Prank Wars (47 page)

She caught me while I was mid-climb and one-handed. It ripped me from my grip. I lost my balance and my breath caught in my throat as I fell through the darkness. I screamed, the air rushing through my hair until I jerked to a stop, dangling at the same spot where I had attached my harness. Would it hold? I screamed again when something slipped from my back pocket and fluttered though the air. My
war journal.
It hit the ground far below me. The pages splayed out against the gravel. It could’ve been me. I tried to catch my breath, but it came out ragged.

“Mad Dog!” I peered through the darkness. The world swung below me. Byron hurried through the gravel, the ripped ends of his shirt flying behind him. He was on the roof. “Is that you?”

Hope filled me. I wouldn’t have to climb the tower after all. I cupped my hands over my mouth. “Get rid of your phone!”

“Get down!” His words were lost.

“Your phone!” I repeated.

Eric tackled him from behind By now; they both were bruised and bleeding. I leaned my head back in a groan, feeling the sweat on my forehead. There was no way I could get to Byron in time. How long did Eric plan to stick around for the fireworks?

A tug on my harness made my head jerk up. Sandra was messing with the cords attached to the painter’s scaffold. I shrieked, diving to the side to get away from her. I felt strangely like a worm caught on a hook, and reached for the ladder. It was too far away. Once again, Sandra was between me and what I wanted, looking just as fierce as she did when she guarded a batch of chocolate chip cookies. Even from down here, I saw her smirk. She was actually happy to see me die.

My hands balled into fists. I held my breath and swung myself back to the ladder, bringing the cords of my harness back into her reach again. She stole them...predictably, and I clasped the ladder in a killing grip, quickly undoing the cords around me before she could send me plummeting to my death. No way was some high-maintenance girl going to outdo me. “Don’t be stupid,” she snarled.

Why not? According to her, it’s what I did best. I climbed back up the ladder without a harness this time, half aware of the sirens blaring in the streets below us. They were too late to stop any of this from happening. The static gathering from the energy around me made the hair rise on my head, my arms…my legs. It was a weird sensation, and I knew the device was fully functional. Hölle had come through for Eric. Sandra waited at the catwalk above me like an angry sentinel. I forced myself forward. She wasn’t throwing anything at me. It meant she was out of ammunition—or she had a plan. I had nothing to use against her. No. Actually. I might have
something
.

I studied the flat roof to the side of the tower, not finding Byron or Eric. The dish antenna above me was lowering. Sandra ducked skittishly out of its way and I felt my hands go weak on the rungs. It was the perfect distraction from me at the worst possible moment. It had to be aiming at Byron. I struggled over the edge of the catwalk, my stomach scraping over the side. I didn’t know how to stop any of this in time.

Sandra swung at me and I ducked, seeing the wrench inches from my arm. I landed flat against the catwalk, feeling the jagged metal dig into my back. I rolled out of Sandra’s way, pulling out my old lady perfume. She snickered and came for me again. I sprayed it straight into her eyes. She gagged, falling back. The stench was her downfall. I yanked the wrench from her hands, rushing for the antenna. She clawed at me. I elbowed her back, never before realizing how strong she was. The antenna pointed downward, focusing on its target. I tried to jam its descent with the wrench. It kept going. I hit it a couple of times. Why wasn’t it working?

I spotted the control box and lunged at it a moment before feeling a huge explosion tear through the air. Fire shot through the roof below us. I gasped, catching onto the rails of the shaking catwalk. Smoke billowed up into my face, burning my lungs. I coughed and fell to my knees, staring below at the roof, searching for any sign of life. “Byron!” I shouted. “Please, don’t be hurt. Byron!” I was so shocked, I couldn’t even cry. “Don’t be dead.”

“You think he can hear you?”

My head lifted at Sandra’s nasty voice, barely able to take in the hurt, the loss, the sudden anger. Her face was smug. Black make-up streamed down her cheeks, and I felt all of my emotions erupt inside me. Nothing else mattered. “What did you do?” I whispered hoarsely. After one look at my face, she stepped back. I stood up and felt everything snap, all my self-control, all my numbness evaporated into rage. I swung the wrench and Sandra shrieked in dismay. It hit the control box behind her and I smashed it harder and harder, throwing my anguish against it.

