"Who are these jack-wagons?" Gramps asked, his legs spread far apart, his arms folded across his chest as he studied the pair.
I loved that Gramps didn't question where in the blue hell we were.
Immaterial to him. We were here and it was time to deal.
"Graysheet scientists," I replied.
Gramps grunted in displeasure. "Have you been holding out on your grandpa, boy?" he asked, his brows in an angry line above his eyes.
Wow, great timing, Gramps.
Gary laughed. "You don't know the half of it, old man."
Gramps scowled. "If you're feelin' froggy, go ahead and jump on my lily pad." His hands curled into fists at his side.
Gary backed up a step then realized how it made him look and took it back.
"You don't intimidate me. This is our world now. The fragment," he swept his palm out and away from his body. "We rule here now. And your grandson and his imbecilic friends facilitated that."
Gramps frowned. "The how and why don't matter. You're here and we've come for something."
"No Gramps!" I said.
The brothers looked at us. When they saw what they were looking for they smiled.
"Got out of hand, did you?" Gary asked me.
Parker sighed and Gary looked at him. "You know all is fair in love and war, right Parker? What did you think was going to happen when you sent your pet into another world after us. Did you think you could stall us in our endeavors? That we wouldn't have made the provision for a contingency plan of some sort?" He shrugged, shaking his head indulgently.
"They've been given the enhancers, I see," Joe said, noting the welts on everyone's arms.
"You'll be fine for a little while here, then the process will speed. Time moves differently in this world. Always forward, but at a different rate. What would have been weeks of stability will now degrade to days. Those of you that had days, it'll be hours. And," he held up a finger and smiled, "there is no cure!"
Gary slapped his hands together. "Now then, we've delivered the news of your fate and you're stuck here because your Dimensional is," he looked at Randi, who was mumbling and incoherent, "indisposed at the moment." His gaze locked with Parker's. "You didn't help anything, you just signed their death warrants."
He looked at me. "Especially him." He drilled me with his eyes. "We don't need any C-Ms here in this world. And two," he looked at Parker and me, "is two too many." He winked and inclined his chin, the signal for the fragment to move in.
There had to be a hundred. They swarmed around our party.
When they moved to take Jade I felt that warm slide of rage in my head and she cried out at the rough treatment. And when the male of the fragment punched her in the stomach the rage moved to something that knew no bounds, its searching tendrils of smoke reaching out, out... out, until it found what it needed.
They came, jerking in response to the hook of death, the net catching them all like a school of fish.
All.
I felt the dead awaken, all the dead from everywhere and I lifted my hands above my head, the pulse of their movement was an unseen thread that coiled inside me, its spool of function perfectly synchronized to my call.
"Caleb watch out!" I turned and something hit me perfectly in the head. I swayed as I heard Gramps yelling at someone.
And then there was silence and peace.
A black so absolute no light survived it.
It swallowed me into inky oblivion as I lost the last link of my consciousness to the sucking obsidian vortex.
CHAPTER 19
I awoke puking.
It was a total theme. When there was nothing left in my stomach, and the roaring stopped in my ears, I could hear John talking to someone. A someone that held my head in her hands. The gentle touch was the only thing that kept my head from spinning off into the distance.
"He's got a concussion," I heard Terran say.
Yeah, I had something. My damn head felt like a hippo had used it as a trampoline.
"What do ya mean? They knocked his brain loose?" Jonesy asked logically.
John sighed and I opened my eyes, a cool washcloth pressed on my mouth and I grabbed the wrist that used it, staring up into a scared young woman with dark eyes and hair.
"Caleb, cool it!" Jonesy yelled and I winced.
"Inside voice, dipshit," Tiff said.
"Right," he said, scrubbing his head. "Don't hurt her, man, she stopped the bleeding."
What bleeding?
John looked at my expression and answered the question there, "You were bleeding out your nose. Pretty sure that fragment caused your brain to swell."
Alex, who was shackled soundly said, "But, no worries, that dude won't be bludgeoning anyone else."
I looked at him and he continued, "Your grandpa beat him to death with the weapon he used on you, man."
I sat up too quickly and the room spun. The young woman put both her hands on the sides of my face and the room settled.
"Is he okay... Gramps?" The faces in the room looked around anxiously. Archer finally said, "Don't know, they beat him pretty bad. And he's not getting the organic treatment."
"What?" I asked, my eyes moving back to the girl.
"Yes, that's what she is," Mia began.
"She's this world's version of an Organic," Sophie added.
I stood, leaning against the inside wall, made of rough-cut wood, the splinters biting into my palm.
I took in my surroundings, all the while the girl's hands remained on me. I looked down at her, her smallness striking me. She reminded me vaguely of Jade.
Jade.
My eyes scanned the inside of the dimly lit building, light filtering through the stout boards and found her within the circle of Brett's arms. She gazed back at me like the last two years had never been.
"Jade..." I moved forward.
John grasped my arm, the Organic's hands falling away, and with them, that sense of healing dissipated and the pain of my head injury slammed back into me. I bent over, groaning and she was just suddenly there.
"Do not, young sir. You have been grievously wounded. If you would but stay still a mite longer, I would see you restored." Her eyes, which I had mistaken for brown, were actually the deepest midnight blue, almost black, dark sapphires.
"I have to get to Jade," I said but Jade shook her head, her dark hair falling like black water around her sides, some of it getting stuck in the crevices of Brett's jacket.
