by M. Van
Chapter eleven
Maece
Boots pounding, left, right, left, right—they became an eerie drone in my head until, finally, Kyran’s voice replaced the eeriness with a promise of safety.
“Go,” he whispered as if even he was afraid the approaching enforcers’ scans would pick up on his voice. Without checking if Saera had heard, I pushed the door open and pulled her inside behind me. The sound of boots was so close now that they must have come around the corner and stepped into our hallway. Hoping they hadn’t noticed, I eased the door shut until it clicked and waited. Holding my breath, I listened. Saera stood silently by my side, watching that dreaded door.
Once the footsteps had passed, we both let out long sighs. As I met Saera’s eyes for a moment, the relief I felt was mirrored in her face. The corners of my lips threatened to rise into a smile, and I couldn’t help it. I grabbed hold of Saera and hugged her.
“That was close,” she said, sounding breathy, but she smiled as I pushed her at arm’s length. My heads-up display indicated spiking adrenaline levels, and she had an elevated heart rate. Other than that, she seemed fine. I opened my mouth to ask if my indications were right, but she beat me to it.
“I’m okay, so you can stop scanning me now,” she said a bit snappy, but her grin told me it was fine.
“Let’s get on with it then,” I replied as I released Saera from her bonds and glanced around.
A glass wall separated the room into two distinct sections. The one we were standing in had that all-familiar white sterile feel that I had seen inside the hospital and walking down the halls outside the door behind me. On the other side of the glass, the walls seemed to be dressed in a sleek black coating. Except those weren’t walls. Lights blinked in intervals on the five man-sized mainframe computers. Thick columns of cables lowered from the ceiling and connected to the five towers propped against the wall.
“Now what?” Saera asked. I had asked myself the same question when I didn’t notice a visible entrance into the mainframe area.
“Please don’t tell me I have to blow something up?” I asked Kyran on the other side of the line. I glanced along the edges of the glass, suspecting that even explosives would have a hard time cracking this barrier, which my scan confirmed. Five-inch armored glass stood between us and the information we needed. Kyran’s voice sounded amused as it came over my coms. “Don’t worry. I wasn’t about to.”
“Then what?” Saera said, scrutinizing the barrier in front of us.
“Maece, move to the left and wave your hand in front of the glass,” he said. The area he had indicated didn’t look any different from the rest of the glass wall, but I did as he asked. At least I’d intended to, but I froze as Kyran’s urgent voice bellowed in my head. “But don’t touch it!”
My foot hovered in midair as if my nerves had locked it into place.
“You idiot,” Saera retorted, clearly not amused by Kyran’s method of warning. “You nearly gave me a heart attack.”
My boot landed with a thud on the tiled floor, and I let out the breath I was holding.
“Sorry,” Kyran said in a softer tone, “but touching it might set off an alarm.”
“And activating it won’t?” I asked. Kyran and Harp were sitting far away and deep underground, but the sound of Kyran’s fingers tapping reverberated as drums in my head.
“I’ve been working inside that place for a while,” Kyran replied, “and I created a back door. Just stay where you are. I’m opening a connection with the help of your heads-up.”
“Let me guess: something Tyrel fixed?” Saera said.
Kyran didn’t reply over the feed, but instead, Harp’s raspy voice filled my head.
“Stop bugging Kyran and let him work.”
I glanced at Saera standing next to me and shrugged. She crossed her arms over her chest and watched as I waved my hand at the glass wall. A portion of the glass darkened until it wasn’t see-through anymore. Several colorful icons popped up on the created screen, and text windows opened. Green letters filled the different windows, scrolling up and down too fast for the normal eye to read.
“We’re risking our lives for that crap,” Saera mumbled.
“Hang on,” I said and used my heads-up to slow the data until it became comprehensible. “I’m getting background information on ArtRep.”
“Well,” Saera said impatiently. I ignored her, reading through the text as fast as I could.
“What?” she said, and I presumed it had something to do with my mouth falling open.
“They’re…so many of them,” I said under my breath.
“Of what?” Saera asked again.
“Harp, are you getting this?” I asked.
“Yeah,” he said in a clipped tone.
Saera punched me in the shoulder, and my gaze shifted to her. She glared at me wide-eyed.
“The ARs,” I said. “We’re not talking about a few hundred serving TED. There’s thousands of them, and every one of them is Subterran.”
Saera blinked as if her brain had trouble processing the information. Her eyes shifted from me to the screen and back again.
“What do you mean they’re all Subterran?” she said.
“The ARs, none of them were constructed in a bioprinter,” Kyran piped in, “enhanced maybe, but not constructed. They are all Subterran.”
“How is that possible?” she said, the disbelief in her palpable.
“But…” I said and hesitated, “if there are so many of them, where did they all come from and why isn’t anyone missing them?”
Saera shook her head without having an answer for me and I returned my gaze to the screen. Along with a picture, the screen filled with information on Harand Sulos, the CEO of ArtRep Enterprises. Empty eyes stared back at me from the old man’s picture.
