by K A Riley
“That’s a great idea,” I sneer. “You stay here. Along with anyone else who thinks cornering ourselves and getting picked off is a good plan. Me? I’m going out there, and I’m going to find whoever it is.”
“Then what?” Libra asks.
“Then I’m going to make them pay.”
Without waiting for anyone else to try to stop me, I dart out into the dark corridor. I stride along, poking my head into each of the glass-walled classrooms as I go. By the time I get to the far staircase, the others have caught up with me.
With all eleven of us gathered at the top of the stairs, Trax puts a gentle hand on the crook of my arm. “Are you planning to search the entire Academy by yourself?”
When I don’t answer right away, Chace adds, “It’s huge. There are too many places for someone to hide.”
“Fine. Then we’ll split up. Cohort A can come with me. Cohort B, you stay with Wisp and Granden this time. Just in case. You said the intruder was heading toward the East Tower?”
Reverie nods.
“Then he’s either going up to the gardens or down the back way toward the Sub-Basement exits. I’m guessing he’s not here to investigate the hydroponics lab. We’ll head downstairs. Start there.”
“I wish we had more eyes between us,” Ignacio says.
“What?” I ask.
“More eyes. That would make our search go so much faster.”
“Maybe we can have more eyes,” I tell him with a cheeky grin. “I know a white raven who’s really good at spy work.” I concentrate and reach out with my mind to connect with Haida Gwaii.
Nothing happens.
I reach out again. If Haida can lend me some of those same skills she lent me in my blindfolded fight with Granden, there’s no way any intruder to the Academy will stand a chance of staying hidden or escaping.
Haida?
Nothing.
I try again.
Haida?
This time, we connect, but only for a split-second. Unfortunately, a split-second is all the time I need to sense, hear, and feel her response. It’s an easy emotion to interpret, and it’s only one word. The problem is that it’s the one word I never wanted to hear:
~ Help!
32
Tunnel
“Haida’s in trouble!” I cry.
“Your bird?” Trax asks. But then he blushes and seems to realize how dumb that sounds and quickly apologizes. “I mean, yes, of course. Your bird. Haida. How is she in trouble?”
“She’s in trouble because she’s not here!” My throat goes so tight I can barely squeak the words out.
“Not here?” Libra repeats.
“In the Academy.”
Chace says, “Whoever is in here—”
“Isn’t anymore! And they took Haida with them!” I finish, my eyes heavy with the deluge of tears I’m trying desperately to hold back.
I’m half-expecting to get laughed at. Or maybe have my fellow students roll their eyes, question my instincts, or tell me I’m over-reacting.
None of that happens, though.
Instead, Arlo pushes his hood back from his head, exposing the maze of rubbery scars and deep blue bruises on his face and neck. “We need our weapons.”
“Right!” Libra agrees. “And then let’s go rescue Haida and find whoever took her.”
Ignacio slaps a fist into his palm. “And make them pay!”
Together, we bolt upstairs to the Weapons Lab.
Fully armed now and feeling confident but also angry, confused, and scared, I lead my small squad of classmates back down to the Infirmary.
“We’ll split up here,” I tell Trax. “My Cohort will track down the intruder and find Haida. You and your Cohort stay here and take care of Wisp and Granden. And make sure no one else is in the Academy.”
“What about Arlo?” Sara asks. “He’s the only one who knows how to work the med-lab. Shouldn’t he stay and watch over Wisp and Granden?”
“It’s okay,” Reverie assures us. “Lucid and I can take care of them.”
I ask them if they’re sure, and they tell me they are.
Trax says, “Okay” and calls his Cohort together to strategize their next moves.
Wait. Did I just bark out a slew of orders? And did everyone just listen to me like I know what I’m talking about?
There are lots of good leaders in the world. I’m not one of them. I was meant to be a rogue fighter, not the one in charge.
And yet…here I am.
“Come on!” I shout to my Cohort as I sprint out of the Infirmary toward the stairs leading down into the Sub-Basement.
Slipping out of the Academy is relatively easy.
It helps that I was one of the first ones in here. Five years ago, I helped set this place up. So I know its ins and outs better than pretty much anyone.
We head down one of the sets of back stairs—the ones branching off to the lift access and maintenance ports.
