The Second Key

By Be Boring

Chapter 11: Change With The Tides

Mole sneered slightly and ran a finger over White's ribs. They were sticking so far out of the guy's body that it was hard to believe he was still alive. Zack apparently hadn't been feeding him much even before he started starving him. Oh well, it was what the bastard deserved.

Shivering from the cold breeze, Mole finished fastening White to the narrow clock tower on the top of the Seattle Times Building. He loved this place, it had been built in 2007 for the Seattle Times. Just to enforce their name perhaps, they had built a tiny clock tower on top of it that was about 20 feet tall and the width of three people. It was rather tiny for sitting on top of a 50 story building, but it was serving a good purpose right now. Mole doubted the people who'd designed it had planned for someone to be tied to it, but that's what it was good for.

Mole turned suddenly when he heard a movement behind him, then relaxed. Ray was just having a nightmare and was moving in his sleep. Mole had drugged him a couple times throughout the night to keep him asleep, he didn't need the kid seeing his dad just yet. That time would come soon enough. Mole was fairly sure White would never forget seeing his kid thrown off the top of a building this tall, so at least the Conclave should wind up hearing about it. That was what Kay had wanted and that was what she would get. She may not have intended for the cult to find out about Ray surviving the initiation in this way, but they would find out all the same.

Kay could hardly see where she was going through her anger. She had made it clear to Mole that she was to be informed about his plan before he started it so she could approve it. Since he didn't obey that rule, she was pretty sure he must have thought she wouldn't approve of it. In that case she wasn't going to let him finish it. She had absolutely no clue where he had gone but it couldn't be too far. He would still want to be around when the other transgenics ran out of Terminal City.

The sound of one of the many TVs outside reached her ears. It was a news broadcast that had several people standing around the television laughing. Kay slowed down in the car she'd hotwired and rolled down the window so she could hear the broadcast.

"The janitorial staff of the Seattle Times have been fired because of supposed drug use. All were suffering from hallucinations a few hours ago when they were on the night shift on the top floor of the Seattle Times Building. One of the janitors is quoted to have said 'A giant lizard-man with a cigar was carrying a man in sweatpants and a little boy down the hall.' The police are furious to have been called out in the middle of the night only to find absolutely nothing in the entire building. It was then they found that all the janitors had been smoking marijuana and two of them have claimed to have seen transgenics before. All in all, it's an embarrassing situation for the Seattle Times."

While people by the TV were cracking up, Kay turned the car around and headed for the Seattle Times Building.

Sate's long legs carried him quickly through Terminal City. He barely noticed the many younger transgenics who ran into side alleys to avoid him when they saw him coming, he could care less about them. What he really wanted was at the Rec Center.

Max looked up and couldn't prevent the chill from going down her spine as she saw the tall young man walking towards her. She had been talking to Dix about security, but the eyes of the stranger completely distracted her. Why was he looking at her like that? It was as though he was looking straight through her and found whatever he saw to be funny. The amusement at her reaction to him was clear on his face, as was how he felt about the other transgenics in the room. He looked thoroughly disgusted to be around them.

Max stood up as straight as she could, not putting even a dent in the difference between their heights. "Who are you?"

Sate came to a stop only about a foot away, causing Max to take a large step backwards. "My name's Sate. I assume you're Max?"

Max nodded, seeing Dix step back nervously out of the corner of her eye. "What do you want?"

Now his smile turned frightening. "I want control."

Max couldn't even get a word out to express her confusion before she went flying backwards into Dix. The next thing that went was the table they'd been standing by, it was sent crashing into a group of freaks playing dice. Luke went sliding across the floor into Max and Dix, causing them all to crash to the floor. Lights started exploding, keyboards smashed through the screens of their computers, and windows shattered inwards. Anything that could be moved was used to destroy something else. Max heard a loud snap somewhere nearby, but couldn't tell what it was. Then suddenly, everything was quiet.

