Forbidden Fire (Forbidden #2) (11 page)

Sharp spikes pierced my mind as I pried my eyes open.

Drake's voice drifted in and out as his hand squeezed mine. "Sam, you okay? What happened, Honey?"

My vision focused. The frown lines on his forehead worked overtime.
What happened? I was standing in the hallway, bumped into Brad, then—

"Oh my God, Drake, someone was in my head!" My body shook from the memory. I scanned the mental energies of everyone in the house, but nothing felt unusual. Aside from a pounding headache, my own mind also felt normal—well, as normal as it ever got.

"What do you mean? Like the way we talk?"

"No, like someone tried to spy on us through me. Felt like they were tearing apart my brain with a knife."

"Are you okay? Is our baby okay?" His blue eyes glistened with spent tears. I'd never seen Drake cry before.

"I think so. My head hurts, but otherwise I feel normal. Help me up?"

He kept a hand on my shoulder. "Shouldn't you rest?"

"I want to make sure my body still works."

He nodded and supported my shoulders as I sat up. The world spun, then settled.

"I'm fine. How long was I out?"

"About two hours," Drake said. "I've been worried sick. Brad wanted to take you to the hospital, but I knew you wouldn't like that. I didn't know what to do, Sam. I've never felt so.... Even when I was powerless, I didn't feel like this."

He leaned in and kissed me. The soft warmth of his lips, the scent of his breath, brought the rest of my body to life. Heat spread through me, but I ignored it. Bad timing.

Our kiss ended abruptly when Brad opened the door. "Sorry. Didn't know you were awake."

Drake pulled back slightly, but wrapped his hands around mine. "It's okay, come in."

Brad closed the door behind him. "You look terrible."

"Gee, thanks. Just what every girl wants to hear."

"So what happened?" Brad sat in a chair in the corner.

"I think I was mind-jacked."

Brad's brow wrinkled in confusion. "Mind-jacked? Is that even a real thing?"

"It is now. Someone hijacked my mind, tried to spy on us from my eyes."

"Shit, man, that is seriously messed up." He leaned forward in the chair, his hands clenching and unclenching. "Are we in danger? Do they know where we are?"

I shifted under my blankets. "I don't think so. I pushed them out before I fainted. They didn't see much, but they might have gotten something from my memory. Depends on how powerful they are. Then again, I don't know the address here, so maybe they can't find us anyway. I just don't know."

"Maybe we should leave," Drake said.

Brad crossed and uncrossed his feet. "Where else could we go at this point? We still need to get our story out and find some help. Bernard is helping me with that. Maybe we should talk to him and see what he thinks."

"See what I think about what?" Bernard stood in the doorway, his face etched with worry lines. "I'm glad to see you conscious again. These boys have been running around like headless chickens. We were all very concerned for you."

Drake helped me sit up again so I could see everyone while I explained what happened to the professor.

"This is concerning," he said. "They have some pretty heavy para-powers on their side if they were able to get into your brain. We'll have to give this more thought. In the meantime, I have some information you might find interesting."

He sat down in a chair opposite Brad and crossed his legs. "I got an email about the hair sample I sent in for testing. You had copious amounts of drugs in your system—a designer drug, actually, that is a blend of several narcotics. The length of your hair showed that the drugs have been in your system for years. Your entire hair follicle had traces of it."

"So that means they've been feeding me drugs for as long as I've had my hair?"

"Basically, yes."

"What drugs?"

"It looks like a blend of opiates, something resembling meth, and something else the lab has never seen. I speculate the effects of this drug would create a slight euphoria, augmenting the organization's ability to use subtle coercion, and perhaps environmental controls, to keep all of you kids happy and unquestioning about your circumstances."

Brad cleared his throat. "So, in plain English, what you're saying is they drugged the kids to keep them happy and complacent, right?"

The professor mock-scowled at Brad. "More or less, yes."

His words relieved a guilt that I didn't realize I'd been carrying. "So I'm not just a gullible idiot for believing them all these years?"

"You were never that, even without the drugs."

"Then why did I believe Drake when he started questioning things about my life?"

"I thought about that, and I suspect it is a combination of the hormones released in your system from the pregnancy and good old-fashioned love. The chemical and emotional connection you and Drake formed likely changed your physiology enough that you were able to think through the drugs. It looks like the vitamins you received every three months were really drugs, and they probably wore off around the time you went into withdrawals."

 "That means all my friends are still getting drugged up." I placed a hand over my belly. "What about the baby? Wouldn't this be bad for the baby too? Drake, we need to link to Lucy and Luke and tell them what's happening. We can't put this off anymore, not even for my health."

He frowned, but didn't argue.
Smart man.

The professor gave a pointed look to Brad and walked out of the room.

Brad jumped up from the chair. "Right, we'll just go work on the blog some more. You two talk to your friends."

He closed the door behind him, leaving Drake and me alone.

Drake brushed stray strands of hair from my forehead. "Are you sure about this? Opening yourself up could give whoever is tracking you more access."

"I hadn't thought of that, but you'll be in there with me. Together we're pretty strong."

"Okay, but if anything goes wrong, we get out and shut down the link. Agreed?"

"Agreed."

We held hands and closed our eyes. The physical contact helped strengthen our focus, making the link more powerful.

