by J. L. Lyon
Donalson flashed another cruel grin, “A fine and vindictive display, Major Graves. I suppose if Hell is to be my home, it is no matter if I add a few more links to my chain. What will be the payment, do you think, for the torture and murder of Elena Wilson?”
“You keep away from her! She has no part in this.”
“Tell me what I want to know, and only you need suffer.”
Graves remained silent, but 301 could tell he was mulling it over. His eyes twitched from nervousness and his mouth hung open as if in preparation to spill every secret he owned. But then he found his footing, and in a moment of solidarity Graves shut his mouth to prevent himself from breaking his oaths.
“You should know,” Donalson said, leaning forward over the table. “I was hoping it would come to this. Bring up the feed!”
Donalson’s assistants left the Hall of Mirrors as the screen they had set up came to life, revealing three figures gagged and bound in chairs. A woman sat in the center with two children on each side—a boy to the right and a girl to the left—neither more than five years old. A grim-faced soldier stood behind each of them, weapon drawn. Graves shook desperately in his chair as he beheld the terror on their faces, and struggled in vain to get free.
No, 301 thought. Surely not. He had expected this for Elena, but those children… The tales of Donalson’s conduct in Rome came rushing back to him, and he had no doubt that the man had a gruesome fate in store for them all. 301 tasted bile in his throat. Such darkness sickened him.
“Good of you to join us, Elena,” the grand admiral said. “If I may introduce your father, Major Timothy Graves of Silent Thunder.”
Elena’s eyes went wide with shock, but the gag in her mouth prevented her from speaking. Her fear increased at the announcement of her father’s affiliation…association with traitors was as bad as treason itself.
“Also, Major, I don’t believe you’ve had the honor to meet our other two guests. James, Audrey…say hello to your grandfather.” The children, too afraid to even look at the camera, had tears streaming down their cheeks. 301’s throat constricted and he felt a hard weight on his chest, so heavy it was difficult to breathe.
“Let them go!” Graves yelled, rattling the chains that bound him to his chair. “They have nothing to do with this!”
“Ah, but by committing treason against the World System you have forced them to become part of your cause!”
Again the world shook around 301, and he braced himself against the observation glass as the Hall of Mirrors winked out of existence. In its place came the world from his dreams…of his nightmares. He stood in the pounding rain, listening to the voice of darkness itself: You still don’t get it, do you? Look around! No one is coming to save you. You are mine. Your son…is mine. Maybe you still believe that there is a power in this world working for your good, that some God will stretch out his hand and intervene. But you are wrong. There is only one god here.
301 snapped back to reality, luckily still standing, his breath coming in short gasps. Derek was at his side, more concerned now than he had been at the Solithium Depot, “Captain? Are you alright?”
He stepped away from the glass and stood up straight, trying to regain his composure, “I’m fine.” But he wasn’t fine. The visions were getting stronger. No longer just dreams that stole hours of sleep, now they invaded his waking world as well. And that was the second time in a matter of hours.
He needed to be rid of this. Otherwise he would never be the same man again. But how could he deal with it when he didn’t even understand it? Would the major even be able to tell him anything?
301 could tell Derek was not convinced, but Graves pulled them both back to the task at hand with a desperate demand, “What do you want from me? I don’t have anything that will help you!”
“Do not lie to me, Major!” Donalson’s fist slammed into the table. “Even if you don’t know their next target, you know where they are hiding. Tell me where they are!”
“I can’t!” Graves insisted. “If what you say is true—if Jacob Sawyer really is dead—then it is over anyway! Just leave my daughter and her children in peace!”
“You will watch them suffer,” Donalson threatened. “You will watch as we inflict horrors upon them that even you could not endure. You know I will do it, Major! You, who know my handiwork in Rome so well.”
“You shouldn’t let this happen.” At the sound of the small voice, 301 looked down to see Eli staring into the room with a deep sadness. His own face no doubt reflected the very same expression. Eli tore his gaze from the scene and focused on him with hopeful eyes, “This is not the way.”
