Mystics 3-Book Collection (71 page)

He paused, his face paled.

“There is a reason why we called a National
Assembly today. Over the past month, our most celebrated scientists
have gathered
disturbing
information. When the portals from
both worlds aligned, the worlds
shifted
with catastrophic
consequences.”

He paused and sighed. “Soon our world will
be cursed with earthquakes, tsunamis, hurricanes, and volcanoes. We
are now confronted by a devastating force that threatens to consume
everything. Billions will die, and life as we know it will
expire.”

Cries and shouts boomed throughout the
stadium like a storm. Zoey’s breath caught in her throat. She felt
like she was stuck in a horrible dream. She looked at Director
Hicks.

“Is . . . is this true?” she whispered to
him, her voice dry and cracking.

Director Hicks stared at the floor, and when
he looked up his eyes were wet. “I’m afraid it is.”

Zoey felt lightheaded, and the room started
to spin. She forced down the urge to throw up. This couldn’t be
happening; she couldn’t be the
cause
of the end of the world
. . . .

Director Patel stood up and raised his voice
with alarm. “Neither world can survive a
permanent
portal.
If we do not find a way to close it soon, both worlds will be
destroyed.”

Chapter 5

W
hen Zoey woke up
the next morning, everything from the previous day felt like it had
been a horrible dream. It
had
to have been a dream. She, the
little orphaned redhead, couldn’t be responsible for the end of the
world, could she? It was too absurd to even think about. But there
it was, as plain as rain. Zoey St. John had destroyed the
world.

After unsuccessfully convincing herself that
yesterday was just a bad dream, she shuffled down the stairs. She
sat at her usual table and ate her breakfast like a zombie. Her
limbs moved unconsciously, and she grunted now and then. When she
tried to recall the morning, she didn’t remember eating at all.

Zoey pushed her plate away and stared out
the window. Most of the snow had melted overnight, which was very
unusual for Toronto. And now the red, pink, and yellow tulips at
the borders of the Wander Inn were not their usual,
brightly-colored selves. They had browned and rotted, as though the
snow had thawed too quickly and somehow spoiled them. Things were
definitely not normal. Signs of the Great Junction were creeping up
on her, and she had a bad feeling this was only the beginning.

It was the first week of April, and spring
was her favorite season—but even that couldn’t change her morbid
mood. What were the seasons good for anyway if the world was going
to end?

She opened the window, but she coughed as
she inhaled a breath of what she expected to be fresh air. The air
smelled strongly of sulfur, like the air itself had rotted.

She shut the window, and Aria waddled in and
poured her some more orange juice.

“You hardly touched your food. Zoey? Are you
listening to me?”

Zoey turned from the window. “I am.”

“You need to eat,” said Aria. Her yellow
cat-like eyes showed her concern.

“I could make you something else if you
want? How about some French toast? I know how much you love
that.”

“No thanks, Aria,” said Zoey, and she forced
a little smile. “I’m not hungry.”

She turned back and stared out the window
again. How could she eat when she felt like throwing up all the
time? She knew Aria cared about her, a rare commodity right now at
the Hive. She felt a spark of warmth inside for just a second,
before it got crushed by an overwhelming feeling of dread.

Aria put a hand on her shoulder.

“Zoey?” said Aria, her voice soft and
comforting. “I know what you’re doing.”

“Yeah? What’s that?”

“You’re torturing yourself. You have to stop
blaming yourself for what’s happening.”

Zoey shook her head. “You don’t get it.
I
did this—me.
I’m
responsible for all of it.”

One of Aria’s set of arms pressed firmly on
her hips while the other two cupped Zoey’s face gently in her
hands.

“Now you listen to me, young lady,” she
began, and Zoey felt mesmerized by her yellow eyes and couldn’t
look away even if she wanted to. “You have to stop this nonsense.
You’re innocent in all of this. How can
you
be responsible
for something you didn’t even know
existed
? Only a cruel and
wicked person would want to destroy the worlds . . . and that’s not
you. So stop this at once.”

