Invincible (25 page)

After Taylor and I talk for a couple of
hours, I rush back home, forcing myself to face the nightmare of Davidson and the Catchers teaming up to kill me.

As I burst into the living room. Brad and Alex—who were still in the same spots when I left—look at me with confusion upon their faces.

“What took you so long?” Alex asks.

“Nothing,” I say. “I just dropped Jack off and…went to Taylor’s house.”

“What?” Brad exclaims in surprise.

I shrug my shoulders, trying to pretend as though it wasn’t a big deal. “I went to go see her.”

My attention then turns to Alex, who on the other hand was furious as she leaps up from the couch.

“Are you serious?” she says. “We’re being hunted down by vicious aliens and a mad scientist, who could be tracking us down right this minute, and you’re at your girlfriend’s house playing
kissyface?!”

“Hey!” I snap back at her. “I had to see her one last time. Who knows if I’ll ever see her again?”

“You told her?” Brad asks, somehow putting together the meaning behind my words.

I nod my head. Alex stares at me for a moment, then sighs as
she falls back onto the couch.

“So what do we do now?” I ask.

“I’m not sure,” Alex says. “If what you and your friend are right, and the scientist is with the Catchers, it’s only a matter of time before they know where we are.”

I begin to pace the room, trying to figure out a plan. But after a while, nothing seems to come through.

“You’ve got anything yet?” Alex asks.

I stop in front of the couch and shake my head.

“Me neither,” she says.

Brad slowly sits up in his chair. “I don’t get it,” he says. “I mean, are the Catchers really that bad?”

Alex whips her head towards Brad and looks at him with an angered expression, as if he had just insulted her.

“Yes, they are,” she hisses. “They are the most dangerous and lethal creatures this universe has ever seen. They can’t be underestimated. That’s how our planet got destroyed. They see something they like, they kill it, destroy it, and when they think there’s nothing left, t
hey move on to someplace else.”

Brad looks at Alex with a sympathetic face, feeling ashamed of what he said to her.

It took me a while for Alex's words to sink in. The choice of words, and the tone in which she used them were unlike anything I've ever experienced from her.

How did she get like this? Back on Iarnam, she was so gentle, so kind, her spirit a beautiful dandelion blooming in the spring. Now all of that was pushed to the back burner. I could still see glimpses of it, but other than that, all that laid in front of me was the soul of a raging bull.

Was this what the war had done to her? Turned her into a heartless monster, full of violence and rage?

“The point is,” she says, “once they’ve started, they’ll never stop.” She then turns around to face me. “Never.”

My body begins to tense. It never crossed my mind that the Catchers would stop at nothing to get

me. Maybe it was because I didn’t want to face that idea. Because I didn’t want to have the thought on my mind. But it didn’t m
atter anymore. Now that Alex had said those words, there was no way they could ever be taken back.

“How do the Catchers work?” I ask, trying to ignore the comment. “Do they track us in packs, or do they go altogether? How do they know where to find us?”

“They usually move around in groups,” Alex explains. “Only a majority of them follow their leader, Kantos.”

“Kantos?” I say.

My mind goes back to earlier today. The man I saw at the gym. The one who’d ordered the attack against me. It was him. He was their leader.

“I saw him,” I say. “He was at the school when they started to attack.”

“Really?” Alex asks.

“Yeah.”

Alex shakes her head in a slow manner as Brad looks at both of us with eager eyes.

“But I still don’t understand,” I say.
“How could they have found me?”

“I think you know the answer to that,” Brad says.

I look at Brad in confusion, trying to comprehend his words. I play them back in head, and by the time I make sense of it all, I am unable to breathe.

“Lion-Man,” I whisper.

That’s how they know who I am. I’ve been all over the papers and TVs that they could easily spot me. That’s how they found me at school. That’s probably how they got to Davidson.

I began to think about Davidson again and how he got involved in this situation, and I realized that the Catchers had more in plan for him than just interrogating him for random information.

He was able to read my mind. That was how he could sense my fear of him in the lab. That’s how he knew I was suffering from amnesia and was able to know my name. It only makes me wonder how much
did
he know in those brief moments?

My mind only comes to one answer. If he had known all of those things, what could’ve stopped him from knowing other things? Things about Brad? About Jack? About Taylor?

