Origin (Lux #4)(102)
The couple in the car darted out and rushed to the sidewalk, where they spun around and stared openmouthed at Dee.
Dawson was next. He stayed near Beth and Ash, on the other side of the congested road. When he took his true form, several people let out startled shrieks.
“I mean it, Kitten, stay close to me.”
She nodded again.
Off in the distance, I could hear the helicopter. No doubt it was circling back to make another run at the Boulevard. It was about to get all kinds of real.
Unease grew among the humans, becoming as thick as the heat-clogged air. It seeped into me, making me itchy as I let my human form slip away.
Like someone pressed a universal pause button, the humans around us seemed frozen. Their hands clenched on cameras and cell phones. The awe in their expressions changing from surprise to confusion, and then fear slowly crept in. Many were exchanging glances. Some were starting to move away from Andrew, but they couldn’t get far on the congested sidewalks.
We need to turn this up a notch. Dawson’s voice filtered through my thoughts. See the Treasure Island sign? I’m going to take it out.
Make sure no one is hurt, I said.
Dawson floated a step back. Raising an arm, he looked like he was reaching up into the sky to grab a star. Energy crackled in the air, charging it with static. The Source flared, wrapping down his arm like a snake. The burst of light shot from his palm, shooting high into the sky and racing across the four lanes. It arched over the pirate ship, striking the white bulkhead.
Light exploded in a flash, turning night into day for a brief second. The energy rolled across the sign and then shot down, flaring out the eye sockets of the giant skull under the sign in a shower of sparks.
Andrew had spied the Venetian tower and all the pretty golden lights at the top. He turned to me. Twisting at the waist, I summoned the Source. It really was like taking a nice deep breath after being underwater for several minutes. Light arced from my hand, smacking into the tower, taking out the lights in a shower of fireworks.
That’s about when people realized that this wasn’t some kind of show, an optical illusion or something to stand around and point at. They might not have understood what they were seeing, but whatever instinct humans possessed that triggered that flight response kicked in.
It became all about survival—about getting away from the big, bad unknown—while trying to snap pictures of the spectacle at the same time.
Got to love the near-innate human response to capture everything on film.
People scurried like ants, running in every direction, abandoning their cars in their rush. They streamed out of the streets, a flood of different shapes and sizes, pushing into one another, falling over their own feet. Some guy knocked into Kat, forcing her away from the SUV. For an instant, I lost sight of her in the pandemonium.
I rushed forward, parting humans like the Red Sea. Their excited screams were already an annoying buzz in my ears.
Kat!
Her answer was both in my head and out loud. “I’m here!”
She stumbled around a woman who had frozen in front of me. The look of shock on the lady’s pale face roused a bit of guilt in me, but then Kat was in front of me, her eyes wide.
“I think we got a lot of people’s attention,” she said, dragging in air.
You think? I touched her arm, overly glad at the welcoming spark that traveled from her skin to mine.
Luc appeared beside us, along with Archer. “We should move some of the cars out of the way?”
Good idea. Keep Kat with you.
I centered my attention on the line of cars in front of us. Four lanes. All packed with vehicles ranging from ones on their last leg to luxury cars I was really sad about scratching.
Archer joined me. “I’ll help.”
He took one lane while I focused on the one in front of the Hummer. The ability to repel things away from us was easier than pulling it toward us. It was the release of energy, like a shockwave.
Stretching my arms out, I watched the car before me start to shake, its rims rattling and gears grinding. Then it shifted to the side. One after another, cars were sliding out of the way like an invisible giant had swiped its arm across the road. I went as far as I could see, then pulled back, knowing that Daedalus already had to be aware of what was going on.
Turning back to where Andrew stood, I saw him shooting off blasts of energy like there was no tomorrow. Hidden behind an empty tourist bus was a teenage guy, filming it all on his phone.
A bit of restlessness trickled through my veins. This would be all over YouTube in seconds. Off in the distance, I could hear sirens. With the way traffic was backed up behind us, I doubted they’d be here soon.
“Look!” Kat shouted and pointed to the sky.
Overhead, a helicopter circled the scene, shining floodlights over where Andrew stood. It wasn’t the military. A KTNV 13 News emblem was emblazoned on the side. Damn. They’d gotten here before the police.
“This will be live,” Kat said, stepping back. Her eyes were wide. “They’ll be filming live—it’ll be everywhere.”
I don’t know why it didn’t sink in until that moment. Not like I didn’t fully grasp what this would mean, but seeing the news copter circling the Boulevard struck home. The images were fed into the newsrooms, and from there it would be signaled out to the entire nation within seconds. The government could take down a few videos here and there, even a hundred of them, but this?