Most of the stairways in the Academy’s main buildings and its two turrets are made up of bright chrome and glass with wide, curving steps and light oak handrails. Very clean. Very pretty.
The stairway we’re on now is ugly, cold concrete with crumbling sides. It’s narrow enough to scrape our shoulders as we edge our way down into the darkness.
At the bottom, we run into a door with a blank input panel in the wall next to it.
Our reflections are distorted on its wavy face of glistening black glass.
“What now?” Libra asks.
“It’s got a handle,” Ignacio points out.
“So?”
“So…most of the doors in the Academy operate on sliding mag-tracks.”
“I don’t—”
Libra slides her sledgehammer from its holster and strap like she’s a Medieval knight drawing out a broadsword.
Without consulting us or taking an extra second to assess the situation, she swings the steel head of the powerful weapon onto the top of the pewter-gray lock.
The impact of metal on metal fills the tight space with a deafening ring. Arlo clamps his hands to his ears until the echo fades.
Sheathing her intimidating, long-handled hammer, Libra leads us through the narrow doorway. We follow her past a bank of generators and over to a line of input panels.
“Look,” Mattea points out. “The indicator light’s off.”
“Could be another glitch,” Sara tells her.
“Yeah. Or it could be that someone disabled it, came in, and then left again.”
“Why come in just to knock out Wisp and Granden, steal a bird, and then leave?” Ignacio asks.
“You can ask them when we find them,” Libra says.
“I don’t think the intruder was here looking for Wisp and Granden,” I tell my Cohort. “I think maybe they just got in the way.”
“You could be right,” Mattea says. “The VR-sim room is secure. They wouldn’t have known we were in there.”
“So you think someone broke in looking for us?”
“Yes,” I confirm. “Someone who knew Kress and the others wouldn’t be here.”
“And since they couldn’t find us…,” Ignacio begins.
“They got the drop on Wisp and Granden and took Haida?” Sara asks. “That doesn’t make sense.”
Arlo peers down the tunnel into the darkness, but he doesn’t step forward. “I think maybe Wisp and Granden knew there was danger.”
“And you think they put us in the VR-sim room…,” I ask.
“To protect us. Possibly. I heard War and Mayla talking to Wisp about it.”
“When?”
“I don’t know. A few days ago. Maybe a week.”
“And you didn’t tell us?”
“What’s to tell? They didn’t sound so sure about anything, themselves.”
“Did you say anything to them?”
“I tried. Mayla’s my mentor. I asked what was going on.”
“And?”
“And…they said it was nothing.”
&
nbsp; “Maybe it is nothing."
“Maybe.”
“You don’t sound sure.”
“Wisp doesn’t worry. Not like that. If you saw her, you wouldn’t be sure, either.”
“Whatever it was…is…they sure as hell couldn’t handle it.”
Libra latches her hand onto my upper arm. “Branwynne…”
“What?”
“We can’t leave the Academy.”
“Why not? Has this tunnel magically shut down or something?”
“You know what I mean. Wisp’ll kill you.”
I point at the ceiling. “She’s not exactly in killing shape at the moment.”
“What about the security protocols? The Perimeter Pylons?”
“They’re for keeping people from getting in, not to stop us from getting out.”
Libra takes a step back from the mouth of the narrow tunnel. “I think this is a really bad idea.”
“I agree,” I tell her. “That’s why you should stay here.”
“I’m not going with you.”
“Good. Stay upstairs with Cohort B. Help them take care of Wisp and Granden. Go look around the Academy for the intruder who I guarantee isn’t there anymore. You’ll just slow us down, anyway.”
“Fine. I’ll go with you,” Libra sighs.
And with that settled, the six of us plunge into the darkness.
We all know about the tunnels, but none of us has ever been in them before.
Thanks to one of the Auditor’s many informal history lessons when I first got here, I know how in the 19th century, this part of the mountain was center to a whole hub of mining operations. Mostly silver. Most of the primary mines and tunnels are long gone—either destroyed on purpose or else the victims of the countless cave-ins.
Not long after we first arrived at the Academy, Terk led a crew on a major discovery and excavation mission down here. I wasn’t part of it, but I got to hear all about it.
Kress told me about the network of tunnels, the sealed up mines, and the assorted access ports scattered all around this part of the mountain.
Now, it’s not just theory. The black maw of the tunnel—in all of its dark, creepy glory—is right here in front of me.
