Van Bender and the Burning Emblems (The Van Bender Archives #1) (33 page)

The Tangle Rope passed the shirt and the first of the brink arc. It coiled to strike.

I reached across my body, shoving the lighter toward the bottom of the arc. I flicked my thumb—fearing for an instant that the lighter might not ignite.

But it did.

Never has a single yellow flame meant so much to me. Probably not to anyone in the history of the world. Maybe even the galaxy. Perhaps the universe.

Seriously.

The lighter flame touched the base of the brink arc, right near the wet metal floor.

As I finished my slide, the Tangle Rope leaped at me. Nick was a dozen feet behind, still coming at full speed.

I made a face at him, sticking my tongue out around crooked lips, and crossing my eyes.

The look distracted him for an instant, but it didn’t make a difference. He never had a chance to stop. Especially because he tripped on my shirt.

“Enjoy your zip!” I said.

The flame finished its race across the brink. The metal square turned incandescent. With a flicker of light, a white zip-door sprung from the square, four-feet wide and eight-feet high. It blocked Nick from my view. He screamed.

The Tangle Rope wrapped around one of my wrists, then yanked it downward to my ankles, behind me. It wrapped around both of my ankles.

Nick’s scream ended. The pounding of his feet silenced. The zip-door flashed out.

And it was like he was never there.

In fact, he was at Intersoc. Without any brink to zip out with.

Still kneeling, like I was praying, I tilted my head back and laughed. It was a crazy laugh. Insane with relief.

The Tangle Rope had bound one hand to both of my ankles behind me. The other hand was free, and clenched with the remnants of the brink.

This, I thought, is how people go bonkers. Crap like this.

My celebration laugh ended as a flash of light rolled over me.

The bomb. The
nuclear
bomb. Had gone off.

Chapter 59: I finally get some sleep

I tried to escape once I got to Intersoc, but EPIC—those bastions of obnoxiousness and plot-ruining—immediately caught me.

-Nick Savage

I only know a few things about atomic bombs.

1. The USA dropped two at the end of World War II.
   
2. They kill a lot of people and do a lot of damage, almost instantaneously.
   
3. Radiation is bad.
   
4. In StarCraft, once you hear “Nuclear launch detected” you’ve got about ten seconds to stop it before you’re toast.
   
5. They look really, really incredible.
   
6. I didn’t want my parents or Marti decimated by one.
   

I knelt there, behind Nick’s barrier, one hand tied behind me at my ankles. A churning black pillar of smoke rose up over the mountains, with roiling red fire in its midst. A dome capped it, expanding up and out, with a ring of smoke just below it. Underneath the ring, another puff of cloud spread on all sides.

Maybe another flash would burn out my retinas, or a blast of heat would turn my skin crispy. Having zipped so far away, I couldn’t even see the base of the explosion because of the mountain horizon—just the churning pillar with its cap. I was probably far enough away that I wasn’t in much immediate danger.

I couldn’t say the same thing about the people there.

The fire faded from the cloud. I waited for a blast of heat to melt my eyeballs, or a nuclear wind to blow me away. None came. Not that I noticed, and since I don’t have a built-in Geiger counter, I have no idea if any radiation even reached me. Although, a deep rumble rolled over me. The tower shook. I thought it might tumble.

I knelt there. Hog-tied. Thinking. When your parents are at the hypocenter of a nuclear explosion, it gives you a reason to pause. Things occur to you—like maybe they weren’t so bad. Maybe you should have been a better son. Maybe if you’d just listened to them. they wouldn’t have been vaporized.

At least I’d obeyed Dad at the end. How many other times should I have obeyed and trusted him and Mom?

I tried to look on the bright side. If they were gone, I could meet all the fans I wanted, and hang out with any other rock star I wanted.

Yay. Yipee.

Of course, they might have lived. Marti might have gotten the spell off before the explosion. And the spell might have worked. If so, I would let her yank on my arm all she wanted. I’d let her smack me around until I was incoherent.