“Most of them came from the power plants still occupied by Tenebrae since the war,” Kyran said, “but there seems to be a network that operates from one or two hospitals located on the edges of Subterran territory.”
“Let me guess: Icordia,” Saera said. I glanced at her sideways as the name rang a bell. She noticed and said, “Don’t worry. Not something you would want to remember.”
I had a feeling that whatever happened to lead me to work as an enforcer for the Tenebrae Enforcer Department most have started at that hospital. A sensation, rather than a memory, sent a shiver down my spine.
“They’ve been using our own people against us,” Harp said as the numbers of what seemed to be some sort of payment scrolled across the screen.
“I don’t get it,” Kyran said. “What the hell are these?” I could understand his trouble interpreting the information. What would a Subterran gain by selling off their own? Selling how? The only currency left on this planet, at least as far as we could tell, was unprocessed mushrooms and fungi. The Subterran government used these products to trade with the combined districts. Mushrooms and fungi were used to reproduce nutrient assets for our daily diets and had become a vital component for survival. As the main supplier of these products, Subterra had a surplus, and it didn’t seem logical that this was the currency the numbers represented.
Within Subterran borders, food and other essentials, like clothes and sanitary products, were equally divided among its citizens, and for the most part, people seemed content with that.
The Combined Districts of Tenebrae had a similar approach in which they decided who received what. Dependent on background or class, this meant some received more than others. For the less fortunate, this entailed that they received just enough to survive, but when had surviving ever been enough? Especially when most had to make do with so little while the few lived in luxury.
In a society where the government dictates where you live, what you eat, and what you own, people tend to become inventive. For as long as humans had roamed this planet there had always been those who’d sought opportunities to make a profit. For that reason, black market dealings had created their own form of currency in the
form of credit notes, but these were mostly IOUs and weren’t worth much in the real world.
What was it that Tenebrae had to offer a Subterran citizen? All I could think of were perhaps some pretty lights and other forms of technology that most Subterrans didn’t care for.
Saera’s eyes seemed to glaze over after I told her about the weird currency trail, and I thought her mind must have drifted off until she said, “Energy, they produce magnetic power and lots of it.”
“What good would that do anyone,” I said pointedly, “I assume Subterrans’ self-reliance hasn’t changed since I’ve been gone.”
“Then why don’t you come up with something,” she said as she narrowed her eyes at me.
“I wouldn’t rule it out,” Harp said over the coms. Saera smirked and I would have rolled my eyes if she’d been able to see them.
“Oh shit,” Kyran said.
“What?” Saera and I simultaneously replied.
“Eh…” Kyran started to say but hesitated. The line went silent for a moment as if the two of them had cut us off. Saera lifted her shoulders as I searched her face for answers. Then Kyran’s voice reentered my head.
“Are you sure,” he asked, and I presumed he was talking to Harp.
“Tell them,” Harp said sharply.
With that, Kyran cleared his throat and said, “Maece, do you remember that device I mentioned that they have inserted into your cerebellum?”
“That…” I started to say, but hesitated and then swallowed. It wasn’t that I didn’t know what he was talking about, but Kyran’s voice sounded ominous, and I felt sure I wasn’t going to like what he had to say. “That thing that is blocking my memories,” I managed to add.
“Yeah,” he said. Another moment of silence fell, and an impatient Saera placed her hands on her sides.
“Kyran,” she said in a loud voice.
“It’s…it’s a self-destruct.”
It had gone silent inside the room and on the coms as if we needed time to let the information sink in. On automatic, my hand went to the back of my neck and rubbed the spot where I imagined the device to be.
“But you disabled the one in Maecy’s head, right,” Saera said. Silence followed, and not getting the answer as quickly as she wanted, she bellowed, “Kyran!”
Her voice came out loud, and my head shot toward the door. Nothing stirred, and I hoped no one had heard her. I grabbed her arm and jerked it.
“Why don’t you hang a sign on the door that says we’re in here,” I said in a firm but low voice.
“We didn’t even know to look for it,” Kyran said, but Saera ignored him. She glared at me with the utmost disbelief. Perhaps she had expected me to freak out, but Kyran’s information about the explosive didn’t come as a shock to me. It had occurred to me on one of those long times spent in Memory Junction. At the time, I saw myself as a ruthless killing machine, and it didn’t seem logical to not have something to control us ARs. I couldn’t remember why the thought had even come up. It could have had something to do with Kyran’s tinkering inside my brain, but somehow the thought had resonated.
“Why aren’t you more upset?” she asked, crossing her arms over her chest again.
“I don’t know.”
Saera narrowed her eyes at me, and I felt glad for the heads-up covering my face. This way she couldn’t read my reaction, and I had a feeling she could read me like the back of her hand.
On the other side of the line, Kyran sighed audibly.
“What?” I asked.
“Sulos is the only one who can give the order,” Kyran replied. “He’s the one who built in the kill switch. That’s why no one knew about this—none of the unimportant people anyway.”
“Like you,” Saera said.
“Harand Sulos,” I said, once again ignoring Saera, “CEO of ArtRep.”
“The one and only,” Harp said. I had almost forgotten he was still on the line.
