The Elders Read online

He looks around without the usual confusion people get when they’re suddenly pulled into the Quiet, and when his gaze falls on Mira, he doesn’t react at all. That’s weird.

  Then he glances at me.

  His eyes look as though they’ve zoomed in on their target, all Terminator-like.

  Without blinking, he silently walks toward me.

  “Thomas, you won’t believe what’s happening—”

  My words are rudely interrupted by Thomas’s fist hitting me in the mouth. I taste the metallic tang of blood, and all I can think about is what Mira will say in her most vindictive tone: “I fucking told you so.”

  Chapter 2

  “Thomas!” I block his attempt to hit my Adam’s apple. “What the hell?”

  In answer, Thomas kicks my shin. With all my talking and confusion, I didn’t see the kick coming, and damn it, it hurt. The mixture of betrayal, incredulity, and resurfacing anger intensifies the pain.

  As Thomas moves to attack me again, I swerve out of the punch, but something else distracts me, something relevant to the fight at hand. A part of me—the part that’s been waking up during fights ever since I Joined with Caleb inside the head of the Israeli martial arts guru—registers that Thomas’s ‘interesting’ fighting style is Hapkido-inspired.

  As if to confirm my guess, Thomas grabs my arm as I move to hit him in the stomach, and overextends my elbow joint. An eruption of pain instantly follows. Then he throws me over his shoulder. Two Hapkido classics, I think as I sail through the air.

  As I’m about to hit the ground, the world slows a little, so I have some hope as I try, yet again, to phase into Level 2 of the Quiet. My fight with Thomas has recreated the conditions of my last phasing to a T: if I land on my head, I will break my neck and die.

  I hit the ground. Air rushes out of my lungs as I land on my back rather than on my head. Clearly, nothing happened as far as Level 2 phasing is concerned. The only result of my fall is the excruciating pain in my tailbone.

  “You will stop, Pusher.” Mira’s voice is cold and commanding. “Now.”

  Were she addressing me, I’d strongly consider stopping.

  I try to say, “Listen to her,” while I begin rolling over onto my stomach, but what comes out is a hiss as Thomas kicks me in my exposed side.

  A gunshot rings out.

  Thomas’s body falls on top of me.

  Is he dead? I’m torn between the hope that she did shoot him, which would stop the fight, and not wanting Thomas to get hurt, because, well, it’s Thomas. I haven’t yet accepted that he’s attempting to kill me for real; I could think of another explanation if people would just stop kicking my ass.

  When he grabs me in a headlock, I realize I was wrong—wrong about him being dead and wrong about his fighting style. This is more of an Aikido headlock. What I also know about this lock is that once you’re in it, you’re usually done for.

  “Darren, stay still,” Mira says.

  All I manage is an affirmative grunt. That done, I pretend like I’m choosing not to move in order to comply with her request.

  She fires another shot.

  Warm liquid sprays all over my body, and Thomas’s hold on me slackens.

  I try to move, but I’m not ready for that yet.

  Mira puts the gun’s safety back on and fumbles with Thomas’s body, rolling him off me. I immediately feel lighter.

  “Are you okay?” She gently touches my face.

  “How do I look?” I ask and spit blood. I wiggle a tooth with my tongue. That’s not good. Teeth are usually stable, unmovable objects.

  “You look . . . disturbing. Let’s get you out of here.”

  Cringing, I half crawl, half turn so I’m next to Thomas, and then I feel for his pulse.

  The heartbeat is there, though faint. His breathing is ragged, and I’m not sure how long he has.

  “You shouldn’t have done that.” I frisk Thomas for guns or any clue as to why he attacked me. No luck. “Unless I phase out, Thomas will be Inert.”

  “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” she says. “You’d rather he make you Inert?”

  “No, but—” I crawl away from him, toward my frozen self’s body.

  “He tried to kill you, probably to prevent you from overriding your would-be killers.” She nods in the direction of the cops. “Something you should actually do, by the way, and as soon as possible.”

  She’s right. If Thomas made me Inert, those cops would’ve shot me in the real world, which reminds me that she’s also right about this second point.

