Raging Sea (Undertow, #2)

“We certainly had to pay enough to get everyone to use that term,” Spangler continues. “Besides, terrorists torture people, Lyric. We’re a corporation, we offer a service.”


Two soldiers charge through the front door of the building. One has Bex; the other, Arcade. They push the girls into the sand, revealing that each has a noose around her neck. The nooses are connected to long steel poles the guards hold tightly. Bex and Arcade look drugged. Neither of them puts up a fight.

Something explodes inside me. I can’t say what it is—maybe the last part of me that thinks people are mostly good. I came here to save people, and I hoped that I wouldn’t have to hurt anyone to do it. I am not a killer. I know that for sure. But that doesn’t mean I can’t really hurt them. My mind calls out to water beneath Spangler’s feet.

What would you have us do?

“Get creative,” I whisper back.

The ground rumbles and quakes as something huge pushes to the surface, but Spangler is not concerned. In fact, he smiles at me as he taps away on his tablet, and all at once it’s as if the power I feel all around me has been switched to the off position. I can’t hear the voice. The whispers have been silenced, and my control over the water is gone as well.

“What did you do?” I ask.

“All right, people. Let’s get out of this heat,” he says.

A soldier steps forward and hands him a Taser rifle.

“Spangler, we talked about this,” Doyle shouts at him.

“We tried it your way, David,” Spangler says. He fires the weapon and there’s a pop! I feel a stabbing pain in my chest, and I fall to the ground. When I look down, I see wires sticking out of the wound leading all the way back to the rifle. I try to pull them out, knowing what is coming next, all while studying Doyle’s face. He stares down at me, disappointed and frustrated. His eyes say, I told you so.

I hear a zap, and suddenly I am on fire.





Chapter Eleven


I COME BACK INTO THIS WORLD SWINGING. I am gnashing teeth and claws on throats. My body’s lust for damage burns like a dangerous fever. It takes several long moments of flailing before I realize that I am completely alone. Spangler, Doyle, and all their people are gone. I’m not even outside anymore. They’ve put me in a circular room with towering walls that soar high over my head. A steel door is built into a wall, but there are no windows on it and no windows in the room, either. The effect is not unlike being at the bottom of a well. Panic seeps into my thoughts. I’ve never been afraid of small spaces—I’m not claustrophobic in the least—but right now I want to scream and scratch and beg for help. My breath grows shallow. I start to wheeze. Everything is about to crush me into paste.

“Calm down, Lyric, calm down, Lyric, calm down, Lyric,” I say between short, staccato gasps. “You need to think clearly. It’s the only way to get out of here.”

Though I’m not sure there actually is a way out of here.

I’m lying on my back on a paper-thin mattress tossed onto a cold concrete floor. It’s the only furniture in the room—no sink, no toilet, nothing. Only a hole in the floor. There’s a single light bulb dangling high above me that is so bright, it’s hostile. I suspect it can shine right through my body to the other side. It sings to me: Tick—tick-tick—tick—tick-tick.

Suddenly, there’s a clang at the door.

“Inmate 114. Stand in the circle,” a voice barks, but, as outside, I can’t find the speaker.

“Where am I?”

“Stand in the circle,” the voice repeats with growing impatience.

I try to sit up, but my whole body revolts. I feel broken, and my limbs are uncooperative. My head is a soft avocado. On top of that, one of my shoes is missing and there’s blood on the big toe of my sock.

“I’m hurt,” I say.

“Last warning, inmate! Stand in the circle.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I whimper, falling back to the mattress.

There’s a loud clank, followed by an electronic buzz, and all at once my body becomes a herky-jerky marionette, thrashing in agony. My teeth grind together, holding back shrieks until the buzzing and the pain stop.

“Stand in the circle painted on the floor of your cell,” the voice demands.

I hear him, but my brain and body are too busy rebooting to obey. My eyes, the only part of me that’s not in full shutdown, find a circle on the floor painted in bright yellow. It’s wide enough to stand inside, but getting into it feels like an impossible request.

“Stand in the circle, or I will shock you again!”

“Please, I’m trying,” I beg, then weakly crawl in its direction. Every movement is a Herculean effort, but I somehow manage to get into the circle. It feels like hours before I can actually stand.

“Confirmed,” the voice says, followed by a soft click, and then nothing.

“I need a doctor!” I shout.

There’s no response.