The Dark at the End Read online

  “I can’t tunnel to my dad anymore either,” I say, almost under my breath. “Myka had the picture of him, in the van. I can’t tunnel to anyone. We have no warning.”

  She takes my hand. I don’t want her to—it feels wrong to accept any comfort—but I don’t pull away this time. “But that’s what we want, in the end,” she says. “If we get this serum, and it works for you. You won’t be able to tunnel at all.”

  Is this what that would feel like? Blind, helpless? Is it crazy to hunt down a serum that would take away my only tool? But then no one would want to steal my family right from under my nose, would they? They wouldn’t be bait anymore.

  We go back up the steps into the little yellow house. Where I’d almost forgotten that Vladimir is dead.

  *

  It’s hard to concentrate on searching, but I stumble through. Dedushka searches the baseball room, Rachel the living room. I take the kitchen. Dedushka says he already searched Vladimir’s bedroom, and we don’t need to go in there again. The door is closed.

  He rests a hand on my arm. “We will get them back,” he says, certainty in every word. It’s the only thing that’s made me feel any better. It’s hard not to believe him when he talks like that.

  I look through every bit of the kitchen, even things that weren’t smashed. I’m hoping maybe Vladimir hid the serum, or a clue to it, taped to a flour container or something. Or Smith’s men dropped a ring, or a key, or a pen, something that stands out. All I need is one object of theirs, and I could tunnel to them, find out exactly where Mom and Myka are right now.

  Nothing. I don’t think Vladimir even ate anything except eggs, bananas, and sandwiches—there’s two containers of peanut butter, two kinds of jelly, and a new loaf of bread. The only thing in the freezer is another loaf of bread and some ice.

  Jesus. Here’s this old guy sitting alone in his house eating peanut butter sandwiches and watching baseball, and he ends up shot in the head. For a 50-year-old secret. For me.

  No, I do need to go in that bedroom again.

  I stride down the hall, past Rachel, past Dedushka, and slowly open the door.

  Dedushka’s laid him out on the bed, his hands folded on his chest, his eyes closed. If it weren’t for the angry hole in his head, his faint blue color, it’d look like he was sleeping. It smells odd, musky. Ripe.

  Dedushka stands in the hall, his eyes questioning, but I shake my head and close the door. Turn back to the old man. Just me and him, in a blue-painted room bright with sun even through closed blinds.

  “I’m sorry,” I say to Vladimir. My voice sounds too loud. “This is because of me, because you were going to give us the serum you’ve been sitting on for this long. It must’ve been, right?”

  If this was a horror movie, he’d open his eyes and leap at me. If it was an action movie, there’d be someone hiding in the closet with a gun. I look around, just in case. But it’s quiet, only the sound of my breathing. Painfully quiet. I’m the only breath here.

  “I hope—” No, that’s dumb. He doesn’t have any hope left. “I guess that’s all I can say. I’m sorry. I’ll do my best to make them…sorry too.”

  It’s not much, but it’s all I have. I look one more time at his still face, then go, closing the door behind me.

  “I may have something.” Rachel’s sitting on the sofa, bent over something in her lap. She holds it up when Dedushka and I come in. “This was out here, under the coffee table.” She lays it out for us on the table, smoothing the folds. “It’s a map of the baseball stadium here, where the Orioles do spring training.”

  “He’s got all sorts of baseball stuff,” I say. “The house is full of it.”

  “No, that one room is full of it,” she says, eyebrows high. “It looked like everything was organized, neat, before they messed it up. All of the baseball paraphernalia is in that room. Except this.” She taps on it. “There aren’t any other paper things out here except this newspaper, and what they pulled down from the bookshelf. This is out of place. He knew we were coming, right? So what if he had this out so he could show us?”

  I look at Dedushka. He runs a hand over his beard, rhythmic. Nods. “It is like him. He did nothing without a purpose, Vladimir. And I have found nothing else out of its place, that these zlodey did not do themselves.”

  “Have we looked over everything?” she asks. “Nothing else?”

