She threw herself back, ass hitting ground, and tossed the bag in the process.
I winced, realizing the damage that might have done. The bag on my end moved as hers did, flying through the air, tearing out of my grasp.
There was a weakness to this technique, I realized. The people and the objects in the real world had more weight.
All the same, she’d let go of the bag. Her first thought and priority was her own well being.
My priority here was the bag.
I slid it across the floor, into the open closet, and lifted it up onto the top shelf.
It was almost in plain sight, if she took one step to the right. But Ellie had picked a darker fabric, and it bit her in the ass now.
With a measure of satisfaction, I watched as she scoured the room, her attention on the ground, under the bed, behind furniture.
Her actions grew more frantic.
With every worried glance at the mirror, I felt myself regain a bit more power.
Dangerous, I knew, to risk indoctrinating one of the innocent, but I was pretty sure this little stunt had more than paid for itself.
I’d protected my friend’s things, too.
She did a double-check, examining every obvious surface, ignoring the less obvious location that was the closet.
The sound of a distant door opening and voices ended her search prematurely. Deciding on discretion, she quickly stepped out of the room.
Her fear continued to feed me in little ways.
I hoped it fed both parts of me, bolstering the aspect of me that was Blake Thorburn, thoroughly pissed about what she’d done to my friends.
Before heading upstairs to reunite with the others, I checked on the Thorburn group downstairs.
There weren’t many surfaces I could dwell in, and the surfaces I did have available weren’t good ones. The reflective side of the toaster in the kitchen, the window in the hallway, the staircase window, the window by the back door, and the window in the back door.
My view of the scene was consequently very limited. A tall woman striding into the front hallway, passing by the picture frame so quickly that I couldn’t make her out.
From the toaster, my view was slightly distorted.
Eva. She’d walked right by the doorway between the living room and the front hallway. Nobody had glanced at her long enough to realize they had a stranger among them.
The front door opened again, closing quickly.
“Hey Peter,” Ellie called out from the living room. “A word?”
“Mm hmm,” A male voice responded nonverbally.
Andy, not Peter.
My view of the front door was narrow, when I watched from the picture frame in the hallway. I had to press my head against the side of the mirror to view from the right angle, watching as the door leading into the hall closet was opened. Andy no doubt stood so the door would block any view of him.
I saw Ellie step into the hallway, and knocked on the glass.
She paused.
I knocked again.
Too little, too late. She turned back around just in time to get a mitt pressed over her mouth, simultaneously pressing her against the wall. Andy shoved a taser into her neck.
He held it there, easing up the pressure enough that she could slide down the wall to the ground.
The pair shifted positions, Eva at the corner by the kitchen, where she could watch the staircase, kitchen, back door, and hallway at the same time, a machete in one hand. Andy stood to the right of the door leading into the living room, taser in hand.
Directly opposite me. Eerily calm, brown hair slightly in his half-lidded eyes, beneath a dumb hat with ear flaps, brown on the outside, lambskin or something on the inside.
He pulled off one mitt with his teeth, then shoved it into one pocket. He let the taser dangle from a wrist-strap while he pulled off the other mitt.
He moved his hands in a series of gestures.
Eva responded.
I watched as she stuck out her tongue, then bit it. Her eyes closed, her head rested against the corner of wall. Almost as if she were meditating or in a daze.
Andy slid down to the front door, opened the door, then closed it.
“Ellie? Peter?” Kathryn called.
Eva took the distraction to move past the kitchen door, disappearing around the bend to the space where the back door was.
I beat her there. For one instant, we made eye contact.
“Hi,” she said.
I swung the Hyena, aiming to break the glass.
She beat me to it.
Glass shattered, a few stray shards tinkling as they hit the floor by the back door. I relocated myself to the little window that was part of the door.
She broke that too.
Toaster.
I had a view of the Thorburns standing, ready to investigate. Callan grabbed a poker from beside the fireplace.
This was going so wrong so fast. If we failed here-
How would we even survive the night, when all the creepy crawlies and Others had a chance to come out of the woodwork?
I headed upstairs.
Alexis was waiting by the door. She looked anxious.
“Witch hunters,” I said, before she could say a thing.
I could see the color drain out of their faces.
“Should we-”
“Anything you can send is good,” I said. “But don’t come down yourselves. Lock yourselves in.”
“I can help,” Evan said.
“Come out, stay in Rose’s bedroom,” I said. “There’s a mirror in there. I’ll signal you if I can, to come free the others.”
“If they don’t kill the others,” Ty said. “Because Witch Hunters can kill people. Even innocents.”
I swore under my breath.
I ducked back downstairs.
The little picture frame I’d been using to peer into the hallway and living room was gone.
Only the toaster remained. I could have used the television set, but it was on.
They knew about me, they were planning for me.
Andy was nowhere to be seen, from my limited vantage point.
Eva wasn’t in the kitchen or the living room.
The pair had outright disappeared.
“I don’t care what she said,” Callan said. He had a phone in hand. He held it to one ear.
“That sounds suspiciously like a dial tone,” Kathryn said.
“Fuck me,” Callan said. “Not 9-1-1, then. I know some guys.”
It took him a second to dial.
“Dial tone again,” Roxanne commented.
“Shut up!” Callan hissed the words.
“This is fucked up,” Christoff said, his voice small.
“Yeah,” Roxanne said.
“Ellie isn’t responding, so she either ran or something happened,” Kathryn said. “Peter, far as we know, never came back.”
“Those assholes,” Callan said. “They planned this.”
I would have laughed, if the situation wasn’t as bad as it was.
The explosion, I suspected, caught everyone by surprise. There was no clink of metal on hardwood. Nothing thrown.
Andy’s work.
Light, noise, disorientation. I recovered fast, but I could feel my eyes crawling, as if they were healing from some minor damage.
I saw Eva striding into the room. If Callan was able to see, he would have only caught a glimpse of the girl with the machete before she disarmed him, blade striking the poker. He was doubled over, and she brought her knee up into his chin.
I had never, not once in my varied years, seen someone deliver a roundhouse kick in real life. Eva did it like it was easy. One step forward, another, pivot, kick.
Kathryn threw her arms up in a vain attempt to protect her head. It wouldn’t have made a difference, had the kick connected with her head. Instead, the blow hit her right in the stomach.