The Elders (Mind Dimensions #4)(65)

I take out the gun I picked up from a cop earlier and fight the urge to shoot Thomas in the chest. My finger spasms, itching to pull the trigger. Shooting Thomas would feel wrong, so I shoot the wall instead, over and over until I’m down to one bullet.

My outburst doesn’t make me feel better, so with the butt of the gun, I hit frozen Thomas in the liver, which my weird conscience allows. The strike is as effective as shooting him would’ve been, resulting in a whole lot of nothing in the real world. Not that I’d want to hit Thomas in the liver or shoot him in the real world—not unless, by some fluke, he’s trying to kill Mira out of his own volition. I’m just venting, something my therapist—and ironically, Thomas’s girlfriend—suggested I do when in stressful situations.

Deciding to vent some more, I throw the pistol at the wall. That isn’t good enough, so I break a chair against the wall.

Still nothing. I’ll have to tell Liz that yet another one of her ideas doesn’t work.

Drawing in a deep, steadying breath, I look at Mira. Her face is as peaceful as the last time I looked at her, frozen in this strange sleep. With irrational hope, I gently brush my fingers across Mira’s cheek, but of course, nothing happens.

Certain that Mira’s unreachable, I make my way out of the guesthouse, wreaking havoc on furniture as I go.

Once I make it to the woods, I channel my remaining frustration into a run. After a few miles, I feel calm enough to plan where I’m going.

If Eugene can see the forest from the highway, I have a pretty good idea where he is. That doesn’t, however, make his location any closer. Still, running is easy, and if I need a boost, all I have to do is think about Mira’s current predicament.

I get a déjà-vu-like feeling when I run like this, pumped full of adrenaline. I flash back to high school, when I would use the Quiet to scope out the much older bullies lurking behind corners. Back then, I would run in the opposite direction. Funny how things change with time. If I ran into any of those *s now, or even all of them put together, I wouldn’t run. Not today. Not with how I feel right now. Hell, I’d welcome the encounter.

As I run, many regrets circle through my head. Things like, I shouldn’t have gone to that f*cking Island, or, I shouldn’t have gone to that f*cking funeral, and even, I should’ve treasured our time together more.

Whenever the thought of losing Mira shows its hideous face, I run faster.





*





By the time I reach my destination, I wonder whether I could run a marathon.

The U-Haul truck my friends rented is huge. A strange guy is behind the wheel, and after a quick Read, I learn he’s some random dude Eugene and Bert hired to drive them.

I make my way to the back of the truck. Peering inside, I’m faced with all the charm of Eugene’s secret laboratory, only this place is impossibly messier than his Brooklyn lair. Oh, and there’s a pile of bananas in the corner.

The three occupants of the back of the truck look as if they haven’t bathed in weeks, instead of only the twenty hours or so it’s been. And by three, I mean Bert, Eugene, and Kiki the chimp, of course.

Out of the bunch, Kiki looks most composed. Bert’s frozen eyes are so red I wonder whether he indulged in some drugs; he did say he wanted to get Adderall, something he used to take in Harvard. Then I recall the focus boost my aunt offered to give him. His current state must be the consequence of it. Eugene looks normal—as in, it’s normal for him to look as if he hasn’t slept all night. He’s currently holding a phone, with my frozen self on the other end of the call.

I touch Eugene’s hand.

A second Eugene joins me and says, with surprise written all over his face, “Darren? What are you doing here?”

“We didn’t have time to speak in the real world,” I explain. Fighting a new wave of anxiety, I add, “You have no idea how little time.”

“What happened?” he asks, sounding instantly worried.

“It’s bad. Please tell me you can send me to Level 2.”

His worry gives way to a distinct look of regret. “I wish it were that simple.”

“You don’t understand. You have to do it.”

He shakes his head. “I can’t. We focused specifically on the part of the brain that I suspect is responsible for Splitting, since we had no time to worry about Depth.” He glances at Bert and Kiki. “We made some very preliminary progress.”

“Eugene, please tell me everything, and quickly,” I say. “I’m not a scientific journal. You can tell me, ‘My results are half-assed’ or whatever.”

“The results are inconclusive,” he says. “Not something I’d publish, if I were crazy enough to publish this kind of work.”

“Your results were never going to be complete without me,” I remind him. “I’m the only one who can Split into Level 2 to begin with.”

“Right,” he says. “But I mean the stages before that—”

“Just tell me what happened,” I implore.

“Fine.” He exhales audibly. “We tested the device on Kiki. She was trained to touch me under certain circumstances . . .”

I don’t know if my loud chuckle is merry or hysterical given the situation, but he gives me a narrowed-eyed stare and says, “If your mind is in the gutter again—”