Allie's War Season One (8 page)

Feeling my stare, he turned. His eyes appeared cold even in the morning sun.

I tried to raise a hand...

And the motion of my arm was abruptly stopped.

I stared down at the handcuffs for a full minute before the reality of them penetrated. It struck me that my wrists were bare apart from the metal rings. So were my ankles; the GPS was gone but my ankles were now bound with hard plastic, like those tie-binders they used on reality cop shows. Leaning back, I used my weight to try and budge the only object I thought I had some chance of influencing, namely the plastic armrest.

When it stayed firmly affixed to the door, I looked up at him again, watching him stare at me. I translated his expression as disinterested puzzlement.

He didn’t try to stop me as I continued to test my limits of motion. My whole body hurt; I was bruised, dirty and felt half-naked under the dog-smelling blanket, even though I was reasonably sure I still wore the same clothes I had at work. My throat hurt. I was insanely thirsty. My neck had crimped while I slept against the car door. I thought about my mom in a kind of blurred panic. I started to scream, but that got a reaction from him.

“Be silent!”

His words jarred me. I’d forgotten about the German accent.

When I shut up, his eyes lowered, along with his voice.

“Don’t make me knock you unconscious.” He shifted in his seat, as if uncomfortable, or maybe just hearing his own words. “I would rather not.”

Hesitating, he glanced at my wrists.

My eyes started their waterworks thing. I couldn’t help myself. “Please don’t kill me,” I said. “Mom’s not even over dad yet...she’d never be able to handle this. She might really kill herself, I mean it...she’ll drink herself to death...”

His gaze drifted out the window. He seemed to sigh.

“Please! Mister, I...” My cheeks burned before I’d even said it. “I was always supportive of seer’s rights,” I ventured. “I was never one of those people who—”

He laughed, startling me back into silence.

Unsure how to go on from that, I was still fumbling with words when he turned, his eyes like two flat stones.

“I do not wish to kill you,” he said. “I am sorry for your mother. I truly am. There is nothing I can do.”

I absorbed his words.

I felt the blood slide from the veins in my face when it occurred to me that he really wasn’t letting me go. With the GPS gone, even the cops wouldn’t know where I was. Clearly, they’d be looking for me, though. I glanced out the dusty windows in a kind of desperation, but only saw a semi-truck a few hundred yards ahead.

When a car began to pass a lane over, I shrieked, banging on the glass.

He grabbed my arm, one-handed, forcing me around, so that I faced him. The strength behind his fingers made my muscles lock.

“No,” he said sternly, as if talking to a dog. “Do not make me put you to sleep.” His eyes flickered between mine. “If you need to hear it again, I will talk. Do you agree?”

I felt my muscles unclench as a part of me deflated.

Probably not a good idea to piss off the murdering seer who could read my mind and had me handcuffed to his car.

“Yeah,” I said. “Okay. Sure.”

He released my arm, returning his gaze to the road.

But he didn’t talk.

We drove in silence while I massaged my wrist. When I glanced up next, he was staring at my bare thigh, which had shifted out from under the ugly, gray blanket he must have put over me after he knocked me out.

Slowly, I retracted my leg, hiding it back under the blanket.

I’d forgotten all those other stories about seers.

Frowning, he averted his gaze. “I haven’t seen you in the flesh in a long time.” He gestured vaguely with one hand. “You are...larger.”

I said, “Oh.”

“You are safe with me, Alyson.”

I let out a low snort. I couldn’t help it.

“You say that a lot,” I muttered.

My fingers clutched the chain between the metal bracelets. I tried to think if there was any way I could talk him into unlocking the handcuffs...then remembered he could read my mind. That pretty much limited my options.

“Yes,” he agreed neutrally.

I faced him, biting my lip.

“So what are you?” I said. “A terrorist? One of those ‘unaffiliateds’ who want a seer nation? What?”

He made that soft clicking noise with his tongue. I watched him do it, fascinated in spite of myself. I remembered reading somewhere about seer language, how they used sign language in addition to verbal and telepathy.

“Alyson,” he said. “Killing him bought us time only. I’d prefer not to waste it while you assume my agenda is that of fictitious seers portrayed on your human news.” He glanced at my face. “I was sent to bring you back to our world. That is all. I would only kill you––”

Letting out a shriek, I slammed my shoulder against the door and window.

The man grabbed my forearm, roughly.

Once more, I found myself staring up at his face.

“...I would only kill
both of us
if my attempt failed. If I failed, Allie. Understand?”

I found myself staring back and forth between those clear, glass-like eyes. As I did, my shoulders relaxed involuntarily.

“No,” I said. “I don’t understand.”

“But you believe I will not hurt you.” I heard relief in his voice. “Good. That is good.” He released my arm, putting both hands back on the steering wheel. “We can talk now.”

