The Quest (34 page)

I felt a bullet slice across my left shoulder blade, tearing through the back of my jacket. I was yanked a little to the left, but surprisingly uninjured. Had the round cut into my skin at all, my psionic power would have drained and I would probably have broken my neck smashing into the rocks below. I didn’t have time to appreciate this semi-miracle, though. With less than fifty yards left to my target, I finally realized my big mistake.

I was unarmed!

Had I taken Ed Regis’s pistol, I could have simply put a few bullets into the riflemen from the air. I was even wearing gloves so there was no excuse for my blunder. Nor was there the option of turning back.

I saw two of the three men throw down their hunting rifles and reach for their pistols as I passed overhead and landed a few yards behind them. There was no time for me to prepare focused shots. Thrusting my right hand out, I released two rapid blasts, knocking the pair onto their backs before they could train their pistols on me.

The two men weren’t dead, of course, but I had more pressing business to attend to. Through the corner of my eye, I saw the third man about fifteen yards to my left. He had reloaded his rifle and had just finished leveling it on me. I telekinetically snatched the rifle out of his hands, spun it around in midair, and shot him in the face with it.

That was when I felt a bullet enter my right arm, just below the shoulder. The force of the impact made me lose my balance, and I fell onto my back and slid several yards down the rocky slope. But the hot stinging pain in my arm was nothing compared to the fury and fear I felt as my telekinetic power drained away.

Clutching my right arm to stop the bleeding, I half-crawled, half-slid my way farther down the slope and took cover behind a boulder. I heard the remaining two men shouting and cursing as their footsteps approached.

Before I could move again, one of them, a dark-skinned man with a shaggy beard, popped around the left side of the boulder and grinned. “There you are!” he said nastily, bringing his pistol right up to my nose.

A bullet exited his right temple, and he fell forward, unmoving. A few more rounds rang out in rapid succession, and then I heard more footsteps.

“You okay?” asked Ed Regis, looking down at me over the corpse of the man he had just shot from behind.

“There was one more,” I said, wincing.

“‘Was’ is correct,” reported Terry, who had come around the other side of my boulder. Then she saw the blood on my arm. “You’re hit!”

“Tell me something I don’t know!” I said angrily. “Where the hell is Alia?!”

“Running her little legs off trying to catch up,” replied Terry. Then she said to Ed Regis, “Go find James and collect whatever supplies you can from these guys. We’ve got to get moving quickly.”

“You got it,” said Ed Regis, and disappeared.

Then Terry yelled over the boulder, “Alia! Get your butt down here right now! Adrian’s got another gunshot wound for you!”

Terry helped me pull my jacket off and then used her hook to tear away the bloody sleeve of my shirt. My sister arrived a minute later, out of breath and furious.

“I can’t believe you, Adrian!”
she shouted into my head. It was always a bad sign when she refused to call me Addy.
“What were you thinking?!”

Terry couldn’t hear Alia’s telepathy, of course, but she guessed what my sister was saying. “Just close up the wound, Alia,” Terry said impatiently. “Once we escape, I’ll hold him down and let you kick him as much as you like.”

“The bullet’s still inside,” Alia said aloud. “Can you get it out, Terry?”

“Leave it in,” I said. “Just close the hole for me.”

“No,” said Terry. “Alia is right. We should get it while it’s fresh. The less metal in you, the better.”

Terry ducked back around the boulder for a moment and returned with a small knife. “Now you get to pay for your stupidity, Adrian.”

“Hey, it worked, didn’t it?” I said defiantly, and then howled in pain as Terry started digging.

Alia put her hands on her hips in full-blown angry-mother mode.
“You could’ve died, Addy!”

“Well, I didn’t!” I said through clenched teeth. Terry was holding my arm in place with her hook as she dug deeper into the exposed flesh, and it was all I could do to keep myself from wailing like a baby.

“Actually, it wasn’t such a bad move,” said Terry, still working her knife on my arm. “Certainly saved us a lot of time, and they may not even have radioed their buddies. But did you really have to go without a gun? What the hell are you trying to prove?”

“It wasn’t like that,” I insisted, though I wasn’t about to admit that I had simply forgotten.

My sister gave me an exasperated look.
“I thought you promised Cindy you’d stop getting shot.”

