Infinity Reborn (The Infinity Trilogy Book 3) (24 page)

Infinity has sunk into the floor up to her thighs when it freezes solid again, trapping her legs in a vise grip, as Nanny Theresa turns to look at Genevieve. “Victim? Perhaps you’re forgetting about how many people she has callously murdered in the name of the United Alliance. They were victims! She is a murderer!”

“They used her!” pleads my mother. “They all manipulated her and forced her to kill!”

I can feel the power surging through Infinity’s arms as she pushes against the floor with her clenched fists in a desperate attempt to get free, but there’s no use. It’s like she’s encased in concrete.

“I have seen the files of her many assassinations, Genevieve,” says Nanny Theresa. “She enjoys the violence. And I must admit, today I’ve discovered that the sensation of power it provides can be quite invigorating.”

Nanny Theresa waves her hand again, and suddenly a thick, blunt-ended column of glossy black erupts from the floor in front of Infinity and brutally slams into her jaw like a pillar of stone. The view from her eyes jolts violently from the vicious, jarring blow, and I can hear the crunch of bone breaking as the void rings and echoes with loud tones of damage. The real pain comes next, buffeting through the darkness in wave after wave. I scream out as I feel the agony surge and writhe all around me. The black column slowly retracts into the floor, and Infinity groans feebly.

“Stop! Please!” my mother screams.

“The reports of your missions are very clear,” Nanny Theresa says as she looks down at Infinity. “You enjoy killing. But did you ever once stop to think about the pain you caused? It pales in comparison . . . to this!”

The black column bursts forth again, slamming into the side of Infinity’s head like a battering ram. Infinity’s skull cracks, and I scream out in pain again as her view begins to flicker and darken.
“No! Not again! Infinity! Stay awake!”

I screw my eyes shut, and I pour my influence into her injuries. They begin to heal, but I’m too late to keep her responsive. I feel her consciousness drifting past me, floating away into the deep dark beyond.

“Nighty night, child,” Nanny Theresa says as Infinity’s view goes pitch-black and her head drops forward and her whole body goes limp. She’s out cold.

Infinity is strong, but she isn’t invincible, and Nanny Theresa’s sadistic punishment has proven too much for her to withstand. I don’t know what I can do to get us out of this situation, but I can’t just sit here in the void and allow us to die.

I quickly reach out into the darkness. My hands and feet expand, filling our limbs. I can feel the cold of the floor pressed against my thighs and the dull throbbing ache as the fractured bones knitting together in Infinity’s skull become mine again.

“Wait,” I murmur painfully with my half-healed jaw as I hold my open palms up in surrender.

“So resilient,” Nanny Theresa says as she walks toward me and frowns down. “So difficult to kill. I can see why the military were so eager to have you.”

I look up at her as she raises her blade arm to finish me.

“No!” my mother screams.

I hold my hand up and yell the word this time. “Wait!” I slowly lower my hand, raise my head high, and look Nanny Theresa square in the eyes. She meets my gaze, and her brow furrows.

“Accepting your fate?” she asks. “Is this a shred of dignity I see in your final moment? Perhaps I should allow a few last words from the condemned?”

I nod.

“Out with it then. This should be good,” she says with a sarcastic smile.

I take a deep breath as I prepare to deliver what will almost certainly be my final blow.

“Nanny?” I whisper gently.

Her eyes narrow in preparation for whatever defiant insult I’m surely going to fling at her. That’s what Infinity would do. But my last arrow aims for her heart. If there’s anything left of it.

“Are you really going to kill your only granddaughter?” I whimper as I force a tear from the corner of my eye.

Nanny Theresa’s face slowly twists into a ferocious snarl. I can’t punch her in the face from here, but I’ve definitely hit a nerve, and it shows as she thrusts her blade arm toward my face. “You are not my granddaughter!”

“Yes, she is!” my mother screams as she crawls toward Nanny Theresa. “She has your son’s blood in her veins; he was a good man once, and that part of him still exists inside her. She’s the only family you have left, Theresa.”

“If she is allowed to exist, everyone will suffer,” Nanny Theresa growls.

“That is not her fault,” my mother says as she crawls to a stop at Nanny’s Theresa’s feet. “She didn’t choose her destiny. Richard chose it for her.”

“Infinity must be destroyed, Genevieve. You know what will happen if Project Infinity is initiated.”

