Drops of rain shook loose from the foliage, falling on them, and Nova huddled even closer to Bas. The hair on his arms rose, and he ran his hand down Nova’s back protectively. He took shallow breaths, willing the brush to keep them hidden.
They’re not here for us. Bas focused on what the enemy was doing. This convoy was flying northwest. Why? Something big was happening if it required this many transports heading to the same spot.
Nova dug her nails into his back, her full lips slightly parted, brown eyes too bright. The danger, the adrenaline, and stims all worked together to make Bas suddenly hyperaware of every sensation. The dull roar filling his ears, sharp roots digging into his side, the warmth emanating from Nova’s slim, strong body… and the way his skin had heated up, his chest tingling where her breasts crushed against him.
Bas shifted with discomfort and pushed down the unwelcome thought, focusing on the fleet above. Any minute, they could be seen—bullets would shower down on them, and this time, they wouldn’t escape.
His heart beat even faster, awareness of imminent death only intensifying his awareness of Nova. They could die, right now, which was why his body felt so alive.
The convoy seemed to be never-ending. When the last hover crossed the sky, and the roar faded to a distant hum, Bas got his hearing back—his own heavy breaths mingled with Nova’s shorter, quick breaths.
He swallowed, letting her go. “We gotta move.”
They crawled back out from under the bush, and Nova sat up against the tree, her face flushed. She had a wide smudge of soot on her cheek, and without thinking, he pulled off one of his gloves to wipe it away.
She went still as he ran his thumb along her warm skin, following her jaw line. Her brown eyes softened. Bas’s efforts just smudged the soot further. His thumb came to rest on her chin, and his pulse thrummed again, the danger from a minute ago still charging through him, throwing him off. Nova was family, like a sister to him, whether they shared genes or not. He shouldn’t be touching her like this at all… she’d get the wrong idea again. But he couldn’t seem to stop.
She licked her lips. “What I was trying to tell you earlier… Haven—”
“You don’t need to worry,” Bas murmured. “I’ll get us out of here.”
Her eyes narrowed, and she let out an abrupt laugh, twisting away from his touch and bounding to her feet. “Isn’t that my line? I’ll get us out of here when I comm Haven. And if you’d stop interrupting me, you’d know how I’m gonna do that.” She shook out her long, wind-blown hair, then tied it up neatly.
Bas flexed his fingers and slid his glove back on. “So what’s your plan?” he asked, his voice too harsh.
“It doesn’t matter that our transmitter is busted,” Nova replied, “because Jeremiah sent coordinates.” She widened her eyes and spoke like she thought he was slow. “Which… means… Jeremiah… has… a… transmitter. Or at least has some way to get a message to Haven. We find him, we find a way to comm Haven.” She gave Bas an exaggerated wink. “See? Problem solved. You’re welcome.”
Something cracked in the brush across from them, and Bas had his gun out instantly, aimed in that direction.
Lex emerged, short hair stuck up on one side, deep hollows beneath her eyes, clutching her abdomen. Rory trailed in after her, his six foot one towering over her five two. Lex’s childlike features twitched as she glanced behind Bas, at Nova. Nova was staring at her with open dislike.
Bas lowered his gun, relief surging through him. Lex was back, and Nova was right. Against protocol or not, Haven would have to keep waiting for a message. As soon as they found Jeremiah, they’d find a way to comm home. This mission was back on track.
“You were gone too long.” He walked over to Lex. “What happened?”
Before she could answer, her face creased with pain, and she doubled over, hand still on her stomach. She sank to the ground, her face even paler than before. Rory went for his medkit, but Bas beat him to it. He grabbed a painmod out of it and jabbed it into Lex’s thigh.
“Thanks,” she whispered.
Bas let out a breath, tamping down a flicker of anger at what Infinitek had done to Lex. “What happened out there?”
“One… sec.” Lex blinked slowly as the painmod hit her, and she sank against Bas’s pack.
