A Brutal Justice

by Jess Corban

  The Center for Health Services towers above the cobbled streets like a watchful defender. The gray of early dawn still mutes the fiery orange flame vine covering a dozen arches at the entrance, but now that it’s light enough to see our feet plainly, I’m anxious to get inside.

  We keep low, moving quickly through the lush vegetation circling the building. The front entrance is all but deserted, guarded by only two Alexia who converse with a Center worker, likely coming in for the day. Even at this distance, I recognize the older woman’s tall frame, wiry silver bun, and narrow-rimmed glasses perched on her thick nose: that’s Dr. Novak. Under different circumstances, I’d rush to her side to thank her for saving my mother’s life. Instead, I hope she keeps the guards occupied long enough for us to reach the hidden door leading to the passageway she showed me the last time I was here.

  Getting the Brutes gracefully through the wall of shrubs between us and our entrance without snapping every second twig proves challenging. Almost as difficult as wiggling the door open without it screeching. At least it hasn’t rusted shut since my shoulder’s last frantic encounter with it.

  We file into the narrow corridor and ease the door closed.

  “Alright,” I begin again. “This passageway should be clear. But once we enter the eighth floor, the clock will start ticking as soon as we’re seen. There shouldn’t be many Center workers at this hour, but we can count on plenty of Alexia. If anyone sees us, we have to assume Teera and Adoni will get wind of it as qui—” The rest of the words trickle out sour as star fruit. “As quick as a phone call.” A phone call. I picture Ciela’s back through the square pane of an office window, phone pressed to her ear. How long afterward did Teera intercept me and Mother?

  I think I might be sick.

  “You okay?” Bri asks.

  Ciela? Could she have betrayed us? There was a time I wouldn’t have put it past her, but . . . our last conversation—I thought we were finally putting our petty sibling quarrels behind us.

  “Reina?” Rohan nudges my foot. “You alright?”

  I shake the image away, hoping the suspicion will disappear with it. Right now, we have other priorities.

  “It’s nothing. Let’s go.”

  I take in the group one more time, hoping we haven’t forgotten anything. The Brutes’ many blades glint in the light cast by a single electric bulb. I’m sure they carry just as many I can’t see. Bri and I opted for our Alexia uniforms and weapons, to try to blend in with the guards. And Jase insisted Neechi—

  “Wait—where’s Neechi?” I ask, suddenly very aware of his absence.

  Heads turn and shoulders shrug, but Neechi is absolutely, terrifyingly missing.

  “Who saw him last?” Galion asks.

  There’s a lot of murmuring, mentally retracing our steps through Phoenix City’s back alleys and shadowed streets in the hour before dawn. But the last time anyone actually remembers seeing him was the moment we left the reeds outside Finca del Mar.

  My stomach twists in terror.

  “You’ve got to be kidding me,” Bri moans.

  Théo’s gold eyes grow somber. “Maybe he finally ran out of courage.”

  I glare at him in disbelief. I wouldn’t blame Neechi if he was tired of risking his life, but I know him better than that. He wouldn’t leave without telling me. Would he?

  I plead with Torvus. “We have to go back. If he got caught . . .” Then I’ll lose him like I lost Tre, I don’t dare finish.

  Rohan turns my shoulders to face him. “We’ll find him, Rei,” he says earnestly. “But we can’t go back. We’re not going to have any leverage until we do this, here. Think with your sense, not with your heart.”

  I know he means well, but I want to punch something. I’m angry with myself for losing Neechi, and . . . and because I know Rohan is right. If Neechi has been caught, storming Finca del Mar to rescue him would be as stupid as the Brutes’ earlier plan.

  So I set my jaw and say, “Then let’s create some leverage.”

  The hidden door to the eighth-floor medical room cracks open with a groan. A sliver of hallway light spills under the office door on the far end. Even in the dark, the space makes me shudder. Mother might be alive, but the horror of holding her limp body comes rushing back.

  I force my feet to cross the room, and turn the door’s handle. A quick check reveals a hallway filled only with stark-white tiles. I squint in the sudden brightness.

