Looking around the field, I see my entire group is down. Twin is on twin, healing and helping each other from the ground.
“Kylie,” Jord shouts. “Two defeats?!” I didn’t want to hear it from Luke, and I don’t want to hear it from him. I can’t blow him off, though. “Everyone fallen. That makes you a bad leader.” He marches before me and shouts, “Are you a bad leader, Chief Warrant Officer Kylie?”
“No, sir!” I shout back.
“How is it your group cannot accomplish a single mission? Even after attempting twice?”
Ashamed, I still stand tall. “We will run it again, sir.”
“Do you not think the others are tired of shooting your group down? Tired of watching you fall?” he shouts in my face.
I repeat louder, “We will run it again, sir.”
“Run it again!” He lowers his tone, warning, “And this time, don’t fail.”
This time, don’t fail. Do not fail, Ky. I cannot fail.
“Here,” I yell for my group to fall in. “You all need to switch,” I order hastily, “because clearly this half of your twin is too weak to complete this course.” Only one twin runs the death match; the other sits off to the side in case they need to heal the runner.
They switch vests and clear the field. “Ready?” I shout, balling my fist. There is no reason we cannot complete this course. “If you fail, this will not end, and instead of them coming after you running this course, I will. And I do headshots. It will also be a test to see how fast your twin can make it to you,” I shout at them. “Now spread out for preparation.” They run out to different spots of the field. “Ready,” I inform Jord.
“Begin,” he yells.
Focus Kylie, spot each team member. Five-thousand-square-foot dirt field, scattered with mounds of tires, wooden spools, barrels, and two bunkers. The attackers are hiding around the field, ready to take us out at the blink of an eye. We need to get past them to the other end of the field in order to beat this step.
Frederick and Candace to my left, Alex, Jesail, Joe to my right, and Robert is in front of me. I breathe, and everything slows down as my adrenaline and anger stimulate me. There are six of us and twelve of them.
Someone camouflaged with the dirt leaps from the ground and grabs Candace just after she leaves the starting line. I draw my gun. Two shots—neck and shoulder—and they’re down. Candace is freed, charging through the field. A bullet flies past me. I throw a glimpse over my shoulder, catching Joe lowering his weapon. He took down someone who was on my heels, inches from tackling me to the ground. I give him a nod.
I take off toward Candace, now with two on her. One is around her neck; the other has a gun to her head. At my approach, I hit our foe in her head with the butt of my gun, knocking her to her knees. One shot to her spine. She’s down. Three neutralized.
Throwing an eager glance over my shoulder, I see two of ours down. One can keep going: Alex. I race to him and help him from the ground. “To my back,” I demand as he stands. “Cover me, I’ll cover you!” His back presses against mine, I’m carrying most of his weight, and we make it across the field.
He fires off three shots. Two screams follow. There are seven of our enemies remaining, and five of us. This is good.
I quickly scan the field. My group’s doing a really good job fighting them off, kicking ass before firing two shots to their chests to keep them down.
Behind me, Alex stumbles and falls. I’m hit from the back, and I crash to the dirt. There’s a barrel of a shotgun to my back. One shot. I wait for the pain to set in, but none comes. The body falls on me, and I turn over, pushing it off. To my right, Jesail stands, smiling, offering me her hand.
I snatch her hand and flash a thankful grin as I rise. “Awesome.”
“We are a team. No problem. And just so you know, she was the last one.”
I examine the field. Five of us are standing, and the twelve of them are down. Relief floods me. “Kylie,” Jord demands my attention. “Good.” He stalks to me and speaks low. “Get the other half of your group to be as good as this half. It took less than six minutes for you to complete that.”
“Yes, sir.”
He marches off. The other teams who stood by to watch also leave.
The twins from my team link up. Frederick, who fell, is being healed.
