Live in Infamy

by Caroline Tung Richmond

  “For the car, yes,” she yelled.

  Somewhere outside, another grenade went off and both of them ducked for cover. A line of cadets poured out of an emergency stairwell, some of them still dressed in their uniforms while others were in their pajamas and barefoot. Their instructors shouted for them to get outside quickly. It was the start of an evacuation.

  “We have to get out of the Fortress,” Ren said, and grabbed Tessa’s hand. “Can you drive us?” Ren repeated himself twice more, but Tessa wasn’t listening. She wasn’t looking at him, either. Her gaze had fixed on a pile of rubble by one of the elevators. The ceiling had crumbled there, cracking the marble beneath, but she ran toward it.

  “Plank!” Ren called out.

  Tessa sank to her knees next to the debris and started tossing ceiling tiles and rubble over her shoulder. “Help me!”

  Ren thought she might have gotten a knock to the head. “What are you doing?”

  “Help me. I think Aiko is under here.” She tugged at a piece of dusty fabric from the rubble, a square of dirty silk with bold black brushstrokes. The princess’s last dress.

  That was all the evidence Ren needed. Joining Tessa, he helped remove half the pile until he unearthed a dust-covered face, but it wasn’t Aiko. It was her mother. Ren lifted a big hunk of marble from her body to reveal that she’d been pierced with a sharp piece of concrete, buried so deeply that he had to look away. Grimacing, Ren checked her pulse but felt nothing. She was gone.

  “Ren!” Tessa said. “I think I found Aiko.”

  Ren’s attention jolted back to the pile of rubble, and he pushed aside a heavy ceiling tile while Tessa freed Aiko from the wreckage. The fabric of Aiko’s gown had turned gray with dust, while blood dripped from a long gash on her arm. Her eyes were shut, but Ren didn’t know if she was unconscious from a blow to the head or from the sleeping drug that he’d given her.

  “She’s alive.” Tessa caught Ren’s eye, and a silent understanding passed between them.

  They had Aiko in their hands.

  The mission could still be a go.

  “Let’s head to the car from here,” Ren said, making the decision abundantly clear. He pulled Aiko into his arms and stumbled to his feet. “We can’t go through the sublevel. The hotel might collapse. If anyone gives us trouble, can you talk us out of it?”

  Tessa began smoothing her hair out of nervous habit before she forced her hands to her sides. She nodded at him. “I’ll take the lead. Stay close.”

  They fled from the hotel, exiting the smoke and entering the madness outside.

  A hungry fire lapped at the hotel’s façade, erupting from the helicopter wreckage. Ren could hear the fire trucks wailing somewhere inside the Fortress, but until they arrived the fire leapt higher and spread its arms farther out.

  It was chaos. Sobs and screams filled the smoky air. Dozens of cadets and guests poured out of the hotel and into the chilly winter wind, and more than once Ren was knocked from behind by a frantic ambassador or a uniformed officer. Soldiers tried to shout orders, steering the injured toward the Fortress’s health clinics and pointing everyone else to a nearby training field to be accounted for. One of the soldiers grabbed Ren by the shoulder and zeroed in on Aiko. Ren thought that they might be done for.

  But Tessa stepped in. “You have to let us go! We need to get to the hospital,” she shouted, forcing him to look her in her eyes. She repeated herself, “You have to let us go right now.”

  The soldier stared at her, looking confused, and that was all she needed to push Ren onward. They hurried away from the hotel until the smoke thinned out, with Tessa out front to run interference. They made a sharp right into a narrow alleyway that separated the Mission Hotel from a darkened office building. Ren had no idea how much farther they had to run, but his arms were groaning under Aiko’s weight.

  “The car’s over there!” Tessa said.

  Looking ahead, Ren noticed a parking garage adjacent to the office building. Not much farther.

  Tessa headed for a gold-colored sedan, her feet bare because she had long abandoned her heels. She popped the trunk and removed the bottom panel to reveal a shallow niche below, which the Resistance had helped her hollow out a week prior. Ren nestled Aiko into the niche, tucking her arms in front of her and drawing her knees toward her chest, but she never stirred once. The sleeping drug had done its job and had done it well, but Ren wasn’t looking forward to when Aiko woke up. Her world had been flipped inside out, and her mom had been killed. That wasn’t Ren’s fault, but he was taking her away from her home. From all that she knew.