Before I knew it, I was outside of the living room, with my phone in my hand, dialing Taylor’s number.

“Taylor?”

“Troy!” Taylor’s voice yells thorough the phone.

“Tayl
or!” I yell back, my heart starting to beat rapidly.

Taylor’s voice doesn’t respond back to me. All I could hear now was silence. What was happening? Was I right?
Was what I had predicted true?

My question was answered as soon as I heard a voice return to the phone. But it wasn’t Taylor’s. In its place was a cold and familiar disturbing voice, chuckling at me through the phone.

The phone crumbles underneath my fingers. The fact that Taylor was captured by Kantos and the Catchers set me off. So much anger was building up inside me that there was no chance of it disappearing lightly.

I turn back to the living room, where Brad and Alex are now standing up from their seats, looking at me with puzzled expressions.

“They’ve got her,” I growl, walking back into the room.

“What?” Brad says. “How is that even possible?”

“Davidson can read minds,” I say impatiently. “They’re using him because he read mine’s. He must’ve told them about Taylor, and that’s how they got to her.”

“Well, what
are you going to do?” he asks.

As I try to calm myself—which wasn’t helping much—I realize that there is only one thing to do.

“I’m going to get her,” I say.

I ran upstairs to my room to retrieve my costume. After I put it on, I leave the room and start to head out towards the front door.

“Troy, wait!” Brad pleas behind me. “This is insane! You don’t even know where she is.”

“I don’t care!”
I snap, whipping the door open.

“Well, at least let me go with you,” I hear Alex say.

I was almost off the porch when I whip my head towards her.

“No,” I hiss. “I have to do this. This is my fight.”

“
Your
fight?” says Alex.

She walks down the stairs in a fury, looking at me the same way she did with Brad when he asked about the Catchers’ motives. She stops and stands a few feet away from me, looking at me as if she were planning to cut me with one of her knives.

“I don’t know if you remembered this or not, but they killed our family,” she says. “Whether you like it or not, that makes this is
our
fight.”

But Alex was wrong. Although I was furious about the Catchers kidnapping Taylor, that wasn’t the only reason I was going after them. They had put me through so much. Because of them, I’ve lost my home, my parents, and now they’ve taken the only thing I have left to care about in my life. This was my fight as mu
ch as anyone else’s.

“I haven’t forgotten,” I say.

“Then let me help you,” she says. “I’m sick and tired of running, tired of fighting, tired of it all. This ends tonight.”

The way she looks at me leaves me stunned. It wasn’t a look I’ve seen on her before. The way her eyes meet mine, looking as though they’re asking for ac
ceptance, begging for approval.

I realized at that moment that Alex was feeling the same way I was, that she wanted to confront the Catchers and kill them for what they did to us. Only I was leaving her out, casting her aside, when we really should be fighting together. Not just as family, but as people.

“Okay,” I agree. She slowly nods her head, smiling at me. “Can you find out where they’ve taken her?”

“I can try,” she says, s
lightly worried.

She then takes a deep breath and spaces out. It was almost the same look she had when she was helping me regain my memory, but this time it was

completely different. The best way to describe it would be a blank stare, showing no emotion as her mind drifts away, searching for the Catchers.

A few seconds later, she comes back to reality, gasping and almost falling back behind t
he steps, as if what she had seen had just knocked her out.

“Did you find them?” I ask.

She nods her head, still trying to relive herself from the impact of the search.

“Ambassador Bridge,” she says.

I nod my head in assurance, and then face Brad, who still watches us with a worried expression.

“Call Ryan,” I say. “Tell him that a girl is being held hostage at the Ambassador Bridge.”

He nods his head and runs back inside the house. I then face Alex, who seems to have fully recovered.

“Let’s go,” I say.

Alex nods her head as I turn around and fly into the sky. I look below the house to find her nowhere in sight. I began to wonder where she went, but as I look up, I find her floating a few feet away from me.

“I’ll lead the way,” she says, flying away into the distance.

I then follow her without question. And there wasn’t any doubt in my mind why I shouldn’t. As long as Taylor is in the hands of those monsters, I couldn’t waste another minute.

We finally arrive to the bridge, and I was devastated by what lied in front of us. Vehicles flipped over, citizens running to safety, fire at every corner. It was like Iarnam all over again.