Sideswiped

  No one liked his theory that drafting time wasn’t moving back as much as it was sideways. He’d had to invent most of the instruments to gather his data, and the idea that Professor Milo might cut his funding before he had the chance to prove his theory was a real possibility. He’d been at it for six years and had nothing to show but a handful of gadgets. If not for the versatility of the slick-suits and light pistols, his funding would have been cut years ago.

  The sensor on his tablet began pulsating again. Frowning, Silas toggled it back into normal range.

  At the bar, Allen squinted through his thick black plastic safety glasses at one of the club’s cameras, his long face tight with irritation as he hit a button on his phone. Silas’s tablet dinged, and he thumbed the connection open. “What’s the deal?” Allen said, the music half a second off from what was thumping through the walls.

  Silas fitted an earpiece and took his tablet off speaker. “I’m reading excessive feedback. You’re not feeling it?” he said softly.

  Allen pushed the sleeve of his brightly patterned shirt up to show the phasing fabric of his slick-suit. Lanky and thin, he didn’t need to get his suits specially tailored—apart from shortening the hems an inch or two. But he doesn’t look as good in them, either, Silas thought smugly. Allen was too casual and scar-marked from countless BMX accidents to fit Opti’s old image of the polished, sophisticated agent, especially when next to his partner, Summer, who did. But that was probably why they’d fast-tracked him. And why they keep me in the labs, Silas thought, his mood tarnishing.

  “Knock it off,” Allen complained, his knobby hands pushing his sleeve back down. “You keep phasing it up like that, you’re going to put my arm to sleep.”

  Summer’s throaty voice eased from the tiny speaker as she slipped behind Allen and tousled his short black hair. “You mind getting off the air, Silas? We’re working here.”

  “Hey, you called me.” Silas smiled as the connection ended, watching her through the monitor as she made her way to the dance floor, people moving either to get out of her way or to intercept her, depending upon what they thought their chances were. At the table across the room, Heidi and Karen finished their drinks fast. First on the scene did not translate into getting out with the take.

  But Silas’s brow furrowed when he spotted another drafter/anchor team ease past the thick-armed bouncers and half-stoned coat-check girls. His gaze flicked to Professor Milo, and then he hit the icon for Summer’s phone. Almost instantly she answered, her dancing never faltering. “Summer. It’s a gang bang.”

  Still slowly making her way to Karen and Heidi’s table, she scanned the club, finding Allen at the bar and nodding him closer. “Shit. Who?”

  Silas studied the compact woman coming in and the dark man with the tightly trimmed beard beside her. “Beth and Ethan.” Three drafters on site? What are they thinking?

  Professor Milo cleared his throat. Silas’s neck reddened, and he muttered, “What? I’m allowed. I’m their backup.”

  The professor leaned forward, his tall, gaunt form looming over him. “Drafters and anchors don’t have backup,” he said as he jabbed Silas’s connection closed. “And you are not their handler. Interfere again, and they fail.”

  Chances were good they were going to fail anyway. There were three teams, and only one would walk out with that box of chocolate and the highest grade. Peeved, Silas pushed himself back into the chair, ignoring the six sets of slick-suit data now coming in. Summer touched her ear to show him she’d lost contact before tucking her phone away and laughing at something the man dancing with her had said.

  Allen finally reached her, and Summer pointed out Beth and Ethan with a head toss. Silas could tell the instant their eyes met when Allen’s lips curled. Beth and Ethan played without regard to convention or loyalty to any but themselves. The perfect agents.

  Heidi and Karen’s biodata were elevated, and as Ethan and Beth began to force their way from the door and through the crowd, Karen grabbed the chocolate, shoving it down her front as Heidi pushed her to the back. All they had to do was get out and it was over. But Opti would never make it that easy.

  Summer and Allen had split up, and Silas pushed closer to the monitors. He’d lost Beth and Ethan.

  “Everyone down!” he heard faintly through the pulsating walls, and then a scream overshadowed the music.

  “There!” Milo’s assistant pointed, and Silas watched through the monitor as Beth shot at the disco ball, sending the light beam ricocheting everywhere with a blinding flash.

