by Rachael Wade
“Thanks.”
“Here goes nothing.” Kale raised his guns, straightening in his seat, and Jet and I followed suit, scrambling to pull every weapon we could from our backpack, dispensing its content between us.
I snapped an Aqua Bomb onto my belt and checked my Glock’s ammo, and Jet slipped a rifle strap over my head. “Finger on the trigger,” he whispered. I unclicked my harness and wiggled out of its straps to adjust the weapon, a lump rising in my throat as the alarm’s beeping sped up and the clear hood began to glide open above us.
Chucking back the vial’s contents, I forced breaths in and out as I felt the Capsule line up with the track. The vehicle slowed, coming to a stop on the base station’s deck, behind a row of identical Capsules. Counting helped my breathing. Five, four, three, two …
“Fire!” Jet yelled the second the lid stopped sliding and clicked into place. I pushed myself out of the Capsule with my arms and sprang to my feet, hauling myself over its body and flinging to the left. Jet was right next to me, lining his back up with mine to make sure we were covered. Fire exploded all around us, as did a choir of ear-piercing shrieks. Invaders swarmed the deck, their jaws dropping with that thick, clear ooze to unleash their cries.
My shots were automatic.
I aimed at the Invaders that had already been on the deck, exiting their vehicles. They surged forward, closing us in, and Jet and I leveled them, turning slowly in a circle to empty our rounds into their taut white skin. More poured onto the deck from inside the ship, floating toward us in the same calculated, uniform arrangements I’d seen that day in the woods. I was conscious of Kale’s presence somewhere on our right, could hear him shooting amidst the creatures’ sharp cries, but I didn’t stop firing.
Aqua Bombs, Venom Spheres, and different metal cylinders I’d never seen before spiraled at us from every direction. Kale moved in to join Jet’s and my formation, yelling over the fire, “We have to move!”
Jet was only able to lock eyes with me for a second before he sprinted across the black track and over the landing pad’s barrier, but that was all we needed to say what we couldn’t say aloud. He disappeared and I joined forces with Kale, dodging the Invaders’ weapons and throwing kicks at their slender, strong forms while they lurched at us from every direction. We managed to move to what I assumed was the corridor Kale was aiming for, barreling in through the door and falling into the hallway, slamming the door behind us. A blast of the wet, damp, swampy smell I hated smacked me full force and I broke into a coughing fit.
“Sky!” Kale yelled, throwing me to the other side of the hallway. I banged into the wall and winced as Kale took a hit to the chest. He cringed and buckled over, a gasp of air exploding from his lips as he dropped his gun.
“Kale!” I rushed forward and helped him stand straight, struggling to get a look at what had hit him. Please don’t be an Aqua Bomb, please don’t be an Aqua Bomb. My fingers scrambled to pry his arm away from his chest.
He was gripping the metal cylinder, breathing hard through his teeth. “Sookay,” he forced out, “stings, but the drug’s working.”
“Tell me which way to go!”
“Keep moving down this hall. Make a left at the double doors on the left.”
I grabbed his gun and shoved it back in his grasp, trying not to focus on the blood spilling from his chest. It leaked and trickled around the cylinder lodged in his skin. Throngs of Invaders filled the halls, their lean skeletal legs bending and snapping as they charged for us, but their efforts to attack were in vain. Kale’s pain was lessening, the drug taking effect. I could feel it moving through my body too, a fuzzy, euphoric high zipping through my veins at lightning speed. Bullets and hot metal cylinders grazed my arms and cheeks but no pain registered. Each nick and scrape barely caused me to flinch.
With our newfound strength, Kale and I lifted our heads and powered forward side by side, charging ferociously through the packs of creatures, delivering bullets to each and every one as we soared by. Just as we reached the blue double doors, two Invaders grabbed hold of me, their exquisite, strong fingers closing around my neck and shoulders. Another grabbed Kale, and he jerked forward to shoot and cover me, but he didn’t need to. The two Invaders dropped me as if they’d touched something hot, and those ghastly screams ensued, unfurling from deep in their lungs. They began to retreat, lowering their heads in submission.
