Mystics #1: The Seventh Sense (23 page)

Tristan pulled out his slingshot and started down the hallway. “There
are hostile mystics here—lots of them—I can feel it. Keep your eyes open and be
ready for anything.”

“And the adventure never ends.” Simon wielded his slingshot. “We
better get promoted after this. It wasn’t in the academy’s course outline. If
we die, I better get an
A
for
effort
.”

“Nobody’s dying, but let’s hope we’re not too late.”

Zoey drew her boomerang and followed Tristan and Simon cautiously
down the dark corridor. It was a dead end. They stopped in the darkness to
consider what to do next. Zoey heard a swishing sound, and a giant battle-axe came
crashing down towards them.

“M
OVE!” cried Tristan as he
pushed Zoey and Simon to the ground, just as a giant axe swung inches above
their heads.

Zoey hit the ground, but something sharp cut her hands as she tried
to break her fall. She felt the warm blood seep between her fingers. She rolled
over carefully, but she could still feel something shattering and crunching
under her. She got to her feet gingerly and looked around. The floor was
littered with broken mirrors.

She pulled a large shard of glass from her left palm. The cut was
deep and blood poured down her arm. The ground wavered as pain and nausea
threatened to take her over, but she clamped her hand shut and ignored it. She
looked up.

A ten-foot-tall, gray-skinned humanoid that looked like a cross
between a dragon and a man stood in front of her. Its body rippled with
muscles, and horns sprouted from the top of its flat head. It swished its thick
tail behind it and watched her malevolently with beady black eyes.

“What is that?”

Tristan moved to her side. “A
Daragon
,” he
whispered. “—a dragon beast—it’ll kill anything that moves.”

The look of excitement that began to show in its eyes, and the blood
on its axe and its body, was clear evidence that it had murdered before and had
enjoyed it.

“Okay, so let’s
not
move,”
whispered Simon.

Through the smoldering fires and smoke, Zoey could see that they
stood in a great cathedral of a hall. All the light fixtures had been smashed
and hung uselessly from their broken brackets. Hundreds of mirrors had obviously
lined the great hall once, but every single one was completely smashed, and the
floor was carpeted with sharp and deadly glass shards.

Zoey started to gag on the smell of burnt meat. Feathers dotted the
floor to her left, and a pile of scorched feathers and a body lay a few feet
away from them in a pool of blood—the
Sestram
. And
then she saw something that made her retch. The burnt remains of three people,
their skin crisped and black like coal, lay in a heap near the wall.

“By the looks of it, it’s been pretty busy,” said Simon. “And it’s
destroyed all the mirror-ports, too.” He pointed to the hundreds of broken mirrors
that outlined the great hall.

“That’s why we landed in the store,” he continued. “No one could
mirror port into here.”

Zoey couldn’t tell how long ago the mirrors had been smashed, but
she hoped it was
after
the agency had
sent help.

“The creature knew what it was doing,” she said, keeping her voice
down. “Someone told it to smash all the mirrors. Someone’s controlling it—”

“Watch out!” cried Tristan.

With a massive swing, the
Daragon
hurled
its battle axe at them. It spun fast, like a giant, sharp boomerang.

Zoey leaped out of the way as the axe spun crashing into the wall behind
her. She scrambled to her feet and ran to the other side of the room with Simon
and Tristan.

With three giant leaps, the
Daragon
crossed the room and wrenched its axe from deep in the wall. It brushed off the
chunks of plaster and dust that the axe had dislodged and turned to face them
again.

“How long can we keep this up before we get killed?” said Simon,
backing away slowly.

“I don’t know,” answered Zoey. Her hand was still bleeding
profusely. “Let’s just try
not
to get
killed.”

The mystic roared and came at them with a deathly swing of its battle-axe
once again. They leaped out of the way as the great axe crashed into the ground
in front of them and smashed the marble tiles into dust.

The
Daragon
snarled through its pointy black
teeth, “
Ich
gruthic
se
matvis
,
homen
.”

Its deep rasping voice sounded like the roar of a lion. It flexed
its great chest muscles, and glared at them as though it was challenging them
to a fight.

Zoey looked at Tristan. “You don’t speak mystic, do you?”

Tristan loaded his slingshot. “Nope.”