“Then we must kill Sulos,” Saera said.
“Saera,” Harp spoke in a monitoring tone.
“They’re Subterran,” she said. Her voice rose an octave. “And he can kill them with the flick of a switch, including Maecy.”
“We can’t act on this, not until we analyze the information,” Harp said. His voice had changed, almost sounding soothing, but I could tell it didn’t affect Saera. Her clenched jaw twitched, and from my scan, I could tell her heart rate was faster than before.
“If they figure out Maecy is off the grid, they’ll inform Sulos, and he’ll flip the switch,” she said.
“I’m aware of the risk,” Harp replied, “but Kyran and Tyrel know what they’re doing.” Saera’s hand twitched at her side, and along with the wild look in her eyes, I had a feeling she was about to do something stupid.
“Saera, please,” I said, reaching out to her.
“No,” she said adamantly, wrenching herself away from me, “and stop scanning me.”
On the other end, I could still hear Kyran’s fingers move across the keypads, and from the corner of my eye, I saw new data scroll across the screen.
“We have to act before it’s too late,” Saera added and took a step back. “We need to kill Sulos.”
“No,” Harp said harshly, “we cannot risk a war, but a plan is in place.” He didn’t give an explanation, but from the look on Saera’s face, clarification wasn’t necessary. Her flushed face and wide eyes told it all. She was pissed, and although the information we had just received hadn’t been pretty, it seemed something else was going on.
Something in Saera’s expression changed, and she lifted a hand to her forehead. She seemed anxious.
“What plan?” she asked. Her voice sounded surprisingly calm, even though nerves caused her to bite her lower lip.
“I’m sending in the team,” Harp said. Saera looked confused as she shook her head.
“But that won’t work,” she said.
“I know it’s not your standard routine, but they can handle this,” Harp replied.
“No,” Saera said in a loud voice that made me check the door again. “I’m not going to let you do this. I’m not going to sit and wait so you can screw me over again.”
The anger in her voice was directed at Harp, but I had no way of knowing what it was about. Saera’s eyes filled with tears, which could be either hurt or frustration or maybe both. Something inside me told me it was hurt. The same hurt I had seen in her eyes before. The hurt I had seen that night we had met for the first time since I could remember.
Although it didn’t make any sense to me, I felt a need to console her, to be a source of comfort, but I didn’t know how. I took a step toward her, trying to close the gap she had created between us, but Kyran’s voice forced me to stop.
“Maece, whatever you’re doing, stop! I’m losing the feed.”
I had moved away from the glass, and the distance interfered with the heads-up connection. As I stepped back into place, Saera moved closer to the door.
“I’ll go,” she said. “If needed, I’ll kill Sulos myself.”
“You stay with Maece,” Harp said in a hard tone that sounded almost threatening. “I’m sending the team, and that’s final.”
“If you think I’m just going to sit by and wait for Maecy’s head to explode while you send someone else I love to their death, then you don’t know me very well,” she replied and took another step toward the door. “I’ll go. Besides, we’re already here and can be at the ArtRep buildings a lot sooner.”
“Saera,” Harp said. His voice had returned to his calm self.
“No,” she replied, “I’m going.”
“You are still under my command,” he said. “Now let them do their jobs.” Ignoring Harp’s order, Saera moved to the door.
“Saera, what are you doing,” I asked and heard the fear in my voice. I had no idea what they’d been talking about, but I sensed it wasn’t good. Our gazes locked, but I couldn’t reach her. It was as if the dark mask hiding my face wouldn’t allow me to get thro
ugh to her.
Her hand lifted to open the door. Inside my head, I heard Kyran’s strained voice.
“Are you seeing this?”
“Maece, don’t you move from that spot,” Harp said in a hard voice. “We need this intel.”
“Please just wait,” I said. My voice was barely audible but filled with desperation. If she exited this room without me, she would die for sure, and even though my lack of memories didn’t allow me to know her, in my heart, I knew I did. More than that, if the pounding in my chest and the tears stinging behind my eyes were any indications. I lifted my hand in a gesture to just wait. She seemed to comply, and I grabbed the opportunity to gaze at the screen.
I sucked in a breath as my quick scan absorbed the green text running down the screen.
“This can’t be right,” I said under my breath. “He couldn’t do this.”
The moment the words left my mouth I regretted them. They had nothing to do with what Kyran had found about the explosive in my head or had anything to do with Harp, but Saera might have understood them that way, because before I could even turn to her the door had opened, and she stepped through.
Chapter twelve
Maece
“Saera,” I called after her, but it wasn’t any use. The door closed behind her, and she was gone.
“I’m going after h—” I started to say, but Harp’s booming voice invaded my head.
“No,” he yelled, “you stay put.” The way he stressed it made me stand frozen on the spot. “You’ve seen what’s in these files.”
I glanced at the screen, fists clenched. Pictures of starving men and women filled my head. Children carrying heavy loads with bodies like skin over bones. The images were too painful to look at, and I returned my gaze to the door. Sound scans didn’t indicate anything wrong, which meant enforcers hadn’t found Saera yet. My feet twitched as I shifted toward the door.
