12 Getting to Know the Enemy

I didn’t pick Taylor up for the meeting. She didn’t want me to. I was already there when she walked into the conference room with her father and Tara. Her eyes were puffy, like she had cried all night. I wasn’t surprised that she didn’t sit by me, but she didn’t even look at me, which hurt my heart. I was glad when Ostin and McKenna sat down next to me. Fortunately, neither of them asked me about Taylor.

“How’d you sleep?” Ostin asked.

“I’ve slept better. Bad dreams.”

“No surprise,” he said. “At least it can’t be any worse than the nightmares we’ve lived through.”

“Don’t count on it,” I said.

Next Jack walked into the room. He glanced at me, then over at Taylor, then back at me and shrugged. He sat down next to me, then leaned in and whispered, “So Taylor’s over there and you’re here. What’s going on?”

“We’re in a fight.”

“I figured that. Over what?”

“It’s complicated.”

“It always is.” He slumped back in his chair. “Let me give you some advice. Let her win.”

“Like I said, it’s not that simple.”

“It never is,” he said. “So, is this meeting going to be another waste of time?”

I turned to him. “We know where Abi is. She’s in Peru. We have the exact coordinates.”

Jack practically jumped up from his chair. “Where? How’d you find her?”

“Grace,” I said. “She came back for a little while last night. Then she left again. My father will tell everyone about it.”

“Finally,” Jack said. “I’m ready to get back on that plane—”

“Good morning,” my father said as he walked into the room. He was carrying a folio that I guessed contained the papers from our meeting with Grace. “I hope you all got some sleep last night. You’re going to need it.”

Taylor glanced furtively at me. She looked more sad than angry.

“I’m pleased to inform you that we had a breakthrough last night. Grace came back to us.”

“She’s back?” Nichelle asked.

“She came back for a few minutes to talk to us. She knew exactly where Abi is being held and by whom.”

“What are we waiting for?” Jack said. “Let’s go.”

My father looked at Jack, then said, “You know better than anyone else that a rescue operation is never simple. In this case, there are some major challenges we’ll need to address.” He opened the folio. “We have the exact coordinates of where she is being held right here.

“As Ostin hypothesized, you are not the only electrics. After you were born, Elgen Inc. pulled the MEI from the hospital. They knew that they had killed all those babies, and they wanted to be out of the country before they were discovered and it resulted in criminal charges.

“They took the MEI machine to South America, where they could experiment without liability. That’s where these other electrics came from, which means they are all just a few years younger than you. They’re different from you in other ways. They glow red, and their eyes glow as well, so you can imagine the ostracization these children faced growing up in a superstitious country. Some of these electrics are less powerful than you; some are more powerful.”

“In what way?” Zeus asked.

“I have a report on each of them,” my father said.

“It’s like a scouting report,” Ostin said. “Like in sports.”

“Grace had limited access to information on these electrics, but she’s given us what she had. These electrics live together in a place they call ‘the colony.’ They were brought together as children by an American doctor named Samuel Cook. Dr. Cook was a general physician who owned a successful family practice in Dayton, Ohio, until his wife and daughter were killed in a car accident. That same week, one of his patients filed a malpractice suit against him. It was a perfect storm. Even though he won the malpractice lawsuit, the pain of his loss and the legal action were too much. He sold his practice and left the United States. He decided to devote the rest of his life to helping children. He opened a free health clinic in the VRAEM.

“It was while he was helping these impoverished Peruvian families that he discovered the first of the electrics. After finding more of them, he changed his mission to finding and helping them. As most of them were orphans, he took it upon himself to house, feed, and educate them.

“After raising almost thirty of these children, Dr. Cook was killed by the Shining Path terrorist group. That’s when things changed. Up to that point the colony had been peaceful, their lives devoted to helping others. After his murder, the colony fell under the control of a powerful, malicious electric named Chispa.

“Grace gave us a list of the colony electrics. There are more, but apparently some of them have such minor powers that Grace didn’t bother to list them.”

“Minor powers,” Quentin said. “Like what? Electrolysis? Hair removal?”

Everyone laughed, and even my father grinned. “You’re not too far off, Quentin. Like, one of them can charge minor devices, such as cell phones or batteries. Another just glows brighter than the rest of them.”

“That’s lame,” Nichelle said. “Party tricks.”

“Low currents,” Zeus said.

“Only some of them,” my father said. “Some have incredible powers. Let’s go through the more powerful ones. You’ll notice that the doctor was into philosophy and renamed the children after famous philosophers.”

“The first electric he found he named Socrates. He was in line to be the doctor’s successor. His power is intelligence. He’s smart. Like Ostin.”

“I told you intelligence was electric,” Ostin said.

“According to this, his powers go even further. He can make other people smart as well.”

“Ostin just makes me feel dumb,” Nichelle said.

