Mystics #1: The Seventh Sense (21 page)

Zoey ran after him. But when she reached the doors, they wouldn’t
budge.

“He’s locked us in!” she yelled over the alarm, her words thick in
her mouth.

An automatic message suddenly sounded in the chamber.

Systems shutdown
…
commencing in ten
seconds…nine…eight…”

Simon ran over to the computer. “It’s locked with a password!” he
yelled as he typed on the keyboard.

“I can’t do a system’s reboot without the password. I can’t stop it!”
He hit the keyboard with his fist.

Tristan ran over to the desk, reached under it, and pulled out the
power cable. He tossed it to the ground and then stood still, waiting.

“
…seven…six…
” said the
voice. The alarm still thundered across the chamber.

“It didn’t work,” said Simon. He covered his head with his hands. “What
happens after ten seconds?”

Tristan looked around frantically. “I don’t know—I guess we’ll find
out soon enough.”

“
…five…four…
” continued
the voice.

“But I don’t want to find out!” squealed Simon. “I want to
live
!”

Zoey ran back to the others. “I don’t like this! What’s going to
happen?”

“
…three…two…
”

 
The three of them stared at
each other, petrified.

“
…one
.”

Zoey stopped breathing.

“
System shutdown
.” The
alarm stopped.

And then the worst thing that could happen, happened.

A series of
clicks
sounded,
and then one by one the doors to all the cells opened.

S
imon pinched his own arm. “Wake
up, Simon. Wake up! Ouch!”

Zoey punched him on the arm. “You’re awake like the rest of us. Snap
out of it! I need you
focused
.”

They watched aghast as the mystics slowly crept out of their cages. With
a beat of her wings, the winged woman flew to the ceiling where she attached
herself upside down like a bat. Her snake hairs hissed at them.

A spider the size of a couch scurried out of its booth and froze in
the middle of the room. It surveyed the room with its large, black eyes, as if it
were waiting to pounce on its next victim.

 
Some mystics ventured out confidently,
while others preferred to stay in the safety of their prisons. The fire horse
was one of them. It backed away from its open door, neighing and trembling. Its
eyes were wide with fear. Zoey started forward, as if she were going to comfort
the fire horse, but Tristan held her back.

At the other end of the chamber, the
Krakenite
waddled out of its pen like a giant alligator finally escaping from the years
of confinement of a zoo. It tested the open space carefully, as though it
needed to make sure it was real. Its dull gray eyes seemed surprised.

All the mystics that came out had one thing in common—their eyes
burned with hate. Like convicts about to pounce on their prison guards—their malice
was pure and simple. They had been imprisoned by the agency, and now they
wanted revenge.

“Is it me, or do you guys feel like we’re on the mystic menu?”

Simon looked around and then pointed to himself and said in a very
loud voice, “I have a
medical
condition called IBS—irritable bowel syndrome—if you eat me, you’ll suffer
severe
intestinal failure for the
rest
of your life. Now think about that,
before you go all table d'hôte
on us!”

He turned back to Tristan and Zoey and added in a low voice. “I
don’t think they care. What do we do now? They’re like a hundred, and we’re
like—
three
.”

“We’ll have to fight our way out. Grab your weapons and get ready to
use them.” Tristan drew his S9 and grabbed a chair. He smashed the chair on the
ground, and it exploded into pieces. He stooped over the pile, picked up a metal
chair leg and waved it around like a baton.

 
“Zoey, stay close to me.”

 
“Yes,
Agent
Price,” she teased with a little smile that failed to
disguise her fear.

“If we get out of this alive,” said Simon, “I promise to stop
stealing Billy’s chips from his school bag and eating them.”

Following Tristan’s example, Simon yanked his slingshot from his
pocket and armed it with a metal ball. Zoey clasped her boomerang securely. With
their weapons brandished before them, they stood close to each other—ready.

The fairies who watched them never blinked their eyes.

“It was a pleasure serving with the two of you,” continued Simon, in
a melodramatic voice. “May the force be with us!”

And then the attack began. The fairies dive-bombed them.

Using both arm ambidextrously, Tristan swung his metal baton at the
deadly fairies. With mighty swings, he batted them skillfully like a seasoned
baseball player. They ricocheted off the bat and smashed against the wall with loud
crunches
.