  “Kitchen is clean,” I say. “No clues.”

  “Clean,” Dedushka echoes.

  I stare down at the newspaper, the only other thing on the table. It has one of those four-inch screaming headlines they only use for big news. LOCAL GIRL STILL MISSING, FBI CALLED IN. I pick it up, scan the story. A Sarasota girl, 10 years old, missing since last week. Believed to have been abducted by a stranger, and taken over state lines. Exactly the sort of case Liesel would’ve brought me, in Montauk. If someone brought me an object of that girl’s, I’d know where she was in three seconds. Or I’d know if she was dead. But someone would have to ask me.

  Dedushka nods again, tapping the map. “Let us go to this stadium and see where it leads us.”

  It’s not what I want to do. I want to run screaming after Mom and Myka, in every direction at once, until I find them. But I can’t. I have to follow this possible clue, one slow step at a time.

  We go out the front door, leaving Vladimir and his little house behind us.

  3

  JAKE

  Say Goodbye (A Tough Decision) by Una & The Sound

  Without the van, we have to steal another car or find some other way to get to the stadium. There aren’t any cars handy—and this isn’t the kind of place where people leave them unlocked. We walk out to a main street and try to find a bus that will take us, but there isn’t one. So we walk. In the broiling afternoon sun, about three and a half miles, according to the map Dedushka found. In silence, each in our own heads.

  I’m not having any coherent thoughts. My head is stuffed with rage, sheer helplessness, and guilt. A lethal mix. I want to run and hurt mindlessly, like a bear when you’re aiming at her cubs. Or worse, you’ve stolen her cubs. My mind is all fangs and claws.

  About a mile in, I stop dead, in front of a nail salon. Rachel and Dedushka stop too, with a glance at each other.

  “This is wrong.” I clench my fists at my sides. “The serum isn’t the most important thing right now, by a long shot. We need to go look for Mom and Myka.”

  Dedushka bites at his beard, then sighs. “How would you look? We do not know where they are taken. No direction. No objects for you to tunnel with. But this stadium—” He points south. “Right there. Vlad may have hidden the serum there, yes? We must look. If we find it, we have something to bargain with.”

  I frown. “You mean…trade Smith the serum for Mom and Myka?”

  He throws his hands up. “I do not know. I do not even know if he wants it. It is more likely he wants you. I am as upset as you, malchik. It is Abby and Myka. I understand. But I want choices. The only other way is to try to get object for them, yes? At your house, 900 miles away, which is watched and guarded. This is first. Closer.”

  I turn to Rachel, though the pity on her face makes me want to shrink away.

  “We should at least look,” she says.

  Dedushka steps toward me. “I promise, if we find nothing, we head to Virginia, for objects. We will not give up until we have them with us.”

  I nod reluctantly in agreement, and we walk again. I stay a pace behind them, though. I feel so alone. When I was being held in Montauk by DARPA, I thought I’d never see any of my family again. It was all I wanted, ached for. I can’t believe I finally got together with them, and now they’re gone. In an instant.

  Even being with Dedushka and Rachel isn’t helping me not feel lost.

  A little while later, the stadium rises ahead of us. From the outside it’s massive, a whole block. The stone is cream-colored, rich, with palm trees lined up out front. It reminds me of a big plantation house, except new.

>   We pause in the shade of an awning and look at it. There aren’t many cars in the huge parking lot across the street, and I don’t hear any noise inside.

  “No game today,” I say.

  “They only use it for spring training.” Rachel’s hair is tied up in a knot now, damp tendrils on her neck. Her face is bright red. Too much Florida sun. “It said that on the map. There was a team, but they don’t have it any more. It’s a waste, this big place.”

  What’s a waste is coming here. The serum is a side venture right now. But I agreed to try.

  “So do you want to break in?” I ask.

  Dedushka shakes his head. “I will ask them about Vladimir. That is first. Why steal when you can be given?”

  He walks forward, and I start to follow, but Rachel puts a hand on my arm. Her eyes search mine, worried. “You doing okay?”

