Mystics #1: The Seventh Sense (6 page)

Mystics Theoretical, Group
1 – Division 416

She pressed enter. A window opened, and the following folders
appeared.

A Mystic way of life: Philosophy
behind the Mystics

Management rules and
regulations

The Mystic Manual, Ranks 1 - 12

Mystic Treaty

“Let’s continue. We were identifying rank two mystics and groups
before we were interrupted,” Agent Ward said. “Leah, please name me the first ten
mystics from that rank.”

A girl of about sixteen with a long brown ponytail stood up. “Adaro,
álfar
,
bathin
,
caliban
,
cyclops
,
dain
,
duineach
, hobgoblin, goblin, and griffin.”

“And which group do they belong to?” asked Agent Ward.

“The ally group, except for the hobgoblins and goblins, which are in
the hostile group,” answered the girl.

“Good. I expect everyone to know the first
one
hundred
by heart, by
the end of the month.” She stared at Zoey for a moment. “Everyone open your
Mystic Manual, rank two folder, and go to page thirty-five.”

Zoey had no idea there were so many monsters—
mystics
, she reminded herself. There were several hundred, just in
the second rank folder. Every mystic had its own file, like a police record,
with a photo, a description of what it looked like, and a brief history of the
creature. Half of the mystics in this folder had the word ‘hostile’ written in
bold red letters. Not all the mystics were friendly—she knew this—and she would
have to learn to distinguish friend from foe very quickly.

After three full hours of studying, Zoey’s eyes hurt from looking at
the screen. She was grateful when Agent Ward announced it was time for lunch.

When she stood up, she caught the boy Stuart glowering at her again.
She wondered if he ever used another face. He was joined by three other boys
and two girls, all of whom gave her evil
you-don’t-belong-here
looks. They were the same looks she used to get from the kids back at her
old high school. Foster kids were troublemakers—so everyone used to say—she’d
been labeled a freak from early on. The agency seemed to have the same kind of
cliques.

She noticed that some of the other students wore the same ruby rings
on their fingers. It meant something, and she was going to find out what.

“Ignore them,” said Tristan as he challenged Stuart with a dark
look. “He thinks because his last name is King that he can boss everyone around
like he’s royalty or something.”

Zoey watched Stuart put his hand on one of the other boys’ shoulders
and whisper something.

“What’s up with those rings? The ones they’re wearing with the red
circle.”

Tristan followed her gaze. “They say it’s a symbol of the Originals,
those who wear them think they’re like
their
descendants.”

“And what exactly are the
Originals
?”
asked Zoey.

“The original Sevenths,” answered Tristan. “The first people like you
and me—people with our abilities that existed in this world centuries ago.”

Somehow Zoey didn’t want King Stuart to have such a significant part
in the Sevenths’ ancestry. It gave him airs that he didn’t have any proper
claim to.

“So, Stuart and them are
really
descendants of these Originals? Well, that’s too bad, I was hoping to steal his
ring and feed it to him later,” she said.

Tristan laughed softly. “The truth is it’s a bunch of made up
stories if you ask me. No one can really tell who the real descendants are. The
Originals existed centuries ago. I don’t think anyone can trace that far back because
no one knows who they really were. This whole thing started years ago when a
group of Sevenths decided to do some DNA testing. Next thing you know, they
started to wear these rings and claimed to be descendants of the long lost
Originals.”

Zoey looked back to Stuart. “Now I get why he’s so thick. He treats
people like scum because he
does
think he’s royalty. He thinks he’s one of the Originals, and the rest of us are
peasants.”

“Who cares about him anyway? Come on, let’s get lunch,” said Tristan
as he made his way towards the door.

With a final glower in Stuart’s direction, Zoey followed Tristan out
of the class. She tried to forget how unwelcome he made her feel and strained
to think about how fortunate she was to be in the program—but she couldn’t. Her
hatred for the boy was growing. While she had found a new friend here at the
agency, she had also gained an enemy.

