Convergence - The Last Science #2.1 - In Plain Sight

B2: Chapter 4 - Comes the Hero - II

  Jessica returned with the equipment. Her parents watched as they bounded up and away from the backyard, vanishing into the sky as Jessica made them invisible. Hailey didn't have any time to waste. Luckily, it was a cloudy day. Her favorite kind, in fact, with massive puffy cumulus clouds forming huge mountains in the sky.

  She summoned up a powerful jet of wind using the tourmaline stone hanging from around her neck, pushing them skyward like the thrust of a rocket while she kept her wings folded flat behind her. As they crossed the lowest cloud layer, she released the jet before it started to burn the gem and spread her wings wide.

  Jessica released the patch of invisibility that had kept their ascent hidden. She began to push out raw energy, allowing a flow of magic to emerge from somewhere in her chest to fill the space between herself and Hailey. Hailey took it gratefully and transformed it into another jet of wind to propel them across the wide empty expanse. They tore across the blue at breakneck speeds, reaching Rallsburg in a quarter of the time it normally took. Hailey felt like her face might get cut by the air itself from the sheer speed they managed, but to her relief the pain dissipated as they slowed down.

  The forests around Rallsburg were rife with activity. A pair of helicopters with police markings were making slow passes around the town. Hailey used a bit of the leftover energy Jessica was still pushing out and sent it into her eyes. As Jessica had described it, she was actually enhancing the cones in her eyes to pick up far more light than usual and be able to resolve images much further away in greater detail. Hailey didn't quite understand how that was possible, but Jessica managed to explain the exact way to manipulate the tiny components of her eyes without really explaining what was actually changing. She wondered if Jessica had actually known herself, since many of her trickier spells came to her through long stints of casting out with her Knowledge affinity.

  Now, of course, she couldn't explain a single one of them.

  Once her brain had adjusted to the vastly increased capabilities of her eyesight, Hailey took a quick scan of the area. She could see dozens of uniformed men and women scouring the forest and the remains of the town alike, in much the same fashion they had back in May. It was a bit different seeing it herself, rather than plastered across the news, but either way Hailey felt unsettled. She tugged Jessica's right sleeve downward, telling her they were heading in. Jessica nodded against her, then stopped the flow of energy between them.

  A faint outline of a circle appeared below them. Hailey dove for it, picking up speed as they fell. Jessica's arms clenched tight around her as they accelerated, summoning a wall of invisibility in every direction. Hailey could tell she was straining at the sheer mental difficulty of keeping up so many fast-moving illusory walls. Just a few more seconds, Jess. Hang in there.

  They dropped straight through the forest canopy. Hailey flared out her wings and sent a jet of air below them at the same time, braking as hard and fast as she could. They just barely slowed down in time, landing on a single foot and perfectly straight up in the middle of the bridge. It was probably Hailey's best landing ever, utterly exhilarating—but no one was around to celebrate it.

  She unstrapped Jessica, and they hurried into Cinza's cabin. The entire group was gathered inside, watching a live feed of the search on Ruby's laptop while another feed played out on the computer monitor. Cinza gestured at them to close the door behind them.

  "So you guys heard," Hailey said breathlessly, taking an open chair near the door. Jessica squeezed in and sat down on the floor next to her. Cinza's cabin wasn't exactly large. Twelve of them inside at once was straining the confines of the place, already split in half by the curtain, to its breaking point. Ruby and Cinza shared her chair, and Ruby looked like she'd seen a ghost, her skin impossibly pale against her dark red hair.