by M. Van
Something blinked on my screen, and I assumed it tried to warn me of my elevated heart rate, but I didn’t need the heads-up to remind me of that. I could feel it rage inside my chest like a wild beast trapped in a cage as the memories of a similar tube flashed across my mind. It wasn’t this man’s pain that I could feel; it had been my own.
Robotic arms hovering in front of my eyes before they started to tear at my flesh sent a sense of dread through my body that resulted in my hands shaking uncontrollably. I clutched them into fists, taking a sharp breath as I tried to flush the memories from my mind.
A hand on my shoulder startled me, and shocked, I turned to face Saera.
“I’ve been calling you,” she said. Her voice was soft and filled with concern. In a distant corner of my mind, I heard Kyran’s voice echo that we needed to move.
“Are you all right?” Saera asked.
My eyes returned to the man inside the room, and Saera’s gaze followed mine.
“Bad memories,” I said. Unable to face Saera, I turned and walked toward the door.
Chapter twenty-four
Reece
“Come on, Riffy,” I said, keeping my voice low. “You’re using up all the space here.” Riffy grabbed a metal rod for balance and shifted his position. It had taken us a while to override the lift’s security features, and we had even been forced to enlist Tyrel’s help, but in the end, we had managed just before Kyran had informed us that Maece and Saera had located the workstation. Even though it had taken us longer than we would have hoped to get this lift going, it seemed we were still good on time.
Lucky for us the magnetic lift had a more classical design and looked like a box with actual wooden panels decorating the walls. It didn’t seem wise to just take the magnetic lift and ride it down to the Hymag platform without knowing what to expect. The lift was part of Sulos’s secret escape route, but that didn’t mean nobody else used the Hymag platform in the lower levels of this building. So, after Maece and Saera left for their part of the mission, we decided to descend into the belly of the beast on the roof of the small box.
I maneuvered over the hatch that we had used to climb up from inside the lift onto its roof and placed my feet on either side of the opening.
“Ready?” I asked. Kelle was sitting in position beside the hole as she looked up and nodded. The lift’s velocity reduced, but not enough to take me off balance. Just in case, I grabbed hold of Riffy’s shoulder and used my free hand to grab Kelle’s belt. Confirming that my grip was solid, I said, “Ready when you are.”
Silent as ever, Kelle lowered herself headfirst down the hole. The box slowed even more and then stopped. Kelle eased forward, hoping to get a look of what was awaiting us for when the doors opened. She signaled for me to lower her some more. Her belt and my hold on that belt were now the only two things that kept her from falling nose first.
“Clear,” she said.
“You sure,” I whispered. Kelle glanced up and cocked an eyebrow. She was sure. I lowered her further, and when her feet pointed to the ground, I released her. She landed in a crouched position and stayed there, watching whatever it was she was watching.
“I’ll go first,” I said, turning to Riffy, “in case you get stuck.” That earned me his middle finger, a gesture that had been around for who knew how long. I grinned and took a step to drop into the hole.
My hands shot up, and I grabbed the edge of the opening before my legs hit the ground. I dangled for a moment, catching my own impression of what awaited us on the outside of this box. I groaned as I saw the short hallway with three doors, and then I dropped to the floor. Blowing out a breath, I passed Kelle and stepped into the hall. Damp-looking walls and three doors. I half turned, glancing over my shoulder to see Kelle still sitting in her crouched position.
“What was it you were looking for?” I asked.
She stood as if she attempted to shoot me with her glare and stepped out of the box. Her eyes never left the doors as she said, “Doors can open.”
Behind us, a loud thud sounded as Riffy landed inside the box. To keep myself from any snide remarks, I didn’t turn to see how he had landed, but I could imagine it. I tapped the coms device lodged in my ear.
“Hey, Ty, I need a little help,” I said. “Door number one, two, or three?” I heard Tyrel’s fingers tapping ferociously on her virtual keypad. Unfortunately, we didn’t have one of those nifty heads-up displays like Maece had. Those things made for way better access. In Tyrel’s hands, I’d bet she’d be able to perform magic tricks with it beyond words.