Zoey looked over Aria’s shoulder. It seemed
that every Agent in the Inn was listening in on their conversation.
They all had the same look in their eyes—blame. She stared back at
the table, feeling more miserable than before.

Aria let go of Zoey’s face. “You need to eat
before going out there on your assignments—”

“Assignments?” laughed Zoey. “Do you
honestly think they’re going to keep me on after all of this?
Seriously? Even
I’d
get rid of myself if I could. It’ll be
back to the foster system for me.”

Aria glared at Zoey. “Well, maybe with that
kind
of attitude they will. My mother used to say,
‘
The most useless of all emotions is
self-pity.’
Stop acting like a victim and
do
something about it.”

She turned on her heel and walked away.

Zoey thought that there was something
strange in Aria’s tone. Was she implying something?

But just as she was about to ask Aria what
she meant, Simon and Tristan walked into the Inn.

“Thought we’d find you here,” said Simon as
he grabbed a chair. His face was full of expectation. He waited
until Tristan was seated and then said, “Are you going to tell us
what happened at the assembly or do we have to
beat
it out
of you?”

Zoey looked at her friends’ smiling faces.
She hated to disappoint them, but she recounted yesterday’s events
as enthusiastically as she could anyway. Her voice cracked, but she
continued her story till the very end. When she was finished, she
sat and waited for them to say something, anything, before she
burst into tears.

Tristan was the first one to speak. His
voice was soft and gentle, “I know what you’re thinking, Zoey. But
this isn’t your fault—”

“He’s right,” added Simon earnestly. He tore
off some pieces of Zoey’s cold pancakes and ate them.

“We didn’t know the crazy woman’s plans,” he
said with his mouth full. “I mean, how could we? She’s a
psychopath. We’re normal. See what I mean?”

“But it still
happened
,” said
Zoey.

She felt the tiny pieces of the breakfast
that she had actually swallowed rise in her throat. She forced them
back down. Her eyes burned, and she blinked repeatedly. She
wouldn’t let herself cry in front of her friends, even though she
knew they’d understand.

For a few moments there was an uncomfortable
silence, as if her friends were afraid that if they spoke she’d
start crying. She decided to spare them the painful silence and
tried to change the subject.

“So, why are you guys here anyway?” she
asked. She tried to keep her voice steady. “Shouldn’t you be
reporting to Agent Vargas for today’s new assignments? I’m sure
there’s a lot to do now with all these portals opening. Must be
tons of illegal mystics that need to be caught.”

Simon and Tristan shared a look, and then
Simon said, “Well, we’ve got some news to cheer you up!”

Zoey wanted to say,
I doubt that
, but
she didn’t want to dampen Simon’s mood. Only a true friend would
want to cheer her up. So instead she said, “What news?”

Suddenly the lights flickered, and the
building cracked and moaned, as though some ghostly force were
squeezing it. Zoey looked outside.

The blue morning skies had become dark with
angry gray clouds. Trees swayed back and forth dangerously, as if a
gusts of wind would snap them in half. Little whirlwinds of last
fall’s leaves whipped across the grounds, chasing each other like
cats and dogs. And then she saw something that made her blood turn
to ice.

A sudden bolt of jagged red light flashed
between the clouds like thin strands of godly hair. Red lightning.
But Zoey knew there was no such thing as red lightning, so what
was
that?

She hid the terror in her face when she
turned to her friends. “You were saying Simon? Simon?”

Simon tore his eyes from the window. He
swallowed hard and said, “Thought you’d like to know that the
Agencies are gathering special troops to try and stop the Great
Jungle portal—”

“Great
Junction
,” interjected
Tristan. He smiled at Zoey, and she forgot all her troubles for
about two seconds.

“That’s what I said,” continued Simon, as he
jabbed Zoey’s fork into a pancake and took a bite.

“They’ve already figured out where the
portal is and they’ve set up a few anchor points that are close
enough to it, but still hidden in case of possible threats—enter
psychopath Dupont—anyway, they’re taking volunteers . . . like
loads of them . . . like right now as we speak.”

Zoey sat up in her seat. “What are you
talking about?”