“Didn’t think so.”

 
Tristan scowled at the beast.
“But I can tell you this—it means to kill us.”

“I figured that much.”

The mystic growled, swinging its battle-axe from side to side,
taunting them. Its black eyes moved between them leisurely, as if it enjoyed deciding
whom to kill first.

“I’ve love to stay here and flex my nonexistent muscles at the
dragon-man,” said Simon, his eyes wide, “but does anyone have a plan?”

 
“Aim for its head,” said
Tristan.

He moved away and circled the creature. “If we all hit it at the
same time, we might at least knock it out—I think that’s our best shot.”

With trembling fingers, Simon loaded his weapon with a metal ball.
“Guys—you know my aim sucks. I don’t work well under pressure. And this is
way
too much pressure for me.”

“Just try to relax, Simon,” said Zoey. She shifted her weight
nervously, trying to calm herself as well.

“I’m ADD—I don’t know the meaning of
relax!
” cried Simon.

Tristan steadied himself. “Okay, you guys—on three…”

Zoey aimed her boomerang at the beast’s head.

The
Daragon
cocked its head to the side,
watching them, and she wondered if it knew what they were planning. It bared
its teeth and looked almost as though it were smiling. It was enjoying itself.

“One
¼
” counted Tristan, sweat dripped down
his face.

“Thank God it doesn’t breathe fire,” said Simon hopefully. “I mean,
that’s lucky, right, a dragon-man that it
doesn’t
breathe fire.”

“Two…”
 

Zoey held her breath.

“Three!”

Two metal balls and a boomerang shot through the air and struck the
beast’s head. The creature staggered for a second, and Zoey felt the thrill of
hope as she caught her boomerang back. But then the
Daragon
steadied itself and lowered its eyes. Its top lip quivered into an evil snarl,
and with a deafening roar it tossed its weapon onto the floor and flailed its
arms around in a violent tantrum.

“I think we only made it
really
mad,” said Simon.

He took a step back. “That’s bad isn’t it? What do you think it’s
going to do now?”

“I don’t know, Simon,” snapped Tristan.

As if in answer to his question, the
Daragon
stretched out its arms, flicked its wrists, and two fireballs the size of
watermelons formed in its palms.

Zoey felt the blood drain from her face. “That’s just great,” she
said and looked at Simon.

“I thought you said it
didn’t
breathe fire!”

Simon shrugged. “I didn’t
breathe
it—it conjured it.”

“What’s the difference?” cried Zoey angrily. “It’s still
fire!
”

The
Daragon
sneered wickedly and hurled
the two fireballs.

“MOVE!”

Zoey leaped out of the way, and the fireballs whizzed past and
exploded on the wall behind her. The entire wall went up in flames, as though it
had been sprayed with gasoline beforehand.

Her eyes watered from the heat of the flames. She knew she would
have burst into flames like the wall if one of the fireballs had hit her.

“This way!” yelled Tristan.

He jumped over a body and bolted down a corridor away from the
Daragon
. Simon and Zoey followed behind him.

The ground shook beneath their feet as more fire balls exploded like
grenades around them. Chunks of plaster fell from the ceiling and showered them
as they ran. Coughing through the rubble Zoey stole a look behind her. The
Daragon
had stopped hurling fireballs and was charging
after them at full speed, swinging its battle-axe like a madman. They had a few
seconds head start, but the mystic was catching up to them fast.

They bounded down the corridor, passed some elevators, and arrived at
a T-junction at the end of the hallway.

“Left or right?” asked Zoey as she tried to catch her breath.

 
Suddenly, screams echoed from
somewhere down the left corridor. Then a series of ear-splitting cracks, bangs,
and rattles, like a fireworks display. A woman cried out, then nothing—silence.

Without another word, the three of them turned left and charged towards
the scream.

They burst into a large oval shaped auditorium. Heavy red drapes kept
the edges of the room in darkness, and rows of seats in a semi-circle faced down
towards a stage.

“We’re too late,” said Simon as he stared at a body lying on the
ground in a pool of blood. “It’s already started.”

Zoey could see that the auditorium was littered with bodies that had
been shot in the head, execution style. Blood splattered the walls, and the
marble floors were sullied in red. There were no moans, no cries for help, just
silence. It was a massacre, a merciless bloodbath. She couldn’t see anyone
alive.