But he didn’t talk.

I watched in disbelief as he sank deeper into the cloth driver’s seat, wincing from the gun wound in his shoulder.

“So you’re from another world,” I prompted, when he didn’t look over. “I remember reading some conspiracy theory about that...that seers are really aliens who seeded us from another galaxy.” I leaned against the car door, trying to find a comfortable place for my arms. I couldn’t, so eventually I gave up. Exhaling, I added, “I also heard one where you were all victims of some disease...or an asteroid that hit the earth back in the early years of human evolution.”

His eyes flickered to mine, reflecting puzzlement.

“Seriously,” I said. “If this isn’t about the terrorist thing, what do you want? Money? I don’t have any. Sex? There are easier ways, man. You’re not a bad-looking guy. One of my friends thought you were hot. I don’t know how she feels about seers, but knowing Cass, she’d try anything once.”

He frowned slightly, his eyes flickering back towards the road.

“Did someone hire you?” I said. “Do I have a
rich
crazy stalker this time?”

“You are the Bridge,” he said. “The Harbinger.”

“Great,” I said. “That’s what the other guy said.”

The man’s mouth firmed to a line. I got the sense my words irritated him, though.

“Terian likes his little games,” was all he said.

I waited, wondering if he would say more. But he didn’t.

Biting back impatience, I shook my head, as if to clear it. “So what kind of accent is that? German? I didn’t think any seers even lived in Europe anymore. I thought you were all in Asia, with the exception of a few who worked directly for—”

“You are not human, Alyson.”

When he didn’t say anything else, I broke into a shaky laugh.

“Okay. So you want to play that game again? Well, I’ve been tested, man. Like,
hundreds
of times. So pardon me if I think you’re full of shit. Whatever you’re trying to do, framing me as some kind of über-seer, Syrimne-wannabe, I don’t appreciate being the fall guy for whatever takeover trip you’ve got planned...”

He reached out without a word and laid a hand on my leg.

It wasn’t a sexual thing that time, but I sucked in a breath anyway, feeling him all around me, invisible hands shoving at me, pushing me out of my body until...

...I feel myself leaving.

I couldn’t stop it.

The car disappeared around me like a shadow in brilliant light. The road disappeared too, along with the mud-spotted windshield, the plastic saint statue glued to the dashboard, the handcuffs, my bruised legs, his shirt collar with the dried blood...

I passed through what felt like a stretched membrane...

...AND FIND MYSELF once again in that endless black and violet sky.

The colors shock me back into remembrance.

I remember this, from when we walked the streets of San Francisco.

Here, though, we are alone, surrounded only by distant stars and lumbering clouds. It is more than I can take in...the stars, the strange river-like currents I can feel, flowing above and below where we stand, filled with flecks of different-colored lights. A kind of prismatic wind ripples veins in my limbs, penetrating my light-filled skin.

I could spend hours looking only at him.

He stands beside me in the night sky, carved in detailed gold and white light. Bones, muscles, teeth, veins, irises, hair and skin are replicated in a million subtle shades and hues, all moving so fast that the colors appear almost to be stable. I only see their movement as waves flicker through the whole, changing him subtly and silently.

The space directly over his head fascinates me the most.

A line rises up from the crown of his head, filled with complex structures.

There rotate light-filled geometries, like living math equations rendered in multiple shapes and dimensions. Whatever they are, they look complicated, structured, but also strangely alive. I sense something there, too. The man’s presence lingers around them of course, but I also get a feeling of, I don’t know...function, I guess...as if those structures have a use. Whatever they are, I definitely get the impression they’re more than just a bunch of pretty lights.

One thing is for sure: he is nothing like the man in the park.

His light shines with a subtle clarity that is vastly different than Terian...and yet, he is not soft here, either. His eyes are diamond white, carrying a faint edge.

I am still staring when he points.

I see nothing at first. Nothing but clouds and stars.

Then I see movement. Beings dart from and into those massive thunderheads.

They remind me of old woodcuts of tentacled leviathans surrounded by underwater forests. Some are singing. Watching them, I know I should be more afraid.

The man watches me look.

They will not hurt you,
he reassures me.
Those kind are harmless.

My mind pauses on “those kind” then decides not to pursue it.

Where are we?
I ask.

Instead of answering, he points down. Two long, twisting trails of light, one white and gold, the other a different shade of gold and white, loop languidly from our feet. I follow the course of those lights. At the bottom is a circle of blue daylight.

There, a black-haired man drives a car, blood staining the collar of his shirt. His hands grip a leather-wrapped steering wheel as he leans back in his seat, and next to him, a girl with matted blond hair with dark roots leans against the car door, her wrists handcuffed to the armrest.