Embers & Ice (Rouge) (5 page)

EIGHT

God
please,
Jenny prayed as she sat inside the freezing laboratory
after possibly the worst day of her entire life.
Make him stop talking.

She
had swallowed a total of five cups of the strongest coffee Joshua could handle
making –
apparently he can’t touch things that are hot, the freak –
 so
she was running purely on an insane amount of caffeine. And still, she was
falling asleep.

“I
just don’t get it,” Joshua moaned, rubbing his forehead for the thirtieth time
as he paced the lab. “How did she do it?”

Jenny
sighed loudly, hoping this strange human being would find the answer soon, or
she might literally go bananas. But he was oblivious. He had finished telling
her everything she needed to know – even a little more than she wanted to about
Hunter’s mother and the fact that Joshua hadn’t
ever
been with a woman,
which didn’t become obvious until she went to comfort him and he fell backwards
in fright – and now he was trying to figure out Hunter’s secret with figures
and hypothesis.

He’s
got this all wrong,
she thought.
Does this man have any
humanity, or is he some sort of alien?

“Maybe
the secret lies in the mountains,” Joshua whispered, his pale eyes wide. He was
clicking his fingers as if he could summon the thoughts that way like a dog.
“I’ve never even come close to figuring out where Ravenadium came from-” He
tapped the glass tank and she peered at it from her chair. “It’s not even from
Earth, it’s-”

“Alien,
yeah, I know.” Jenny dragged herself to her feet and over to the tank. “You
mentioned it several times already. All these years and you’ve never tracked
down its origin?”

“Of
course I have, I lived beside the mountain for over a year.”

“No,
I mean its
original
origin.”

Joshua
snorted sarcastically. “Yes, as a matter of fact I talked to the alien king on
Skype last night.”

Jenny
ignored his comment. “Then you’re in a bit of a pickle, aren’t you?”

“I’m
aware of that, thank you. That’s why I need your help.”

“So
you freeze me and kidnap me and keep me locked in your lab? Why not just tap on
my classroom door at school and ask for a favor?”

“Sometimes
I… overdramatized a situation just to avoid conversation. I blame my powers.”

“Why
isn’t Hunter nearly as insane then?”

The
room fell instantly colder than usual, and Jenny knew that it was Joshua’s
doing. Her heart sank.

“That’s
precisely what I’m trying to figure out,” he said through his teeth.

“Well–”
She tried to be brave and avoid eye contact at the same time. “I think I might
have an idea as to why Hunter was stronger than you.”

“What
is it?” he asked eagerly, taking the other chair and placing it opposite her.

Jenny
bit her lip. “Would you make me another coffee first?”

Eyeing
her suspiciously, Joshua took the empty mug. “You’re sure you want another?
Your pupils are very dilated.”

“For
your information, I’m trying to stay warm. I’m not a tea person and it’s not
exactly balmy in here.”

Joshua’s
face dropped. “I… I’m sorry, I wasn’t aware… my body temperature is naturally
cold, so…”

He
fumbled around with the air switch by the door and for a moment, Jenny’s heart
softened. As much as she knew this man was insane and very awkward and
malicious enough to fake hers and Eli’s deaths just to prove how protective he
was of Hunter, she had already seen his softer side. It was naïve and somewhat
gentle. She was so interested in how this man functioned, that at times she
forgot he had put her to sleep and was holding her prisoner in his tiny
laboratory, and that he had the power to manipulate ice.

As
much as their powers fascinated her, Jenny was sure she was getting herself
into deep trouble. She was, after all, just a physics teacher. She may have
braved the science years ago, but that all went away when the laboratories in
Sweden were destroyed and all traces of Feucotetanus were lost. Apparently that
was Joshua’s doing. Was this her second chance to change the name of science,
or should she turn away from it for real this time?

Jenny
already knew the answer. She was there for a reason, she was alive for a
reason, and she was whole and healthy for a reason. Before the fire, before all
of this began, Jenny had nothing. She was a teacher living in a rented
apartment with her cat, a dull future stretching ahead of her. Most of all, she
was alone and felt there was something missing in her life.