I had no idea what to do. I maneuvered my bound hand and feet in front of me and tried to pull free, but the glowing blue rope secured them too tightly. I couldn’t see a knot to loosen with my other hand. The ends of the rope had fused together.

Unable to walk, I couldn’t go anywhere, so scooted back to the wall of the tower. It was cold against my naked back. The light from the explosion faded, and once again the land fell into darkness and silence—except for a breeze from the west. A few more drops of rain fell. They hit the steel balcony with distinct pings. Every now and then, Nick’s hazy barrier flickered.

Would the night ever end? The entire adventure—which began with my utter stupidity—had started at seven o’clock the night before. The concert had ended by ten. I looked at my watch. 5:02 a.m. Ten hours had passed. It felt like an eternity.

My body was weary, tired. Nick’s rejuvenation spell had worn off, but I couldn’t say when, exactly. The vomiting had also taken its toll, as had the night without sleep. I wanted to close my eyes and just rest.

I watched the dark horizon, ignoring the rain on my face. How long until I knew? Before the military swarmed the area or the media arrived? If only I could find a way to contact my parents.

Contact my parents.

The video calling spell!

I still had a little of the brink on my hand.

I wiped the water from my face with the back of my hand, then turned my hand over to look at it. A little brink pooled there in my palm. Enough to cast one small spell.

Quickly, I used the last of it and drew the oval with a squiggle down the center, then paused for a moment with the lighter poised at the base of the spell, considering who I should contact.

Mom and Dad had both fallen paralyzed, and if they’d survived the blast, might not be able to talk. Marti was the only conscious person around.

I lit the spell.

Would the spell work if she was dead? Would it show me her corpse? What would even be left to show me?

I shuddered, and watched the brink burn.

A second passed with no shimmer of white light in the oval.

Two seconds. Still nothing. My heart hammered. Tears rose.

Three. Four.

The brink turned to ash, and as it floated down, the wind pushed it into my chest.

I bit my lip. My breathing came short and shallow. I tried to find some conclusion besides the obvious one. I didn’t know all the details about how the spell worked. Maybe I’d cast it wrong. Maybe the radiation prevented it from working. Maybe it was the protective barrier she’d created. There were too many possibilities to accept the worst one.

I needed to search for them. Try to find them—only I couldn’t go anywhere. Not tied up.

I tried again to untie myself. I pulled and twisted my hand, trying to loosen my ankles, but the rope stayed tight. It didn’t hurt, but it also didn’t give at all. It stayed firm around my socks and wrist. I even tried taking off my shoes and pulling my socks off, to give myself a little extra slack, but the Tangle Rope just tightened against my skin.

Not knowing what else to do, weary to the bone, I laid down on the wet metal, rested my head on my free arm, and closed my eyes.

I fell asleep thinking that I’d failed. I’d set out to prove that I could make good decisions on my own.

And I’d done nothing of the sort.

Chapter 60: Bright as the sun

The radiation detector stayed at normal levels. None of us understood it. A nuke had gone off, but radiation had been contained. It was like magic.

-Private Gary Bartholomew

I awoke before dawn, when enough light had come to illuminate the hilly shape of the land and the grayness of the cloudy sky. Vehicles rumbled in the distance. I lay there, blinking, trying to figure out how far away they were. Headlights moved in the distance, perhaps a mile away, over the vague shape of hills. Ashes crusted the water on the balcony around me. Nick’s barrier had disappeared.

Soon the sound and headlights faded. I sat up, not feeling rested at all. My back and neck hurt.

I sat looking to the west, and at that point I noticed it—and if I hadn’t noticed it then, I would have just a few seconds later.

A light. Miles away, beyond the outline of a range of tall hills. At first, it was just the color of the sky, a little lighter than the shape of hills below it, but it grew brighter, like a vehicle’s headlights as they approach a hill from the opposite side—only much brighter. A thousand times brighter, and a dozen miles away.

I watched, still numb, imagining it was military.

It grew brighter, spilling out over the hilltop. It even illuminated the smoke in the distance behind it—the cloud from the bomb that had started to spread over the land.

