Steelheart (The Reckoners #1)

I have to keep moving, I thought. If I can stay ahead of him, I can lose him. We had tunnels in and out of places like the restrooms, the o ces, the locker rooms, and the concession stands.

The UV ashlight gave o very little visible illumination, but I was an understreeter. It was enough. It did have the odd e ect of making things that were white glow with a phantom light, and I worried that would give me away. Should I turn off the flashlight and go by touch?

No. It was also my only weapon

against Nightwielder. I wasn’t about to go around blind when facing an Epic who could strangle me with shadows. I crept down the tomblike hallway. I needed to— I froze. What had that been in the shadows ahead? I turned my ashlight back toward it. The light shone across discarded bits of trash that had fused to the ground in the Great Transfersion, some formerly retractable stanchions for line control, a few posters frozen on the wall. Some more recent trash, glowing white and ghostly.

What had I …

My light fell on a woman

standing quietly in front of me.

Beautiful hair I knew would be golden if I were seeing it under normal light. A face that seemed too perfect, tinged blue in the UV

beam, as if sculpted from ice by a master artist. Curves and full lips, large eyes. Eyes I knew.

Megan.





37

BEFORE I had a chance to do more than gape, the shadows

around me started to writhe. I dodged to the side as several of them speared through the air where I’d been standing. Though it seemed as if Nightwielder could animate shadows, really he exuded a black mist that pooled in darkness. That was what he could manipulate.

He could have very ne control over a few tendrils of it, but usually he opted for large numbers of them, probably because it was more intimidating. Controlling so many was more di cult, and he could basically just grab, constrict, or stab. Every patch of darkness around me started forming spears that sought my blood.

I dodged between them,

eventually having to roll to the ground to get under a group of attacks. Doing a dodging roll on a steel oor is not a comfortable experience. When I came up, my hip was smarting.

I leaped over several of the steel crowd control stanchions, sweating and shining my ashlight at any suspicious shadows. I couldn’t turn it all directions at once, though, and I had to keep spinning to avoid the ones at my back. I paid vague attention to the chatter from the other Reckoners in my ear, though I was too busy trying to not be killed to digest much of it. It seemed that things were in chaos.

Prof had revealed himself to hold Steelheart’s attention; Abraham had been located because of his shot to save me. Both he and Cody were on the run,

ghting

Enforcement soldiers.

A blast rocked the stadium, the sound traveling down the hallway and washing over me like stale cola through a straw. I threw myself over the last of the steel stanchions and found myself

shining the light frantically about me to stop spear after spear of blackness.

Megan was no longer where

she’d been standing. I could almost believe she’d been a trick of my mind. Almost.

I can’t keep this up, I thought as a black spear struck my jacket and was rebu ed by the shielding. I could feel the hit through my sleeve, and the diodes on the jacket were beginning to flash. This jacket seemed a lot weaker than the one I’d worn before. Maybe it was a prototype.

Sure enough, the next spear that caught me ripped through the jacket and sliced my skin. I cursed, shining the light on another patch of

inky,

oily

blackness.

Nightwielder was going to have me soon if I didn’t change tactics.

I had to

ght smarter.

Nightwielder has to be able to see me to use his spears on me, I thought.

So he was nearby—yet the hallway seemed empty.

I stumbled, which saved me from

a spear that nearly took o my hea d. Idiot, I thought. He could move through walls. He wouldn’t just stand in the open; he’d barely be peeking out. All I needed to do was …

There! I thought, catching a glimpse of a forehead and eyes peering out from the far wall. He looked pretty stupid, actually, like a kid in the deep end of a pool thinking he was invisible because he was mostly submerged.

I shined the light on him and tried to get a shot o at the same time. Unfortunately I’d switched hands so I could have the ashlight in my right hand—which meant I was ring with my left. Have I mentioned my thoughts on pistols and their accuracy?

The shot went wild. Like, way wild. Like I came closer to hitting a bird ying above the stadium

outside than I did Nightwielder. But the ashlight worked. I wasn’t sure what would happen if his powers vanished while he was phasing through an object. Unfortunately it looked like it didn’t kill him—his face was jerked back through the wall as he became corporeal again.

I didn’t know what was on the other side of that wall. It was opposite the eld. Was he outside, then? I couldn’t stop to look up the map on my phone. Instead I ran for a nearby concession stand.

We’d dug a tunnel through there, wrapping down through the oor.

Hopefully, if I could keep moving while Nightwielder was outside, he’d have trouble tracking me down once he peeked in again.

I got into the concession stand and crawled inside the tunnel.

“Guys,” I whispered into my mobile as I moved, “I saw Megan.”

“You what?” Tia asked.

“I saw Megan. She’s alive.”

“David,” Abraham said. “She’s dead. We all know this.”

“I’m telling you I saw her.”

“Fire ght,” Tia said. “He’s trying to get to you.”

As I crawled I felt a sharp sinking feeling. Of course—an illusion. But … something felt wrong about that.

“I don’t know,” I said. “The eyes were right. I don’t think an illusion could be that detailed—that

lifelike.”

“Illusionists wouldn’t be worth much if they weren’t able to create realistic puppets,” Tia said. “They need to— Abraham, not left! The other way. In fact, throw a grenade down there if you can.”

“Thanks,” he said, pu ng

slightly. I could hear an explosion twice—once

through

his

microphone. A distant portion of the stadium shook. “Phase three is a failure, by the way. I got a shot o on Steelheart right after I revealed myself. It didn’t do anything.”

Phase three was Prof’s theory— that one of the Faithful could hurt Steelheart. If Abraham’s bullets had bounced o , then it wasn’t viable.

We only had two other ideas. The rst was my theory of cross re; the other was the theory that my father’s gun or bullets were in some way special.

“How’s Prof holding up?”

Abraham asked.

“He’s holding up,” Tia said.

“He’s fighting Steelheart,” Cody said. “I’ve only been able to see a little, but— Sparks! I’m going o ine for a moment. They’re

almost on me.”

I crouched in the narrow tunnel, trying to sort through what was happening. I could still hear a lot of gunfire and the occasional blast.

“Prof’s

keeping

Steelheart

distracted,” Tia said. “We still don’t have any con rmed cross re hits, though.”

“We’re trying,” Abraham said.

“I’ll get this next group of soldiers to follow me around the corridor, and then let Cody goad them into ring across the eld at him. That might work. David, where are you?

I might need to set o a distraction blast or two to ush out the soldiers behind cover on your side.”

“I’m

taking

the

second

concessions tunnel,” I said. “I’ll be coming out on the ground oor, near the bear. I’ll head westward after that.” The bear meant a giant stu ed bear that had been part of some promotion during the football season, but which was now frozen in place like everything else.

“Got it,” Abraham said.

“David,” Tia said. “If you saw an illusion, it means you’ve got both Fire ght and Nightwielder on you.

On one hand that’s good—we were