I glare at him, ready to force him to tell me everything when Mallory tugs on my arm and I know that even if my own conscience is faulty, hers isn’t. I slowly drop my arm and gesture to the door. “I’ll let you get help, but you need to tell me the truth first.”
Jackson cocks an eyebrow and nods wearily. “Guess I owe you that.”
I know what it’ll do to her, and I already think I know the answer, but I need to hear him say it out loud so Mallory will understand. My heart is in my throat, veins pulsing as I take a breath and look down at Mallory’s sunburned face. It’s her I’m speaking to, even if Jackson is the one who will answer. “My brother is in trouble, isn’t he?”
My eyes don’t leave Mallory’s face. Her eyes widen, then she looks to Jackson for an explanation. I’m not looking at him, I’m trying to hold back the pain that’s flowing around my body. My chest is constricted, throat growing tighter with every second of confusion that grows on Mallory’s face.
Jackson’s voice is weak when he confirms what I’ve known since I got Drew’s coded message. “2B is on lockdown. They’ve sealed the entrances and posted G guards. No supplies are allowed in. No food, no water. Considering the G made an official announcement by way of drone, it’ll be chaos inside.”
Fear is close to taking hold because if they are inside, then I’m powerless.
Mallory’s mouth slackens and she grips my hand and wrist so tightly her fingernails dig into my skin. “They did that because we left?”
I don’t answer. Jackson does. “They did it because they can. They were looking for an excuse and you gave them one.” Jackson pushes off the wall and flinches. His hand is now saturated with blood and his lips are tinged blue. “I’m not sorry I pushed you out Cristan. You needed to see they still own you even though you ran. They knew where you were. They never stopped watching you, they just let the rope out a little longer, letting you think you were free, but you knew that already, didn’t you?” He sways a little and looks like he’s two seconds away from passing out. “We have a chance here. A chance I’ve been waiting for since I saw some of what they did to you and found you and your brother in 2B. No one else has the skill set or inside knowledge you have.”
He takes a step closer and I almost find myself admiring the sheer grit and willpower it must be taking for him to stay upright, let alone continue speaking. There’s passion in what he believes, something I can relate to. Even if I hate what he’s done, even if he knows the extent of what I’ve been through and who I really am, what I’m trying to hide.
I sigh and put the gun away, and with a wistful look at Mallory, I know that because of her, because of what they are continuing to do to kids like we were, kids that deserve more than a penned life like an animal in the old Zoo, I’m in this whether I want to be or not. I pull my fingers away from Mallory and give her a shallow smile. “Can you help me get him up the stairs?”
Her returning smile speaks volumes of her uncertainty, and I doubt she can support much of his weight but she stands ready, as though waiting for me to show her what to do. I place an arm under Jackson’s armpit and heft him roughly upwards. He swears at me and I grit my teeth as Mallory takes the other side.
I keep my voice low as we painfully drag him out of the room. “You got me out because you wanted a war.”
Jackson doesn’t deny it, and I’m grateful he doesn’t try to explain away his actions or justify them. He just nods and mutters so Mallory doesn’t hear. “I needed a weapon, bro. One who hates the G as much as I do. One who’ll do whatever it takes.”
I have never hated someone more. In one selfish, thoughtless, self-serving action, Jackson Stone, criminal, outcast, and Irrelevant rebel, just started a war he expects me to win for him.
As I drag him upstairs, I know what he expects me to do. And to save my brother, and to keep Mallory out of harm’s way, I’ll have to do it. I’ll have to do the one thing I promised myself I’d never do. I’ll have to leave Mallory out here, I’ll have to leave Jed in the Unit, and I’ll have to return to the new city.
Mallory.
I know I’m not doing much to help assist Jackson up the stairs. My muscles are trembling, and I’m breathing rapidly. Sweat starts to trickle down my face and I have to blink it away. Anger is still curling around me, but it’s hard to stay angry when I’m more confused about what’s going on.