How can one half complete this and the other not complete it at all? Maybe I should’ve threatened the first half. Maybe they would’ve done better. “Fall in,” I yell. Even though we should be done for the day, my team and I will continue. “We will run to the open field. I need to see something.” We jog to the free field that’s about half a mile from this one. “The first group that went through, I want all of you to step forward. Their twins, stand down.” Each of them enters the middle of the field. “Gabriel, you first. You will fight me.”
“No, Ky. I don’t want to fight you,” he says, retreating.
I grit my teeth, biting back the rage growing in me over his cowardly display of weakness. “Your twin and the second group murdered that entire field in less than six minutes. You and your group didn’t come close to finishing.”
“But I don’t want to fight you.” He backs further away with his hands raised in surrender, like I have a gun aimed at his head.
His retraction makes me want to shoot him. “Okay, fight your twin. Candace step forward.”
“Ky,” Gabriel objects. “I cannot fight my twin.”
Why do I have such a weak team? “And why is that?” I ask, trying not to shout.
“I would hurt her.”
“So what?” I shout. “Everyone else will hurt her too. Whatever we are about to fight against, whoever we are up against will also hurt her,” I say, full of fury. “And if you can’t defeat this, here, what they’re putting us through, how the heck are you going to protect your twin out there?”
I look away from them, doing my best to not get angry. “Luke,” I call.
He and his group are running laps. They completed the course in one try with none of them falling, and in less than five minutes. His group rocks.
He jogs to my side. “Yes, Ky?”
“I need some brotherly advice. He,” I point to Gabriel, “says he cannot fight his twin because he doesn’t want to hurt her. I want your group to fight my group.”
Luke, intrigued, smiles. “My group would love that.”
Facing my team, I announce, “Since Gabriel refuses to fight me or his twin, all of you will now fight against Luke’s group.” Angry faces glare at me. I smile at them. “We do not know fear! That was cowardice. I do not have cowards on my team. We’re champions! If you cannot accept a challenge no matter who it is against, all of you are failures, and I will not allow us to be failures.” I raise my voice, and ask, “Are you not Creations? Pain is in your mind. You push yourself to the very ends. Luke, have your group fall in.” I step back as his group takes his sides.
“Each of you,” Luke instructs, loudly and stern, “will fight against Kylie’s team.” He steps back. “Diminish fear. Exploit pain. Strengthen the weak!”
“All of you will be fighting. This will be a fight to your last. Your twin may not be available to heal you. So remember that when you are possibly getting pummeled,” I say as Luke and I step a few feet back, giving them the space they need.
“Ready?” Luke starts.
Luke’s group came ready. They each move away from the person next to them, waiting on my group to approach. Jesail and Amber are first, and the others fall in.
“Begin,” I follow.
They fight, none of them holding back.
“Why is your group a bunch of puny bitches?” Luke cackles.
“My entire group isn’t puny,” I defend. “But they do need a few doses of courage. Thought if I had someone beat the crap out of all of them at the same time, it would fix that.”
“Yes, but only half of your group is weak. What your second group did was kind of cool. But the first half, you need to work on them.”
“I know. This is step one in the ‘work on them’ plan.”
“Got it. You know my group is going to beat the shit out of yours, right?”
I rest my hands atop my head and stretch my back. “I’m hoping for it. I’ve tried everything. I was nice, we train, we work hard. They were finally able to complete the obstacle courses, but the mock wars are killing them. It shouldn’t be this hard.”
Someone screams, and I search for the complainer. Weakness. I shake my head, running to Megan.
She looks like her leg’s broken. “Are you hurt?” I ask. She nods. “Good. Do you ever want to feel this pain again?”
“No, Ky. Never.”
“Then never allow yourself to be beat again. Alex,” I call for her brother. “Come help your twin.”