Zoey was so impressed by Tristan’s maneuvers that she was nearly
taken by surprise by three fairies who had sneaked up behind her. She turned
just as they went for her face with their sharp teeth. She ducked, turned, and
with a powerful strike, whacked the three fairies with the end of her boomerang.
They went sprawling. Something hit her on the back of the head like a brick.
She went down and rolled, struggling with the dizzy spell that threatened to take
her over. But she got up and blinked the black spots from her eyes.

The rock creature came at her again. She ducked and hurled her
boomerang. It spun and hit the mystic, but the rock creature was like a brick
wall. The boomerang ricocheted back. She caught it and backed away slowly. She
couldn’t see if it had any eyes, but the gaping maw under its belly dripped
with anticipation. It came at her like a cannon ball. She went spinning and
fell to one knee, amazed that she had still held on to her boomerang. The rock
mystic leaped at her as she struggled to her feet—but this time she was ready. She
whirled and kicked, putting all her strength into it. She hit it with upwards
momentum and flipped the creature on its back. The rock thing wailed
desperately and flailed its limbs in the air like an upside-down spider. But its
rock carapace was too heavy, and it wasn’t able to flip itself back upright.

In the corner of her eye, she saw Simon fire his slingshot at a
hairy creature with two heads and large rabbit ears. At the same time he was
struggling to kick off the fairies that were feasting on his calves.

Tristan had moved away from them, closer to the opposite side of the
chamber, and was fighting a giant, white beast that looked like the abominable
snowman’s cousin.

Zoey knew that they were outnumbered. If they didn’t somehow get out
soon, they wouldn’t stand a chance. They really would become items on Simon’s mystic
menu.

What she saw next lifted her spirits slightly. Six fairies dove
towards her, but when she lifted her arm, ready to throw her boomerang, they flew
over her head and landed on the island of computers and monitors behind her. In
fact, most of the fairies seemed to turn their attention to the electronic
equipment. Although at least fifty other nasty mystics were still ready to skin
them alive, the threat had lessened slightly.

And then something strange happened. The mystics started to attack
each other.

In a cacophony of flesh tearing flesh and earsplitting wails, the
chamber became a bloody battlefield. The mystics fought one another with more
hatred than they had showed to Zoey and her friends. They clawed and ripped at
each other savagely.

She watched as a troll-like mystic used its nails to slash a green,
skeletal creature. It flailed wildly, choked, and finally collapsed. Crimson fluid
poured in streams from its gaping maw and spilled onto the marble floor. Zoey was
disgusted at their savagery—it was a horrible sight. Warm bile rose in her
throat. She had never seen anything so terrifying and so
real
. She knew that there must have been some history between the
fighting mystics, but she didn’t know what.

Then she felt a new premonition electrify her skin. There was flash
of green, and suddenly a spike stuck through her arm. She cried out in pain—the
spike burned her flesh like acid. Then the spike was wrenched back out of her
arm, and she could see that it had left a bloody gash.

She caught a glimpse of her attacker. It watched her with large,
yellow eyes. It was humanoid with long, gangly limbs and sharp, black talons. It
had no neck, and its large oblong head had a mouth full of pointed black teeth.
The smell of decay from its filthy green skin burned into Zoey’s nose. It
cocked its head and looked at Zoey. Then its skin started to bubble and change.
The thing pulled and twisted itself like dough. Slowly it morphed into a distorted
version of Zoey herself. It was a shape shifter.

The creature laughed at Zoey’s shock, and in a parody of Zoey it brushed
its red hair and admired itself. It smiled at her, but not with Zoey’s perfect,
white, straight teeth; the creature’s teeth were rotten and pointy like a cat’s.

The shape shifter lunged at Zoey

Zoey hit it in the stomach with the sharp end of her boomerang. The
creature stumbled back, but before she could react, it had grabbed her boomerang.
The creature twirled the boomerang in its hand and laughed. It was much
stronger than her. It leapt at her again, and Zoey fell to the ground on her
back. The shape shifter snapped its mouth at her, inches from her neck. Desperately,
she tried to push the thing off of her, but it was too strong. Its weight crushed
her chest, and she couldn’t breathe. Her other self was going to kill her. She
felt its rough lips brush her neck.

But suddenly the shape shifter was jerked backwards into the air. Blood
escaped from its mouth, and then its body snapped in half with a hideous
crack
. The
Krakenite
tossed it to the ground. Satisfied that it was dead—the
Krakenite
turned its attention to Zoey.

She backed away slowly. Desperately, she looked for her boomerang.
It was still clutched in the hand of dead shape shifter. Instinctively, she
raised her right arm, hoping that her gold bracelet would draw the boomerang
back to her. It shifted slightly, lifting its wing in the air. It twisted on
itself, trying to break free from the hold of the dead shape shifter. But it
held on too tightly, and the boomerang wouldn’t break free.