Lifting herself up onto her elbows slowly, Max looked around the room. It looked like a tornado had ripped through here, not to mention how it felt. She could hear whimpering somewhere in the rubble, but it was impossible to tell who it was. Luke eased himself out from under Max and Dix, putting his hand up to the open wound on his head. That was when Max looked down at Dix and had to cover her mouth before she vomited. Dix's head had been turned around backwards. It was still facing up towards them, but his body was laying on its stomach. Max and Luke scrambled backwards, Luke looking like he could pass out. Turning her head away from the sight, Max scanned the room for anyone else that didn't appear to be moving. From what she could see, the rest were alright. Shaken, but alright. Then she whipped her head around sharply.

"Where did he go?"

Luke was so horrified by the sight of Dix that he didn't understand what she meant. "Who?"

"That man, Sate!"

Luke looked around, carefully avoiding bringing his eyes back down to Dix. "It looks like he left before all the fun started."

Max shook her head. "He couldn't have. He said something to me just before it started. I just can't remember when he left."

Another voice broke through the confusion. "What happened here? Who's crying?"

Brin stepped over the shards of glass that lay scattered in front of the entrance to the Rec Center and looked around. Alec and Jondy weren't too far behind her, looking every bit as shocked as she was about the damage. Alec paused for a moment, then headed over to where there was a pile of wood, it was where most of the remnants of the tables had wound up. Digging his fingers into the largest board, he pried it away to reveal a little cat-like girl curled up in a ball and crying. She could only have been about four years old. Alec leaned down and lifted her into his arms, not quite knowing what to do with her.

"Uh, could someone give me a hand here? I'm not exactly Daddy material."

The girl started kicking and screaming in his arms, almost to the point where he would have dropped her if Zack hadn't suddenly pulled her from him. Alec glared at him, but Zack completely ignored him. Right now he was focused on the child. He ran his fingers through her hair gently and softly shushed her. After a couple minutes, she relaxed in his arms and leaned against him, still crying.

"What's wrong? What did you see?" he whispered tenderly, trying not to scare her again.

"Bad man," she whimpered, burying her face in his shoulder. Zack couldn't help but be confused about that, he hadn't been here when everything had happened. He had just come as fast as he could when he heard the commotion.

"Who's a bad man?"

"The man who made things move with his eyes."

Zack turned to Max questioningly, she just shrugged. She was every bit as confused as he was. She walked over to them and leaned in close to the girl's head. "What did he look like?"

"Big," was all they got out of her. Realization started to dawn in Max's eyes.

"Did he have scary eyes?"

The girl nodded, then gripped Zack's neck as tightly as she could. He lowered himself down so he was sitting on the floor and she was in his lap, still shaking. Then he looked up at Max.

"Do you know who she's talking about?"

Max nodded, slowly clenching and unclenching her fists. "There was a guy who came here to talk to me. He said his name was Sate, then he said he wanted control. That was when things went nuts."

Alec frowned and crossed his arms. "Must have been a psy-ops. What did he mean when he said he wanted control?"

With a shrug, Max plopped herself down on the floor so she could sit Indian-style next to Zack and pat the little girl on the back. "I can only assume he meant he wanted to take over, but I can't see why he would want to. None of the other people here like the psy-ops, he wouldn't be able to control them."

Alec sat down next to her, leaving enough room for Jondy as she lowered herself down too. "Can you tell me what he looked like? I could tell you who pretty much all the psy-ops are, I saw all of them during my little stay in that area of Manticore."

"Well, you couldn't miss him, he was really tall with curly black hair and blue eyes that can scare the living daylights out of anyone, as you can see." She gestured to the girl, who still hadn't loosened her hold on Zack's neck.

Alec's brow furrowed as he thought. "I don't remember anyone like that. Trust me, from that description I should be able to. He must be transgenic because he's from psy-ops, but I don't remember him."

Max shrugged. "Don't lose sleep over it, he might have been out on a mission when you were there. Besides, all that matters now is getting him out of here."

Nobody saw Zeke slip out of the Rec Center and head in the same direction he'd seen Sate go.