  Summer dropped. Heart in his throat, Silas looked at her slick-suit data. She was fine—simply getting out of the line of fire. Curling into a ball, she dodged the first flush of panicked, fleeing people as the music thundered. Ethan shoved people aside, trying for a clean shot, shouting in anger when Allen made a good hit and Ethan’s slick-suit flashed white. The tall man dropped, out of the game, paralyzed.

  Livid, Beth grabbed her partner’s light pistol before diving out of the way, using a screaming woman as a shield as she made her way across the bar to the back, where a handful of people hammered on the locked back door, Heidi and Karen among them.

  “This just got interesting,” Milo said, and Silas grimaced at his tablet. Twelve 911 calls had just gone out, not one of the agents-in-training on site thinking to block them. Even as he watched, three more flashed up. They had five, maybe six minutes. Going to jail would get them a failing grade as well.

  “Give me the box and we all get out of here!” Beth shouted, and Karen pushed out from the cowering people. Heidi had reached the door and was working on the lock. She was small and clever, and Silas began to wonder if the all-woman team would make it out.

  “As if,” Karen snarled, and then more screaming as she shot at Beth from across the dance floor, scoring on her legs. Beth dropped, paralyzed from the knees down.

  The music cut off, and then Allen was on Karen, knocking her out with a front kick. “You kicked her?” Heidi exclaimed, outraged as Allen’s hand rose with the chocolate.

  “Summer!” he shouted, throwing it as Heidi slammed a roundhouse into his arm. The chocolate went spinning, and Beth, still somewhat functioning in her half-paralyzed slick-suit, crawled across the dance floor after it, groaning when Summer reached it first.

  “Circle out, Allen!” Summer called, but Allen was down, having taken a light beam right to the chest. Pissed, she pointed at Heidi, then at Karen. Ripping open the box of chocolate, she jammed the four pieces in her mouth as she went to help Allen.

  Outraged and red-faced, Karen began firing. Summer dove for the protection of the tables, her slick-suit on her right leg going white as she was nicked by a beam. “That’s not fair!” Karen shouted, and Silas rose, his hands spread wide in helplessness as he stood before the monitors, not believing the chaos.

  But the thunderous boom of a rifle in close quarters brought Karen up short.

  Silas froze, scanning the monitors. A bouncer had gotten to the gun cabinet, a smoking rifle in his hand and bits of ceiling still falling down at his feet.

  “No one move!” echoed through the walls, the sound of someone crying suddenly obvious.

  “Shit.” Swallowing his gum, Silas bolted to the door, only to be yanked back by Milo’s hand encircling his bicep.

  “Sit down.”

  “That’s a real gun!” Silas pointed into the club, and Milo flicked his coat aside.

  “So is this one,” he said, showing a Glock. “Sit,” he said again. “They should’ve planned for this. Let it play. If they can’t get out of this, they deserve to fail.”

  “Fail! What about dying?”

  But Milo shook his head in warning, his thin lips pulled back in a sneer. “Sit. Down.”

  The dangerous gleam in the professor’s eye was a grim reminder that every one of their instructors had once been an active agent. Silas sat, his big han
ds clenched. Milo’s assistant was wide-eyed but useless. Summer was out there, her leg paralyzed by his technology. His eyes shifted to his tablet.

  The sudden wail of sirens pulled Professor Milo’s attention away, and Silas lunged, toggling the slick-suits’ paralyzation off in one swipe.

  “You stupid man!” Milo shouted, and then Silas reeled, his ears ringing when Milo smacked him.

  “This isn’t a game!” Silas roared, and he rose in fear when another shot rang out, then another. Beth screamed in pain, then Ethan in anger. Both their data streams spiked.

  “Summer!” Silas went for the door, but was brought down as Milo grabbed him about the knees. Silas hit the floor hard, stunned, when another shot rang out. Summer’s cry of outrage cut through him, stopping his heart. Someone else had been shot. Allen or Summer?

  “No one shoots my partner!” Summer shouted.

  It’s not her.

  And then his tablet came alive when someone grabbed ahold of time and yanked it firmly backward.