“She got here right before that convoy came through,” Rory said. “She said there are fields ahead… and that she went all the way to Jeremiah’s coordinates.”
“You weren’t supposed to go that far,” Bas said to Lex.
Lex’s eyes flicked back open, but she stared past him, as if at nothing. “I heard so many trucks.” Her voice came out raspy, but she spoke in a measured tone, each word carefully chosen. “The Coalition was out there, moving something. Or a lot of things. But when I got to the end of the field, they were gone. They left behind a transport and six soldiers. Jeremiah’s coordinates are in the middle of a dead quin field, and he’s not there. But right beside it, there’s a barn. And the Pandemic Control soldiers are guarding it.”
The Coalition was sitting right on top of Jeremiah’s last known position. Bas’s mouth went dry. “Did you see what they’re guarding? What’s inside the barn?”
Lex pawed at Rory’s medkit without answering and swiped a stim from it. She dropped it onto her tongue and chewed it with her mouth open. Her eyes flicked from Bas to Nova again, then back to Bas. She took a long, slow drink from Bas’s canteen, then twisted it in her grasp, staring down at the Protected implant peeking out from her sleeve—the silicone disc Bas hadn’t had time to remove when they’d escaped the New York facility.
“Lex,” Bas said, growing impatient. “Tell us what’s in the barn.”
“What’s inside anything the Coalition touches?” Lex asked quietly. “Something bad… Something ugly and broken.”
Nova groaned. “She doesn’t know.”
Lex took another sip of Bas’s canteen. “I waited. But they didn’t open the doors. So I came back.”
Rory and Nova exchanged a worried look, and Bas’s chest went tight.
“This doesn’t mean Pandemic Control has Jeremiah,” Bas said. “All it means is that he was here ten hours ago. He would have moved if he saw them coming… He could still be nearby. Gear up. We’re leaving.”
They readied their gear quickly and silently, and Lex led the group, showing them the path she’d taken out of the woods while scouting.
As they walked, the patches of dead foliage seemed to spread, until half of the growth was brown. Plants that had already fallen lay rotting in a thick mat on the forest floor, soaked from the earlier rain.
Nova cursed from behind Bas, and he turned. Her boot had gotten stuck in a tangle of the rotting debris. She grabbed Bas’s extended hand to pull herself out of it, bringing some of it with her. “Fucking nature.”
“Got a problem, Pocahontas?” Rory asked, his dark blue eyes twinkling with amusement.
“Eat me.” Nova ripped the plant matter from her boot and held it up. The thin roots looked like they were in an advanced state of decay, covered in slime. “Does this look like any kind of drought you guys have ever seen?”
“This isn’t the worst of it,” Lex said evenly.
“Not our problem,” Bas said through gritted teeth. “Keep moving.”
By the time they reached the edge of the woods, they saw what Lex had meant.
Just outside the edge of the forest, everything was dead.
Beyond the tree line—for as far as Bas could see across the sloping open ground—there were fields. Fields of brown, desiccated crops. The nearest field contained a quin crop with dry stalks that had to be eight feet tall.
There were no signs of any people, no signs of hovers in the sky, none of the usual sounds of life found in nature.
In the distance, the tall quin stalks rustled as a light breeze moved through, filling the eerie silence.
“What caused this?” Nova whispered.
Bas shook his h
ead, scanning the field and sky again for any sign of the enemy. All that mattered was finding Jeremiah and extracting him from this shitshow. Whatever the truth was about these plants and the quarantine, he should know, considering he’d been down here so long. But why had he come down here?
X hadn’t given Bas many details about Jeremiah’s mission, and Bas hadn’t pressed. Haven was a safe place—a refuge—because so few people knew everything about it. And that included details about the many missions X ran. Asking questions wasn’t Bas’s job. Completing missions was.
“The plants aren’t our problem,” Bas said gruffly, breaking through the tense silence. “We find Jeremiah, we get his transmitter, and we get the fuck out of here.”
Lex jutted her chin toward the field. “The barn is a mile that way.”
