Chapter 51: Earth

The bad news is that the good guys really should kill me before I can muck up their precious prison system.

The good news is that Isis has more scruples than I do, and they don’t know I’m Awake.

Which gives me a little bit of wiggle room.

I learned how to make do with very little at an early age.

And when I think about it, I don't even blame them for wanting to kill me. I mean, of course they want to prevent all the bad guys on Earth from having a load of powers with which to muck about hurting people. The thought of a bunch of telekinetics, even more powerful than the ones on Terra, wandering around free?

It’s horrifying.

Plus three more worlds’ worth of monsters? Perish the thought.

But some of these folks already have powers here, and the Followers of Amun are already hunting.

For me.

I do feel a bit like a fox that has been released for some kind of wacky hunt. Which way do I go? On Terra, Devlin allegedly wants to capture me, even though Amun as a whole wants me dead. And here, apparently the Followers of Amun want me alive to unravel the prison, and the Followers of Isis want me dead so it won’t fall apart. It’s a good thing that Kahn and his buddies can’t send messages from Earth to Terra, or Duncan might strangle me himself.

“I’m sure it wouldn’t come to that,” Kahn says. “But if you Wake, we’d definitely need to keep a very close eye on you. Isis has a vested interest in keeping Earth as it is—with very few superhuman villains lurking around.”

“I definitely don’t want a bunch of lunatics freed from prison.”

“We’d love to keep an eye on you,” he says. “Even if you don’t want our help. I doubt Amun will be content to give up on you—and they want you Awake.”

“I need to deal with Jesse.” I look pointedly at his body—hoping he won’t realize that I have no intention of accepting that he’s gone.

“Of course you do.” He exhales slowly. “We’re happy to pay for the funeral expenses, and I can send him to any funeral home you’d like.”

A funeral home. I try not to completely freak out at the thought. Jesse’s still alive on Terra—I remind myself over and over and over. “Sure, thanks.”

“You can go with the body, if you’d like. Or not.”

That’s my ticket out of here. “I’d like that,” I say. “To stay with him, I mean.” What I really want is to get out of here so I can interrogate Devlin and develop a plan to save Jesse. Then I’ll kill Devlin, of course.

In precisely that order.

I’m pretty sure the second I’m free, Devlin will come for me. I just need to get away from my magically delicious goody two-shoes soulmate and his band of seditious babysitters. Kahn stands up and waves toward someone—who passes a box into the room.

“We have clothing for you,” he says. “It’s not yours, but we thought it might be better—”

“Than a white nightie?” I take the box from him. “What about that?” I glare at the camera.

Kahn tosses the white blanket over it—just like I did before the guy shoved the gun in my face. “Sorry about that.”

I lift one eyebrow.

“Seriously, I am sorry.”

A split second later, without any warning, men rush into the room. Three, four, six, then eight men in fatigues surround me, all of them holding guns. One places the cold hard muzzle directly against my forehead, clearly prepared to blow my brains out.

“What is happening?” Kahn asks. “This wasn’t cleared. Who sent you?”

“Stand down, Brantley,” the man with the gun to my forehead says. “We don’t answer to you.”

Kahn’s eyes light up and the man is flung backward against the wall. His gun flies to Kahn’s hand. “You may not answer to me, but you don’t point firearms at anyone in my custody without someone explaining why.”

Two of them swivel around and point their weapons at Kahn, and another man steps to the left and places his gun where the first soldier’s was before, flush with the center of my forehead. “We’ve been told to eliminate the prisoner,” the new soldier with the gun to my head says.

“And anyone who tries to stop us.” The tall soldier pointing his weapon at Kahn steps closer, his gun now aimed directly at him. “Are you trying to stop us?”

“From killing her?” Kahn asks.

The soldier nods.

“Yes. I am.”

In that split second, I can act—I can Block or Lift or defend, and I ought to do it. Kahn’s doing nothing but trying to spare me—defending me.

But if I save him, they’ll know who I am, and they’ll all be after me. And part of me thinks this is another test—like the pen flung at my head.

So I gamble.

And I do nothing.

The soldier with his gun pressed against Kahn’s forehead fires. At my soulmate. Ending him, forever.

My heart skips a beat. . .and then I realize he fired a blank.

Kahn’s fine.

The soldiers glance from Kahn to me and back again.

“See? I told you she’s not Awake,” Kahn says. “She’s fine.” He offers the gun he stole to the first soldier, who takes it with a scowl.

They all march back out the door.

“Why don’t you get changed?” Kahn opens his mouth and closes it again. Then he steps closer, and freezes. “I really am sorry, for all this. We had to make sure you weren’t Awake before letting you go. The hearse won’t be here for a few hours, so if you want to leave now—you can. If you’d like to wait and go with your brother’s body, that’s fine too.”

By the time I change into a pair of jeans that are a little too large, and a plain blue t-shirt they’ve provided, I’ve decided. I have very little time, and I can’t waste it. I need to get to Devlin, find out what he knows, and then make him pay. “Can you just give me the phone number on the funeral home? I can talk to them on the phone about the arrangements?” I glance at Jesse’s body as if it makes me nervous. “I think that would be simpler.”

“Of course,” Kahn says.

“Where are we, exactly?”

Kahn leads me out the door, around the corner. . .and into the hallway of a regular-looking house. My whitewashed cell turns out to be in the center of a normal, suburban home in Cypress, not too far from Katy. I suppose with all the various and sundry monsters running around, keeping padded rooms in nondescript locations around town isn't such a bad idea.

“I can drive you wherever you need to go,” Kahn says.

“Where are you going to allow me to go?” I ask. “I mean, the Followers of Amun are after me—and now you guys know about me, too. What exactly am I allowed to do?”

“You can go about your life,” he says. “That’s our hope.”

“How would I possibly do that?” I frown. “My brother’s gone, and monsters are hunting me.”

“Your brother.” Kahn’s face falls. “You can’t know how sorry I am, truly. You can hold a memorial service for friends and any family you may want to invite. We can make sure you’re safe from social services, etc. We really are quite good at dealing with. . .the bureaucracy. And let us worry about keeping the Followers of Amun away. Now that we know who and where you are, Devlin can’t bother you anymore.”

I do hope he’s wrong.

Kahn gives me a ride to the closest bus stop—and when I get out and sit on the bench, he insists on giving me a few hundred dollars. “I’m not sure what bills you may have, but I know that losing your brother will make paying them hard. Isis is happy to help,” he says. “And of course, I’m happy to help, too. With anything.” He presses a piece of paper into my hand as well.

“What’s that?”

“It’s my phone number. If you need help, I want you to call me personally.”

Call Isis? Yeah, right. But Kahn’s eyes are steady and kind. The connection that I feel to him—he must feel it too. It’s bizarre. It’s unexplainable. I shouldn’t trust him, yet I find that I do. “If I had been Awake, would you really have let them shoot me?”

He sits down next to me on the bench. “Alora, every single gun in that room was filled with blanks.”

If I’d had the presence of mind to feel for it, I might have figured that out. But there aren’t guns on Terra, so I’ve rarely sensed bullets before. I’m sick of never having any training or skill. I’m sick of being the idiot who can only half use her own power.

I clench my fists in my lap.