301 didn’t speak aloud for fear that Derek might hear, but he nodded in agreement. The horrors about to take place at the grand admiral’s command disgusted him. But Donalson acted on the orders of the MWR himself. What could he do?
The MWR is a man, he heard his own voice echo in his ears. Just like me.
“That man does not control you,” Eli said. “You can stop him. You can save them.”
301’s hand came to rest absently on Calumnior, and a strange sensation spread through his body. It was anger, but not the kind of anger he was accustomed to…not the rage and bloodlust that overcame him on the eve of battle. This was something else…something honorable. A righteous anger.
The major gathered his strength for a decision that no man should ever be forced to make. He could either reveal the location of Silent Thunder, or abandon his own flesh and blood to torture and death. Who could make such a choice? And who could stand idly by while another was forced to make it?
“Still nothing, Major?” Donalson asked. “Very well, then. Your daughter will be the first to pay the price.”
Before 301 had time to think about what he was doing, he detached himself from the place where he stood and made for the door to the room, barely registering Derek’s surprised call, “Captain! Where are you going?”
He did not stop. In a way, he could not stop. Fueled by righteous anger, driven by that same feeling he had experienced in the Hall of Mirrors all those months ago—that he was not quite in control of his own body—he strode to the door and then through it, heedless of Donalson’s outburst, “Specter Captain! This is—”
The older man cut off as 301 yanked him from his chair and shoved him back against the glass with so much force that cracks spread out from the point of impact.
“Call off your dogs, Grand Admiral. I’ve had enough of this madness.”
“The only madman I see is the one staring me in the face,” Donalson spat. “I won’t stand for this, Specter Captain! Get your hands off me or I swear I’ll use every last resource I have to destroy you.”
“This is a mistake.”
Donalson leaned in close and spoke in a sinister whisper, “The only mistake I made was to believe a soft little boy like you could ever be strong enough to lead a unit like Specter. You don’t have the fortitude to do what is necessary to get the job done, and for that you are every bit the failure you were when you first walked into this room. Sergeant!” his voice rose. “You may begin by breaking the fingers on Mrs. Wilson’s left hand.”
“No!” Graves pleaded. “You deal with me, you coward! You deal with me!”
The grand admiral turned his attention to the screen, where the sergeant had hold of Elena Wilson’s left index finger. She cringed in expectation of the pain, made worse by the soldier’s hesitation.
“Do it, Sergeant!” Donalson ordered.
The sergeant did as commanded, and the crack of Elena’s finger was followed by a muffled cry of pain. Fresh tears began to stream down her face, and 301’s fists clenched tighter on Donalson’s uniform. But the grand admiral, calling 301’s bluff, looked him straight in the eye and said coldly, “Again.” The sergeant moved on to her middle finger, and then the next, adding pain upon pain and scream upon scream, until all 301 could hear was the varied cries reverberating throughout the room. Elena, from suffering; her children, from fear; Gr
aves, in outrage and distress; and Donalson, spurring on the torture with issued commands of “Again! Again!”
And then there were the internal voices. One demanded that he stop this travesty while the other warned that grave consequences would ensue if he tried. Donalson had called his bluff. What more could he do?
Am I bluffing? He asked himself uncertainly. How far am I willing to go?
The weight of his emotions pressed down upon him harder and harder with each passing second, until he could barely hold back the righteous anger coursing through his body. He could not let this happen. Not again. Not to this family.
“Move on to the boy,” Donalson ordered, and something in 301 snapped. The blade of Calumnior flashed like a spike of pearl as he pushed away from Donalson and pressed the point of the weapon at the grand admiral’s throat.
“Now you have a taste of true authority, Donalson. Call him off.”
Donalson chuckled, ignoring the blade, “You’re a fool, Specter Captain. Kill me and you’re as good as dead yourself.”
Derek burst into the room, frantic, “Captain, stop! What are you doing?”
