Firefight

27

I found Prof in the conference room, the room with the large wall/window looking out into the ocean. The waters were clearer today than they’d been the last time I’d been in there, and I could see distant shadows, dark and square. They were buildings-a phantom skyline under the sea.

Prof stood in his black lab coat, staring out into the depths, hands clasped behind him.

“Prof?” I asked, hurrying into the room. “Exel just intercepted a conversation. Someone spotted Obliteration. He’s storing energy.”

Prof continued to stare into the depths.

“Like in Houston?” I prompted. “The days before he destroyed the entire place? Sir?”

Prof nodded toward the sunken city. “You never visited this place before it sank, did you?”

“No,” I answered, trying to ignore the awful window he stared out of.

“I came into the city regularly. To see plays, go shopping, sometimes to just walk. It seemed that the most humble diners in Manhattan served better food than the nicest restaurants back home. And the finest places … Ah, I remember the way it smelled.…”

“Um, yeah. Obliteration?”

He nodded curtly and turned from the window. “Let’s go have a look, then.”

“Have a look?”

“You and me,” Prof said, striding away. “We’re point men. If there’s danger, we check it out.”

I ran after him. I wasn’t going to argue-any excuse to get out of the base was a good one-but this didn’t seem like Prof. He liked to plan. In Newcago we’d rarely moved, even on a scouting mission, without careful deliberation.

We entered the hallway and passed the room where Mizzy and Val were working. “I’m taking the sub,” Prof announced to them without even a glance. I hurried to keep up, glancing back and shrugging toward a confused Mizzy, who had poked her head out after us.

I picked up my pace and ran ahead of Prof, fetching my gun from the equipment closet. I hesitated, then grabbed the backpack with the spyril inside as well.

“You shouldn’t need that,” Prof noted, passing me.

“So you think I should leave it?”

“Of course not.”

I slung the pack over my shoulder, then joined Prof as he entered the darkness of the docking room. Here we followed a set of rope guides toward the sub. Why, I thought, do I feel like a dog who just swallowed a hand grenade? There was nothing to be nervous about; this was Prof. The great Jon Phaedrus. We were going on a scouting mission together. I should be excited.

Prof popped the hatch on the sub and we climbed in. Once we were down below, I locked the hatch, and Prof turned on a pale yellow emergency light. He waved me forward to sit in the copilot seat and started up the machine. A few moments later we were moving through the silent depths, and I had to stare out yet another window-the front of the sub-at more water.

“So … do you need to know where we’re going?” I finally asked.

“Yes.” His face was lit eerily by the yellow light.

“Well, we heard them say the words Turtle Bay.”

Prof turned the sub in a slow curve. “Missouri tells me you’re getting good with the spyril.”

“Yeah. Well, I mean, I’m practicing. I don’t know that I’d say I’m good, but I might get there eventually.”

My mobile beeped quietly. I winced, then pulled it out. This new one had a different silencing button, and I always forgot to tap it. It used my old pattern, so anyone who knew that could contact me, but the message on the screen was from a pattern I didn’t recognize.

Okay, let’s talk, it read.

“That’s good,” Prof said. “The tensors won’t be of much use to you here.”

“I don’t know,” I said, trying to work out who was messaging. “When we were fighting inside the office building, it might have been good to slip through a wall unexpectedly.”

“The spyril will be more useful,” Prof said. “Focus on that for now. We don’t want to mix the powers. Might cause interference.”

Interference? What kind of interference? I’d never heard of such a thing. Granted, I didn’t know much about this technology, but if such interference were a problem, wouldn’t it have affected the forcefields Prof gave me?

My mobile buzzed again. I’d silenced it but hadn’t turned off the vibrations. You there, Knees? the message read.

My heart jumped.

Megan? I typed back.

Who else would it be, you slontze?

Prof glanced at me. “What’s happening?”

“Exel’s messaging me,” I lied. “With more information on how to find Obliteration.”

Prof nodded, turning eyes forward again. I quickly sent a message to Exel, asking if he had more information on Obliteration’s location, just in case Prof asked him later on. My mobile lit up almost immediately, saying someone else had seen Obliteration. Directions to the building followed.

In the middle of that, Megan messaged again.

I really need to talk to you about something.

