Numbers Collide (Numbers Game Saga Book 5)

by Rebecca Rode

  “Security code SREVART!” he shouted.

  “Accepted,” the transport said, and there was an audible shift in the engine. Travers grabbed the wheel with both hands and leaned forward. It was then I understood what was happening.

  He’d just switched the transport to manual. I didn’t even know it could do that.

  “Did you install this feature?” I asked when I’d recovered my voice.

  “Your father did. All the family vehicles have them. This one has a few extra surprises, however, things Malachi Hawking paid for but didn’t know about.” He paused. “Doesn’t know about.”

  Our vehicle picked up speed, weaving around slower transports toward a side road. As we did, two other vehicles, both armored Enforcement transports, pulled in behind the first. They matched our speed easily. Too easily.

  Travers groaned. Whatever override system our vehicles had, theirs obviously did too. No wonder they’d stolen Enforcer vehicles. With three of them chasing us, our chances weren’t great.

  “Those number screens they forced people to wear in Old NORA,” I began, still finding my breath. “The Firebrands were implanting the homeless. But they mentioned some kind of update. Were the original screens connected to a brain implant?”

  Travers frowned. “I don’t think so. Perhaps we should discuss it with your grandmother after we escape.”

  The not-so-subtle reminder of our circumstances brought me back to reality. Those Firebrands had to know who I was. By now, Alex would too. He would order every armored Enforcement transport in the city after us within minutes. I had only a stunner, a single transport, and a determined driver for protection. My only comfort was the fact that Alex didn’t want me dead. He would order me arrested.

  Wham!

  The explosion of sound threw me backward and against the door.

  I flung my arms out to catch myself, grunting as my head hit the back of Travers’s seat. Then our momentum flung me against my own seat, entangling me in my empty harness. I pushed free and looked around in confusion, my ears ringing.

  What had just happened?

  Travers grabbed the wheel again, steering us back onto the road. Then he shot a horrified look behind us.

  “What was that?” I shouted. My voice sounded muffled, as if coming from a distance. I couldn’t understand Travers’s reply. By the bewildered look on his face, I could tell he’d experienced the same thing I had. How was the transport holding together after an explosion like that?

  I turned around to stare out the back window and then ducked down in my seat. One of the large vehicles had nearly caught up to us. A Firebrand hung out the window, hefting what looked like a massive stunner in both hands. He frowned at the top of the weapon as if reading some kind of gauge.

  It was far too large to be a stunner. Maybe a stunner cannon. No wonder our transport had shaken like it was coming apart. We couldn’t handle many more blasts like that.

  I had so many questions. How long had those weapons existed? Did Dad know? Did the guard have access to those, or were they a Firebrand weapon? Were there others? How was I supposed to defeat an army with a few hand stunners when they had those? Most importantly, what was that weapon’s weakness? Surely it took time to recharge before each shot, or the soldier would have launched another shot at us while I sat there, staring at him out the—

  Wham!

  The vehicle shook violently once more, nearly launching us off the road again. I ducked and covered my ears, though it was too late to prevent the huge wave of pressure from hitting my eardrums. Travers managed to keep his seat this time, although he slid several inches forward and ducked his head at the impact. As I sat up, I noticed a long, spiderlike crack in the rear window.

  “ . . . down!” Travers shouted. The sound came in bursts of clarity, and I realized he was ordering me to stay on the floor. If the window broke, I’d be vulnerable to whatever that thing was. And then . . .

  Fates. They weren’t just trying to stop the transport.

  They were trying to kill us.

  “Hold on!” Travers shouted, his voice stronger than before. I barely had time to duck before we launched sideways into an alley, clipping the side of a building and knocking a side mirror clean off.

  The transport just behind us missed the turn, but the other two followed.

  Travers’s jaw clenched, and both hands tightened on the wheel. The alley was dark and narrow. If they managed to halt our transport, we wouldn’t even be able to open the door to escape.

  Then I’ll have to make sure they don’t stop us.