  “No.”

  She squeezes, brief, then lets go. “I wish there was something I could do.”

  I want to do something too, more than anything. Take action. Find them now. Dedushka is up at the ticket booth, asking about Vladimir. I stare up at the sign above us. HOME OF THE BALTIMORE ORIOLES. Above that—I have to crane my neck to see—ED SMITH STADIUM.

  The name burns into my brain, imprinting like a neon brand. SMITH. It’s mocking me. Again I see Smith ordering his goons to press that knife into Rachel’s cheek, to get me to give up Dad. Holding guns on us in that train yard, threatening to kill Rachel for no reason. He’s a sadistic son of a bitch with no regard for anything except what he wants. And what he wants….

  Dedushka’s back. “Vladimir works there,” he says, his voice hopeful. “As a cleaner. I have asked to see his locker, as an old friend he sent to fetch something. Not today, they say, the manager is not here, but tomorrow. He will let us in—”

  “Tomorrow?”

  There’s a silence.

  “We can plan,” Rachel says. “What we’ll do next. We can get out of the freaking sun—” she swipes at her face “—get something to eat, and get some rest. Then tomorrow we can start fresh.”

  I stare at the ground, at my useless hands in fists again.

  But they’re not useless, are they? I can do a lot more than most people can.

  Dedushka is smart. Trading something for Mom and Myka—it may be the only way to get them back. It’s what Smith understands, how he deals with people. He’s always looking to trade.

  But it’s not the serum he wants. Or money. It’s me. I bet you anything he’d trade them back for me.

  That’s why he took them. To play one of his weird mind games, and make me turn myself over to him.

  I don’t say anything to Rachel or Dedushka. But it’s a thought. A little flashlight of a thought.

  I know it’s what I’ve done before, sacrifice myself, and it hasn’t worked out. But maybe I can make it work this time. I’ll have to think about it more, tonight. But it might even turn into a plan.

  *

  About 2 am, I quietly close the door of the motel room and step outside. It’s still warm—probably 70 degrees—but the relative coolness, the breeze, are a massive relief.

  I can’t stay in there anymore, in a hot, stuffy room with Dedushka snoring in one bed and Rachel curled up on the other. I can’t believe they can sleep. I feel like I’ll never be able to sleep again. There’s a hamster wheel in my brain, spinning away, and I can’t stop it.

  The parking lot is full, but still. Silent except for the endless clicking of night bugs, the hum of the freeway.

  I’m itchy in my skin. I have to go…somewhere. Anywhere. A walk.

  There’s a Taco Bell across the street, still doing business, and I’m tempted. But it costs money, which we don’t have a lot of. More, I’d have to interact with someone. I don’t want to talk to anyone, unless it’s Mom and Myka. Or Smith.

  If only I could find a way to talk to Smith, to…deal with Smith, this could be over.

  It’s insane. I can’t do that.

  I walk. There are a few cars, not enough to bother me. Mostly closed shops and other fast food places. Still too bright, too distracting. When I come across a park I veer straight in. It’s big, with lots of trees, and in the daytime it’s probably great for shade. At night it’s creepy and forbidding, and entirely deserted.

  Perfect.

  I stop somewhere around the middle and sit, on an exposed root under a big tree. I wrap my arms around my legs, stare into the dark, and try to let my mind settle a little. Just enough to think.

  First: I have to try to clear the guilt away, long enough to figure out what to do. Leaving them in the van was a viable plan, and should’ve been safe. We must’ve missed something, clearly, and I really want to know what. But Smith is the one to blame. He’s the psycho who did this.

  Is he? Do I know that for sure? I flip through the possibilities. DARPA. Liesel Miller is the agent I dealt with there. She started everything, six months ago. She came to my house, told me she knew what I could do, and could protect me and my family. She could help me. All I had to do was cooperate. I had two agents worm into my life—Ana and Eric—and for a while, it worked. I could tunnel and balance everything else, living at home. But then they claimed another group, a foreign agent, was threatening my family, and I had no choice but to go underground. They sealed me up in their base at Montauk and made me work for them, lying to me the whole time. So DARPA and Liesel are manipulative. They can even be violent. Eric went crazy after I controlled him through tunneling to escape. He threatened Dedushka. And then Liesel shot him, right in front of me.

