Visions

by Teyla Branton

  Reese wanted to yell at them to shut up. To leave her alone. Her mind threatened to explode. She shoved a man from her path, wanting to hurry to her targets. Wanting to . . .

  A sudden lethargy fell over her. Her steps slowed. What was she doing? Oh, that’s right. The thin preacher and the guy on the right, the man who was pointing something at her now. Something that might be some kind of gun. Wasn’t that interesting? She stared into the face of the man. His expression wasn’t pleasant, but she found she didn’t care.

  “Go!” The man yelled at her. “You have better things to do.”

  He was right. She was hungry. When was the last time she’d eaten? There was a great little restaurant nearby with a handsome waiter she liked to flirt with just to tease Alex. If she left now, she might make it there and back to the train on time. Or not. Did it matter? First, she needed to sketch the images in her mind. After that, she’d eat.

  She turned and walked back the way she’d come.

  Chapter 3

  “BREAK IT UP!” Jaxon shouted, sweeping the temper laser over the people nearest him. “Your CivIDs have been recorded. You need to go home or stand to the side. Go on now! You will all be contacted and interviewed about what went on here today. As of now, this is an enforcer matter.”

  That was enough to send more people scurrying away, but the crowd was still dense as he approached the preacher man’s position. Reese should have been close to him by now. Where was she? One young man threw a punch at Jaxon, but he blocked it and shot his temper laser at him.

  “Go home,” Jaxon told him.

  The man’s shoulders slumped. “Hey, whatever,” he said, and ambled away.

  Jaxon swiveled, craning his neck to see how Reese and Eagle were doing, and was stunned to see that both of them had turned from their targets and were heading to the edge of the crowd.

  “Hey!” he shouted. “Reese! What are you doing?”

  Since they were still connected through their iTeevs, her voice came to him clearly, but sounded odd and detached. “Just going to draw a few sketches. Too many images in my mind. Then I’ll grab a bite to eat. Would you like me to bring you something?”

  Jaxon stared. What was up with her? She sounded drugged, distant. He scanned the crowd for danger. There, the four men without CivIDs were carrying laser-like devices in their hands, all of which were double the size of his temper laser.

  “Reese, Eagle, they have some kind of temper lasers,” Jaxon said, “and you guys have been affected. You should nearly be out of range, and the effect will fade, but I’m going to need your help sooner rather than later, so fight it and get back in here.” The effects of a temper laser lasted an average of fifteen minutes, but this version seemed powerful.

  All enforcers had to go through temper laser training, so Reese and Eagle should have developed at least some resistance. They had also been frequent receivers of temper blasts back in the Coop as children, which should lessen their recovery time. Of the crew, only Jaxon had been born with immunity, along with less than one percent of the CORE’s two million people.

  Jaxon watched Reese turn to him, her eyes shuttered by her iTeev. “Come on!” he yelled, knowing his voice would ring through her comlink. “Get back here and finish your job. Now! That’s an order!”

  Without waiting to see if she or Eagle responded, Jaxon grabbed the bystander in front of him and threw him out of the way. One of the men with the temper lasers laughed at him and turned his weapon in Jaxon’s direction.

  Jaxon dived toward him, simultaneously exchanging his own temper laser for a stunner. This guy didn’t deserve the soft treatment. He fired and a little dart shot out, hitting the man in the neck. The thug shuddered with shock and went down.

  Two of the remaining three rushed Jaxon, exchanging their useless temper lasers for their fists. Jaxon got one with the close-contact feature of his stunner before it was wrested from his hand. At least they couldn’t use it on him without a team code or the correct fingerprints. From the corner of his eye, he saw the fourth guy grabbing the preacher and pulling him off the bench he’d been standing on. They’d get away unless Reese and Eagle could shake off the effects of the laser.

  A fist slammed into Jaxon’s head, reminding him he had more immediate concerns. He scrambled to regain his balance and punched at the big man attacking him, who barely seemed to notice Jaxon’s blow. The man lunged wildly toward Jaxon, his leap exposing his stomach. So not a professional. Jaxon put all his strength into an upper cut, one that should have stopped the man instantly. Instead, he simply coughed and threw another meaty fist at Jaxon’s face.

