Free Fall (Pyramid of Gold) Chapter 28: Reflections

And now things were weird. We were friends. We were making music together, hanging out together, talking for hours. Talking to her made feel nice, made the hatred go away. I smiled, content to just be near her. She did too. But there was this wall of awkwardness between us, an invisible barrier keeping us apart. We both knew it was there, and tried to pretend not to notice.

It sucked.

She was seeing Sam now, and it sucked even worse. Sleeping with him, probably. He was often around, smug and handso. I was friendly. I was smiling, and listening to all the interesting things he was talking about, asking questions in proper places. I was also fantasizing about ripping his head off at the sa ti, but hey, no one's perfect.

This was one part of my life. The guys, the band, philosophical debates in the university cafeteria.

The other part of my life was much less blissful, and much more deadly.

#

I was stalking Tanya Duncan.

I was smart about it. I learned how to from the PA.

It all started the next day after the party. I was on my way to et Mickey, holding my phone in one hand, a string of angry ssages shining in the chat window of his special app.

'WTF man where are you?!!'

'She's in the car!'

'Where r u fuckface?!'

'Fuck Matt answer '

'I'm going w/out u, shit'

And then, an hour later, soti around the ti Nelly was calmly letting know that she'll kill if I keep bothering Claire.

'Matthew, buddy, WHY THE FUCK ARE YOU NOT ANSWERING ?'

'You know that, forget that, prick. I'm fine flying solo.'

'Actually, I'm like real life fucking Jas Bond.'

'Shaun Connery, not this new asshole.'

'I tracked her to her house.'

'It's a nice house.'

'Fucking answer goddammit'

'Fuck'

At that point, I was ho and turned my phone on.

'I'm here.'

'Where the fuck were you?!'

'Long story. Any sign of Zero?'

'No.'

'We need to think. Let's et tomorrow, at the diner, 9:00AM.'

And then it was tomorrow, 8:30AM, and I was walking to the diner after dropping off Ted's car at his place.

That was when I felt soone watching . It was a strange feeling, sohow... muddy. Weak. A second later, it was gone. I stopped, frowning, then continued walking. I thought: 'It was probably nothing. Weird.' Then I thought: 'But what if it wasn't?'

I was strangely calm. My mind didn't start racing; instead, things ca into focus. Fact: I felt like soone was watching . Possibilities:

A stranger for so reason stared at for a second.

I imagined the whole thing.

It's the Disease, I'm losing my mind, and I'm going to die soon.

Soone is following .

I reached into my pocket and touched the Rubik's cube hidden in it, then left it there. My paranoia was ringing the bell, pushing to consider possibility D. I continued walking, looking relaxed, nothing out of the ordinary. But really, I was looking around, tuning the reflexive properties of different things around to see for three hundred and sixty degrees. My mind was like an octopus, with invisible tentacles reaching into shop-windows, shooting into the shiny cars driving past, brushing sunglasses of pedestrians walking towards . Changing the reflections to see what's behind . The strain of it was enough to tax my mind, but I also had to look into the reflections, perceive everything, compile it into a comprehensible picture, and spot a person spying on ... if they existed.

My head had begun killing in thirty seconds.

I walked. I bought myself a cup of coffee at a street cart. I stopped and pretended to look sothing up on my phone. All the ti studying the morning crowd, every face, every gesture, near , a block behind , two blocks behind . Where are you? Who are you? Mitchel? One of his goons? The Protector herself?

... April, Abby, Alex?

I was almost ready to give up when I noticed sothing. A face that for so reason caught my attention. It belonged to a woman in a grey trench-coat, busy looking, brown hair. How do I know her?

I continued walking, thinking. It was 8:45, and I was almost to the diner where Mickey was supposed to et . Who was that woman? Why did she caught my eye?

I reached the diner, looked in the windows, and kept walking.

The woman was still behind .

Now that I knew who I was looking for, I could release most of the Affects I was holding in my mind. The relief of it made exhale sharply, alleviated. But it wasn't ti to relax yet.

I reached the end of the block and turned. Ten seconds later, the woman made the sa turn. Two blocks later, she was still following . I crossed the street and walked on its other side. The woman continued on, trailing from across the road. I made another turn, walked a bit and stopped, pretending to fiddle with my phone. For a while, nothing happened. Than she appeared from around the corner, made a few steps and looked at the shop-window displaying brightly colored mannequins dressed in expensive clothes.

Holy shit. Fuck .

How was she doing that? How was she spying on without my Ability sensing it? Who was she?

I opened the app and wrote:

'Change of plans. I think I'm being followed, can't risk a eting. Stay low.'

After that, I walked for a couple of hours, aimlessly turning left and right, slowly approaching the lakeside. The woman was still there, always a block or two back, inconspicuous, calm. Sotis she would disappear, only to show up again in ten or twenty minutes, sotis wearing a different wig or clothes. It didn't take long to realize that she had a partner, a balding man with thin lips and dark eyes, with whom she would alternate. There was probably a third mber of their team, following unseen in a car.

Soon, two things beca apparent.

First, I realized why my Ability wasn't able to sense them. I understood it after watching the woman carefully for a while. She was never looking directly at , like any person would. Her head was always turned away, this way or that, with hanging sowhere on periphery of her vision. Her attention must have been unfocused, too. The man did the sa. I've never heard of anything like this. Doing it must have required so serious ntal training. If it weren't for that one slip, two seconds of focused intent aid my way, I would have never noticed them.

It was ingenious.

After that, the second thing ca easy. They knew how to trick my Ability, which ant that they knew what I was. As soon as I realized it, I was finally able to place the woman. She and I had t before. Well, more like walked pass each other, in the hospital lobby, near the forr PA facility that was now a pile of cinders. It was almost a year ago, but I was obsessive about observing my surroundings to the point of paranoia, and good at rembering faces.

That's why my subconscious had noticed her in the crowd of pedestrians. It knew what she was.

She was a Protector. The PA was watching .

I accepted this fact calmly. It made sense, really. They knew that Zero might try to contact , otherwise why show the photo? And now that he had allegedly attacked them, they must have been in a rush to strike back. So they put a tail on .

They showed the photo to Mickey, too.

I wrote:

'Being followed for sure. It's the PA. I think they're watching you too. Act normal. Don't go near Tanya Duncan.'

One minute later, he responded.

'WHY ARE THEY FOLLOWING US?'

'Looking for Zero? Don't panic. They don't know that we know, let's keep it that way.'

'... What do we do?'

'For now, just watch.'