  I need to stop all these cops from shooting me. I only have a few moments to phase out and back in again. A few moments that would buy me the chance to reset my injuries, as well as Thomas’s. The cops’ hands are far enough from their guns to allow me this luxury.

  Deciding that crawling isn’t efficient enough, I get up, even though doing so makes me feel as if I’ve suddenly aged three centuries.

  Mira turns toward Thomas, drops to a crouch, and checks his pulse. She looks unhappy with what she finds.

  My heart sinks. I didn’t make it. He’s already dead, which means he’s now Inert.

  A part of me says, Oh well. Maybe it’s for the best.

  Then Mira stands up and aims her gun at him.

  I was wrong. She must’ve discovered that he still has a pulse and decided she wants it gone. She wants him Inert.

  It’s not clear to me why I do what I do next.

  With my body screaming in agony, I leap for my frozen self.

  I fall a foot away from me/him. I’m certain I just broke something else, as the pain is incredible. On the bright side, I feel on the brink of phasing, but I hit that mental wall again. If I could climb over it, I’d reach Level 2. Then again, I’ve hit this wall before with zero results.

  Mira hears me move and her big eyes widen in a ‘are you insane’ kind of look. Then her eyes narrow in realization.

  “Idiot,” she says and removes the gun’s safety.

  No Level 2 this time, I think and extend my shaking right hand, snaking it under my frozen self’s pant leg to touch the ankle. I feel the hairy leg under my fingers, and all my pain dissipates.

  The sounds of the world return, and in the next moment, after I phase back in, everything is still again.

  I’m back in the Quiet and all the injuries Thomas inflicted on me are gone, as are Thomas’s shot-up body and Mira.

  I let myself reflect on the fact that I didn’t hear Mira’s gunshot, which means Thomas isn’t Inert. Yay?

  I debate bringing her in, but decide against it. She’s probably pissed at me for thwarting her plan. I don’t want to deal with that right now, not until I secure the area.

  I walk to where my moms are standing. Even though I’m about to neutralize the cops as a threat, I Guide my moms to get on the ground in case my Guiding doesn’t go according to plan, and in case Thomas has a gun hidden where I couldn’t find it. I’m certain he doesn’t, since he would’ve used it to shoot me when he was attacking me, but when it comes to my family, I err on the side of caution. For good measure, I make sure they won’t notice if any shooting starts. They’re to ignore any violence that occurs in the next few minutes. I don’t care if my moms experience slight amnesia; safety comes first. With any luck, they’ll think they zoned out because of the priest’s monotone voice.

  Knowing my moms will be safely on the ground, I approach the uniformed officers.

  I find two female cops and Guide them to walk toward us, get on the ground, and cover my moms with their bodies. It may be overkill, but better safe than sorry.

  I then approach every officer and give the following Guiding instructions: You will not reach for your weapon. You will not move from this spot for the next twenty minutes. You are absorbed with emotions of loss, and you will not pay attention to anything but the ceremony. You are solemnly observing a few minutes of silence for the fallen hero.

  I give similar ‘ignore the world and don’t move’ instructions to the
rest of the civilian-clothed cops, as well as to the priest and the guys with rifles.

  When it comes to the Quarterback and a couple of other bigger-looking dudes, I give them a few extra instructions.

  Happy with my progress thus far, I walk back to my body and phase out.

  As soon as the world comes back to life, I phase in and out of the Quiet every fraction of a second to make sure the cops aren’t reaching for their weapons anymore.

  To my huge relief, on the fifth check, I find that they aren’t.

  I phase out of the Quiet again.

  “Area secured,” I whisper to Mira as soon as the sounds of the world return. “But just in case, be ready for anything.”

  She doesn’t reply. I guess the incident in the Quiet garnered me the silent treatment. Instead of worrying about Mira’s mood, I focus on my surroundings. After counting exactly two Mississippis, I spot movement in the direction of the cops.

  I also see Thomas taking a step toward me, the beginnings of a run.

  I return to the Quiet to make sure my extra Guiding worked. It did. The movement I saw in the corner of my eye was indeed my doing. I phase out and focus on Thomas.

