friend Xarethe that I would not exterminate all of her creations.

His smile grows harder, even as the black eyes turn sharp.

...But Terry,
he says gently.
Your time is up. It is fortunate for me that you are as obvious as you are insane...

The being calling itself Xarethe turns, its glowing eyes suddenly predatory.

Galaith adds,
I hope, at least, you got the explanations you were hoping for, old friend...

A bolt of light strikes from overhead.

Terian sidesteps it, severing his connection to the Pyramid even as he leaves the false imprint of Xarethe behind.

The darkness disappears...

...AND TERIAN JERKED open yellow-gold eyes.

He lay in a cream-colored seat on a private plane, a middle-aged woman with a tennis player’s body. She was on her way to the Hamptons for a week, with husband number two and kids. When she blinked her eyes to clear them, a man appeared over her, holding a gun.

It was not her husband.

“Did you really think he wouldn’t hear what you’d been doing, Terry?” the seer asked.

The woman held up a hand. A diamond wedding ring sparkled from her third finger. “We can talk about this, my brother—”

The infiltrator fired. The skull of the slim woman in the five thousand dollar Chanel suit blew back from an entry point just at the inside of her right eye, decorating the seat’s upholstery with a sickening thump.

She slumped forward in the soft leather seat.

...just as a different man on another continent approached a girl patiently brushing a pony’s dark mane. She looked maybe sixteen, but the expression in her eyes flashed older as the infiltrator approaching her fit a silencer to the end of his pistol. Her long hair caught in a gust of wind as she struggled to mount the small horse. Before she could get her leg over, he fired...

...and now they are aware. All Terians, everywhere. He is on the run, in all his various forms, but Galaith had planned for that, too.

...A man in his twenties bolted down an aisle of slot machines, his eyes wide as he scanned for exits. He’d just about reached the cordoned entrance to the cocktail lounge when a security guard stepped directly behind him, stabbing him in the kidney multiple times with a straight-edged knife. Before he could cry out, the same guard jammed a syringe against his neck and hit a button to depress the stopper.

A crowd gathered as he convulsed on the carpet, but only the guard saw his eyes flash yellow before he expired...

...A businessman in Italy stepped out of his church, looking around frantically for his family’s chauffeured car. He crossed the street with his coat collar raised, lifting a hand for a taxi when unknown persons gunned him down in front of ten witnesses, including the secretary he’d met an hour earlier at a nearby apartment building, and who he’d been banging behind his wife’s back for over three months...

...even as with a jerk and a gasp, the Vice President of the United States, Ethan Wellington, sat up in bed.

For a long moment, he didn’t know what had wakened him, didn’t know what was wrong.

Then, receiving a number of flashes from the Barrier construct he’d erected over the room, he felt in the bed beside him for the body of his wife, feeling a faint rush of panic when he couldn’t find her. Seconds later, he remembered she was out, touring the Southern states on free school lunches, or one of the other social programs he’d asked her to support. As parts of him whispered in the dark, he found himself thankful for her absence.

He threw back the covers, shoved his feet into plush slippers and reached for the drawer where he still kept a small gun, like in that apartment he and Helen shared when they lived together in graduate school.

The door to his bedroom opened.

Ethan tensed, blinking up into the giant eye of a Maglite flashlight.

“Good,” he said, exhaling as he recognized Wes, the lead of his security detail. “Have them bring my car around. There’s been a family emergency, and—”

“Sir,” the agent said. “That won’t be necessary.”

It occurred to Ethan that he’d made a mistake, even as his eyes adjusted enough to see the gun his security chief held beside the long flashlight. Ethan’s mind toyed with regret—that this wasn’t a seer’s body, that he might have acted faster, that he hadn’t remembered to call Helen that night.