Extracted (25 page)

“Hey, Chernobyl,” I say, walking over to them. “What happened out there?”

“Aw man, it was like a storm out there. It was the first time that anyone had rifted into the American Civil War. We weren’t taking anything this time. Gloves wanted us to follow the train that was carrying the Union’s payroll, all in gold, of course. The thing was, when we got there, most of the soldiers were gone and in their place were these little dome-headed geared creatures that tried to take us out.” I look down at my leg.

“Those are Gear Heads. One of them sawed off my leg.”

“Those guys did that?” Chern asks. “I had no idea, sorry.”

Ink Spot slaps him on the neck to indicate that he’s done. Chern flinches.

“Well, I got to go,” he says. “Gotta return this stuff to the lab. I’ll catch you later.”

“Okay,” I mumble, staring at my geared prosthetic.

I walk to where Nobel, Ember, and Ethan are sitting. They are congregated in the same spot we were in earlier.

“Hey, something is going on. Chernobyl said that he ran into a bunch of Gear Heads during a mission.”

“Not a surprise. The Peacekeepers can track Contra. That’s how they find you guys in the stream,” Ethan says.

“Yeah, but we’d never rifted there before. They predicted where we would be and got there before us. That team walked right into a trap.”

Ember puts her hand on my shoulder. “Lex, I don’t mean to sound harsh, but has it occurred to you that your friends are stealing? The Peacekeepers were trying to prevent them from taking something that didn’t belong to them.”

I shrug her hand off. I’m about to say something nasty when Ethan cuts me off.

“I’m worried more about the how than the why right now. This means they’ve somehow figured out how to use Tesla’s predictive algorithms to predict where the Hollows will strike. This will make it very hard for you and your friends to smash and grab. They could have these things waiting for you anywhere at any time. Always one step ahead.”

“True,” Nobel agrees. “So our immediate problem is finding a way to disable several Gear Heads at a time. Like some sort of electromagnetic pulse?”

“Like the one I used in The Institute?”

Ethan nods. “That might work. You could try to isolate the correct harmonic resonance to shatter their glass domes—”

“It doesn’t matter right now,” I cut them off. “We’re wasting time. We are going to save Stein.”

“All right,” Nobel interrupts. “Let’s go. Here, take these.”

Nobel hands each of us two small green pills.

“You got the Dox?” Ember asks, rolling the Contra between her fingers.

“Sure thing,” I answer, tapping my pack.

“What are these?” Ethan asks, holding the green pill up to the light like some rare jewel.

“This is how we rift,” I answer. “No fancy tech and no practice missions. Take this baby and you’ll be hooked on rifting for life.”

Ethan looks to Ember, who shrugs. They both remove their Tethers and toss them on the table.

“Okay.” She pops the capsule in her mouth. “Let’s do this. We just rift from right here?”

“Yep. Part of the deal we had with Gloves was that he would have Claymore set the date and time of the mission in these capsules so we would show up at the right time, just before Stein falls. So just pop the pill and hold on tight.”

I adjust my jester’s hat, put the capsule on the back of my tongue, and swallow.

* * *

Rifting is second nature to me now. I can feel the Contra pumping in my veins, making me lighter than air but also more solid than I could ever be in real life. Colors swirl, and as we approach the spot where Stein dies I can feel the stream thinning. It’s like pressing against tissue paper. I push forward and the stream shreds around me. I’m spit out onto the sandy ground.

We have come out just behind an outcropping of rocks. I peek over them as the others orient themselves. Ember and Ethan look a little pale, but otherwise fine. I see the blimp overhead, cut ropes flailing in the wind. To the right I see two Gear Heads, the red liquid sloshing around in their domed heads as they scramble up the loose rocks in our direction.

“We’ve got to move,” I order.

Everyone follows me as I manage my way down through the boulders where the blimp is still tied. Two Gear Heads have taken position near the other me. I see Stein trying to distract them. For a second the urge to run to her is overwhelming. I am barely able to keep my feet planted.

Then I see myself.

Stein screams. The Gear Heads have nearly pushed her over the edge of the cliff.

My alternate self runs to the cliff. Tripping on the tether, he falls, fighting off Gear Heads while grabbing for Stein. Another crazy little geared-ninja rolls agilely to the side and takes its position on my calf. I wave my hand, giving the others the signal to intervene.