“What are you doing?” she screamed. I swung one last time and ripped the control box from its hinges. It spun through the air and twisted until it disappeared into the darkness. A hollow clatter signaled it hit the ground below. Sparks flew up at us. Sandra screamed even louder.

“What? Why are you screaming?” I cried. “It can’t
hear
you!” The tears that wouldn’t come before now ran freely down my cheeks. I wanted to roll up in a ball and forget everything, but I was stuck on the top of a tower with an evil witch and my heart was dead. Byron was dead, and there was no way to bring him back. I covered my face.

“Hey, it’s okay.” I recognized the voice and felt his warm arms wrap around me. My face was in his chest and my hands were kind of stuck between us, so I really couldn’t see, but his heart beat rapidly, strong. Freeing my hands, I lifted my face up to Byron’s. He watched me tenderly.

I cried even harder, grabbing at him. “You’re alive.” Just barely. His hair stuck out worse than before. His white shirt was dingy and torn. His face and knuckles were swollen and bloody.

“C’mon,” He smoothed down my wild hair, wrapping a hand over my elbow. “This place is going to blow.” Sandra was already escaping down the ladder. Her beautiful chestnut curls floated over her face as she slid all the way down the rungs to the catwalk between the tower and the highest roof. She lunged onto the roof, her bare feet spinning against the gravel.

“She won’t get out fast enough,” Byron said into my hair. He pulled me to the edge of the catwalk, and I looked down the tower to the ground far below us. I could feel the energy snapping and sizzling through the air. Something was very wrong. Byron grasped the painter’s scaffold the foreign agents had set up, and heaved the cage closer. I didn’t have time to argue. He pushed me inside and threw himself next to me, his arm finding me.

The cage tottered dangerously beneath us. I tried not to look at the ground until I saw it come at us in a blur of color. The wind rushed through my hair. Byron had let go of the ropes, lowering us as fast as his hands could move as if he could beat the catastrophe overtaking us. Every sense inside me felt it coming. The air wasn’t right. It felt prickly and heavy. It was an unexplainable fear that made it feel like we were wading through a nightmare.

We had escaped only halfway down the tower when the night sky lit up with a brilliant flash of lightning. It struck the tower from the cloudless sky. Loud resounding thunder echoed in and out of the towers. I covered my ears. A pillar of fire burned though the atmosphere above us. One glance up told me that the antennas were obliterated. I sank to the bottom of the cage, trying to escape the fire. An answering explosion sent a ripple of power trailing through the tower next to us. Jerking back with a shriek, I watched the brace holding up one side of the cage disintegrate completely. The rope fell heavily over our heads and we toppled through the air with it.

My converses dug into the scaffold’s guardrail. I held on, twisting my arms through the railing as if that would stop me from falling. The cage came to a crashing halt a few feet later and my whole body flipped up, bouncing through the air—my arm the only thing holding me down. I screamed in pain, hearing Byron shout out at the same time. He threw his arm around me, holding me between him and the railing. His arms bulged against the strain. I couldn’t hear what he was saying. I twisted my head up, seeing only one side of the scaffold held up by a rope. It tipped at a crazy angle. I didn’t know how long we could stay upright before it broke. The arm on the other side was down. The rope from it lay tangled at our feet. I grimaced at the ground below us. It was too far away. We’d be dead if we fell. The entire cage groaned. My hands slipped against the rope. My arm wouldn’t work properly.

“Hold on!” I felt Byron’s arm leave my back. His long fingers edged closer to the rope. He caught it. “It’s long enough,” he muttered brokenly. “We can do this.” He was rigging a makeshift harness, but I couldn’t keep my grip. I shouted out something unintelligible. His free arm found me and he jerked me up. My chest hit the railing and it knocked the breath out of me. “C’mon!” he shouted. “Work with me, Mad Dog!” His strange endearment renewed a spark of determination through me. “Don’t let go!” he said. “I can’t do this by myself!” I gasped for air and reached for him, winding my arms around him as he half dragged me onto his back. “Hold onto me!”

