Crossing the Line

by Meghan Rogers

  My eyes fluttered open. I was back in my old room, lying on the thin mat on the ground. The calm acceptance I had felt at the start of the mission had settled back in my stomach.

  “Look who is finally awake,” a voice to my right said in Korean. It was my handler, Chin Ho. I blinked a few times and focused on him.

  “How long was I out for?” I asked. I glanced around the room. We were alone.

  “Only about an hour,” he said. His voice sharp and gruff, as usual. “When was your last injection?”

  I swallowed hard. “Right before I left.”

  He considered me critically, then nodded. “Good.” He pushed himself out of the chair. “Come with me.”

  I followed him without question. He led me out of my room and up to the main floor. We ended up on the other side of the building, standing outside the biggest room in the facility. My heart jumped. I had a good idea what I was going to see behind that door and I wanted no part of it. Chin Ho typed a code into the keypad and the door slid open. Behind it were rows and rows of big, round hovercrafts. Even though I was prepared, my breath caught.

  They were finished, and from the looks of things, fully operational. KATO had everything they needed to cross the DMZ.

  “We’re ready to invade?” I asked.

  “We will be starting the missile prep momentarily,” he said. “It needs a day and a half to prepare before it launches.”

  I kept myself calm and my breathing even. “What do you need from me?”

  “We are pulling you out of the IDA for the time being. As far as they know, you have been kidnapped by your former agency. When we invade, we are stationing you in South Korea.” I felt like I couldn’t breathe. “Once the situation stabilizes, we will send you back to prepare for phase two.”

  It took me a minute to find my voice. I focused on the hovercrafts, doing my best to appear in awe of them so I didn’t have to talk. It must have worked because a few moments later, Chin Ho said, “You should be very proud of your role in this.”

  “Thank you,” I said, my stomach roiling. I stayed transfixed to hide how fast my mind was working. I had planned on the hovercrafts and the missile being in the same room, but they weren’t. Everything was too spread out. I’d have to disarm the missile, take out the hovercrafts, and get the hovercraft technology out of their system. If they still had access to the tech, there was nothing to stop them from rebuilding and starting the process from the beginning. I didn’t want to wait for the others, but I remembered what Travis had told me on the plane. They would be more at risk if they had to search the whole facility to find me, and there was no way I could get to all of those pieces without exposing myself. I needed to alter my goals. If I could spend my time here getting as much intel as I could, I would be able to pass it on to the rest of the team when they arrived.

  “Let’s go. I have some training to put you through,” Chin Ho said. “Your job is going to be to blend into society and eliminate any Southern uprisings. This means you cannot be associated with us. We have to be creative about how we get you across the border.”

  I had plenty of questions, but I followed him silently. I was expecting him to lead me to the training room, but he threw me off when he opened a small closet door. Inside was a relatively compact trunk. Chin Ho opened the lid and pointed. “Get in.”

  I blinked a few times. He couldn’t be serious. This wasn’t the kind of training that was normal even for KATO. I wasn’t even sure I would fit—and if I did, I would be crammed in tighter than a sushi roll. “What?”

  I was out of practice and I never saw his fist coming. I stumbled and the right side of my jaw stung. When I straightened, Chin Ho gave me a deeply disapproving look. “It looks like you have had too much time on your own. Don’t forget, you’re not in charge of your own Gerex in here.” I let a flash of fear cross my face; it just didn’t mean what he thought it did. “You have to be packed into the hovercrafts, and you have barely more than a day to get used to it.” Then I understood the plan. I couldn’t be seen by a Southerner getting off a North Korean vessel. I would also bet most of the military members who would be on the hovercrafts wouldn’t be cleared to know KATO was putting a spy on the ground. This way, I could be brought into the South covertly, as a supply chest, without any South Korean or unauthorized military official knowing about me.