  I hug my legs tighter. I don’t like to think of that, or it takes over.

  But Liesel shot him so he wouldn’t shoot ME.

  I picture Vladimir again, harmless, shot defenseless in his bed. It has to be Smith. No one else in this game—Liesel or other people at DARPA or Dad—would do that. And Smith’s the only one who would search for this serum, which is only good to me. Only because he wants to lure me. He happened upon something even more valuable to me, my family, which he saw instantly and snapped up.

  It’s Smith. And he really wants to trade. He wants to sell me again.

  I take a deep, strong breath of night air and let myself imagine it. Captive. In someone else’s hands. Last time Smith sold me to Dad, and I thought I was saved, only to find out Dad wanted to lock me up too. Everyone wants to lock me away and force me to tunnel for them. With Liesel it was tunneling to fugitives, terrorists…and occasionally kidnap victims, like that little girl. Locating them fast before something even worse happened. That part wasn’t so bad. I was helping people. Could I do that again? Could I consider doing that, voluntarily, to save my mother and sister?

  I let my hands fall, feel the damp, alive grass under them. The tree at my back. Look at the sky, stretching wide behind the trees, the few dots of stars.

  In Montauk I was never allowed outside. I couldn’t even see the sky. Dad wanted to keep me underground too, for “safety.” He wanted to experiment on me. I shudder. It was worse, when it was Dad. It was betrayal. I hate him for that.

  If Smith sold me to either one of them I could be shuttering myself away from sky forever.

  But it’s my family. It’s Mom and Myka. I hurt them before, letting them think I was dead. I hurt them now; they were taken because of me. To stop that, to make it right, I could give up everything again. I’d never forgive myself if I didn’t.

  I have the hope that I could figure a way out, eventually. After all, I got out of Montauk, a maximum security facility. I could probably get out of most places. So maybe it wouldn’t be permanent.

  But even if it was for a long time—God—I have to do it.

  I really have to do it.

  I stand, pushing up against the tree. I have to find a way to contact Smith. Now.

  I could probably get to him eventually if I pushed my face in front of a bunch of cameras at banks, at gas stations. He probably monitors that stuff. But so does DARPA, and Dad. I don’t want someone else
to find me first. The most important thing is getting Mom and Myka back.

  There’s a more direct route. I know he has a company, Smith Enterprises in DC. I bet they have a phone number.

  I head back out onto the street, back to the few places that have people. This time I’m crammed with purpose.

  I find it in about an hour, the other way from the motel at a little gas station. A cell phone sitting on the console in an empty car, the driver inside paying.

  I reach in through the window, grab the phone, and keep walking, around behind the station, off into some bushes in a ditch. Sit and stare at it, my heart pounding.

  It doesn’t have a lock code, the owner entirely too trusting. They may be able to trace it, soon, but I only need it for a few minutes anyway.

  I search for the number, find it way too quickly. Breathe once, bite my lip, and hit the screen to dial. Leave a message that Smith will understand, with a place to meet me tomorrow.

  Then I leave the phone in the bushes and make the long walk back to the motel. It’s done. All I have to do is show up tomorrow, and if everything works, they’ll be safe, all of them. I can forget about the serum for now, my chance of getting rid of this power. I need to tunnel for a little while longer.

  When I open the door to the motel, and they’re still there, sleeping, I almost want to cry. But I don’t. I curl up, gently, behind Rachel, on top of the sheet. She’s warm, and it’s too hot to be touching, but I don’t care. For tonight, it’s what I need.

  It’s all I need.

  4

  RACHEL

  See You Again by Elle King

  Jake’s leaving. After all we’ve been through. All he went through at the hands of those people. He’s turning himself in to that psychopath?