Rory pulled out the stims and handed them each a fresh dose.
Bas swallowed his and gestured toward Lex. “Take us there.”
The relentless heat faded as the afternoon wore on, but Selene felt no relief. Her anxiety had grown with every step toward downtown, until all her thoughts were too slippery to hold onto. When they rounded the last bend, her skin prickled. She lurched forward to grab Eli.
“Wow.” His voice rose. “I’ve never seen so many cars!”
A half-mile ahead, the road they were on connected with the main highway and the street that led into town. One after another, cars turned off the highway and headed toward downtown Telmont in straight, even lines.
Everyone in the county had to be here today to form this kind of traffic. Selene fought the urge to turn around. They hadn’t walked all this way just to go home empty-handed. Besides, whatever this was, it likely had nothing to do with the Thrift store.
“Keep walking, and don’t stare.” She let go of Eli to put on her jacket, zipping it up to better conceal her gun.
Soon they reached the place where the wilderness ended and sidewalks and anemic trees began. It smelled different here, like civilization had stripped away all life, leaving behind only a sea of asphalt to bake and crack in the hot sun. Selene kept her head down, trying to ignore the cars filing past on autodrive.
A hazy memory rose in her mind. A view from inside a tall building, rain trickling down a glass windowpane. Lots of cars on a highway below, not moving. But that had been in the city. Seattle? The image faded away, and Selene was glad. There was only pain in the past—not worth thinking about.
The first building at the edge of downtown was the holo station that reported local news and acted as a relay for the national feed. The two-story metal and glass structure was much newer than other buildings in town. It was set far back from the road, only a few cars and a van in the empty parking lot. At the gated entrance, a metallic 3D cube rotated in the windless sky above the word Calliope6.
Selene’s stomach turned like it always did when she saw it, but Nan wasn’t worried. The international media corporation was part of the Corporate Coalition, but they hardly had a presence here. And they didn’t hunt Protecteds like Infinitek did.
She grabbed Eli’s hand and pulled him along faster, toward the large shopping center ahead.
Signs flickered beneath awnings as holographic images cycled through the latest sales. Cars were parked in front of the bitbank, the autoshop, and the thrift store. But the overwhelming surge of traffic was headed to one place: the market.
What the hell is going on?
Nan said the police station was at the other end of town, before the hospital. Not that Selene had ever gone that far. Her heart raced as she scanned the cars coming from that direction. A black car with a silver Coalition logo on the door had just turned into the parking lot. Cops.
Eli tried to wriggle out of her grasp. “You’re hurting my hand.”
“Sorry.” She let go, her mouth suddenly tasting like dust. Scraggle hadn’t said anything about this on his cast. But the real newsfeed ran inside the market. She didn’t have to wait for Scraggle’s cast… She could find out for herself what was going on.
“What are we—?”
“I—I think we need to stop by the market first.”
“But Nan said only Thrift.”
“We’ll be quick.”
“Let’s just go to Thrift like Nan said.” Eli’s voice trembled.
“It’ll be okay.” She started walking, pulling him along. “Nan will want to know what’s happening—why all these people are here.”
The market looked packed, but they’d be fine… as long as she avoided that cop car. They skirted the crowded parking lot, where lines of cars waited for spots, and joined the crowd filing through the market entrance. Selene tried not to stare at the group in front of her with their form-fitting, temperature-controlled clothing.
As the line moved, she made out the message on the holo sign above the entryway. New shipment expected Wednesday.
What? Why would they be announcing that? What did it matter? The crowd moved forward again, and Selene accidently brushed against one of the women ahead of her. The brunette whirled and pulled away, scowling as she noticed Selene’s clothes, saw the holes in Eli’s tennis shoes. Her nose wrinkled with distaste.
Selene’s cheeks grew hot. She knew what they looked like. Fucking homeless. Maybe even malnourished in this crowd of overweight snobs, well fed on processed crap.
The woman took another step away, edging closer to the man she was with. As if she thought Selene carried a plague. Ha. If only she knew what they really were.