The
Krakenite
advanced slowly towards her,
its muscles rippling under its wet raw skin. It was stalking her and it licked
its lips in anticipation.

Zoey couldn’t see Tristan or Simon. She couldn’t even manage to
scream to her friends for help. Her jaws were frozen in terror, and the words
died in her throat.

Zoey stared death in the face. There was no way out of this one.

The beast reared, and then bounded towards her again.

But Tristan arrived with a flash of blue light. He forced the great
beast’s maw closed with his bare hands, and then stuck one of his metal poles
into its head and pushed it down into its brain. The
Krakenite
stiffened and then crumbled to the ground.

When Tristan turned around, Zoey’s breath was taken away by what she
saw.

His skin was light blue. Large blue veins showed through the skin on
his face and arms like tattoos, as though his skin was paper-thin. And his eyes
glowed with the deepest sea-blue light she had ever seen.

A shiver rippled down her back. That tingling sense she had always
felt when she was around Tristan intensified. She always assumed that the sensations
had been caused by her growing feelings for him, but now she saw her mistake—it
was because he was a mystic.

Zoey couldn’t tell, but she must have looked scared because Tristan
looked hurt when he saw that she appeared to be frightened of him. She was
confused, scared, and her heart was crushed.

Simon bounced into view. He had strange orange slime all over the
front of his shirt, but otherwise he was unharmed. He beamed at Tristan and
smacked him on the back.

“Wow, that was awesome! You had like, super strength, like a
superhero. You’re like, like superman’s little brother. It was
amazing
.”

Tristan didn’t look at Simon. He watched the battle instead.

“Looks like the mystics have forgotten about us, for the time being.
We should move before they remember who put them in those cages.”

Zoey pressed her wounded arm as she attempted to stop the bleeding, but
her eyes never left Tristan.

“How did you do that? You
changed
—your
skin changed color—and you had these veins showing all over your body.
What
are you?”

Tristan’s shoulders tensed, but he didn’t turn around.

When Simon noticed that Tristan wasn’t about to answer, he spoke up.

“He’s a
mysterian
—by the looks of him—a
human mystic hybrid,” said Simon amazed. “They’re like super rare.”

Zoey watched Tristan uneasily. She remembered seeing a blue halo around
him when they had fought the
Krakenite
back at the
academy.

She looked at Simon angrily. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Simon shrugged. “I didn’t know he was a
mysterian
—I’ve
never even
seen
one before now. I
don’t think anyone knows.”

“Management knows,” said Tristan.

He turned around, and his skin and eyes were back to their normal
color.

“—and a few agents.”

He looked at Zoey, but she looked quickly away and then felt guilty.

“Tristan’s right, we need to get out of here,” she added hastily,
pretending not to be affected by Tristan’s sudden change. “—before the mystics
that are left decide to make a meal out of us, after all.”

Pressure on her chest made it hard for her to breathe. She looked
everywhere except at Tristan and felt increasingly guilty at avoiding his gaze.
When she did look at him again, he looked vacant and unfocused.

She heard a neigh and turned to see the fire horse pinned in its
cell by a giant snake.

“Hang on, there’s something I need to do,” said Zoey. “See if you
can unlock the doors. I’ll be right back.”

Zoey sprinted across the chamber before they could stop her. She
skidded to a stop in front of the dead shape shifter, and careful not to look
at its face,
her
face, she pried open
its fingers and rescued her boomerang. She didn’t know why, but she had this
sudden urge to rescue the fire horse.

She made sure no other mystics were in pursuit, and rushed to the
fire horse’s cell. With all the energy she had left, she hurled her boomerang
in the direction of the snake creature. It hit its head, and it collapsed with
a thud. She caught her rebounding boomerang as she ran closer to the fire horse.

It backed away from her, wild-eyed. Flames suddenly soared from the
horse, and she backed away. But even through the flames, she could see the
horse was shivering. It was terrified.

“Come,” she pleaded, her eyes watering from the heat waves.

“Come,
please
. I won’t
hurt you,” she said in her softest voice.

What girl wouldn’t fall in love with a
fire
stallion? It pained her to see it so scared, and she ached to
help it. She knew animals had a special sixth sense. They could sense danger, and
distinguish between foes and friends. She tried to be calm, so not to frighten
the beast. And then she thought of something.