Robert Crane - Untouched

I stared up at the lightbulb above me as my eyes started to shut. They squinted as I tried to force them open one last time, but it didn’t work. I saw the light and it distorted and glared, reminding me of the rising flame in the darkness that was Aleksandr Gavrikov, hovering above me like what the sun must look like, lighting up everything around.

I closed my eyes, and he was there, on fire, just like all the times I had seen him but one. The flames flickered where his skin should have been, an inferno in place of flesh. I could almost smell the burning, taste the ash that should have been in the air. He edged closer to me but there was no heat, and for a bare moment I couldn’t figure it out, then I did. “Dreamwalking,” I whispered.

He floated closer, and I watched the fire recede from his hands, from his face. His dark hair appeared, then his nose and eyes. He looked less pallid than he had when I’d seen him in real life, and the world around us coalesced into my old room. Fire crawled up the walls, slowly burning around us as his feet touched the ground. The silence consumed me like the flames, surrounded me. He stood in front of me, staring into my eyes. “You said you would help me.”

I felt the burn of his almost accusatory stare. “I was trying to save your life.” I looked away, walked a few feet in the other direction, as though placing distance between us could absolve me of my promise. “Not to mention the lives of the others.”

His voice came back to me, cold and empty. “Did you tell them? Do they know what I want?”

“I did.” I turned back to him. “They’re not going to release her. They think you’re a dire threat.”

I saw the haunting in his eyes, the guilt in his face. “I am a dire threat. I am more than that. I am death; more death than they can handle.”

I didn’t blink away from him as he said it, but a part of it hit home. “Sounds familiar. I don’t think they’re going to just give her up on your say so, though.”

He took a deep breath, in and out, closed his eyes and smiled. “Then I’ll convince them. I’m in Glencoe. It’s only about fifteen minutes west of you. Tell them to come and see me and we’ll talk.”

Something about how he said it raised the little hairs on the back of my neck. “You just want to talk? Why do I doubt that?”

“I have a message for them,” he said with an icy calm. “Tell them. I’ll be waiting in the middle of town. Bring as many of their men as they’d like.”

I felt a chill of fear. “I don’t love the way you’re saying that.”

He burst into flames again, his brown eyes replaced by soulless, dancing fire. “Tell them. Tell them to come to me. I’ll be waiting.” He remained afire, but dimmed in my sight until he was gone, replaced by the light over my bed.

Less than an hour later I was cruising west along a highway with Zack and Kurt. In front and behind us were vans, one filled with agents and the other carrying M-Squad. It was early evening, the sun was already down and a bitter cold had followed with the darkness. The thermometer on the rearview mirror said that it was already -4 degrees and I had to guess it was falling. We had streaked through a small town already and now there were snowy fields to either side as we chugged along the highway. I could see the lights of another town in the distance, and as we drew closer the car slowed.

“He said he’s waiting there for us?” Kurt looked back at me, nerves plain on the older man’s pudgy face.

“Yeah. You scared?” I didn’t put much venom into it, but I didn’t need to. His gave me a nasty look anyway.

“If you’re not, you’re stupid.” He turned forward again. “In case you missed it, he burned your damned hand off.”

“I can see why you’re worried; that’d be a fatal blow to your sex life.”

I heard the seething noise he made in the front seat, but he didn’t turn back around. Zack let out a soft chuckle and when Kurt turned on him, he said, “What? It was funny.”

We turned off the main highway at an intersection. After passing a few cross streets, we turned left onto the main street of the town. There was a bank across from a flower shop and a jewelry store. It looked idyllic as we pulled into the empty parallel parking spaces. I stepped out onto the curb, over the small mountain of accumulated snow, onto the sidewalk.

I felt my breath catch in my throat. My coat was buttoned, my hands were covered with gloves, but I could still feel the frigid air creeping in. I felt like I was going to turn to ice. I looked down the sidewalk, but it was empty, the streetlights shedding the only illumination. There was not another running car in sight. Agents exited the van behind us, their weapons concealed under heavy coats. Clary stretched as he got out of the vehicle in front of us, Parks and Kappler joining him as Bastian walked around from the driver’s side.

The agents huddled around Bastian, who didn’t order anyone to come over to him; they just did it automatically. I watched and nudged my way into the circle next to Zack as Roberto started to speak. “We’re gonna sweep Main Street. If you find him, do not engage. Keep eyes on target and maintain a healthy distance.” I watched him touch his ear and realized he had some kind of miniature microphone in it. I looked around the circle and saw the others with the same and felt a little irritation that I hadn’t been offered one. “We’re sticking with the same strategy. This guy can kill any of you faster than you can pull a trigger, so Clary is our point man when we find the target.”

They were all so focused, they didn’t notice a familiar (to me, anyway) figure step out of an alley across the street. “Uh, guys?” I felt the pressure of so many sets of eyeballs lock onto me, but I kept watching Gavrikov as he stepped onto the road, heading toward us. “I have eyes on target,” I said, prompting them all to swivel.

“Scatter!” Bastian’s words echoed through the night as Gavrikov burst into flames in the middle of the street and shot twenty feet into the air. Three fireballs lanced out from his hand and destroyed the front van in an explosion that sent me to my knees. He sent another blast at the jewelry store behind us, a bigger one that caused the storefront to burst into flames.

Zack was huddled behind the car, along with Kurt. One agent was down after the explosion of the van and I couldn’t tell from where I was whether he was hurt badly or not. Disregarding most of my good sense, I stuck my head up over the top of the car and yelled to Aleksandr. “Is this the message you wanted to send?”

“Hardly,” came back his reply. “That was to get your attention. You have two minutes to get back in your cars and leave this town. After that, you have until tomorrow morning at six A.M. to bring Klementina to me at the top of the IDS tower in Minneapolis. After that…” He let his voice trail off and even from where I was behind the car, I could see a smile. “Well…you’ll see in two minutes. Let us call this town…a warning. For what will happen if you don’t deliver.”

I heard Bastian scream behind me. “Back in the cars! Move out!”

I ignored the frenzied action around me and focused on Gavrikov. “Aleksandr…this isn’t the way.”

He drifted to the ground as the first van shot out of its parking place. Agents were hanging from the side and I looked back to see the one still left on the sidewalk. He was not moving. I heard Zack shout my name from the car. His hand extended toward me, fingers dangling in the air between us. Kurt was struggling with him, trying to pull him into the vehicle. One of the agents in the back punched Zack in the back of the head and he crumpled forward, slumping against the dashboard as the car pulled away, slinging snow and mud.