When the light crested the distant ridge, I shaded my eyes. Illumination spread over the ground. The hills and the low brush became visible, almost as if full day had come.

The light flew over the land in my direction. Its luminescence kept me from discerning its size or even really getting a good look at it. But it moved fast, with the rushing of a deafening wind. Within seconds it passed over me, a hundred feet above. Its full sound—like the noise of a tornado—hit me. I scooted around the balcony like an inchworm to watch it fly away.

By the time I rounded the balcony, the light had gone at least a mile or two east, but began to curve and slow. Over the course of ten seconds, it reversed its direction and headed toward the tower. Its speed decreased as it approached, and I thought I heard the sound of fireworks. Darkness fled from before it. Behind it, the lightening clouds seemed dim.

Its angle toward the ground increased the closer it came to me, and slowed more every moment. I sat there, unable to move, wondering what the nuclear explosion had given birth to. Some kind of mutant. Some strange, incandescent creature.

As it neared the tower, the light moved just to the side. The sound of little popping explosions came from its midst, like the sound of Dad letting go of wind sprites.

My hopes rose.

The light passed around to the opposite side of the tower. As it landed on the balcony directly opposite me, there was a flurry of fireworks crackling. I couldn’t see the light’s source. Only the light, as it spilled out past the walls of the tower.

Then footsteps on the metal. And women’s voices. Two people came around the balcony, shapes dark against the impossible light behind.

“Richie!”

I blinked and shook my head. My heart pounded. “Marti! Mom!”

In a flurry of feet pounding on metal, they closed the distance to me, both of them calling my name, falling to their knees and throwing their arms around me. I almost fell over. I laughed and reached for them with my free arm, not knowing what to think.

Mom and Marti had survived.

But Dad? Where was he?

He came around the balcony, his shape outlined by the light, and joined our embrace. I relished the feel of them by me, the fruity smell of Marti’s hair and their voices in my ears.

We just laughed and cried and didn’t say anything intelligible. It was enough just to be together again, enjoying a gigantic group hug.

Chapter 61: Coming to terms

There are rare moments in life when it all pays off. And I do mean rare.

-Elizabeth Van Bender

After a while we disengaged from the embrace. I examined them for signs that the nuke had affected them. Like extreme burns or atomic-born super powers. But I saw nothing, and my parents stepped away to look at me, as if making sure I hadn’t lost any limbs.

Marti squatted at my feet, casting a spell near the Tangle Rope. When she lit it, the rope ends split and the blue light fell away. Shaking her head, she put it into her purse. She helped me stand, and embraced me again. Mom handed me my sopping wet shirt, and after I’d put it on Marti took my hand in a grip so tight I worried that I might need surgery to remove her.

What to do about it? I thought of Sandra, and decided not to do anything about it right then. Not with my parents around.

“Why was your shirt off?” Mom said.

“I took it off so I could draw a protective spell on me. What the devil is that light?”

The white light sprayed from behind the tower, illuminating the countryside with such brilliance that it looked like the bushes on the ground burned. The eastern sky had turned a cloudy gray. The light rain had started, again.

Dad grinned and shook his head. “It’s the brink.”

I’d completely forgotten about the brink.

“It’s so bright,” I said. “Almost impossible to look at.”

He laughed. “It could be the most powerful brink ever made. I can’t imagine what we’ll be able to do with it.”

Mom glared at him and placed her hands on her hips.

“What do you mean, ‘What we’ll be able to do with it?’
You’re
not doing anything with it.”

“It’s created,” he said. “We can’t let it go to waste.” He looked at me. “If anyone has a right to it, you do.”

“Me? All I did was nearly get us all killed.”

“True,” Marti said, “but the emotion was yours. Etiquette says the brink is yours unless you give it up. Plus, since the emotion was yours, you have priority with it.”

Admittedly, I liked the thought of owning the most powerful brink ever made, although I had no idea what to do with it. So far, I hadn’t seen many spells that seemed particularly useful for everyday use. It wasn’t like a cell phone, or something that had an obvious purpose. Except for the video calling spell.