by Caryn Lix
Rune’s fists spasmed at her sides. She took a step forward, scowling up at him. “Your murderers?” she whispered, disbelief lacing her tone. “Is that how you think of us? Think of me?”
For the first time, a shadow of doubt crossed his face. “Rune, I . . . It’s more than just vengeance. It’s better this way. I need to get you off this ship.”
“And into prison.”
He shrugged. “You are criminals.”
She moved so fast I didn’t see it coming, her fist flying at his face.
In the same heartbeat, Matt caught her hand in his. She trembled, arm extended, fist enclosed in his grasp, their faces inches apart. For a long moment they just stared at each other. Then Rune jerked away, shaking her hand as if he’d contaminated it with his touch. For just a second Matt stared at her with something like regret in his eyes, but it vanished so quickly I might have imagined it.
Reed reached out to Rune, pulling her back to join him and Imani. They flanked her, staying close, glaring at Matt with more fury than I’d thought either of them possessed.
“Matt,” Cage said, “come on. We never would have left you if we’d thought you were alive. Never. You know that. You know us.”
“It doesn’t matter.” He leveled the gun in our direction. “This is my life now. Even if I wanted to turn my back on Omnistellar, I couldn’t. You have no idea, no idea, what I owe them. So you’re all coming with me.”
Jasper’s eyes narrowed. “From what I’ve gathered, your power is sensing people. That, your sword, and your gun against the whole lot of us? I don’t envy your chances, even with some new fun healing abilities thrown in.”
“Did you think I told you my story for fun?” Matt arched an eyebrow, and for a moment I saw the old him in his face: determined, dryly amused, kind. Then it vanished. “I was waiting.”
“Waiting for what?” I demanded.
But as soon as I said it, footsteps echoed behind us. We spun to find Priya and the man with the chipped tooth, Hallam, advancing, a small Asian woman at their side. Spinning, we saw another hunter behind Matt, a man in his forties with a shaved head. He, too, had a stun gun aimed right at us.
In the narrow corridor with hunters on either side, we were completely and utterly trapped.
Arrival. Imminence. Completion of one thread only to unravel it and follow it back in on itself. One thread becomes many.
Voices.
Sound.
Cacophony.
Silence.
They do not drift.
They hunt.
TWENTY-SEVEN
AGAINST MATT, WE’D STOOD A chance. Against all five bounty hunters, clearly anomalies themselves, we were helpless. It took us about thirty seconds to arrive at that conclusion before we surrendered.
They snapped cuffs on us to inhibit our powers and marched us through Obsidian, past the curious and hostile glares of the criminals assembled in the halls, back to the docking ring, back to their ship. Alexei’s uncle Grigori waited by the airlock, and Alexei lunged at him so hard it took Hallam and Matt together to restrain him, even with his arms cuffed behind his back. “You said we had twelve hours until Omnistellar arrived,” he seethed in Russian.
Grigori’s impassive features distorted into a rage to match his nephew’s. “And you betrayed your family,” he spit in English, making sure we all understood. “Besides, I didn’t lie. Omnistellar is still several hours away.” He inclined his head to Priya. “Legion finds their quarry again.”
She snorted. “Don’t bandy words with me, old man. I work for Omnistellar. I’m not interested in friendly chitchat with criminals.” She spun to the others. As she did, the sleeve of her jacket pulled back, revealing a glint of metal. My mouth dropped open. She followed my gaze and smiled faintly. “What, you thought we were just anomalies? Omnistellar doesn’t take risks. Legion is the best of the best.” She pushed up her sleeve, revealing a glistening cybernetic arm. I hadn’t ever seen tech like that before; hadn’t even been aware it existed. But now Matt’s words echoed in my mind: steel into my spine An Omnistellar metal soldier. Not hyperbole, then.
Priya snapped her fingers to get our attention. “Take it as a sign, huh? There’s no point fighting us, and no point resisting. Be good boys and girls and relax in your cells until we rendezvous with Omnistellar.”
