Fall of Hades (11 page)

I
t was a Sunday, I think. I wasn't sure. Since arriving at the ranch, it had been hard to keep track of what day it was. The sun was setting over the western hills of Kane County, casting the ranch in a rose-gold hue, which, in spite of all the fear I carried, was still beautiful.

After dinner, Taylor and I grabbed a couple of quilts from my bunkhouse and walked down to the pond. We lay the blankets flat on the wooden dock that hung out over water that had been dyed blue-green so it looked more like water from the Bahamas than a cow pond.

The sun had fallen during our short walk, and the canyons to the east were bright pink with the sun's last offering. We lay down next to each other.

“It's so beautiful,” Taylor said.

I pointed toward a large stone outcrop. “See that ridge right there, that juts out? It's called Queen's Throne.”

“How do you know that?”

“Ostin,” I said.

“Ostin,” she repeated. “Of course Ostin knew.”

“Just past that is the city of Kanab. They used to shoot a lot of old Western movies there. They call it ‘Little Hollywood.'”

“Ostin again?”

I nodded. “He knows everything.”

We looked out over the horizon in silence. The canyons changed as the sun fell more and shadows crept up from the plateau's jagged foothills like a rising hand.

I swatted at a moth that was fluttering in front of my face. Being outside at night at the ranch was a problem. As the sun set, the insects were attracted to our glows, but especially mine, which now seemed to be getting brighter almost daily. I felt like a glowstick. Or, more accurately, a bug zapper. (An Electrical Discharge Insect Control System, as Ostin would call it.) The truth is, I didn't need to swat at the bugs. They'd disintegrate as soon as they landed on my skin. I just didn't like the powder marks and the smell of burning insects on my body.

“Your glow is getting brighter,” Taylor said.

“I'm still getting more electric.”

“Does that worry you?”

“I don't know. I'm not sure what it means.” I looked at Taylor. “I find myself still worrying about that lie Hatch told me at the academy about some of the electric children dying of cancer.”

“He uses fear and lies to control people.”

“The thing is, I know it's a lie. So why do I still think about it?”

“A lie can exist in your mind even when you know it's a lie. That's why you should never stop challenging your beliefs.”

I looked out over the pond. A fish jumped. “You're right.”

“It's so peaceful out here,” Taylor said. She was tracing the fernlike scars on my arm with her fingernail.

“They're weird, aren't they?” I said.

“I like them. I always have.” She was quiet a moment more, then said, “I'm afraid of this mission. I have a bad feeling about it.” She looked up into my eyes. “Are you afraid?”

I took a deep breath. “Yeah. Like out of my skull afraid.”

“Then why are we doing this? Why don't we just stay here?”

“Because eventually the Dark Lord will reach the Shire,” I said. Taylor looked at me peculiarly. “I mean the battle will come here, too.”

“Then let it,” she said. “Let them come to us.”

“By the time it reaches us, it will be too late. We'll have no chance at all.”

She sighed. “You're right. I don't like it, but I know you're right.” She went back to tracing on my arm. “Is everyone coming?”

“So far.”

“Even Grace?”

“No. She'll be helping from back here. She'd just be another person we'd have to watch out for.”

“My parents are freaking out about this. My father doesn't want me to go.”

“When did he say that?”

“Last night. He said we just got back together and he'll never let me out of his sight again.”

A part of me was glad to hear this. The protective part of me didn't want her to go, even though I honestly didn't think we could succeed without her.

“This morning I heard him telling the chairman that this was a suicide mission and he couldn't believe the chairman would send a bunch of kids to their deaths.”

“What did the chairman say?”

“He said that we aren't just a bunch of kids. That we're not only gifted, we're smart.”

“That describes us,” I said sardonically.

“Then he said he knew it was dangerous, but these are dangerous times.” She hesitated. “No, he said
desperate
times. And desperate times require desperate measures.”

“So we're a desperate measure,” I said.

“Apparently.” She frowned. “You know what's really weird? My brothers in college have no idea what's going on. My father hadn't even told them that my mother was arrested.”

“How would you even begin to explain things to them?”

“I have no clue. Especially since they probably think our parents are dead.” She shook her head. “They don't even know I'm electric.” Taylor's frown deepened. “Do you think that the Elgen would hunt down my brothers?”

I didn't want to tell her what I really thought. The truth was, I was surprised that the Elgen hadn't found them already. “I don't know,” I finally said. “So what are you going to do about the mission?”

“What do
you
want me to do?”

I thought for a moment, then breathed out slowly. “I want you to be safe. I want you to be a million miles away from Hatch and the Elgen.”

“That would put me on the sun.”

I grinned. “The sun is ninety-three million miles from the Earth.”

She grinned back. “Really, Ostin?”

“Sorry. I am starting to sound like him.”

“One Ostin's enough.” She laughed. “Actually, one is
more
than enough.”

“My point is, I don't care how far you are from Hatch, just as long as he can't find you.”

“So you don't want me to go?”

I again hesitated. “I want you to be safe. But I don't know if we can do it without you. I know I can't. You saved my butt at least ten times.”

“You've saved mine, too,” Taylor said softly. “Don't worry. I know you need me. And I'm not a kid asking my mommy and daddy for permission anymore. I left all that back in Idaho. My dad still doesn't understand the big picture. He still believes that things can go back to the way they were and we can be a cozy, innocent little family. What he wants right now doesn't matter. The only thing that matters is whether or not it's the right thing.” She touched my face. “You taught me that.”

