Psion Beta (3 page)

Sammy and Feet ducked behind the dumpster, scattering three rats eating a rotted apple core. “They got a heat lock on us,” Sammy hissed. They had no chance of helping their friends now. “We need to shake it. This way.” They ran down another alley, leaving Gunner and Fro-yo. Dense walls were their best shot at getting rid of a heat lock besides running into a large crowd of people.

Feet stopped abruptly and clutched his sides in pain. “I can’t keep running like this!” he exclaimed, gasping for air. “I don’t think we can get away.”

“
We keep going as long as we have to,” Sammy said, leaning against the brick wall.

“
But how long till they catch us?”

“
Never if we keep running.”

“
We can’t outrun them forever. They’re Shocks. We’re nothing! Sooner or later they’ll catch up to us. It’s just a matter of time.”

Sammy shoved Feet against the wall and got in his face to snap him out of it. “Hey! We swore we’d never go back to the Grinder. I can’t go back there, Feet. Never.”

“
I don’t know what to do anymore,” Feet cried. His voice cracked. “I don’t want to run forever. I just want a life. I just want a freaking normal life!”

Sammy had to say something. If not, Feet was going to lose it for good.

He calmed himself first and tried to hitch a smile on his face. His mouth felt all wrong, and he wondered how nutty it made him look. “Let’s leave the city for good,” he suggested. “If we make it to another territory and turn ourselves in as runaways, maybe we could ask to be put in with fosters again. Maybe they’ll even keep us together.”

The stupid, probably impossible suggestion worked. Feet now had some hope. Most of the wild-eyed fear left his eyes and he asked, “You really think so?”

“
Yeah,” Sammy lied. “It’s worth a shot, right?”

“
Where––where would you want to go?” Feet asked, his voice still shaky and tight.

“
I don’t know yet,” Sammy said as he turned to walk, “let’s think about it.”

The longer they talked, the more Feet calmed; the panicky edge in his voice gradually disappeared. Occasionally, a vehicle passed. The cars made very little noise, and Sammy often did not hear them approach until too late. Each time one passed they hid behind trash bins or parked cars. It became easy for Sammy to think they had lost the Shocks for good.

Even if he knew the idea was stupid.

An unmarked armored truck painted all black turned onto the street, silently driving toward them. Sammy had a bad feeling about it the moment he saw it. If it was a Shockbox, more than a dozen Shocks would be inside it. Then red lights began to flash as it picked up speed.

Sammy groaned, alerting Feet to the new danger. They sprinted forward to the next alleyway. Sammy could hardly see a thing. The voices and footsteps of Shocks were not far behind. As they ran farther into the network of alleys, the nauseating odor of garbage and decaying animals grew thicker. Sammy felt trapped. At any moment they might hit a dead end.

And then what?

Frantically, he led Feet through one blind turn after another, praying that each corner would not be the last. They came to a fork in the alley and Sammy went right, hoping it would take them out of the maze.

The darkness prevented him from seeing more than a couple meters ahead, and all he could make out was the blood-red brick of an old building on one side and the metal siding of a warehouse on the other. Without warning, everything in front of him went completely black, and he heard a loud BANG.

Pain shot through his skull as his head smacked into a thick metal door, sending Sammy tumbling backward. Bright spots like little bombs splashed his vision. When he looked up, hope abandoned him. The only routes left were through the metal door or past the approaching Shocks. He and Feet pulled, pushed, and pounded on the door. It was firmly locked.

How can this happen?
he asked himself.

The Shocks were very close; Sammy turned to meet them. Rage boiled inside him as he saw their beams of lights draw closer. The irony of it all. They had chased so long and hard after him and his friends for stealing food, but where had the worthless Shocks been when his life had fallen apart?

Where were you a year ago when my life was normal? When I was still good? It’s not fair!
He wanted to scream all this at them, but he was too terrified.

