Revelations (17 page)

“No!” Rae cried. She tried to wrench the wheel to the right, but her hands wouldn’t obey her.

Drive into that tree!

Rae drove into the tree at full speed. And darkness surrounded her, pulling her into its depths.

"So this scientist killed my mom?” Mandy Reese started making a tiny braid in onesection of her long, light brown
hair, concentrating on it like it was the most important thing in the world.

“Yes,” Aiden told her. “I know how shocking this must be for you. I’m sorry to dump it all on you at once.”

“Mandy can handle it,” Jesse said. He slid his chair around Mandy’s kitchen table to get a little closer to her.
He

likes this girl,
Anthony realized.
I don’t know if he knows it, but he definitely likes this girl.

“Steve Mercer is dead now. I want you to remember that,” Aiden said. “But when he wasalive, it wasn’t just the
women in the group he wastracking.” Aiden hesitated for a moment. Anthonycould understand why. He wouldn’t
want to be theone who had to tell all of this to Mandy. “He wasalso trackingall the kids born to women in the group
after they had received the treatment to boost their psychic abilities.”

“Tracking,” Mandy repeated. She began to twist the little braid she’d finished making around one finger.
That’s

gotta hurt,
Anthony thought.
She’s doing it way too tight.
“So… watching me.”

“Yes,” Aiden said. “You, Rae, all the kids.” This time Aiden didn’t hesitate; his words came out in a rush. “It’s
because he believed that all of you would have powers, and he was right.”

“But I don’t have any powers. I don’t,” Mandy insisted. She tried to get her finger loose from her braid but only
managed to get it more tangled. Jesse, blushing madly, reached over and gently slid the braid off her finger.

“Thanks,” Mandy said softly. “I’m always doing that. I don’t know why I don’t just stop.” She turned her attention
back to Aiden. “I really don’t have any powers.”

Aiden nodded. “Here’s the thing. The powers don’t express themselves until the height of puberty. We believe that
a certain level of hormones in the blood-stream somehow activates the latent characteristic.”

Come on, Aiden, speak English,
Anthony thought. “Rae didn’t get her power until last spring,” he volunteered,
shooting Aiden a quick glance. It was time to let Aiden in on everything. Maybe he already knew it, anyway. But
Mandy had to know the whole deal, and that meant Aiden had to also.

“Rae? What? She didn’t say anything,” Mandy said.

“She doesn’t tell most people because they freak,” Anthony answered. Not exactly comforting for Mandy, he knew,
but he kept going. “When she touches a fingerprint, she can-she can hear the thought the person who left it was
having at that moment. Basically she can read fingerprints.” Another look at Aiden revealed that the guy wasn’t all
that surprised. Or just had a lot of experience hiding the emotion. “It’s kind of cool, actually,” Anthony went on,
wanting to try and hand Mandy something positive.

“So if I had something, would it be like that?” Mandy asked.

“There’s no way of predicting what your talent will be,” Aiden answered. “But it is almost certain that you will have
one.”

“And Aiden thinks he can bring it out earlier,” Jesse jumped in. “He can inject you with somethingthat will give you
your power faster, and then you might be able to help us find Rae. I told them you’d be up for it.”

“What?” Mandy cried. “Why would you tell them that? You don’t even know me.”

“We, you know, we talked on the phone a couple of times,” Jesse muttered. “And I thought you liked Rae. This girl
Yana could kill her, Mandy. Yana kidnapped me. That’s how twisted she is. So, I’m serious, she really could kill Rae.”

Anthony’s eyeballs started to prickle.
You are not going to start bawling,
he told himself.
Not in front of everyone.

He gave a couple of hard blinks, then tried to concentrate all his attention on Mandy.

“What’s in the injection?” she asked Aiden. Her face was pale, but her voice was steady.
She’s handling all this a

lot better than I would have at her age,
Anthony thought.
Or now.

