The Tower (12 page)

“Come on, Adrian!” she taunted. “Hit me!”

“Okay, Terry,” I said hesitantly, “you asked for it.”

But even as I stretched my right arm out toward her, she had closed half the distance between us, sidestepping my blast with over a yard of clearance before knocking me down and pinning me to the mat.

“The problem with new psionics,” she said, adding further pain to an already throbbing arm, “is that they think their powers make them superhuman. Do you want to try again from a greater distance?”

I did. Though I knew my blast energy would taper out the farther she was from me, at least I’d have more time to aim. But it made no difference. Terry was simply too fast. I began to wonder if she might even be able to dodge bullets. Three failed attempts later, I had little choice but to concede defeat.

“You win, Terry,” I sighed as she pulled me to my feet.

Terry smiled. “Don’t feel too bad, Adrian. I’ve been doing this all my life.”

“Just one more try,” I said, suddenly having an idea.

“You don’t give up easily, do you?” said Terry, shaking her head but obviously pleased. “I like that.”

Terry and I faced off about fifteen yards apart, and as soon as I stretched my arm toward her, she sprinted forward. This time, however, I didn’t try to blast her.

“Whoa, Adrian!” cried Terry as I levitated her off the mat.

Terry was heavier than me and was hard to lift, but all I had to do was keep her feet from touching the floor.

“How do you like that?” I grinned up at her as she finally gave up trying to run in midair and glared at me. I couldn’t keep her afloat forever, but in theory, I could quite easily blast her unconscious before returning her to the mat. I didn’t have to. Terry knew perfectly well that I had scored one on her.

“Okay, superhuman,” said Terry, “put me down.”

“Promise you won’t knock me over the second I do?” I asked.

“I promise. Put me down!”

I gently lowered her back onto the mat, and she walked briskly up to me.

I smiled, and a heartbeat later, I was pinned on the mat again. “Terry!”

“That’s two seconds,” she said as I struggled under her grasp. “Always be ready, Adrian.”

Terry pulled me to my feet again, saying, “Mr. Baker wasn’t joking about you. You really are a powerful telekinetic. I didn’t think you could levitate people that easily. But you’re not always going to have a distance advantage on your opponent, you know.”

“Yeah,” I sighed, “I know.”

“So this is what I’m going to be teaching you, Adrian,” said Terry. “Basically, it’s CQC. Close quarters combat. Military-style hand-to-hand. It’s a combination of various martial arts, but it’s not a sport. You don’t bow. There are no judges, no points, no colorful belts, and very few rules. Eventually, we’ll be working with weapons, including jo sticks, knives and guns.”

I didn’t like the sound of any of that, but especially the last bit.

“Guns are made of metal, Terry,” I said.

“You can wear gloves,” Terry said simply.

“Okay, let me just be straight about this,” I said, looking her in the eye. “I don’t like guns. Or knives outside of the kitchen. I don’t know what a jo stick is, but if it’s a weapon that can kill, I really don’t want to know.”

“Bare hands can kill,” Terry pointed out. “We don’t always try to kill our opponents, but that’s also something you have to be ready for.”

There was a time, last year, that I had almost killed someone. I had tried to stab Ralph in the neck with a steel-tipped arrow. It was something I did through a combination of rage and fear, and something that I was sure I wouldn’t have done, even to Ralph, had I the time to think about it. And that was what I really hated about fighting: It wasn’t just the danger of getting killed, but the danger of killing someone else. I honestly wasn’t sure which was worse, and I never wanted to be in that kind of situation again.

“Have you ever killed anyone?” I asked.

“No,” said Terry. “But I’m ready. And when I’m through with you, Adrian, you’ll be ready too.”

Inwardly, I doubted both claims very much, but I didn’t comment. I asked instead, “Where did you learn all this?”

“I already told you,” said Terry. “I was raised by wolves. Come on, enough talk. Let’s go again.”

We faced off, and I counted the minutes remaining to lunchtime while being repeatedly flipped and pinned by Terry. I didn’t try to levitate her again, but in the heat of the moment, I did release a few blasts without thinking. Terry had no trouble avoiding them.

At precisely noon, Terry opened her shoulder bag to reveal the store-bought lunches she had packed for the both of us. Breakfast felt like ancient history, and I ate ravenously, forgetting to thank her until after the meal. When I did, Terry just shrugged.

After a very short break, Terry finally started teaching me some elementary combat moves. How to punch and kick. After spending some time practicing on the punching bags, we moved to the exercise machines and sand-filled plastic weights.

“You’ll have to build some muscle, Adrian,” said Terry as I strained to lift the weights. “Technique is only as good as the muscle behind it.”

“Can’t we call it a day?” I begged, not sure how much more of this I could take before passing out.

“Don’t be such a baby. You’ll get used to it.”

Terry gave me less than a minute to catch my breath before we squared off again on the mat for another hour of non-stop CQC. Terry showed me the various moves by demonstrating them on me, which meant that if I was going to learn anything, it would have to be in mid-flip. It was nearly 5pm before she finally relented and let me out of the dojo. I could barely climb the stairs back to the subbasement entrance hall. Terry didn’t comment as I stumbled into the elevator with her, leaning heavily against the wall for support.

Once the elevator started to rise, she said, “I have plans for the afternoon tomorrow, so we’ll just make it a half-day. Meet me in the lobby tomorrow at 8am. We’re going jogging.”

