[OLD PREVIEW] The Zodiac Operation (#4)

Three

Malcolm had underestimated just how high the tower was. Not that it was surprising his old enemy had gone to such lengths, but still. Malcolm had been hoping this Fragment would be easy. Keeping himself and Tyler anchored in the same location in the Dream Realm was draining.

And the fact that Claire figured out how to break his connection was...irritating. But he would have to deal with that later.

It didn't help that Tyler's progress had been far slower than when they'd worked together back on the Fortuna. Now he had to put most of his energy into keeping her in a fog so she would cooperate, which of course made it harder for her to work.

Malcolm's absolute control over the Dream Realm was far from returning to him. His power was now a fraction of what it used to be. Now, the Realm ran rampant with manifestations of whatever minds it touched. The fact that a mere human—well, a genetically modified one, but still—had more control here than him was pathetic.

Not for much longer, he reminded himself.

A few feet ahead of him, Tyler reached the top of the staircase they'd been climbing for a month—except, of course, when he'd left to find food and water—and grabbed a door handle. She hesitated, took a deep breath, and opened it.

Malcolm braced himself for some kind of attack, but nothing happened. Tyler looked back at him, and he nodded for her to enter the room.

He followed her in. A smile spread across his face. The room was small, and the ceiling was clearly the inside of the tower roof. They'd reached the top.

"The Fragment is hovering above the roof," Malcolm told Tyler.

Tyler nodded and walked to the wall. A window opened up, but it took nearly a full minute for it to grow large enough for a person to fit through.

Tyler climbed through the window and disappeared onto the roof. Malcolm folded his arms and waited. As the seconds ticked by, he grew anxious. Any number of things could go wrong...

He breathed a sigh of relief when she reappeared, Fragment in hand. She climbed back into the room and held the Fragment out to him.

Malcolm smiled and took it from her. "Thank you."

He didn't bother issuing her any sort of warning before he ended the dream.

Malcolm sat up, still clutching his new Fragment. He frowned as he took in his surroundings. A hospital room. Someone must have found them.

Must have been recently, too, if all they'd done was given him an IV. He was still wearing his own clothes, too. And when he checked his inner jacket pocket, his other Fragment was still there.

Malcolm turned around. In a bed on the other side of the room was Tyler. She'd wake any minute now. He slid his new Fragment into his pocket with the other one and headed for the window.

Good. They were only on the second floor. Malcolm had been trained to fall from higher without injuring himself.

He slid the window open and jumped.

~

The camp food wasn't much, but Ivy scarfed it down anyway. It was certainly better than what she'd been served at the detention center.

Kids sat in small groups around the clearing as they ate. Ivy, Claire, and Ash gathered near one of the jetchoppers. One of the Supers, an agrokinetic, had caused vines and leaves to grow out of the dirt and wrap around the jetchopper in an attempt to hide it from anyone flying overhead.

Ivy looked up as Summer approached with a plate of food. "Where's Spencer?" she asked.

"Checking in with the other camps. He'll be over in a minute," Summer responded.

Sure enough, Spencer approached them about a minute later, a plate in one hand and a laptop in the other. Ace trotted a few steps behind him.

"What's the laptop for?" Summer asked as Spencer sat down.

"Someone at camp five said there was something on the news we should look at." Spencer sat down, took a bite of rice, and opened the computer. The others waited in tense silent as he punched in a search and waited for the page to load.

"How do we have internet?" Ivy asked.

"Newman's team was able to set something up for us. Like with the service our phone uses. We're hijacking basically any signal we can find. It's pretty slow, but it's better than nothing," Spencer explained. He frowned and squinted at the screen. "Hmm."

"Hmm?" Summer asked. "What 'hmm'? What does that mean?"

"Sorry, I'm trying to figure out what news story they were talking about," Spencer said. "I think it's this one but I'm not sure—oh!" Spencer set the laptop on the dirt and turned it around so the others could see.

Ivy leaned in. "Boy disappears from California hospital, girl found with him still unconscious," she read.

"Could it be Victoria?" Summer asked.

Spencer shot her a look Ivy couldn't decipher. "Maybe," Spencer said. "Or it could be Tyler. Or maybe whoever it isn't even a Super."

"The boy could be Malcolm," Claire pointed out.

"Didn't you say Tyler rescued Malcolm from Zodiac right before they disappeared?" Ash asked. "It might make sense for them to be together."

Spencer scrolled down and scanned the article. "The two were found unconscious by hikers and taken to the hospital. Within an hour of being checked in, the boy went missing. It is unknown what is wrong with the girl."

"Is there a description?" Summer asked.

"Hang on." Spencer scrolled further. "Let's see... Both are caucasian, the boy has black hair and appears to be roughly eighteen or nineteen, while the girl has long dark brown hair and appears to be about fifteen or sixteen. If anyone has any information, we ask that they call the police."

Dark brown hair. Not black. The girl was Tyler, not Victoria.

After a moment, Ash broke the silence. "Well, are we gonna go get her?" he asked.

Spencer closed the laptop. "Of course. We'll fly out to the hospital after dinner." He stood up. "I'll go find the agrokinetic and have them take the plants off the chopper. I assume you all want to come?"

Everyone nodded. Spencer turned around, but paused and looked over his shoulder. "You too, Ivy?"

Oh. Right. "Well, we're just picking her up, aren't we?"

"I'm not saying you shouldn't, I'm just making sure you're okay with it. Even if it's the kind of thing that shouldn't cause trouble, we've got a pretty big target painted on our backs."

Ivy shrugged. "Well, we don't need a big group to pick her up, anyway. I'll stay here. I should probably rest anyway."

Spencer nodded. "Good idea."

***

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