“So, Socrates is their leader?” Jack asked.

“He was supposed to be. But after the doctor’s death there was a coup. Now they’re under the control of their new leader, Chispa.”

“What happened to Socrates?” I asked.

“Good question. He’s being held prisoner at the colony.”

“Why would the other electrics follow someone else?”

“Grace wrote that he seemed to be one of the doctor’s favorites. He wrote that Chispa reminded him of his own son, and the doctor spent special time teaching him. An important fact is that Chispa was injured as a child, so he was in constant pain.”

“Which finally explains why Abi was kidnapped,” Jack noted sadly.

“He won’t let her go,” Ostin said. “Once he feels life without pain, he’ll fight to the death to keep her.”

“Then he’ll have to die,” Jack said.

“What’s his power?” I asked.

“He has the power to cause something like an aneurysm.”

“What’s an aneurysm?” Tara asked.

“It’s a bulge in an artery or a vein. In his case, the bulge bursts. Depending on where it is, it can cause death.”

“He probably boils their blood,” Ostin said. “The rapid expansion creates a rupture in an otherwise healthy blood vessel wall.”

“That’s horrific,” McKenna said.

“Chispa’s two main henchmen are Nietzsche and Sartre. Keep in mind, most of them go by abbreviations of their names. These two go by ‘Neech’ and ‘Sart.’ They are his stooges. They blindly follow him and will do anything he says. Neech is the one we saw on the video who moves at the speed of electricity. We don’t know if we’ve seen Sart yet. His power is cauterization.”

“Like electrocauterization?” Ostin asked.

My father nodded. “That’s exactly what it is. He can burn skin tissue.”

“How far is his reach?” I asked.

“Grace says a hundred and twenty-one meters.”

“That’s farther than McKenna,” Ostin said. “But I bet he’s not nearly as hot.” He glanced at her. “I meant temperature.”

“He can only burn flesh tissue,” my father said. “McKenna can burn anything.”

“Next, Aristotle and Franklin are like Ian. They use electrolocation and can see through walls and for long distances, comparable to Ian’s powers. Franklin is slightly more powerful than Aristotle, but not by much.

“Franklin was the second electric Dr. Sam found, which is partially why the doctor named him after his deceased son. But Franklin isn’t with them anymore. He left the colony when Chispa took over. Either that or he was banished.

“Aristotle is still with them. He’s unique in that he has two powers. He can see through electrolocation, and he can throw electricity like Zeus.”

“Two in one,” Ian said. “Bonus.”

“Does Grace know where Franklin is?” Tara asked.

“If she does, she didn’t say,” my father answered. “Wait.” He read a little more. “She says he’s off the grid.”

“Next on her list is Dante. She can create ozone.”

“What’s ozone?” McKenna asked.

“You might recognize it as that unique smell after a lightning storm.”

“I love the smell of ozone,” Nichelle said. “It’s so fresh. It smells like bleach.”

“You like the smell of bleach?” Tara asked Nichelle.

My father continued. “Yes, it smells good, but in any real quantity, it’s dangerous. Ozone in low amounts can cause chest pain, coughing, and throat irritation. In high amounts, it can damage the lungs and even cause death. So, Dante is lethal.”

“Ozone,” Jack said. “That should have been her supervillain name.”

“Next is Descartes.”

“Cogito, ergo sum,” Ostin said. “I think, therefore I am.”

“The very same,” my father said. “But, ironically, his nickname is the Horse. Or just Horse.”

“Because he’s so strong?” Taylor asked.

“According to this, he is large and strong, but that’s not why he’s called that. It was an internal joke. Descartes before the horse.”

“I don’t get it,” Tara said.

“You know, don’t put the cart before the horse. Descartes. Day cart. Like ‘the cart.’ ”

“That’s weird.”

“What does he do?” I asked.

“He’s one of the acoustics. He makes sounds.”

“One of?” I said.

“There’s two of them.”

“Acoustic weapons,” Ostin said. “That’s interesting. High range or low range?”

“We have one of each. Descartes has a low range. Horse’s sound can cause pain, nausea, and confusion. The other acoustic is Spinoza. She goes by Spinny. Her pitch is incredibly loud and long range at one hundred sixty-two decibels.”

“One hundred sixty-two,” Ostin said. “Wow. One hundred thirty is considered the human pain threshold. A chain saw is only one hundred and five. We’re talking, like a rocket launch.”

“Or a Carcass concert,” Nichelle said.

“Who’s that?” Quentin asked.

“If you have to ask, you don’t want to know,” Nichelle said.

“What’s her long range?” I asked.

“Two kilometers.”

“More than a mile.”

“It’s enough to cause extreme pain and hearing loss. She can even create a super-high-pitched sound that is audible and painful to anyone under thirty but doesn’t affect older people.”