“You’d better talk some sense into your partner, Specter Blaine,” Donalson said. “It is not wise to make an enemy of me…not even for Specter.”
“Call them off,” 301 repeated, applying enough pressure with Calumnior to draw blood from the grand admiral’s neck. “Or I swear there will be nothing left of you to fear by the time I am finished.”
“Captain, no,” Derek whispered with a shake of his head. “Let it be! This has to be done!”
301 turned his head and gave Derek an incredulous stare, “The torture of an innocent child has to be done? Do you hear yourself?”
“Sergeant,” Donalson growled. “Follow through with my order. The Specter Captain doesn’t have the stones to kill me.”
“Desist from that order, Sergeant!” 301 commanded.
“You have no authority here, Specter Captain!” Donalson snapped. “What’ll it be, Major? Give us the rebellion or watch your grandson suffer.”
The major’s forehead dripped with sweat, his eyes looking desperately to 301 for help. “I can’t. I can’t sacrifice the lives of all those people.”
“Then you will sacrifice your own flesh and blood. Continue, Sergeant.”
“I’m warning you, Grand Admiral,” 301 said harshly. “I will kill you.”
“No you won’t,” Donalson said. “Because you know to do so would be the end of you…and because you’re just another foolish coward parading as an officer of this great World System. Sergeant! Do not make me tell you again!”
The sergeant took hold of the boy’s hand, and the muscles in 301’s arms tensed. He was going to do it, he knew without a doubt that he was. In a single second, his blade would drive through Grand Admiral Donalson’s throat and into the glass, putting an end to this great taint of evil that fate had allowed to walk free upon the earth.
But that wasn’t what happened, for in the moment before the sergeant would have broken that boy’s finger—the very same in which Donalson would have died—Major Graves yelled out in desperation, “The Communications Tower!” and the entire room froze.
Donalson cast a wary glance at 301, obviously unsettled by the realization that he really had been about to die, but the anxiety was brief. 301 lowered his blade, repulsed by the look of victory on Donalson’s face. The major had broken…the grand admiral had won. But he was not satisfied, “The Communications Tower, you say? When, and how many of your people?”
Graves—resigned to his betrayal—opened his mouth to answer, but cut off at a commotion on the screen. Shots rang out, and for a moment 301 feared the soldiers had been given orders to murder the family after getting the location. But a shout of joy from Major Graves dispelled that thought, and 301 focused his full attention on the screen. A Spectral Gladius threw the sergeant down to the floor where his two comrades already lay dead, and four Silent Thunder operatives moved to release the Wilsons from their bonds. But it was the fifth man who caught 301’s eye, a man who wore the rank of lieutenant commander.
“Godspeed to you, Major Graves,” the lieutenant commander nodded respectfully. “Your family is safe now.” He raised a pistol toward the camera and fired. The feed went dark.
Donalson regarded the screen with disbelief—Silent Thunder had thwarted him yet again. He turned to face the major, who in his relief seemed to have forgotten where he was. A smile stretched across his face from ear to ear, and he ran his hand over his forehead to wipe away the sweat that still dripped from his hair. He looked up at Donalson with an expression of victory.
In one deft motion, the grand admiral drew his sidearm and fired a round straight through the major’s skull, splashing blood and gore across the glass behind him. The rebel’s dead body slumped in the chair, still bound beyond the ability to move.
“Why did you do that?” Derek demanded, horrified. “He could still have given us more information!”
“No,” Donalson wiped away the trickle of blood from his neck. “Without his family for coercion he was useless.”
“You didn’t even try to have them re-apprehended!”
“That’s because it’s pointless, Blaine. No time to waste tracking down insignificant pieces on the board, not when we have another rebel attack to prepare for.” He holstered his weapon and took a look at the blood on his hand, then eyed 301’s blade with disdain.
301 deactivated the Gladius, and Donalson—emboldened by its absence—took a threatening step toward him, “Clean up this mess.”