Kay pulled up next to the Seattle Times Building and let her eyes wander over it. The place was huge, Mole could be anywhere in there. Hopefully his plan hadn't started yet. She wanted to rip him apart first.

All the doors were locked when she tried them, since the janitors weren't there the building was locked up and empty. Well, empty with the exception of Mole, Ray, and Ames. She finally pulled out her cell phone, she knew Mole had one. She just hoped he hadn't turned it off. Thank God he hadn't.

"Hello?"

"Mole, dammit, where are you? I know you have Ray and White, but what are you gonna do? You'd better tell me or I'll make sure you never get any other transgenic help, not even from any psy-ops."

She was ready to scream when he abruptly hung up the phone. That hadn't been of any help. She was about to try and break her way into the building when she paused and thought for a moment. There had been a lot of background noise when he answered his phone, more than was natural for an empty building. It had sounded like wind. She looked straight up to the top of the building. From here she couldn't see anything, but she was sure now that Mole had to be on the roof.

The smooth outside of the Seattle Times Building tended to make it rather difficult to climb, but Kay was practically a monkey when it came to climbing. She could scale it easily, it would just take a little longer than usual. It was hard to get a grip on the outside, but she grabbed each windowsill as she hurled herself upwards. She struggled to stay as quiet as possible, she didn't want Mole to know beforehand that she was coming. She just hoped he was actually up there, she would hate to have climbed all that way for nothing.

Kay had just let her fingers get a good grip on the side of the roof when she heard something. Figuring she could hold on for a while, she decided to stay where she was for a little bit.

The cold wind sent chills through Ames, but he was warmer now than he was before in the basement. That was the first thing he noticed when he came back to consciousness. The second thing was that he was now tied up rather than tied down. He hadn't been upright in a couple weeks, it felt amazingly good even though he wasn't free.

Mole was sitting on the edge of the roof, watching him curiously. "Ah, you're finally awake, hmm? Took you long enough."

Ames sneered. "You gave me enough chloroform to knock out a buffalo, what did you expect?"

Mole tsk-tsked mockingly. "Sarcasm is not a good thing when you don't have the advantage. You should know that of all people."

Ames's eyes narrowed as Mole walked past him until he was directly behind him. Ames could hear him moving around back there, but he couldn't figure out what was going on. His face went dead white when he saw what Mole held in his hands as he came back around to Ames' field of vision.

Kay could hear a low, groggy moan, it sounded like Ray. It sounded like he was just waking up from something, so he must not have known who he was with just yet. Bracing her foot on the windowsill below her, she got as good of a grip as she could with one hand and pulled out her phone with the other. Pressing redial, she put it up next to her ear and lowered herself down as far as she could. She could hear Mole's phone ringing above her.

"Is it you again?"

"Who did you think it was, asshole, the tooth fairy? I want to know what you're doing with Ray right now!" she hissed. Her voice was quiet enough that Mole couldn't tell her voice was also coming from only about twenty feet away, but loud enough so she knew Ames heard her through the phone.

Ames couldn't believe it, she had told him to his face that Ray was dead. He had believed her, there was no reason not to. What reason did she have to lie to him about his son? It had felt like he died that day, now it had all been a lie? Anger that was worse than he had felt for 452 coursed through him like a fire. She had lied straight to his face, then she had fucked him! The thought of how easily she had used him completely humiliated him.

Mole rolled his eyes and hung up the phone again, this time turning it off before putting it back in his pocket. Ray was held by one of his arms, which he wasn't yet awake enough to try and pull away from. When his eyes opened all the way, they widened further.

"Dad!"

Ames felt a pang go through his stomach, he wanted to get to his son so badly, but he wasn't going anywhere right now. Ray squirmed in Mole's grip and Mole slammed his fist into the kid's head. He wasn't quite knocked unconscious, but pretty close. Ames nearly broke out of his restraints in his desperation to reach Ray. He couldn't stand to see his son hurt.