We pause at the top of the steps for Jackson to rest, and I almost cringe at the amount of blood leaching out of his chest. The metallic stench of blood is cloying and makes my stomach turn. I clamp my lips together and try not to think about the part I played in Jackson’s injury.
Cristan drags him up the next flight of stairs, and blood continues to splatter down the stairs. This time I do gag and Jackson’s eyes meet mine. His brows knit together and he sends me what I think is an apologetic look.
“If you’re going to hang around with him, you’re going to have to get used to this sort of thing,” he mumbles.
I don’t understand what he means, but I’m more worried about Cristan than Jackson so I push it to one side as we reach the top of the stairwell, breathless and sweating.
Cristan’s voice is rough as he gestures for me to open the door. “Go ahead to the clinic room where the shower is. I’ll meet you there.”
His eyes meet mine. I don’t move. Instinct makes me freeze. He’s keeping something from me. Something bad that he’s afraid will upset me, but I have no time to question him when Jackson groans and slumps against Cristan, breaking his gaze. He grips Jackson by the shirt front and his eyes find mine again. There are too many emotions crossing over his face for me to track them all.
I open the door and come face to face with Kit and Trey. Her cheeks are pink like she’s embarrassed. I don’t care why they were standing in the hallway, so I back up so they can see Jackson and Cristan behind me.
Kit is the first to react, she curses as Jackson grins weakly at Trey. “Take me to the med bay before I pass out.”
Trey doesn’t say anything to Cristan or to me, he just sets his jaw and wrenches Jackson off down the hall with Cristan so they are dragging Jackson’s sagging body between them.
I turn to follow but Kit takes my arm, preventing me from moving. Her eyebrows are raised, and her fingers are gripping me so tightly I frown at her and tug my arm away. “I need to go,” I say.
She shakes her head and moves so she’s blocking my path. “What happened?”
Desperation and panic start to override my desire to be peaceful. I edge away so I can step around her. “Let me pass.”
The anger doesn’t dissipate, it only grows with each second that passes. I move to follow Cristan and she doesn’t stop me this time. I pick up my feet, trying not to look at the blood all the way down the hallway. I hear Kit’s clipped footsteps behind me. She doesn’t say anything as we enter the med bay and find Jackson sprawled out on the table.
Cristan is pacing, his fingers linked behind his back, blood smeared on his shirt. He’s sweating so much; his hair is wet and his shirt is clinging to him. I ignore the activity going on, and the hurried instructions Kit gives Trey, and stand in Cristan’s path so he’s forced to see me.
His head snaps up and he halts. He releases his hands and lets them hang loose at his sides. “Are you okay?” There’s something unspoken in the question that makes anxiety curl into my aching body.
I nod and hop up on the bench while Kit orders Trey about and tends Jackson’s chest wound with all the practised ease of a trained Relevant in the hospital. Cristan takes a seat alongside me and places his arm around my waist and leans in close.
“I’m going back to the control room and see what else I can find out.” He takes my hand and draws it closer to him so it’s resting on his leg. He runs his fingers over my knuckles so tenderly my throat thickens. “Jed won’t last long inside the Unit. Even if Drew can keep things under control, he’s sick and he depends on the meds the G sends in. You know that, right?”
I swallow
hard and blink away the tears that threaten. I have no solutions, no idea of how I can help, so I stay quiet. He releases a breath and looks over at where Jackson is lying, now seemingly under medication to make him sleep. I look away as Kit starts to take a needle to his chest the way I saw our housekeeper do to Constance’s tunic when she ripped it.
Nausea swells in my stomach, so I keep my eyes locked on Cristan’s as he laces his fingers into mine. “They want to make sure everyone knows their place. They want to make sure no one ever challenges them. It keeps us compliant, but it’s no way to live, under the illusion that we’re free.” His voice raises a little higher, but his eyes stay on our fingers as he strokes my skin. “I thought I was getting away from them, but all I did was delay the inevitable.” He looks up and his other hand tightens around my waist. “I’ve been hiding, but I can’t anymore.” A tiny part of my heart starts to break. He’s trying to prepare me. “I ran because you gave me something to run for. Now you and Jed have given me something to fight for. And I won’t stop fighting ‘til you and I can be together.”