Simon smiled cheekily. “Thought that’d get
your attention. I might not be as good looking as pretty-boy here
next to me, but Simon Brown
always
delivers the goods.”

Despite herself, Zoey laughed.

“You’re such a moron,” she said playfully
and leaned forward in her chair. “Tell me
everything
you
know.”

Simon looked over his shoulder and then
lowered his voice. “Well, from what I’ve heard—”

“Overheard,” said Tristan, grinning.

“Doesn’t matter if it’s
overheard
. I
heard
it, didn’t I?”

Zoey sighed, but she felt like she was
floating in her chair. “Simon, please continue before I explode.
What did you hear?”

“Check this out,” said Simon, clearly
enjoying himself with the bit of information he possessed.
“Apparently, the agencies and their scientists have been attempting
to shut down the Great Hole for weeks now, but they haven’t been
able to. It’s like, dudes as smart as Agent Franken just can’t shut
it down.”

“Because of Mrs. Dupont,” guessed Zoey.

Tristan shook his head. “Not exactly.”

Zoey scowled. “Please don’t tell me Mrs.
Dupont has a twin?”

“No,” Simon made a face, “Great! Now I have
a mental image of her and her freak show of a sister. Give a nerd a
break.”

He shook his head and then added with a
voice full of intrigue.

“You ready for it? Yeah?” He leaned over the
table, “Because they figured out that the portals have to be closed
on
both
sides.”

Zoey raised her brows. “So one
here,
and the other in the
Nexus
.”

“Exactly.” Simon drank some maple syrup like
it was orange juice.

“The scientists came up with a secret
weapon, but they don’t have the field training that agents do,”
said Tristan squaring his shoulders.

“The scientists wouldn’t last a minute
inside the Nexus, let alone get
past
Mrs. Dupont’s security
on this side. Agent Barnes’s has seen it. He said that there are
hundreds of armed Alphas protecting the portal. The agency’s trying
to create teams with at least five agents accompanying each
scientist. But not everyone
wants
to go—”

“Even if it means a chance to save our world
before it gets sucked up by a giant black hole.” Simon gulped the
last of Zoey’s maple syrup. “Pretty sad, isn’t it?”

Zoey stared at her friends. This was her
chance to kill two birds with one stone: shut down the portals and
save her mother. It was perfect. What Aria had said rang in her
ears,
Stop acting like a victim and
do
something about
it.
And that was exactly what she planned to do.

But something nagged at her. “So why isn’t
the agency
making
agents go? Isn’t that part of their duty
or something? I don’t get why they’re
asking
for
volunteers?”

Tristan drummed his fingers on the table.
“Because there’s no guarantee that it’ll work.”

“You mean because they might die.”

“Yup.” Simon swallowed the last of Zoey’s
pancakes. “Everyone is saying it’s a suicide mission. I like those
missions. Keeps me on my toes. You know what I mean?”

“Not really,” said Tristan, as he rolled his
eyes. “Under normal agency regulations, Operatives under the age of
eighteen aren’t allowed to volunteer for missions—”

“But since we’re
not
Operatives
anymore, and these aren’t
normal
agency times,” Simon patted
Tristan on the back, “Me and hot stuff here . . . signed up.”

Zoey smiled at her friends. This was what
she was waiting for. She would have a chance to redeem herself and
save the world in the process. Piece of cake.

Tristan flattened a piece of paper on the
table. It was cream-colored and nearly completely covered in black
writing. It reminded Zoey of the birth certificate she had hauled
along with her for nearly fifteen years, except that this paper had
a golden seal in the shape of a shield at the bottom. A long dotted
line awaiting her signature was printed beside it.

With a smile that made her heart melt,
Tristan said, “We’re going to get your mom back.”

He tossed her a pen. “All we’re missing is
you
.”

Chapter 6

Z
oey clipped her
boomerang to her belt and followed Tristan and Simon. Her heart
pounded against her chest like a jackhammer. She had gladly signed
the contract, just briefly glancing at it, but now she feared the
agency wouldn’t let her go. She was, after all, responsible for the
Great Junction. What if they
didn’t
let her go? What would
she do then?