Lunch was at the Wander Inn. The dining room was set up with a
buffet lunch where everyone helped themselves to plates of food and drink. A bulbous,
purple mystic with four eyes and small mouth like a button was wearing a chef’s
hat and stained apron and served behind the counter. The thing squealed in
delight as it packed their plates with
spoonfuls
of
spaghetti and meatballs.

The room was crowded with operatives and agents. Apparently,
everyone ate there, including Stuart and his cronies. They stared at Zoey from
the end of the buffet line, whispering and laughing.

After they had served themselves with two slices of pizza, fries,
and two bottles of water, Tristan and Zoey took a table near the window where
they’d be out of earshot.

“So, Agent Ward wasn’t half as bad as I thought she’d be,” said
Tristan as he popped a handful of fries in his mouth. “I thought it went pretty
well.”

Zoey stared at him. “Are you kidding? The woman nearly bit my head
off. She hates me.”

“She hates everyone,” said a voice.

Zoey looked up from her plate. The voice belonged to the boy who had
tried to get her attention earlier. He was lanky with a goofy kind of face,
blonde hair, freckles, and large pleading blue eyes.

“Can I sit with you guys?” he asked, and before either of them could
answer the boy sat at their table and stuck out his hand. “Simon Brown at your
service.”

Zoey laughed and shook his hand. “Nice to meet you, Simon.”

She liked him immediately.

“Everyone’s talking about you, you know,” said Simon as he angled a
large slice of greasy pizza towards his mouth.

“You’re like the main attraction around here. People haven’t been
this excited since Cameron clogged all the toilets on the second floor. It must
have been a real shock for you when you came here, right? Yeah, must have been.
I would have been shocked. I mean—if
I
were you. But I’m not—but I would have been—you know what I mean?”

Grease rolled down the sides of his mouth as he chewed happily.

There was something Zoey had wanted to ask Tristan since they had
rescued her, and she figured there was no better time than right now.

“What’s an
interloper
?”
she blurted out.

Simon choked on his pizza, and Tristan’s fries fell on his plate.
The entire dining room froze, and all eyes were on Zoey.

“Agent Lee said that one was stolen yesterday in Boston,” she
continued. “So I’m thinking that you must have seen it or something, right?”

Tristan and Simon looked at each other but said nothing.

Zoey leaned forward on the table and lowered her voice.

“What did I say?” She looked at them both. “What’s the big deal? Why
is everyone staring at me?”

Tristan waited until everyone went back to their meals before
answering. “Don’t say that word so loud.”

“What word? Interloper?”

“SHHH!”

Zoey covered her mouth. “Okay,” she whispered and lowered herself
even closer to the table, getting pizza grease on her sleeves and hair.

“But what is it? And why do I have to whisper about it?”

Tristan and Simon looked at each other again, and then finally Tristan
said. “It’s a top secret device that only a few Sevenths and mystics have
ever
laid eyes on. It’s used to travel
through and back from the Nexus.”

“The Nexus,” repeated Zoey. She remembered that both her foster
mother’s demon and the agents had mentioned it.

“Is that like where the
monst
—mystics live,
or something?” She caught herself.

Tristan took a sip of his water. “The Nexus is where the mystics
came from thousands of years ago. It’s another dimension—a world filled with millions
of mystics.”

A slice of pepperoni fell from Simon’s mouth. “I think I’m going to
be sick.”

The pieces to Zoey’s puzzle were all coming together now. She was
getting the hang of it.
   
“So why is it
so special…this interloper?” she said and lowered her voice on the word
interloper
. “Why is it kept secret?”

“Because it’s one of the
few
devices
that actually work,” said Tristan, looking serious.

“Guys, I think I’m lactose intolerant,” interjected Simon. “It’s the
cheese—I think maybe that’s why I’m afraid of cows.”

Tristan ignored him. “The mystics built the devices thousands of
years ago and used them to cross over to Earth, to colonize our world—”

“—Like an alien invasion,” said Simon as he took another bite of his
pizza.