The Invader that grabbed Kale didn’t let go. Kale’s eyes widened in surprise as the others continued to retreat, struggling against the creature restraining him. I raised my gun to take care of it, but Kale drew his knife and slammed it behind him, into the Invader’s torso. The creature sank to the ground, its pale arms and legs going limp, and I fired a bullet into its skull before reaching for Kale and rushing through the double doors.
“What was that?” Kale panted.
“I don’t know. It’s happened before.”
We picked up our speed, running next to one another down the hallway. Kale halted at a chrome elevator door, bringing his fingers to a screen on the wall. His fingertips flitted over it, moving strange images until the door hummed and opened.
“We have five minutes,” he said. “If we’re lucky.”
We dashed into the elevator, and I prayed to God that the Invaders didn’t somehow shut it down with their superior technology. I shifted from left to right, unable to remain still. The swamp smell was making me nauseous, and the elevator’s speed wasn’t helping. I turned to check on Kale’s chest, looking for a way to dislodge the weapon. “We have to get this out of you and get you bandaged up. If the drug wears off while it’s still inside you—”
“No time for that.”
“We better make time! I can’t make it out of here alone.”
“You won’t have to,” he shot me a sad smile. “Jet will come for you.”
I yanked myself into him, gripping the sides of his jacket, burning him with my gaze. “We’re not leaving you here to die.” Dropping to the ground, I swung my bag from my back and around my hip, digging inside for the med supplies Kale had packed.
Jackpot.
An antibacterial injection. I’d only ever heard about these, had never seen them in the flesh, but one glance at the long syringe made me sigh in relief. I recognized the drug name immediately. Before the Invaders arrived, before my parents were taken from me, I’d seen news about it on television. My mom was a nurse. She’d cited GuardCore Antibacterial Injections as the most innovative advancement in the pharmaceutical industry in the last twenty years. Seeing what the invincibility drug Kale had given us was capable of certainly eclipsed GuardCore, but who knew what kind of crazy side effects we’d have to worry about when that stuff wore off?
Without asking, I stuck Kale with the needle and emptied its contents into his chest, making quick work of his shirt buttons to expose his bloody skin. He didn’t object, just stared down at me, his dirty-blond hair flopping when I brushed at his chest with my shirtsleeve to get a better look at the wound. “You might feel this,” I said, moving fast before he could protest. I lifted my knife and plucked the weapon from his chest, using my palm to put immediate pressure on the area the second the bomb lodged free. Ripping my sleeve with my teeth, I used my free hand to tear off material and press it onto the wound. “Hold that.”
“We’re almost there—”
“Just one more second.” I dug through the first aid supplies, peeling a string of gauze from a medical tape roll. I slapped the gauze over the wound and taped over it, then tossed the remaining supplies back into the bag. “That’ll have to do for now.”
“Thanks.” Kale eyed me curiously. “Skylla, what happened back there … it wasn’t the first time?”
“No.” I dropped my gaze to my feet. “It’s weird, right?”
“I was going to say … amazing.”
Before he could continue, the elevator door opened and I was assaulted with another ripe wave of putrid swamp water. I gagged and squinted as we stepped out, eyes watering
. He ushered us toward another chrome door, gaining access by drawing more strange symbols onto the door’s screen.
“Where are they?” I asked, shooting cautious glances right to left. “I thought the entrance to Central Control would be crawling with them.”
“I thought so, too,” Kale murmured. “You ready?”
I nodded, not sure if I was really ready for whatever was on the other side of that door. My mind jumped to Jet and his search for Hera. I wondered if he’d made it that far.
I forced my thoughts to halt, unable to imagine the other possibility.
