Mystics 3-Book Collection (76 page)

“Yeah, yeah, that.” said Simon. “So, the
agencies
knew
that it could happen. They knew all along,
didn’t they?”

Agent Franken closed his eyes for a moment.
“Not everyone believed in the Great Junction, but there were a few
who did, and a dozen UECs were made regardless. We’ve made some
minor adjustments to them recently, but overall, they are the
same.”

“So what exactly are they?” asked Zoey.

Agent Franken took in a
breath. “Weapons. Utron is an energy source—a very powerful one. It
produces explosive energy.”

“So, in other words, it’s
a
bomb
,”
Simon said.

“What!” Zoey stared at
Agent Franken’s bag on her lap like it might explode.

Even though she couldn’t
see through the bag, she knew the bag had two UECs in it. She
thought she might throw up.

Agent Franken saw the
distress on Zoey’s face. “Yes, I’d be very careful with
that.”

She was afraid that if she
moved just an inch, the bombs would go off.

“Don’t worry, my dear,”
said Agent Franken gently, “they’re quite safe now. They will not
detonate until they are opened. You have my word.”

Zoey swallowed hard. “And
how do we
open
them?”

She tried hard not to
visualize her body blown into little red bits as the entire Hive
exploded and vanished under a giant mushroom cloud.

“It’s quite simple,” said
the scientist. “You simply twist the capsule and lift the lid . . .
like opening a bottle.”

It wasn’t that Zoey
didn’t
believe
Agent Franken when he said that the UECs wouldn’t detonate,
it was just that she had never been so close to something so
unbelievably dangerous.

After a few moments, she
breathed a little easier, but she still felt uncomfortable with the
bombs resting on her lap.

“I’ve been listening to
your conversation,” said Agent Franken.

He hoisted himself higher
on his bed and focused on Zoey. “I believe that if there’s a chance
you can persuade the Minitians to help you, then you
must
try—our
world depends on it.”

Zoey looked away. She
didn’t want to be responsible for the end of the world.

“You know they can make us
invisible, don’t you?” said Zoey. “They have the ability to do it.
They’ll put a spell on us or something. Am I right?”

Agent Franken nodded
feebly.

He whispered almost to
himself. “Yes, the Minitians are very powerful sorceresses. They
could make an entire city invisible if they choose to. But the key
is to persuade them.”

He looked up at Zoey
again, his voice stronger.

“It’ll be
much
harder than
you think to convince them. They do not wish to interfere with the
Sevenths.”

From the way he was
talking, Zoey had a feeling that Agent Franken was holding back
some dark secret about the Minitians.

“Muttab will help,” she
said confidently, remembering the tall hooded figure with the white
face. “I know she will.”

“If you say so.” Agent
Franken didn’t look convinced.

“I really do hope you are
right, Zoey. And now you must leave an old man to recover. Go. The
world will only last about twelve hours if we don’t close the
portals. Otherwise there will be nothing left.”

“Twelve hours!” Simon
stared at the old man like he had just confiscated his favorite
video game. “But that’s like
half
a day!”

“Very good, boy genius,”
said Tristan.

Zoey saw the fear on Agent
Franken’s face. “Are you sure that’s all the time we
have?”

“I’m afraid it is. The
signs are everywhere now. Our world cannot hold on for much
longer.”

“Then we better get a move
on,” said Simon.

Zoey and Tristan eyed him
angrily, and he shrugged. “What? I hate being late for anything.
Even the end of the world.”

The end of the
world
, repeated Zoey in her head. It
was just too awful to think about.

Zoey scooped up Agent
Franken’s bag gently, like a newborn child. She felt like an
idiot.

“You want me to carry the
bombs, Zoey?” offered Tristan.

Zoey sighed and shook her
head. “Thanks, but no thanks. This is my burden. I should be
carrying them.”

She hoisted the bag’s
single strap over her head and fitted it across her shoulder like a
small messenger bag.

Tristan leaned towards
her. “Don’t start blaming yourself again. You have to stop. This
isn’t your fault—”

“Of course it is,” she
said stubbornly. “Well, partly.”

She took in a deep breath.
“I’m going to fix this, you’ll see.”

She sounded braver than
she felt at the moment, and she hoped that her friends and Agent
Franken didn’t sense the panic welling inside her. Just as she was
about to say goodbye to Agent Franken, she remembered
something.

“Um . . . Agent
Franken?”

The old man blinked up at
her. “Yes?”

“Where can I find the
Minitians?” asked Zoey uncomfortably. What good would their help be
if she couldn’t find them?

Agent Franken looked
puzzled. “And therein lies the first mystery . . . .”

“Excuse me?”

The science officer rubbed
his eyes. “No one knows. They live in a white-stone fortress that
keeps changing shape and disappearing. It moves from village to
village and never stays too long in one place. Only Minitians can
see it.”

“So how are we supposed to
find them?” Simon’s voice rose. “It’s not like we have time to play
the tourist. You told us yourself that we only have twelve hours.
And that includes getting
their
help, and then going to
the Nexus and shutting the portals.”

Agent Franken looked at
Zoey and smiled.

“Zoey can find them. She’s
the
only
one who can.”

Although Tristan and Simon
looked confused, Zoey knew exactly what he meant. She smiled at her
friends. For once she knew something they didn’t.

“Good luck,” said their
scientist, and then he lost his smile. “You’re going to need
it.”

Simon laughed
incredulously. “Gee thanks. Nothing like a good pep talk before an
end-of-the-world battle.”

Zoey turned to her
friends. “Come on, let’s go.”

Agent Franken grabbed her
wrist.