A reflection from the ground caught his eye. It was a pipe. Reason fled from him. He picked it up, brandishing it like a club. “Remember your promise,” he told Feet, who pulled the shocker out of the back of his pants. “Don’t let them get us.”

The Shocks were close enough now that Sammy heard their labored breathing. Sammy hated them. He hated the world. He hated his friends for allowing themselves to get caught. And he felt real fear now. The lights on their guns bounced off the brick wall before the Shocks even turned the corner into the narrow space where Feet and Sammy were trapped.

Six Shocks stopped only two meters away from where the boys held their ground; they formed a line to barricade off any escape. Three shockers were pointed at each boy. One of men in the middle yelled, “Put down the weapons and get on the ground. Put down your weapons!”

Feet immediately got down onto the ground, but Sammy had no intention of obeying. How could Feet give up so easily? The boiling rage inside reached a critical point. He held the pipe higher in the air and defiantly screamed, “
NO
!”

Three of them fired at Sammy. The instant he heard the sound, he closed his eyes and threw his hands out to brace himself. A powerful surge flowed from his head, down his neck, and through his arms. It spread out of his hands and fingertips. He waited for what felt like an eternity for one of the jolts to hit him––to send him down to the ground in uncontrollable spasms.

It never came.

2.
Elite

“
Brains, what
––How did you do that?” Feet got up and brushed the dirt from his pants.

Sammy opened his eyes. All six Shocks lay on the ground. Their scattered guns cast points of light in all directions.

He looked at his hands and back to the motionless Shocks. “What happened?”

Feet did not answer. He was too busy crawling around, examining the pavement. When Feet found what he wanted, he stood up and exclaimed, “Here, look at this!”

He opened his hand. By the light of one of the Shocks’ guns, Sammy saw a three-pronged jolt reflecting the dim light off its metal tips.

“
So?”

“
So? You stopped all the jolts in midair! They flew back. I saw it. How’d you do that?”

“
I didn’t do anything,” Sammy insisted.

Two of the Shocks stirred and another moaned incoherently.

“
We’ve got to go,” Sammy said.

He and Feet grabbed two shockers apiece and ran. After retracing their path, they took another route and left the alleyway. Sammy pushed them as fast as he felt they could go, and when they were too tired to run, they stopped to rest only as long as they dared. During these rests, Feet tried to explain to Sammy what he had seen.

“
You stuck out your hands.” Feet said, mimicking the motion. “All six of those guys just flew back like they were hit by an invisible . . . something. Honestly, it––it was like magic.”

“
That’s not possible,” Sammy said, but the more he thought about it, the more confused he became. “No, there has to be some kind of logical explanation.” It sounded like something his father would have said.

Sammy wanted to talk more, but necessity forced them to keep moving. When he became too exhausted to run, they slowed to a walk on a quiet street in the wealthier suburbs. He feared his legs would cramp up, and he wouldn’t be able to move at all. He had been fighting stitches in his sides for over an hour.

But where are we going to go?
he kept asking himself. With no money and no one to help them, they had no options. Feet might have been thinking the same thing, because he asked, “Should we try one of these houses? I did houses a little before the Grinder.”

All the residences in the neighborhood had perfect lawns and big windows. Probably expensive alarm systems, too. They reminded Sammy of his old home. He decided they should just keep going. They traveled to the edge of the city, always hugging the roadside, staying near trees and bushes so that when a car passed, they could duck out of sight.

“
You must be some kind of a . . . what do you call it?” Feet persisted, “Psycho? Psychic? You know what I mean, where you can move crap with your head. You ever get hit by radiation or something nutty like that? That’s how it starts. Gotta have radiation. Everyone knows that.”

Sammy rolled his eyes. “You mean telekinesis? You realize how stupid that sounds? It was probably a shocker gone haywire.”

“
Yeah, right!” Feet snorted. “Was the jolt you stopped mid-air part of the malfunction, too? And don’t forget about what you said after you fell.”

