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All this telepathy happens at the speed of thought as I get to my feet, as Setrákus Ra crosses towards Marina and Nine. I’m out of time, though—he’s there; I need to act.
“Get up, Nine, come on,” Marina pleads, still trying to heal the dead flesh on his shoulder.
Holding Sam in my mind, letting him see what I see, I fly towards Setrákus Ra, hoping to buy Marina some more time.
He anticipates me. Backhands me with a force that cracks my jaw and sends me crashing to the cave floor, skittering through the broken shards of Marina’s ice wall.
Nine is still on the ground, moaning and shaking, probably going into shock. Marina presses both her hands to his stump. Our healing Legacies don’t regrow limbs, though. There’s nothing we can do.
Setrákus Ra grabs Marina by the hair and yanks her off her feet. She thrashes, raking her hand across his face. She hits the exact spot that Nine sliced with the Voron blade just a minute ago.
Setrákus Ra drops her, recoils and clutches at his cheek.
That part of his face slips off, the black oil holding it together receding into his body.
Marina and I make eye contact.
What did you do? My thought hits her mind with urgency.
Healing! she replies. I was still using my healing!
I remember New York City, right before the invasion. Secretary of Defense Sanderson and the black ooze running through his veins. It took minutes and it was exhausting, but I was able to burn that gunk out from inside his body by using my healing.
We can kill Setrákus Ra. We just have to make him Loric again. We have to expel these Augmentations and destroy what’s left of the man.
Marina’s already got the idea. As Setrákus Ra recovers, she flashes forward, hand extended in his direction.
Setrákus Ra sidesteps. He catches her by the elbow and twists, wrenching Marina’s arm behind her back and dislocating her shoulder. Then he slashes her face with his claws, opening up four deep scratches diagonally across her face. Meanwhile, his own sick visage has already been restored by the ooze.
I fly into Setrákus Ra before he can finish off Marina. I wrap my legs around his chest and grab him on either side of his head, pumping as much of my healing energy into him as I can. At the same time, I muster as much force as I can and fly us across the cavern, hoping that keeping him away from his vat will weaken him further. I can feel the Augmentations inside him, the oil writhing in every part of his body. There’s more of that inside him than there is man. It’s like I’m trying to beat back a tidal wave.
Still, I have to try. This is the only way it ends.
Setrákus Ra screams as I force healing into him. But quickly, he fights back. He bites down on my shoulder, his mouth hideously huge, teeth sharpened, and tears off a chunk of flesh.
“John!” Marina shouts. Her one arm hanging limp at her side, blood streaming down her face, she races forwards to help.
Spikes of hardened ooze thrust forth from Setrákus Ra’s body. One goes through my leg, another my side, another my shoulder. I’m not even sure if he’s controlling this or if it’s a reaction brought on by my healing, like the ooze is trying to escape. Either way, now we’re pinned together. Another spike nearly makes it to Marina’s eye before she skids to a stop a few feet away.
I redirect some of my healing to my own wounds. Try to close them as fast as Setrákus Ra can make them while still beating back the vileness that’s spread throughout him.
As my healing Legacy drives it from Setrákus Ra’s body, the ooze coalesces around us in battering tendrils. Marina can’t even get close anymore.
“Go!” I yell at her. “Take Nine and get out of here!”
“I’m not leaving you!”
“Six is in the caverns up there; she needs healing,” I tell her, gritting my teeth against the pain. “Please—gah—please, Marina—GO!”
Marina looks at me, tears in her eyes. I can barely see her anymore through the mess of ooze thrashing around me. I see her look up doubtfully at the spiraling pathway that leads back to the surface, then down at Nine.
With a groan, Nine touches Marina’s leg. He shudders.
“Just . . . just like we practiced,” he says deliriously, transferring his Legacies to her.
I remember that. Capture the Flag in Chicago. Nine’s team won because he gifted Marina his antigravity Legacy.
