The Quest (23 page)

We wheeled Terry’s stretcher into the house, but Dr. Land decided not to try moving Terry to a bed. Terry’s breathing was so shallow now that I seriously feared she wouldn’t be alive when we returned with Alia.

Looking down the long, straight country road, I could just make out our target house in the distance. Whoever had taken the photos from the passing car had used a telephoto lens, and the aerial shot hadn’t shown it either, but the house was on a little rise, almost a hill, about a hundred yards off the edge of the road. There were a few trees here and there, but no real cover to hide our approach. If the Seraphim were looking out through their windows, they would easily spot us in any direction.

“That’s not a good thing, is it?” said Scott, standing next to me as I sighed at the distant speck of a house.

“No, it’s not,” I agreed quietly. “But at least it’s dark. That’s a good thing.”

I wasn’t referring to the Angels’ house, which fortunately didn’t have any light coming from its windows, but rather to the overcast sky. No stars, no moon, and no city lights nearby. As long as we were careful not to trip in the darkness, and if the house wasn’t equipped with motion-activated lights or something, we still might get up to it undetected.

“We walk from here,” I said, turning to the crowd that had gathered behind me. “Unit leaders, get your radios on.”

My radio’s single earpiece was designed to be clipped onto a right ear, but obviously I couldn’t keep it on mine because I didn’t have much of a right ear to attach it to. I instead forced it awkwardly onto my left and hoped it wouldn’t come off during the raid.

“Radio check,” I said into the microphone extending from the earpiece. “Rabbit Two? Three?”

James and Scott nodded.

As we tested our radios, the rest of the team checked their weapons one last time.

The Richardsons weren’t carrying guns, preferring to rely on their psionic powers as sparks, which I had discovered earlier that day as being quite impressive. Both could throw little lightning bolts that blackened the paper targets in our basement shooting range. Their electric discharges were by no means exceptionally accurate, but would be plenty effective in close quarters. I was curious whether they ever had a fight between them, but I was too polite to ask.

Everyone else, including Merlin and me, had pistols and spare clips. I preferred my telekinetic blasts to guns, since blasts were always perfectly accurate, but I needed to be able to fire rapidly, and focused telekinetic shots took too long to prepare.

I wore a thin pair of cashmere gloves that not only kept me from being drained by my gun, but gave me a little extra protection from the night chill. I had forbidden my team from wearing heavy jackets that could hamper movement, and I found that I wasn’t the only one shivering.

It was now 11:30pm. I had originally planned to get here well past midnight and breach at around 2am, but I wasn’t going to wait any longer.

“Last chance to go home,” I said quietly, looking around at the grim faces staring back at me.

“Let’s do this,” said Scott.

Scott and James picked up their fire extinguishers, and Mr. Richardson hoisted his rolled-up blanket onto his shoulder.

We started walking quietly along the side of the road. A minute later, a truck passed us from behind, but didn’t slow down. We must have looked pretty weird: eight people on foot on a country road at this time of night. But I doubted anyone would call the cops on us. And if they did, Mrs. Harding had already agreed to keep things under control.

As I led my team through the dark and chilly silence, my mind briefly wandered back to a time when I was younger and naive enough to question the justice of what we were doing.

The people sleeping in that house were responsible for the deaths of two of our children, true enough. But it was equally true that if they were converted Angels, then they had been acting under the influence of psionic control. I knew, of course, that not all Angels were converted, but there was no way to know for certain about the people we were about to attack. If they had been brainwashed by their master to hate us, then that would make them victims of the Angel cause, not much different from ourselves. In the past, that would have bothered me a lot.

But killing Mr. Simms – twice – had taught me what I was capable of. Perhaps the Angels sleeping in that house did deserve our pity, even our mercy. But they wouldn’t get it from me. It no longer mattered to me in the least whether our targets were Angels by choice or not. For Terry and for Alia, this had to be done, and so I would do it. It was really that simple.

I couldn’t be as certain about the resolve of my teammates, however. No one had spoken openly of it to me, but I suspected that they all felt some hesitation about what we were about to do. They would be less than human not to. As I listened to their soft footsteps following me toward the Angels’ house, I sincerely hoped that they were ready to do what was necessary. I hoped that they were ready to kill.

