***
Lucas and the reinforcements he had called came upon their vehicle in the night approximately one hour later. Morris had been thinking about Jane and her relationship to this new person who had entered her life and then just as quickly—and astonishingly—vanished. Although she had described Max to him already, nothing could have prepared him for the man’s appearance. He had felt immediately dwarfed by him, but now, his feeling of concern over Max’s disappearance overshadowed this other feeling greatly.
Then Morris saw the flashes and in the side-view mirrors, watched as Lucas and his forces approached. First Morris saw a dim, multi-coloured light at a great distance. Initially, he dismissed it out of sheer, desperate hope that it wasn’t what he thought it was. As the lights grew closer, though, and scattered their beams all over the road, he knew they had been found.
He looked over at Jane, who was asleep. The light reflected off the side mirror and illuminated her face. He thought that he had never seen anyone so beautiful, and he regretted having to wake her. However, before he could lay a hand on her shoulder, she woke and sat straight up. She looked over at him, then straight into the side-view mirror, her eyes wide and alert.
“They found us,” she gasped.
“Yes.”
“I better wake the others.”
He heard her speak to the others in her mind.
Guys, look alive. They’ve found us. They’re about two hundred metres back.
Morris focussed for a second and projected his mind briefly into the back of the truck. He could see them waking. He quickly returned his focus to the road.
“What are we going to do?” Jane asked.
“I’m not stopping,” he responded, gripping the wheel harder.
“And what if they stop us?”
“Then we’ll defend ourselves, of course,” he said gruffly. He took her hand and pushed the accelerator to the ground.
Michael heard Morris’ voice, and it roused him from the gentle sleep he had fallen into. Before his eyes had barely opened, he reached for the glass he had stashed next to him and placed it on the floor in the centre of the cabin. Quickly, the others began to wake up. Michael pulled hard on the tarp; the metal clasps clicked in rapid succession as he ripped it away from its holding. It flew out into the night air and disappeared.
He could see the open road now, and the wind blew around him violently, vanishing all traces of sleep. The road was clear except for the series of black unmarked cars and—he was shocked to see—even larger vehicles behind and flanking them. The two cars in front had lights positioned on their roofs; these cast a flashing, multi-colored glow over the road around them. He squinted at the brightness of the flashing lights. Then he felt the pull of the truck and saw the ground speed by faster as they began to accelerate. That was good; the faster they moved, the better the chance that what he was planning to do would enable their escape.
He looked down and unwrapped his small cache of projectiles. The glass was jagged and splintered; he dared not touch any of the pieces. For a brief moment, as he looked down at it, now glinting with odd, multi-colored lights, he hesitated and felt the familiar mix of emotions he associated with the people who were pursuing them: fear, contempt, loathing. A steel expression came over his face then as he ignored the surging feelings. This was followed by a defiance he had never felt before. He selected a large piece of glass, about six inches long, with an extreme, jagged tip, and focussed on it.
It had been six months since he had accessed the power. Even before then, he hadn’t used it much, as his family had been perturbed by it, but he had no choice now. He reached out with his thoughts and felt the jagged edges with his mind’s eye. Then he willed the glass to move. After a long second during which nothing happened, he felt the energy that he did not understand flow from his consciousness. He watched as the glass rose from the floor and into the air in front of him. It hovered there, abiding his mind. He cupped his hands underneath it and looked up at the cars just as his ears filled with a blaring message from their speakers.
“PULL OVER IMMEDIATELY,” came a booming voice from the lead car, which accelerated and pulled forward to the left of their vehicle.
He looked back down at the glass, knowing his target now, and sent into it the energy that had built up in his palms. The glass rocketed across the dark night, a chimera-like spear. It hit the car just above the back wheel for which he had been aiming and broke into pieces. The car swerved slightly as the driver reacted, not knowing what had happened. Michael saw the driver return his focus to him, his face now contorted into shock.
Damn, he thought. He looked back down at the glass and selected the next largest piece. He lifted it and once again focussed on his target. The glass flew from his hands, and this time he felt the minute shockwave rock back into him as the glass punctured the forward tire on the nearest vehicle. The sound of the exploding wheel filled the night air, and the car swerved violently to the side of the road as the driver slammed on the brakes. Michael heard the sound of screeching tires as the driver struggled to maintain control, but at that speed, he didn’t have a chance. The car swerved three hundred and sixty degrees and skidded off the side of the road, coming to a sudden stop. The car behind barely had time to curve around the careening vehicle to avoid crashing into it.
Immediately, this car accelerated to fill the gap. Without hesitating, Morris selected the next piece of glass and, more efficiently this time, lifted it into the air. Then he rethought his strategy and looked back at the glass. He focussed on several more pieces and raised them, too. He aimed all four pieces at the front tires and fired. The shards of glass hit the target immediately, and once again the driver swerved, trying to maintain control of his vehicle as it veered to the edge of the road. It slowed down, receding into the darkness behind the other vehicles.
Whatever you’re doing, Mike, keep doing it, he heard Morris’ voice echo clearly in his mind.
He looked down at the glass. There were seven or eight pieces left.
I don’t know how long I can keep this up, he called back as other unmarked cars pulled into the space that had been vacated by the dispatched vehicles. There were four of them left—two cars and two other, larger vehicles.
We need to block the road somehow, he heard Jane say.
He raised another piece of glass, focussed intently on the front wheel of one of the nearest vehicles, and fired it. The glass hit the chassis just above the wheel and smashed. The driver looked up at him and gritted his teeth as he pulled on the steering wheel to adjust his trajectory. Michael locked eyes with him for a moment, totally unafraid now that this new power was flowing through him. Ciara came from behind and looked over Michael’s shoulder.