Like a horde of barbarians, we rush the cliff. Ethan and Nobel busy themselves by smashing whatever Gear Heads they can get hold of. There are more of them than I remember.

“Stein, look at me,” the other Lex orders. He screams and I remember why. I can almost feel the muscles tearing under his skin. As if by reflex, I bring my hand to my own shoulder and squeeze to make sure it isn’t happening to me.

“Lex, please don’t let go,” Stein pleads.

Breaking into a sprint, I run as fast as my leg will allow, but neither has seen me, seen us. Ember and Nobel rush past me. Ember lunges for the cliff, grabbing Stein with two hands. Ethan is only half a second behind her, clutching Stein by the back of her shirt. Nobel attacks the Gear Head preoccupied with greedily cutting off my leg. He shoves a screwdriver into the base of its clear dome skull. Sparks fly and it hisses like a ticked-off snake. Nobel pries the pincers from the other Lex’s calf muscle and throws it to the side. It lands in a heap against some rocks, like a broken toy.

Nobel is pulling the other Lex away from the cliff as he flails, confused by what is happening. I dive in beside him, grabbing the hand that just let go of Stein. Ember, Ethan, and I pull Stein up the rocky cliff face to safety. Stein lies there, breathing heavily, looking to me, then to the other me, and back again. Ember and Ethan stand up. Stepping back, she clutches herself to him. He wraps his arms around her, kissing the top of her head. Nobel makes a quick tourniquet for the other Lex’s leg. I lie by Stein, wishing I could hold her like Ethan is holding Ember. But I don’t reach out to her. She’s looking confused and a little scared, her attention rapt on where the other me is being patched up.

“Stein,” I say gently. “Look at me.”

Stein slowly turns her head in my direction. Our eyes connect and she throws her arms around my neck. I breathe in the smell of her and close my eyes.

I take her hand and we stand. Nobel crouches by the side of the other Lex, putting pressure on the leg wound while that Lex goes in and out of consciousness.

“What’s going on?” Stein finally asks. She can do the math. Two strangers, one Nobel, one Stein—and two Lexs.

“We came to save you, Stein,” I say, brushing her cheek with my fingertips. “I stole some tech from Tesla so I could come back for you.”

Stein looks down at my leg, then back up at me like I’m some kind of freak. She drops my hand and backs away, going to Nobel’s side. The shock is fast and hard. It feels like I’ve just been sucker punched, and it’s hard to breathe. I tense, squaring my shoulders and trying to keep my expression neutral.

She bends over the other Lex. “Nobel, would you be so kind as to fill in the blanks for me? I feel like I may have missed some minor details.”

“Lex and I came back to save you, just like he said.”

Stein frowns, pointing at me. “I’m gonna need more than that.”

I walk over to them. My leg hisses at Stein as if it doesn’t approve of her.

“You died. You fell off the cliff, and I got my leg sawed off by a Gear Head. But I didn’t want to lose you. I couldn’t lose you. So I—we—came back to save you.”

“Nobel, help me up,” the other Lex demands.

Nobel and Stein each hold out a hand and pull him to his feet.

He limps forward, looking me over.

“Oh yeah. This can’t be good,” he says with a laugh.

It’s strange. It’s like looking in a mirror, only…not. I agree with him. This can’t be good. “Yeah, well, you think that’s weird. I never thought I’d see myself with a leg again, albeit a mangled one.”

I also never would have thought in a million years that I’d have to compete with myself for my own girlfriend. I shake my head. “I have got to think these things through better.”

The alternate Lex turns around to look at the strangers in his periphery.

“Anya?” he asks, stumbling toward her.

“Oh, yeah. I forgot about that. So, our sister is alive, too,” I say with a shrug, still staring at my alternate self. Maybe I can toss him off the cliff.

As if reading my mind, Stein looks at me and glares.

Ember steps between us, blocking me from view.

“But, how are you here? I thought you were dead.” The other Lex turns to me. “The tech you used to save Stein, did you use it to save our family as well?”

The hope in his eyes is like a knife in my chest. I shake my head.

Just as the hope dies, Ember reaches him and throws her arms around him, hugging him tightly. But behind his back her eyes are locked on mine in a silent question.

What now?

“How did you escape the fire?” he asks Ember.

“I was with Tesla Institute,” she tells him.