Another misfortune for Tyrel was that Harp always favored Kyran, and although the boy wonder was good, he couldn’t come close to our little girl magnificent. For Tyrel, this meant she got stuck with the minor assignments, and usually that meant getting stuck with us. We had nothing to complain about, though. Tyrel hadn’t grown up as part of our crew; she wasn’t one of Harp’s kids, but she could have fooled me.
Harp wasn’t the only one to rescue kids from the plants, although he was one of only a few that didn’t do it entirely for selfish reasons. Sure, wanting us to join his organization was selfish, but to his credit, he had given us the choice. Other kids weren’t that lucky and were often used as cheap labor. Tyrel had been one of the lucky kids if you don’t count losing both parents by the time she turned six.
Tyrel let out an exasperated sigh before she said, “This might take a while.”
Patience wasn’t one of my strong suits, and after bothering Riffy for a while and pacing the narrow space until I feared I might have worn out a path on the floor, I stretched my muscles. Kelle gave me an annoyed look as the popping sounds that I made with my mouth started to go on her nerves.
“Okay, found it,” Tyrel said, sounding as excited as a shy girl could ever be, “just give me one more minute.”
To give my mind something else to do, I switched channels. This wasn’t exactly protocol. We were supposed to focus on our part of the job, and Tyrel or Kyran would monitor each other’s feeds. They would inform us if there was something we needed to know, and if necessary, we could switch to the main channel. Still, I felt curious.
As soon as I switched, voices battered my hearing, frantic chatter going from Kyran to Harp and then back to Saera.
“She needs help,” Saera all but yelled.
“Stay with that HUD,” Harp said.
“I don’t understand how this happened,” Kyran said, underlining the conversation. Panic was evident in their voices. In the background the clear sounds of weapons fire combined with a struggle were evident.
“Goddammit, Saera,” Harp said, raising his voice and apparently losing his cool. “If someone takes a shot at that thing, then everything will have been for nothing.” Knowing Saera, what Harp’s plea fell on deaf ears. I had heard enough.
“Ty, doors, now!” I said. Kelle and Riffy looked at me in surprise. They hadn’t heard what I had.
“I know,” Tyrel said in her timid voice. She had been listening. I stepped up to the door, glancing at them one at a time. She must have known what I was thinking, because Tyrel shot me a warning, “If you choose the wrong one it will trigger an alarm.”
“The alarm has already been triggered,” I said. That bit of news also triggered Kelle and Riffy. Both drew their weapons and stepped in line behind me.
“Do you want them to know your escape route?” Tyrel added. She was right, of course.
“Reece,” Kelle said. She spoke my name as if it was a question. I glanced over my shoulder, and I knew she could read the reply on my face.
“They’re in trouble,” I said. “I want this platform cleared in three minutes.” Before I could add anything, else Tyrel said, “Second door on the left.”
I glanced at the doors and said, “So it’s the middle door.”
“The screen reads, second door on the left,” Tyrel replied. I opened my mouth to speak, but then felt Kelle’s fist in my back.
“Focus,” she hissed.
“Right,” I said and pressed the panel that was supposed to open the door in the middle.
Relieved at the sight of two officers and not enforcers, we slipped into the large open space and hid behind a column. The space resembled Harp’s little hideout and looked like a cave, but on a much smaller scale. Something the two places didn’t have in common was the massive pillars that seemed to carry the roof of this place. Two rows of columns carved a path from the door we had just come from to the platform where a single Hymag stood parked. The pillars provided some much-appreciated cover from the men patrolling that platform.
