Page 123 of Junk Magic

The Corps has procedures for searches, as with most other things. And while the majority of the mages had run for the lab, the supposed source of the disturbance, half of the rest were fanning out to check the doors along the hall. While the remainder stayed by the stairs, blocking the way out.

Somebody was listening in training, I thought grimly.

And then I thought, what’s that?

On the wall beside the stairs was a pad. It was blinking, I guessed because some of the war mages had opened a few of the empty rooms to check if anyone was hiding inside. The little device didn’t like that, and was blinking a message: SHUT ALL DOORS?

I stared at it, and then got a hand between the metal side of the stairs and the concrete block wall, because I knew that pad. There was one like it at HQ on the lower levels of the prison wing. It acted as a way for guards to shut the place down in an instant in case of a break out, because wards were great and all, but a steel door was still a steel door. And redundancy was a wonderful thing.

But the rescue squad hadn’t used it, because the doors were already secured.

But what closes things down also opens them up, right?

I decided to test a theory.

Of course, a mage took that moment to step in front of it, half obscuring the screen. His coat was inches from my outstretched fingers, but he wasn’t looking at me. He was staring down the hall toward the lab and there was nothing in this direction to redirect his gaze—as long as I didn’t screw this up.

And I didn’t. I stretched, calmly, quickly, and silently, and passed the key card through the scanner attached to the monitor. I held my breath and waited for the screen to change and give me some options.

The screen did not change.

I gave it a second, then tried again, thinking that maybe I’d wobbled a little and it hadn’t gotten a good read. But the result was the same. It seemed that Igor didn’t have high enough clearance to do me any good, and that was bad.

That was very bad, because people were starting to come back this way, having not found anything in the lab but a couple of fresh bodies. Something that was likely to make them trigger happy, and with this many mages crowded into a small space, they’d spot us in seconds. Not to mention that talking my way out of a problem had never been my strong suit, especially with somebody’s blood still dripping down my chin—

I felt a tug on my sleeve and looked back to see Jack mouthing: “Let me try.”

I didn’t know what the hell he thought he could do, but I was out of ideas. We switched places, slowly so as not to attract attention, and he reached out. But not all the way because he didn’t need to. A tiny filament of electricity arced from his fingertip to the pad, reminding me of the lightning storm that had briefly broken over Wolf Head, lighting up the night—

And then things suddenly got a lot more interesting.

The pad burnt out in a suddenly flame, doors clanged open simultaneously all along the hall; someone screamed a warning, and blue, green and lavender shields bloomed everywhere, so closely packed together in the limited space that I didn’t see how anything could get in between them.

Anything managed.

To be more precise, the things in the cells managed, with the corridor suddenly awash in fur and fangs and scales and claws. Not to mention spells slamming everywhere, one of which melted a section of the stair railing right over our heads. I jerked Jack back from the dripping metal, as screeches, roars and the sibilant sound of a massive snake broke out in the formerly quiet space.

And then the sound of bodies being thrown everywhere, as all the things rushed for the stairs.

But we were there first. I climbed onto Jack’s back and he went running upward, right through the middle of two mages who hardly reacted, because they were too bust reacting to whatever was headed their way. I had half a second to see wide eyes and hastily reinforced shields, and then we were past, and we were moving.

“Should’ve gone out for track,” I said, although it sounded more like sh-sh-sh-should’ve, because that’s how fast he was taking the stairs.

Jack laughed, and while it was a little high pitched and a little manic, I’d take it. He wasn’t the kind of kid who broke down in a crisis. Which was good, because we still had one.

“Hold it!” I told him, and we paused to use the key card on another door. And then to hide behind it as more mages thundered down to join the search.

I got a better look at them this time, through another tiny window, and they weren’t dark. They were Corpsmen, as familiar to me as the wards down here, with their shiny service pins winking on the front of their coats like badges of honor. But that was just it—I didn’t know who was honorable, and just happened to be assigned to the upper levels of Frankenstein’s lab, and who might be another Igor.

And in the shape that I was in, if I guessed wrong, it was game over.

So, as soon as they’d passed, we ran out behind them and kept climbing—and climbing, and climbing. The little room I’d woken up in turned out to have been a grand total of twelve stories below ground. Which was why Jack was panting and cursing under his breath by the time we finally reached a floor with no more stairs going up.

“Careful,” I mouthed at him. He didn’t answer. He probably couldn’t, as he was mostly concentrating on sucking in air. But his expression lightened when I unlocked the door on the last landing and carefully cracked it open . . .

Onto a desert vista with the sun just beginning to peek over the horizon.

I felt the wind in my hair and the pinkish rays of a new morning on my face as we stepped out onto the top of a small, two-story building. It was plain concrete block and looked to be part of an abandoned mine, with several corrugated tin outbuildings and some rusted mining equipment scattered around. That probably meant that we weren’t all that close to Vegas, which was a problem if I couldn’t find a vehicle to hotwire.

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