“When’s the last time I kept a promise, Alia?” I said, and then let out another loud yelp as Terry finally located the bullet and pulled it out.

“Be quick,” Terry said to Alia. “We need to start running again right now.”

Terry disappeared again, presumably to help Ed Regis and James gather supplies.

“I’m sorry, okay?” I said.

Alia silently put her hands up close to my bullet hole. I felt guilty about putting her through the fear she must have felt for me when I charged down the mountain. But Alia was a soldier too now, and she knew that risks were an unavoidable part of getting things done. At least we were all still alive and the Seraphim on the other side of the mountain none the wiser.

“All done, Addy,”
said Alia, removing her hands. There was an ugly scar left and my right arm was still a bit stiff, but I could move it without any real pain. After quickly wiping the blood off of my body, I put my jacket back on.

Having lost a fair bit of blood, I felt dizzy when I stood.

“Think you can carry this?” Terry asked me, holding out one of the backpacks taken from the riflemen.

I stared at her disbelievingly.

Ed Regis said, “I’ll carry it till Adrian has recovered his strength.”

As much as I hated being helped by the Wolf, especially just after he saved my life, I didn’t argue. Ed Regis wore my backpack on his chest. Combined with the bigger pack on his back, it made the man look like a walking boulder.

It turned out that Terry, before sprinting down the slope to catch up with me, had ordered James to bring down our two backpacks. There hadn’t been time for James to take down our tent, but we still had our food and water, and James had even managed to bring one of the sleeping bags. Then, while Terry and Alia were taking care of my arm, Ed Regis and James had combined the riflemen’s supplies with ours. We now had five packs, one for each of us, a three-man tent, four sleeping bags, ropes and other mountain gear, as well as additional food and water that might even be enough to last us to the Historian, if we ever made it that far. Our three new rifles went to Terry, James and Ed Regis, and I took two of the riflemen’s pistols for myself, including the one that shot me.

“Let’s get moving,” said Terry. “The Angels haven’t seen us yet. They might not even know what’s going on.”

“Let’s keep it that way,” said Ed Regis, taking his rifle and firing it once into the air.

Occasionally firing a few rounds behind us to make it appear as if the riflemen were still driving us up the mountain, we double-timed it down the slope, slipping and sliding down the steeper parts. It was a harrowing descent, but we made it back to the bottom by mid-morning, and miraculously without injury.

“Keep going,” said Terry, nodding toward the slope rising to the west. “Once we put enough distance between us, we’ll work our way around.”

“Look!” cried Alia, pointing back up to the top of the northeastern mountain.

My eyes had trouble focusing on the distant peak, but I could just make out the tiny moving shapes, like ants on a hill.

Looking through his binoculars, Ed Regis said, “Twenty. Maybe more.”

If they decided to charge down the mountain at the same speed we had done, they could be here before we got sufficiently up the next slope.

“Couldn’t expect them to be fooled by the gunshots forever,” muttered James. “They can sense us.”

“Give me my pack,” I said to Ed Regis. “I’ll carry it from here.”

“First you need to eat, Adrian,” said Ed Regis, looking down at my unsteady legs. “I think we all do.”

I had forgotten that we had skipped breakfast.

“Alright,” conceded Terry. “Ten minute break. Then we go.”

We ate hurriedly and nervously, keeping a watchful eye on the Angels gathering on the distant peak. Ed Regis assured us that even a professional sharpshooter wouldn’t be able to land a bullet in our midst at this distance, but I was more worried about the possibility of a long-range psionic-based attack. The range of psionic controllers varied considerably: some required eye contact, others didn’t. I doubted they had any finder-controllers among them, since if they did, they could have locked onto Alia and me from much farther away, but now that the Seraphim had line of sight on us, there was no telling what might happen. And neither James nor Alia had any mental blocking training. Keeping my consciousness guarded against sudden intrusion, I watched my team carefully. But no mind attacks came, nor did any flight-capable telekinetics try swooping down the mountainside.

“They’re well hidden,” I said, popping a handful of mixed nuts into my mouth. “I can’t sense any of their powers.”

“At least they’re not coming down the mountain yet,” said James.

