The Darkest Legacy by Alexandra Bracken
He thought this might happen, I realized. He must have.
I tore open the drugstore bags, picking through the boxes of medicine and food until I found the bottles I needed. One, the metoprolol, was in pill form and the other, haloperidol, was in liquid form.
The syringe—that’s why I needed it. I found a box of them and dumped them out, clutching a handful. Neither of the boxes had instructions on how to administer them.
“Of course not, because it’s supposed to be done by a fucking doctor,” I muttered. “What the hell—?”
A sudden spark of power shot across my senses, burning through every other thought. My adrenaline kicked in as I straightened, searching for the source. Distant, but coming nearer. Three…four…five…six sparks. Low-grade power like…
Comms. Soldiers.
I pressed the medicine to my chest and bolted for the house, shoving the door open with my shoulder. My feet slid across the dusty floor, coming to a dead stop.
The bottles and syringes tumbled from my arms as I reached back and pulled out the gun I’d taken from Roman.
“Back. Up.”
Lana hovered beside Roman and Priyanka, staring at them through the curtain of her wild hair. She hadn’t touched them; she hadn’t seemed to have done anything to them. Yet.
The girl didn’t move. She only looked at me with that thousand-yard stare. “Where’s her medicine?”
“Back up,” I warned her again, switching the safety off.
The sparks were close now, just on the other side of the house. Another extraction team.
As soon as that thought registered, another came right on its heels: I still had my power.
“Blue star…”
My gaze shot back to Priyanka. She was trembling harder now, as if it were taking every last bit of strength she had to hold on.
“Blue star,” she was muttering, “blue star, blue star, blue star…”
The words tugged at something in my mind, some memory.
“That’s right, Pri. Figured it out, have you?” The girl was fixated on Roman’s and Priyanka’s stiff forms, watching through heavy-lidded eyes as they worked. Then, like puppets whose strings had been cut, they collapsed to the floor, still writhing. Lana ignored me, ignored the gun, and went for the medicine.
I fired a shot at the ground beside her, stopping her. Outside, the team of soldiers that had come to support her was gathering. I only had seconds before they stormed the house.
My gaze fixed on the other girl. Lana’s presence alone wasn’t what caused the suppression. She must have had to will it to happen, just like the rest of us. And right now, I was still free of it.
My silver thread of power wove through each of the sparks outside. I seized control of the batteries on their comm units and urged the electricity forward, tugging until I heard the soldiers begin to shout in agony.
All six power signatures went out. No new ones approached.
A few of the soldiers were still alive; I heard them groaning in pain. The first attack hadn’t been enough to erase the threat they posed. Not completely. The thread found another, bigger power source. The AC unit idling outside.
Lana looked up slowly, her eyes narrowing, and I seized that one last opportunity.
The explosion from the unit knocked us both off our feet, sending the gun sailing out of my hand. My vision blacked out as my head cracked against the ground.
When I came to, Lana had pushed herself up off the floor. She staggered to her feet, pressing a hand against a cut on her forehead. The back wall of the house was on fire. Tendrils of it raced along the floors and ceiling, pouring more smoke into the room.
She dropped down onto her knees beside the liquid medicine, clutching one of the syringes in her fist. She jabbed the needle into the open bottle and filled it with surprising care, eyeing the measurement.
Roman groaned from the ground, his legs curling in pain. He didn’t seem aware of his sister or the explosion. There was no world outside of whatever agony was scorching him from the inside out.
Lana crawled toward Priyanka, the syringe in her hand. I dove for her, tackling her back to the ground.
The lance of pain that skidded across my brain still caught me by surprise as Lana switched off my powers. Her elbow knocked me back. That same horrible rush of hot pins ran down my back, leaving a jagged, gaping emptiness, as if my abilities had been physically torn out from under my skin.
“You…” I choked out.
“She needs her medicine!” Lana growled at me. “I’m trying to help her!”
I lashed out a foot, knocking the syringe from her hand.
Something seemed to occur to her. A rare light entered her eyes.
“You don’t even know,” Lana taunted, her voice turning singsong. “You don’t even know! Aw, did you think they were your friends? Did they tell you some sad story about how very awful their lives have been?”
“They told me enough,” I said, as we circled each other. Lana licked her lips, obviously relishing this. “They told me about the Psion Ring.”
Her face screwed up. “The Psion Ring? What are you talking about? We were raised by Gregory Mercer—you’ve heard of him, haven’t you? I can see it in your face.”
Mercer. Blue Star.
The connection snapped into place. I did know that name. He was on Interpol’s wanted list for weapons trafficking. His had been one of the few crime syndicates to stay afloat and thrive after the United States’ borders had been closed during the Psi epidemic.
Blue Star. His organization.
Blue Star. Like the tattoo on Priyanka’s wrist. Like the tattoo Lana pushed up her sleeve to show me on her own wrist.
The cold shock of it left me standing in place, my feet frozen to the floor.
Liars. The word hissed through me, as bitter as it was ugly.
After everything, they’d still lied to me. The only difference was that this time, I’d been stupid enough to believe them.