“
Okay––you’ve got a point. But don’t you think I would know if I had telekinetic powers?”

“
Course not. Most don’t develop tele––super powers until they’re in high school. Gotta be a teenager. Everyone knows that, too.”

A bell tolled nearby, cutting off Sammy’s sarcastic remark. Two solemn chimes announced the time to be 02:00.

“
A church,” Feet said. “Let’s see if it’s open.”

They crossed three more blocks until they stopped at the walkway leading to the building. Sammy gaped at it. He couldn’t remember seeing anything so magnificent.

The “church” was an impressive stone cathedral adorned with a giant cross and dozens of angels and symbols carved into the stone. Ornate wooden double doors stood at the top of the stairs, beckoning them to venture inside.

They climbed the stairs and pushed open the doors, walking into a richly decorated lobby. The lobby split into a vestibule that surrounded the chapel. The atmosphere was serene, the lobby illuminated by natural moonlight through the windows. Sammy couldn’t remember when he’d last felt safe, but he did here.

Inside, twelve ornamental stained glasses high up on the wall provided very little lighting, but dozens of candles surrounding the altars cast a mystic glow over the vast room. Sammy liked the way the polish of the wooden pews reflected thousands of points of light. He and Feet walked inside tentatively, checking to see if there was anyone worshipping. It looked empty.

The sound of shuffling shoes across the room to their right alerted them. Feet jumped back against Sammy with a shout that echoed twice, then faded. The feet belonged to an old man with thick, white hair tousled from sleep. His face looked as if it had not seen a razor in several days. Two large, but empty blue eyes stared at them for what seemed like several minutes. Finally he cocked his head at them and said in an odd accent Sammy had never heard, “Hello!”

The two young fugitives stared back with fear and wonder. Sammy had no idea what to say. It was an awkward silence. Finally the old man spoke again.

“
Which one broughtcha here?”

Sammy looked at Feet to see if his friend had any idea what the man meant. Judging from the empty expression on Feet’s face, he did not.

“
Which––which one what?” Sammy asked the old man.

“
Don’tcha know? The Holy Saints? Which one o’ them led ya here? I was led here by the Holy Saint Benedict Joseph Labre.”

They watched the strange man cock his head like a curious bird, and it dawned on Sammy that the man might be a little off his rocker. He felt a mixture of pity and humor.

“
Er . . . we were . . . brought here by the Saint . . .” Sammy stole a glance at Feet for some help.

“
Dismas,” Feet interjected simply, “Saint Dismas.”

The old man’s eyes got very big. “Oh, I see. Saint Dismas,” he repeated, mulling over the name silently. “In trouble, are ya? Well, you’ve come to the right place I should think. It’s like me father always said, ‘Ain’t no one like the good Lord to help ya out a spot o’ trouble.’ ”

“
Ya see,” the man continued, “sometimes ya think everything’s coming to an end. Ya can’t see no way out o’ your problems, but truthfully, sometimes, that’s when things really are just beginnin’.”

The man looked at Sammy for a moment, waiting for a reaction. In that instant, his eyes no longer seemed vacant and lost, and then he went back to moving his head side to side, as though confused as ever.

“
What’s your name?” Sammy said, moving a step forward.

“
Oh, I’m Amos, don’tcha know? Did I forget to introduce myself again?” Amos said to himself more than anyone else. He scratched his head, as if picking at his brain for the answers to his own questions. “Yes, yes I did. But, well, the name’s Amos.”

He offered his hand to shake. Feet took it first. Then Sammy took another step forward, and shook Amos’s hand as well. The man’s grip was surprisingly firm. Sammy remembered his own father’s words: “A strong handshake usually means strong character.”

“
Well, you’ll probably be wanting a place for a kipper, eh?” Amos said grinning toothily, and cocking his head again. “Tell ya what, I will, some of these pews are fer older people like myself. Ya just lie yourself right down on them and ya’ll be asleep before ya’ve finished saying yer prayers. Try over by that wall.”