Strike

by D. J. MacHale

  None of those details mattered compared to what was in the center of the room. Sitting behind the desk with his feet up was Mr. Feit. Colonel Feit. Though this time he looked more like the Feit I had first met on Pemberwick Island. His hair was still short, but rather than the Retro military uniform he wore jeans and a blue T-shirt. He was reading from a handheld device and didn’t look up until the door was closed.

  “What’s the right thing to say here?” he said with a typical smile. “We meet again! How’s that?”

  Tori and I stood silently.

  “I’ve been working on this project for a long time,” he said. “I guess you could say I dedicated my life to it. The planning was meticulous. Every contingency accounted for. Every detail anticipated. It was an awesome mission nearly seventy years in the making and it’s gone exactly as planned except for one small, teeny little annoying problem.”

  He paused for effect. Or maybe he expected us to ask him what it was.

  We didn’t.

  “You,” he said. “A handful of kids. Incredible.”

  Feit shook his head with dismay. “None of the other regional commanders have to deal with this kind of aggravation. Why am I so lucky?”

  “Blame yourself,” I said. “You brought us into it. You came to me on Pemberwick Island. I didn’t come looking for you.”

  Feit chuckled. Feit always chuckled. It was one of the many things I hated about him.

  “Yeah, that was a bad move in hindsight. I shouldn’t have gotten involved on that level. But I don’t like to command from a distance. I like the action. Maybe I should stay behind a desk and delegate a little more. What do you think?”

  “I think you should bite me,” I said.

  Feit gave me a long look, as if trying to understand where my head was. I wondered if he realized my overriding thoughts were about lunging across that desk and strangling him.

  “You’re not the same kid I met on that beach, Tucker,” he said. “The scrawny little benchwarmer has turned into a real badass.”

  “Thanks to you,” I said.

  “Man, you really hate me, don’t you? What about you, Tori? Do you see me as the personification of all things evil? Am I the big bad boogeyman?”

  Tori didn’t answer, which was her way of answering.

  “Okay, I get it,” Feit said. “But open your minds a little. Try to see things from my perspective.”

  He stood up and walked to the giant map of the world.

  “This must be so alien to you,” he said, referring to the map. “There are only seven countries now. Seven. That’s it. The United States covers all of North America up to the old Arctic. Newchin spreads over what used to be known as Asia. They split Russia in two with Europa. Ambia used to be known as Africa. That place is a real pit. Then there’s Brazilia, which controls South America and what used to be Central America. We lost that one in a war. Nasty business. Finally there’s Australia and the New Arctic. Seven countries. Seven governments. That’s it. Sounds all neat and tidy but the fact is we’re all at war with each other. It’s a constant battle for space. For water. For energy. For life. It’s not about wealth or power or prestige, it’s about survival.”

  Feit walked away from the map and stood directly in front of us, staring us both down.

  “You hate us for what we’ve done to your world? You hate me? Think about how much hatred is coming your way from the people of my time, who look back at a society that saw the writing on the wall and did nothing about it.”

  “And that justifies mass murder?” Tori said.

  “I could make that argument. What the people of the past did is just as heinous as what we’re now doing.”

  “That’s not true!” Tori argued. “Nobody in the past intentionally tried to trash the future.”

  “Maybe not,” Feit shot back. “But they did it just the same. Whenever I spend time in the past I see gluttonous, selfish people who scrape more food off of their plates in a single meal than most people of my time get to eat in a week.”

  He pulled away from us and hurried to the window that looked over the dome, and the filthy city. He was getting worked up, which wasn’t like him.

  “This city was built on the recycled garbage of the past. That’s all you left us and you think we’re the villains? We suffer every day because of your shortsightedness. As a loyal citizen of the United States of America who proudly works under the orders of our commander in chief, I can say with total confidence and a clear conscience that it’s now your turn.”

  Feit touched the pad he had been working on. A second later the wall opposite the map turned into an invisible panel, revealing the room next door. It was just like when the deck of the giant attack plane vanished when Tori and I were on board.

  Beyond the unseen wall was a clean white room with two metallic silver poles that spanned from floor to ceiling, spaced six feet apart. The space between the poles glowed with a white light that seemed to be generated by them. In front was a silver chair with two Retro guards standing on either side.

  Feit took a deep breath, trying to get his emotions back under check.

  “I can’t tell you how bummed I was to find out that Olivia Kinsey was part of this group of traitors that call themselves Sounders,” Feit said. “Blew me away, to be honest.”

  “Yeah, well, not everybody from the future is an a-hole,” I said.

  Feit snickered. “We’ve known about these people for some time but haven’t been able to root them out. They’ve been smart. They haven’t made any blatant moves against the government or the military. We expect that to change. And soon. As much as you and your friends have caused me grief, it turns out it may have all been worthwhile.”

  “How do you figure that?” Tori asked.

  “You’re going to give us the Sounders,” Feit said.

  “Sorry to disappoint you,” I said. “We don’t know anything about them.”

  “Really?” Feit said, smugly. “Let’s see.”

  He touched his pad again and a door opened in the next room. A Retro guard entered with a prisoner wearing an orange jumpsuit.