This isn’t exactly a good time, I sent back.

Great. Fine.

The terseness of that reply made me sick inside. I was turning her away after practically begging her to talk to me earlier? I glanced at Prof. He seemed absorbed by his driving, and the sub didn’t move quickly. I probably had plenty of time. How suspicious would it be?

Well, maybe I can spare some time to chat. I pressed SEND.

No reply.

Sparks. Why did everything have to happen at once? I waited for a response, submarine engines churning, sweat trickling down the sides of my face. Sitting up front here, you could see the whole underwater world stretching out before you, seemingly into infinity itself. Thinking about all this nothing made my hair stand on end.

I bent down over my mobile and sent another message to Megan. Do you know why Regalia claimed she can make Epics?

This time I got a response almost immediately. She said what?

She told me she’d made someone into an Epic, I wrote back. She seemed to think it would scare me. I think she wanted me to decide that we can’t fight back because she can send an unending string of Epics at us.

What did you tell her? Megan asked.

Can’t remember exactly. I think I laughed at her.

You never were very bright, Knees. That woman is dangerous.

But she literally had us in her grasp at one point! I wrote back. She let us go. I don’t think she wants us dead. Anyway, why do you think she would claim something that ridiculous? Did she really think I’d believe she could make someone into an Epic?

Megan didn’t respond for a time.

We really need to meet, she finally wrote to me. Where are you?

Heading into the city, I said.

Perfect.

Prof is with me, I added.

Oh.

You could meet with both of us, I wrote to her. Explain yourself. He’d listen.

It’s more complicated than that, Megan wrote. I was a spy for Steelheart, and I infiltrated Prof’s own team. When it comes to his precious Reckoners, Phaedrus is like a mother bear with her cubs.

Huh? I wrote back. No, that’s wrong.

What?

I don’t think that metaphor works, Megan. Prof is a dude, so he can’t be a mother bear.

David, you are a complete and utter slontze.

I could hear the smile in her tone. Sparks, I missed her.

I’m an adorable one though, right? I wrote to her.

A pause, during which I found myself sweating.

I wish it was so easy, her message finally came. I really, really wish it.

It can be, I wrote back. You still willing to meet?

And Phaedrus?

I’ll find a way to lose him, I wrote as Prof began to take the sub to the surface. Will message you later. I then tucked the mobile into my pocket.

“We there?” I asked.

“Almost,” Prof replied.

“You’ve been pretty quiet this trip.”

“I’ve been trying to decide if I should send you back to Newcago or not.”

The words hit me like a slug from a.44 Special. I blinked, searching for a response. “But … you said when we came here, you said you were bringing me because you needed me.”

“Son,” Prof said softly, “if you think I can’t kill Epics without you, then you must have a low opinion of my skills. If I decide you shouldn’t be part of this operation, then you’ll be out. Period.”

“But why would you decide that?”

Prof piloted in silence for a moment, steering the sub slowly around a large chunk of floating debris-it looked like a hot dog stand. “You’re a good point man, David,” Prof said. “You think quickly and you solve problems. You have excellent instincts under fire. You’re bold and aggressive.”

“Thank you?”

“And you’re exactly the sort of person I’ve avoided recruiting over the years.”

I frowned.

“You haven’t noticed?” Prof asked.

Now that he mentioned it … I thought about Cody, and Exel, and Abraham, and Mizzy. Even Val, to an extent. They weren’t gun-toting, shoot-’em-up types. They were reserved, careful, slow to act.

“I’ve noticed,” I said. “But I didn’t really put it together until now.”

“The Reckoners are not an army,” Prof said. “We’re not even a special forces unit. We’re trap-layers. We’re patient and conservative. You’re none of those things. You’re a firecracker, always urging us to action, to change the plan. This is good, in a way. You think big, son. It takes people with big dreams to accomplish big goals.”

He turned to me, the sub puttering along slowly, not needing his guidance. “But I can’t help thinking,” he said, “that you don’t intend to stick to the plan. You want to protect Regalia, and you harbor sympathies for a traitor. You have aspirations. So you’re going to tell me, right now, the things you’ve been hiding from me. And then we’re going to decide what to do with you.”

“Now?” I asked.

“Now.” Prof met my eyes. “Out with it.”