“Look, we should probably get out of here,” the other Lex says, looking at me. “I’m getting a little light-headed from the blood loss.”

“That might be easier said than done,” Ember says, pointing beyond the cliff, where the sky is moving like ripples in a pond.

Lex pulls his backpack over one shoulder and fumbles to unzip it while staring at the strange waves. In a flash of white light the sky splits, tearing open like a burst seam. Inside the gaping wound is darkness and swirling wind. For a moment we are safe, but then the vortex begins to pull us forward. Dust flows toward the cyclone, giving it substance. A bolt of lightning crashes to the ground in front of it. Loose dust and small gravel rush past my boots and are eaten by the darkness.

My hair whips into my face. I glance at the others. A tornado of sand and stone taller than a building is sucking us forward. Beside me Ethan braces himself, grabbing me with one arm and holding the other out for balance. Nobel steps up behind me, pulling me by the shoulders while Stein wraps herself in the other Lex’s arms. Lex pulls the Dox out of his pack, looks up, and sees them.

A look of unexpected pain washes across his face. Maybe no one else sees it, but I catch it, and it makes my heart ache for him. After everything he’s gone through to save the girl he loves, he still might end up without her. It doesn’t seem fair. I want to comfort him, but before I can the vacuum doubles in strength and we all skid forward in the dirt, leaving tracks behind us. In his hands, the Dox glows faintly.

“Now what?” he asks, looking to me.

I shake my head. “I have no idea. It was never tested, remember?”

The vacuum intensifies again and I pitch face-first into the dirt. Ethan’s not far behind me. I hit the ground so hard my teeth ache from being snapped together. Ethan rolls over, covering me with his body, pinning me to the ground. Something about his weight makes me feel safer, less frantic. But there’s something else, too. Another sensation I’m not completely familiar with. It’s almost… wonderful, even in the chaos. It feels like, as long as we’re together, everything will be all right.

“Whatever you’re going to do, do it fast,” Ethan orders Lex, who is violently shaking the Dox. It glows for a moment, then fades like a jar full of dying lightning bugs. Lex is chewing on his bottom lip and perspiration beads on his face. His jester’s hat is sucked off his head. He reaches back to catch it, but it’s useless. It’s gone. Vanishing into the void.

“Maybe we have to get it closer to the tear,” Nobel chimes in from where he crouches beside me. I want to slap him. The last thing I want is for Lex to get closer to the blackhole. My brother slaps the Dox with the palm of his hand. He looks to me, his eyes full of helpless frustration.

“Maybe we should have stolen the directions, too,” he jokes uncomfortably.

It’s how he hides his fear. Something he learned from our father. He looks like our father to me now. Older. Harder. And with a grim smile that tells me he doesn’t expect things to end well.

Stein screams, but the sound is eaten by the blackhole, which is now the size of a house. The other Lex has slipped from her grip and is skidding out of control toward the tear as if being pulled by an invisible rope around his ankles. His arms flail as he gropes for something to hold on to. But there’s nothing. Just loose gravel and sand.

I cry out and reach for him, but he skids past me in a cloud of dust that stings my eyes and fills my mouth. Lex leaps forward, the Dox tucked under his arm, and lands on top of his other self. His prosthetic leg emits a puff of smoke and screeches to a stop, seizing up. Losing his balance, he is pulled forward, off the other boy, and they both tumble toward the swirling vortex. Lightning streaks again, so close and so bright I have to close my eyes against the light. I feel the heat of it singe my face. The scent of burnt hair is carried on the wind. When I am finally able to blink, I see Lex holding his other self up. Lightning strikes again, but this time I force my eyes to remain open. I see the light engulf them both like the sun. For a few seconds everything is white. When the glow fades, only one Lex remains. I look down and see his metal leg. He looks stunned, shaking his head and pressing his eyes closed with his thumb and forefinger. I can feel the pressure building. Another strike is coming any moment.

“No!” I scream.

I just got my brother back. I can’t lose him now. I turn my head to Ethan, but as usual I don’t need to tell him what I’m thinking. He just looks at me and nods. In a moment of bold desperation, we leap to our feet and lunge for my brother. Ethan grabs him first and—using his momentum and the pull of the vortex—swings him around and rolls them both out of the direct path of the suction. As the boys fall, the Dox rolls free of Ethan’s hands and is sucked into the air. I lunge for the fragile glass device.