  But this was war, wasn’t it? There were no happy choices, merely decisions that were a means to an end. That’s what Ren told himself anyway.

  Tessa placed the panel over Aiko’s body and then covered that with a blanket and a box of jumper cables. Ren was about to tell her to start up the car when he heard footsteps running toward them, heavy yet fast.

  “Stop right there!” someone shouted in Japanese before barreling into Ren’s back, knocking both Ren and Tessa onto the hard garage pavement.

  Dazed, Ren blinked up to find Sasaki standing over them, pointing a gun at their heads. Out of instinct, Ren raised his hands, but Tessa had other ideas.

  “Sasaki-sama —” she started.

  But Sasaki wasn’t having it. With the gun aimed at her forehead, he spewed, “Shut up! What are you two doing?”

  “We’re trying to get somewhere safe!” Tessa replied. She kept trying to make eye contact with Sasaki, but he kept flicking glances in Ren’s direction and breaking the connection.

  “What’s in the trunk?” With one hand still pointing the pistol at Tessa, Sasaki reached inside the trunk, but Ren was already moving. Ren kicked out his leg and swept Sasaki onto the concrete. It worked even better than Ren had planned, and the gun clattered out of Sasaki’s hand. Ren made a dive for it.

  “Get in the car!” Ren said to Tessa as his fingers curled around the pistol handle. But before he could aim the gun, Sasaki recovered and knocked it out of Ren’s grasp. The gun flew deeper into the garage, and Sasaki used the chance to kick Ren in the ribs, stunning him. While Sasaki hurried to retrieve his pistol, he wrestled his radio from his belt.

  Sasaki shouted into the black device. “Headquarters, come in! I need backup over in Garage 230. I’m calling in an arrest warrant for a Fortress employee named Cabot. That’s C-A-B-O-T. His accomplice is —”

  Ren sprang to his feet and tackled Sasaki from behind. Together they careened back to the pavement. As Ren landed hard, he groaned as something sharp jabbed his hip — the pistol.

  Twisting around, Ren reached for the weapon but accidentally sent it skidding into a puddle and out of reach. That was when Sasaki began pummeling Ren hard. A punch to the jaw. An elbow to the windpipe. Agony exploded on every part of Ren’s body, but the blows only came faster. Sasaki readied another fist toward Ren’s nose, when a shot rang out.

  Sasaki made a gurgling sound. Blood spurted out of his neck, and he collapsed to the ground, clutching the spewing wound.

  Stunned, Ren saw Tessa standing over them, pistol in hand. Ren shoved Sasaki off him and watched grimly as the soldier gasped and stared helplessly up at Tessa.

  She fired at him again.

  This time Sasaki went still.

  Tessa’s eyes were enormous. Her hands were shaking, but she wouldn’t let go of the gun.

  Ren swallowed a choppy breath and wobbled to his feet. “Are you okay?”

  She didn’t answer. She couldn’t stop staring at Sasaki’s body.

  “We need to get out of here.” Because Tessa was too shocked to move, Ren guided her gently into the car. “Listen. Do you still have the keys?”

  It took her a few seconds to reply. “Front seat.”

  Ren started the car for her and gingerly pried the pistol from her grip, tucking it into the glove compartment. “In case you need it,” he explained. “You have to start driving.”

  The fog seeme
d to clear from her eyes a little. She stared at the steering wheel, then up at Ren. “Why aren’t you getting in?”

  “I can’t,” Ren said, his voice cracking. “Sasaki radioed in my name. You’ll never get out of this place if I go with you.”

  Her brows pulled together. “I can use my power to get us past the checkpoints. Get in.”

  Ren made no move to climb into the car. He saw the slump in her shoulders and the exhaustion on her face. She had pushed herself to the limit already, and what little strength remained she needed to save for the escape.

  Ren shut the car door. “The mission comes first.” He was probably signing his own death warrant by doing this, but he couldn’t jeopardize the operation. “Tell my cousin good luck tonight. Tell my dad that I love him.” His throat throbbed with emotion. “And if my mom is alive at Alcatraz, you have to get her out.”