  “Okay,” I whisper, “coast is clear.”

  Still, I have to take two more deep breaths before I muster the courage to leave our cover. For all I know, I could be leading them into a trap.

  I run through my mental map of the eighth floor—what I remember of it—one more time. There may be a quicker way to get to the room in question, but I’ll have to stick with familiar landmarks so we don’t end up lost in the maze of exam and delivery rooms, offices, and seemingly endless hallways.

  From this office we head for the nursery. I see they’ve already repaired the three-meter glass panes destroyed the last time Teera suspected treason.

  From the nursery we take a right, but just as we pass records, we have to squeeze into an empty exam room to avoid two Alexia guards on the far side of delivery. In the moment we’re waiting, Jem peers strangely at a doctor’s instrument, and Jase canvasses a wall, touching charts and dials. How strange the Brutes look in this setting; how otherworldly this place must seem to them. Only Torvus doesn’t appear curious—just impatient to get moving.

  “Alright,” I whisper, as soon as the hallway clears, “we’re almost there.”

  After one wrong turn in delivery, we reach the life serum clinic, and at the end of the hall, just as I remembered, the glass-walled room that holds the key to our success.

  Except it isn’t empty.

  Ciela stands with her back to us, carefully removing a thin vial from the open bank with gloved hands.

  She startles when I open the door, and the vial drops to the ground, shattering. She whirls on us and, catching sight of her sister and eight Brutes, turns as pale as her creamy-beige lab coat.

  “What are you doing here?” I hiss.

  “I could ask you the same thing,” she says, without taking her eyes from the Brutes crowding the space.

  “Who is this?” Torvus demands.

  “Torvus,” I say, “meet my other sister, Ciela, who is just about to tell me why she betrayed me and Mother.”

  What little color was left in her cheeks drains completely.

  “Rei, please. It’s not what you think . . . I mean, I can explain.”

  I take a step closer, unsheathing my sword and pressing the tip to her chest.

  “Did you call Teera?” I ask slowly, teeth clenched.

  “Yes.”

  I almost run her through right then and there. “Mother could have died!”

  “You think I don’t know?” she says miserably, her chin trembling. “You have no idea what it did to me when Dr. Novak took me to her.”

  “Then why did you do it?”

  “Grandmother said to call her if I saw you or Mother around the Center because she needed to talk to you. I didn’t think . . . Rei, she said I was this close to getting the director position when Mother retired, and—” She breaks off, choking on a sob. “I hate myself for not seeing through her. You have to believe me.”

  I reluctantly lower my sword, and she surprises me with a tight hug.

  “Not to break up the family party,” Dáin says, scanning the hallways outside the two adjoining glass walls, “but didn’t we say time was of the essence here?”

  Ciela glances nervously at my companions. “Are they—?”

  “Brutes, yeah.” I glance at Rohan and can’t help but grin, recalling my first impressions.

  She scans their faces, and her gaze hitches on their weapons. “Mother told me about them, but they’re nothing like I imagined.”

  “She did?”

  “After Dr. Novak staged her death, I hid her at Bella s
o she could recover. When she could talk, she told me everything—what Gentles really are, and that I should help you if you came back. I was mad at first. Do you know how much that information could have sped my research? I understand why she couldn’t, but still, with her help I’ve already nearly isolated testosterone in my samples.”

  “I don’t know if that matters now,” I say, peering behind her at the box, then glancing at Torvus.

  “Why not?” she asks incredulously.

  “Because we’re here to destroy the bank.”

  “The what?”

  “The bank—you know, the thing behind you that helps them make the life serum.” Recognizing how ignorant I sound, I get irritable. That’s all I know, and I’m suddenly keenly aware how little it is.

  She scrunches her nose, humoring me with one raised eyebrow.

  I sigh, exasperated. It’s just so like my sister to enjoy making me feel stupid because she knows so much more than I do or whatever.

  “We’re going to destroy the stuff that lets them make babies, okay? Clear enough for you?”

