Legacy (21 page)

Zack nodded. “Thanks.”

What’s so special about Building Sixteen?
Wait. Is that where they make dodecamine?

Zack gave me a subtle nod, not turning his head toward me. He was still shielding so well I would’ve walked past him in the dark.

Drew pulled inside the gate and parked the van next to a huge, open slab of concrete that dominated one corner. Metal beams traced a long rectangle across its surface, with gaps that might be doorways at either end. A pile of scrapped wood pallets stood off to the side. At the far end of the fenced field, two trailers nearly touched the edge of the enclosure. Electric and water hookups trailed off both of them and into Building Sixteen, along with a snaking green cable that I hoped was an internet connection.

“The pre-fabricated building goes up tomorrow morning.” Martinson gestured to the slab. “The installation crew will be here by eight.”

Zack nodded. “Good.”

Zack was doing all the talking and suddenly I felt—
sidelined
. I knew I could no longer manage some of the basic tasks on a mission—like talking to this strangely unflappable man—however, seeing Zack confidently handling the situation made me feel obsolete.
Useless.
And I couldn’t even read his stupid, shielded mind.

You need to do everything?
Trevor asked.

I shook my head.
Sorry. I don’t know where that came from.

Long day?
He could feel how tired I was.

Yeah
.
Any idea how we’re going to handle dinner?

Umm…

Zack just took care of it while I was having my existential mini-crisis, didn’t he?

Martinson got into his little golf cart and putted away. Seriously, it would’ve been faster to walk.

Uh-huh.
Trevor smiled.
They’re delivering pizza.

Ah.
It was my turn to smile.
Jersey pizza.
Like bagels, the quality of pizza seemed inversely proportional to the distance a place was from New York. Jersey pizza—with the drippy orange grease that would run onto our hands as we fed ourselves the narrow, folded-in-half-lengthwise slices—was simply the best pizza on the planet. We’d be able to
feel
our arteries clogging, slowly killing us with each incredible bite—but what a way to go.

Trevor laughed.
Hungry?

Oh, yeah. I’m sorry, but they do NOT do pizza right in New Hampshire. I mean, what are they using for sauce? Ketchup?

Speaking of New Hampshire…

I handed him the cell phone.
Remind me why I’m the one still carrying this thing.

Conversation died out at the sound of Trevor’s, “Hey, Rachel.”

I couldn’t hear her response over the sudden flashes of concern.

Where’s Isaiah now?

Is he coming for us, or are we going after him?

Why are we in New Jersey again? Nothing good ever happens to us in New Jersey.

Why isn’t Rachel with us? Is it because Sean died around here and she can’t handle coming back?

Trevor put his hand over the receiver. “Isaiah’s still in Phoenix.”

The others relaxed and started talking again. I considered the other concerns for the group. The most difficult issue would be the sleeping arrangements. We needed to place ourselves so that both Ann and I were far enough away from the others—and from each other—to avoid sending or picking up dreams. I scanned the enclosed space and frowned. Suddenly, the football-field-sized space didn’t look big enough.

Ann?
What’s your range?

I used to hear at one-ninety, detect at three-thirty.

I shook my head. No, definitely not big enough, particularly with the stronger connection between minders.

But I’m not at full strength on the new dosage, and I don’t share dreams.

You don’t?

I hear them from other people, so I need the distance to sleep well, but I’m not projective like you and Uncle Jon.

But you can shield now
.
I’m pretty sure that shielding and projecting are related.

Oh.
She considered that. She didn’t know whether this was a good or bad development. The idea of being a projective telepath intrigued her on one level, but sharing thoughts and dreams unwillingly scared her.

I humphed.
Tell me about it.

