Gunner Jameson wasn’t special.
Sure, he had inky hair. It sometimes curled from under his hat because he let it grow too long—a direct violation of protocol. His eyes were the color of tea, deep and dark, like looking into the middle of a storm.
I have to tell you something, he messaged, using the encoded cache so his voice seeped into my mind. He stepped closer. I inched toward him. We stood, mere breaths apart, studying each other. I traced the strong edges of his face with my eyes.
I swallowed hard, trying to regain my composure. Crushing on him in his last hours of freedom wasn’t great timing. I employed the tactics I taught the Insiders and folded my feelings into a neat box inside myself. That way no one could use them against me.
We need to get off the street, I chatted back, forcing a measure of nonchalance into my message. You can tell me then. I stepped away from his touch and took another random turn.
What’s going on? Trek asked. Your vitals are vibrating.
Nothing, I grumbled, Gunner’s intense stare still burning my senses.
Doesn’t register as nothing. Trek’s chat carried a frown, as if his equipment wasn’t telling him the truth.
Look, techie, I said it was nothing. I moved faster, trying to put more distance between me and Gunn.
Whatever you say, Rainey.
Don’t call me that. Only my dad used that nickname. I hated it, and Trek knew it.
Left at the corner, and then the alley on your right, Trek said. I have coffee.
Halfway down the appointed alley, I opened a door and motioned Gunn inside. He raised his eyebrows, something I pointedly ignored, and stepped past me.
The darkness was twice as thick inside the hallway. “Am I supposed to grope my way forward?” he asked out loud.
A soft chuckle escaped my throat. Not a giggle. Not a laugh. I don’t do stuff like that. I’m cool and calm and not crushing on this Gunner guy. “Ten steps, flyboy.”
He counted off the steps and waited. I came up behind him, stopping just as he turned. “Now what?” he asked.
“Open the door already. I’m freezing.”
He grumbled but groped the wall for the latch. Thankfully, he found it after only a few seconds and opened the door to a brightly lit café. I squinted into the tech lights and blinked away the spots from my vision.
Two dozen people loitered at the crowded tables. They all wore winter hats and gloves and nursed cups of coffee. The oldest one was eight years older than me—twenty-five. Their eyes, sharp and focused, swung toward me.
I pushed past Gunn and settled at a table across from Trek, in all his mousy-hair and hazel-eyed glory. I grinned at my tech handler and the leader of this group, the Lower Block Insiders.
“Close the door!” someone yelled from a table in the corner. I rolled my eyes as I removed my hat and peeled back the fingers of my gloves. Gunner stood in the doorway like he’d never seen a café before. He pushed the door closed with a little too much force, then cringed when it slammed.
“Newbie,” someone nearby muttered. But playfulness lingered under his grumpy expression. Most Insiders were very good at being two different people. We had to be. We lived one life during the day and a completely different one at night.
“Yup, someone new,” Trek said, standing up to address the entire café. “Guys, this is Gunner Jameson, Raine’s newest recruit, and number one on Director Hightower’s list. Voice candidate.”
The Insiders shifted. None of them had voice talent. And, seriously, it’s a pretty freaky talent. Very rare. My dad’s been looking for voices for a while now, which was why I’d been trying to get Gunn on the Inside these last few months.
“Thanks for that smashing intro,” he mumbled to Trek as he slumped into the chair next to me. He scoffed in a way that said Really? A coffee shop?
Trek simply grinned, pocketed some piece of tech that kept this location and all its inhabitants off the radar, and settled back in his seat. I ignored them both and drummed my navy fingernails on the table.
Protocol fact: Nails are to remain unpainted. We can’t have piercings either.
Raine fact: I paint my nails every Friday night. Usually blue. Sometimes purple. Never pink.
Gunn studied my discolored nails, a mix of disbelief and something else I couldn’t identify on his face.
“What?” I snapped.
He cleared his throat. “Your nails are tight.”
I squinted at him, trying to decide if he was going shady on me or not.
“I like them,” he added, a hint of amusement seeping into his expression. I watched his smile form, thinning his lips and revealing his perfectly white teeth.
I squeezed my eyes shut when I realized I’d been staring too long. “Coffee?” I asked Trek as I opened my eyes. He got up and moved toward the counter in the back, poured coffee into three cups, and returned to the table.
Trek dumped an obscene amount of sugar substitute in his and frowned at me. He flicked his gaze to Gunn and then back to me, raising his eyebrows. For a moment, a flare of embarrassment shot through me. But it’s not like Trek knew why I’d gotten all flustered outside.
“So Raine’s gonna be your trainer on the Inside, your main contact,” Trek said after a long swig from his mug. “That cool with the both of you?”
“Fine by me,” Gunn mumbled into his drink. I stirred my coffee without speaking, without even looking up from the curling wisps of steam.
“Check-in is at six thirty, Raine,” Trek said. “There’s a spidered flat in Rise Nine. Your dad is expecting Gunner.” He looked at Gunn, who didn’t react.
“Done deal,” I said, wishing I’d brought my hoverboard so I could fly to Rise Nine, get Gunn all set up, and then spend the rest of the night on the track. Six thirty seemed impossibly far away. “Gunn used the scrambler.”
“I had to,” he said again, this time with a major dose of not my fault in his tone. He shot me a glare before relaying the details to Trek.
When he finished, silence settled over the three of us. I nursed my coffee, feeling very un-rebellious. While Trek messaged Gunn the hideout possibilities, I daydreamed about the flight trials. My feet itched to be out flying, and I replayed Gunn’s performance at the competition last fall. He’d—
Did you have to bring him here? Trek’s voice came over an encoded cache signal—I could tell from the high-pitched whine in the background.