As the grand admiral attempted to push past him toward the door, 301 shoved him backward. “It’s your mess. Clean it up yourself.” 301 led the way out of the Hall of Mirrors and continued on toward the hallways of the North Wing. Derek followed him closely, but one look over his shoulder confirmed that Donalson did not.
“You should be more careful, Captain,” Derek warned as they made their way back up the hall. “Donalson wasn’t bluffing when he said you don’t want him as an enemy. Not you, and certainly not Specter.”
“I’m not afraid of him,” 301 said. “His days in power are numbered.”
“That may be true, but if I were you I’d watch my back.”
“Worried about me?”
“Someone has to,” Derek said grimly. “What was that back there? That’s the second time you’ve nearly passed out in the last few hours.”
“I told you, it’s been a trying day,” 301 replied. “And apparently, it’s about to get worse.”
“You think Graves was telling the truth?”
“I think he was ready to tell us everything, and would have if those rebels hadn’t arrived.”
“That concerns me, Captain. It took a concerted effort and decent resources to find Elena Wilson and her family. Apparently Sawyer’s daughter has managed to keep them from fragmenting as we had anticipated.”
301 couldn’t help but feel a spark of pride for her. She had done well, there was no question. Silent Thunder was every bit as much a threat as they had been under her father, despite the fact that they would soon be overshadowed by the coming civil war.
They paused in front of the elevator and 301 caught Derek staring at him with deep concern.
“What?”
“I need to ask you a question, Captain,” Derek said carefully. “But I don’t want you to take it the wrong way.”
301 nodded. He had a suspicion what was coming. “Go ahead.”
“You spent a lot of time with this woman. I don’t know what happened between the two of you, or if what Aurora said on the deck of Infallible today was true—”
301 opened his mouth to respond, but Derek cut him off as he continued, “And honestly, I don’t care. All I need to know is that you will be able to do what is necessary when the time comes.”
What is necessary… 301 had thought of almost nothing else since learning that Grace had become Silent Thunder’s new commander. For the past several week
s he had tried everything to forget her…to hate her, even. She was an enemy of the World System. So why could he not see her as his enemy? Even drowning out his feelings by attempting to fall in love with Liz had not worked. She was still with him, her voice an echo in his ears, her touch a memory of fire and affection.
But now she was the World System’s prime target. That he loved her did not change that fact. And—much as he longed to see her again—it meant that if their paths crossed at the Communications Tower that night, he could not rejoice at their reunion.
Because he would have to kill her.
“Captain,” Derek said more forcefully. “I need to hear you say it.”
301 hesitated for only a moment, and then replied. “Yes. I can do it.”
11
IT TOOK THE BETTER part of the afternoon for Napoleon Alexander to decide what to do about the impending rebel attack. 301 managed to convince him that Major Graves, desperate and driven by despair over his daughter’s torture, had not deceived them. The MWR did not wish to send a huge force to the Tower and risk the rebels sneaking inside as they had at the Weapons Manufacturing Facility, but in the end they had little choice. The Tower had to be defended.
Thus it was early evening by the time Specter left the docking bay bound for the southwest corner of the city. Alexander had moved the whole of the Fourteenth Army to bolster the Tower’s security, and no one in any position of power believed the rebellion had enough strength to take it.
But none of them knew Grace like he did, and 301 was certain she would be every bit as dangerous a commander as her father. The fact that no one else took her as seriously ensured that when battle came, the rebellion would find them unprepared.
There was also something deeper on his mind—something beyond unpreparedness or even his fear of seeing Grace at the Tower. This would be his first actual engagement with the rebellion since the death of Jacob Sawyer. More specifically, since learning he might be the son of Jonathan Charity. All his life he had thought the truth would be a sort of salvation, that it would deliver him from a life of obscurity. But in reality it was a curse. The son of not just a rebel, but the greatest rebel of all. He still had his doubts about the validity of Jacob Sawyer’s last words, but the dream and the visions were making an outright denial impossible. He had to at least accept the possibility.