“Richard’s plans for her don’t have to be fulfilled,” my mother pleads. “Project Infinity can be stopped without sacrificing my daughter.
Your
granddaughter doesn’t have to die because your son lost his mind.”

“Richard’s obsession with her is what sent him into madness,” seethes Nanny Theresa as she glares at Infinity. “Every breath she breathes is a reminder of everything I have lost.”

“No,” my mother replies. “Richard’s mind was twisting into madness long before she was born. I chose to ignore the signs because I loved and admired him so much. I know you saw it, too, Theresa, and you turned a blind eye, just like I did, like we all did. That blindness cost you your life . . . and it cost my father his life as well.” My mother looks sadly over at Dr. Pierce.

Nanny Theresa glances at Dr. Pierce’s body, and I see her face slowly soften with regret. But the moment is fleeting. As she looks back at me, her fearsome glower instantly returns. She jabs the blade toward me. “No! None of that matters now! If she’s allowed to live, there’s nowhere she can run where Richard won’t find her. He’ll track her down, and the suffering unleashed on humanity will be immeasurable!”

“Enough people have suffered already, Theresa,” implores my mother. “Richard must be stopped, and Infinity is the only one who can do it. She has to destroy this place, and destroy all the research Richard kept at Blackstone Manor. But most of all, Richard has to die, Theresa, because as long as he’s alive, he’ll try to do this all over again.”

“What . . . what are you talking about?” I ask.

Nanny Theresa doesn’t answer; she just stares at me in furious confusion.

“She’s the only one who can end this, Theresa,” my mother pleads. “Deep down, you know what I’m saying is true.”

As Nanny Theresa glares down at me, I can almost see the conflict boiling behind her eyes. But then her glower softens ever so slightly, and she looks at the floor with an expression of bitter resignation. Nanny Theresa slowly lowers the blade, and it morphs back into a normal arm. With a reticent sigh, she languidly waves her hand through the air. Suddenly the glossy black barrier hisses and slides back down into the floor, and I slowly rise from my imprisonment and stumble to my feet.

“Hello? Is it safe to come in?” Percy’s voice says from the breach.

“Yes, everything’s OK, I think,” I say as I warily eye Nanny Theresa. Percy gingerly appears in the gap. I could only see his face through the hole in the barrier before, but now I can see that he’s dressed in a strange, full-body plastic yellow suit of some kind. “Just give us a minute,” I say to him, and Percy nods and backs out through the breach as I turn to Nanny Theresa.

“I’m . . . I’m glad you’re not going to kill me anymore, but is anyone going to tell me what this is all about? What is Project Infinity?”

“You need to go,” says Nanny Theresa.

“Go where?” I ask. “What’s happening here? Can someone just give me one straight answer?!”

“Do what your mother said,” says Nanny Theresa. “Destroy this facility, burn it all. Wipe it off the face of the earth, and my poor, deluded son along with it.”

“Ohhh-kaaay . . . clearly you’re not in a mood to share.”

“Please, sweetheart,” says my mother. “All you need to know right now is that your father intends to use you to release a global pandemic that will kill millions of people. Your unique mind and physiology are the final pieces he needs to complete his plan. You have to stop him. You have to destroy this place, please, for all our sakes.”

“I don’t understand. Why would he do that? Why would he feed and clothe the population of the planet only to kill them?”

“He has his own deluded reasons,” says Nanny Theresa. “Just know that the threat is very real, the entire human race is in critical danger, and the task has fallen to you to stop him.”

I look from my mother to Nanny Theresa and back again. “You’re not joking, are you?”

“No, I’m afraid not,” says my mother. “Theresa discovered Richard’s true intentions two years ago. She revealed Richard’s plans to the board members of Blackstone Technologies, and they unanimously agreed that she should replace him as CEO. If that had happened, Project Infinity would have been stopped immediately, so Richard instructed Major Brogan to . . . dispose of her.”

“Jonah killed you?” I ask, glaring in disbelief at Nanny Theresa. She confirms it with a stern nod.

“Poison. Smeared inside my gardening gloves,” Nanny Theresa replies. “I may be dead, but to this day the sight of yellow roses makes me nauseous, and the slightest mention of Major Brogan makes me murderous.”