  I whipped the stunner from my pocket and let my finger hesitate over the switch. Stun mode wasn’t likely to make much of a difference with an armored vehicle protecting those soldiers. Clearly, these guys meant for Travers and me to die today. This was no time for hesitation. I flipped it to fatal mode, opened the side window, and sent off a couple of quick shots. But nothing happened.

  Our vehicle rocked with another impact, shards of glass flying in my direction. I ducked again and threw my arms over my head.

  Travers swore from the front seat. “Are you all right?”

  I carefully lifted my face, finding my hair buried in glass, and shook it off. Then I brushed away any remaining glass and glanced back. The rear window was completely blown out.

  One more shot and we were goners.

  I lifted the stun gun once more and shot at the driver. Nothing, not even the sound of ricocheting. The Firebrand shooting the stun cannon retreated inside. Only one kind of shot would stop that thing, and that shot required the best aim of my life.

  I had to take out that Firebrand.

  It felt like an eternity before he appeared at the side window again, lining us up along the barrel of the stun cannon. I growled in frustration. Not much of his face showed, and the road was bumpy, but I wouldn’t have another chance. I aimed and yanked on the trigger.

  An explosion unlike any of the others ripped the air apart, throwing me across the vehicle. I gritted my teeth as pain sliced through my hands, arms, and face.

  The transport flew forward just as Travers turned onto a side road, the momentum throwing us toward another transport headed in the opposite direction. I caught a glimpse of the terrified man in the front seat. His vehicle must have deployed its emergency halting mechanism because we missed him by centimeters.

  Travers gained control of the transport once more, his face drained of color. I shook myself free of glass again, cursing at the tiny bleeding cuts on my palms, and turned back toward the rear window only to see the other transport disappear behind us. It had smashed against the wall of a clothing store, black smoke curling up from the engine. Just then, the second Enforcer vehicle rammed into its backside, flinging the first into the street. A third swung wide to avoid hitting it.

  I stared at the stunner in my hand. How . . . ?

  Then understanding dawned. I’d missed the gunner, but he’d pulled his trigger at the same time. Stunners used sound waves to incapacitate a target. The two waves, though very different in force, had collided midair and caused some kind of explosion that threw them off course.

  “Yes! You did it, Miss Hawking!” Travers shouted. Even as he finished, his grin faded and his jaw clenched. I whirled around to find that the third vehicle had abandoned the others and now plunged headlong after us.

  “Go, go, go!” I yelled, watching through the space where the back window had been. An unmistakable shadow, black and heavy, sat in the front passenger’s arms. Another stun cannon.

  My throat grew so tight I could barely breathe. I’d been lucky the first time. There was no way I could repeat it.

  “See if you can lose them,” I shouted at Travers, aiming my stunner at their vehicle and releasing a couple of quick shots at their windshield. Nothing. Not even a crack, and they’d already begun to close the distance between us.

  We needed a plan. If only we had something stronger to shoot at that windshield—or perhaps throw at it.

  I
gave my seat a sideways look. Dad had commissioned it after purchasing the vehicle, having fitted it specifically to the shape of my body. What else had he added for extra protection? I reached beneath the seat and began to fumble with one of the latches.

  “What are you doing?” Travers asked.

  “Don’t worry about it. Just keep them from shooting at us.”

  “How am I supposed to do that?”

  I grunted, throwing my weight behind the last latch. “Evasive maneuvering? I don’t know. You’re the one who reads all the books.”

  “Romances,” he muttered. “I read romances.” But he gritted his teeth and yanked the wheel sideways, sending me scrambling to secure myself so I didn’t slide into the piles of glass again. Just as he straightened out, a giant whoosh blew past us. We’d barely missed that one.

  “Perfect!” I shouted. “Now, pretend we’re in a romance novel and the bad guy is after your busty blonde heroine. What would you do?”

  “I don’t think that comparison quite works here, Miss Hawking.”