  Silas breathed in blue sparkles, watching the incoming data flow across the screen as it gathered information about the shifting localized gravity, Doppler particles, and the minute shift of light that defined a drafter’s reach. Ethan could draft more than a minute into the past, but he could only physically affect a circular block. Heidi had never exceeded ten seconds, but her reach was a breathtaking mile across. This one had the tight wavelength of Summer, and he suddenly found himself back at the desk instead of flat on the floor.

  Milo was bright-eyed with threat. “Think about this, Silas,” he intoned, the retired agent able to recognize the draft as easily as he.

  “Every day of my life,” Silas said, and with no more thought, he rabbit-punched the professor.

  The man dropped like a stone. Silas turned, again shutting down the slick-suits’ paralyzation. They’d gone back twenty seconds, but every one of them would remember what had happened until time caught up and the drafters forgot. They wouldn’t get shot again.

  Suit coat furling, Silas bolted out of the small back room. The smell of spent gunpowder hit him and he recoiled. Allen was standing in the middle of the dance floor, hands raised, as the bouncer aimed the rifle at him, muzzle shaking.

  “It’s okay,” Allen said calmly, and Silas exhaled in relief. Summer was safe behind Allen. Ethan and Beth were to one side, Heidi and Karen to the other, protecting the cowering people by the back door. “We’re all okay. Stand down. It was just a little game.”

  But the gun went off. Shocked, the bouncer dropped the rifle, shouting, “I didn’t mean it! I didn’t mean it!”

  Allen fell. Behind him, Summer jerked at the sudden warmth spraying her, her eyes wide in horror as Allen hit the floor with the sodden sound of a wet bag.

  “No!” Silas shouted, and he saw Allen’s eyes, full of pain as he realized his death was moments away. They were in a draft. To draft within it would cause them all pain.

  But Silas looked at Summer, nodding. “Do it,” Beth said, grimacing, and Karen, gripping Heidi’s arm, nodded as well.

  Summer took a shaky breath. Once more, blue sparkles spilled down from the spinning disco lights, racing over Silas’s already overstimulated nerves like poison. He breathed them out, and he shook, catching his balance as he again found himself just outside the back office’s door.

  “Excuse me,” Silas said loudly to distract the bouncer, ducking when the frazzled man turned, the rifle going off. The shot was an instant of warmth past his face, and behind Silas, Professor Milo grunted in pain.

  Allen lunged, bringing the bouncer down. Bellowing in anger, the man fought back, but there were seven of them and one of him.

  And then time caught up and smacked Silas across the head.

  With a simultaneous cry of pain, the students fell away from the incensed bouncer. Silas reached for the bar, knees giving way as pain blossomed from inside, fighting to find a way out of his skull through his eyes. Gasping, he leaned over the bar and panted, trying to keep from throwing up. He hadn’t been bitch-slapped by a double-draft for years.

  “Yep. Still hurts,” he groaned. Someone was throwing up. Someone else was crying hysterically. But it wasn’t anyone he knew, so he didn’t care.

  “Get that rifle!” Milo shouted, and Silas looked up, smiling weakly at Allen helping Summer up off the floor. She was pale but unhurt. Allen was alive—he’d replace her memory. That’s what an anchor did. It had been worth it. Everyone had agreed.

  “Dr. Silas Denier,” Milo said sarcastically, and Silas’s stomach lurched when the angry man spun him around and Silas fell back against the bar. A wet, red stain spread from the professor’s shoulder. He’d been shot, but clearly it wasn’t life-threatening. Sirens were sounding louder in the nearby distance, and people were leaving, racing for the door. “I told you not to interfere,” the professor said as he roughly motioned for his students to get out as well. “This was a test.”

  “Yeah?” Peeved, Silas used his coat to wipe his brow. The Band-Aid on his forehead caught, and he pulled it off, having forgotten it was there. “You can shove your test up your ass, sir. These are my friends.”

  Milo pushed into his space, cheeks red. “It was a test. And you just failed. You, Summer, Allen, and everyone out here.”

  “What!” Anger gave Silas the strength to stand upright. “Me? I wasn’t being tested. And why flunk them? I’m the one that hit you. Is it because they didn’t let one of their own die? Double-drafting isn’t grounds for failure. It just hurts like hell. If anything, you should commend them for ending this with all parties alive!”