  Jaxon dodged. He’s hyped up on juke. This close it was easy to see the glassy, bloodshot eyes. He wouldn’t feel anything Jaxon did to him for thirty minutes or more, and with the guy’s longer reach, it’d be a challenge to get him down quickly with only his fists. Jaxon faked a punch to his face and reached for his gun. The man grunted and sprang at him again, punching Jaxon’s hand away from his weapon. Jaxon lashed out with his foot, crashing it into the guy’s stomach. The man gasped for breath but kept moving forward.

  There, an opening. Jaxon twisted, ducking close to the man and punching into his chin, snapping his head backward. He followed with a hammer punch and another kick. The man fell.

  “Stop!” Reese shouted.

  Jaxon turned to see one of the other men he’d taken out behind him, his temper laser raised to smash into Jaxon’s head. The man shuddered and crumpled as Reese got him with her stunner.

  “Thanks,” he said.

  She nodded with an expression he knew too well. She was blaming herself. Her gaze went beyond him where Dani was fighting both the fourth man and the preacher. Dani moved with so much speed that for a moment Jaxon was mesmerized. Her gift was utilizing oxygen in such a way that she was faster and stronger than any man or woman had a right to be. She could run all day without tiring, stay underwater for hours, and she healed faster. Everything that humans needed oxygen for, she had improved upon. Within seconds, she had disarmed the men and had her assault rifle aimed at their stomachs. She turned and gave Jaxon a gloating smile, the locks on her long brown wig slightly askew.

  Jaxon wiped the blood from the side of his face and helped Reese cuff the fallen men. Eagle appeared in time to help with the third before picking up one of the oversized temper lasers. “This is new,” he said. “I don’t usually react so badly to a temper laser.”

  “Here comes our backup,” Reese announced.

  Dani dragged her prisoners over to them, their hands cuffed. “Sit,” she said, pointing at the ground. In her hands was the temper laser that had belonged to the fourth man.

  “You’re immune to the temper?” Jaxon asked her, his voice low. She hadn’t been as a child.

  She cracked a sardonic grin. “No, I just moved fast. He didn’t get a chance to use it on me.”

  “These belong to fringers?” Eagle indicated the laser he was carrying. In the CORE, only enforcers and doctors who conducted psychological reconditioning had access to temper lasers, so it was a logical question. “Too strong and it could cause brain damage.”

  Dani frowned and indicated their iTeevs, reminding them that as long as they were connected to the feed, they were in danger of being overheard. Jaxon, Reese, and Eagle shut down their units and moved a short distance away from the prisoners.

  “Without doing more research,” Dani continued, “all I can tell you is that they resemble weapons we have in Newcali. Like ours, they aren’t activated by fingerprints, and we’ve improved on many weapons that were still available after Breakdown. We don’t stifle creativity or research. But these men are not ours. I’ve already sent their images to our database, and they aren’t Newcalians.”

  “Undergrounders, then?” Reese asked.

  Jaxon had been wondering the same thing, but El Cerebro didn’t usually go for public disturbances unless it was to cover up another secret operation, and the only operation he was aware of right now was saving D
r. Kentley. Then again, he didn’t know everything about the underground leader.

  “Well, if they’re with the Underground,” he said, “we’ll leave them to Brogan.”

  “And if not?” Reese cocked her head at him.

  He sighed, but it was Dani who answered, “Then we’ve got another player on the scene. Saca, for all we know they were sent by Special Forces to weed out sympathizers.”

  “Paranoid much?” Eagle gave her a placid smile. “They could be just what they seem—disgruntled citizens. They probably want more pay, were rejected for a business license, or had their birth order denied.”