Kay fumbled around the window she was next to, looking for a way into the building. Finally, she saw a window a couple over from the one she was next to that was slightly open. She figured she could reach it pretty quickly.

Mole walked over to the very edge of the roof with Ray in his hands, then held him over the edge. Ray's eyes easily spotted Kay right beneath him, but she held a finger to her lips and made an impression of screaming, then motioned for him to keep going. Ray may have been a young kid, but he was pretty smart for being a Familiar. He immediately resumed his kicking and screaming, making things as difficult as possible for Mole.

The restraints holding Ames back weren't going to last long with the way he was fighting them. He could already see what was going to happen. He just hoped that Mole was planning to bargain with him for something so he would get the chance to save his son. He would give anything so Ray wouldn't die, even his own life. He knew life wouldn't be worth living. That was how he had felt after Kay had told him Ray was dead, so he had lived the time after that in a daze. He had tried to do what the Conclave ordered, then he had just put up with being a hostage. It didn't seem to matter anymore. Now it mattered more than ever.

Mole smiled at the look on Ames's face, he liked seeing the enemy squirm. "Too bad you won't get the chance to let your people know they could have already been controlling the world." He said that knowing perfectly well that the first thing Ames would do when he was free would be to tell the Conclave that his son had survived the initiation. Waiting just long enough for Ames to think that he wasn't really going to do it, he abruptly let go of Ray.

Now the restraints actually broke and Ames lunged for Mole's throat. Mole didn't even have time to put up his arms before he found himself freefalling towards the ground, barely catching a glimpse of Kay slipping into the open window with Ray in her arms before he plummeted the rest of the way down to the street.

Kay pulled Ray's head away from the scene, she didn't need him seeing that kind of stuff. He was only six, after all. He was perfectly relaxed in her arms, he had known from the moment he'd seen her that he would be alright. Now he just wanted to go up and see his father.

As Kay shut the window, he whispered in her ear, "Can I go see Dad now?" Kay looked at him a little sadly. The poor kid wasn't likely to see his dad ever again, she knew that. Ray would probably make it through the war she could feel coming, but Ames probably wouldn't. A part of her wanted to go up to the roof and let the two see each other again, but then her soldier side kicked in. That would be a poor strategical move on her part, it would be letting her emotions get the better of her. Emotions were something she didn't want to deal with ever again.

The Rec Center was filled with people milling around, trying to fix things up. They could all see that this would take quite a bit of repair and most of them didn't have the knowledge to do it, especially the computer repairs. They would need whole new computers, but most of the computer equipment in Terminal City had been given to Logan so he could get started on his Eyes Only operations again. Now they would need his help to get back on their feet, even Max knew that.

Most of the rubble had been cleared out and new tables and chairs were being brought in. Alec, Max, Jondy, and Brin had been busy working, but Zack hadn't been able to leave the little girl's side. She had told him her name was Chelsea, but that was all the talking she had done. She hadn't let him go anywhere, crying whenever he tried to leave her with someone else. He would have rather been helping everyone else clean up, but he was needed right here. They had found her mother's body with some others among the strewn debris. Right now Luke had been sent to find out where someone would take Chelsea in, Max had felt the need to get him somewhere other than here after he saw Dix's body.

Alec and Jondy were working at straightening out the railing that had been near the computers. Brin was trying to help, but she really wasn't of much use. Finally, Jondy paused and grabbed her arm.

"Why don't you go take a break? Alec and I can handle this, and it looks like the work around here is going to be wrapping up for the night pretty soon."

Brin put her hands on her hips. "What am I supposed to do?"

"Why don't you go help Zack keep an eye on Chelsea?"

Brin looked down where Chelsea was now asleep in Zack's arms. "It doesn't look like he needs any help."

Jondy put her hands on her hips as well, doing a perfect impression of Brin. "You know what I mean. You two have a lot more to sort out than anyone else."

"I just can't talk to him yet. You don't know why it hurts so much."

"What hurts?"

"He managed to control himself around Kay when he threw her with White during her heat cycle, but he couldn't control himself around me. Was he just waiting to take advantage of me or something?"