  I got in the trunk without another word. I had a plan, but I waited a few minutes to make sure I was alone before enacting it. Fortunately I could reach my boot. There were lock picks embedded in the soles. I’d been prepared in case I needed access to a room without an air duct, but now I was just glad I could pick the trunk’s lock from inside. My joints were starting to ache when I finally lifted the lid and breathed in the quiet of the room.

  My eyes adjusted quickly to the dark. The room was small, but the ventilation shaft was just as big as the rest in the facility. Since Chin Ho was letting me “practice” in small spaces, he had no reason to come looking for me for a while. I pulled myself up into the vent and got oriented. I knew the layout of these ducts better than the regular floor plan. I had only been caught once, and punished enough that no one ever thought I’d try it again. They didn’t know that to me it only meant I had to be smarter.

  I found my way to the director’s office. It was empty, which wasn’t too surprising. With something this big going on, he was probably a very busy person. I crawled to the vent a few rooms over—the conference room. It was packed with leaders and military officials discussing plans of attack. I’d never seen these two groups working together like this.

  “We’re sure the missile will work?” one of the military officials asked.

  “It passed every simulation,” the director said. “And we have the developer in the facility if anything goes wrong.”

  I bit my lip to keep myself from making a sound. Dr. Foster was in here. There was a good chance he was even on this floor. They wouldn’t want to expose him to too much of headquarters.

  I didn’t have a lot of time. I knew KATO wouldn’t let me starve and dinnertime would probably be within the next ninety minutes.

  I moved through the vents expertly, checking each opening for anyone who might be Dr. Foster. I couldn’t help him, but if I knew where he was, the others could when they got here.

  I was ready to give up and head back to the closet when I found him. He was a few doors away from the hovercraft room. He was either asleep or unconscious, but I could see his chest rising and falling. He was alive.

  I crawled back to my closet, then settled in the trunk again. I was there for about a half an hour before Chin Ho came back with a tray of some unidentifiable food. I hadn’t thought about the food before I left, but now that I was back the idea of eating it made my stomach turn. But I didn’t have a choice. He was watching me. I took my time, eating slowly. When I was done, he ordered me back in the trunk, saying he’d be back in the morning.

  I picked the lock again. When I got out I stretched out on the floor. It was a huge shift from my comfortable bed, but I couldn’t help feeling like I got off lucky. They left me alone. It was so much better than I could have hoped for.

  • • •

  I could never let my guard down at KATO. It wasn’t until I got to the IDA that I realized how I’d adapted to being half asleep. I had fallen back into that routine easily. That night, I got enough sleep to be rested, while still being constantly on guard, ready to jump back into the trunk if I had to. I startled awake when I heard a key turning in a lock and curled up back inside the trunk.

  Throughout the course of the next day, Chin Ho brought me out only to eat and use the bathroom. In between I crawled around the vents, checking on Dr. Foster and seeing if there was anything new I could find out. Aside from confirming Foster was still alive and learning that the missile prep had, in fact, been initiated, I hadn’t come up with anything else.

  After I finis
hed lunch, Chin Ho pulled a vial and needle out of his pocket. I froze.

  He misread my fear for excitement and smiled. “I figured you’d be ready. And you’ve been so good with your training, aside from that one incident.”

  I bit my lip, hard, trying to figure out how to get myself out of this. The only thing I knew was that there was no way I could let that back in my veins.

  But I couldn’t fight him. There was no logical reason for me to fight this. If I showed even the slightest resistance, Chin Ho would know and he’d interrogate me, then he’d kill me. He tied a tourniquet around my upper arm and I swallowed hard, thinking of the detox ahead of me, and how much harder it would be now that I knew what to expect. He filled the syringe with the Gerex. I breathed through my nose, trying to keep it together.

  As he moved the needle closer, I was forced to admit that this was really happening. And now that it was so close and so real, I wanted it. Goose bumps came over me as the needle hovered above my skin. I braced myself for the wonderfully familiar searing burn, and the moments of bliss that would follow. I hadn’t let myself think about the good part in so long and now that it was unbearably close, I felt overwhelmed.

