Sparks move fast, faster than any human can move. Korwin and I aren’t just Sparks, we are soldiers, spies, and trained fighters. The things we’ve endured have left us calloused and resilient. They’ve left us desperate to succeed. Compared to the day I left Hemlock Hollow, I am solid muscle, exponentially stronger and faster. That’s the good news.
The bad news is I’m hungry and my nerves are shot. I’m running on adrenaline in a blue dress that is tearing apart with every step, and I’m not sure how long my remission from the Nanomem disease will last. Still, as I approach 54 Lakehurst Drive, the place where my metamorphosis began, I feel free. I feel like God has a purpose for me, and I am living it. It’s not a quiet and gentle purpose like I thought it would be when I lived in Hemlock Hollow. It is a mighty purpose. I am an archangel, fierce and terrible, sent to bring justice.
A squad car with the Green emblem painted on the side is parked in the driveway. The Greens have had one here since the day they found me. Aside from the vehicle though, the place has the overgrown appearance of abandonment. The front line of the war rages in the distance, but no one watches from the windows and all the lights are off.
Korwin takes the porch steps in one leap and approaches the door.
“Be careful,” I say.
“I don’t think there’s anyone here.” He peeks in the side window. Backing up, he kicks the door and it breaks away from the old-fashioned lock. No protest meets us at the threshold. We enter glowing blue and prepared for anything.
Inside, the family room is just as we left it, only stuffy and dust covered. I stop short.
“What’s wrong?” Korwin asks.
“The lamp. This is where it all started. The first time Caleb turned on the light, I was electrocuted and became a Spark.”
“I thank God every day that you did. You saved me, Lydia, in more ways than one.”
I stare at the blue porcelain base and ivory shade for a second more. “I feel the same way.”
“Come on.” I follow him to Caleb’s old room, to the closet where Englisher clothes still hang. Korwin peels back the carpet and knocks on the floorboards. When he finds one that sounds hollow, he digs his fingers into a knothole in the wood and yanks out the board. The tunnel beneath is dark and dank. We’ll have to drop into a space barely large enough to accommodate Korwin’s body.
“I can’t do this in a dress,” I say. My mother’s blue dress is torn and tattered. It keeps catching on my legs. I rummage through Caleb’s old clothes, then remember I have another option. “Hold on.”
Sprinting to Hannah’s room, I find her closet filled. I strip out of the dress and pull on a pair of jeans, a T-shirt, and climate-controlled hoodie. Better. I ball up the dress and throw it in the trash.
When I return to Caleb’s room, I find Korwin has changed as well. “Do you think we should destroy the clothes?” he asks.
“Why bother? There’s no disguising what we did to the front door.”
He agrees. “You go first. I’ll lower the board over us after we’re both below.”
I approach the dark hole in the floor with trepidation. Korwin snaps his elbow and lights his hand. There’s a ladder.
Reluctantly, I climb down into a concrete corridor. It’s better than the sewer, but only marginally. The air is thick, and there is no natural light. A smell, similar to wet dog, permeates the cold and dark. I would not want to be here alone.
As Korwin’s foot hits the top rung, a low growl comes from the shadows.
“Who’s there?” I ask, igniting my own hand to see. In a flash, a narrow snout and sharp teeth lunge at my face. More than one hundred pounds of matted fur and slashing claws barrels into me. I howl as the skin of my cheek is torn open. I topple to my back on the concrete, a raging beast’s neck between my hands. Saliva drips through its teeth onto my face.
“Lydia, spark!” Korwin yells.
I shake off my initial astonishment and free the electric ribbon at the back of my brain. The smell of burning hair meets my nostrils. The beast’s eyes bulge and its tongue protrudes. I squeeze harder. It succumbs and goes limp. I roll it off me and find out it wasn’t alone. Korwin has fried another two animals and eliminates a third before I can get my bearings.
“Sewer rats,” he says. “He got you.”
After checking for the rat’s brothers and sisters, I place a hand over my torn cheek.
“Here. Let me.” He cups the wound. The corner of my vision lights blue from his touch. The pain stops but he doesn’t pull his hand away.
“All those times we traveled through the sewer we never saw one sewer rat, and this is where we run into them?”
“The good news is, we didn’t run into the really big ones.”
“The rats we killed were as large as full-grown pigs!”
“Just joking. They were enormous, especially the one you killed.”
Slowly, he pulls his hand away but his attention doesn’t leave my face. “That’s concerning.”
“What?”
“The wound stopped bleeding but it hasn’t completely healed.”
“It’s the Nanomem. Charlie said SC-13 didn’t cure me, he just helped stabilize my cells. The more energy I use, the less I can take in. I’ll eventually burn myself out.”
He frowns. “You should hide here and recover. I can do this alone.”
I brush my hands off on my pants, ridding them of grit and rat hair. “There is no chance in heaven or on earth that I’m going to leave your side, certainly not to hide in a rat-infested tunnel.”
He opens his mouth to say something and I place a finger over his lips. “No chance.”
“Are you okay to go on? Or do you need to rest?” he asks.
I nod. “Good to go.”
He leads the way into the dark, then fumbles with a switch on the wall. Glass panels ignite above us, one after another, filling the tunnel with cool light.
The illumination allows us to see the rats have left dung and hair in every corner. “Eww.”
“Yeah.” He points to a small cart up the tunnel. “Let’s hope that works. I’d hate to walk through this mess.”
The cart is narrow and I climb in behind Korwin. He taps the dash and a driving console comes to life. “Good news. This thing is electric, and it looks like this tunnel has its own grid.”
“Probably powered with scamped electricity,” I say.
“If you’d rather pick your way through a few years of rat dung…”
“No, I’m good,” I say, smiling.