The final chrome door glided open, and the wind was knocked out of me as Central Control was revealed. Kale dashed inside, but I stood, stunned, my gaze drawn to the round, clean room. It was clinical and cold, but provided with the perfect dash of warmth by the crystal-clear tank that lined its walls. The round tank was filled with an array of marine life, fish I’d never known existed, and rich, intricate plant life that beckoned me to dive in and touch it with my fingertips. The green was greener than anything on Earth, the water the clearest I’d ever seen. It was purely magical, reminding me why I was so drawn to the water.
Surely, something this beautiful couldn’t be sinister after all.
“Sky, you with me?” Kale’s voice floated toward me. His back was to me as he positioned himself in front of the main console, already going to work, busy typing and sliding images and commands all over the computer’s panel, mumbling to himself while he moved. My gaze fell on the seven planet models and I stilled, suspended in fascination. The wrong kind of fascination. I should’ve been horrified to see the truth for myself, but I wasn’t. I wanted to reach out and touch the spinning blue globes as they hovered in the air over the control panel, wanted to run my fingers over their continents and marvel at their beauty.
“Yeah, I’m here,” I replied absently.
“Good, I need your help. I’m going to make sure all the Shepherds are activated and loaded into the dock Capsules. I need you to watch the door for incoming. And oh, also keep an eye on the seventh planet prototype. It should alert us as the remaining Shepherds activate. Only two lights should be missing.” He paused and lifted his gaze to mine.
“Missing?” I asked, my voice jumping.
“Yes.” He nodded solemnly, his eyes softening as he continued to hold my stare. If I wasn’t mistaken, there was an apology lurking there. A genuine one. “I’m one of them,” he said.
ELEVEN
My lungs protested when I sucked in air. I stepped back, raising my hands. “No. You can’t—I can’t be here—please, I’m going to just walk out of here and never come back, okay?”
“Skylla,” Kale pleaded, his voice still soft, his posture unthreatening, “I meant it when I said I’d never hurt you. I regretted throwing you up against that wall when I found you in the restaurant closet. One look into your eyes, and I knew … you were worth protecting.”
My lips trembled as I continued to stumble backward. “How would you know something like that about a stranger? You can’t know something like that. You don’t know me.”
“I do now.” He inched forward, raising his hands defensively.
“Stay there! Don’t fucking come near me. Don’t you dare move!” Something had been off about Kale’s behavior. It wasn’t hard to see it, but I hadn’t wanted to examine its cause. I barely knew this guy, but the little I’d gotten to know made me want to believe his radical views on the invasion were just part of his charismatic personality.
I didn’t want to believe this.
“Before you run and chance getting yourself killed, just hear me out. Why did I go back for Jet, Skylla, huh? Why did I bring him here, with us? Because I wanted to keep my word. I wanted you to trust me. I wasn’t lying when I said I need allies.”
“Trust you?” My vision blurred while I worked to make sense of his words. He was being sarcastic, surely. Adding salt to the wound, enjoying his sadistic little game.
“I didn’t know why I’d instinctually felt you were worth protecting. Why I wanted to be near you. My parents eliminated my implantation years ago. I shouldn’t feel anything, shouldn’t have this kind of instinct. But I do. And I know now. I need you to think clearly, need you to pull it together and accept it, if we’re going to make it through this alive.”
“What are you…?” I shook my head, my chest heaving up and down. It was working to keep up with my shaky breaths. Nothing was working as it should. Even my lungs had forgotten their proper function, everything sideways. “What are you saying?”
He pressed one last button on the panel and the seventh prototype lit up, the continents shining and sparkling as they rotated. Kale chanced a peek at it but dragged his gaze back to mine, blowing out a harsh breath. “When I was sixteen, my parents abandoned me. Left me a letter … and this scar.” He swiveled around and pointed to the back of his neck. A sharp, raised area of pink skin sliced vertically from the bottom of his hairline to the top of his back.
My lungs officially seized up and I felt the color drain from my face.
“The letter told me everything. About the Invaders. Their plan of attack. That I was one of the Seven Shepherds, selected at birth. They said my role was so sacred, they’d be killed if it were discovered that they’d removed my chip, destroyed my preselected activation. They said they wanted to be honest with me, wanted to leave me with a choice. They didn’t want to make the decision for me, but they removed the chip to give me a clean slate, just in case I decided I didn’t want to help the Invaders with their plan. So with the letter, they left me this….”
