“All right. If the two of you can work on that, I’d appreciate it. Cassidy, can you write up a text to send to Brandon’s phone that says the gist of what we’ve discovered here? Don’t mention Stewart going in yet. I think we need to talk a little more about how that will work before we bring it up. We’ll let them know, though, that we’ll be sending someone in so they can all get out.”
“Sure,” Cassidy said, grabbing Cadence’s phone off of the table.
“Let me look at it before you send it.” Her sister nodded. “Cale, will you go over to Christian’s lab and check on Tara and Lucy? That’s where they are isn’t it?” Christian nodded, and Cadence continued. “See if they need anything and if Tara is doing okay. If they want you to, stick around and help them with their assignment. I think that would be the best way you can help us. Who do we have on the ground in the
If there was an order to the opening of the portal regarding the various tunnels, Brandon wasn’t seeing it. After the last opening had been at fourteen, which made absolutely no sense to anyone, Brandon had given up on that being their method of concocting a way out of here. Heather insisted there was never any rhyme or reason to it, but the three older, wiser Guardians were still hashing it out. Not that his dad was much help; he wasn’t quite as clever as the other two when it came to situations like that. He had his merits, though, and Brandon would’ve rather been trapped in here with Elliott than just about anyone when it came to finding a way home. He had managed to cheat death once already, after all.Heather was sitting against the tunnel wall studying the weapon she’d inherited from Alex. She had a solemn expression on her face, and Brandon couldn’t tell if that meant he should leave her alone or if she just always looked like sour grapes.
Heather sat up and turned her head again, her eyes wide with wonder as she stared at Brandon through the darkness. “You know Mina?”“I did. I’m pretty sure I told you earlier that we met someone who mentioned you to my girlfriend, right? She said her name was Mina, and Cass got the impression she was related to you somehow. Was she?”Heather didn’t say anything for a long time, but when she did, her voice broke slightly. “She was my sister.”He nodded. Cass had gotten the impression they were related one way or another, though she wasn’t exactly sure how.“I’d seen ’em in the woods, a few weeks earlier. Told my folks. They didn’t believe me. You see, my pa said he never believed in none of that mumbo jumbo. He got mad at my ma for even talkin’ to anyone about it. Back when we lived in Virginia, even before I was born, up until we moved west, my ma had sidled up to a neighb
Cadence had set her alarm for a few minutes before noon, but when it went off, she was already staring at the ceiling, trying to piece things together in her mind. She’d been asleep long enough to have a dream—not a pleasant one either. But then, most of her dreams had been unpleasant since she’d killed Jack. With time, visions of him chasing her had dissipated some. Now, he wasn’t the one in pursuit in her mind when she fell asleep. It was someone else, something else. She couldn’t see its face, but she knew it was to be feared.She’d awoken with beads of sweat on her forehead and the idea that she probably shouldn’t sleep again until everything was right with the world, though what she’d said to Cassidy before was true. They needed to get some sleep if they were going to be of any use to anyone. Still, not sleeping meant not dreaming, and that was a positive as well.Her phone buzzed and she reached for it, flipping the
“Well, we began by using the lat/long of the sites we thought we could identify to try to determine if this list was in a specific order. Turns out it is. These points on the map are in order from west to east around the globe.” Ward pointed to a translated list of names Hannah had written down from the book“Okay—so the portal opens in directional order?” Cadence asked.“No,” Ward said, shaking his head. “At first we thought so. But then clever Christian here thought of something remarkable that never entered my mind at all until he suggested it.”Cadence wasn’t surprised to hear Christian had come up with something, though the fact that he’d told other people was a new development. “What is it?”“I pulled the cell phone records from Dax’s phone and pinpointed the initial contact between his texts and a cell tower, and I think we can trace a general idea of where th
Brandon spent a good five minutes trying everything he could to get his phone to cooperate, but after turning it off and back on several times, pressing every button he could think of, handing it over to Dax who did the same thing, and even shaking it up and down for several seconds, they had to accept the fact that their message hadn’t gone through, and they hadn’t received any new ones.“That really sucks,” Elliott muttered, pacing back and forth in front of where the rest of the group was huddled near the entrance to the tunnel they’d occupied for at least six hours, or so it seemed by the way the portal was opening. “I don’t like this. I don’t like this one bit.”“There’s likely a logical explanation,” Aaron said, his voice calmer than anyone else’s but still starting to crinkle around the edges. “I’m shocked it’s worked at all.”“We must be out of ran
Dr. Hamish Stewart looked almost exactly like Cadence expected him to. Disproportionately large nose, thick glasses (which made no sense since he was a Vampire, but then Hines wore them...), messy salt and pepper hair, button down shirt unbuttoned one button too far, slacks, loafers, and a smirk on his face that told her he wasn’t planning on saying much of anything.She’d figure out how to change that.“You sure you don’t want me in there with you?” Cale had asked in the hallway right before she’d gone in alone. “If he does anything....”“He’s tied to a chair. What can he do?” she’d countered. Cale had been standing a step too close to her, breathing a breadth too deeply. She’d been completely oblivious to Christian’s feelings, but Cale was much easier to read, and especially now that he was single, Cadence was aware of every subtle look, every lingering glance, every word that
Cadence shot across campus to Christian’s lab where her sister was sitting with Lucy and Tara. They were patiently waiting to see if Holland’s other plane left or if anything unusual happened at any of the airports near where Holland was last spotted. The girls also kept an eye on any private planes moving in and out of the area, particularly chartered flights. It had crossed Cadence’s mind that Holland’s plane moving could all be a bluff, but she’d have to know that LIGHTS was watching her. It seemed like an awfully big coincidence that her plane just happened to be going to the location where they thought the portal would open soon, later that same evening.“I think I’ve got a name.”Cadence hadn’t even entered the room before her sister shot the information at her. “Great,” Cadence said, dropping into a chair on the other side of Tara. The girls didn’t even have to scrunch together to sit in fro
“How far are you willing to fall?” Brandon asked Dax as they stood in one of the tunnels Jamie thought might be closest to where the portal would open next. The last time the portal had opened, they’d made it in time, but it had displayed nothing but a field of stars, so they’d all stayed put. They hoped the next time would be different. Once they heard the popping sound, if they didn’t actually see the opening at the far end of the tunnel they were standing in, all three of the lucky escapees would run back to the center and take a look down adjoining portals until one of them saw it. Then, they’d run like hell.“I’ll jump pretty damn far, though not from outer space,” Dax admitted. “I know we won’t have a Healer on the other side waiting for us, but I’d just as soon be out and miserable than trapped in here.”“What if there are Vampires on the other side?” Brandon countered. &ld