Shutdown (Glitch)

what they would be going through over the next few days.
    These people were only the beginning. I slowly pulled my energy back into myself and then let go of Markan’s hand. I thought I’d feel an extreme exhaustion as soon as I lost connection with him, but to my surprise, I felt fine. It was as if the power I used while connected to him sapped only as much strength as it did when I was on my own in my normal smaller sphere of control.
    I blinked my eyes open. Henk and Markan were both watching me.
    “It’s begun,” I said. I grabbed Markan’s hand again. Henk turned back to his controls and we lifted off the ground and flew out of the wide bay. Saminsa’s bright blue shield vibrated in front of us as we approached the perimeter.
    Henk spoke into his arm com. “Release it, Saminsa.”
    The blue orb suddenly exploded outward, dissipating as it went. There were no more transports in range, so everyone still in the building would be safe for the several moments it took us to fly up and out of the compound.
    *   *   *
    For the next three hours we covered the entire country, all of Sector Six. By the end, I’d crushed at least a hundred million pre-adult V-chips, maybe more.
    “More incoming,” Henk shouted from the driver’s seat. A loud beeping filled the transport as another missile that had been fired at us came into our air space. We’d been fielding them almost incessantly since we took off.
    Henk swore loudly. “This one’s a nuke. Mother of god.”
    In spite of the fact that I’d been fielding missiles for the last few hours, my heart still jumped into my throat. With the previous missiles, I’d just detonated them by ramming them against each other, into the ocean, or into the ground in secluded areas. When Adrien had told me his vision, I’d balked, saying surely no one would be foolish enough to release a nuke, no matter what. But here we were, flying over a huge metropolis no less, with nukes headed toward us. I was infinitely glad Adrien had made us bring Lundris along.
    “It’s coming on fast, Zoe,” Henk shouted. “Tell me you’ve got it.”
    I abandoned my control over the subjects in the city below and gripped Markan’s hand tight as I surrounded the nuke instead and gently slowed its momentum, bringing it to a stop right outside the back hull.
    “Two more are in range now,” Henk said.
    I reached and plucked them out of the air as well. “Got them.” I held them completely still in the air, feeling along the contours of their long, cold shells with repulsion. “Open the back hatch,” I called to Henk, then stood, dragging Markan along behind me and signaling to Lundris.
    “You know what you have to do?” I asked the towheaded boy. He nodded. Henk had brought the transport to a hovering standstill as the back hatch opened. It was surreal to see the deadly warheads bobbing mere feet away from us.
    I took Lundris’s hand as well, and lifted all three of us up off the floor of the plane, flying through the air so we could get close enough to the nuke to touch it. The wind was calm today, and since we were hovering still, there was only a cold breeze tugging at our tunics. Markan’s eyes went wide as he took a quick look down at the empty air below us. Then he squeezed his eyes shut hard.
    Lundris was calmer. His gaze was focused only on the nuke in front of us. I held my breath as he reached out his thin fingers toward the metal casing. I winced when he made contact, but nothing happened. I’d known in my head a simple touch wouldn’t be enough to detonate them, but still …
    Then, before my eyes, the gleaming metal turned to solid gray stone. Lundris could manipulate the molecular structure of any object he touched. And he’d just turned a deadly warhead into a warhead-shaped lump of rock. He repeated the procedure with the other two, then I sent them to rest gently on the ground a thousand feet below.
    When we got back in the transport, I marched up to the front where Henk was sitting. “Who launched the nuke?” I asked, my voice cold. An icy fury swept through me that anyone would risk the kind of destruction a nuclear weapon promised.
    “Sector Five, looks like.”
    I sat back down. “Then we’ll be heading to Sector Five next. We’ll shut down the V-chips in every country that has nuclear capability first.”
    Henk looked back at me, a frown on his face. “That’s six out of the eight worldwide Sectors.”
    I met his eyes with a steely gaze. “We