And
suddenly the fire happened. She believed her life was at its end. She thought
her sickness would kill her. She was blessed to have Hunter, even in her final
week, and she was satisfied with what she discovered, willing to let go and
move on to… whatever else was out there. But then Joshua came for her on that
cold night in the hospital wing and everything changed. She had a sort of…
out-of-body experience while in her deep sleep. And when she awoke, she felt
like a changed person. A new person.

Joshua
returned with another cup of coffee, his expression young and hopeful. He truly
believed she had the answer. Of course, Jenny knew nothing about this volcanic
substance, nor was she as gifted scientifically as Joshua. But he and Hunter
were completely different. Joshua had developed great skill with his powers,
but Hunter’s will was stronger and Joshua didn’t know why. He believed she was
fuelled by rage, but it was clearly something else. Something with pure
strength.

But
he doesn’t see it,
she thought, sipping her coffee as Joshua
answered his phone to someone named Barry.
He can’t understand the key
ingredient, the very thing that pulled Hunter away from the dark side and gave
her the courage to walk away.

The
thing that is alien in itself to Joshua: Love.

“Barry,
I’m sorry, I’m swamped with work at the moment,” he said and hung the phone up
abruptly before turning to her. “So, you were going to share your views?”

Jenny
clasped her hands together firmly. “Joshua I think there are more important
things to focus on. Like whether Eli will wake up soon.”

Joshua
ran a hand through his hair. “I’m worried about the kid. He should have woken
up first. I’m trying to move along with the process but it’s taking longer than
I expected.”

“Well
Hunter needs to know he’s okay. She can’t live like this believing he’s dead.”

Shoulders
slumped, Joshua shook his head. “I have no idea where Hunter is.”

For
the first time that night, Jenny’s stomach dropped. “What do you mean?”

“She
hasn’t come back to the apartment.”

“Well
have you looked somewhere else?”

“Of
course I have! You don’t think I care about her whereabouts, especially with
the state she’s in?”

“Uh,
can you blame her?” Jenny raised an eyebrow. “You
did
just kill the love
of her life.”

“He’s
not dead,” said Joshua stubbornly.

“You
can’t be sure of that Joshua. Cryonics is a dangerous science to mess with.
Have you considered how lucky it was that I turned out fine, that I didn’t
suffer fractures from thermal stress or even permanent brain damage? It was a
miracle I even woke up. You need to bring him out of it before the coma falls
through. He’s on the brink of death.”

Joshua
pursed his lips, too obstinate to argue.

“Where
else could she be?”

“I
know a place, but I’m terrified to think of it.”

“You’re
talking about this ICE Institution? The one the Agents work for?”

Joshua
nodded, and his silence made her skin prickle.

“How
would you know if they’ve taken her? Has she contacted you at all?”

There
was a moment in which Jenny swore she saw Joshua’s eyes tear up. But of course,
he didn’t show her. “I will set up a proper bed for you and check on the kid,”
he said. “I’m hoping he’ll wake up in the next few days, and he’ll need you
there to comfort him.”

Joshua
punched in the code to the door and stiffly marched back into the living room,
leaving her alone again in the laboratory. Jenny glanced back at the freezer
door and sighed. If only she could get a message to Hunter, to tell her that
Eli wasn’t dead. She could come home and explain everything to Joshua, and he
would let her go and they would live happily together again and…

And
she would go back to being a lonely girl with nothing to live for.

Jenny
sipped her bitter coffee and stared at the wall across from the desk where the
photos of Hunter and her mother were pinned. She wandered to the door and then
to her right, where the giant glass tank hummed dully, filled with plants and
the very volcanic substance Joshua was so puzzled about. Her research on
Feucotetanus was only half of what information was needed to complete Hunter’s
formula, and suddenly all those years felt like a complete waste, as though she
were hiking up a small hill only to come to a gigantic mountain soon after.

That
stone is not of this world
, he’d said. Of course, that was why
Hunter could produce fire from within her body and why she reacted with deadly
flames to whatever emotion she was feeling. But was it really alien? Was that
even possible? Or was this rock, this ‘Ravenadium’, from somewhere else?

