Collide by Christine Fonseca Page A

. .” I can’t bring myself to finish the sentence.
    “David’s fine. We’d have sensed if he was taken or worse.”
    I’m not so sure.
    We walk back around the house and my skin erupts in chills. Duck! The word boomerangs through me. Without another thought, I flatten myself to the ground, taking Josh with me.
    “What the—”
    “Shh,” I say. Or maybe I only think it.
    A series of loud bangs shatter the space around us as bullets slice the air.
    “We have to get out of here.” Josh pulls me into the fields behind the house.

 
     
     
     
     

     
     
    MORE SHOTS RING OUT AROUND US . Acting on instinct, I imagine us both enveloped in a bullet-proof armor.
    “They went into the fields. I think they’re headed for the woods, sir. There.” The words are too loud behind us. Too close.
    “Proceed with caution,” says a voice that sounds like it’s coming from the other end of a walkie-talkie.
    Footsteps crunch the dry corn behind us. We move quickly through fields until we reach the edge of a thick forest. Tall trees covered in moss darken the sky. I pull Josh close to me and we press ourselves against the largest of the trees.
    My finger to my lips, I motion for complete silence. My eyes roll back and I imagine ourselves disappearing into the tree, untraceable, almost as though we’d somehow concocted Harry Potter’s invisibility cloak. I hold my breath, staring at Josh. He’s envisioning a shield, same as me. My brain flashes to other moments when I’ve “disappeared”—the time at school when I wanted to sneak out with David, my arrival at the hospital, just after my “episode”, when the staff tried to inject me with some mind-numbing drug and one other time during my childhood.
    The memory is clear now. I’m in the lab with the others. Mom and Dad instruct the group, asking us to utilize both our supernatural abilities and our understanding of warfare. We had practiced making ourselves appear as the landscape around the lab, fading into the background at will. A smile creeps over my face for only a moment as I remember Josh’s skill and the games of hide and seek we used to play.
    Josh squeezes my fingers. Armed assailants enter the woods. They’re directly in front of us, inches away. I push myself into the tree and my arms tremble. They’ll find us here for certain, capture us. Maybe even kill us. I take a slight breath, desperate to stay hidden against the tree. My eyes water with fear as Josh grinds his teeth. We stare at the assailants and wait.
    Endlessly.
    “Have you found them?” The rough voice clicks over the walkie-talkie, startling me. I suck in a sharp but silent breath, afraid and focused at the same time.
    “No, sir. They’ve . . .”
    “They’ve what?”
    The man with the gun swallows hard. Sweat trickles down his temples; fear pulses through his cells. I sense it all.
    “They disappeared, sir.”
    Josh tightens his grip on my hand.
    “You fool! They’re hiding.” Anger breathes from every word.
    “Not possible, sir. We’ve checked—”
    “Shoot into the woods. Burn down the forest if you have to. Whatever it takes. Just end this.”
    I stare at Josh, watching the color drain from his face, knowing the same is happening to me.
    Don’t panic , Josh whispers into my thoughts.
    Impossible.
    The assailant motions to his minions. Bullets fly in every direction. I slam my eyes closed, waiting for the death that comes. Josh yanks my arms and pulls me deeper into the woods. I look over my shoulder. The first man with a gun falls, blood splattering in every direction. One by one the other gunmen fall, their faces locked in an expression on shock.
    I pull back on Josh and force him to stop. “Look,” I say as I nod toward the carnage. “What’s happening?”
    Josh stops, stunned.
    More assailants fall, each sliced by invisible weapons or suffocated by unseen hands.
    “No way,” Josh whispers as a slow, mischievous smile replaces the concern on his face.