I have an idea, she said. Morris, you’ll have to go a little faster. Put some distance between us and them.
Okay, Morris replied clearly.
Michael heard their conversation and waited for them to carry out their new plan.
Lucas watched as yet another car was dispatched with an effortless grace that was disturbing. He looked up at the vehicle in front of him, and at the teenager sitting on the floor, manipulating the glass with extreme ease. Lucas wanted nothing more than to reach out the passenger window and take a shot at him, but he was too far back. Perhaps he would have taken this action if he were in one of the last remaining cars, now accelerating to get closer to the vehicle.
He was in pain, and he knew he had a mild concussion from what Jane had done to him. He was tempted to reach around and place a hand on the back of his head, where it had impacted the door, but he ignored the thought. “Go up to their left, cut them off,” he said gruffly, addressing the car in front through a communications channel that was continuously open. He ignored the light-headed feeling that shadowed his mind.
“Got it,” he heard the voice come back to him and watched as the front car accelerated towards the side of the vehicle. Then he watched in frustration as the truck carrying the ethereals accelera
ted dramatically and pulled away from the car in front. He could see Jane’s dim image in the side-view mirror of the truck as it sped away from him. He slammed his hand on the dashboard.
The truck was a hundred metres in front of the forward car when his driver hit the brakes and came to a sudden halt. Lucas felt the safety harness squeeze his torso, and he struggled for air as the sound of screeching tires filled the world around him.
They had stopped. He looked up.
It took a long moment for him to comprehend what he was seeing. There was a lion standing in the middle of the road. It was staring straight at them, illuminated by the front car’s lights. It was male; Lucas could tell from its lush, thick mane. He was immediately mesmerised by its beauty. Its form was perfect, as though every fibre of its body had been delicately crafted cell by cell, as though it hadn’t been born through the rough, jagged process of evolution.
Nothing else about it was unnatural, though, he thought as the lion turned towards them. It regarded them serenely for a moment, then opened its mouth and roared, shattering the new silence of the night around them. The sound hit Lucas’ body, a shockwave that sent adrenaline pumping through him. He began to gasp. He wanted to put his hands to his ears, but kept them fastened to his knees in a vise-like grip. His heart was beating hard in his chest as the lion’s tail swished from side to side.
The lion stared at them a moment longer, and Lucas felt as though its eyes were penetrating his mind. It was as though, somehow, the lion knew every single thing about them—every wrong they had done and every trick they had ever pulled in their lives. This creature knew them. Then, after a few more moments, it looked into the open space beyond the side of the road and walked away casually into the night, disappearing into the darkness step by step with its tail swinging slowly from side to side.
Lucas’ jaw clenched and his teeth came together in an audible grinding sound.
“Would somebody like to tell me what the hell just happened?” he blurted after a moment. He looked at his driver, who shrugged his shoulders and returned his gaze nervously to the road.
“DAMN!” Lucas spat as he slammed his hand on the dashboard.
“What did you do?” Michael looked up at Ciara, who was standing over him, holding onto the handles attached to the roof of the truck.
“A projection. I made them see something that wasn’t there.”
Michael’s brow furrowed in amazement. “None of us have ever done anything like that before.”
“No, I guess not. Not any of us. I used to know somebody, though…Danny. He could do it pretty easily.”
“Who was he?”
“Just an old friend. I don’t want to talk about it.” She looked down at the black road as it sped past them. “Sorry, Mike, no offence,” she said, smiling.
“No problem. Maybe another time?”
“Right, sure.” She smiled at him again.
Jane watched the cars receding in her mirror as Morris pulled away, then saw them come to an abrupt stop. Ciara relayed to Jane information about what she had done. Jane felt a swell of pride that one of them—any of them—had been able to pull off such an ingenious trick.
“That’s incredible,” Morris said with a smile. He was still driving fast, trying to put more distance between them and the cars, lest the vehicles decide to pursue them once again.
“Yeah, it really is. Makes me wonder what we’re all capable of.” Jane smiled, but already her thoughts were elsewhere. Her fear of the cars was fading away, and she was thinking about Max again. She wondered where he was; she was worried about his wellbeing. She quivered when she thought about the way he had been taken from them. It was sudden and violent, and it certainly spoke of someone’s anger. He appeared to have been pulled—ripped—from their reality, and she had felt him go.
In the time she had become accustomed to his presence, she noticed that she could feel his essence; once she was outside the facility, his presence could be detected easily if she focussed hard enough. But when he had disappeared from the warehouse, he was gone completely—she could not sense him anywhere. She looked up at the stars. It felt that Max was just as far away as they were—unreachable.
Beyond that, there were the weighty concerns of the things he had told her on the majestic road. Words like disaster and catastrophe occupied her mind briefly before she turned her head and looked out the window, pushing the thoughts from her mind forcefully.
She reached into her pocket and retrieved the glass butterfly she had first formed in the darkened forest under his tutelage. It glinted in the moonlight as she ran her fingers over it. A single tear rolled down her left cheek; she wiped it away. She looked once again out the window at the passing road.
Lucas would still pursue them. They knew now that others would pursue them, too. Without Max, she thought they would be in serious trouble. There were only so many tricks they could pull before they would probably falter…and fail. Their machinations had proved effective so far, but Jane had a sudden fear that they had seen only the smallest glimpse of what lay in store: only the tip of the spear.
She grasped the glass ornament tightly in her hand.
She imagined herself and her small group of friends facing off against Lucas, backed by an army of others like him. They would stand no chance against such forces. So they did the only thing they could: they drove on into the night and hoped.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
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