  The vehicle straightened out just in time for another sharp turn to the left. I braced the now-loose seat against my body, although it still tilted toward Travers. I caught it with my leg before it could tumble into the front, then lowered it to the ground beside me. It was heavier than I imagined. Lined with some kind of metal, perhaps.

  Thanks, Dad.

  Travers swore again and swerved. This time the shot caught us halfway. Without the back window in place, the whoosh was much stronger. The wave of air nearly picked up the vehicle and threw us as strongly as the interference wave had earlier.

  “The transport can’t take another one of those,” Travers called out. “Did you say you had some kind of brilliant plan?”

  “No. A risky plan will have to do. Can you let them get closer?”

  “Closer?”

  “Just trust me.” Although I didn’t even trust myself. If this didn’t work, I could very well be sentencing us both to death. The soldiers would drag our bodies back to Alex, and the Copper Office would be his forever. Dad wouldn’t last long, nor Gram, and Kole would . . .

  No.

  We would not lose this battle today. The thought thrust itself upon my mind as forcefully as anything, startling me with the intensity of it.

  Travers slowed the transport, its high-pitched whining lowering in pitch by the second. Good. Let them think the battery had taken a hit and we’d soon be theirs. Maybe it meant they would hold off on the stun cannon for a few seconds. That was all I needed. Just a few seconds . . .

  The sound of cheering behind us meant they were much closer than before. Was it close enough? Did I dare lift my head to find out, or would they blast it off at the first opportunity?

  The electric whining of their engine rose in pitch as it drew closer and closer.

  Now.

  I lifted the seat in front of me, angled it, and heaved it through the back with a mighty yell.

  Their driver tried to swerve, but he had little time. The seat hit the street, bounced, and smashed through his windshield. The vehicle lurched to one side and smashed into a light pole, which teetered, paused, and then plunged to the ground.

  Travers turned us down the next street, and the scene disappeared behind us.

  Seven

  Kole

  Thanks to my self-imposed spying missions, I knew exactly where Dane’s headquarters stood.

  My uncle no longer used his home. Ever since Alex’s order to disband the Enforcers who didn’t support him, they’d occupied the old Enforcer building around the corner from the Block. One of those old-fashioned, gray, two-story buildings, the structure looked like something once owned by the fire team. I avoided the front door and its fingerprint lock, instead swinging around to the side. This door had an implant-code lock—the type that clicked open only when you had brain-implant authorization. Firebrands were as cocky as Enforcers were paranoid. They didn’t expect to be attacked in their stronghold. Surely they’d left something unlocked.

  Ignoring the pounding in my skull and pain slicing through my rib cage with every breath, I carefully examined every window until I found an open one in back, voices floating through from inside.

  I heaved it open and slid inside in a single movement, muting my screaming muscles to a dull buzz.

  There was a crash as someone jumped to their feet behind a desk. Zenn, Not Dane. He’d stopped shaving since I saw him last, and the dark scruff he now sported on his chin met with thick sideburns in front of his wide ears. In another lifetime, he’d been one of my best friends.

  “Where is he?” I roared.

  “K-Kole,” Zenn sputtered, grabbing the closest object on the desk. A pen. He lifted it but made no move toward me. “You can’t just break in like you belong here.” He usually hid his accent better. I’d truly startled him.

  “If I belonged, I wouldn’t be breaking in. Where is Dane?”

  “He isn’t here, I swear. Why do you look like you just walked through a campfire?”

  “Very funny.” Except he looked genuinely confused. Baffled. Concerned, even. “You really don’t know?”

  His thick, black eyebrows drew together in confusion. “Know what? That you’re sleeping in chimneys now? Why the fates would I know where you’ve been? You’re the one who abandoned us and ran off with some doomed heiress.”

  So that was Dane’s dialogue. He’d conveniently left out the hospital attack where he killed my mom and chased me off. And Legacy was no doomed heiress. She was the future leader of NORA. I’d make sure of it.

  “Dane tried to kill me,” I snapped. “Set my building on fire and killed a dozen innocent people.”