We clustered the tents in the corners, leaving the center of the rectangular area open. Ann and I were diagonally across from each other. Trevor set out his tarp and air mattress on the concrete slab about twenty feet in from my little blue tent. The corner opposite the trailers filled with the metallic tents of the sparks. I hadn’t heard the discussion that put Hannah in one trailer and Zack in the other, but it worked. While Claire’s tent was pitched by the trailers, I got the impression from her and Dave’s minds that it was mostly for show.

The pizza arrived as we finished setting up. Drew and Harrison scavenged some scrap wood from the construction debris and flashed up a little campfire in the middle of the manicured lawn, in the exact center of the fenced area. I could almost feel the horror of whoever’s job it was to keep this place looking like a golf course. We pulled a few of the air mattresses into a loose circle around the flames and ate pizza as the sun dipped from the sky and the light evening breeze cooled the air.

I looked around the group. Claire and Dave sat hip to hip. Their bright blue eyes seemed to match, although she was slender and dark-haired, while he was burly and barrel-chested with the standard-issue, McFee red hair and blotchy freckles. They talked and laughed with Ellen and Melanie.

On their other side, Drew and Harrison debated the best way to get a good color change out of the flames, and parts of the fire flared red, yellow, white, and blue in turns as they showed each other various techniques.

Jonah Parker was quiet, both in and out of his head, and he cast a light presence here, especially with so many large, vibrant McFees around. I focused on him for a moment, trying to figure him out. I knew that Jonah was a descendent of the first known pyrokinetic, William Underwood. I floated a quiet thought into his head.

What happened to bring me to Ganzfield?

The memory played through his mind. Three years ago, a distant cousin had visited him. Two weeks after a cheek swab to look for the “genetic abnormality” the cousin claimed to have, he’d been thrust into a new world of sparks, charms, and minders. He’d never told his mother or grandfather about his ability, despite the fact that he’d inherited it through them. They were both strongly, charismatically religious. He feared they’d regard his power over fire as demonic and evil—and the joy he felt from it as wicked and prideful.

I gathered from their conversation that Hannah and Jonah were part of the same group that met in one of the Blake House classrooms on Sunday mornings for an informal church service. How strange—Ganzfield had an actual church on the premises, but the faithful met in a classroom.

Yeah, I asked about that when I first started sleeping there.
Trevor’s shoulder pressed against mine.
The people who started the group a few years back wanted to meet in a place with heat.

Lucky for us.
I smiled sideways at him.

Ann and Zack sat together across the circle from Trevor and me, shielding as they talked to each other. Half-eaten slices of pizza hung forgotten in their hands.

I pulled a mental shield around Trevor and me.
I can’t read either of them
.
Are they interested in each other?

He half-choked on a bite of pizza.
Seriously? You can’t tell?

They’re both shielding right now.

They’re into each other. Totally enamored.
He was so much better at reading body language than I was.

Think that’s okay?

I think it’s fantastic that he’s interested in someone who isn’t you. But Ann’s…well, I worry about her.

He’s a good guy.

She’s had a rough time of it
. I felt a little flare of jealousy at the remembered flash of the time he’d spent with her, before I’d gotten to Ganzfield. Trevor had been one of the last people she could stand having around last time she’d been on dodecamine. On one hand, I could completely understand that—Trevor’s genuine goodness really did feel wonderful to minders. On the other hand, the thought of her “connecting” with his mind made me pink up with delayed jealousy.

Trevor snorted.
So, I was jealous of Zack and you were jealous of Ann?

I could see the humor in it—now.
And now they seem to be interested in each other.

So this could be a good thing?

I smiled.
Or at least in our benign self-interest
.

I lowered the shield.
Ann, should Trevor and I take the first watch, or do you and Zack want it?

Ann flushed. When she dropped her shield to answer, her mind blossomed with Zack-related giddiness.
We’ll stay up and talk a little more.