  A chill shot through me as the needle touched my elbow crease. I wasn’t just ready for it, I was desperate for it.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  FIGHT FOR CONTROL

  Then the door banged open. “Get. Away from her,” Nikki said, with her gun held out and a fierceness so different from her usual kind demeanor. I met her eyes, and I had never felt more transparent. She moved closer, pointing her gun at Chin Ho’s skull. He froze with the needle on my skin, seconds away from puncturing. Even my tougher-than-steel handler didn’t want to die.

  Nikki leaned toward Chin Ho, her eyes widening when she saw what was in his hand. Then, in one easy motion, she knocked him out. “I got her,” she said into her comm.

  The syringe clattered on the ground and I dove for it. Nikki got there first. She snatched it away and sprayed the Gerex all over the floor. A fierce fury burned in my stomach—enough to make me want to attack her.

  “Hey!” She grabbed my face, sandwiching it between her hands. “You don’t need that. You know you don’t need that. We have a job to do here and we need you with us.”

  I focused on her eyes and my breathing. I had a mission. A mission that had to be more important than anything. I felt the adrenaline start to flood my system. I nodded. “Yeah,” I said; my voice sounded breathy and detached. “Yeah, I’m here.”

  She let me go and nodded. “Good.” She handed me a comm and a gun. I took them from her, working the comm into my ear while she found Chin Ho’s keys and locked him in the closet.

  “We have a situation,” I said, pressing the comm in so the rest of the team could hear me.

  “Raven?” It was Travis. “Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine,” I said, burying my craving even deeper. “I have a lot to fill you in on.” I told them everything I knew about the missile, the hovercrafts, and Dr. Foster.

  “He’s here?” Travis asked.

  “I saw him this morning.”

  “Okay,” Travis said, and I could practically hear him working out a plan, but I already had one.

  “I’ll get to the control room. I know where it is and I can get there faster,” I said. That missile had to be stopped and I was the best person for the job. Even if it meant I’d leave here a KATO traitor. “Scorpion, get to Foster, and the rest of you take out the hovercrafts.”

  For a moment everyone was quiet, waiting to hear if they should listen to me or not. Then Travis spoke. “Do it.”

  “Command, did you get that?” I asked.

  “Oh, I got it,” Sam said. “I lost the hack into their feed but I’m working to get it back.”

  “Good,” I said. “Because I’m going to need your help.”

  “Just keep your eyes open. They know I was in their system, so they’re going to be looking for all of you.”

  “I’ll see you later,” Nikki said, before sprinting off to meet Cody and Rachel.

  I held my gun low in front of me, then closed my eyes. I focused on the metal between my fingers. I’d done a lot of things in this facility, but running around with a weapon was something new. I took comfort in the feel of it in my hand and the power it gave me. Then I opened my eyes. I could do this.

  I crept back to the main entry hall and ducked behind a pillar. I peered around it, down one of the hallways, then darted to the next pole. I didn’t look back. “We’re outside the room,” Nikki said in my ear. I kept moving, quickly glancing around the pillar after each move, then hurrying to the next until I got to the hallway that was slightly off the atrium. I pushed my comm in. “Okay, Command. I’m staring at the door. I’ll let you know when I’m outside it.”

  Then I heard a gun click a bullet into place near my ear. I stiffened.

  “Well,” Chin Ho said, his lips tight and his jaw locked. “This is quite the disappointment.” I dropped my weapon without being asked. The closet didn’t hold him. We were running out of time.

  I stayed frozen, and my heart started to speed up. I was more terrified than I’d ever been. And for the first time in my life, I didn’t see a way out.

  In my ear Nikki, Cody, and Rachel were rushing Sam—they were still stuck outside the hovercraft room.