The docking ring lurched to the side so hard I staggered, barely catching myself before I went over. Imani crashed into me, and I steadied her as best I could without hands. A hint of a gasp escaped her before she clenched her lips, obviously determined to stay strong in front of our captors.
“What the hell was that?” I demanded.
Grigori must have had the same question, because he was already striding away from us, one hand raised to his face as he snarled into his wrist comm. Over the nervous babble in the docking ring, I couldn’t hear anything he said.
Priya shrugged. “Doesn’t matter to us. We’re out of here as soon as we’re cleared for takeoff. Stow the baggage and let’s get moving.”
My mind raced frantically as they shoved us into their ship, leading us toward the holding cells. “Bian, Finn,” Priya said, addressing the Asian woman and the bald man, “ready the ship and get clearance from Obsidian.”
“Understood,” Finn replied in a gruff voice tinged with a British accent. Bian only nodded.
“Contact Omnistellar and let them know we’re en route. Hallam and Matt will take care of the prisoners.”
Priya didn’t say what she was going to do, and no one asked. My mother would have garnered the same respect from her crew. I looked at Priya with new eyes, seeing not a bloodthirsty bounty hunter, but a woman fiercely dedicated to her job and her corporation.
Which meant, maybe, she could be reasoned with.
Or maybe she had the same undying loyalty to Omnistellar as my family.
I wouldn’t get a chance to find out now, though. Hallam and Matt took us to the brig, shoving Imani, Rune, and me into the first cell. “Listen,” I pleaded. “Matt. You’ve seen the aliens. You know what they’re like, what they can do. Omnistellar is luring them in, using them to get new tech. If those things show up here—”
Hallam rapped on the bars of my cell, a smirk on his face. “I think the entire combined might of Earth’s corporations might have a little more success against your aliens than a station full of unarmed teenagers, sweetheart. No offense.”
But something flickered on Matt’s face, something like terror. Then he glared at me like I was responsible for the feeling, shook his head, and loaded the others into the remaining cells: Cage and Alexei in the second, Mia, Jasper, and Reed in the third. Mia hissed and snapped her teeth at Matt, aiming for his jugular, but he sidestepped her easily and shoved her into the cell with such force she bounced off the rear wall.
“Easy, brother,” said Hallam, clearly surprised.
Alexei’s face settled into a neutral, almost pleasant expression. “You will pay for that,” he promised.
Matt snorted. “Take your best shot,” he invited. “My teeth are reinforced steel. So is my spine. I have a crew of superpowered bounty hunters behind me. And apparently, I’m immortal. What do you think you’re going to do against that?”
“Matt, please.” I approached the bars. He spun on me, his expression anything but friendly, but I didn’t let myself back down. This mess was my fault. I was the one who’d pulled the trigger. If I could only make him understand . . . “Please,” I repeated. “You have to listen. You can’t really think I wanted to kill you.”
For a split second, his face gentled before returning to its now-characteristic scowl. “I know you didn’t. I don’t even blame you for that, Kenzie. What I blame you for, what I blame Cage for, is leaving me behind. Leaving me to face Omnistellar by myself.”
“We thought you were dead!”
“You saw Sanctuary explode!” he shouted, inches from my face. Instinctively, I recoiled. Imani was at my side in a heartbeat, grabbing my shoulders and pulling me bac
k. “You knew damn well what caused that to happen! You were the one who told me about it, Kenzie. One escape pod, triggering the self-destruct mechanism. You saw it, and you didn’t come back for me.”
“Matt!” Rune’s volume matched his, making everyone jump. “We didn’t know. It didn’t even occur to us! We thought the station took too much damage, maybe the aliens caused irreparable harm. We never even suspected—”
“Of course you didn’t.” Was it my imagination, or did his voice soften just the tiniest bit when he turned to her? “As far as you knew, I’d been torn to shreds by alien monsters. And you didn’t know anything about the escape pod. Kenzie and Cage, on the other hand . . .”
Hallam cleared his throat. “All right, brother. This is all well and good and fascinating, but we have other jobs to do.” He pointed a finger in our direction. “If you’re smart, you’ll settle in. This ship’s a bit bouncy on takeoff.”