With a hand, I gestured at Kelle and Riffy, and they both nodded before they fanned out on either side of me. I started counting, and by the time I reached thirty, I moved out from behind the column. As if I belonged, I walked down the path between the rows of pillars and headed in the direction of the two men. The rest of room was large and empty, except for a platform that led up to the Hymag and some box-sized spaces that looked suspiciously like the magnetic lift we had just used. It seemed Sulos had built more than one way to sneak out of the building. With my firm stride, my boots were loud inside the hollow space, and both men turned at the same time to see me approach.
They paused as if unsure of what to make of me. In my suit, I looked like an enforcer but without the headgear. It took them a little longer than I expected to come to the right conclusion. Their eyes widened as they realized that, in fact, I wasn’t an enforcer. A grin formed on my face at their clumsy attempts to draw their weapons. I spread my arms wide in a welcoming gesture as I kept my pace.
“Hey, guys, what’s up,” I said cheerfully. “I heard there was a party here.”
“Stop right there!” one of them shouted before he even had his weapon pointed at me. Wearing heavy-looking assault gear, they might have looked impressive if it weren’t for their baby faces and the evident shock in their eyes of not knowing what to do.
“Stop!” the kid on the left shouted again.
“Oh, come on,” I replied. “Don’t tell me you’re not willing to share.”
With both of them pointing their weapons at me, I stopped and added, “Pretty boys like you wouldn’t mind some company, right.”
“Identify yourself,” the one on the right said. The shock had lifted from his face, and his jaw clenched. This kid might mean business after all.
“Haven’t you heard,” I said. “I’m the new babysitter, and I’m here to tuck you in.”
“Funny,” the one on the right said. “Chase, secure him, and I’ll call it in.” Chase swallowed hard and took a step toward me. The other guy had barely reached for his com device when two energy blasts hit them from the sides. Their bodies crumpled to the ground.
“Took you long enough,” I said aloud as Kelle and Riffy emerged from the shadows.
Kelle raised an eyebrow with a hint of a smile on her face. Then her eyes shot past me, and she simultaneously shoved her artificial elbow into my side. The sudden force exerted by the tiny woman took me off balance and sent me reeling sideways. The strength Kelle could wield with her mechanical arm didn’t surprise me anymore, but feeling the pain, it brought to my ribs even while wearing a protective suit knocked the breath from my lungs.
It happened so fast that I barely had the chance to register the jerky motion Kelle’s body made before she fell. My head snapped to the side, catching sight of the officer holding his weapon outstretched. He stood on the platform next to the Hymag, and I figured he must have emerged from its cabin.
“Riffy!” I shouted as I reached for my weapon and veered sideways, hoping the movement would catch the officer’s attention. From my peripheral vision, I saw Riffy grab hold of Kelle’s limp body as he started to drag her behind one of the pillars. He knew what to do, and I forced myself to focus on the young man holding the weapon.
“Hey,” I shouted, desperately trying to draw the man’s attention, but he seemed blind to me as he fired his weapon at my friends. I fired my weapon. Usually, I tended to be a pretty good shot, but the magnetic blast missed its target. At least I had caught the officer’s attention.
Heart pounding, I raced toward the platform. I couldn’t let myself dwell on how Kelle and Riffy were doing. Kelle was a tough kid, and Riffy knew what to do, even though he didn’t always act the part. Instead of letting the dread consume me, I morphed it into hate and stormed right at the man.
The officer shifted his aim toward me. That kind of took me off guard because I hadn’t thought any further than drawing his attention. The weapon fired, and the energy blast looked like a white bolt of fire hurling straight at me.
I threw my body to the ground, rolling twice before I stopped in a crouch and fired. The man ducked, and my charge missed. He cursed as he turned, heading back toward the Hymag. I couldn’t let him get inside. If he hadn’t already alerted security, then he certainly could from inside there, and if he locked the door, we would have lost our only way to get out of here.
Getting back to my feet, I fired, taking the man off balance as he stumbled while ducking to avoid my barrage of magnetic blasts. I jumped up onto the platform, and using my momentum, I slammed into the man’s torso. He grunted as my shoulder ripped the air from his lungs. We both hit the ground with a thump.