My pulse began to pound and my old friend Rage made an appearance.
I was going to put a hurt on someone.
John fell into my line of sight between Jade and I. "Listen, Caleb... she's gone. The enhancer has an accelerated response in some. And in this world, worse."
My eyes flicked up to his. "What about you, pal?"
He shook his head and showed me the welt. It had begun to heal, the swelling and redness-gone. I felt my face frown. "I don't think they were really certain about the reactiveness of it all." He shrugged. "Me being a Null must metabolize it differently. I feel nothing."
"What about everyone else?"
He shrugged. "It's different with everyone. I think the girls are getting hit hardest."
I moved John aside and the Organic moved with me. I turned and looked at her. "What's your name?"
She looked up at me for a second, translating maybe, and responded, "Elise."
I paused, then said, "Thank you."
She smiled and it utterly changed her face, making her look younger, more vulnerable. Maybe she was. Living with these creepers would make anyone old before their time.
I came to stand in front of Mason.
He looked at me with sullenness. "Yeah, Hart?"
"Listen to me." I met his eyes and tried for reasonable. While I still could, that is. "My friends, family... everyone but you and me have gotten nailed with this government drug that's an enhancer."
I swallowed my anger when he wrapped Jade closer against him and she cuddled into him like her favorite teddy bear.
I just wanted to spray barf again, but not because of the head wound.
I went on, pressing through my desire to rip his head off and shit down his throat. "Jade doesn't know what she's doing, man. She can't choose, she's not thinking rationally. The drug makes people's thought processes effed up, their insecurities that they would normally rationalize, becomes magnified on this stuff."
I saw something flicker in his eyes, some kind of connection with what I was saying, then it was gone.
Dammit, I just knew he knew something was up. Jade wasn't acting like herself and he'd clued in. But since it was going oh, so his way he wasn't going to become introspective or anything.
The dick.
I clenched my fists and Jade moved out of the circle of his arms and touched my forearm.
I ached to take her into my arms, looking at her like a guy starving for the perfect sandwich. For me, she was it.
Jade gazed up into my face, while Elise's hands were pressed against the base of my neck from behind and said, "This is why we can't be together Caleb. I need someone that's not so violent. That cares about me first... not all the dead things," she flicked her hair back behind her shoulder, the hollow of her throat bare, the necklace I gave her gone forever.
Maybe she was too.
My eyes met Brett's and he stared back, reeling her back in against his body, like a prize trout.
"I just want him to go away, he makes me nervous Brett," Jade whispered in a voice that was slightly slurred. We could all tell she was going downhill. Why didn't this asshole see it?
He didn't want to, that's why.
Brett stroked her hair. "I know, he's going... right Hart?"
I leaned forward and hissed close to his face, "You know what I told you is right. Don't do this, Mason. Don't use your connection to manipulate the situation!"
"I'm not man, you handed her over before any of this bullshit started happening, remember?" His eyes pegged me with accusation. "You're the one that got into it at school, again. Then," he kept his penetrating stare on me, "you asked me, no begged me to protect her from Howie." He grunted his annoyance over her head, his chin almost resting on it. "Then when he made his psycho move, who came to her rescue? I did, ya moron. You came late, as usual. We're meant to be together. I'm the one with all the family violence and drama, but you act like it comes natural. Maybe you're the one with the problem. I should be the one that doesn't have any self-control. Where the fuck is yours?" He leaned his head back and laughed. "Nowhere." He pointed his finger at me. "I'll take care of Jade, Hart. 'Cuz you obviously can't."
I didn't need the enhancer for all the self-doubt in the world to come crashing in on top of my head. I saw our past flash before my mind's eye. All the fights, the violence, the dead always a casualty of everything. How it would seem to Jade, the enhancer warping it all out of proportion. Then I saw all the things that balanced that... mainly, our love. I saw the countless times with her body under mine, my hands everywhere, protecting her... loving her. My heart squeezed inside my chest. Stupid Mason thought I was giving him some kind of reprieve.
He was wrong. He was effectively on notice.
Starting now.
I knew that Jade was messed up mentally. I looked around the room, trying to gauge my other friends. The girls gave me different expressions but it was Jonesy that grinned.
"I'm still sane, I'm already half-crazy anyway. I'm not gonna go more nuts overnight."
Elise kept her hands on my skin as I took stock of everything. I told myself that at least Jade was safe. Brett was a proven guard dog. Too bad he'd latched on to my girl as mistress. I blamed myself. But sometimes choices had to be made that were the best out of a bunch of lame ones.
I needed to get us out of here and fast. But first, I had to collect the blood, find out if Gramps was okay and then....
I snapped my eyes to John's. "We need to get outta here, like yesterday."
"You don't think I'm aware of that?" he snorted, then looked at Elise.
She lifted her hands off of my neck and drew back, I went to grab the hand that had left me and she cringed, throwing up her other hand to defend herself.
"Hey," I said softly, "I won't hurt ya." I gently pushed the arm down but her eyes were full of fear.
"What's wrong with her?" I asked John.
"Figure it out, Caleb, look at her."
I did. The parts of her body I could see carried the marks of pinches, hits and lashes. Some fresh, many were old. My anger came rushing back like the tide to shore.
"Who did this to you?" I asked in a harsh whisper.