  This gets her attention. “But . . . why would you want to do that?”

  “I don’t have time to explain. We’re sitting curassows in this room. Mother told you to help me, right? You’re going to have to trust me.” Or be forced to cooperate, I think, but let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.

  She seems to need more reassurance.

  I press, “It’s the only way we know to stop the gentling and keep Grandmother from killing the Brutes. From killing Jonalyn’s own baby.”

  Ciela’s face softens. Though perhaps she’s not completely convinced, I think we have her cooperation.

  “Can we smash it already?” Dáin asks, fingering his club. The other Brutes glance repeatedly out the windows, clearly uneasy with how exposed we are.

  Ciela shields the box with her body. “Hold on.” She draws another vial from the still-open box. “These contain prepared life serum, but only the auxiliary ingredients are stored in this room.”

  “In English, please?” I mutter.

  She rolls her eyes. “If you want to completely eliminate the ability to create life serum, ‘smashing’ this box won’t do it. You need to find the source of this,” she says, removing a tiny glass vial, no longer than a bean.

  “What do you mean, the source? There’s more somewhere?”

  She nods. “This isn’t my department—I’m only here to get some serum to test against . . . that doesn’t matter. It’s my understanding they only store here what they need for, oh, a year’s worth or so of serum.”

  “Okay,” Jase says. “Where’s the rest?”

  “No idea. Only Center leaders have clearance to know the location, but wherever it is, that could be the bank you’re looking for.”

  I squeeze my eyes shut, begging my knees not to give out under me. The room suddenly feels very small and very exposed. I can practically hear a clock ticking in my head. I brought them all here, and now we’re stuck inside a tiny room in a nine-story cube that will sound an alarm if we’re spotted, and we’re no closer to finding the bank than when we left Finca del Mar.

  “Now what?” Bri asks.

  Galion bounces, peering out the windows. “Time to go.” A single Alexia comes into view, spots us, turns and sprints the other direction.

  Every Brute springs into action, hands anxiously grabbing for weapons.

  Torvus asks, “Back to the passageway?”

  “We can’t leave without destroying the serum,” I insist. I turn back to Ciela. “You said Center leaders have access. Mother’s a Center leader.”

  “Who is supposed to be dead. Even if I knew where she was right now, she wouldn’t be able to set foot in the Center, let alone a sensitive area.”

  “Dr. Novak,” I nearly shout. “She’s here. And she helped Mother.”

  Ciela tilts her head, considering. “She’s probably your best chance.”

  “Where would she be?”

  “Her office, most likely. She works more hours than I do. Ninth floor.”

  Before I can think why, I squeeze Ciela in a tight hug. Then we hightail it out of the glass box like curassows fleeing the kitchen, hoping to live another day.

  Ciela hides us in a clinic room a few doors down marked with a number eight. She assures us no one will be using it this early in the day, though as she closes the door behind us, she adds,

  “If anyone does come . . . run?”

  “Super helpful. Thanks.”

  Though none of us are real excited about being packed in a strange room with no windows while the guard alerts Adoni, Teera, and hundreds of Alexia to our presence, we don’t have much choice. Waiting here gives us a better chance of an audience with Dr. Novak than forcing our way upstairs.

  Bri and Jase lean against a wall behind a long exam table, shoulder to shoulder. Galion and Théo peer down at a counter covered with strange metal devices, probably figuring out how to turn them into weapons. Torvus paces, Dáin sulks, Rohan fidgets with the end of a knife, Dantès yawns, Jem twirls a blade between his fingers, and I don’t know if I can take a single minute more in this room when we hear footsteps approach.

  In the time it takes the door handle to turn, all eight Brutes have drawn at least one weapon. They resemble tense Jungle cats, ready to pounce. So when Dr. Novak slips through the doorway, wire-rimmed eyes round as oranges, I can’t really blame her. In fact, I’m proud of her for not fainting, because the absolute shock registering on her face makes it clear Ciela didn’t give her a clue why she dragged her down here.

  My sister shuts the door.

