My head lolls to the other side, and the world spins with it. I clench my eyes shut, but no time passes when I open them again. I am fully awake but in tremendous pain.
And in mid-air.
Suddenly, everything slides into focus, and I see where I am: high above the ground, my legs dangling from the swing. I stop letting my legs kick out of instinct, forcing myself to calm down. My hands aren’t tied, but that doesn’t stop the fear clutching my throat. A metal bar stretches across my lap, holding me in the thin leather seat. It connects to the two chains on the front, and when my knee hits it, it moves up.
I look around wildly, and ice courses through my veins at what I see. A person is in a swing a few dozen seats away, directly across from me on the other side of the pole in the center. I recognize him despite his being slumped over, his head curled into his chest. A single, dried line of blood runs from his forehead down his nose.
Xavier is hurt, and there is no metal bar securing him to his seat.
“Don’t I remember your saying you loved the swings, Emma?” Dragon shouts from far below me. “Or was it that you hated them?”
I look down to see him standing in a box just outside the metal bars of the ride’s barrier. A control panel sits in front of him, and the wireframe that once held a canopy to cover the operator is now bare, so I can see straight down to him. His toothy grin is wider now, and the light bounces off it.
“Let him go,” I shout down to him.
“Poor choice of words, Emma,” Dragon replies and presses a button. Lights suddenly fill the ride, and I squint against them.
“Bring us back down, or I swear to God…” I begin.
“What? You swear what? What good are your promises anyway?” he screams, spittle falling from his lips and resting on his chin. He doesn’t even wipe it away as he speaks. “What do you know about power?”
His other hand holds a phone, and he presses his thumb into the screen. When he does, lights flood the entire area of the park. I can see for dozens of yards beyond the swings.
“I know about power,” Dragon continues. “Like electricity, it flows through me. It’s funny. This old place was abandoned for a long, long time. Yet all I needed to do was make one phone call. Just one, and poof.”
Another press on the screen of the phone, and the lights of the swings come on. Music begins to play, and in the distance, the wheel comes alive, spinning with no seats. A ride for no one but the breeze.
Across from me, I hear Xavier stir, and I snap my head over to him.
“Don’t move, Xavier. Stay where you are. I am going to get you out of this,” I call over. “Just don’t move.”
“Okay, Emma,” he mutters weakly.
“Power, power, power,” Dragon grumbles below me, and I turn back to him. “People fear me, Emma. They fear my power. Fear is better than respect, you know. Big shot agent you are, you know about respect. But respect means nothing. People can respect you and still disobey you. But fear? When people fear you, they do as they are told. And on the rare occasions when they do not...”
He lets his threat trail off. His hand floats to a switch, and he flips it as he stares up at me. I feel my body jerk, and the sound of the motor comes to life in the pole. The swings begin to move.
“Xavier, hold on to the chains,” I shout back at my friend.
“I can’t!” he calls. “My hands…”
I move my gaze to where his hands are clenched between his legs. They are tied with a thick rope. There seems to be another rope tied around his elbows as well, the other end running down below the swing.
“Oh, God.”
“Sometimes,” Dragon continues below, “you have to teach people to obey. Like a dog.”
The swings turn and gain speed. Xavier starts to slide as the swings’ movement pulls them up parallel with the ground. He looks back at me with eyes that have no fear, no worry. Just resignation. This is the world as it is, right now. Maybe for the rest of his life.
“Shut it down,” I cry out to Dragon. “You don’t have the power you think you do. You still owe The Order. They will collect. So will the FBI. You can’t outrun everyone.”
As I spin, I can hear the echo of his laughter encircling me. Xavier is slipping inch by inch, and my mind is racing to figure out how to stop his slide.
“The debt to The Order is paid!” Dragon screams. “And my power doesn’t stop at the doors of the law, Emma. I have friends everywhere.”
Xavier cries out from across from me, and I look over to him, a scream filling my own throat. His body tumbles out of the seat, and the rope that holds him around his arms slips up nearly to his shoulders. I see the way it is tied in a noose above his back. The way he is spinning on the swings, all it will take is for him to slip further and further down, and the noose will tighten around his neck.
“Xavier, don’t panic!” I cry out. “Try to stay calm!”
His eyes are rolling around as if he is taking in everything one last time. His lips move as he mutters to himself. I can’t make out the words, but it seems as if he is doing a math equation.
“Too bad about Xavier Renton,” Dragon calls from below. “So distraught by his inevitable return to prison that he came to a place he used to spend time, found his favorite ride, and took his own life.”
My eyes make contact with Xavier’s, and