For a moment I thought Matt would argue. But then he shook his head as if we weren’t worth it, and the two men left us alone in the cells.
Silence reigned. I risked raising my head. Rune and Imani had retreated and sat on the bench on the far side of the cell, staring at me. Alexei glared at Cage. Reed and Jasper only looked confused, but Mia glowered at me with intense hatred. I was suddenly very, very glad she wasn’t in my cell.
Slowly, Cage rose from where he’d slumped against the wall. “All right. We’d better talk about this.”
“About what?” Mia demanded. “About how Kenzie killed Matt and lied to cover it up? Exactly what is there to say?”
Cage sighed, raking his fingers through his hair. “It was my call, Mia. I was the one who suggested we hide what happened.”
I cast him a look of gratitude. I still hadn’t forgiven him for leaving me twisting on the end of my hook earlier. We were supposed to be in this together. We’d lied together. We’d hidden the truth. And then when they called us on it, he’d abandoned me.
But he was back now. Maybe it had just been the shock of discovery, of Matt being alive? My relationship with Cage, if you could even call it that, was so new. We’d only known each other a few weeks. How could I anticipate what he’d do? Did I even really know who he was?
I examined him, looking for signs of manipulation, of lies. But all I saw was the same Cage I’d known on Sanctuary: tough, charismatic, a bit weary. He raised his hand, forestalling Mia’s objection. “If it happened yesterday, we would have told you the truth,” he said, biting off every word. “But back then, not one of you trusted Kenzie, especially you, Mia. If I’d told you what happened, you’d have gone for her throat, just like you did in the hallway.”
“What did happen?” Rune asked softly. All the anger seemed to drain out of her and she slumped over her knees, looking more exhausted than I’d ever seen her, even on the alien ship when we’d spent full nights fighting the AI to direct it where we chose.
Our eyes met, and I winced. Rune was angry. She was every bit as angry as I’d feared she would be; she was just showing it in a different manner. But I knew her well enough by now to read her emotions, to see the betrayal in her gaze. Next to her, Imani watched me with suspicion. She hadn’t known Matt, though, and couldn’t have the same investment in the situation as the others. I drew a deep breath. “The alien jumped down the stairwell,” I said. As the words passed my lips, I relived every horrifying moment: the creature’s scream as it lunged, Matt’s answering yell, the clatter of claws, Cage’s panicked calls for me to shoot. “I . . . I’ve never been much of a shot, but it was hurting Matt. Killing him, I thought.” Unless I was wrong? Was it merely paralyzing him, planning to put him in stasis with the others? “I had the gun,” I said, and my voice locked in my throat. My mouth formed words, but no sound emerged, my vocal cords catching and tangling into knots.
“I yelled for her to shoot,” Cage filled in quietly, his gaze locked on Mia’s. “Before that thing tore Matt to pieces.”
I drew strength from the support, from the reminder I wasn’t alone in this. “I pulled the trigger,” I managed, struggling to keep my voice steady. “I still don’t know what happened next, whether it moved at the last second or I just missed. But Matt went down, and the alien chased us.” I nodded at Rune. “Then you electrified the floor and killed it. When we returned to Matt, we realized what had happened.”
“And I pulled him into sector four and told Kenzie to lie about it,” Cage interrupted, his voice strong and clear. How did he sound so confident in this situation?
Jasper scowled. “The worst thing about all of this is you’re not even sorry, are you? You’d do it again in a heartbeat.”
We all turned to Cage, even me. I had no idea how he’d answer.
For a moment he seemed to consider it, meeting each of our eyes in turn. Then: “Yes,” he said. “You’re right. If it meant saving Kenzie’s life, and maybe all of yours, if it meant stopping you from killing each other when we had a horde of alien creatures on our tails, then yes. I would tell you a thousand lies if it meant getting you to safety.” He sighed, some of his confidence draining away. “But that doesn’t mean I’m not sorry.”