“It’s an injection of the same kind of hormones your own body is already producing,” Aiden answered. “The thing
you have to know is that if you decide to take the injection, it will only be speeding up what will happen to you in
time, anyway. The injection won’t give you a power. It’ll only bring out the power that would emerge sooner or later.”

“And you really think if I do this, I can help you find Rae?” Mandy asked Jesse. Jesse was clearly theone she
trusted.

“We don’t know,” Jesse admitted. “’Cause we don’t know if whatever it is you’ll be able to do… after is the kind of
thing we could use to track Rae down. But it’s pretty much the only shot we’ve got. That’s why I brought these guys
to you.”

Mandy looked at Jesse for a long moment, and it was like they were continuing the conversation silently. “I’ll do it,”

she finally said.

Aiden reached into the leather bag at his feet and pulled out a small glass bottle with a rubber stopper, a syringe,
and a length of rubber tubing. Anthony noticed Mandy’s eyes widen slightly, but she didn’t say anything. She just
stretched her arm out toward Aiden.

“I just need a second,” Aiden told her. He slid the tip of the needle through the bottle’s rubber stopper, then pulled
back the plunger of the syringe. A few inches of the liquid in the bottle were sucked up. Aiden pulled the needle free
and studied it. He gave the side a couple of taps with his fingernail. To get any air bubbles out, Anthony figured.

“Okay, Mandy, I need you to make a fist,” Aiden said after he’d tightened the rubber tubing around her upper arm. He
ran his finger lightly over the inside of her elbow, tracing a vein. “You can still change your mind.”

Mandy shook her head. Anthony bet her jaw was locked too tight to get out a word. He could see how tight the
muscles there were.

“All right. Here we go.” Anthony heard Jesse suck in a breath. And Anthony had to look away as the needle began
to enter Mandy’s delicate skin.

Rae opened her eyes, the world a blur of color around her. Slowly the colors separated and resolved themselves
into the blue of Yana’s sweatshirt, the white-blond of her hair, the brighter blue of her eyes. “You’re awake,” Yana
said.

“You mean I’m conscious again,” Rae muttered, meeting Yana’s gaze unblinkingly.

“And I’m glad you are,” Yana answered. “I was getting lonely. I can’t wait to for us to start on all the fun things I’ve
got planned.”

Get a knife from the kitchen!

Rae instantly stood up from the floor of the cabin. “No.” The word came out as a whimper, and Rae was disgusted
for letting Yana get a glimpse of the fear raging around inside her.

“No, what? I didn’t say anything,” Yana told her.

Get a knife from the kitchen!

Rae’s feet began to walk toward the counter. She could see the knife there, its blade shining in a spot of sunshine.

Don’t pick it up,
she told herself.
You’restronger than she is. You’re in control of your own body.
But her hand
reached out and gently picked up the knife. Its handle was cool against her fingers. She knew Yana had touched the
knife, but she didn’t get any thoughts from it.
She must be able to block me somehow,
Rae thought.

“While you were
napping,
I was trying to decide on the best way to kill you,” Yana said conversationally, like she’d
been trying to decide which movie she and Rae should rent later. “I wanted something slow, so I was thinking
maybe just hundreds of little cuts.”

Cut the back of your hand ! Not too deep.

Rae tried to let the muscles in her fingers go slack. If she could just drop the knife, then-But even as she was
thinking that thought, she started making a cut across the back of her left hand. A thin line of blood followed the
path of the knife.

“That’s one,” Yana said. She sounded so happy.
She’s doing this to me,
Rae thought.
It’s impossible, but she’s

doing this to me.
“You look confused, Rae,” Yana went on. “Did you think you were the only one who got a power
from your mother? Mine is a pretty cool one, actually. I can put thoughts right into people’s heads.”

Cut the back of your hand again .

A moment later a second line of blood marred theback of Rae’s hand. The tiny red droplets glistened all in a row,
not big enough to roll down her hand. “Like I said, cool.” Yana smiled. “I’ve been wanting to do this for so long.”