  Jaxon stared at their captives. Despite the increasing chill as night approached, the thin man had laid down on the cobblestones, his hands under the back of his neck as if he hadn’t a care in the world. He didn’t look like Special Forces or Elite, but whether or not he was an actual disgruntled citizen, Jaxon couldn’t tell. “Or she might not be paranoid enough,” he said.

  “They could be from one of the fringe groups living in the empty zones,” Reese suggested.

  Dani nodded. “Though most of the groups near here are connected with Newcali, there are several groups that aren’t. Some of them are vicious. They periodically attack our people.”

  “Maybe Hammer and Brogan can figure it out before we get back.” Jaxon could already hear the humming of the tracks above them. “Train’s coming. We’ve got to pass these guys off quickly.”

  Eagle stuffed the oversized temper into his already bulging weapon’s bag, seemingly uncaring about appropriating evidence. “If you send them your feed of the event, we can file our reports on the train.”

  Jaxon motioned for an approaching enforcer to take care of the prisoners, then tapped into the AED general enforcer channel and explained the situation to the backup team as he and his crew ran up the metal stairs to the station platform. The train slid into place before them, wind whipping at his face even at its drastically reduced speed.

  Inside they chose the table cars, with three seats abreast on either side of the table. Jaxon threw his bag into the overhead compartment and slid in next to Reese. She was closer to him than the window, and their legs touched, but she didn’t move away. Delicious heat flooded his body.

  “Sorry about what happened back there,” she said to him. “I knew what I was supposed to do. I just cared more about other things. I’ve always been able to reorient quickly, but this time it took forever to shake.”

  “These tempers seem stronger than ours,” Jaxon reminded her. Her scowl showed she didn’t care to accept the excuse. She slapped a drawing pad on the table and began sketching.

  Eagle removed the oversized temper laser and set it on the table before stowing his heavy bag. “Double check your iTeevs,” he said. “Let’s make sure they’re off before we talk about anything important.”

  Jaxon had already removed his iTeev from his face, but he checked the unit on his sleeve anyway as the others stored their equipment. Only Eagle kept his special glasses on so he could see, disabling his connection to the feed.

  “You know,” Eagle said, settling next to Dani. “That guy was right, the one Jaxon called the preacher. The CORE does tax everyone fifty percent.”

  “Yeah, and they’re only pretending to send that money to the colonies.” Dani’s voice was acid. “Tell me, where is that money really going? Because no matter how you look at it, the only ones enjoying life in the CORE besides the Elite are enforcers like you. And that’s because they’re getting paid enough to look the other way.”

  Jaxon couldn’t protest. None of them could. Even a few months ago, he’d been blind to what was going on, but after learning about the slavery in the colonies and nearly being killed by Special Forces, he’d begun noticing the furtive looks in the faces around him. How they flinched from him whenever he approached. Life outside the colonies for him had been so much better than inside that he’d swallowed the rhetoric completely. He hadn’t noticed the quiet suffering of people who were too frightened to speak out. Now everywhere he looked, he saw the fear.

  “Right,” said Eagle, “but people don’t know the colonies aren’t being supported.”

  “Or do they?” Reese countered, not looking up from her sketches. “The underground exists, scientists have been contacting the fringers for years for help in getting out of the CORE Territories. Maybe people know more than we give them credit for.”

  “Whatever they believe,” Dani said, “slavery doesn’t just happen. Someone trapped people in the colonies on purpose, someone experimented on us there. Someone’s pulling the strings. It’s a matter of finding out who.”

  “It has to be some of the Elite,” Reese said, her gaze crossing Jaxon’s.

  He nodded. “They’re the only ones not afraid. The question is, what are we going to do when we find them?”

  “We kill them,” Dani answered. “Exactly the way they killed over ten thousand of our people.”

  Jaxon wanted to protest that they had no idea how far up the corruption went. Because if it went all the way to the top, they’d more likely end up in padded cages or have their ashes trampled in the dust than succeed in killing anyone.

  No one else had an answer for Dani either.

  “Anyone hungry?” Jaxon’s stomach had been sending urgent messages since before leaving the division. Everyone nodded.