  Tessa tried to get out of the car, but Ren wouldn’t let her. “You don’t have to do this!” she argued.

  “Tell them all that I was the Viper,” Ren forced out before he lost his nerve.

  She blinked at him with new eyes. “Ren …”

  “Everything I wrote was for my mom. I wanted to make her proud.”

  Before Tessa could say anything, Ren took off. He made the choice for her to leave him behind, even though he had no idea what he should do. He just ran. He bolted through the parking garage and past a block of quiet buildings, and he only let himself stop when he nearly doubled over from exhaustion. Huddling in the shadows of a half-constructed barrack, Ren tried to get his bearing. The hotel was far behind him, but its towering height made it easy to spot, standing tall and proud even as bright orange flames climbed up its exterior.

  Ren went over his options, which weren’t many. He had to get out of the Fortress fast, but he didn’t know how without getting caught. He’d get shot dead if he tried to scale the fence that enveloped the Fortress, and he’d get interrogated if he tried to leave through a checkpoint. Once they demanded to see his ID and read his name, he’d be done for. But he had to make a decision soon. The longer he waited, the chances of survival dimmed more and more.

  Ren forced himself to keep going, moving from shadow to shadow until he saw a small service checkpoint ahead. A handful of soldiers stood there, guarding a barrier that blocked anyone from coming in or going out. Ren could never slip past all of them. He would have to find another way.

  But then came a sliver of an opportunity. Ren stood on tiptoe, watching, as two ambulances raced toward a checkpoint that led from White Crescent Bay. The soldiers stationed there hurried to open the barrier they had erected to block the road. A couple of them had even shed their rifles to work unencumbered while the rest of the team disappeared into a tiny building next to the checkpoint, maybe to call the Mission Hotel to say that medical assistance was on its way.

  The guards were distracted.

  The ambulances might offer some cover.

  Ren shut off his thoughts and made a run for it.

  The wail of the ambulances hid his thumping footsteps. The security guards hadn’t spotted him yet, so he upped his pace, breathing hard, breathing fast. The first vehicle blazed through the checkpoint, its alarm blasting into Ren’s head but he shook it off. He was nearly there.

  “Stop!” a soldier cried.

  Ren ignored him and sprinted like he’d never done before.

  “I said stop!”

  The second vehicle drove past the checkpoint, just as Ren cleared it, too. He had made it, but it was the smallest of victories. The soldiers were coming after him now, screaming at him and popping off shots. Ren ran in a zigzag to make himself a tougher target, and unbelievably, it seemed to be working. As the gravel road stretched before him, hope rose in his chest. Just a little farther and he might step into the clear.

  But then the pain overcame him. It exploded on his right arm where a bullet grazed his skin from elbow to wrist, splitting the flesh open. Ren stumbled but managed to right himself. He could deal with a flesh wound.

  Then the pain doubled, even tripled. This time it hit him in his side, right about his hip bone. Ren cried out and fell. Hot blood blossomed onto his shirt.

  This one wasn’t a flesh wound.

  Another bullet had taken out a knuckle-size chunk of flesh from Ren’s waist. He tried to get up — he had to push through the agony — but he just couldn’t. The pain was too much.

  But the soldiers caught up to him and hurled him onto his back. Ren gasped as one of them pointed a pistol in his face, straight at his nose. Another soldier arrived and yanked the bloodied work badge clipped to Ren’s lapel.

  “His name’s Cabot!” the soldier shouted to his comrades. While they spoke in rapid Japanese, Ren tried to flip himself over and drag himself out of reach. He would crawl if he had to.

  “Grab him!” someone yelled.

  Ren forced himself to go faster, but his body protested and his vision had already blurred. The soldiers took him by the shoulders and dragged him onto his feet.

  Ren thought about the suicide pill in his pocket. Too late.

  One of them lifted his rifle. The blow came quick and sharp, and the darkness soon followed.

  Ren sank in and out of consciousness, drifting between darkness and harsh light.

  The first time he came to, he found himself lying on a cot and being carried into a small health clinic on base. The wail of ambulance sirens filled his ears, prodding Ren more awake.