Silence met his pronouncement. I risked glancing at the others. Rune closed her eyes and clenched her hands at her sides. Imani and Reed looked somewhat sympathetic, and even Alexei, Jasper, and Mia’s hostility deflated a bit. I examined Cage again, torn between admiration and fear. I’d noticed on Sanctuary how easily he manipulated a crowd. It was only recently that it had occurred to me to wonder if he did the same to me.
But he gave me a tired smile, and all the artifice I’d seen in him slid away, leaving only the boy who’d fought by my side against the aliens. “Hate me if you must,” he said. “But leave Kenzie out of it. You don’t know what she’s put herself through since she pulled that trigger, how many times she’s tried to convince me we should tell you the truth. This is on me.”
Alexei laughed humorlessly. “But that’s the problem,” he said, his accent a bit thicker than usual. “Do you not understand that? The lying is the problem.”
“Lex,” I pleaded, “I wanted to tell you the truth. I did. But I couldn’t know how you’d react.”
“You mean you didn’t trust me.” He gave me a sad smile and I opened my mouth to argue, but then shut it again. Because he was right. I hadn’t trusted them. Cage had started the lie, and I’d tried to convince him to tell the truth a few times. But had I really wanted to succeed? Or did I just want Cage to talk me out of it? The reality was, I hadn’t trusted the others. I thought I knew what was best for them. But now, staring at Alexei, I realized what a high-handed and presumptuous choice that had been.
Alexei heaved a sigh. “Cage,” he said quietly. “Three years together in that cell, and you still lied to me.”
“Yes, I did.” Cage glanced at each of us in turn. “Maybe I underestimated you. Maybe the stress of the situation got to me. I just knew we couldn’t afford any more conflict, not when we’d barely escaped Sanctuary. I made the best decision I could at the time, and I won’t apologize for it.”
Rune drew close to the bars, slumped in sadness. “You always do this, gege,” she said, not at all unkindly. “You take the weight of the world on your shoulders and make decisions for everyone else. Don’t you think it’s time you trusted all of us, trusted Kenzie, a little bit more? We can make our own choices. We don’t need you to do it for us.”
Cage’s eyes flew open in surprise. I didn’t think his sister had ever spoken to him like that before. For once, he was at a loss for words.
And before he could find them, alarms rocked the ship.
TWENTY-EIGHT
WE SHOT TO THE FRONTS of our cells, arguments forgotten. The alarm was deafening for the thirty seconds it echoed through the enclosed space. When it finally stilled, I didn’t know whether I should be terrified or relieved. “Did something go wrong?” I asked.
Beside me, Imani murmured a prayer and drew herself to her feet, her eyes flashing as she scann
ed the room. “They said it’d be a rough takeoff, but the ship hasn’t moved. Has it?”
We all glanced at Reed, who shook his head. “No,” he said. “I know ships. This one is still docked. There wasn’t any of the drift that comes with takeoff on a model like this.”
A long silence lingered, and then Mia cursed loudly. “All right,” she said. “Imani. You got a safety pin in that hijab of yours?”
“What? Yes, I—”
“I need it.”
Imani’s eyes narrowed. “For what?”
“To pick the lock on these cuffs.” She rattled her hands. “They’re an older model. Actual locks. With my hands in front of me, I could do it no problem. With my hands behind my back, it might be more of a challenge. Just be glad they’re not the mitten models they used on Mars.”
“And then what?” Imani demanded. “You’ll still be trapped in these cells.”
“Yes, but they didn’t turn on the power dampeners when they brought us in. Don’t want to affect their own abilities, I’m guessing. That means the only thing inhibiting our powers is these cuffs, and I’m not going to pick my own,” Mia explained patiently. “I’m going to free Jasper.”
It took a second for us to catch her meaning, but when we did, a collective gasp went around the room. Without another word, Imani dropped to her knees. “See if you can get the pin free,” she instructed.
“I’ll do my best.” I turned my back to her and stretched out my fingers. Imani wiggled into place, settling her chin in my hands. I winced, groping for the pin, terrified I was going to jab her in the eye or something. But it went smoothly, the pin popping open in my hands. I even managed to leave her hijab relatively undisturbed.