  He’s running in earnest.

  The blur of movement coming from the crowd of cops gets closer.

  Thomas is mere feet away from us when the Quarterback smacks into him with all the grace of a horny rhinoceros. I don’t know that much about football, but this looks like great work to me. Thomas flies into the air—far into the air—and lands in the dirt that’s destined to go on top of Kyle’s casket. I hope the dirt softened his landing and try not to feel too guilty about what I made the Quarterback do to him.

  My guilt increases as the Quarterback falls on top of Thomas. He’s keeping my friend down until I can figure out what the hell is happening. The other larger officers form a makeshift human pyramid on top of them. As I recall from when this sort of thing happened to me, this doesn’t hurt the person on the bottom too much.

  Granted, this happened to me back in kindergarten.

  Suddenly, my world is filled with pain so visceral that my eyes water. Air escapes my lungs with an audible whoosh.

  Trying to comprehend what’s happening to me, I realize with a shudder that the pain is coming from my most treasured and intimate of places.

  I focus on inhaling air and not falling, and at the same time, I phase into the Quiet.

  Oh, the sweet relief. The pain is instantly gone. Its absence highlights just how bad it really was, and I feel as though I’ve been given a shot of morphine.

  From my new vantage, I see what happened and recoil in disbelief.

  Mira is frozen in the act of kicking me in the balls.

  Chapter 3

  Is she that pissed at me for stopping her from making Thomas Inert? We need to have a talk, I decide, and pull her in.

  “What the fuck, Mira?” I say as soon as she shows up in the Quiet. “If you’re upset with me, you can just say so. Do you have any idea how much that hurt?”

  Her eyes lock onto me and do that thing that Thomas’s eyes did.

  Before she takes a step, I remember the theory that had been on the tip of my tongue earlier, before she made me doubt Thomas. That theory would cover all the weird stuff that’s been happening.

  For good measure, I still ask, “Is this about Thomas being Inert?”

  Instead of answering, Mira closes the distance and attempts the exact move her currently frozen self is doing to my real-world body.

  Kick me in the nuts once, shame on you. Kick me there twice, shame on me. I put my arms in a crisscross block. The backs of my hands sting where her foot connects with them, but it’s nothing compared to what would’ve happened had I not blocked her kick.

  She swings at me with her fist, and I dodge her punch, my certainty about what’s going on increasing. All the pieces fit. The cops. The way Thomas looked at me and attacked me. The way he ignored Mira while we were fighting—a bad, irrational move. And the reason Mira is now intensely focused on attacking me.

  “You’re being Pushed,” I say as I step aside, dodging her punch.

  She staggers, swinging at me again.

  “Snap out of it!”

  She doesn’t reply and continues her relentless attack.

  I know I shouldn’t be offended that she hasn’t stopped—no one ever said that telling someone they’re being Guided will allow them to break out of the compulsion—but it’s hard to imagine that I’d ever attack her, even if someone did Push me. I feel as if I’d be able to exercise my free will somehow. Then again, she probably didn’t consciously hear me when I told her she was being Pushed. In her mind, she may not be fighting me right now, but rather some illusory enemy.

  If I can’t talk her out of it, I have to stop her some other way. I decide to go for something ungentlemanly that doesn’t cross the line into hitting a girl. Before I start, I remind myself that this is the Quiet, and Mira will only suffer for a brief moment—if one can even suffer while in the state of being Guided.

  I dodge a few punches, searching for my opening. When she moves to kick me, I see my chance. I catch Mira’s leg before she can inflict any damage. It hurts my palms, but hey, no pain, no gain. Firmly holding on to Mira’s foot, I unceremoniously raise it in the air.

  The result is as I hoped. Mira falls backwards. To my surprise and relief, she manages a soft landing, falling much more gracefully than I would have.

  Her landing isn’t important, but the freedom from her strikes is, as it gives me the opportunity to run up to my body—and I rush to do so.

  Seeing the pained look on my statue-like face reminds me that I’m about to return to something very unpleasant, but I touch my frozen self’s arm without hesitation.

