CHAPTER ONE
SIX
UNKNOWN LOCATION
SIX GLARED AT THE CLOSED DOOR. SHE HAD BEEN doing so for about fifteen minutes—ever since Eleni had dragged Sam out of the room—hoping to jump-start her telekinesis and force it open.
It hadn’t worked.
Furious, she sat down on the cot that stood against one wall. Her head throbbed from the effort of trying to get her Legacies to cooperate. Or maybe that thing Magdalena put inside you is crawling around doing its job, she thought.
The idea that some kind of parasite was in her head, doing who knew what, made her even angrier. She’d been hoping that the Mog’s story about implanting her and Sam and Max with some kind of parasites was a lie, something Magdalena had told her to throw her off. But given how her and Sam’s Legacies weren’t cooperating, how weak Sam seemed and how easily Eleni had pushed her aside earlier and prevented her from helping Sam, when normally she would have been able to take the Mog out with a couple of hits, she now had to assume it was true. And that pissed her off.
Thinking about Max, she wondered how he was doing. She and Sam had been teleported from the bunker in Utah to a new location. But what about the others? Where were Max and Bats and Lava now? And the other kids who had attacked them back at the bunker? She wished she could get her hands on those delinquents. Especially that girl, Freakshow, the one who had used her fear-inducing Legacy to make Six relive one of the worst moments of her life. What she wouldn’t give for a chance to repay her for that torture.
Pain ricocheted through Six’s head. She pictured a rat, gnawing away at wiring, disrupting the electrical signals and causing lights to flicker on and off.
“I swear, if I had a knife I’d try to cut it out myself,” she muttered, hitting the side of her head with her fist.
She winced as another jolt of pain throbbed through her, as if the thing inside her head could understand and was telling her she didn’t have a chance against it. She lay down, closing her eyes and trying to calm herself. How much longer could the parasite keep doing what it was doing? Days? Or did she have only hours left? Was Magdalena going to remove it, or was the plan to let it kill her?
That was not going to happen. She was not going to allow herself to be a Mog experiment. If it came down to it, she really would try to get the parasite out herself. And if that didn’t work, well, she’d die before she let the Mogs steal her Legacies.
She opened her eyes and stared up at the ceiling, trying to channel her anger in a purposeful way and figure out how to get herself out of the room. The door wouldn’t open, and there were no windows. There wasn’t even an air duct to try to get into. And any second now, she suspected, Eleni would come back for her.
Six didn’t intend to be there when that happened.
Her gaze focused on the light fixture in the center of the ceiling. It was the only other thing in the room besides the cot she was lying on. Six concentrated on the wall switch that operated it, trying to make it turn on and off with her telekinesis. Again, nothing happened. She was going to have to find a way out of the room that didn’t involve using a Legacy.
The image of the rat chewing on wires flashed in her head again, and an idea began to form. She got up and dragged the cot so that it was directly underneath the light. Standing on it, she was able to reach up and remove the glass globe that covered the two bulbs inside. She placed the globe on the floor, then got back up and examined the inside of the fixture. It was a basic light, nothing fancy, and it was easy enough to twist the base and remove it from the mounting pins, revealing the electrical wires that snaked out from the ceiling. There was a black one and a white one.
Six yanked the white wire out from where it connected to the fixture. The bulbs in the fixture winked out as the circuit was broken. Now the room was dark except for a thin line of light that seeped in under the door from the hallway outside. But Six didn’t need light for what she did next. She took hold of the black wire and pulled it free, being careful not to let it touch the bare end of the white wire.
Getting down, she picked up the glass cover, wrapped it in the thin blanket that had been on the cot, then smacked it against the floor. It shattered. She unwrapped the blanket and carefully examined the shards with her fingers. There were several large ones. These she took out and set aside. She shook the others out onto the floor, then tore several long strips from the blanket. Holding a couple of the biggest pieces of glass together, she wrapped one of the strips around them, forming a grip. She repeated this with a second strip so that she had a handle she could grasp without cutting herself.
Standing on the cot again, she found the black and white wires. “Here goes nothing,” she said as she touched the exposed ends of the wires together. There was a loud pop and some sparks. Glancing at the door, she saw that there was no longer any light coming in.
Six let go of the wires and got down from the cot. Picking up her makeshift knife and what was left of the blanket, she positioned herself in the corner where she would be hidden from view if someone opened the door.
Then she waited.
A few seconds later, she heard voices in the hallway.
“Is it out everywhere?” a woman asked.
“I think so,” someone answered.
“I’m sure it will be back on in a minute,” a third voice, a man’s, said. “Let’s just stay put.”
The voices retreated. Six heard doors opening and shutting. She reached out and tried the handle of the door to the room she was in, but it remained locked. She started to fear that maybe nothing was going to happen after all. But then she heard the sound of someone rattling the handle from the other side.
“The main panel sensor shows the short came from in here,” a man’s voice said.
The handle turned again. Then Six heard the sound of a key being inserted into the lock. She readied herself. She had no idea who might come through the door, whether they were Mog or human. Whoever they were, though, she wasn’t going to wait and ask questions. A moment later, the door opened. A flashlight beam cut through the darkness. The pieces of glass on the floor sparkled.
“Whoa,” said a second male voice. “What the hell happened in here?”
“Looks like the fixture fell somehow,” said the first man. “Well, it’s easy enough to fix. Come on.”
The men stepped into the room, leaving the door open. As soon as they weren’t blocking it, Six slipped out from behind the door.
“What the—” one of the men exclaimed, jumping back.
Six didn’t stop to offer an explanation, pushing past the men and darting out into the hallway. She saw a flashlight scan the hall behind her as she ran, but nobody followed her. Whoever the men were, they didn’t seem to be interested in finding out who she was, which puzzled her. Had Magdalena just left her there without a guard? If they were in yet another Mog stronghold, why had the men come into the room so casually, as if they expected it to be empty?
She reached the end of the hall, which went off to both the left and right. As she stood there in the dark trying to decide which way to go, the lights came back on. All of a sudden, Six was looking at a giant poster depicting a woman who looked strangely familiar. Then she realized why—the woman resembled her. Not enough that anyone would confuse them, but enough that it was an obvious likeness.