Jenny
didn’t know, but she wanted to find out. And the only way she could uncover the
truth was to investigate the stone’s origin. It would be just like her research
on the drug, only now it was a paired project… with a madman harboring an evil
personality as well as super-human abilities.

Sighing
and taking another large gulp of the hot coffee clasped in her hands, Jenny
tried to relax in her chair and think on the bright side.

Well,
came
the same voice from before
. At least you don’t have to teach ignorant
teenagers any longer.

“Good
enough,” she muttered with a happy smile.

NINE

Hunter
was escorted directly from the laboratory to the bathroom upstairs. She
desperately needed a shower and actually started looking forward to it, until
she was taken through an iron door into a long room with tiled floors, slimy
mold and a single bench running down the center. Along the walls were shower
heads with taps spaced at intervals above grime-stained mirrors. There were
drains everywhere and soap scrubs hanging from chains for washing. Hunter
presumed the water – like the rest of the juvenile prison – would be cold.

When
she turned back to the two Men in White who were guarding the door, they shoved
a dirty towel, fresh jumpsuit and shoes into her arms.

“This
is the bathroom?”

One
of them tried to hold back a smile. The other just rolled his eyes. “Does this
look like a five star hotel, Princess?”

She
shut her mouth instantly. They chuckled and stepped aside as someone else
squeezed between them as they shut the door.

“You
get used to it,” said the girl with the brown hair Hunter knew as Jet’s
girlfriend. Having forgotten her name, she merely gawked by the doorway.

“I’m
Mikayla, by the way.” She was already unzipping her jumpsuit.

Hunter
avoided looking at the naked girl as she shoved her dirty clothes down and
turned on a shower head.

“Where
are you from?” asked Mikayla.

“New
York,” she replied, adjusting the icy temperature and shivering beside the
flow. She kept imagining she was standing on a damp forest floor, green moss
getting stuck between her toes.
Don’t think about it, don’t think about it.

“I
knew you were a New Yorker. My mom lives there with my stepdad.”

Hunter
slipped under the chilly flow and gasped. Only her skin was cool; the inside of
her body burned with raging fire. The water stopped her feeling so dizzy.

After
her consultation with Dr. Wolfe, Hunter was lightheaded and an air of fear
still swept through her bones. But the rest of the session wasn’t as bad as she
expected. He took at least three pints of blood and went over her body with a
strange torch device that scanned her skin. What he was looking for, she had no
idea. He worked in silence. She tried not to let her head be smothered with
fears and thoughts of Joshua lying on the same bed.

“Is
that your natural hair color?”

Hunter
stared across the room at Mikayla as she scrubbed her legs with the moldy
stick. Her initial impression of the girl was
bitchy-cheerleader-with-a-dick-boyfriend. Those were the girls she despised.
But maybe she’d rushed into it. Mikayla was obviously making an effort to get
to know her.

“Yeah.
It comes with the powers,” Hunter replied.

“Right.
Your fire.”

Hunter
pushed her wet hair out of her eyes and swallowed disgusting sewer water when
her mouth dropped open. She remembered the way Jet hinted at her power that
morning before she broke his nose.
Was there some kind of announcement at
breakfast before I arrived?
“How’d you know?”

“Comes
with
my
powers,” she smirked. “I absorb other people’s abilities and
render them powerless, so I can sense what people do. They don’t have bracelets
like that for me. My power isn’t that much of a threat.”

“It’s
still a power.”

Mikayla
snorted. “Well until I figure out how to steal people’s powers and use them
myself, it’s pretty much pointless.”

Hunter
looked away from the girl and pretended to scrub dirt from the bottom of her
feet. The look of desire in her eyes like a thirst for power reminded her of
Joshua’s psycho moment in the warehouse. Hunter already knew that some
abilities have the power to really mess with people’s heads, and Mikayla was
becoming one of those victims. What
would
happen if she could someday
take other powers?

For
the first time since she arrived at ICE, Hunter started wondering how it was
that the other kids actually had abilities. Her powers were an occurrence of
chance, a complete accident that would never happen again. So how did all the
other kids have such a variety of abilities? She would have to make a mental
note to ask Dr. Wolfe in her consultation tomorrow. If she could form a
sentence that didn’t end with a nasty curse.