  He looked genuinely stunned. “I didn’t know, man. I’m really sorry.” He glanced at the window I’d just entered and took a step back as I approached. “But are you sure it was us? I mean, we didn’t light anything up last night. Dane isn’t even in town. He went to—went somewhere.” There was a note of defensiveness in his tone.

  Some of the anger drained from my chest like a doused flame. At least Zenn knew where Dane was. “So Dane had some other coward set the fire. Big deal.”

  “You really think he’d let someone else kill you? He’s been muttering about strangling you for weeks. If he knew you were here right now, after all our searching, he’d . . .” He clamped his mouth shut. “You don’t have much time left, man. If I were you, I’d turn around and disappear.”

  So Dane had scoured the city, wanting me dead. It meant my decision to live away from Legacy had been the right one. “Not until you tell me where Dane went.”

  “You know I can’t talk.”

  It was then I noticed his hand reach into the desk drawer. I leaped over the desk and slammed him against the wall, pinning him there. “Tell me where he is, Zenn.”

  My former friend’s eyes narrowed as he struggled against my arms. The movement tore at my sore ribs, stoking the flames consuming me from the inside. Any injuries I bore now were preferable to what could have happened. What Dane had intended to happen.

  “I swore the oath,” Zenn snapped, shoving my arms away. “So did you.”

  “We swore to bring freedom to the city, not terror. Don’t pretend the Firebrands didn’t start those other fires too. I know you did.”

  “We had our orders,” he admitted. “But we always clear the building first. If people died, it wasn’t us. And if Dane wants you dead, he will succeed. All Firebrand traitors eventually vanish. Seems like you’d know that better than anyone, Mason.” Zenn shoved me backward, forcing me to stumble and hit the desk with my lower back. It sent pain screaming through my rib cage. I gritted my teeth to hide a grunt. The last thing I needed was for Zenn to know my current state.

  “Here’s a thought,” I said, rising to my full height to glare down upon my former friend. “Maybe Firebrands shouldn’t be killing anyone.”

  He gave an incredulous snort. “I don’t know what you thought we were doing here, but it wasn’t makin
g pretty speeches about a world full of rainbows. This is the real world.”

  “Well, maybe I’ve seen both sides and realized I was on the wrong one. I’ll give you five seconds to tell me where Dane is, or I’ll send your nose through your brain. Five . . . four . . .”

  He smirked. “Wrong side, huh?”

  “Three . . . two . . .”

  His arm jerked upward, and a stunner appeared in my face. He’d managed to grab it after all.

  I shoved the barrel aside just as he pulled the trigger. A portion of the blast caught me in the shoulder, sending me tumbling across the desk and to the floor. I hit hard and rolled a few feet toward the open window. A pained gasp escaped my throat as the room blurred around me, going gray at the edges.

  Don’t black out. Don’t black out.

  Zenn opened another drawer, removed a pair of cuffs, and stepped around the desk. He meant to keep me here till Dane returned.

  He was about to be very disappointed.

  My legs shot out as he approached, my foot connecting with his shin. He howled and dropped the cuffs as he leveled the stunner at my chest. I rolled out of the way just as another blast hit the floor. Then I launched to my feet and swung a fist to his face. It connected just as he turned.

  Now he was the one who flew across the desk, toppling his chair. I stepped around both to find him lying there, looking dazed.

  “Tell me where he went!” I shouted. My headache flared, causing spots in my vision.

  “No,” he managed.

  I threw my rage into a single kick to the temple. His head snapped sideways, and he toppled to the ground.

  Footsteps sounded behind me. I turned in time to see a figure rushing me from the doorway. He slammed me against the desk. My head hit the surface, making the already-blurry room float oddly. I fought the darkness rushing in as I slid to the floor, my breath wheezing alarmingly. Every centimeter of my body ached now—from my scraped fingers to my torn feet and burned face. I imagined what it would feel like to let my head fall to the side, to give in and let the blackness take me. Zenn was right. If Dane wanted me dead, I couldn’t escape him forever. Better to face death sooner than later.