Page 23 of Anarchy Chained: Alpha Thomas

“What I mean,” she sneers, “is how did you know I was an illusionist?” She enunciates each word carefully.

“Level ten,” I say, shooting my finger at her. “You told me, remember?”

“I’d never tell you that.” Her eyes pin mine to hers. Her attention stabs me with an intensity I’ve only ever seen in a few people. Lincoln Wade and Case Reider.

Alphas.

“OK,” I say, shoving her towards the couch so she’ll fall over in that direction and not hurt herself. “Fine. I can see you need a little more time to adjust. So just take a seat while I pull up the hospital on the maps and take a look at how much damage I did up north.”

“That’s right,” she says, pinching the bridge of her nose to stave off pain. “You…” She opens her eyes and looks up at me. “What exactly happened back there?”

“Sorry about that,” I say with a shrug. “You just got caught in one of my infamous mind blasts. But you didn’t get injured. At least not by the shock wave. I’m still thinking about that head injury you have.” Her fingertips go to her scalp, searching for a wound. “Don’t worry. It didn’t cut you. At least on the outside.”

“What’s that mean?” But just as the last word comes out of her mouth, she winces, like the pain is still shooting through her mind.

I got her good. I don’t know why she didn’t fall over with the blast like everyone else. I don’t know why her injuries aren’t worse. But that’s only because I haven’t had time to think about it too hard. It’ll make sense soon. But first… I really need to figure out what’s happening in the city. So I’ll give her some lame excuse and leave her alone to sort it out.

“Well, I’m just guessing here,” I say in my most amicable tone of voice. “But I think what I did knocked something loose in your head. You know, because you’re an illusionist. You’re Prodigy, Sadie. Like me,” I add. “We’ve probably had some of the same modifications.”

She just stares at me. For several very long seconds. Then shakes her head. “I don’t know what’s happening.”

“My mind blast knocked your memory out of whack. That’s all. It’ll come back, I promise you. Just give it a day.”

“Should I know what a mind blast is?” And it’s such an honest question, I smile.

“No,” I say, shaking my head at her. “Not really. It’s not important. You didn’t get hurt too bad, just a few screws loose up there. I promise, it wears off. Your memory will come back.”

Her fingertips gingerly pat the side of her head where she thinks there should be an injury. She draws them back, looks at them, unable to believe there’s no blood, then sighs heavily. “What if it doesn’t?”

“I’ll call my friends and let Sheila do a work-up on you. K?”

“Who’s Sheila?”

“It’s not important right now. But she’s capable of fixing pretty much anything. So don’t worry.”

“Then why don’t you take me there now?”

“We’ll be caught if we go now. So we’re here. But I swear, you’ll be fine. I gave you something. It’s the same thing Sheila would’ve given you anyway. Where she’d start, at least. We’re just gonna roll with it, OK? One step at a time. Besides, I can just call her and she can tell me what to do if anything goes wrong. I have almost everything here they have there.”

This seems to mollify her, because she sinks back into the couch cushions.

“Now just rest up. We’ll figure it out. But right now, I need to see what’s going on up north OK?”

She doesn’t answer. Just stares at me.

I take that as a yes and go back over to my control panel and take a seat. All the screens are live now, and I zoom in and out, looking all over the city for anything that could help me understand what’s happening.

Obviously, this was an attack. And now that I know what this Sadie girl is… it means it was an attack on me and my friends. She has to have come from Prodigy School. I don’t want to admit what that means. That the school still exists. That we didn’t end things when we blew it up fifteen years ago. But I have to. Because she’s real.

She didn’t come to kill me. She can’t kill me. And they know that. But they sent her for something.

And Yasmine. What the hell was she up to back at the hospital? Obviously, she knows what I am. I think she was trying to draw out Sullivan. But why?

I fucked up pretty bad last month when shit got… out of hand. Funny thing about that… Yasmine did manage to get rid of the voices in my head. And they’re not back.

Yet.

So maybe our luck is changing all the way round? Maybe we have the perfect team now? Linc, me, Case, Molly, Lulu, Sheila… and—I look over my shoulder to see Sadie, lying down on the couch, her hands tucked under her cheek as she stares back at me—her. Yeah. She’s exactly what we need to finish this city once and for all.

“Go to sleep,” I say over my shoulder. “I’ll keep watch while you rest. That stuff I gave you is gonna kick in soon and you’re gonna need rest. Lots of rest. Don’t fight it. You can’t win.”

All I gotta do is keep her happy until we figure out what to do next.

I take one last look at the satellite images and swivel my chair around to look at her properly. We blew up Prodigy School fifteen years ago, so her mere existence is a mystery I’d like to solve.

She’s very young. Older than fifteen, for sure. But not by much. Barely legal if I had to guess. No way can she walk into a bar and order a drink. Way too young for me.

But… there’s always a but.

She’s pretty. And she survived my mind blast with nothing more than a headache. I’m exaggerating, obviously, since it wiped her memory. But she was still standing. That in itself is practically unheard of.

So she’s one of us. And that’s the only thing that matters.

Because now that I found her, it makes her mine.