The Sphere Chronicles: A Holding Kate Series Book (3 page)

“Macy!” Dirk whimpered.

“Shh,” she scolded, turning to look at him. Her heart melted. His eyes were wide in terror, staring down at a grotesque corpse. Macy tucked him under her arm and tilted his chin up, forcing his eyes to hers and away from the rotting body on the floor.

“We are going to be fine, Dirk. We just have to find the exit.”

He nodded quickly, rasping breaths sending tremors through his gangly, adolescent frame.

“We just need to follow these lights. See how they are pointing us along the hallway?”

He jerked his head and gazed down the dark passage beyond. Fuchsia tones reflected off his chocolate skin, strobing with the neon pulse behind the glass wall. A tear puddled before spilling from his wide, panicked eyes.

“Come on, don’t look down.” Macy nudged him forward through the stench, trying not to gag. She scoffed at her own advice. There were so many of them, she had to look down just to find a place to step. Punctuating her thoughts, Dirk slipped in gooey black fluid seeping from one of the bodies behind her. She grabbed his arm to keep him from falling.

She hated jumps like this. Macy scanned to the end of the corridor. A body sat upright leaning into the corner, staring down the sharp turn, his skeletal profile illuminated by the spirals in the wall behind him. They approached slowly, carefully stepping over his leg. She suppressed a shudder as she gazed into the horror-stricken face, jaw fallen, and eyes fixed and clouded.

What did you see, unlucky one?
Macy wondered. She pivoted to follow his last line of sight. A darkened corridor stretched into infinity. No lights. Just inky depths of the unknown yawned a warning.

Macy crept forward into the gloom with Dirk latched to her side. After several steps, she glanced back.

The hall had fallen into darkness! Oppressive, the air grew heavier with each breath. No bodies were strewn along this hallway, only a blanket of smothering bleakness.

A noise filtered down the hall, like static on a radio. A strangely familiar sound, but not quite mechanical. It seemed organic, but Macy couldn’t place it. Dirk planted his feet when he heard it and refused to move. He dug his fingers into her jump jacket and held her back.

“Let me go,” she whispered, gently removing his fingers from her sleeve.

“No, no, no,” he pleaded and groped for her hands.

“It’s okay. I’m just gonna get my flashlight.”

He stopped groping long enough for her to pull her backpack off and dig inside. The
ssshhhh
grew louder. Was it nearer? It was hard to tell. Dirk pressed into her side as she swung the backpack around to her shoulders again.

She flicked the switch. Light skittered across the black tile floor, quickly escaping into the void, before the bulb blinked off. Macy banged it against her palm, and it flared back on. She glanced at Dirk when he stiffened and squeezed her arm.

The expression on his face stole her breath. He gazed down the corridor with eyes wide and mouth slack, wearing the same expression as the dead man down the hall.

Macy slowly turned her face to the illuminated beam of light, and terror seized her. Twenty feet away, hovering in the air, were three wasp-like creatures the size of her Jack Russell terrier. The buzz of their wings registered as impossible. No insect should be that large. They bobbed in the air, and the light glinted off the sword-like stingers that swung forward, spurting venom from the needle-sharp tips.

Macy swung the light and saw a corridor veering off to the left about six feet in front of them. “Run!” she screamed and tugged on Dirk’s arm.

He jerked his arm out of her grasp. “I’m not running toward those monsters!”

She shoved him toward the opening, then his feet took over, and he sprinted faster than she thought possible toward the dark hole.

The sudden charge surprised the wasps and they reeled backward slightly, quickly recovered, and then flew to meet them at the corridor branch. Macy turned into the hall with the wasps just feet away and threw her blinking flashlight at them to buy some time. She heard it
thud
against one, and the wings stuttered.

The hall zigged and zagged. Dirk flew like lightning through the place. She could barely keep up with him, but a glow along the floor tiles illuminated ahead of them, keeping them moving. Dirk slammed into a dead end and turned to Macy.

The glow on the floor climbed up the wall in an elaborate floral vine. When the lights swirled and reached the ceiling, a panel slid open, and they rushed into a room the size of a small kitchen. The panel slid shut behind them.

Dirk slipped to his knees in the center of the room, breathing heavily. The lights crawled into the room with them and traced up the four walls and across the ceiling in a dizzying display. The traces met in the center of the room and then blacked out. Macy moved to stand by Dirk as he slowly rose to his feet.

“Macy, what is this place?”

“I don’t know. It’s a new jump. I’ve never been in it before.”

“Would those—those things really hurt us?”

“I wouldn’t want to give them the chance to try, would you?”

“No way!”

“Where is the rest of the team?” Dirk’s arm pressed into hers.

“Dunno.”

A scraping sound echoed from the corners of the room. Dirk whimpered. Green phosphorescence hovered in a Y-shape, just around knee height, accompanied by clicking sounds.

“What is it?” Dirk whispered.

“No idea.” She breathed the reply and slowly drew her dagger. Focused on the glowing shapes in front of her, she didn’t see the one behind her until it was too late. It slammed down into her calf and lit her leg on fire. Pain seared through her, hot and intense, a burning brand that ate her flesh away. She screamed and fell to her knees.

Glowing scorpion tails closed in. Dirk kicked and stomped at them wildly, but broiling heat spread from every place the acid touched. The giant scorpions swarmed over her. When the lights flared back on, they scuttled back to their corners and disappeared through panels.

Dirk’s lip trembled, and his nostrils flared when his eyes scanned her. Tremors wracked through her body.