I dig my fingernails into my palms. I bite down on my lip, but none of it distracts me from what I know will come.
Not today. Maybe not tomorrow, but soon. He’ll leave me. And I’ll be right back where I started from. Alone. Scared and completely dependent on someone else for my survival. I swallow back the rising panic. For him, I want to be stronger than I am. For him, I want to be able to stand when I’d rather fall.
“I’ll be okay,” I hear myself say.
Chapter 7
Mallory.
Faint lights spark in my vision. The distant sound of a nervous laugh. The smell of the alcohol they rub on my arm makes my body tense. I know that pleading won’t work. I know because it never stopped the green-eyed man before. His face is hidden. But it’s his eyes, his icy touch, his voice that haunts my dreams. I come to consciousness with a choked scream, my breath coming in rapidly, my fingers hooked into the sheets, and my hairline soaked with perspiration.
Cristan rubs at his eyes and blinks as the lighting in our cramped little room hums to life. He pulls me into him and I allow him to smother the fear that comes night after night. Now that the behaviour modification medication is completely gone from my body, each day that dawns seems to bring with it a new painful memory. What the doctors did to me. What my parents allowed, what they hoped would cure my Irrelevance and save them the humiliation I would bring them.
He holds me so tightly, I’m crushed against the hard muscle of his chest. Rather than add to my discomfort, the feeling of pressure and being held soothes away the trauma. He’s like a security blanket made of muscle, bone, flesh, and warmth. I squeeze my eyes together and hold fast to the one person in the world who understands what I’ve gone through.
We don’t speak of the scars his dragon tattoo hides. We don’t speak about what will happen when Jackson is awake. We don’t talk about anything that will steal the time we have together. When I’m calmer, I pull away from Cristan and offer him a weak smile and apology in one garbled breath.
His voice is still husky with sleep. “Don’t apologise. Not to me.” His lips tug downwards as though he’s reluctant to leave our bed. I hear his bones clunk and pop as he moves. He flinches, though he tries to hide his pain from me. “I’m going back to the control room. I don’t care what Trey or Jackson say. There must be a way to make contact. I just need to find it.”
My nightmare fades at the hesitance in his voice. He doesn’t want me going to the basement again. He told me he doesn’t want me to see the blood stains on the floor. I know he wants to protect me, but he also must know he can’t always be there for me. I clear my throat so I can make myself heard since we’ve been repeating the same conversation over the last two days.
“Please don’t tell me I won’t understand, or that you work best alone. I want to be where you are.”
He eyes me with an expression indistinguishable from the worry I see each time I’ve woken from a night terror. I try to tell him that Kit and Trey will be asleep still, that Jackson will be too, but he slumps down on the bed and leans over to pull his boots on so his back is towards me.
I don’t want to argue again so I sigh and peel myself from the bed and find my own boots to wear. My soles are still tender, but the blisters are healing and the pain is almost gone from the rest of my burned skin. I don’t need to look at my arms to know they’re no longer red, but a shade darker than they were before.
He stalks to the door and my heart starts to speed. I don’t want to wait in here. I don’t want to wait until Kit comes to find me. Cristan pauses and slowly turns, his lips tug into a smile. “You coming?” I nearly skip to him and smile up at him as he reaches for my hand. We only let go of each other when heat touches his cheeks and he gestures to the ablution stalls past the old clinic. “Back in two.”
I hide my own embarrassment and head in the opposite direction so I can wash my face and try to scrub my teeth with the odd dental cleaning Kit left for me. I pull open the door and head towards the small stall with a hand basin and a mirror overhead. I run the water and peer at my reflection in the mirror. My nose is peeling so I pick at it until my eyes water.