He rushes to her aid and heals her with ease. Megan stands, putting her weight on the leg that was broken, testing it out. As she examines herself, I tell Foster, Luke’s group member, “Make her scream again until she no longer feels pain.” I face Megan. “Or until you are able to make him scream.” That’s harsher than I’d prefer to be, but we need to make these changes. “Everyone else can stop. Get your twin healed and step aside. Foster and Megan, in the center.” Foster marches off first. Before Megan passes, I grab her arm. “Don’t fail.” She yanks her arm from me. They meet in the middle. “Ready. Begin,” I shout.
Luke comes to my side. Foster punches Megan so hard her head jerks back. She’s slow and takes too long to retaliate, giving Foster the opportunity to land blow after blow.
“Why is she such a slow fighter?” I ask.
Luke rubs the back of his neck. “She needs to be trained.”
“What do you think I should do?”
“When my group does well, I don’t praise them, and I continuously make them work. They’re never still, and there’s no rest until our day is completed. We run rounds, daily competitions where they have to battle each other.”
“Yes, I’ve noticed that.” When he stops, his team continues. Either with pushups, jumping jacks, or running in place. They’re constantly training until the end of the day. It’s the reason he’s at the top and his team never lets him down. “I didn’t want to be that hard on them.”
Luke snorts. “You think you got to be as good as you are because I wasn’t hard on you?” He shakes his head, leaving my side. “Foster!” he commands. “Finish that. Everyone else, fall out.”
Foster takes Megan by the arm and punches her so hard her body hits the ground. He nods once and shakes his arm out before running off to catch up with his team.
I rub the back of my neck, pointing to Alex. “Heal her,” I say sulkily, disappointed in Megan. “Everyone but you two are done for today. Enjoy your evening and your day off tomorrow.”
Megan climbs to her feet and limps over to me. “Alex and I are Creations, born by Breeders, engineered by Kebel for the second wave of our generation. We were looked over and didn’t respond to many calls to trainings. We spent most of our time learning the histories of our land—our country—before and after the invaders. We never trained; we were never called for management like many of you were. Our strength is knowledge. It’s not combat or weaponry.”
“And you never expected to be drafted off to Separation or uphold your duty as Creations? They didn’t create us for our knowledge.”
“Our Breeders thought they could persuade them and allow us to advance to the First City, and we would provide help for the environmentalists and those technologists monitoring extraterrestrial activity.”
Nodding, I ponder my words before I say, “When you fail, I fail. When we first met, I explained, I am not a failure. I do not fail. That word will not be associated with me. Everyone failed. You failed and embarrassed me and yourselves. As a Creation, you understand what is expected of you. We don’t have dreams, aspirations, or desires to do anything but what is required of us. You are ordered to be in shape for any fight from now on. Respond!”
“We understand,” the twins call out.
“I will personally do what I can to help you get there. I’ll teach you everything I know,” I promise.
“I will do better. I will show no weakness. I will not fail,” Megan barks.
“Never fail, never show weakness, and better—your best—is never good enough. We’re done for the day, you two. Spend your day off tomorrow studying up on hand to hand combat and advance weaponry. Should you ever be called to use those weapons on your hips, you want to make sure you at least know how to handle them. The ability to defeat our worst enemy, fighting for our country, and living to do it again is our purpose, nothing else. I need you two ready to work your hardest.”
They run off to the houses, hopefully knowing this is not another instance they can slip through the cracks; this is the nitty gritty. Those two were created for one thing, and they are worth more than this entire base. To think our leaders would allow them to do anything other than be soldiers for this land is foolery.
I head back, needing to cool off from how angry they made me.
“Kylie,” Jord calls. I’m dreading this talk with him. He catches me in the doorway of our house. I run to the middle of the dirt road where he stands.
“Sir!” I stand at attention.
“Your group fighting Luke’s group,” he starts calmly. “What was that about?”
I hesitate before answering, “They showed weakness, they were failures, and they revealed their cowardice.”
“And you couldn’t fight them?” he questions with doubt.