“Richard wanted Theresa out of the way to preserve his plans, but that’s not why Jonah did it,” says my mother. “Jonah was afraid of what Theresa would do to
you
once she was in power. He knew it was wrong to murder her, but he did it to protect you, Finn. He did it because he loves you very much and he couldn’t bear the thought of losing you.”

“Major Brogan was made a figurehead CEO in my place,” says Nanny Theresa. “Richard had the board members picked off one by one, and I was left to die.”

“Yes,” says my mother. “But before Theresa died, she was able to transfer her mind into the computer in a further attempt to stop Richard, but he managed to imprison her deep inside the mainframe. When your friend Bettina hacked into Onix, the whole system fractured. Theresa was able to escape, and when she saw that you were here, she took it upon herself to kill you and end Project Infinity once and for all.”

I just stand in silence, doing my best to take this all in. “That’s why you’ve been trying to kill me?”

“Yes,” says Nanny Theresa.

“But why did you have to kill so many of my classmates, too?” I ask, glaring up at her accusingly.

“They were merely collateral damage,” Nanny Theresa says coldly. “A few dead to save billions of lives? It was a simple choice, and if Genevieve hadn’t talked me out of it, you’d be dead by now, too.”

“But Project Infinity wouldn’t,” says my mother. “Even if Theresa killed you, Richard would only try again. I had no idea of the depths Richard would go to until today, when his most classified files began leaking through the cracks and I was able to see them for myself.”

“Destroy . . . everything,” says Nanny Theresa.

“OK, OK, I believe you, and I’ll do what you say,” I mutter. “I’ll destroy everything if that’s what it will take to stop this from happening, but how exactly do I do that? I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but this place is huge.”

“We will use the Swords,” Nanny Theresa replies.

“Um . . . no offense, Granny Theresa, but I don’t think a couple of swords will cut it.”

“Firstly, never call me that ever again,” Nanny Theresa says, eyeing me with her familiar disdain. “And secondly, yes, they will. The Swords of Damocles are a series of thirty-meter-long tungsten rods attached to a low Earth-orbit satellite. Once a target is chosen and a rod is released, the Earth’s gravity will bring it plummeting down from the stratosphere at a tremendous velocity. A single Sword of Damocles will impact the ground with the force of a low-level nuclear weapon. I suggest we use three.”

“OK, wow,” I say, trying to wrap my head around what they’re asking me to do. “I think that should do it.”

“Of course it will,” says Nanny Theresa. “And there are many hurdles to overcome if we are to gain access to the part of the mainframe that will enable us to control the Swords. Your little school friend with the glasses has her work cut out for her.”

“What do you mean?”

“The girl named Bettina was planning to reset the main computer. At least that was the information I garnered from her before you all so rudely attempted to sneak her out from under my nose. Is that information correct?”

“Yeah, that’s what we’ve been trying to do.”

“Well,” says Nanny Theresa. “When Graham informed me of his need to repair Onix and reset the mainframe to initiate the final stages of Project Infinity, of course I was vehemently opposed to it. But now I’m afraid we must allow your friend to do exactly what she intended to do and repair the damage that she has done. It’s the only way to ensure that every last scrap of Project Infinity is destroyed. Correction,” Nanny Theresa says, narrowing her eyes at me. “
Almost
every scrap.”

“Theresa, please, that’s enough,” says my mother.

Nanny Theresa rolls her eyes and clears her throat with a gruff harrumph.

“What about the genetic lock?” Bit’s voice issues meekly from the breach.

“Excuse me?” Nanny Theresa says, looking toward the gap in the dome wall.

Bit gingerly appears from the breach, with Brody following right behind her. Her arm is in a makeshift sling fashioned from a torn piece of foil blanket. As she shuffles inside, she eyes Nanny Theresa very warily. “The computer’s neural core can only be entered through a door that has a genetic lock. Dr. Pierce is the only one that can open the door, and . . . he’s . . .”

Nanny Theresa looks down at Dr. Pierce’s body, and her gaze lingers for a moment. She drifts over to him and kneels on the floor beside him. “I’m sorry, Graham,” she says quietly as she takes his hand and strokes her thumb over the back of it. All of a sudden, her other hand hisses and morphs into a short black blade, and with one swift chop, she promptly cuts his hand clean off at the wrist.

My mother grimaces at the sight, and Bit looks away. “Oh, that’s disgusting,” Brody mutters.