Reaper's Legacy: Book Two (Toxic City)(22)

The crashed Jeep's rear doors opened and three Choppers jumped out, guns at the ready, eyes wide and alert.

Jack searched inside. He delved into that sparkling constellation of potential Nomad had seeded within him, looking desperately for something that might help them. He grasped one idea he had used already and made the weapons hot, but the Choppers wore heavy gloves. He threw an image at one of them that they were breathing insects. Perhaps it was the Choppers’ fear, or his own panic, but it was ineffective.

As Jack stood and helped Jenna to her feet, the three Choppers rushed forward and aimed their guns.

“Don't move!” one of them said, his voice incredibly high. There was blood splashed on his face.

“Just shoot them!” a second soldier said. Her head flipped back and her throat opened from ear to ear, her only scream a bubbling cry.

“Stop it!” the first soldier said. His gun was shaking as he aimed at Sparky, his comrade bleeding out on the ground beside him.

Something moved again. A blur, a smudge on reality. Jack blinked.

The soldier's gun vanished from his hands and then appeared again, barrel pressed against his forehead, held by a tall, stocky woman in a short dress.

“Where the hell did she come from?” Jenna asked.

“Out of thin air,” Sparky said. “Let's hope she's on our side, eh?”

“Drop it!” the woman said, but the third soldier spun, bringing his own weapon to bear on the newly arrived woman.

She grinned, flitted out of view again, and the third soldier's head snapped back before the gunshot even sounded.

“Shit,” Jenna said, turning away.

The other two Jeeps’ doors sprung open and Choppers emerged, a dozen of them fanning out around their vehicles and quickly closing on the scene of slaughter.

“Shift!” Sparky said needlessly, and he grabbed Jenna's hand as the three of them darted for cover.

But Jack was watching, trying to perceive what was happening, and at the same time a particular star began to shine in his mind's eye. There she is, he thought, flooded with certainty that he would be able to follow the woman in the dress.

The last survivor from the crashed Jeep was pulling his sidearm, eyes on Jack, hatred on his face.

The woman had not reappeared, but from behind the vehicle came a startled cry, and then several guns started firing at once.

Sparky and Jenna reached a shop doorway and slid across the pavement until they were protected from the field of fire.

Jack breathed deeply. When Sparky turned to look at him, he smiled.

“J—!” Sparky shouted, and Jack let the power flood through him, scorching his veins, setting every nerve on fire with the thrilling potential of something he had never done before.

The world ground to a halt.

Jack caught his breath as every sense retreated to nothing. Sounds faded until all he heard was his own beating heart, and blood pulsing through his ears. The air was motionless. Smoke hung like Christmas decorations above the crashed Jeep's front end. Blood dripped from the dead soldier on its bonnet, each drop barely moving, exclamations on the air.

Sparky reached for Jack, mouth hanging open and bearing his unuttered name. Jenna was suspended halfway through a fall to the ground, hair streaming behind her, hand held out to arrest the impact, her eyes on Sparky.

Jack looked around at the Choppers, all similarly frozen—

But not quite. “Not quite still,” Jack said. His voice did not echo, as if he'd spoken in an insulated chamber rather than in this bloodied London street. The Chopper pulling a gun on him was shifting slightly, his shoulder raising, hand tugging the pistol from its holster, movements as imperceptible as a minute hand on a clock. And Sparky's mouth opened wider, wider, as he shouted his friend's name in terror.

“Oh!” a surprised voice said. “Well. I thought I was the only one.”

The woman in the dress appeared from behind the crashed Jeep and strolled casually across to the standing soldier. She stepped over one of the bodies without looking down, though Jack had seen her shoot the terrified man in the face.

“Who…?” Jack said.

“Name's Fleeter,” she said. She watched Jack curiously as she moved the soldier's hand aside and pulled the pistol from his belt. Then she smiled, and it made her look manic. “I wasn't told you could do this.” She stepped back and aimed the gun at the man's head.

“Wait!” Jack said, his word cut off by the gunshot.

“Why?” the woman asked, all innocence. As she walked towards Jack, he saw the most terrible thing.

The bullet struck the Chopper's face in slow motion. It impacted his skin, entered just below his left eye socket, and sent a ripple of imminent destruction through the man's face.

Jack turned away, not wishing to see any more.

“So,” the woman said, circling Jack so that she could see his face. “You want to help me with the rest of them?”

“No!” Jack said. “Who are you? What are you?”

“Reaper sent me to keep an eye on you. Make sure you didn't get into trouble.”

She had already turned and was walking towards the other soldiers, her wide hips swaying the short skirt. She wasn't pretty, but she was striking. In Jack's eyes right now she was also monstrous, and he was desperate to prevent her continuing the slaughter.