Whatever happened to once bitten, twice shy? I asked myself savagely.
“Mr. Mercer made us. He cared for us,” Lana said. “My brother and Priyanka let someone else fill their heads with lies. They hurt him when they left, so badly, and I—” Her face hardened with rage. “They’ll need to answer for it. But the punishment won’t be as harsh, now that they’ve decided to come back with me.”
I straightened, unable to hide my surprise at the girl’s conviction.
“They don’t want to go back,” I told her, my throat raw from the smoke. “They want to help you get away from…from Mercer.”
“Do they?” Lana asked, her voice too sweet for the dark look on her face. “Why else would they be here, turning on the server and helping Mercer? That little worm wouldn’t give us the actual server location. He would only give us remote access to it after we extracted him from the house.”
“Who’s he?” But I knew. I already knew.
Anger, as helpless as it was scalding, poured through me. It was impossible. Clancy’s memory was locked down. How could he remember where he’d left a server in his past life enough to—The rest of her words caught up to me.
Extraction. Clancy had asked Blue Star to get him out of his house. Out of Charleston.
Somehow, he remembered.
Lana only smiled. “The boss’s business is his own.”
Behind her, a section of the wall collapsed. Neither of us so much as flinched.
“You don’t believe me,” she said. Reaching into her jacket’s pocket she pulled out a familiar black device. The spare battery. “Tell me, why was Priya carrying the tracker from the drone? Why did she switch it on, if she didn’t want me to come get them?”
I drew in a sharp breath, choking on it. The blood left my head so rapidly it felt as if the floor were tilting up underfoot.
If we keep chasing her, she’ll run farther and faster, Priyanka had said. We have to find a way to get her to come to us.
Oh, Priyanka, I thought, glancing toward her
“She wasn’t telling you she wanted a pickup,” I told Lana. “She was luring you into a trap. And you fell right into it.”
Lana’s face transformed, hardening with rage. Her top lip peeled back, and it was my only warning before she charged.
The wind rushed out of me as she drove her head into my gut, knocking us both to the ground. I shoved back at her as she hissed and clawed, pinning me, her knees locked tight to my side. I tried kicking her off as her fist slammed into my cheek.
“It was you, wasn’t it?” she screamed into my face. “You’re the one who changed them! You’re the one who took them away!”
Don’t let them get you on your back. Vida’s voice floated through my mind as dark spots clouded my vision. You’ll never be able to get up again.
I wheezed. She leaned over me, her hands around my neck.
Get back up….
My nails were broken or gone altogether, but they still left ragged marks across her nose and brow as I raked them across her face.
“I don’t have to bring you back alive,” she told me. “It’d be easier for him if you were gone. It will be easier.”
Her pupils dilated until her irises were nearly gone, and the hate in her expression made my skin feel like it was being flayed off even before the boiling agony filled my skull. It blew apart my last thoughts. My feet drummed on the ground beneath us, my whole body writhing in pain as my vision feathered with black.
At the edge of awareness, I heard the explosive crack of a gunshot and the pressure and pain suddenly eased across my whole body. With the weight off my chest, smoky air rapidly filled my lungs. I gasped and coughed, fighting the phantom hands still squeezing my throat.
Lana stood, staggering back toward the small kitchen. Her palm pressed against her shoulder. But there was no blood; the bullet hadn’t pierced through skin or muscle. There was only a rip in her jacket where the shot had grazed over the leather.
Roman had found the gun I’d lost and had lifted his torso off the ground just enough to get the shot off. I wasn’t sure which one of them looked more stunned by what he’d done. “Lana—wait!”
She turned and vanished through the smoke, and, in an instant, I knew I hadn’t taken out all the soldiers. Two figures, their pale faces burned to a painful, angry red, emerged out of the darkness of the kitchen, charging forward. Roman fired again, downing one of them, but the other already had him in his sights.
An enraged scream filled the house. Priyanka, illuminated by fire, was on her feet now. Every muscle in her body looked strung too tight as she gripped the server rack and hauled it, and all the attached devices, up off the ground as if it weighed nothing. She threw it at the soldier hard enough for it to crack the floor as it fell on top of him.
“Priya!” Roman shouted, his voice strangled. “Stop!”
She charged toward the man, crossing the room faster than I could blink. Shoving the server rack out of her way, she knelt on his chest, clasping her hands together high over her head and slamming them down on his face. Her movements were so erratic and sharp it felt like I was watching a film skip through frames.
She was too fast. Too strong. I could see her pulse beating through her skin, racing harder and harder as she drove her hands down.
Roman crawled forward, snatching up the syringe that Lana had filled. Priyanka was still turning the man’s face into a bloody pulp when he stumbled up behind her and pressed the needle into her neck, jamming down the plunger.
“No!” she howled, swatting at it. “I’m not finished! This isn’t enough!”
Her arm knocked Roman hard enough to send him sliding across the room. He collided with the bottle of pills and snatched it up, struggling to get the lid off.
Priyanka shot to her feet with almost inhuman ease, her eyes too glassy and too bright. There was a predator’s focus to her expression. “Where is she? Where did she go?”