  “Scottie,” I said with a gasp.

  “Friend of yours, right?” Feit said. “She caused the ruckus that let you slip away from me back at the camp.” Feit broke into a sly grin and added, “Took a while for me to figure that one out.”

  Scottie looked confused and terrified. She struggled against the guards but it was useless. They forced her to sit in the silver chair and clamped her wrists to the armrests.

  “Scottie!” I called out.

  “She can’t hear you,” Feit said. “Or see us.”

  The door opened again and another Retro entered. It was Bova. Nothing good ever happened when that guy showed up. He walked to the invisible wall that separated the two rooms and gave a small nod.

  “He knows we’re watching,” Feit said. “Now, tell me, what exactly is it that the Sounders are planning?”

  Tori and I exchanged nervous looks.

  “We don’t know,” I said. “Olivia didn’t get the chance to tell us.”

  Feit stared me right in the eyes as if trying to read my mind.

  “You saw how easily we obliterated Las Vegas,” Feit said. “Developing weapons like the one we used there was one of the few legacies from the past that have proved useful. There was money in war back then. The technology we used against Las Vegas is the same as you see in there. So, tell me, what can we expect from the Sounders?”

  Tori started to shake with growing anger. She gave a quick glance at the frightened woman strapped into the chair, then made a move toward Feit.

  “You can’t do this,” she said as she took a step forward, but the Retro guard grabbed her and held her back. I made a move to help but the guard quickly raised his pulser toward me.

  “I’d rather not harm your friend in t
here,” Feit said calmly. “But it’s up to you. Tell me what you know about the Sounders.”

  “Nothing,” Tori cried. “We met a few of them and heard that something is going to happen but they didn’t tell us what it was.”

  “It’s true,” I said quickly. “Olivia’s apartment was attacked before she could tell us.”

  Feit lifted his pad and pressed it.

  Bova nodded, turned to Scottie, lifted his leg up, and put his boot on the arm of the chair.

  Scottie screamed with terror. She glanced behind her at the glowing light then back to Bova. She said something to him that we couldn’t hear. It had to have been a plea for her life.

  I’d never felt so helpless and frightened, even when bombs were flying around me. Scottie had helped me, twice, and now I held her life in my hands.

  “Don’t!” Tori begged. “This is monstrous.”

  “I can tell you something,” I said. “Scottie has nothing to do with the Sounders. That much I know for sure.”

  Feit let out a bored sigh.

  “This isn’t about her, it’s about you. I could have put your mother in that chair but that really wouldn’t have been cool.”

  I lunged at Feit and instantly felt a sharp jolt of pain in my back that knocked me to my knees. The guard had fired a pulse of energy at me. It wasn’t strong enough to injure me, but it sure hurt.

  “The choice is yours,” Feit said. “Tell me everything or . . .” he punctuated the statement with a shrug as if it were out of his hands.

  I was near panic. We really didn’t know anything, other than the name of Colonel Pike and the fact that we were supposedly the last piece in the puzzle of the Sounders’ plan. Seeing Scottie’s terrified face tore my heart out. Would the little information we had be enough for the Air Force to stop the Sounders’ plan? If we gave up Colonel Pike, would she be the next one sitting in that chair?

  “Last chance,” Feit warned in a singsong voice.

  Tori gave me a tortured look. She was as torn as I was.

  “Please don’t hurt her,” I said, lamely. “I swear we don’t know anything.”

  Feit pressed his pad.

  Bova kicked the chair over.

  Scottie opened her mouth to scream as the chair fell back through the curtain of energy between the silver poles. Her body was enveloped in white light. An instant later, she was gone. The chair tilted back to its upright position, empty.

  Tori let out an anguished cry.

  I think I did too. I can’t say for sure. The agony of knowing I was the cause of an innocent person’s death, someone who had risked her own life to help me, was too much to bear. I had witnessed untold death and devastation over the last few weeks but this was personal. Nothing had compared to this.

  Bova turned back to us, showing no emotion. He was as cold-blooded as Feit. The monster stood there, waiting for instructions.

  “Tell me, was that worth it?” Feit asked.

  “You can’t justify this,” I said, trying to keep from crying with anger. “You can look back in time and blame people for whatever you’d like, but you can’t claim that what happened in the past is anything like cold-blooded murder.”

  My anguish was quickly turning to rage. I looked to Tori and said, “I would push that button. I would push it until every last one of these bastards was blown away.”

  Tori dropped her head in total anguish, and defeat.

  “Let’s continue,” Feit said and pressed his pad again.

  The door in the next room opened and two more Retro soldiers stepped in, headed for the death chair.

  With them were Olivia and Kent.

  SEVENTEEN

  “Stop it, now,” Tori demanded.

  “No problem,” Feit replied casually. “Tell me about the Sounders.”

  For one brief moment my mind flashed forward to what was about to happen. Who would be put in the chair first? Kent or Olivia? Probably Kent. Olivia’s knowledge of the Sounders would make her too valuable to execute. What would I do? Would I give up Colonel Pike to save Kent? Would I admit that the Sounders had a plan to stop the Retros, even though I had no idea of what it was? Would that be enough to save him? Or would it just hurt the Sounders’ chance of success?