“That’s a real thing?” Nichelle asked.

“It is,” Ostin said. “It’s mostly used at college campuses.”

“Next is Kierkegaard. She goes by Kierka. Her power is hearing. She can do with her ears what Ian does with his eyes. She can hear sounds up to two miles away.”

“But can she distinguish them?” Quentin asked. “Doesn’t a jaguar walking through the jungle brush make the same sound as a soldier?”

“Grace says she can distinguish between the footstep of a boot or a tennis shoe.”

“That’s incredible,” Ostin said.

“Incredibly bad,” Quentin said. “For us.”

“I bet she hates the acoustic electrics,” Tara said.

“I’m sure she can turn off her powers, just like you all can.”

“I can’t turn it off,” Ostin said.

“Your brain or your mouth?” Tara said to herself, but loud enough to be heard.

“Next is Rand. Rand can sense other electrics and distinguish between them. She can ‘smell’ an electric a kilometer away.”

“So she will know if we’re near,” I said.

“Very likely,” my father said. “Next is Voltaire. Or Volt. He is like Michael. He can basically cause an electrical explosion, devastating everything around him for fifteen meters.”

“Next is Thoreau. They call him Thor. He is imprisoned with Socrates. He’s an ardent pacifist and refused to fight.”

“What’s his power?”

“He creates vibrations.”

“Is that useful?” Tara asked.

“The right vibration can shatter glass, cause nerve damage, cause an avalanche, or bring down bridges.”

“Very useful,” I said.

Quentin said, “With that kind of power, how do they keep him locked up? Why doesn’t he just vibrate his way out?”

“It’s a good question. We don’t know,” my father said. “The last two on the list are women. Epicurus, goes by Epic. We’re not exactly sure what she does. The report just says she creates pleasure.”

“I’m going for Epic,” Quentin said.

“Of course you had to say that,” Tara said.

Quentin looked innocent. “Hey, I’m not leashed to anyone.”

“Then there’s Pascal. Grace didn’t know her power.”

“I’ve never heard of Pascal,” Tara said. “The philosopher. Or the electric.”

“French philosophy, seventeenth century,” Ostin said. “Inventor of the Pascal triangle.”

“Oh, that Pascal,” Tara said flippantly.

“Are we really supposed to remember all these names and powers?” Nichelle asked.

“Not right now. That’s why I printed these handouts.” My father handed out a stack of paper for us to pass around. “And we can’t forget that there’s Bryan and Kylee. We should assume they are on the colony’s side.”

“I don’t care what side they’re on. I’m taking them out,” Jack said. “They betrayed Abi and all of us.”

“I understand your anger,” my father said. “Just remember, our primary goal isn’t punishing anyone. Our focus must be on rescuing Abigail. If we can do it without conflict, we should do it. The most powerful enemy is the one that’s never seen. With an adversary this powerful, it’s unlikely we can do battle and not incur casualties. To save one person and lose three is an unacceptable outcome.”

“Losing anyone isn’t acceptable,” Taylor said. She gave me a pointed look.

“Now that we know who we’re fighting, I want to give you an example of how they use their powers. Grace got this report from the Shining Path terrorists’ intelligence. This is how they described the battle. Or, more accurately, the massacre.

“They said it started with an intense and painfully loud noise. It was so painful that the men were all covering their ears. Then they felt a lower feeling, like a vibration. Some of the men reported the feeling of everything spinning. Some threw up. A few even passed out.

“This was followed by a powerful smell of ozono—that would be ozone. It became so strong that they started choking and coughing up blood. Many died.

“Some reported that, in this compromised state, their weapons started sparking with electricity, causing them to throw the guns down or rip them off their bodies. Others reported that their flesh started burning. They could smell their sizzling flesh.

“Then they just randomly started dropping dead by the tens and twenties. The report said that they found blood coming from the corpses’ ears or mouths. Almost as quickly as the battle had started, it was over.”

“How did they know about the earlier stuff if everyone was killed?”

“Two of the soldiers survived.”

“The electrics probably let them live,” Ostin said. “It’s common warfare strategy. You can’t instill fear in the enemy if they don’t know what you can do to them.”

“You’re probably right,” my father said.

“Question,” Ostin said, raising his hand. “This Rand, the one who can sense electrics. Can she sense nonelectrics?”

“We don’t know. It doesn’t say she can, but I wouldn’t rule it out. But I don’t think Grace would have specified that she ‘smells’ electrics if she could smell everyone,” my father said.

Quentin said, “There’s also that Kierka chick, who can hear a rat belch two miles away.”

“So a surprise attack on them is unlikely,” I said.

“Likely or impossible?” Nichelle asked.

“I’d say impossible,” Quentin said.

“How do you defeat an enemy that powerful when they know your every move?” Zeus asked.

I breathed out slowly. “You don’t.”