“They refused.” I avoid eye contact, although his stare drills through me. “That was their cowardice. One coward, all cowards. Luke’s group is ready and willing, and I needed to show them how they should perform. I have been light on my group.”
“You have been light on them. What is your plan?”
“Change.”
“Change is good,” he agrees. “You only have a week to make them as strong as you are. If your entire group cannot complete that minor course, they need to be diminished. You know what we are up against. Fear, weakness, hesitation, and lack of confidence will not be acceptable.” He steps back and continues, “You, being who you are, that should not be a challenge for you. If this is something you cannot handle, we clearly have the wrong person in line for the female leader and should be considering someone else.”
“That is not necessary, sir,” I say, meeting his eyes. I don’t often stand this close to him, where I’m close enough to make out his purple eyes, like Marc and Sean’s, and see how extremely smooth his chocolate skin is, as well as the scar over his left eye.
“Prove it,” he says and walks off.
Goodness, I thought yesterday’s training was stressful. This day is no better. I have never looked forward to an off day more than I do now. In my room, I shed my suit down to my tank and shorts and split for a quick shower. I’m not leaving our house, not even for dinner. I will eat something small from the little fridge in the kitchen and kick back for the evening.
Thinking of relaxing compels me to think about Marc. When he wrapped his arms around me, I revealed to him my weakness. Nothing but a girl in a man’s world, weak to the inconveniences of life. A girl, ready to fight against something I don’t understand. For once, I don’t know; I only understand I was brought up to follow them and live by their order.
Megan has me thinking. Why would they assume they could have any other purpose but the usual purpose of a Creation? We aren’t supposed to question it or why we are obligated to fight for something we know nothing about. The Premier and Guidance of The America do not require the Creations to know the history, although Luke and I do. We were forced to know the history of this planet, the country, and the development of Creations. We needed to know what we were up against and what bodies we would be securing for the Vojin.
Chapter Nineteen
It’s quiet. The sun’s setting, and I have the entire house to myself.
My room here now feels
like my room back at my aunt’s house, but it’s harder for me to withstand alone. It took me years to tolerate my room at home alone and to even sit upon my bed. Now, here, as I stand on the floor in the middle of my space, my skin crawls. My fears are sneaking up on me.
Diminish fear, Ky.
How do I diminish this fear? The only thing I fear is the only thing I cannot face. Even to the point where it disturbs my sleep. Why must we possess such human emotions if there’s no solution to them?
“Ky, you’re here?” Cory calls as I’m walking back down the stairs. I want to turn back to my room, but I won’t. I don’t need Luke to stand up for me, and I won’t run away from someone or something that makes me uncomfortable.
He waits on the landing, staring up at me. “Hey. You okay?” He rubs the back of his head and drops his gaze to the floor. “Missed you at dinner,” he adds, meeting my eyes with concern twitching in his. It’s a look I’m quite familiar with, one I possess when Luke goes off on a rant. He bottles it well, until the bottle fills and pops like the cork of a champagne bottle—spewing out his emotions in a hateful rage, like the bubbled fizzy contents in it.
“I am fine,” I say, passing Cory.
“You sure?” he asks.
“Yes, Cory,” I snap, irritated by his interrogation. I head for the den but stop and turn on my heels to face him as I ask, “Why were you in my room the other night?”
“I was waiting for you.”
“But why?”
“I thought we were going to talk. But instead, I ended up talking to your brother,” he grumbles.
“There’s an entire house to wait for me in. You should not have been in my room.” I say, pointing at him.
He widens his stance and crosses his arms. “Is there something wrong with me waiting in your room?” His gaze floats over my body, starting at my shoes and continuing up to my face as if those emerald eyes were x-ray beams, making out my curves under my clothes.
I cross my arms, wrapping my hands around my muscles to shield myself from his vision. It shouldn’t cross my mind, but I could kill Cory. Though it may not look good if I murder my superior, I could definitely do it.
The Separation Trilogy Box Set: Books 1 -3 Page 15