  The soldiers carrying Ren’s cot halted at the clinic’s white doors, where a harried nurse was directing orders. “We’re full,” she told them. “You’ll have to bring him to the makeshift clinic on the training fields.”

  “He could bleed out before then, and we have to keep him alive,” one of the soldiers said crisply. “We think he has information about the attack.”

  The nurse paused and murmured something into her radio. “A bed opened up in Station Twelve. Take him inside.”

  Pain thrummed through every corner of Ren’s body and he nearly blacked out again — he would have welcomed it gladly — but the jolt of the cot kept Ren awake. Around him, he saw nurses dashing along the corridor, their arms holding IV bags, while guests from the ball, covered in blood and dust, lined up against the wall for the next available doctor.

  The soldiers deposited Ren inside what looked like an employee lounge, where a white-coated doctor had set up a makeshift medical station. He spoke to the soldiers in rapid Japanese and ordered them to move Ren from the cot and onto the hospital bed.

  The doctor was going to save him, but Ren didn’t want to be saved, not like this. He tried to reach for the small white pill in his pocket. The end would be painless, Tessa had said.

  But the doctor batted Ren’s hand away as he assessed the gunshot wound in Ren’s side. Ren’s back arched in agony, and a scream tore out of his mouth. But strong hands held him down, and a needle slid into Ren’s skin, making his vision go foggy.

  Ren thought again about his pill, but the darkness entered the corners of his vision and dragged him under.

  A part of him wished that he would never wake up again. He didn’t want to find out what would await him there.

  Hours passed, or maybe it was a day or two. Ren lived in snatches of consciousness — the sharpest of pains before another needle bit into his body and sent him sinking back to sleep. Every time his eyes cracked open, he saw something new. A nurse checking his pulse. A doctor scribbling notes. A soldier standing guard beside him. One time, he thought he saw Sasaki at his bedside, a smirk on his chapped lips, but it must have been a dream. Sasaki was dead, wasn’t he? Ren couldn’t remember.

  A harsh slap on the cheek brought Ren fully awake for the first time since the Joint Prosperity Ball. Ren gasped for air as his whole body throbbed. His gunshot wounds had been stitched up and dressed, but he could feel those stitches stretching with every breath.

  Ren’s head whipped around, unsure of where he was. One thing was for certain — he wasn’t in the he
alth clinic anymore. Walls of concrete surrounded him, and a sole lightbulb swung above his head. This must have been a prison cell. Or an interrogation room.

  Ren had been propped up on a wooden chair, and a large mirror hung opposite him. He grimaced at the mirror, his face unrecognizable between the bruises and swelling that had overtaken it. He also grimly wondered if this was a two-way mirror and who was sitting on the other side of it.

  Another slap came swift and hard. When Ren’s eyes refocused, he found a soldier at his side, wearing the uniform of the Ronin Elite. His blood froze at the sight of her.

  Major Endo.

  She leaned toward Ren, and he flinched at their closeness. He could see the pores on her nose and the mole that rested on her left cheek.

  Her face remained calm as she spoke, but he heard daggers in her voice. “Where is the princess?”

  Ren pressed his lips together.

  The next blow came quick. She punched him in the jaw. “Where is she?”

  Ren tasted blood, but before he could spit it out, she hit him again, this time in the temple. “We know you helped kidnap her. Who are your accomplices?”

  Ren still said nothing, but he winced when he saw the new punch coming. It hit him square in the stomach and he fell backward in the chair, sprawling onto the concrete floor.

  “Tell me their names!” Major Endo kicked aside the chair, leaving Ren vulnerable on the ground.

  Ren drew his knees against his chest, his only defense, but Endo stomped a boot into the gunshot wound at his side. The pain was blinding, but somehow Ren kept his mouth shut. He wouldn’t betray Marty or Tessa. He would die here, taking their names to his grave.

  But when Major Endo’s boot landed against his groin, Ren’s vision went sideways and he almost let something slip, just to make all of this stop. That temptation doubled as Endo knelt beside Ren’s quivering body and placed her fingertips on his skull. Ren had watched her do this before, on Daisy and Jay, but that never could have prepared him for what came next.

  “Tell us where your people took the princess,” she said softly.