The man looked like he didn’t know what hit him. His eyes shifted frantically inside his head, and his hands searched for the weapon that had fallen from his grip. As he struggled underneath me, I had no interest in seeing the fear in his eyes. The fact that this officer was a kid barely out of training didn’t interest me either. All I could think of was the look on Kelle’s face as her body jerked before she fell to the ground. An afterthought came in the form of what Saera would do to me if anything happened to Kelle.
Weapon still in hand, I brought it down on the young man’s face. The impact made his nose crack, and I hit him again after which the blood started running freely. His body went limp, and instead of checking on Kelle and Riffy, I did what I should have done in the first place.
Maybe Maece’s reappearance had affected me more than I had anticipated. Nerves had plagued me all day, but I hadn’t expected it to make me act sloppy. This shouldn’t have happened. Silently cursing myself, I stood, weapon raised, and made my way to the Hymag to search its interior and to clear the area.
“The area is clear,” I said as I knelt next to Riffy. Kelle sat propped up against one of the columns, her face the echo of a ghost. Her jaw flexed as Riffy pressed another gauze on her upper arm. Kelle hissed in pain.
“It burns,” she said through clenched teeth. Her suit had taken most of the blast, but with our inferior technology, it provided only minimal protection. The fabric diverted most of the heat but couldn’t protect the skin as the energy penetrated like molten lava.
I glanced at the scorched flesh that ran along the length of Kelle’s arm to where her prosthetic began at the elbow. Smoke billowed up where bits of metal from her robotic arm had become red-hot and singed the flesh. It looked terrible and incredibly painful. With some effort, I tried to keep the heart-wrenching feeling in my gut from showing on my face.
“That little scratch,” I said.
Kelle saw past my fake grin and said, “That bad, huh?”
At a loss for words, I placed my hand on her head.
“We need to get her someplace where we can keep her stationary for a while, so I can shoot her up,” Riffy said. His hands moved efficiently as he filled a cylindrical vial with fluids from several bottles before placing it in a dispenser and injecting the needle into Kelle’s arm. “These are just against the pain,” he said. “I need to be sure that you’ll be able to lay still for at least twenty minutes before I can inject you with something that’ll help the healing process.”
Riffy glanced up from what he was doing, catching my eye and then nodding in the direction of the Hymag.
“Copy that,” I said. From Kelle’s drooping eyelids, I could tell the drug Riffy had given her had started to work. Not wai
ting for Riffy, who was putting the medical supplies back into his pack, I eased my arms under Kelle. “Let’s go for a ride, princess,” I said in a whisper. Kelle groaned as I lifted her off the ground, but didn’t comment on my princess remark. That had me a little worried as I rushed her inside the transport, until I placed her on one of the benches inside the Hymag and her foot kicked out to catch me in the knee.
“That’s my girl,” I whispered. Bending over her, I kissed the top of her head.
Riffy entered the Hymag at the same time Tyrel announced herself over the coms.
“Ty, where have you been?” I asked. The distraction from before had kept me from wondering, but hearing her voice suddenly made me realize she’d been absent the entire exchange.
“Sorry,” she said.
“Tyrel, we have secured the Hymag,” I said. “Kelle got hurt. Are Maece and Saera on their way down?” Saera and Maece were skilled at getting in and out of trouble, but from what I had heard over the coms, their situation sounded intense. In this instance, I crossed my fingers and hoped they had been able to get out of their tight spot. We needed to get Kelle out of here, but I feared the worst.
“They’re pinned down on the east corner of the building,” Tyrel answered in strained voice. She didn’t say it, because it wasn’t her call, but I could tell Maece and Saera were in big trouble.
“We have to get them down here,” I said.
“How about those magnetic lifts?” Riffy said. I glanced at him and then out the Hymag door and into the open space with its stone pillars. Riffy had noticed the additional magnetic lifts as I had, and his idea might just work if we managed to figure out which one we would need to use.