“There’s something I
forgot to tell you about the UECs,” said Agent Franken urgently.
“The bump on my head is making me forget things, but listen
carefully.”

Zoey leaned
forward.

“Utron is lethal to us,
much like radiation—”

“Great,” said Simon. “It
keeps getting better and better.”

Agent Franken ignored him.
“Once you open the first UEC—and I must insist that you open it
with
extreme
caution—place it gently inside the portal. After that you’ll
have maybe two minutes to pass through the portal before the energy
will kill you, so don’t linger—”

“You don’t have to tell me
twice—ouch!” Tristan smacked Simon on the back of his
head.

“As soon as you pass
through to our side, open the second UEC quickly.”

Zoey waited for Agent
Franken to explain further, but he didn’t. “Then what?”

Agent Franken raised his
eyebrows. “Then find a safe place to hide from the blast. You won’t
have much time, so you better run. Anything within a two hundred
foot radius will be destroyed in the blast.”

Zoey nodded. “And
then?”

Agent Franken let his head
fall back on his pillow heavily. “And then we pray that it works,
because we have nothing else.”

Zoey secured the strap
around her shoulder and followed the others out to the main hall. A
crowd was gathering around the mirrors, but no teams were going
through.

“Let’s go to the Inn and
get some food and drinks,” said Zoey.

She pushed her way through
a throng of agents.

“Good idea, I’m starving,”
said Simon, and he rubbed his belly. “If I don’t feed this gorgeous
body soon, it’ll lose the two pounds of muscle mass I gained this
year.”

“What else is new?”
laughed Tristan. “But I could use some food, too.”

As Zoey made her way
through the moving crowd, she felt something was off. The agents
were agitated, and by the looks on their faces it wasn’t because
they were about to go on a dangerous quest. It was something else.
But what? And where was Agent Ward?

Zoey saw Directors Hicks
and Campbell flailing their arms, trying to calm them down. But the
mob pushed and shoved, like crazed fans at a concert trying to get
at the head of the line. Something was very wrong.

“Who could have done
this?”

“What will this mean for
us?”

“It’s all
over!”

“We’re all going to
die!”

All the agents were in a
panic.

Zoey wasn’t going anywhere
until she knew what was going on.

She approached a young
agent. “Excuse me, what’s happened? What’s going on?”

The agent trembled. “The UECs!” he cried
hysterically. “They’re all gone! Gone! Stolen!”

Instinctively, Zoey squeezed the strap on
her shoulder. She had never let it go.

She felt the material between her fingers.
But when she reached down, where the bag should have been, the
strap dangled in midair. The bag was gone.

Z
oey stared opened
mouthed at the straps. Her stomach twisted until she couldn’t
breathe. She was having a meltdown.

Tristan grabbed her shoulders and met her
eyes. “Zoey, where’s the bag?”

“Oh my God, are you serious!” Simon stared
at the strap in Zoey’s hand like it was about to explode.

As much as she
wanted
to answer . . .
she couldn’t. She had
no
idea where the bag was. The bag
was
gone. It was just gone.

She’d been so careful with the bag, had held
it so securely, that at first she thought her eyes were playing
tricks on her.

“It’s been . . . it’s been cut,” said
Zoey.

She showed them the strap. “A sharp knife or
something, I never even felt it.” She felt stupid saying it, but it
was the truth. She hadn’t felt anything.

Who took her bag and why?

Tristan frowned as he surveyed the hall. “It
could have been anyone in here.”

Zoey knew that anyone could have taken it
without her knowing, but they had to have been stealthy. Neither
Tristan nor Simon had noticed anyone coming near her.

Simon shared a quick conversation with a
nearby agent and hurried back towards them.

“Apparently,
all
the UECs are gone,”
he said in a low voice. “Every single one of them has been stolen
from the science officers. And get this—no one saw what happened.
They just disappeared. No one else has any idea who took them
either. What are we supposed to do now?”

Zoey caught a few agents looking their way.
Their cold and accusing eyes focused on the strap she held in her
hands. And before she knew it, a mob of agents was whispering and
pointing reproachfully at Zoey.

“Yeah, that’s her,” she heard one man
say.

“. . . Bet
she
took them,” said a
woman with short auburn hair. “Look at her. She
looks
guilty!”

“She’s in on it. She’s working for that Mrs.
Dupont, I know she is . . . .”

Here we go again
, thought Zoey.
Would they ever accept her?

She scanned the hall. The
real
traitor had been here moments ago, but they were probably long
gone.

Suddenly, someone grabbed Zoey from behind
and spun her around. A fat finger pointed at her face.

“YOU!” hissed a large woman in tight outfit
that exposed too much skin. “You did this, didn’t you?”

The woman’s spit flew in Zoey’s face. “We
all know you’re the cause of this mess—”

“I’m not.” Zoey wiped her face and strained
to control her temper. “I’m not responsible for this—”

“Yes you are!” bellowed the large woman, her
double chin wiggled like a water balloon. “Where did you put the
UECs? Where are they?”

Zoey clenched her jaw.

“I. Don’t. Know,” she growled. “Take your
finger out of my face, before I
bite
it off.”

“AH!” the woman threw up her hands.

“Did you hear what she said?” she raised her
voice so that everyone in the hall could hear her. “She wants to
attack me! She wants to
kill
me!”

A mob of agents crowded around Zoey and her
friends. Slowly, she reached for her golden bracelet and waited.
She saw Tristan and Simon reach for their weapons, too.

“Where are they?” repeated the woman as
sweat trickled down her forehead. “You better tell us . . . or
we’ll
make
you tell us—”