  “You didn’t fail because Summer drafted within a draft,” Milo said. “You didn’t even fail because you hit me. You failed because you didn’t adhere to the spirit of the test.”

  Silas went still, seeing the understanding in the eyes of Karen and Heidi as they limped past him, supporting each other like fallen soldiers. “Is that so,” he said dryly.

  “You were here to gather data for your thesis and monitor the slick-suits,” Milo said, jerking Silas’s attention back with a hard jab to his chest. “You interfered. They failed. Get out.”

  Summer waited for him by the door. Allen leaned heavily on the wall beside her.

  “I said get out!” the professor shouted when Silas turned on a heel to go back into the office for his tablet.

  “I forgot my data,” he said as he passed Professor Milo, the man quivering in rage. The professor had not liked him ever since Silas had proved one of his theories wrong in his freshman year.

  Silas looped his arm in Summer’s as they crossed the threshold, and she tucked her head against his shoulder, their pace matching perfectly. He breathed in her scent, fighting the shakes. He could have lost her. But he hadn’t. Her ability had saved not just herself, but everyone out there. How can I live with her doing this every day if I’m not the one at her side anchoring her? Keeping her safe?

  “I think we won, Allen,” she said as they got into the waiting Opti van with the other drafters and anchors, all nursing migraines the size of Montana. “I got the chocolates out.”

  She’d eaten them.

  Silas looked up, seeing the rueful nods and rolling eyes of the students around them. Allen chuckled, the sound ending in a groan, and Silas smiled, even if it did hurt.

  Failed? Not yet. They had three days until graduation, and time was on their side.

  CHAPTER

  THREE

  The bar’s thermostat was set blessedly low, and Summer had used her womanly charms to get them the large round table in the back, right under the air-conditioning vent. It wasn’t their usual place, but with seven of them, the bar’s usual community college clientele ignored them after their cursory assessment of “academy asshats.” Word had gotten out that they had been responsible for the campus-wide migraine every drafter, anchor, and the retired-agent staf
f had endured last night. Being out of sight was more than prudent.

  Silas licked his fingers clean of the last of the wings; he’d been starving after the headache-instigated fast. His glass tablet was a soft glow before him as it scrolled through his most recent data, and he meticulously cleaned his fingers with the Handi Wipe that Summer had found him. The noise from the bar, full on a Friday night, was a pleasant background, and he could almost ignore the electric country the place seemed to be stuck on.

  Across from him, Karen and Heidi were working on their second glass of red wine and a bowl of gluten-free crisps. Ethan and Beth were to his right, their beverage and snack of choice being beer and wings. Allen was a dangerously quiet lump to his left. Summer was at the bar getting food and solicitations for her phone number. It had been almost twenty-four hours, but everything was still fresh and raw, seeing as Heidi, Ethan, and Summer had only recently recovered their missing twenty seconds. Migraines prevented their defrags until this afternoon.

  “Can we just forget about it for tonight?” Heidi said, trying to coax Karen into a better mood. “And get your hand out of that bowl before you put on ten pounds,” she added.

  Lips pressed, Karen shoved the bowl to the center of the table. “As far as I’m concerned, it was a major screwup and we deserve to have to repeat the test.” Karen slumped in her chair, staring at the bowl. The woman was a rail. Ten pounds would look good on her.

  Elbows on the table, Ethan tipped his bottle up and took a swig. “They don’t run them again for another six months. I checked,” he said, wiping a drop from his tidy beard.

  Allen stirred. “I’m not waiting another six months to graduate.”

  A collective sigh sent guilt through Silas. Maybe hitting Professor Milo had been a mistake, but that paled in comparison to the professor taking a bullet in the rewrite. That Silas might end up out on his ear—irreplaceable skills and techniques aside—would be a real concern if half the administrating body hadn’t wanted to punch the distasteful man on more than one occasion. Let them die. Bullshit. He had a feeling his punishment simply hadn’t been decided yet. They’d probably put him in charge of the freshman drafters, every one of them a maddening mix of justifiable arrogance and insecurity.