Marina scoops Nine up with her working arm. She’s got his strength too. With one last look at me, she runs straight up the wall, leaping over the ledges as she sprints for the surface.
Via my telepathy, Sam has witnessed this whole thing. He feels what I’m feeling. The ebb and flow of pain, the tearing throughout my body.
Sam. The others are coming out. Will you do it now, Sam?
John . . . His sadness flows into me, worse than all the pain.
He’ll do it. I know he will.
I turn off my telepathy. Focus only on healing. I let all the Loric energy stored inside of me cascade forth.
I pray it’s enough.
I am face-to-face with Setrákus Ra. The two of us locked together. My healing continues to pour into him, and, with every second, his young face melts away, the oil driven back. His pale skin returns, his bulbous bald head, the sunken cheeks, the vivid purple scar. He snarls at me. He spits in my face. Headbutts me.
In his black eyes, for the first time, I see doubt.
“I’m going to kill you,” he snarls, his breath hot and wretched against my face.
I know this is true. I’m going to die down here. Tangled together with my worst enemy. Healing him, even as he tears me apart.
“You . . .” A bubble of blood pops when I try to speak. “You’ll die first.”
A tendril of his ooze, razor sharp and ice-cold, slashes across my abdomen. Opens me up.
I push warm, healing energy into him. Watch as his face turns gray and wrinkled. A centuries-old man.
The ooze coalesces around my legs. Crushes them like a vice, my bones snapping like twigs.
More healing. A little bit for my body—just enough to keep me going—the rest for him.
A chunk of hardened ooze falls away from him and turns to dust on the cavern floor. Setrákus Ra bellows.
He rips into my rib cage. His claws dig through my flesh, saw through bone. He’s trying to dig out my heart.
Hold on, John.
I let him shred me. Focus on the warm glo
w. I could melt away in that glow. . . .
“Do you . . . do you really think you can outlast me?” he sneers. A black vein bursts on his forehead.
“I’ve done it all these years, what’s a few more minutes?”
“You were always a fool, Pittacus.”
“I’m not Pittacus Lore,” I say through gritted teeth. “I am Number Four. I’m the one who kills you.”
A tremor. The entire cavern complex shakes. Out of the corner of my eye, I see a vivid flash of red light.
The bombardment has begun.
Thank you, Sam.
Just keep him here. Bury him down here, with all his horrible experiments.
The withered, hideous face before me laughs maniacally.
I close my eyes.
Picture Sarah. She holds up a camera, snaps a photo and smiles at me.
I let my Legacies pour out of me. All of them.
Until there’s nothing left.
CHAPTER THIRTY
CONSCIOUSNESS COMES BACK SLOWLY. THE CAVERN floor vibrates under my face, a rumble louder than thunder shaking the entire complex. I come dangerously close to the edge of the chasm that Adam and Phiri fell down. With a groan, I roll away from the gap, onto my back, and try to sit up.
“Ugh . . .”
My mouth tastes of blood. Every breath feels like I’m rolling around on broken glass. The mountain shakes again, and rock-dust falls from the ceiling. I close my eyes to avoid the stinging debris. Maybe, I think, I’ll keep them closed a little longer.
Six! You stay awake! You get up!
Ella, her voice coming through a megaphone directly into my brain, so loud that it makes my head ache.
“I’m up, I’m up,” I reply out loud as I struggle into a sitting position. It hurts to bend like that, and I have to stifle a cry. “What’s happening?”
We’re going to bring down the mountain, Ella replies. Sam’s chipping away at it, but we’re not unleashing the main cannon until you’re out.
“Guess I better get up then,” I grunt, and struggle to my feet.
So Sam’s been forced to play the role Adam was meant for—if everything goes wrong, blow the whole thing up. Adam . . . I just couldn’t get to him in time. I peek over the edge of the chasm but see nothing but jagged rocks and shadows. Something along the edge catches my eye, though. A thick blood trail that wasn’t there before that stretches from the control room to the chasm.