I tried. My whole body shook. He clipped into the rope, tying us into the painter’s scaffold. I gasped in pure fright. Was he seriously going to rappel down the side of the Provocity tower with me on his back? My grip tightened involuntarily around his neck and shoulders. Anything was better than waiting to die. Pain coursed through my right arm. He tensed and pulled upright. At least we would go together. I took a deep breath and he shoved off the side. Cold air whistled past us. I felt his legs pound fiercely against the tower’s side, and I forced my eyes open.

The ground came up fast, but not fast enough. Fire licked over the tower. Another deafening explosion sounded above us. I twisted to stare up at the five-hundred pound cage. It swayed over us and fell with a loud crack. Almost simultaneously, we hit the gravel against the ground and rolled, trying to kick free from the scaffold before it flattened us. I tripped on the rope. My knees scraped into the ground. Byron had me, rolling us through the gravel to escape. I heard the crash behind us. Debris sprayed into me. I covered my face, feeling Byron’s arms and waited for it all to be over.

I took a hoarse breath, hearing his breaths carry with mine in the sudden silence. Were we still alive? I lifted my head to see the damage. The scaffold and some of the catwalk had crushed into the ground where we had landed moments before. I turned to stare at Byron. He had me by the shirt. His head was down and his shoulders heaved while he tried to catch his breath.
I could hear the sirens somewhere in front of us.

“Your iPhone?” I managed. Why was Byron still alive? “It exploded.”

He swallowed another breath. “I slipped it onto Eric at the ledge.” He met my eyes with a searching look. “No way I’d keep a cell phone on me. Sorry...I saw you and...I really don’t know what happened to him.”

I had a few ideas. Before I could say anything, I heard steps in the gravel behind us and sniffed the foul smell of old lady perfume. “I swear Mad Dog, you have nine lives. How did that
not
kill you?” I twisted to see Sandra hobble closer. She limped on bare feet. Her cheeks flushed scarlet with fury. Black mascara ran down her cheeks. “No worries,” she said. “I think I can finish the job this time.”

Byron tried to stand, but just toppled to his side with a groan. I noticed he was bleeding, his jeans unrecognizable. I tried to get up, but it didn’t work either. My ankle had rolled weird and my arm wasn’t responding. I couldn’t believe it. After all this, we would die? “Sandra,” Byron kept his eyes steady on hers. “Killing her won’t do any good. It’s over.”

“Shut up!” Sandra wiped at her bleeding mascara. “You think it was a picnic pretending my life was as pathetic as these desperate coeds? The only thing keeping me sane was knowing I’d see both of you smeared all over the ground! Oh.” She made a face at Byron. “You care about the brat, don’t you? Well, you didn’t have to live with her! You never will!”

My eyes searched Sandra for a weapon, any weapon. She held her iPhone like a gun, but even if she wanted to kill us with that, Thanh’s assassination device was a little out of commission. It lay in pieces next to the remnants of the scaffold and my war journal. The sound of choppers sounded above us. Sandra smiled up at the sky. I could only guess it was Hölle. He would take us all out. Her phone rang, and she answered it with trembling fingers. “Hello?”

Tory jumped out from the shadows in usual Tory fashion. She had on a sleek gray jacket over her
Cookie Monster needs professional help
t-shirt, looking as normal as any girl in the middle of a prank war, like none of this was happening. “Hello, Sandra.” She clicked off her phone with a smirk. I groaned, but before I could warn Tory to get back, she ordered Sandra back in a very un-Tory-like voice, “Put your hands up where I can see them, Agent Vincent.”

Sandra froze just as shocked as I was. “W—why should I?”

Tory shrugged confidently, her red hair a blaze of fire behind her. She looked like she could back up her words. “You prefer to talk it out with control or with me?”

Sandra stepped back. None of us had seen this coming at all. Byron closed his eyes, grimacing in pain. “Looks like we found our sleeper agent. They must have activated her to find the mole.”

Tory confiscated the CIA regulation iPhone from Sandra’s numb fingers. Sandra tried to fight, but Tory shoved her arm behind her, pinning her easily. Tory’s nose wrinkled. “Ooh. Someone needs a bath.”