Jondy's mouth dropped open. "How could you even think that? Zack may be a little harsh at times, but he would never do something like that. He loves us, Brin, he wouldn't hurt us like that. Kay was just different. He never felt the same way about her as he feels about us. He would never take advantage of you. Have you even brought this up to him?"

"Yeah, but he said something like he was prepared to deal with Kay but I was just thrown on him when he wasn't expecting it."

Alec stopped working for a moment. "That would do it. I know it would for me, anyways. Don't think that just because nothing happened between Zack and Kay didn't mean that he wasn't dying to. It probably took every bit of willpower he had to keep from sleeping with her himself. Those pheromones are powerful things."

Jondy gave Brin a small push. "Just go down and talk to him. I can't stand to see you guys like this."

Brin sighed and headed down the stairs. "Fine, but if a fight gets started you're going to regret this."

Jondy grinned. "I can handle you. Even if I can't, I have Alec to back me up."

"I could take you and pretty boy at the same time."

Alec held a hand to his heart. "She called me pretty boy, I'm touched!"

Brin laughed as she headed across the floor to where Zack was sitting with Chelsea. She gently plopped down beside him, biting her lip nervously when he didn't even acknowledge her presence.

"I didn't know you were so good with kids."

He kept his eyes on Chelsea's tiny form curled up in his lap. "I took care of the rest of you, I've had lots of practice."

"You've always done a good job."

Zack finally looked up into her eyes, his own being a bit questioning. He wasn't sure if this meant they were on speaking terms again, but he truly hoped so. "I never thought so, but I must have done something right. Look how you turned out."

Brin blushed slightly, he was trying to score points so she would stop hating him. He could be an insensitive jerk at many times, but he could also turn on a dime and become the biggest sweetheart. She was one of the few people who had been fortunate enough to see that side of him.

Max looked down at them from above, feeling a little better now that they were talking again. It was hard to see their family split up like it had been. True, she hadn't been Zack's biggest fan for a while, but she eventually had to forgive him. It was impossible to hate him for long, he had done so much for them in the past.

She had never felt more alone than she did right now. She didn't have control over anything anymore. Dix was dead and Mole was missing, they had been two people she had greatly depended on for help. She had been on bad terms with Zack, Jondy and Alec were focusing more on each other, Logan wasn't here, and now Brin would probably become good friends with Zack again and spend more time with him like she had before. Not to mention that Luke was hurting too much over his best friend's death to be of much help and Sate wanted to take over Terminal City. If she was honest with herself, she realized that there really wasn't much now that she could do to stop it if Sate did try to take over the city.

It felt like the whole world was slowly crashing down around her. She didn't even have control over White and Ray anymore. For all she knew, the Coming would be starting any day now and there would be nothing she could do about it. Feeling completely helpless was something that was new to Max, she had always had some level of control in the past. It was so frustrating to have nothing to do but watch the struggle and hope things came out in your favor.

Brin looked up and saw Max standing alone, arms crossed and head down. She got to her feet and held up a finger to show she would be back in a minute, then walked over to her sister.

"What's up, little sis?"

"I'm just tired."

"Why don't you go home and sleep?"

"I didn't mean tired like that, I just meant I'm tired of everything. I'm tired of fighting, I'm tired of losing our people, and I'm tired of being hated by people that just over a month ago liked me or at least tolerated me. You know, maybe I'll take your suggestion and go home and get some rest. I usually don't need it, but I think I'm burning low on fuel lately."

Brin patted her shoulder. "Give me a second to say goodbye to Zack and I'll come with you."

Max shook her head fervently. "No, you and Zack really need to get on track again. You two were really good friends before, you need to work on getting that back. Besides, I'd rather be alone tonight."

"Where will I sleep?"

"I'm sure Zack would let you have your old bed back at the house you were staying at."

"Yeah, he probably would. Are you sure you'll be okay?"

Max forced a smile. "Don't worry, I won't self-destruct or anything while you're not watching over me. I'll be fine, you go on."