A wave of nausea came over her, and she forced it down. She had
never seen so many dead people before. She had to be brave.

She found two more bodies sitting in the chairs at the back row. They
didn’t have any blood or visible injuries on them. They sat with their heads
bent slightly backwards, looking up to the ceiling. Their faces were twisted in
terror, as though they had been frightened to death.

These people hadn’t died at the hands of the
Daragon
—or
any other mystic—so who had killed them? She already knew the answer.

“What do Alphas look like? I wouldn’t want to kill any of our own.”

Zoey squeezed her boomerang hard in her sudden rage, the pain from
her previous fights forgotten.

Tristan shook his head and clenched his jaw. “Never seen one. All I
know is that they look like us. They’re Sevenths—just
not
with the agency.”

“I’ve never seen one either,” said Simon. He stepped carefully over
the bodies and tried his best not to look at their faces. But he couldn’t help
himself.

“It’s not like the Alphas were
best
friends with the agency. They probably look like any of us—that’s why no one’s
ever really paid closer attention to them—they didn’t think they’d turn out to
be psychos.”

“Right.” Zoey looked around at the victims to see if she recognized
any of them. She feared that Agent Barnes would be amongst the dead. Then she
realized that they had forgotten something.

Zoey looked at her friends. “Guys—where’s the
Daragon
?”

Simon jumped, startled, and Tristan peered back down the corridor.

“It’s gone,” he said, with a surprised look on his face. “That’s
weird. Why did it stop chasing us?”

A flash of red light zipped past Zoey’s cheek. Then a red flare
scraped her thigh like a red-hot blade and hit the chair beside her. She cried out
in pain and threw herself to the ground behind a row of chairs. Tristan and
Simon flung themselves onto the ground next to her. At first she thought they had
been attacked by mystics, but when she raised her head slightly between the seats,
she realized how wrong she was.

A dozen men and women clad in exquisitely tailored, blood-red suits
stood on the auditorium stage. The men had army-style crew cuts, and all the women
had their hair pulled back into tight buns or ponytails. They all looked mildly
amused—as if this was a game to them, and they were already winning. All except
one of them carried large automatic weapons at their sides.

The woman without a gun had dark hair and milky white skin. She held
her right hand out in front of her, and above her palm a glowing red sphere
hovered like an apple suspended by invisible strings. The woman’s cold smile
sent a chill rolling down Zoey’s back.

Then a man whom Zoey had thought was dead stood up in the middle of
the auditorium. He started limping through the aisle towards one of the side
exits. Zoey felt the strain and desperation that she saw on the man’s face.

The woman with the sphere stepped down from the platform calmly and
moved toward the man. The man whimpered when he saw her, and in a last
desperate attempt to save his life he moved as fast as he could. But it wasn’t
fast enough, and the woman blocked his way

“NO!” cried the man. “No, please, don’t! Please!”

The woman smiled and lifted the sphere towards his face. A sudden beam
of red light shot out from the globe and hit the man’s eyes. His expression twisted
grotesquely from fear to a terror like nothing Zoey had ever seen before. Then
he froze like a statue.

The woman laughed and pushed the man softly, with a single finger. He
toppled to the ground, like a dead tree, and didn’t move again.

“That was pretty disturbing,” whispered Simon, who looked like he
might throw up. “He died of fright. We better get out of here before the mad lady
decides to use her freaky snow globe on us.”

“I’m guessing
these
are
the Alphas, right?” said Zoey.

She looked away long enough to check the wound in her thigh. Blood
soaked through her jeans, but it wasn’t a deep cut.

“Looks like it,” answered Tristan. “Now that they’ve seen us, they’re
coming this way—and I have a feeling they don’t want to chat.”

Simon frowned. “Well, they dressed for the occasion. I guess they
were going for a theme—red for
blood
.”

“And red for murder.”

The Alphas marched confidently across the atrium in a perfect horizontal
line. They looked down at their victims in disgust—like they deserved to be
dead. Zoey’s hatred for them grew— these weren’t Sevenths—they were nothing
like the Sevenths in the agency. These soldier-type assassins appeared to kill
for fun and to take pleasure in the suffering of others.
They
were the
real
monsters.