Dangerous Games (5 page)

‘About it being the worst night of your life,' I prompted.

‘Oh, that,' Soph said, and laughed. ‘I was hung-over, that's all. You didn't think I really meant it, did you?'

And she laughed in that I'm-a-woman-of-the-world way that made me feel like I was about five years old.

E
very morning since the day I met Finn I'd woken up with a slight tingle of anticipation, and as soon as I thought about it the tingle blossomed into excitement that maybe today would be the day when Finn would reappear and start teaching me some of the cool stuff he knew. All of that first Sunday, while I was hanging round with Soph watching Draz, I was half expecting to get the call, but it didn't come. Then it was Monday, and I had to go to school, which meant there was only a small chance of hearing from Finn (although there was always that bit of time after school and before dinner …) but Monday passed, and Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. No Finn. Saturday – when Soph was out having the best/worst night of her life – I was convinced he'd call me, but he didn't. And by Sunday I'd practically given up. He must have decided I was too young, or too inexperienced, or something. Maybe he'd found other, better destroyers. Maybe Ben's unfriendliness had put him off. Maybe he'd decided our town was a dead loss and headed off to find somewhere better. By the end of that weekend I was pretty much convinced I
was never going to see him again, and the world seemed like a duller place because of it.

I spent most of Monday listening to Soph going on about what a great night she'd had and I was expecting Tuesday to hold more of the same, but as I left my house and started heading for school I saw someone get out of a car which was parked just up the street, and before my head had even identified who it was, my heart had started leaping like a flying fish, and I was smiling so much I felt like my cheeks were going to burst.

‘Hey,' Finn said. He was dressed exactly as he had been the last time I saw him, in jeans, a black coat and jumper. ‘Where are you headed?'

I tried to think of a witty response, but the sight of his face had driven all the cleverness out of my head. ‘School,' I said.

‘Wrong answer!' Grinning, he grabbed my school bag from my shoulder, and threw it into the boot of his car. ‘You're coming to hunt agents.'

You're going to think I'm the biggest goody-goody in the world when I tell you this, but I'd never actually wagged school before.

‘What about school?' I said.

‘It'll still be there tomorrow,' Finn said. ‘I'll write you a note.'

His eyes sparkled with mischief and I knew that he was the kind of guy who wouldn't think twice about skipping school – for all I knew he was skipping school right now – and so I got into his car without another word. Now that I was with him again I was desperate to
win his good opinion, and running the risk of detention seemed like a very small price to pay.

Finn's car was even worse than Ben's car, with a noisy muffler and an engine that went dug-dug-dug when it idled. It was black and huge, with big fat wheels and interstate numberplates. It was old, but it sounded fast. The back seat was knee-deep in clanking cans and rustling food wrappers. ‘Meet the Beast,' Finn said, and cackled with laughter.

He drove very fast and his blasting stereo made it difficult to talk, but I tried. ‘What've you been up to since I saw you last?' I asked.

‘Oh, this and that,' he said vaguely.

‘I thought you might've left town,' I suggested.

‘Nope,' he said, and grinned, refusing to elaborate.

We drove into town and parked, and then the two of us walked to the middle of the pedestrian mall where workers and students and people of all ages and descriptions were hurrying past on their way to wherever they were going. Finn sat down on a convenient bench to watch the crowd and I sat down next to him.

‘Now,' he said, ‘tell me who's an agent of order.'

I only knew one way of identifying agents of order, which was by the pin they all wore: a white circle on a navy blue background. We had our bracelets, they had their pins, and that was how you knew them. The only problem with this method was that it wasn't much use until you were so close to an agent you were already in trouble.

I scanned the crowd, not really believing I was likely to see anyone, but couldn't see a single tell-tale gleam
on a shirt or a lapel. ‘I can't,' I said. ‘They're moving too fast.'

Finn smiled. He waited, his eyes bright and intense. For a long time he didn't say anything, but then his eyes narrowed. ‘There,' he said. ‘Grey suit. Fair hair.'

I picked out a young man moving quickly through the crowd. ‘Carrying a backpack?'

Finn nodded. I stared at him, but couldn't see a pin, or any other distinguishing features. ‘How do you know?' I asked.

‘Guess.'

‘Is it the suit?'

‘No.'

The young man disappeared into the crowd without seeming to notice us, and we sat there for several more minutes in silence, watching and waiting. Then Finn pointed out another one.

‘There,' Finn said. ‘Older woman. Dark blue uniform.'

She was a nurse, perhaps in her forties, with tired-looking eyes.

‘Any clues yet?' Finn asked. ‘Nope,' I said.

And then the nurse, too, was gone, swallowed up by the crowd.

We waited ten more minutes until we saw our next one: a young woman in jeans and sneakers who looked like a university student. I couldn't see anything about her that was in the least bit striking or exceptional.

‘Okay, I give up,' I said. ‘How do you tell?'

‘It's all about using your instincts,' Finn said. ‘You
can't tell by looking. But if you pay attention, you can feel them.'

‘How?'

‘It's their powers. They set up a vibration in the air – you can sense them coming. Go on, you try it.'

‘How do I know what I'm – feeling for?'

‘Don't think about anything, just let your mind drift. Start to notice what's around you – the sights, the sounds, the smells. Things will start to catch your attention, but don't force it. Just let it happen.'

He paused and I did what he said. At first, all I was conscious of was him sitting next to me – the heat from his body, the smell of his clothes, the sound of his breathing, the way he made my powers itch – but then I managed to put him out of my head and began to concentrate on the world around me. I heard snatches of conversation, the roar of cars rising and falling as the traffic ebbed and flowed; I smelt coffee and doughnuts and hurried cigarettes, a woman's perfume, a faint whiff of cat piss; I saw light glinting off an awning, a girl wrestling a pram down some stairs. But what I didn't see or smell or hear or sense, even in a subliminal sort of way, was the vibration of the agents of order.