Glancing down, Macy witnessed seeping boils erupt across her arms and legs. Her neck stiffened and the rest of her body followed suit, arching backward in a seizure. She felt Dirk cradle her head. She could hear him sobbing but it faded farther and farther away. Darkness closed in around the edges of her red-tinged vision. The pain intensified. A blood-curdling scream echoed through the room. Her pulse rammed against her sternum, racing faster and faster. Something sat heavy on her chest, and she couldn’t get any air. Macy kicked and flailed to throw it off, but the invisible weight would not move. She sucked at a vacuum and the screaming stopped as gurgling, slurping sounds began. She locked eyes with Dirk for a moment and knew—death had come for her. His face faded away.

She hovered above Dirk as he cradled a lifeless and deformed body covered in boils and acid burns. His sobs faded into the distance. “Macy! Macy! No!”

She turned from the sad sight, wafting away as death wings carried her into the night.

©LaDonna Cole 2014 See
The Keepers
, Book 2 of the Holding Kate Series for another jump into this bizarre site.

TEARS WERE FOR
wimps!

I pressed the razor against the scar on my thigh. A line of red beads rose to the surface, shiny and glistening against the white skin. Fascinated, I watched them grow and then merge, forming a long trickle as gravity forced the scarlet line between the ridges of my scars to race toward the ground.

I didn’t even feel the pain anymore; I’d done this so many times. It was starting to lose its draw. The blood congealed, sealing off the shallow cut. I slapped a bandage on it and faced my reflection in the mirror.

“Pinky, come on! We’re gonna be late!” Thing One screamed up the stairs.

“Coming, Mom,” I bellowed, adding a touch more black eyeliner and smudging it around my eye. I stuffed my black lipstick into my backpack and lumbered down the stairs.

Thing Two met me at the door, and pecked my cheek. “You got your project?” She handed me a juice box.

I nodded, grabbed the juice, and raced after Thing One, who already had the car revving. I crawled in the passenger seat and tossed the juice box over my shoulder onto the back seat. Mom sighed and threw her arm over the back of my seat, turning to back out of the driveway. “Aunt Joyce just wants you to get your vitamin C quota for the day. She cares about you.”

“Whatever.” Snatching the seat belt over my shoulder, I grimaced as it cut into my fresh thigh wound. I bundled my plaid skirt for cushioning and clipped the latch into place.

We rode in silence until the tall spires of the Gothic cathedral rose over the trees, and Mom pulled into the parking lot of St. Mary Eugenia’s Catholic School for Girls.

“You sure you’re ready to start back today?” Mom levered the gearshift into park and turned to study me.

“Yeah.”

“Because I’m positive they would allow a few more days—”

“It’s fine, Mom!”

“Pinky, losing your dad suddenly is hard…”

“I know that, Mom. Just shut up, okay? I told you I don’t want to talk about him, especially with you!”

Her chin dropped, and she pressed her lips together. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see her working her jaw. I’d hurt her feelings.
Good
!

The dead place in my chest squirmed.
Not good
! I didn’t want to cry. I’d managed this long without tears, and the hard part was over. Dad was in the ground. The sappy funeral was over, and I lived with Mom and “Aunt Joyce” full time now.

“I gotta go.” I grabbed the door handle, but Mom reached over and held my arm.

“Pinky, you know I loved your father.”

I snorted. “You had a really twisted way of showing it.” I jerked my arm out of her grasp. “I’m gonna be late.” I rolled out of the car and slammed the door. I took off running without looking back.

Roxi met me at my locker. “Yo, biatch!”

I grinned at her and scanned her outfit. There was no getting around the stodgy plaid skirts. The nuns insisted on them. But Roxi had rolled her waistband enough that the skirt hit her thighs at an indecent length. Her black T-shirt sported a silver skull, and the gauge in her ear was big enough to hold her pencil.

“You wore the boots. Wicked!”

I stuck my leg out so my mid-calf combat boots could be appreciated fully. We stripped off our sweaters and tied them around our waists. The nuns didn’t care where we wore them, as long as they were on our persons at all times.

“Did you get it?” I asked.

Roxi nodded and arched a brow. “We have time if you want to try it now.” She patted the roll at her waist.

I shoved my pack into my locker and slammed it. “Let’s go.”

We passed into the courtyard and rounded the back abbey. The nuns were all in the school by now. The residence was usually vacant during the day. A fact we discovered when we ditched chemistry one day. We darted into the back door and rushed down the hall of the dormitory to the janitor’s closet. It was our favorite hiding spot. We’d sat in there for hours before, talking, smoking. Roxi even gave me my last piercing in this closet. It was our place.

I scoped out the corridor before closing the door and turning to Roxi. She unrolled the waistband of her skirt and revealed a Ziploc bag of joints and a lighter.

“This is the last batch for free. Skizo said we had to pay if we want more.”

“Well, we’d better enjoy it then.” I sat on the upturned mop bucket and took the joint. I pulled the chain out of my shirt and clamped it into the roach clip. Roxi lit it for me and sat beside me on a five-gallon bucket of something called outdoor primer. We passed the joint back and forth.

Smoke filled the small closet quickly, and before long Roxi was up doing ballet poses using the supply shelf as a dance bar. I fell off my bucket laughing at her. We both erupted into spasms of hysterical giggles. She collapsed to the floor beside me, and we finished off the last joint. I shook the nub out of my clip, and it rolled into the corner.