The bird, frantic, ducked into a building through a small gap in a broken window. I jetted up behind and used a spray of water from my handjet to shatter the window further, then I followed with my shoulder, breaking into the room. I managed to land without falling on my face—barely—and charged after the blue animal. It darted out another window, and I broke through, leaping into the air again.
“David?” I could barely hear Megan’s voice. “Were those windows? Sparks, what is going on?”
I smiled, too focused to give a report. My chase wound through the waterway streets of Babilar, passing people on rooftops who pointed and cried out. The bird tried to fly high at one point, but the strain was too much and it came back down to land on a rooftop. Yes, I thought. This is it. I jetted up onto the roof and landed near it.
As I got my balance, the bird’s form fuzzed and reshaped into a man. Knoxx’s face was pale where it wasn’t blue, and blood covered his shoulder. He stumbled back from me, clutching one hand to his shoulder, pulling out a knife with the other.
I stopped and stared at him for a moment, waiting. Then, finally, he toppled over, unconscious.
“I’ve got him,” I said, staying back in case he was faking. “At least, I think I do.”
“Where are you?” Megan asked.
I looked around, trying to orient myself after my frenzied chase. We’d curved through the streets and come back around to near where we’d begun.
“Two streets over from the building where I placed the camera. Look for a rooftop about four stories above the ocean, sparsely populated, a big mural of some people picking fruit spraypainted on the top.”
“Coming,” Megan said.
I unstrapped my gloves, then took Megan’s gun from my pocket. I didn’t want to get any closer to Knoxx without backup, but with that wound, would he bleed out on me if I didn’t do something? There was too much to lose, I decided. I needed this man alive. I inched forward and finally decided that either he was a really good faker, or he actually was unconscious. I bound his hands as best I could using his own shoelaces, then tried to bandage his wound with his jacket.
“Megan?” I asked over the line. “ETA?”
“Sorry,” she said. “No bridges. I’m having to weave all the way around to get to you. It’s going to be another fifteen minutes or so.”
“All right.”
I settled down to wait, letting my tension melt away. It was replaced by a realization of the full foolishness of what I’d just done. I’d obviously underestimated Knoxx’s transformation powers—he could turn into more than just a bird. What if he’d been even more powerful than that? What if he’d been a High Epic, impervious to bullets?
Prof had called me reckless, and he was right. While I should have felt triumphant in what I’d done, I found myself embarrassed. How would I explain this to the other Reckoners? Sparks. I hadn’t even called Tia.
Well, at least it had turned out okay.
“Listen carefully,” a voice said from behind me. “You’re going to drop the gun. Then you’re going to put your hands into the air, palms facing forward, and turn around.”
A jolt of fear washed through me. But I recognized that voice. “Val?” I said, looking back.
“Drop the gun!” she ordered. She’d come out through the stairwell that connected the top floor of this building to the rooftop. She had a rifle tucked into her shoulder, sights on me.
“Val,” I said. “Why are you—”
“Drop it.”
I dropped Megan’s gun.
“Stand.”
I obeyed, my hands out to the sides.
“Now your mobile.”
Sparks. I ripped it off my shoulder and laid it on the ground, just as Megan said in my ear, “David? What’s happening?”
“Kick it forward,” Val instructed. When I hesitated, she focused her sights right on my forehead. So I kicked the mobile toward her.
She knelt, gun still on me, and picked it up with one hand.
“Sparks, David,” Megan said in my ear. “I’m hurrying as fast as—”
She cut off as Val ended the signal, then slipped my mobile into her pocket.
“Val?” I asked as calmly as I could. “What’s wrong?”
“How long have you been working for Regalia?” she replied. “Since the beginning? Was she the one who sent you to Newcago to infiltrate the Reckoners?”
“Working for … What? I’m not a spy!”
Val swung the rifle and actually fired, planting a bullet at my feet. I yelped, jumping back.