I looked at the time displayed on my cell phone. It was a little before eight.
Wake me at ten.
We quickly set the order of the night’s watch—Drew and Harrison at midnight; Dave and Claire at two; Jonah and Hannah at four; Ellen and Mel at six. With so many of us, we didn’t have long watches. They weren’t too much of a priority at this point. Isaiah was still far away and Allexor had enough existing security to keep out most other threats. I sent a quick text to my mom letting her know that we’d arrived—although Rachel probably had told her.

Another side benefit of being an RV—Rachel would always know where her child was…and what he or she was doing.

I kinda pitied the kid a little bit.

Trevor gathered up some additional construction debris as we left the fire. He sat on his air mattress and put a ring of wood scraps at the ends of his range, marking a circle so the others wouldn’t accidentally approach too closely while he slept.

The others noticed when Trevor joined me in my tent, but after eight months as a couple, we really weren’t the objects of gossip anymore—more like part of the social landscape. Only Jonah’s morally-tinged disapproval registered at the outermost reaches of my range.

I popped up a shield around our minds, since we were still in Ann’s range. I couldn’t hear her thoughts—she must also be shielding.
Quiet.
I felt the strains of the day leaving me and the sense of completeness filled us. The minds and voices within the enclosure gently touched the edges of my consciousness and I drifted to sleep in Trevor’s embrace.

Two hours later—which felt like ten minutes—Ann’s hushed voice called my name from outside the tent.

I’m awake.
Trevor’s arms were still around me. My forehead was damp from where it’d pressed against Trevor’s neck.

I’m awake, too,
he sent to us both.

What?
Ann’s surprise flared bright yellow. She hadn’t heard his thoughts from inside the tent until he dropped the shield at the sound of her voice. He’d been borrowing my ability to shield us both while I slept.

You stayed awake and shielded me?

You hate sharing dreams with other people,
and Ann was still in range when you fell asleep.

Tears tickled the edges of my eyes and a lump filled my throat.
Thank you
. I was so unworthy of this consideration. In the dark, I felt the tender brush of his lips against my forehead.

Trevor scavenged a few more pieces of scrap wood, built the fire back up, and then slid down to sit next to me. We talked silently through the uneventful shift, shielding together so as not to disturb Ann. I felt her mind in the isolated little tent in the far corner. Her foggy shield slipped as she drifted into sleep.

Only a few stars were visible in the hazy sky when we woke Drew and Harrison at midnight for their watch. The two sparks shared my unspoken view that the two-hour shifts definitely beat the all-nighters we’d been doing at Ganzfield. The air felt damp as I watched Trevor settle down to sleep on the air mattress in the center of his no-man’s-land bull’s eye. I curled up in my now-lonely tent, feeling his mind disappear into unconsciousness. The solitude felt empty; I was glad I was soon pulled down into sleep, as well.

Maybe it was because we were back in New Jersey.

I had the van attack nightmare again for the first time in months. I cried out as Mike punched me in the jaw and Del ripped my shirt down the front. Suddenly, Trevor pulled them away from me, scooping me up in his arms as the world shimmered and changed into our beautiful beach in Aruba.

“I thought we were done with that one.”

“So did I.” Ah, the magic of dreams—
I could talk again!
I wasn’t broken and defective in Trevor’s imagination. I rubbed my jaw, trying to use the lucid dreaming technique to make the pain dissipate. It didn’t work. Trevor slid down onto one of the beach chairs under the grass umbrella, pulling me into his lap as he did.

“You sure do have to rescue me a lot.” My voice still held a quiver.

“You’re worth saving. And besides, you rescue me, too.”

He leaned in to brush a feathery kiss across my lips. I put my hand around the back of his head, pulling him closer. The kiss deepened and his arms tightened around my back.

“Oh!”

We pulled apart at the sound of a familiar voice. Ann stood on the beach, wide-eyed.

Ann’s in our dream?

The shock woke all three of us up.

I let out a long breath.
Ah, hell. We’re going to need a bigger boat.

Trevor came quietly into my tent, his little pen-sized flashlight in-hand.
Are you okay?