“I’ll—I’ll show you,” I rasped out, standing on unsteady legs.
“Stop her!” Roman said, panic ringing in the words. “Don’t let Priya leave!”
The servers still had a lick of power left in their warm bodies. As I passed the rack, I brushed my leg against one of them, catching that slight charge and carrying it forward that last foot of distance to Priyanka.
The snap of faint voltage jumped from my fingers to her skin. She straightened, her eyes wide as it momentarily stunned her. It was just enough time to wrap her up in my arms and pin hers to her side.
Roman pressed the pills into her mouth, holding his palm over it to keep her from spitting them out. Priyanka fought both of us. Her too-fast pulse pounded against my skin as her muscles and ligaments turned to steel.
“You have to swallow them, I’m sorry, I know,” Roman was saying. “Please, take them, just take them—”
I could tell she hadn’t meant to, but she did. Sweat streaked Roman’s face as he pulled his hand back.
“Lana,” she cried, still trying to get away. Her pulse was slowing, though, the strength sapping out of her. “No…. Let me help….Please…I’m…not…”
“What did you give her?” I demanded.
“A sedative and…” Roman pressed his hand against his head. “And something to keep her from having a stroke.”
Distant sirens underscored his words.
“Shit,” he said, pulling Priyanka’s arm around his neck. I retrieved the gun he’d used, then moved to her other side. Her legs had turned to sand beneath her, forcing me to absorb her weight.
“We have to get out of here,” Roman said, blinking rapidly. Sweat dripped from my face. The smoke was making it hard to think, and if we stayed any longer, the roof would fall in on us.
But Roman seemed almost as unsteady as Priyanka. We made slow, staggering progress across the yard. The heat from the fire roared at our backs.
When we reached the car, Roman struggled to open the back door, his hand slipping off the handle like he couldn’t get a grip on it.
“I’ll do it! Just go start the car!” I ordered. It still felt like Lana’s hands were on my neck, choking the words out of me by force.
Roman nodded, stumbling to the front of the car. The engine started just as I had gotten most of Priyanka’s long body through the door. My muscles sang in relief as I laid her in the backseat. I checked her pulse one more time, satisfied to find it slow and steady.
“Did you see where Lana went?” Roman asked, his voice thin.
Fury swelled in me again as I threw the front passenger door open and slammed it shut behind me. “She got away.”
He brought both hands down on the steering wheel and swore again, this time in what I assumed was Russian.
“No,” I told him. The emergency vehicle sirens were closer now, maybe only a few streets away. “You don’t get to be angry about this. Just drive!”
Roman didn’t move. He searched the street with a desperation that might have broken my heart in any other circumstance. So I did the only thing I could think of. I pulled the gun on him.
I gritted my teeth. “Drive.”
He reached down for the stick shift, moving it out of park. The sedan lurched forward, banking up on the curve before slamming back down onto the road again. The engine revved as he tore onto the next street.
The static was back, pouring through my skull. The lights on the dashboard flickered.
“Tell me what’s going on,” I said, keeping the gun steady. I pressed my back up against the window, putting as much distance between us as I could. In the backseat, Priyanka moaned something insensible. “Tell me about Blue Star—what it has to do with any of this!”
Roman’s eyes blinked rapidly, color draining off his face like ink bleeding from wet paper. One of his fists came up to mash against his temples, beating against it. His breath fluttered in and out of his bloodless lips, which pulled back in obvious agony.
“Stop it,” I whispered. The gun shook in
“Take…” he began. The car lurched right before he straightened it again. “Take…the…wheel….”
It was the last thing Roman said before he slumped forward in a dead faint.
I shot across the seat, gripping the wheel. The speedometer climbed up and up and up past eighty, ninety, a hundred. The road came to a dead end at a school under construction just ahead; the headlights skimmed over a yellow banner proudly proclaiming OPENING FOR THE BRIGHTEST MINDS NEXT YEAR!
There wasn’t time to pull him out of the seat. I climbed over him, sitting on his lap and kicking his foot off the gas. The car squealed as I slammed my foot on the brake and spun the wheel to the right until it finally locked.
The car skidded to a stop, but not before bumping the scaffolding surrounding the sign. The banner fluttered down onto the hood of the car.
Then, finally, everything was still.
“What…” I breathed out, “the…fuck…is going…on?”
I SAT ON THE EMPTY dirt road, between the beams of the two headlights. The same dust we’d kicked up speeding down the deserted country lane still floated lazily in the air, as if unable to settle itself. With the light blurring out the dark landscape, I could almost imagine that this was what it would be like inside an electrical current. Everything was aglow. Everything was simplified. I watched the hypnotic dance of the dust particles as they drifted down again and ignored the tide of dark thoughts as long as I could.
All along, I’d felt like I was missing at least one piece of this mess. So many aspects of it hadn’t made any sense, even after I found out about Lana. Some parts of it still didn’t.
I told myself that was the reason I hadn’t already left them on the side of the road. For a few minutes, I’d been angry enough to seriously consider it. The only thing more powerful than the suffocating feeling of betrayal, though, had been the need to know. To force the last few answers out of them, if I had to.