  “I’ll help.” Reese set down her pencil and followed him into the aisle.

  In silence, they made their way to the back of the train car where the readymeal dispenser stood. Jaxon turned on his iTeev, linked to the enforcer credit in his account, and sent it to the machine. Reese began pushing buttons. The machine whirred as it sent the cartons of food through the microwave before popping out of the slot. Jaxon chose a variety of drinks to wash the sometimes tasteless food down.

  As they waited for the meals to cook, Reese stared at the passing landscape, her eyes distant. Her hands twitched.

  “Are you all right?” he asked softly.

  She didn’t meet his gaze. “Just a bit on edge. I need to sketch more.”

  “How bad is it?”

  She waited so long to reply that he almost thought she wouldn’t speak at all. “Bad.” She sighed and added, “I told you that I haven’t been taking the neural suppressant Alex gave me because it makes me feel fuzzy. But what I didn’t say was that I can barely touch anyone without it.”

  Which was how the suppressant had come into play at all, he suspected, especially since she was dating Alex. It was probably wrong of Jaxon to be glad things weren’t working well between them.

  “On a brighter note,” she added. “I can now wait up to ten hours before I’m forced to get the sketches on paper. And I don’t have to make them as detailed.”

  “That’s good.” He’d seen her go from calm and controlled to a quivering mass of need in less than an hour in the past when she’d seen too many sketches. Her ability made her the perfect enforcer sketch artist, but it was slowly driving her crazy. He started to put a comforting arm around her, then hesitated.

  She leaned into him. “I can feel sketches from you,” she said. “And the others in the crew, but not all the time. You are a relief to be around compared with other people. At least most of the time. Except when you have premonitions near me.”

  Which he tried not to do, if he had any warning at all. He always put as much distance as possible between him and Reese, in case the vision was of them together. As long as she was dating Alex, he couldn’t let her glimpse that intimacy. Among other reasons, it seemed too desperate on his part. Embarrassing that he could want it—want her—so much.

  “Why would it be different for us?” he asked.

  She shrugged, giving him a flat grin. “Maybe it’s because I already filled an entire sketchbook with images from your mind.”

  Or maybe it was because they spent almost every day together and she’d built up an immunity to him. Whatever the reason, Jaxon was willing to accept her explanation at face v
alue.

  “Looks like our food is ready.” He piled the readymeals on a disposable tray. “Grab the drink skins, would you?” She swept up the skins and preceded him up the aisle.

  Back at the table where the others waited, they doled out the readymeals. Dani wrinkled her nose but said nothing as she dug into hers. Eagle ate as he chatted about the cool features on the new temper laser. Reese began drawing again.

  There was a picture of him, Jaxon saw, more detailed than the rest. Who had sent her a mental image of him? He was willing to bet it wasn’t anyone from the crowd at the train station. Should he ask?

  She caught his gaze and turned the page. Later then, he thought.

  The train slowed abruptly as it raced into another station. The doors clanged open and a few people entered. They took one look at the uniforms Jaxon, Reese, and Eagle were wearing and moved to the next car. Had that always happened?

  “Better make our reports now,” Jaxon said. “We don’t want to send them anywhere close to Santoni.”

  They spent the next hour filing their reports, and then took turns changing into civilian clothes in the train restroom before each activated one of the fake CivID cards Brogan had given them. Their enforcer IDs had been useful to get their weapons onto the train, but now their uniforms and IDs would only bring attention to themselves. Back in Amarillo City, Evan Hammer would be busy planting false information into the camera feed that would make anyone monitoring the train, or who later reviewed the recordings, think the team had left at another station.

  Hammer also sent Jaxon an encrypted file over his T-link with the details about their trip. Aside from the lodging reservations, Hammer had hacked into the doctor’s daily schedule and made an appointment for Reese in the morning under one of her fake CivIDs to talk to the doctor about back pain. She was to get him alone and explain that she was also from Colony 6 and get him to accompany her back to Amarillo City willingly. If not, the rest would step in and take him by force.