Immediately Forgettable

Chapter 17

With Dagger down, our plan quickly deflated. Within seconds of his body hitting the floor, every weapon in the room was turned on Jen and I. I quickly dropped my gun and placed my hands in that air. Jen dropped the phone and followed suit.

I looked over at her for confirmation that she had been able to get a signal and call for reinforcements, but her look was stern and she gave me the smallest of head shakes.

King re-entered the room from wherever he had hidden during the brief fight, and, for the first time that I had seen, looked furious, which I hoped meant that we had at least set his plan back a few more months — as Dagger's EMP had done. At least that would give us time to form another plan or find some way to get word out of King's agenda.

"You know I really tried with you," said King through gritted teeth, looking down at the rubble of computer debris and bullets, "both of you, really."

Oh, he's talking to us. As if to bring the point home, he jabbed a finger in my direction.

"You in particular! I gave you the chance to be somebody! To be remembered! To have a hand in the reshaping of a better world. And thisis what you do with it!"

He kicked over a decimated computer terminal. He walked around the floor, surveying the damage. Mr. Knight kept his gun on me, and looked like he really wanted to pull the trigger.

I was, to put it mildly, scared out of my mind. I couldn't fathom what to do next, but then I looked a Jen, still being held at gunpoint and looking terrified herself, and realized I had to try to shift more attention to me.

"One point six billion people," I croaked out. "We couldn't let you do it. Surely with all your resources you can find another way."

King ignored me. I started again.

"You have to rebuild now anyway — maybe you can take a fresh look at it and see what you and the Vizier can come up with."

King froze for a second. Listening? Thinking? His face was still turned toward the floor so I couldn't read it. When he finally looked up, he was smiling.

"Rebuild? Rebuild?! My God, you are an idiot. I don't have to rebuild. This little stunt did nothing. Nothing. I learned after Dagger's EMP bit. This was merely a monitoring station. Big screens. Great for photo ops. All about image, you know.

"The plan is still on track. Within a few hours, the world you know will be gone, and the evolutionary phase will have begun."

He paused, thumb on his chin for a moment, head tiled slightly to the side, as if a brilliant idea was coming.

"And do you know what is going to happen to you and Ms. Holt? Nothing. Well, not right now, anyway. You both had the opportunity to watch the transformation of this world from the safety of this compound. Both of you would have had prominent positions in the new regime.

"But now? Now we are going to toss you outside the gates to fend for yourselves, and I wouldn't think you will last long. Try and tell someone what you know, by that point anyone with any sembleance of old-world power will be way too busy to listen, and probably wouldn't believe you anyway.

"So go! Go! You are no longer welcome in Paradise!" To the guards: "Take them back out to the other side where they can't cause us anymore trouble over here. I don't care where you toss them for the next hour, but once that hour is up, bring them to the front gate and toss them out — hard.

"Get them out of my sight!"

And with that I was grabbed on either side by a guard and was being pulled away when King added, "And do not let himout of your sight for a second until he is safely locked away!" Which I kind of liked because it made me sound dangerous, when I knew it was really said so I couldn't use my ability on them.

I was then forced back up the ramp, with Jen following shortly behind under the same situation. I took one last glance at Dagger's body as I was shoved beyond the bottom wall, hoping it wasn't as bad as it looked, but deep down knowing that it was.