“Excellent. Hold on tight.”
I lean forward and wrap my arms around his waist. He hits a button and the cart glides into motion. It coasts along a track at a quick but even pace.
“That wasn’t so bad. Why did you tell me to hold on tight?” I ask.
“Because I like the feel of my wife’s arms around me.” He flashes me a half grin over his shoulder. I squeeze him tighter.
A few minutes later, the cart slows and then stops. This part of the corridor is dark, aside from the light of the dashboard. Ahead of us is a white door, the high-tech type I’ve come to relate with the Stuart compound.
“It’s unlocked,” Korwin whispers as the door gives slightly under his touch. He ignites one hand. The other finds the pistol tucked into his waistband. He uses his toe to push the door the rest of the way open. The antechamber is dark and quiet. The interior door is also shut but unlocked. No illusions. No force fields. No blood or codes to get inside. This is wrong.
Carefully, we venture into the hall. Korwin turns left and I follow close behind, unsure where we are in the Stuart compound. Unlike the last time we were here, it’s dark, and Korwin must use his spark to see. The air is close with a slight musty odor.
As we round the corner, we pass the windows overlooking the gardens. Korwin pulls up short. I stop and follow his line of sight. Once thriving and green, the indoor paradise is dead and gone. In the light of Korwin’s glow, I can barely make out the white marble of the statue of Pandora through the branches of dead trees and shrubs. On what was once the walking path, the body of a goldfinch lies limp and rotting in the dark.
“They’ve cut the emergency power,” Korwin says. “No water. No sun. No security. That’s why the doors were unlocked.”
“I’m sorry. This is devastating.” He once told me the gardens at Stuart Manor had perfect conditions and contained a host of rare and unusual plant species.
“Only because it’s the site of our first kiss.” He pecks me on the cheek and gives me a weak smile. “Let’s go.”
It bothers him more than he’s letting on, I’m sure. Korwin grew up playing in these gardens. Just like everything else, it’s a concession we must make, another sacrifice to the god of war. Nothing angers me more than the sight of that dead bird. A free thing trapped inside an artificial Eden, never understanding its prison until it was too late.
With a sigh, I follow Korwin through the labyrinth of hallways to the stairs that lead from the compound to the main part of the house. The vault door hangs open. We climb the steps to the wood-floored great room where we shared our first dance. All the furniture is gone. The metal shields are down, blocking the windows. Without a sound, we search the remaining rooms until we find ourselves in Maxwell’s first-floor study, one of the only areas that is still sparsely furnished with a desk, a chair, and a garbage can.
“I don’t understand,” I say, eyeing a hodgepodge of books and paperwork on the desk. “It looks like there was someone here until recently.”
Korwin bends over and snatches a crumpled piece of paper from the garbage can. He flattens it on the desk and turns it toward me. “Not anymore.”
I take the paper from his hands. “Notice of reassignment,” I read. “Due to threat of war, all nonessential personnel are ordered to report immediately for reassignment within capital boundaries. This is dated the day after Pierce was killed.”
“They’ve been planning an attack. Conserving their resources. Organizing their troops. They must’ve known where we were all this time,” Korwin says.
“Konrad knew. He always knew. Only after Pierce died, he found a benefactor who believed him. Elias Fitzgerald has been planning this for weeks.” I shake my head. “And I lured the drone to the reactor.”
Korwin frowns. “Don’t blame yourself. The attack was inevitable. Come on. Let’s hope we don’t have to walk to the capital.”
Easier said than done. I do blame myself for our discovery, both by my confession on Konrad’s table and the incident with the flashers. It drives me forward. I have to succeed in destroying the hub and ending the Green’s control over the Deadzoner army. Only by completing this mission can I make it up to those who trusted me.
In the garage, Maxwell Stuart’s coupe is still parked in the third bay. Korwin gives the garage door a little juice and it rumbles open. When we get in, I tap the dash.
“Fuel cells are empty,” I say.
Korwin shrugs. “We’re on the grid. A little juice to get us out the driveway and we should be good. He places his hand on the dash and the engine purrs to life. We roll out of the garage, then down the hill to the open gate. But when we’re on the main road, Korwin frowns. “The grid should be here.”
I scan the surrounding area. “It’s like a ghost town.” There are cars abandoned in the street. Houses dark with lack of power. Overgrown yards. The entire neighborhood is evacuated. “What do you think happened?”
Korwin keeps driving using his own power to fuel the vehicle. I can tell it’s getting difficult for him. Probably like being hooked to a drainer. I put my hand on his skin to help, but he shakes his head. “We can’t wear you out. I might need you later.” I remove my hand.
A few slow miles later, Korwin smiles. “Hot damn. The grid.” He removes his hand from the dash and the car snaps on. Even so, our pace is pitifully slow as we head toward the capital.
“They’ve run out of power,” I say. “They’ve abused the system too long. With everyone scamping and the waste, I think it finally caught up to them.”
Korwin nods. “The Deadzone’s been growing for years, but I had no idea it was this bad.”
“They short-circuited themselves,” I murmur.
“Huh?”
“At the ball, I saw picketers across the street from the Ambassador’s Club. Their signs said Stop Wasting Energy and Equal Allocation for All. What if the people did this? If they don’t trust the Green Republic anymore and the capital starved the provinces for energy, maybe the provinces struck back? Massive scamping could be responsible for the blackout.”
“Makes sense. There is definitely something going on here.”
My stomach tightens and my cheek aches. I try to ignore the nagging suspicion that I’m a balloon with a slow leak. I have to stay strong. I have to do this. Too many people are counting on me. Korwin types the address for CGEF into the dash and we exit the grid for downtown Crater City.