Kale dug into his pocket and pulled out a necklace. He extended it so I could see, but I stepped back. I couldn’t distance myself from him enough. Still, I glanced at the silver chain. A chip similar to the one Jet had shown Lillian hung from it, smashed and disfigured, but still in one piece.
“Okay, so?”
“So I tried to ignore it. All of it. Didn’t want anything to do with it. I was put into foster care, eventually started college, moved on with life. But my curiosity wouldn’t let it go. I started researching, started learning about all of the Underground rebel groups. About their theories for how the world would end. I thought I was losing my mind. It didn’t help that my parents had taken off and never came back. They disappeared, I guess to save themselves and me, but I was still so angry at them for leaving the way they did. I was … infuriated.”
“Why did you lie? Why are you telling me this now? I don’t … I don’t understand.” My hands began to tremble, and it was then I realized my cheeks were wet.
“I didn’t know where I belonged, Skylla. For the longest time, I was a lost, scared kid … just trying to figure out what I was and what I was supposed to do, now that I’d turned my back on my destiny. So I joined the rebels. Learned all I could, tried to understand if or when the Invaders would arrive. When they did … everything was so surreal. I stumbled across Rico and his men, and I thought they were different. I was drawn to Rico—his leadership, his vision to gather the Seven Shepherds and confront them somehow. I wanted answers, and he was the first one to seem interested in the same thing. All the others were only interested in annihilating the Invaders and taking back what was theirs.
“But knowing what I’d known—that Earth wasn’t really ours—well, it kind of changes your perspective. I wanted to meet them, get to the bottom of everything. Not just destroy them and go on as if nothing had ever happened.”
He inched forward, closer and closer, and my body was too stunned to back away any farther; my reflexes fried on the spot.
“I needed to know where I belonged,” he said. “Just like you did, back in Morton.”
“No. This is … no. I won’t listen to this. You lied to us. Why would we trust you?”
“Because you and Jet want the same thing.”
“No. We want revenge. Revenge on these … these things, for all they put us through.”
“You want answers, not revenge. You j
ust don’t see it.”
“Why do you need me and Jet?”
“I only have some of the answers. I need more. That starts with Lucenta, and you and Jet. The Invaders’ underwater city. It’s been buried here on our prototype for centuries. I need to access it, but I can’t do it alone. And I can’t go with just anyone. I need allies who trust me. Who have the courage to follow me all the way. The second I saw the loyalty you and Jet shared, I knew you were the ones. You were fearless. Honest about what you would and wouldn’t do. Both of you determined to protect one another. That’s rare when Earth is torn to pieces. Everyone’s out for themselves. But you two … you acted as a unit.”
He gave a frustrated sigh. “Here’s why I’m telling you all this. If the Invaders find out my chip’s been removed, they might execute me on the spot, or worse, I don’t know. I want the chance to communicate with them, to find those answers we’re all looking for. I’m begging you, Skylla. I need some help. I need a team I can trust.”
Kale’s face seemed foreign now, albeit as warm and friendly as I’d known it to be. I didn’t recognize the man standing before me, and I wasn’t sure if I ever would again. Not after what he was revealing to me. What made my blood go colder was the scar he’d shown me. Acknowledging how eerily it resembled mine was unthinkable. Mama and Daddy always called it my birthmark, so I never thought otherwise. Besides, it was on the back of my neck—who thinks about what they never see?
“What do you want from this city?” I said. “This, this Lucenta. What do you expect to find? Jet would never agree to going there with you. I won’t, either, Kale. This, this friendship—whatever you call it that’s between us—it ends now, do you understand? It’s over.”
“It doesn’t have to be. The city holds the key to our fate as Shepherds. It’s where we’re sent to claim our leadership once we gather after activation. I have to prove my loyalty to the Invaders, prove to them it wasn’t my choice to remove my chip.”