“Since that day we met in the hospital?” Rae asked, her mind reeling. This was all too much to take in.

“That’s right,” Yana answered. “There was no community service assignment. I thought-implanted one of the
administrators to get myself that job on the psycho ward. I wanted a chance to know the daughter of my mother’s
killer.”

“You don’t even know the truth about my mother,” Rae said.

Cut your hand again !

Slice. Pain. More red droplets. Just like that. Rae’s body obeyed Yana’s thought commands so easily.

“I couldn’t believe it when I figured out your powers,” Yana said. “Could they be any more pathetic, Rae? You’ve
got nothing to use against me. And you didn’t even figure out what was going on with the witnesses when I
kidnapped Jesse.”

Rae raised her eyes from the thin lines of blood on her hand. “You did your thought thing on the witnesses,” she
said, the realization taking the air out of her. “That’s-that’s why they all had different versions of what happened.”

“Weeks and weeks later, she finally understands,” Yana said. “I knew you could get thoughts off prints when you
were able to track Jesse down after you touched his pocketknife.”

Rae shook her head. Too much, too much.

“I don’t-you’re obsessed with revenge because you think you’ve been treated so unfairly,” Rae began. “But you
have no problem hurting someone completely innocent, like Jesse. How does that work?” Maybe there was a way
to get Yana to think about what she was doing in a different way. Maybe Rae could get her to see-

“Oh, come on. I didn’t hurt little Jesse,” Yana said. “You’re the only one I want to hurt. And only because your
mother is dead. If she were still alive, I’d go after her. You have to remember that everything I’ve done to you is your
mother’s fault. So don’t blame me.”

“There was never any chance that you were going to get institutionalized, was there?” Rae asked, the mind fog
continuing to clear and revealing more and more frightening thoughts as it did. “That was a load of bull to get me
out here with you.”

“I thought-implanted my dad so you’d pick up the right info from his fingerprints,” Yana explained cheerfully.

“And as a bonus, you decided to give me some ofyour implants to make me think I was losing it again,” Rae said.

“That was a good one. That really freaked me out.”

“I know,” Yana told her. “It was a great game. But the game is over.”

Make a cut across your throat . Not too deep.

Rae obeyed. “Yana, I never did anything to you. Can’t you see that?” she cried.

Make another cut .

Rae didn’t allow herself to make a sound as the knife bit into her flesh again. She wasn’t going to give Yana the
satisfaction.

“I wonder how many of these little cuts it will take to kill you,” Yana said. “Thousands and thousands, I bet.”

Mandy picked up the pencil off the kitchen table and flung it across the room. “That’s the only way I’m going to
make the thing move,” she exploded. “I’ve concentrated until I feel like my head is going to crack open, and
nothing!” Anthony noticed that her face was flushed and little drops of sweat had popped out all over her forehead.

Was that from the hormone injection or just from how hard she’d been working? Aiden had been poking and
prodding and testing the girl for hours. And Mandy had tried anything he asked without complaining. Until now.

“Can we stop?” she asked. “Whatever you did didn’t work.”

“You don’t know that for sure,” Jesse said.

“Yes, I do know,” Mandy shot back. “It’s my body, okay? In case you’ve all forgotten that.” She tossed her long,
light brown hair over her shoulders.

“Some of the emotion you’re experiencing may be from the hormones,” Aiden said gently. “Why don’t we take a
break, then try a few more things. I know we’ve done a lot of tests, but there are still psi abilities we haven’t-”

“God, now I’m freezing,” Mandy cut him off. “First I’m sweating like a pig, and now it’s like I’m sitting on ice cubes
or something.”

“The physical effects will fade,” Aiden promised her. Jesse grabbed a light blue sweater off the back of the chair
next to him. He looked like he was thinking of wrapping it around Mandy’s shoulders, but he just handed it to her
instead.