It was strange considering how utterly they outnumbered us, but if anything, it looked like the Angels were just observing and debating what to do.

“Whatever they’re planning, it wouldn’t hurt to put more distance between us,” said Terry, standing up.

“Five more minutes, Terry?” pleaded Alia. “My legs really hurt.”

That was my sister’s first and last complaint of the day, but Terry replied unsympathetically, “Your legs will stop hurting when you’re dead, Alia. On your feet. Now!”

I took my new backpack from Ed Regis, who turned around and offered to carry Alia’s next.

But after a quick glance in Terry’s direction, Alia shook her head, saying resolutely, “It’s okay, Ed. I can carry it.”

We had given Alia the lightest load possible: Hers was the backpack without the sleeping bag, heavy gear or bottled water. But even so, Alia’s backpack, like the others, had been designed for adults, and even with all the straps pulled tight, my sister had a lot of trouble walking with it.

“Once we’ve eaten through enough of our food, we’ll combine everything into four packs,” promised Ed Regis.

The western slope, though not as steep as what we had just descended, was a serious challenge for our exhausted crew. The going was not only slow and painful, but nerve-racking with the knowledge that we now had a large audience one peak away. The Angels still hadn’t moved from their vantage point, and I constantly felt their eyes on my back as we made our way up the rocky mountainside.

In the early afternoon, we finally managed to leave the Angels behind as we began our descent down the other side of our mountain, turning slightly northward. It should have been a relief, but I soon came to the conclusion that it was even worse on this side since we couldn’t see the Angels and thus had no clue what they were doing. Still, we kept to a safe pace this time, and reached the bottom within a few hours.

“We still have some sunlight left,” said Terry. “Let’s see how far we can get up the next mountain.”

My sister kept her mouth shut, so the rest of us did too.

We made our way northwest, climbing steadily until near sundown. That was when Alia pointed behind us again.

The Angels had been following us, carefully keeping their distance just as the riflemen had been doing. They had gathered at the top of the slope that we had descended in the afternoon, and again they refused to come any closer while we were in view. In the rapidly waning light, I watched them uncomfortably, wondering what they had in store for us. Was this the cat playing with the mouse before eating it?

“What the hell are they playing at?” said James.

“I’m not sure,” said Terry, “but we’re stopping here for the night.”

“But we’re only another two hundred yards or so from the top,” argued James. “Shouldn’t we at least get to the other side today?”

Ed Regis shook his head. “Terry is right. These rocks here will give us plenty of cover, and if the Angels decide to attack us during the night, we’ll be able to see them coming and have a decent tactical advantage.”

“What if there’s another team on the other side of this mountain?” asked James. I was wondering the exact same thing.

“Then either way, we’re dead,” said Terry.

Fair enough.

My sister had been almost entirely silent today, even during our breaks, but I couldn’t be sure if she was in one of her moods or if she was simply dead tired like the rest of us. As we settled down for the night, I asked her timidly, “Are you still mad at me, Alia?”

Alia shrugged, replying quietly, “I’m too tired to be mad. But I should be. I just can’t figure out what you’re thinking sometimes.”

“It’s not like I enjoy getting shot, you know.”

Alia finally smiled. “Four times, Addy.”

Ed Regis and James set up our tent in a relatively flat space between several large rocks. Our new tent, though still a tight fit for four, was definitely an improvement on our last one, and this time we even had enough sleeping bags for everyone who wasn’t on night watch. Alia fell asleep almost instantly.

I had first watch again, but Ed Regis, who was second, joined me. I suspected that he was afraid I might fall asleep on the job, but it was hard to feel insulted because I wasn’t so sure myself.

“So what
were
you thinking, Adrian?” asked Ed Regis, his eyes scanning the dark slope.

“I wasn’t,” I admitted meekly. “Thanks for saving my life, by the way.”

“What goes around comes around.”

“I already told you that wasn’t me,” I said stubbornly. “It was Alia.”

In the short silence that followed, I wondered if Terry might have had a point this morning when she accused me of trying to prove something. I hadn’t
deliberately
flown down the mountainside without a pistol, but I
had
flown down the mountainside. While even Terry had agreed that, under the circumstances, our lightning attack had been the best possible tactic, that wasn’t why I had done it.