“If we don't stop the Elgen, they'll just grow more powerful. The longer we wait, the more dangerous they become. Like python eggs.”

“Exactly. Easy to crush, but let them hatch and grow, and they'll crush you.”

Let them
Hatch, I thought.

“There's something else I don't know what to do about. . . . I mean, in case we don't make it back,” Taylor said.

“What's that?”

“I know what Jade Dragon knows. I mean, I don't understand it, but I could recite it all. Should I tell them?”

I swatted at another moth. “I don't think so.”

“You don't trust the resistance?”

“I don't know if I trust them with
that
.”

“But we've trusted them with our lives.”

“It's not the same. Even if they weren't our friends, our lives are important to them. But this is different. Some information is too tempting. It's like, I've never stolen anything before, but if you told me that there's a million dollars, unguarded, in a box behind the school, I might consider taking it. You know what I mean?”

“Yeah.”

“What if someone decides that it's a good idea to beat Hatch at his own game by creating their own electric civilization?”

“Someone? You mean, the resistance?”

I nodded. “We don't really know much about the voice, do we? What I do know is that that much power in one person's hands is too much. Besides, they know where to find Jade Dragon.” I kissed the top of Taylor's head. “There will be time to figure this out after we come back.”

She nodded. “
After
we come back.” She cuddled back into me. We lay there quietly on the quilt with my arms around her, and her head on my chest. She felt so good. So warm and soft. In spite of the mess of my life, I still felt lucky. If my electricity had brought me nothing but Taylor, it was worth it. I couldn't imagine loving anyone more than I loved her.

Then Taylor lifted her head and looked at me. “There's something else I want to tell you. But I'm afraid.”

I leaned up on one elbow. “Why would you be afraid?”

“I don't want you to think I'm crazy.”

“I know you're crazy,” I said.

She punched my shoulder. “No, I'm serious. It's weird.”

“So? I'm weird. Tell me.”

She took a deep breath. “How do I begin?” She hesitated a moment, then said, “I read something the other day that said we only use ten percent of our brains. Except, like Ostin, he probably uses like ninety percent, but this article said that if we could use all of our brains, we would not only be able to read minds, but we'd be able to see the future.” She looked at me intensely. “I thought it was interesting that they made the connection of mind reading to seeing the future. What do you think of that?”

I shrugged. “I don't know how you could know something that hasn't happened. But I don't know if time is really the way we think it is. Ostin once tried to explain to me Einstein's theory of relativity and how time warps. I didn't get it. He also said that Stephen Hawking said that he couldn't understand why we couldn't remember the future, so maybe if our brains were powerful enough, we could.”

“So you think that it might be possible to tell the future?”

“Yes. I mean, people have made predictions before, like prophets and Nostradamus and stuff.” I looked into her eyes. “Why?”

“Something is happening to me. I keep having dreams. But they don't feel like dreams, they feel real. Almost like memories. And they come true. At least they have so far.”

“What kind of dreams?”

She sat up, pulling back from me a little. “Like, right after we escaped the Starxource plant in Taiwan, I had a dream that all these black dragons were flying over Timepiece Ranch and then they started breathing fire over it until everything was burned to ashes. After it was over, there was one dead dragon on the ground.

“And when we got there, that's what we saw—the ranch was completely burned up and there was one crashed helicopter on the ground.”

“Why didn't you tell me about your dream?” I sat up too.

“I didn't think it mattered then. I mean, we were facing real nightmares in Taiwan. But then I had another dream. The night after we met up with Gervaso in the Gadsden, I had a dream that my mother was in a cage and my father was walking around it dressed in his police uniform. I asked him why he didn't let her out, and he said, ‘Because she stole you.' I said, ‘How could she steal me, I'm right here?' and he said, ‘No one can see you, so the police won't let her go.'” Taylor exhaled slowly. “Then, just a few days later, we find out that my mother had been arrested by the Boise police and charged with my disappearance.”

“That's weird,” I said, not sure what to say. Taylor looked upset.

“I don't know what to make of it.” She looked me in the eyes. “Am I, like, psychic?”

“Maybe we should talk to Ostin about this. I'm sure he'll know something about this.”

Taylor put her hand on my arm. “I don't want anyone else to know. At least not yet.”

“Okay,” I said. “Anyway, if it's true, then it's a good thing. We'll have an idea of what's going on.”

“Yeah, if we knew what my dreams meant. Like, last night I had a dream that my father grew antlers like a deer and was running around the ranch being chased by hunters. Then one of them shot him.”

“Were they Elgen?”

“I don't think so. I mean, it was like they were just . . . hunters.”

Just then the serenity was broken by the sound of three gunshots—the sharp recoil echoing through the surrounding hills.

“What was that?” Taylor asked.

“Gunshots.” My worst fear flooded in.
What if the Elgen has found us?

“We'd better go see,” I said. I looked to the hill south of us, where the water tower and sentry were. “It came from over there.”

Leaving our blankets, we ran up the north bank of the hill toward the water tower. It wasn't easy in the dark, as our path was lit only by a rising moon.

We had run nearly two hundred yards from the pond when we reached the top of the hill. We were both out of breath, and my face was ticking like crazy. We stopped next to the water tower to rest.