“So
anyway, have you met anyone else besides Barbie and Shifty the Sloth?”

“Who?”

“You
know, the fat guy you were sitting with at lunch and his anorexic friend?”

“I’m
sorry, who are you calling anorexic?”

Mikayla
smiled and ran her soapy hand over her shoulder. “Just wait, Fire Girl. You may
have some meat left on you, but a month in this place and you’ll be a skeleton
too.”

Swallowing,
Hunter tried to act like that didn’t scare her. “If you’re all skeletons, why
is Zac so… pudgy?”

“He’s
a Shape-shifter. When they brought him in, that was what he looked like. He’ll
stay that way till they take off his bracelet.”

Mikayla
ran her fingers through her wet hair and switched off the shower. As she dried
herself, Hunter found her mind wandering to the others in the breakfast hall.

“What
about your boyfriend then? What’s his deal?”

“Jet?”
She threw her a cheeky grin. “I knew him in the outside world. We started
dating in high school, then two years ago the Agents found us. Now we’re locked
in this prison and it’s driving him crazy. He’s always starting fights,
especially with Marcus. I’m pretty sure he’ll be in the Orb any day now.”

“The
what?”

Mikayla’s
grin widened. “You haven’t heard about the Orb?”

I’m
not sure I want to know,
Hunter thought and shook her head.

“There’s
two places you’re sent for bad behavior here. The first is Solitary, where
you’re locked in an empty room like a madman for forty-eight hours with no food
or anything. They wrap you in a strait jacket just for kicks.”

Hunter
shivered under the cold flow from her shower.

“Solitary
is only for the little things like answering back to one of the scientists or
refusing to come out of your cell. But for other things, like trying to escape,
there’s a far worse punishment. We call it the Orb. It’s an arena blocked by
impenetrable glass. A small stadium surrounds it. Anyone who’s done wrong is
released from whatever binds their powers inside them and left to fight another
person.”

Hunter’s
mouth hung open and cold, bitter water ran into it.
What kind of sick place
is this?

“Yeah,”
she sighed. “It’s pretty intense. I haven’t seen a real fight since Jet went in
there with Fearne.”

“What
happened?”

“Jet
was teasing her about her head brace. It wasn’t even the first time, but she
just… snapped. Kind of like you did today.”

Hunter
switched off her tap and didn’t meet Mikayla’s eyes. That didn’t stop her from
wincing at the bite in her tone.

“The
fight was relatively clean, anyway. Fearne didn’t look so psychotic in the Orb
without her head brace. In fact, she looked happy to have her head clear again.
Jet was much the same. I’ve never seen him so blood thirsty. It was messy at
first. That scar Fearne has down her cheek was from the fight. That was all it
took before she cracked. She turned around and suddenly Jet was shrieking in
agony and clutching his head as though his brain was melting.”

Hunter
shuddered. “So she did something to his mind? Is that her power?”

“Telepathy,”
Mikayla nodded. “That girl might look like a pretty little princess, but she’s
bonkers. And in the Orb, she turned into a complete monster.”

“What
did she do to him?”

“She
flipped his evil switch,” she said. “Jet’s always been pretty cold-hearted. I
just think she brought out his true personality.” Mikayla smiled as though the
thought turned her on. Hunter was liking her less by the minute.

“And
what’s Jet’s power?”

“He’s
Telekinetic.”

“Telekinetic?”
Hunter snorted. “Like he can make things float?”

Mikayla’s
face morphed into an ugly scowl in less than a millisecond. “Suddenly I’m
wondering why I’m standing here talking to you.”

She
stormed to the door, leaving Hunter with seconds to cover herself before it was
flung open.

“Oh,
and Hunter?” Mikayla called. “Jet isn’t the only one you should be scared of.
There are things ten times worse in this place. That psycho with the head brace
is one of them.” A look of sincere bitterness flashed in her eyes before
slipping away in her wicked smile. “See you at lunch.”

When
the door locked and she was alone, dripping and freezing in the empty bathroom,
Hunter found she couldn’t get the look on Mikayla’s face out of her mind.