  I truly didn’t know what to do.

  Olivia and the Sounders did.

  The two Retro soldiers pushed Kent and Olivia toward Bova.

  As soon as they were released, the two soldiers faced us and put their hands on their hearts.

  Sounders.

  I shot a look to Tori.

  She gave me a quick nod.

  It was time to go.

  I threw myself at the soldier behind us. He was so surprised that he didn’t have time to defend himself. I grabbed for his pulser while pumping my legs, forcing him backward until he slammed into the wall.

  Tori launched herself at Feit, who had his communicator up, probably to sound an alarm. He didn’t get the chance. Tori tackled him and bent him back over the desk.

  In the next room, the odds had changed dramatically. Bova and two Retro guards were fighting two more Sounders, along with Olivia and Kent. It was no contest. Surprise is a powerful weapon.

  The Sounder soldiers first fired on the two Retro guards. One was hit and fell to the floor; the other was knocked into the white light and instantly vaporized. Bova ran for the door to escape but Kent tackled him.

  Olivia grabbed the pulser of the downed guard, calmly aimed at the invisible wall, and fired.

  The room next door was no longer silent. The ear-splitting sound of shattering glass erupted as the invisible wall between us was blown away, falling to the floor in a mass of sharp fragments.

  Feit pushed Tori away and ran for the door.

  Olivia quickly adjusted the power of the pulser and fired at him, knocking him off of his feet and throwing him into the map of the new world.

  I continued to wrestle with the Retro guard until Olivia calmly stepped up to him, jammed the pulser into his back, and fired. The guard stiffened, let out a gasp, and fell unconscious.

  In ten seconds we had gone from being at the mercy of murderers, to having two choice prisoners.

  “How?” Feit moaned, barely able to lift his head.

  Olivia strode over and looked down on him. “You have no idea how many Sounders there are. We’re everywhere and we’re coming for you.”

  She jammed the pulser into Feit’s gut and fired.

  Feit grunted, stiffened, and passed out.

  I wished I had been the one to do that.

  “He’s not dead,” Olivia said to me. “In case you were wondering.”

  Kent entered the room, pushing a sniveling Bova with both arms twisted behind his back.

  “You will all die for this,” Bova said.

  “Really?” Kent replied. “Shut the hell up . . . please.”

  He punctuated this by twisting Bova’s arms up further, causing the prison commander to cry out in pain.

  The two Sounders stepped through the broken wall and into the office. One went directly to Kent and Bova.

  “I’ll take him from here,” the soldier said.

  Kent hesitated.

  “It’s okay,” Olivia said calmly.

  Kent gave in and allowed the soldier to take charge of Bova.

  The other soldier said, “We have to move.”

  “You realize this place is full of Retro soldiers,” I said to Olivia.

  “And not all of them are loyal to the Air Force,” she replied. “Besides, we’ve got protection.”

  She patted Bova on the cheek and said, “Isn’t that right, you little weasel?”

  “You’re a traitor,” Bova growled.

  “I am,” Olivia said with a flirty smile. “And you’re a sadistic killer. I win.”

  “How are we goi
ng to get out of here?” I asked.

  “Follow me,” the first Sounder soldier said and went straight for the door.

  The second soldier followed, pushing Bova along. We left Feit unconscious in the office. We didn’t need the dead weight.

  Kent, Tori, and I followed. The last to leave was Olivia, who had her pulser weapon poised and ready to fire.

  As soon as we hit the corridor we were faced by several surprised Retro soldiers. None of them were armed. They stood still, not sure of what to do or how to react.

  “Stay calm,” the first Sounder announced. “Stand back.”

  The stunned soldiers moved out of the way, clearing a path for our desperate little group.

  “Do something!” Bova screamed.

  Nobody dared to make a move. They must have realized that as soon as they tried to stop us, Bova would be dead.

  We made our way to the end of the corridor with Olivia to the rear, walking backward, ready to fire if anybody dared to attack.

  The Sounders seemed to know exactly where they were going and pushed through doors that led to stairs.

  “Move, now!” the first Sounder commanded.

  He didn’t have to say it twice. We all ran down the stairs as quickly as possible with Bova being dragged along.

  “Is there a plan or are we just winging it?” Kent asked.

  “Little of both,” Olivia replied.

  “Speed is our best friend,” the first Sounder called back. “We’ve got to get out before the place is swarmed.”

  “I thought a lot of the soldiers were with the Sounders?” I asked.

  “They are,” Olivia said. “But we’re still outnumbered and we don’t want to get into a full-on battle. At least not yet.”

  “So we’re just going to go outside and run down the street?” Tori asked.

  “Not exactly,” Olivia said. “Trust us.”

  “I do,” Kent said. He meant it, too.

  We kept descending, dropping down to a level that was significantly cooler and seemed to be below ground. When we reached the bottom, the first Sounder stopped at a double door and turned back to us.

  “Head for the nearest car,” he said. “Load in and hang on.”