She touched the face of her illegal laptop and Margorie Devoe’s voice sounded, clipped and in control. “This is a standard removal protocol. One to transfer.”
A man’s voice said, “Yes ma’am. We’re picking up a resident from Dorm Alpha, seventh floor?”
Devoe said, “The desserts of the other residents on Dorm Alpha were dosed with a light sleeping medication to keep their dangerous magic down, in case it’s contagious.”
“Magic goin’ crazy iscontagious?” a second man asked.
“It is in the elderly,” Margorie lied, her voice uninflected, as if she was talking about a mannequin instead of a human being. “The dorm will be monitored to make certain they’re all asleep. The sedative should hit them in an hour, at which time you will take the resident from his room, cover his head with void strips, and take him down the service elevator, to the truck.”
“Why we gotta do all that?” the second man asked. “’at sounds a lot like kidnapping. I don’t know about this, lady.”
“His magic hit his own brain and fried it,” the first man said. “It happens more often in geezers than you think.”
Devoe added, “He signed the papers for this when he was admitted here. This method is to protect the residents from uncontrolled, dangerous, and contagious magic, not kidnapping.”
“We strap the geezer onto the gurney and transport him to Building Z,” the first guy said. “Easy.”
“What if he lets loose a spell? Or runs?” the uncertain man asked.
The other man laughed. “Never happened. He’s out cold. They always are when their brains get fried. And besides, we’re faster than any old fogies in support hose and knee braces.”
Mable touched her screen off.
Sandra closed her eyes. “Dear God.”
It was clearly a prayer and Mable didn’t know what to do. She had never prayed and when Sandra did, it was creepy.
Sandra opened her eyes and looked at them, meeting their eyes, one by one, her own full of conviction and purpose. Mable felt the power in her gaze like a slap to her face. “We have to save them,” the former preacher said. “It’s why we were put here.”
Mable wasn’t sure what Sandra meant about that, but she agreed. No one should be harvested. She went back to her laptop and a moment later said, “I got into the medical orders. Buck didn’t fry his own brain. He was dosed with a knockout drug.”
“That’s the proof we’ve been looking for,” Dani said. “The Sevens really are harvesting power. Send that to the office.”
Dani
“It’stime to institute plan Blow Things Up,” Dani said.
She glanced at her coffee and concentrated. The liquid reheated without boiling over or exploding straight up into the air. In class, when she tried that spell she never used control; there, it was as if she’d stuck a magic cherry bomb in the bottom of the mug, just like when she first got her power.
Her talent had fallen on her like an anvil at age sixty-two, in midflight over Arizona, and had nearly brought down the 747 she was taking to Reno to visit her granddaughter. Back then, if she got mad, things blew up. Now, if she still wanted to, she could keep a small city in power through steam production, but she had all the cash and investments she and her family would ever need. After she finished her five-year contract helping to supply the energy needs of Las Vegas, she had wanted something more. Not a contract where she worked for a company, but something for her and her friends. Tridevi had come out of that need.
Sandra clapped her hands softly. “That was beautiful,” she said of the warm coffee.
“I like it better when she blows shit up,” Marvin grumbled.
“So,” Dani said, “we need to get someone into Building Z as a patient. Marvin, you destroying the warden’s car didn’t work. If anything she was even more interested in keeping you here, where she could negotiate a contract for you. Sandra, no one expects you to turn another person in order to get put over there. And we need Mable free to do her electronic magic, not hooked up to a machine.” Dani thought through what she was about to say and decided it was still the best plan. “Sooo. I guess, today, I’ll blow something up, dissolve into tears, and storm off to my room.”
The others looked at her in dismay.
“Mable,” she continued, “I’ll need one of Marvin’s MTTs put in under my skin.”
Marvin had invested a large percentage of his holdings into electronic companies and startups, and one such company had devised MTTs—Mini-Tracker-Transmitters. They worked alone, or in conjunction with another of the company’s devices called the Invader. The devices were the heart and soul of Tridevi’s plan to rescue Franz, and now Buck, and the others from Table J.
“We don’t know what kind of brain damage The Seven’s magic energy collection system does,” Sandra said softly. “If we’re right and they do brain surgery to install a port, and if we can’t get you out in time, you may be … permanently ….” Her mouth closed in a firm line.
Dani squeezed her hand. “Permanently brain damaged forever. I figured that out. But I trust you all to rescue me, and someone needs to go inside. It needs to be Marvin or me, and they didn’t take Marvin’s bait. I think they’ll take mine. With the MTT and Marvin’s Invader, Mable should be able to cut off any drugs, and I should quickly be able to wreak havoc.”
Marvin looked hard at her. “The MTTs haven’t been tested on humans. And if we can’t get inside to place the Invader in your room, or if Mable for some reason can’t manipulate the Invader, you might be lost.”