‘I can't feel anything,' I admitted.

‘You're thinking too much,' Finn said. ‘Try again. And don't think.'

Have you ever tried to not think? It just makes your brain machinery tick over twice as fast. But I did my best to not think and tried to open myself up to all the secret vibrations of the universe. And after a while I did start to feel something – a tickle, a whisper, my skin crawling,
a little shiver from the bracelet on my wrist, like the flicker of a snaky tongue. It was my own powers activating, nothing more, but it made a sort of sense that I'd need
my
powers to sense
their
powers. And I was aware of that feeling I always have when my powers activate, a sense of possibility, but of danger too, because once the forces of destruction start moving around inside me there's no knowing what they're going to do. Things could get out of control very easily, and that's sometimes a good feeling but sometimes a bad feeling, especially if, like me, you're the kind of person who doesn't like things to be out of control. But we weren't at that point yet and my powers were still just a frisson of excitement in the pit of my stomach, and as I let my senses drift out into the morning, amongst the hurrying commuters with their jumbo takeaway lattes, I began to think that maybe, maybe I could sense something after all. I turned to look at Finn and saw him staring at me, and his greeny-grey eyes caught mine and he brightened into an excited smile. ‘You can feel it!' he exclaimed.

‘I
think
I can,' I said uncertainly. ‘Try and focus,' he said. ‘See if you can pick them out of the crowd.'

So I did, I scanned the crowd and tried to keep feeling the thing I was feeling and find that agent of order (if it really
was
an agent of order) and my eye was caught by a man in a footy jumper, wearing the colours of the team that had beaten the mighty Reds last week and I felt a little hiccup of resentment in my diaphragm and I said: ‘Him, it's that guy!' And to be honest, I didn't have a clue whether he was an agent of order or just a
sadly misguided sports fan, but I saw Finn looking kind of hard and intent as he picked the guy out of the crowd and then he jumped to his feet and said, ‘Let's follow him.' So I guessed I must have got it right.

We followed the guy up the mall and out into the streets. When he turned left, we turned left. When he stopped, we stopped. Finn never took his eyes off the guy, following him with an excited smile on his face, and so I followed Finn.

At last the guy came to an office tower and went inside. I was sure this was where we'd leave him, but Finn followed him into the building, casual as anything, and stood right beside him as he waited for the lift. I hung back, unable to believe he was doing something so risky, but then Finn turned and grinned at me, and his look said
are you up for this?
And even though my head was screaming
danger
my heart was saying
Follow him! Prove yourself! Show him what you're made of!
So I crossed the foyer under the eyes of the security guard, feeling conspicuous with my uniform and even more conspicuous with my bracelet, and then the lift doors pinged, the guy in the footy jumper stepped into the lift and me and Finn jumped in right after him. The guy pressed the button for the eleventh floor, and as the lift doors closed, Finn pressed the button for the first floor. The blood pounded in my ears as I realised we had voluntarily sealed ourselves into a lift with an agent of order. What was I thinking? Finn was staring straight ahead, radiating an air of intense excitement, the destructive energy pouring off him in waves, and I felt my own powers starting to stir in response. The guy in the footy
jumper shot us a suspicious look and I tensed, ready for whatever was about to happen, but then the lift doors slid open and the lift voice announced, ‘First floor,' and Finn jumped out and I followed him, and as the lift doors closed again the guy said: ‘You could have taken the stairs you know.'

‘Are you crazy?' I hissed, as we headed for the stairs and went back down again. ‘He could have neutralised us.'

My head was buzzing and there were shivers running up the back of my neck.

‘There were two of us and one of him,' Finn said easily. ‘He knew there was nothing he could do.'

‘But he's seen our faces now,' I said. ‘What if he comes looking for us?'

‘He won't,' Finn said.

‘How do you know?'

‘He wasn't an agent of order.'

‘What!?' I shrieked.

Finn laughed. ‘He was just a guy.'

‘But – but –' My face was turning vividly, brutally, punishingly red. ‘Why did we follow him?'

‘Because you thought he was an agent.'

I was mortified. ‘Why didn't you tell me he wasn't?'

‘It's good practice. You never know when you'll really need to follow one.' He paused. ‘I can't believe you got in the lift with him.'

‘You did.'

‘Yeah, but I knew we were safe.' Finn looked at me thoughtfully. ‘You've got guts.'

And I rebounded in one dizzying leap from the depths
of mortification to sizzling delight –
Finn thinks I've got guts!!!

I was abuzz with adrenalin now that the danger (the imaginary danger) was past, and the rest of the morning seemed to fly by. Finn talked and I talked and we laughed and mucked around and swapped stories about our first experiences with our powers and then he told me about some of the places he'd been and some of the people he'd met on his travels. He'd done enough to fill up three lives already and I felt like I could have listened to him all day.

Lunchtime rolled around and we went to Maccas and got burgers. Finn paid.

‘You,' Finn said, pointing at me with a chip, ‘you're a natural.'

‘No I'm not,' I said, blushing again.

‘Yes you are. I've got a feeling about you.' He looked at me intently for a moment and I squirmed with pleasure.

‘Not everyone can detect other agents, you know,' he continued. ‘In fact, some people will tell you it's impossible. But that's just because they won't admit there's stuff they can't do.'

‘So how did you learn how to do it?' I asked.

‘My guide,' Finn said. ‘She taught me everything I know. She taught me about our mission.'

‘You've got a mission?'

‘We all have a mission,' Finn said. The smile faded from his face and when he spoke again he sounded older and more serious. ‘Do you know what a destroyer does?'