Terry stepped out of the elevator on the fourth floor, where she apparently lived. I continued leaning against the wall as I rode the elevator back up to the penthouse.

Staggering into the living room, I heard Cindy call out from the kitchen, “So, how did it go? Did you have a good time?”

“Oh, wonderful, Cindy!” I called back sarcastically. “I haven’t had so much fun since my chat with the Wolf.”

Alia and Cindy came into the living room as I slumped down onto a couch.

Handing me a glass of orange juice, Cindy said, “The first day is always the hardest.”

Alia wrinkled her nose at me.
“Oh, Addy, you really smell bad.”

I ignored her and said grumpily to Cindy, “I can’t learn from Terry! She doesn’t teach me anything. She just throws me around!”

“Oh my goodness, Adrian!” Cindy cried in mock-alarm. “Are you whining about being beaten up by a girl?”

I scowled at Cindy, and Alia started giggling.
“Addy has a girlfriend!”

I was in no mood for that. “Oh, shut up, Alia!”

My sister only laughed harder, and Cindy smiled, saying, “What did you expect from someone who was raised by wolves?”

I choked on the orange juice and spat most of it back out. Alia just barely jumped clear of me.
“Ew, gross!”

“Wolves?” I asked, coughing up a storm. “You mean, like,
the
Wolves?”

“Sure,” said Cindy. “Haven’t you discovered who her grandfather is yet?”

I blinked at Cindy for a second. What was Terry’s last name again?

“Ralph?!” I cried.

Cindy laughed. “Terry Henderson. I thought you’d figure it out when I told you yesterday.”

“And Terry is Ralph’s...”

Cindy nodded. “Small world, isn’t it?”

Far too small.

“Ralph taught her how to fight?” I asked weakly.

“I don’t think so,” said Cindy. “You see, when Ralph deserted the Wolves, a few members of his team came with him. They all joined the Guardians together. Terry was raised by them. I don’t think Ralph ever took care of her after her parents were killed.”

“Tell me more about her.”

“No, Adrian,” said Cindy. “Ask her yourself when you get to know her better.”

I shook my head furiously. “I don’t want to get to know her better! I just want to know if she’s a threat to my life!”

Cindy laughed, saying, “Trust me, Adrian. Terry is nothing like Ralph. Just be friends with her. And, oh, dinner is almost ready, but for the love of our noses, take a bath first, okay?”

I did, and as I lay comfortably in the Jacuzzi, ignoring Cindy’s demands for me to hurry up so we could eat together, I felt the pain in my muscles gradually receding. I knew I was still sore, but total lack of power balance had its perks. My psionic power was supplementing my body, and by the time I toweled myself dry, I felt almost as good as new.

“Mr. Baker asked me to give this to you,” said Cindy over dinner, handing me a silver elevator key like the one Terry had. Cindy had wrapped some tape around the handle so I wouldn’t get drained.

For the rest of the evening, my sister simply wouldn’t stop begging, so I eventually agreed to let her come with me to the dojo during my future training sessions. Considering the way Terry taught combat, I figured it would be safer to have a healer on hand anyway.

The next morning, I dutifully met Terry in the NH-1 lobby for my morning jog.

“You’re late,” Terry said by way of greeting.

“Only one minute,” I said, glancing at a wall clock.

“One minute, one hour, one year. It doesn’t make any difference, Adrian!” snapped Terry. “Not if you’re on a mission. You’re either on time, or you’re not.”

“I’m sorry, okay?”

“If it was okay, I wouldn’t be telling you,” Terry said icily. “Come on, let’s go.”

“Since when was this a mission?” I muttered to myself as I followed Terry out the door.

Apparently having heard me, Terry turned her head and said nastily, “The way you’re built, Adrian, five miles will be a mission.”

“Five miles?!”

Terry quickened her pace, and I couldn’t believe how much her jog was like my run. We probably hadn’t gone a mile before I was feeling knives in my chest, and I had to use my telekinesis to push me from behind in order to keep up. But even psionic powers are physically taxing after a while. Terry only stopped when I had fallen so far behind that she could no longer hear me panting.

“You’re unbelievable, Adrian,” she called to me as I fell into a walk. “We’re not even halfway yet.”

“Just let me catch my breath,” I said. I knew that my psionics would recover in a moment and I’d be ready to go again.

“Forget it,” said Terry, giving me a disgusted look. “Go on back and wait for me in the dojo. Mr. Baker told me about your power balance problems. My job is to train you, Adrian, not to train your powers.”

With that, Terry turned and started running again. Still breathing heavily, I stood watching her until she disappeared around a street corner. I shook my head in disbelief. How could Terry expect me to run five miles on our first jog?!

I walked back to New Haven One and fetched Alia from the penthouse. Using my new elevator key, I took her down into the subbasement. There was a man I didn’t recognize, probably a Guardian Knight, lifting weights in the dojo, but he ignored us as we entered.

“Wow, this looks familiar,”
remarked Alia as she looked around at the large, concrete room.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought too,” I replied quietly. “But at least we can leave when we want.”

“You mean when your girlfriend says you can leave.”

I said in an irritated tone, “Alia, Terry isn’t my girlfriend. And you’ll know why as soon as she gets here.”

“Hey, Adrian!” called Terry from behind me. “Had a nice walk?”

I jumped in surprise, wondering if she had heard me, but Terry took no notice and turned to my sister. “What are you doing here, Alia?” she asked pleasantly.