The universe expanded and time stood still. Drake and I merged into one thought, one heartbeat, one breath. At this level of connection, direct thoughts were no more necessary than they would be with one's self. Every secret, every hidden corner, every nuance of memory lay open and transparent. This level of intimacy required complete trust—nothing could be held back.

Our collective mind pulled from memory the mental signatures of Luke and Lucy, as distinct as fingerprints, as familiar to me as their voices. We slid in gently; unlike my mind assault on Kylie, this wouldn't hurt them. It merely expanded their capacity to "hear" beyond the range of their ears.

'Sam? Is that you?'
Lucy's mental voice carried her signature enthusiasm for life. I had missed her more than I allowed myself to acknowledge. All my love for her and Luke carried forward in my thoughts as images, emotions, memories.

Just as all their worry and fear crashed into me.

It didn't take as long as Lucy expected to fill Sam and Drake in on the changes at Rent-A-Kid. Rather, the shock on both ends took the most time to process.

Lucy's skin crawled at the thought that the school had force-fed her and Luke and everyone here drugs their whole lives. What kind of long-term damage would their bodies suffer?
And poor Sam, going through detox and withdrawal while pregnant—how awful!
Lucy wished more than anything she could be there for her friend during all this, instead of stuck planning a rebellion.

Luke's mental voice broke through her thoughts.
'So what do we do about this Seeker dude?'

"Drake and I will need to figure out a way to track him. He must be somehow connected to your power problems. Nothing else makes sense at this point. When you go on your assignment, can you figure out a way to email us photos and a layout of the security at the school? Mark off which buildings are off-limits, where the soldiers are stationed, that kind of thing. We'll find a way in as you guys plan a way out. A two-pronged attack on them may be our best bet. Lucy, can you hack into the school and see if you can find anything useful?"

'I can try. Security is pretty tight these days. We'll do our best to get that information to you while we're on assignment. It's going to be risky, but we can't sit around waiting for them to do more experiments on us.'

"I have to go now. My body is still weak, but I'll check back in with you guys as soon as I can. Be safe. I love you both."

'Love you too, Sam. Drake, take care of her.'

'I will,'
Drake said.

They were gone. Lucy's head suddenly felt light after sharing it with three other people. She didn't know how Sam survived it, bumping into every thought someone else had. Lucy would have gone crazy and started slapping people to get them to mentally shut up.

She sat up straighter on the couch in their suite, and reached for a glass of water. "This just gets better and better, doesn't it, Bro?"

Luke stood and paced the room, his brow furrowed in worry. "Still think the Freedom Fighters group is worthless?"

"I don't know. I can't see it working, but it doesn’t look like we can totally count on Sam either. We may have to do something, but I'm not sure the Freedom Fighters are the way to go." The campus loudspeaker buzzed. "Oh, crap. We're late for class. Hurry!"

They grabbed their book bags and raced from the room before the hall monitors could cite them for tardiness.

Outside, a crowd had formed around the center circle, where punishments were handed out for citations. In the past, Higgins handled these issues privately in his office, not as a public display of power like this.

Luke and Lucy paused to see what the commotion was about.

The voice of their new god, Mr. Black, boomed from a megaphone. "Classes have been postponed in order to mete out punishment to a student who felt he was above the rules. Assemble at the circle as witness to his crimes, or suffer your own consequence."

One of the Freedom Fighters stood bound and gagged in the center.

Lucy couldn't remember his name, but recognized him from the meeting. She hoped they hadn't snagged him for rebel-related infractions.

Mr. Black continued. "This boy was caught using his powers in an improper location without permission. Punishment has been set at five lashes to the back."

The crowd gasped. First, no one had ever prevented students from using their para-powers anywhere they liked, as long as they didn't hurt anyone else. Second, the punishments for citations had usually been some kind of manual labor. One girl had been forced to clean a bathroom with a toothbrush when she was caught making out with her boyfriend behind the bleachers, but nothing like this....

Mr. Black set the megaphone down and stood before the crowd with a whip in hand. An evil smile curled up his face.

Silence descended on them as everyone held their breath, waiting to see what would happen next.

He flicked the whip and a scream filled the air around them.

Lucy imagined wild animals made a similar sound when caught in traps.

The entire crowd of students shuddered with each lash. Guys who never showed emotion in public wiped tears from their eyes. Girls sobbed.

Lucy got angry. Really angry. So angry she would have given anything in that moment to have a more proactive power, like fire or telekinesis. A human lie detector was only useful in certain circumstances. Right now, she wanted to hurt them in a more immediate way.

Gary had been right. She might not want the death of students on her conscience, but she couldn't allow this to happen either. Many would fight whether she and Luke helped or not, but maybe with their knowledge and training, more would survive.

It was time for another Freedom Fighters meeting.

***

That night, Lucy stood in front of a different crowd. The brutal punishment, rather than force obedience, had inspired more rebellion. More students than ever had joined the Freedom Fighters. Lucy vetted each one with questions, designed to make sure there were no spies in the ranks, and that each person was prepared for what might come.

Namely, death.

"Has anyone heard how Mike is doing? I can't believe they beat him like that."

A girl, Desirai, raised her hand. "I slipped into his dreams before I came here. He's in a lot of pain but he'll be okay."

Ah yes, a dreamwalker.
Lucy made a note to talk to her soon. They could use someone with her gifts to weaken the enemies for the main assault, and to coordinate plans with Sam and Drake.