  The world is back, as is the pain, which actually seems worse than before.

  I force another breath into my lungs and, clutching my family jewels, use every ounce of my strength to avoid falling on the ground. If I do, it will not end well for me.

  Mira doesn’t wait for me to recover. She capitalizes on my inactivity by punching me in the face.

  My cheekbone stings, but I ignore it. The pain is nothing compared to the blow my pride will sustain if a girl beats me to death.

  She aims her next punch at my stomach, and I manage to catch her wrist with my left hand. Without realizing what my body is doing, I move closer to Mira, the way I’ve done to initiate our million and one make-out sessions. Only this time, after I’m in her space, I circle around her. I bring her arm for the ride until it’s folded at an odd angle along her spine, ensuring that any movement will be extremely uncomfortable. If her kick to my balls didn’t preclude such thoughts, I’d find this position mildly erotic.

  She continues to struggle.

  Crap. I can’t rely on pain as a means to restrain her, not in this case. She’ll only hurt herself.

  I consider my options and do something that isn’t inspired by any martial arts training. I give her a tight hug from behind, pinning her arms to her sides. When she tries to twist out of my arms, I lock my fingers across her ribcage and hold on. Standing like this, with my crotch against her butt and the tips of my fingers brushing against her breasts, the situation goes from mildly erotic to full-on hot. Hey, Mira’s kick didn’t cause any permanent damage—that’s good news.

  All eroticism instantly vanishes when the back of Mira’s head connects with my face. Luckily, thanks to some martial-arts instinct, I leaned back in time. My chin hurts, but at least my nose isn’t broken. When Mira swings her head back again, I dodge. This hug maneuver is not sustainable.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I catch a blur of movement.

  Just what I need, I think and phase into the Quiet.

  The lady cops I Guided to protect my moms are moving in. I get inside each of their heads and change their directives, then return to the real world.

  I dodge Mira’s head-butts a few more times before help arrives.

  One butch-looking lady
grabs Mira’s shoulders from the front and the other pushes me aside. In a fluid motion, the cop locks her handcuff around Mira’s right wrist. Before I even register it, both of Mira’s hands are securely handcuffed.

  “That was smooth,” I tell the cop, even though she probably won’t remember it later.

  They gently lower Mira to the ground, ignoring her thrashing legs and screams.

  Handcuffed and disheveled, but still futilely trying to reach me, Mira looks like a hot zombie. It’s eerie.

  I phase into the Quiet.

  In the silence of my safe place, I can finally think about what’s happening.

  Someone is doing to my friends what I did to Kyle. Someone else can reach Level 2, the psychedelic netherworld that’s so unlike our everyday reality.

  This someone Pushed my friends.

  Did this person attempt to Push me too? I’m guessing not. If he or she had, it’s likely I would’ve been pulled into Level 2 with them. If they could get inside my head, they probably would’ve Pushed me to commit suicide, making this whole ordeal with my friends and the cops redundant.

  So who’s doing this?

  I recall the telltale signs of Pushing I discovered inside Kyle’s mind at the science conference, the signs I wanted to investigate but couldn’t because Kyle’s head was in the process of blowing up from Victor’s shot. Could the ‘voice’ in the minds of the cops belong to the same Pusher? Damn, I wish I’d Read Kyle far back enough to hear the actual Pushing instructions. Then I’d have some reference to compare this voice to.

  In a moment of political correctness, I decide to call this new mystery Pusher a ‘she’ until I know more details. Also, to distinguish her from all the others, and given what she can do, I decide to call her the Super Pusher. For all I know, I might be right, and it could be some powerful girlfriend that Kyle was dating without my knowledge. If the Super Pusher is actually a guy, well, calling him her is like calling him a bitch—which is fitting, since this individual is one.

  I walk around the graveyard and closely observe my surroundings. Wherever the Super Pusher is, I assume she wouldn’t have bothered walking too far in the Quiet to Push my friends, which means she might be hiding in this very cemetery. My guess is that it’s one of the Guides from the wake. She probably followed us to the cemetery and is now hiding like the coward that she is.