What did Selene need fancy weather-adjusting clothing for, anyway? Ridiculous. These people were corporate slaves, in debt ‘til death, working to buy things they didn’t need. That’s what Nan said. She said none of these people really owned anything. Not their houses, not their cars, probably didn’t even really own their clothes. At least she and Eli owned what they wore and had full bellies from what they grew.
Selene ground her teeth, her anger warring with shame. Eli was staring at the woman, and when he looked up at Selene with open hurt on his face, something inside her twisted. She pretended to stumble, knocking the rude woman into the people ahead of her. The woman looked back, eyes flashing with anger.
“Watch where you’re walkin’, lady.” Selene enunciated each of the words to increase their effectiveness.
The woman blinked and shrank away, and the man beside her wrapped an arm around her.
Eli tugged on Selene’s sleeve, pointing at the cop standing next to the doors… staring right at Selene.
Selene’s eyes dropped to the Coalition symbol on his breast pocket, then to the ground. Shit.
Would he see the bulge beneath her jacket, guess what it was? The gun suddenly felt heavy on her hip, bulky and obvious to anyone who looked.
Selene’s mouth went completely dry, and she didn’t breathe as they inched past.
Please don’t stop us.
Please.
I promise I’ll never draw attention to myself ever again.
Somehow, amazingly, the cop didn’t stop them.
Then they were inside.
The full force of the unnaturally cold air hit Selene, making her stomach lurch. Checkout lines extended down the aisles.
Aisles of near-empty shelves.
She pulled Eli through the crowd, away from the scanners, and hurried down the nearest aisle. Only a few jugs of water and packaged drinks remained on the rows of metal shelves.
“Nan said to keep to ourselves.”
“We are.”
“You shouldn’t have pushed that woman.”
“What? You gonna tattle to Nan?”
“No.”
Two customers in front of them broke into an argument over a container of synthetic breast milk. Bile crept up Selene’s throat as the customers’ voices rose, and she pushed past them, shielding Eli.
Eli held on tight as Selene pressed on, weaving around tense shoppers until she reached the pharmacy at the back of the store.
Two publ
ic holo screens hung next to the pharmacy sign, meant to entertain shoppers while they waited. A crowd of people, most of them very old, stood in line at the pharmacy. None of them seemed fazed by the chaos around them—most were paying rapt attention to the cast. Eli wiggled out of her grasp and began reading through a tech module display.
Telmont’s own local news channel was on the main display. A young, very tan man spoke, and an image of a red carpet hovered beside him on the screen. “The CC Entertainment Awards will take place in Seattle in just a few days. Several key figures in the Coalition are expected to appear to award and honor United North America’s most talented entertainers. Tune in right here for complete coverage. But don’t forget to upgrade your holo gear. With Calliope6’s new VRx2000 immersion module, you won’t believe you’re watching from home.”
Selene couldn’t believe this was on the news. She forced her gaping mouth shut and heard her jaw click. Why the hell was this guy reporting on an awards show when the market in his own town had no food? And how come no one else in line seemed to notice how crazy that was?
She dropped her gaze to the smaller holo screen below, quickly scanning it for answers. Community announcements cycled across it, but none mentioned a food shortage.
If you see any of these criminals, please report to your local law enforcement agency immediately. Practice extreme caution. They are armed and dangerous.
Pictures of the criminals appeared for a moment and then vanished into the next announcement.
Selene blinked, and her stomach hollowed out. There had been three images. Three wanted criminals.
An old heavyset man. A middle-aged man with a beard. And a slim woman with blond hair.
The travelers who had bought everything from Selene’s stand.
Criminals.
Selene’s pulse quickened, and racing thoughts flooded her mind, clouding it.
“In other news,” the news caster droned on, “Infinitek has released a statement that their colony fleet is as much as ten years ahead of schedule. A representative from the company said the corporation is ‘confident they will begin accepting passenger applications by fall.’”
Defective (Fractured Era Book 1) Page 8