With a sigh, I wash my face and pick up the elongated stick with tiny brushes on the end. I squeeze a tiny amount of the minty paste the way Kit showed me and try to clean my teeth. It’s such a foreign idea, like most of what I experience out here. She tells me that the government decided to put fluoride into all our food, and enforcing monthly dental scrubs, and a high powered twice daily water flossing system did away with the need for brushing.
I don’t know if that’s true. I just know I like the taste of the gritty paste and the way it makes my mouth feel clean. I use the organic waste toilet and wash my hands again and check my reflection one last time. My hair is lank and knotted, but there is nothing to be done save cutting it, so I ignore it and hurry back out to meet Cristan.
He’s waiting, leaning against the wall, his hands jammed in the pockets of his tan trousers. He looks up with another smile and pulls his hands out of his pockets. “We’ll get something to eat after everyone is awake.”
I nod and follow him to the door that leads to the basement stairs. Unlike the last time we went looking, Jackson knows Cristan is using the control room to look for a way to contact his brother. My legs are a little less shaky as we descend but I’m still struggling to climb the ladder to the rooftops. If it weren’t the only place I can see the stunning coloured lights that illuminate the night sky, I’d probably not bother.
Cristan is a few steps ahead of me, but his eyes are almost constantly on me as I hold on to the handrail to steady myself. I’ve never done much physical exertion, and manual labour is for Relevants listed six and under, so I’ve never had to consider that I might someday need a body that was strong.
He pauses at the bottom of the stairs, one hand on the door handle, as he waits for me. I hear faint noises coming from above us and release a sigh. If Kit and Trey are up this early, it can only mean Jackson is. Which means they’ll be joining us.
Cristan cocks an eyebrow and looks upwards. He shrugs and opens the door. “Maybe they’ll leave us alone for a bit?”
We both know they won’t, but I walk into the control room for the first time in two days. As I walk across to the console, I try my best not to look at the blood stain, that I feel partially responsible for causing.
Cristan.
I take a seat at the desk and yawn as I punch in the access code I need. Between worrying about how Jed’s doing and Mallory’s nightmares, I don’t think I’ve had more than five hours sleep in forty-eight hours. All my muscles ache. My joints feel inflamed and my throat is tickling like I’m getting sick. I shake it off and hope that if Trey and Kit appear they’ll at least bring us something with caffeine in it.
I stretch my back out and try not to flinch. Mallory sends me a weary smile and pulls her chair alongside mine. As nice as it is having her w
ith me, I do work better alone, but I’m not about to shoo her out. I still have the gun on me and until she can protect herself, I’m not leaving her upstairs any more than I have to.
I focus on snatching a few minutes of unmonitored time on their server and start stripping back the firewalls and protection put in by whoever built the system. Mallory thinks I’m looking for a way to contact Jed. And I am. But I’m also looking for information on Jackson, Kit, and Trey. They still aren’t talking about who else is out here and I’m running out of time. Jackson is still recovering in his room. Despite Kit fixing him up, he still looks like death warmed up and he’s too weak to stand, let alone help me formulate a plan that works for everyone.
If I have to leave, I need to know Mallory will be safe here with them. I can’t just get up and walk away not knowing how this place runs. I still haven’t seen anyone else, but I know there are others out here. I know it because there are storage containers filled with water that must have come from somewhere close by. I haven’t had the chance to climb the roof in the daytime, but next chance I get I’ll scope the area with Trey’s old binoculars and see if I can find anything. Until then, until I know what numbers we’re dealing with, I’ll look for everything and anything I can that might prove useful.
I’ve hacked back into the G server and scroll through screeds and screeds of useless documents about the infrastructure of the old Zoo where Jackson has based himself. The structure itself is a lot bigger than I realised. There are plans for walkways, compounds, and housing, which makes no sense considering this was supposed to house animals. The more information I find, the more I start to see this was meant to be more than a refuge and housing place for animals. How it ended up only being that, I’m not sure. As soon as Jackson is up and about, I’ll ask him directly and demand he stops hiding everything from me.
Irreverent: Young Adult Dystopian Romance (The Relevance Series Book 2) Page 8