Annoyance swept through me. He has a top-notch voice. He’s on tommorrow’s list. He gets his one night of freedom.
Trek leaned so close I smelled the fabricated jelly doughnut on his breath. “This is one of our last unknown locations,” he whispered—so loud it wasn’t a whisper at all—as the encoded cache collapsed. “And he’s . . . dangerous.”
Trek had no idea who was dangerous and who wasn’t. Even with his feared voice power, Gunn had nothing on me. But Trek didn’t know that. Only Cannon did, and he’d die before he told anyone.
Everyone with talent could be labeled as dangerous. Everyone in this café. Everyone in my genetics class. If Trek meant “dangerous” in the way the Insiders did, then anyone with talent was a threat.
We wanted the government to ease up. The Great Episode had happened a long time ago; the fires were a distant memory; the sun shone again; the Earth was renewing itself. Those in power wanted to keep their power, and They were using the talented to do it. I glanced around the room at all the talent/danger within. None of them looked like they thought Gunn would be a problem.
“I’m your top recruiter,” I hissed back. “We need him a whole freakin’ lot. He just wanted some freedom before his check-in tomorrow.”
Trek cut a glance at Gunner, who acted like he couldn’t hear us. “Just get him hooked up and outta here.”
I waved him away before meeting Gunn’s gaze. No doubt he’d heard the venom in Trek’s last statement. Instead of noticing the accusation on his face, I saw him flying with the wind hitchhiking in his hair, the concentration riding in th
e lines across his forehead.
“How’s Cannon?” Trek asked me, interrupting any thought I had of talking to Gunner like a normal person.
“Fine. How’s your brother?” I countered.
Trek made a noise of disbelief, but anger shone in his eyes. He didn’t like talking about his brother. He and Trek didn’t see eye to eye on a lot of things, one of which was the level of control the Thinkers currently held. His brother worked in the shining jewel of the Rises: the Evolutionary Rise.
The Evolutionary Rise employed the best scientists. They worked on genetic manipulation, trying to fabricate environmental conditions that would produce talented people. So far, all we got from their experiments were clones. They served in the most menial jobs, if they survived at all.
“Cannon’s not your brother,” Trek said, practically growling.
“He might as well be,” I said in a cool voice, but really a rumble of anger grew in my stomach.
Gunn watched us, keeping up with the conversation, which only made me embarrassed on top of furious. He shifted toward me a tiny bit. “Raine—”
“I saw you win,” I blurted out, tearing my gaze from Trek’s. “Last fall, in the flight trials. I used to watch your memory every night.”
Gunn just stared at me. I could tell his brain was working hard to catch up. To think of something to say.
I picked up my mug, my hand shaking—how ridiculous was that?—and gulped my coffee. A slow heat crawled up my neck and settled into my cheeks.
“Raine’s real into flying,” Trek mocked, like it was today’s megaheadline. Ignoring him—and the surge of anger—I turned back to Gunn, who now wore that winning smile all mindless girls love. I wasn’t mindless, but that smile still made the coffee in my stomach boil.
“You won first in the girls’ league,” he said. “I should be watching your memories. Got a spare?”
“She’d love that.” Trek volleyed his gaze between me and Gunn. Now I know why your vitals were all screwy. He all but laughed over the cache.
I choked and coughed, causing the fire in my face to intensify. I leapt from the table and clicked off my cache. “Let’s go, flyboy. No copy, Trek,” which meant Try to message me or turn my cache back on and you might die tonight.
I moved toward the back room without waiting for Gunner. I grabbed a fistful of pills and stuffed them in my pocket. When I turned, Gunner stood there, watching. “I’ve got the hideout coordinates,” he said. “What’s with the pills?”
“You’ll need them to stay awake in school. You take the lead with the coordinates.” I stepped carefully around him so we wouldn’t even be in breathing distance. Trek watched our every move, almost like he was cataloging the exchange to review later. He probably was.
With Gunn behind me, I headed toward the door, glaring at Trek as if to say, Pills, check. Spidered flat in Rise Nine, check. Anything else?
Trek simply shook his head, a tiny grin not quite concealed behind his coffee mug. Just because he was currently in charge of the group didn’t mean he had to be a high-class jerk. We usually got along fine; Trek just didn’t like Gunn because of the whole flight trials loss. I’ll admit, that’s why I brought it up.
Once out in the pitch-black hallway, I groped my way along the wall to the door. I pushed it open to find bright tech lights illuminating the alley. Several seconds passed before I could see the three men standing there. Two of them held tasers at the ready. The third wore his I’m very disappointed in you face.
Time slowed as I tried to process the scene. Words raced through my mind. Excuses tripped over each other—what would he believe this time?
“Raine, this is wrong,” my dad said, taking one parental step forward. “You shouldn’t be out this late.”
“Dad, you gave me permission to fly at night.” My voice verged on panic, but Gunner had to be right behind me, and he didn’t need to get caught mere hours before reporting for his training. And Trek and the other Insiders . . . our last unknown location was now known.
With my cache off and my dad blocking my only exit, I gathered my raging emotions and tightened them so he couldn’t read how I felt.
“Yes, you and your flying.” Dad pinched his lips together in a way that screamed disapproval. He looked at the ground, searching for something. “Well, where’s your board?”
Damn.
elana johnson wishes she could experience her first kiss again, tell the mean girl where to go, and have cool superpowers. To fulfill her desires, she writes young adult science fiction and fantasy. She lives in central Utah, where she spends her time with many students, one husband, and two kids. Find out more at elanajohnson.com.
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