And that's when I knew I was in trouble. That's when I knew why I hadn't been thrown into the Dream by Allison.
It was because they wanted me in that office.
I spun and flung myself for the nearby window, only for someone to trip me. Scribe was on me in an instant, a band of cloth around my throat. Bright flashes snapped to life in front of my eyes as I struggled to breathe, driving my elbow back for him as the opposite hand clawed at the thing cutting off my air supply. I kicked and squirmed, managing to pull it down enough to draw air into my lungs, but only for a second.
He readjusted the band and choked me again. Of all the things I could cope with, survive through, fight back against; the body can only hold on to oxygen so long. The few superheroes I'd met who didn't need to breathe were almost entirely aquatic beings who still needed water to drag through their gills. Everything that survives on oxygen can only live without it for a precious little time.
And mine was running out.
I threw us onto our backs as the darkness crowded into my vision. A kick snapped his ankle. He roared but didn't let go. I caught him with an elbow across the ribs, feeling one crunch, but it wasn't enough. Being a Blitzer wasn't enough.
I didn't know what I was doing; not really. I only knew the general idea of it. I wrenched into his mind and found the anger, the despair inside it. There, I twisted it like a screwdriver and forced agony and sorrow to build until it was impossible to control. With a sob, he tore away from me and the world popped back into view.
Allison pulled herself up from the chair, no longer bound. She reached toward me but I was already on my feet and running. The Dream threatened to drag me back in. I grabbed a globe from the corner of Scribe's office, cursing myself for thinking I could do this alone. Then I slung the heavy ornament through the nearby window, said a silent prayer, and leapt out into the air beyond and out of Scribe's reach.
For the moment.
Chapter 17
I didn't stick the landing.
Thankfully, I didn't have to.
Chris, alias Starseer, snatched me from the air, minus the usual gore show we got with Adam these days. He plopped me down in front of the others, all of which were in their civilian clothes and rather mutinous as a whole. Edwin grabbed me the second I was on my feet and I was dogpiled by the rest of my men.
Nishelle stood back, shaking her head, "What the fuck, Strikes."
"I was just trying to help," I squeaked out. "Guys, I'm fine. More or less."
Adam gave me a sniff. "You smell like smoke."
"Well, that's because he decided to electrify some of the floors. No big deal. Probably comes natural to him now that he's a Zap or whatever." I brushed myself off and withdrew from them. "Besides. We've got way bigger problems than me being a little charred."
"Like you needing to sit this one out?" James asked, pulling a bit of fried hair from my head.
I yanked away from him, too. "Like hell. I'm the only one who knows how and where and why and what is going on up there. All those important things that all of you need to know to stay safe."
"Kind of what we all assumed you'd say," Adam sighed. "What's up?"
And in the minutes that followed, I outlined everything for them. The electrical panels, the fact that the elevators weren't working, that Allison was still a massive threat to our general health, the suchlike. I'd barely finished when I felt the first nudge of the Dream starting to encroach upon our consciousnesses.
"Everyone take a deep breath and pinch your arm or bite your tongue. Allison's trying to pull us in," I said, voice shivering.
I wasn't up to protecting us from the Dream again, but that didn't matter. I was going to do what I had to do to save them. I'd given them everything I knew, told them what they had to know to get to Scribe; what else could I do to make sure that the mission succeeded?
The Dream came upon us, a never-ending wave of black loneliness that separated the world into fragments. I was trapped, alone, in a void that I could not escape from. Was this what death was, at its core? A one-way door that didn't let anyone else through with you? I shivered and kept concentrating, hoping that I could keep my connections with the others. I wasn't an experienced Psychic.
But you didn't have to be to defeat the Dream.
It was the newer charges that were so hard to connect with. James was a cousin of mine and I'd known him longest of their five, but it was still difficult to keep a hold on him. My mental image of Lexi, Izzy, and my lovers were so much better. I could feel Adam straining against the confines he was kept in, knew that Nishelle was burning everything to pieces around her.
The frustrating thing as that I still couldn't reach them. Why? My mind ticked off options. It couldn't be so simple as knowing that I could. Confidence effected a great deal of a Psychic's powers, even more so than most superheroes. It meant that they- we! could be interrupted in our abilities if we were told that we couldn't, that we were unable to