Once we were about halfway to the house, I gestured to Scott, and he led Daniel and Candace off the road and into the grassy field. They were going to walk in a wide arc and approach the house from behind.

A few minutes later, I heard Scott’s voice in my earpiece say, “Rabbit Three to Rabbit One, we’re at the base of the hill.”

“Roger, Three, I hear you loud and clear,” I whispered back. “Too loud, actually. Keep your voice down. Start climbing and report when you’re in position.”

“Roger that, Rabbit One.”

Rabbits One and Two were already at the foot of the little hill too. I gestured to start climbing. So far, everything was perfectly quiet except for my thumping heart. I realized that I was no longer feeling at all cold. My adrenaline was kicking in, and I had to wipe the sweat from my brow.

Crouching low, we silently made our way up toward the front of the house. Instead of walking on the asphalt driveway, I kept everyone on the soft ground to reduce the sound of our footsteps, but I felt my whole body hiccup every time someone stepped on a dry twig.

One excruciatingly slow step at a time, we finally made it to the front porch. To the left was the wide rectangular window that James’s team would enter from. The curtains were drawn behind the window, and the five of us crept up to it. Right above was the second-floor balcony. The house was completely quiet. Not a single sound or light anywhere.

“This is Rabbit Three,” said Scott on the radio. “We’re at the rear door.”

James replied for me, “Roger that, Rabbit Three. Two is in position. Stand by for One.”

I levitated Merlin up onto the balcony, setting him down as gently as I could so as not to make any noise. Then I followed him up.

I whispered into my radio, “This is Rabbit One. We’re on the balcony. Stand by for breach.”

The curtains were drawn behind the balcony’s glass door as well, so I couldn’t see inside, but according to the floor plan, this was the master bedroom.

This house obviously had its own hiding bubble, but now that I was standing on the balcony, I could tell that there was a psionic presence close by. It was the pyroid who had burned Rachael, and I was certain that he was just behind the curtain. It occurred to me that I was about to rob Scott of his revenge, but so what? Rachael would be happier if Scott returned alive.

I was about to reach for the glass door to check if it was locked when I heard Scott’s voice again. “Rabbit One!” he whispered in a panicked tone. “The kitchen light just came on!”

“Stay calm and silent, Three,” I whispered back.

Someone was awake downstairs. Maybe the night watch, or someone grabbing a midnight snack.

I put my hand on the doorknob and slowly tried turning it.

It was unlocked!

I looked at Merlin, who just shrugged.

I steadied my breathing. The cold night air would wake the pyroid sleeping inside the moment I opened the door. This would have to be done in one fluid move. Open the door, step through the curtain, and put a focused blast between the eyes of the pyroid before he could scream or burn me.

I said into my radio, “Rabbit One to Rabbit Two and Three, stand by. Rabbit One is going in quiet. Take your guns off safety, hold position and be prepared to breach on my command.”

James’s voice answered, “Rabbit Two, roger that. We’re ready.” He was speaking so quietly that I couldn’t hear him except on the radio even though we weren’t more than five yards apart.

“The light’s still on,” Scott whispered frantically. “Rabbit One, the kitchen is still on!”

“Roger that, Rabbit Three,” I replied. “I hear you. The kitchen light is on. Stand by.”

It didn’t matter. If the guy in the kitchen was on night duty, he wasn’t going to go to bed anytime soon, and even if he was just getting a midnight snack, I wasn’t going to wait for him to fall asleep. Terry was dying. Besides, since I could sense the pyroid, no doubt he could sense me too, even in his sleep, which might wake him at any moment.

I felt my pistol’s safety to make sure that it was still on, and then tucked the pistol under my belt. After wiping the sweat from my face again, I gave my pendant a quick tap and then carefully focused a powerful telekinetic blast in my right index finger.

Once my blast was ready, I reached for the doorknob with my left hand, my right hand pointed like a pretend gun in front of me. I looked at Merlin, who had his pistol drawn, ready to back me up if things turned noisy. I had only one silent shot, but I was fairly confident that I could pull this off without waking up the house.