  Chin Ho circled me, and when he came into my field of vision he had a vial of Gerex between the fingers of his other hand. “I saw it all over the floor. Which means you must be desperate by now.” I was outside of their control and he knew it. He was so close to me I could feel his breath on my face. “Even if you have been off it for months, I know you still want it. As I’m sure you have figured out by now, it does not matter how long you have gone without it or how clean you think you are—you will always want it. It is how it was designed.”

  I swallowed hard, because he was right. I wanted it. My mother made me want it. But not as badly as he thought I did. I was on an assignment, and right then, that was all I felt.

  I fixed him with a look of total disgust, breathing evenly through my nose and trying to think. I needed a plan. It didn’t matter that I didn’t have a weapon. I would not let him win. Not after everything I’d done to stay free.

  “What?” He cocked his head to the side and stepped closer to me. “You are not even going to beg for forgiveness?”

  I snapped. “You killed my mother. I don’t have to ask you for anything.” I quickly grabbed his wrists, then twisted, pointing the gun at the sky. Two shots fired off into the air. My cover may have been blown, but now I could use that to my advantage. It meant I didn’t have to pretend anymore. I kneed Chin Ho in the groin, temporarily stunning him so I could knock the gun out of his hands.

  Then Sam was in my ear. “Raven, what the hell are you doing?”

  I kicked his legs out from under him and pressed my comm in. “I’m a little busy.”

  Chin Ho popped up and came at me, faking a punch to my head and landing one to my unprotected stomach. I forced myself to stand straight and fight. We battled until I got an advantage. I hit him in the head with enough force to make him stagger away from me. I saw his gun lying on the floor. I knew I couldn’t get to it, but I had enough time to kick it far away from both of us.

  He bounced back with an angry fire in his expression. He wasn’t amused anymore. He started cursing at me, saying things designed to break me, and dangling the Gerex in front of me, hitting me with the biggest weakness I had, but it wasn’t working.

  He faked a punch, then tried to sweep my legs out from under me, but I saw through it and jumped up, kicking his stomach in the process. He sprawled across the floor, landing far too close to the gun. He glanced back at me with a mixture of delight and disappointment in his eyes, then army-crawled over to it. There was no way I could get to him before he got to the weapon, so I retreated,
running back to the hallway I’d first come down—where my gun had been kicked aside.

  I grabbed it and spun around to find Chin Ho on the floor with his gun on me. I liked my odds better in a hand-to-hand situation. He knew about a dozen moves to kill me in seconds, but I had always been quicker than he was. When it came to guns, however, he had the best shot in KATO.

  For a moment we were both frozen in place. I edged closer to him, tightening my grip on the gun, trying to figure out a way I could not shoot him. I’d killed enough people because of him. I wasn’t looking to add to that number, even if I did want him dead. “You need to come with me,” he said.

  I clenched my jaw, but kept walking. I didn’t stop until I was practically standing on top of him. “Not a chance.”

  He sat up a little bit straighter. “You know I’ll kill you if I have to.”

  I swallowed hard, knowing he wasn’t bluffing. I fired two rounds fast. They sliced through his thigh, accurately hitting their target. I dodged to my left, knowing what was coming. He fired two shots of his own. The first cut into my right shoulder as I fell to the ground, and the second flew past me, so close to my ear that I could hear it. I swung my leg high as I fell, kicking the weapon out of his reach. I held mine tight in my left hand and pushed myself off the ground. I aimed for his head, wanting so badly to pull the trigger. But I couldn’t. He’d raised me, and no matter how much I hated him, I couldn’t kill him. I tipped the nose of the gun down to his stomach and fired.

  I stood over him, panting and trying to ignore the pain shooting through my right arm. The bullet was still inside. I holstered my gun and reached for his, praying he would bleed out before he could get any kind of help. I gave him one last look and saw him squirming, before I moved toward the control room. I struggled to press my comm. “Command, did you get back online?”

  “Give us a second,” Sam said. “We’re close.”

  “Get closer.”