Brin sighed and gave her sister a hug, then walked back down to Zack. Max ran a hand back through her long hair and walked out the door.

Zack looked up as Max left, then turned to Brin who had taken her place next to him again. "Is she alright?"

"She'll be fine, she's just a little worn out."

He nodded understandingly, then slowly got to his feet. "I suppose I should head back home. I guess until Luke finds a place for her to stay, she'll be staying with me. There's plenty of room at the house and I'm sure Sandeman won't mind cooking for one more."

"How about two more?"

Zack looked up in surprise. "Does that mean you're moving back in?"

She smiled. "You'd better believe it."

He returned the smile. "Let's go then."

Kay walked out the front doors of the Seattle Times Building, covering Ray's eyes so he didn't see what was left of Mole's body. There was already a large group of people around him even though it wasn't even dawn, but thankfully they were all too preoccupied with him to see the two people slipping away in the car that no one had bothered to question the presence of.

Poking her head out the window as she pulled away, Kay could see Ames climbing down the side of the building, making sure he was just out of sight of the group of people. He was going slower than usual, but Kay knew Zack hadn't been taking very good care of him. She knew he would still get down and go to the cult, which was what she wanted. The problem was that he also knew Ray hadn't died at the initiation and he would later find out that Ray hadn't died here either. After all, there was no body. That would lead him to her, he knew she had been looking for them. That just gave her more problems.

The car was left to sit on a deserted street a couple blocks away from a shabby, old apartment building. Ray was nearly asleep in Kay's arms as she walked, so she just tried to walk as carefully as possible so she didn't wake him up. Glancing at the list of occupants down on the first floor, Kay headed up to the third floor by way of the stairs. She didn't trust elevators these days.

They finally reached the door she wanted. Knocking gently enough so she wouldn't disturb Ray but loudly enough so she knew the apartment's lone occupant would hear her, she waited for the door to be answered. When the door opened, she could see the surprised look on his face at who his visitor was.

"We need your help."

Brin sat down on her old bed, feeling happy to be back. She had liked this house when Zack found it, it was just nice to be able to lay down here again. She could hear Zack putting Chelsea to sleep in the next room. Sandeman's eyes had lit up at seeing the little girl. She may not have been normal-looking, but she was still just a little girl. Brin flopped back and spread out her legs so she took up the whole bed. She raised her head to see Zack standing in the doorway, an uncharacteristic grin on his face.

"The second you get a big enough bed, you have to work harder to fill up every inch of it, don't you?"

She grinned back at him. "Yeah, that's pretty much how it works. What can I say, I'm a bed hog."

He chuckled and came in to sit down on the edge of her bed. She didn't move an inch, so he didn't have much room. The look on her face let him know she was being funny, not trying to push him away.

"Are things okay again?"

Brin sighed and sat up. "I'm still a little mad about some stuff, but you can't really do anything about that. I guess things are pretty much back to normal."

He smiled gently. "Good." He leaned forward and pulled her into a hug, he'd been dying to feel close to someone after being kept so separate. Then he pulled back and gave her a quick kiss on the forehead. "Goodnight."

"Goodnight." Brin offered a little wave as he walked out of the room, then lay down and fell asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow.

Sate gazed out at the street from his house. It had felt good to use his abilities like that earlier, it was like going out for a walk after weeks of laying down. The only thing he'd been able to use his telekinesis for lately was making the salt-shaker come to him from across the room because he forgot to bring it to the table. That didn't exactly keep his skills honed to perfection. Still, they worked pretty well for not having been used in a while. Not to mention the fact that it had been fun to watch those idiots run around to escape their flying furniture.

He liked the plan Kay had given him, it would be interesting to be able to scare the shit out of all the people here that he hated and not get in trouble for it. He didn't like anyone in Terminal City, not even the psy-ops. They had turned to him because they had no one else, but even they didn't realize that he wasn't like them. He was different from everyone here. That was something they'd find out soon enough.