“But then the hostiles massacred hundreds of thousands of humans,”
continued Tristan. “They wanted to annihilate the entire human race—”

“—Until there was nothing left of us but dust,” added Simon, still
chewing.

“The Mutes didn’t understand what was happening to them. They
couldn’t
see
their threat, so they
couldn’t fight back. That’s when the Sevenths got together and destroyed most
of the interlopers, to keep the hostiles from crossing over to Earth again. And
that’s when the Agencies and the treaty were created.”

Simon licked the grease from his fingers. “We patrol the dimension’s
borders. We keep tabs on the hostiles. Can I have a sip of your drink?” he
helped himself to Tristan’s drink.

Zoey watched Aria pouring water into empty glasses.

“So why do they stay here? Why don’t they go back to their world?
Don’t they like it there?”

“Because to most of them
this
is their world,” said Tristan.

“They were born here on Earth and have been here for generations.
Their home is here, just like you and me, and they have the right to stay.
Besides, from what I’ve heard, the Nexus isn’t all that great. The hostiles use
the weaker mystics as slaves, and there are ongoing wars between races. It’s
pretty bad.”

“Guys, I think I’m going to become a vegan,” said Simon as he belched.
“Hey, I feel better now!”

“So they prefer to stay here because they don’t want to go back.” Zoey
remembered that the Skin and
Duyen
demons had been
determined to stay here on Earth. They were prepared to do whatever it took to
avoid going back to the Nexus.

“I get it, it makes sense.”

She looked back at Aria and imagined her as a toddler with her siblings
as her own mother ran after them and picked them up with her four arms.

Simon wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “It’s all there in
the treaty. The mystics
must
respect
our world and us, ‘cause if they don’t—well, that’s when the agency steps in
and things get ugly.”

Zoey looked at Tristan. “You said they didn’t destroy all the
interlopers, so where are they now?”

Tristan stared at her. “All I know is that there are only a few left.
They are hidden in major cities around the world. They’re all heavily guarded—it’s
not like you can just walk in and take one. You’d be killed. You’d be insane to
try.”

“But someone did,” said Zoey, her curiosity growing by the minute.

She felt Stuart’s creepy blue eyes on her but ignored him and turned
her attention to Tristan again.

“Did Agent Lee find out who took it? Do they have any leads and theories
as to why they took it in the first place?”

Tristan hesitated then shook his head. “No. It was really bad. There
were bodies everywhere, mystic and human. It was horrible.
Who
ever
took it must have had an army or something—they got through the
agency’s toughest security. We don’t know how they found out where it was.”

 
“But
why
would someone steal it?” asked Zoey, aware that Stuart was
slowly making his way closer to their table. It was so obvious he was trying to
hear what they were talking about.

 
“To travel without being
detected,” answered Tristan. “To let the hostile mystics who hate us
in.
There’s no way we could keep track
of all the mystics traveling to Earth if someone had their own interloper.”

Zoey frowned. “You mean like,
illegally
?”

“Yup,” said Simon. “I mean we do get illegals from time to time. They
slip through the cracks, so to speak. Usually they use other transporting
devices, but those things don’t work very well, and most of the time the
mystics die trying to get across. But a single interloper could let thousands
of undetected mystics through at one time—thousands of
big,
ugly ones.”

“So who would want to do something like that?” asked Zoey.

“Hostiles, probably,” said Tristan.

An uneasy feeling grew in the pit of Zoey’s stomach. “So whoever
stole it has big plans for it, like something really bad, right? I mean, that’s
the only thing that would make sense, right?”

“Yup,” agreed Simon. “Like a nuclear explosion of hostile mystics.
They’d come here and destroy every last human being. They would probably eat us,
too.”

Agent Barnes had said that whoever had stolen the interloper must
have been an insider. Someone with Agency connections must have stolen the device.
But who had it now? And why did they take it in the first place?

When they were finished eating, Zoey pushed her seat back and got
up.

“Okay, what’s next?” she asked.