“On three,” I mouthed to Merlin. “One…”

Bang!
The sudden gunshot made me jump in surprise, and I instantly lost my psionic focus, causing me to release my blast into the air. Where had the sound come from?! Who had fired?!

Drawing my pistol and flipping off the safety, I yanked open the balcony door as I shouted into my microphone, “Damn it! Breach! Breach! Go! Go! Go!”

Sighting down the barrel of my pistol as I pushed through the curtain, I was only dimly aware of Merlin following me in. My attention was fixed on the lone figure that had sprung up into a sitting position on his bed.

“Jesus! No! Please!” shouted the pyroid, and I quickly ended his life with three rounds to his chest.

My peripheral vision caught movement to my left. There was someone else in the room. I spun around on my heel, my pistol held in both hands in front of me so that the moment I faced my target, all I’d have to do was pull the trigger.

I heard a high-pitched squeal.
“Addy, no!”

I stopped my trigger finger mid-squeeze. Alia was staring down my pistol barrel with wide, frantic eyes.

There was no time to ask her what she was doing in this room.

“How many?!” I shouted.

“Five.”

“Stay!” I commanded, shoving her aside and moving toward the door to the hallway.

“Addy, please don’t kill them!”

I ignored her. I had heard the sound of breaking glass and now another gunshot from downstairs. Rabbit Two and Three were in the house. Alia was already safe, but I hadn’t planned on a retreat, so we were committed to clearing out the house. If we ran now, the Seraphim would hunt us down before we got back to Dr. Land. It would be safer to stick with the plan and shoot everyone. All that mattered now was speed.

“Five in the house! Go! Go!” I shouted.

Pumped on adrenaline, I pulled open the door and, not even bothering to look, jumped into the nearly pitch-black hallway. It was an exceptionally foolish gamble, but it paid off. I was the first one in the hall, followed one step behind by Merlin. A heartbeat later, a dark, shadowy figure appeared from another doorway a little farther down, and Merlin and I rapidly emptied our pistols into it. The man collapsed back into his room, his feet sticking out into the hallway, unmoving.

More gunshots from downstairs.

Letting my empty clip fall to the floor, I telekinetically yanked my spare from my belt and slapped it in as we rushed forward toward the last door at the end of the hall.

Before we reached it, however, the door exploded outwards, the wood splintering into a thousand pieces as if it had been hit from the other side by several shotguns at once.

I felt the telekinetic’s full power now, and Merlin didn’t need telling.

Skidding to a stop before running into the telekinetic’s line of fire, we pressed our backs against the wall next to the doorframe.

Quickly checking my pistol, I was about to peer into the doorframe when suddenly all the sharp little pieces of wood on the floor jumped to life. The telekinetic couldn’t see us, but she knew about where we were, and I guessed that Merlin and I had but a moment before we were turned into human pincushions.

“Run!” I shouted, and we scampered back down the hall, stumbling over the corpse as we escaped into his bedroom.

The man’s body lying in the doorframe prevented us from closing the door, so Merlin and I both kept our pistols aimed at the hallway as we slowly stepped backwards to the far end of the room.

“You’re mine now!”
said a harsh female voice in my head.

Hearing the curtain behind me snap open, I spun around, but it was too late.

Through the glass I saw her: a tall, skeletal woman with long white hair whipping about her bony face. Candace was right: It wasn’t a person. It was a scarecrow. The poorly balanced telekinetic was only four feet away, levitating just outside the window and pointing her right index finger at the center of my forehead.

I was about to die.

I involuntarily shut my eyes tightly.

“Damn it, Adrian!” shouted Merlin. “Shoot her!”

I fell onto my knees just as the telekinetic’s focused blast, which had been temporarily stopped by Merlin, shattered the window and whizzed through my hair. Opening my eyes, I didn’t bother aiming as I thrust my pistol upwards and fired rapidly through the broken window. The first two rounds missed, but the third caught the woman’s left arm. The impact spun her around, and drained by her own blood, she fell out of sight. There was a soft thud as the woman hit the ground outside.