  “You didn’t tell her?” I mouth.

  “I didn’t think she’d come if I did,” she whispers.

  Unbelievable. I’ve always questioned Ciela’s judgment—I mean, who keeps a rooster as a pet?—but I’m starting to seriously doubt her ability to reason.

  “Dr. Novak,” I say quickly, weaving through the Brutes toward her before she can do something rash. “Thank you for coming.”

  “Don’t thank me yet, Dom Pierce.” Her slender body is as rigid as her voice, but I notice her eyes crinkle as she examines the Brutes—her gaze sweeping over their peculiar features, not just their myriad weapons. As a doctor, perhaps she’s better equipped than most with curiosity.

  “I haven’t had a chance to thank you for helping my mother. And me.”

  “You’re welcome. Though if Leda had told me before she was injured what she did with the child, and what she has continued to do since, I might not have been so generous.”

  I’m not entirely sure what Dr. Novak knows, or what she means by “the child,” so I decide to keep my reasoning vague. “She didn’t do any of it for herself. I think you know that—it’s why you trusted her. And I need you to trust me now.”

  She’s listening, and she hasn’t screamed for the Alexia yet, so I press on.

  “Mother has always cared about Gentles because she believes they are people, just like us. She understands that we are the reason they suffer. You may not have known the details of what she was doing, but when you showed us the Gentles clinic during Candidate training, I saw your own conflict.”

  I observe that battle on her face again as she scans the room full of Brutes. “Leda knows I’ve never completely agreed with our treatment of Gentles, but I didn’t realize she was taking them—” She cuts herself short, flustered, and presses her thick lips together. “What do you intend to do?”

  “We need to force Teera—to help Nedé—embrace a better way—” here goes nothing—“by destroying the bank.”

  She gasps. “Did Leda tell you—?”

  “No.” I shake my head for emphasis. “I don’t know what it is, not exactly, but I’ve read Tristan Pierce’s private journal, and I gather it holds the key ingredient Nedé needs to create new lives. If we destroy it, the gentling will have to stop.”

  Her face puckers like she’s been punched. “Yes, but only because there will be no new births. Dest
roying the bank would destroy life completely—set in motion the end of Nedé itself. There’s no way I can allow it.”

  A ten-kilo weight slams into my chest. “But—”

  “I’m sorry, Dom Pierce. I own up to my actions, and I understand why Leda did what she did. Changes need to take place, and I freely admit the road will be difficult. But eliminating all new life? Preposterous.”

  With a dead end looming in our faces, the Brutes instantly grow antsy.

  Jase comes alongside me. “If she’s not going to take us there, we need to get moving before more Alexia arrive. We’ll find another way.”

  “There is no other way, Jase,” I snap.

  Dr. Novak freezes at my words, turning toward us. She peers curiously at Jase. “You’re Leda’s child.”

  “Yes,” he stammers, as confused as I am.

  My mind whirls. “Dr. Novak, how do you know about Jase?”

  She fixes me with an affronted glare. “Because I delivered him.”

  “You what?”

  She sighs. “Leda was to take you to a Materno finca in Kekuatan. Of course, I felt bad for her when, before she could take you, you died.”

  Her final word hangs in the air, and she smiles slightly.

  “I died?” Jase asks. But I’m putting two and two together. Mother told me about faking infants’ deaths that night in the records room.

  Dr. Novak continues. “Only while fighting for her life did she apologize for deceiving me. She explained she had fabricated your death, and the deaths of others, before taking you to the Jungle to live as Brutes with—” She cuts off suddenly and stares at Torvus, as if seeing his presence fill the room for the first time.

  In the ensuing silence, Bri suddenly interjects, “Am I the only one wondering why a Center leader would help some woman hide a baby?”

  Dr. Novak doesn’t shift her gaze from the formidable Brute. “I felt responsible.”

  “Responsible for what?” I ask tentatively, not sure I want to know the answer.

  Dr. Novak takes one step toward him, then another. Galion and Théo edge out of her way as she closes the distance. When she speaks, her voice sounds remote.