“Do you think this is how they got in?” Libra asks me.
“It’s hard to tell. They didn’t set off any of the motion sensors.”
“Then how—”
“Speculating won’t do us any good,” I remind her, directing everyone’s attention to the gravel and ice-crusted ground. “I don’t know how they got in. But look. These are boot prints. And they’re facing down the tunnel, away from the Academy. Someone got in. I don’t know how. But that someone definitely got out this way. Forget about how. We need to find out who and why.”
Ignacio points into the tunnel. “And you want us to go in there, chase them down, and ask?”
“I don’t think they’ll be sending out a holo-blog to explain their methods and intentions, so yeah…that’s exactly what I want us to do.”
Sara peers into the darkness. “Isn’t there an old saying or a fable or something about chasing a dangerous animal into its den?”
“What’s your point?” I ask, my voice laced with acid.
She points down into the deep, steep, unlit tunnel. “I think this might just be a terrible idea.”
“What about flashlights?” Mattea asks.
Libra beams her big stupid smile and shouts that she knows where they are.
She scampers back the way we came about a hundred feet to a wall cabinet and comes running back with three club-sized flashlights cradled in her arms like firewood.
She passes them to me, Mattea, and Ignacio, and we all click them on at the same time.
Nothing happens.
“Great,” Mattea sighs. “Glad to see it’s not just the main power supply that’s gone glitchy.”
“There are light ports in the ceiling,” Mattea points out before offering up a pathetic sigh. “Too bad they’re not on.”
I swing around to face Ignacio. “You’ve got some sort of bond with electrical energy, right? Can you…you know…light the way?”
“It doesn’t work like that. The electro-magnetic pulse I produce just kind of overrides other sources of electrical power. Small ones. Brohn’s been coaching me, but I’m not able to generate any light of my own, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“Great. So we’ve got what could be miles of dark tunnels to walk through?”
“I’ll go first,” Mattea says, slipping her hands into the handles of her ebony-steel Bear Claws.
Using his long-handed scythe as a walking stick, Arlo strides along after her with me and Libra following him and Sara and Ignacio bringing up the rear.
Hiking our way downhill through the dark like this is a strange, dream-like experience. The walls are rough, but at least the path beneath our feet is mostly paved.
Going as fast as we can without falling or running into any of the walls, we keep our hands on the tunnel’s rough, rocky sides or else on the shoulders of the person in front of us.
Without stopping to rest, we hike along like this until, at last, we arrive at a very welcome sliver of light up ahead.
Relieved, we jog up to find one of the access ports.
“It’s open,” I tell the others, nudging it with my elbow.
“Um…why is it open?” Arlo asks.
“I’ll give you three guesses. And the first two don’t count.”
Libra approaches the portal but doesn’t stick her head out. “Branwynne, are you sure about this?”
“I’m sure someone got in here and did something to Wisp and Granden. I’m sure this is where they got out. I’m sure they’ve got Haida Gwaii.” My voice rises as I start through the portal. “And I’m sure I’m not going to give up until I’m holding their still-beating heart in the palm of my hand.”
Behind me, I hear Ignacio tell the others, “I think she’s sure.”
And then the five of them follow me out of the dark tunnel and into the light of the steep and open mountainside.
33
Brawl
With all of us out on the mountain now, we step forward into a steeply slanted swamp of snow and mud.
Ignacio looks back up the sharply angled precipice above us. “How far down the mountain are we?”
“Far enough for it to be easier to go down than back up,” Arlo says, taking the lead this time.
We hike for another two hours, hoping not to slip and fall as we hop from rocks to tree roots and into dry ravines as we descend.
When we get to an area where the ground levels out, the mud, the jagged rocks, and the exposed root systems of a million toppled trees give way to a crusted-dry plateau. Another hour of hiking after that, and we step through a small area of woods to arrive at the edge of what seems to be an endless expanse of desert.
Mattea drags her hand across her forehead. “Why’s it so hot?”
Up in the Academy, we’ve gotten used to climate-controlled conditions inside and to the raging storms of snow and ice outside.
Down here, it’s like we’ve dropped into the depths of Hell.
And it just keeps getting hotter as we go.
We’re walking across a wide, cracked desert of flat, dried tree stumps and crests of red sand when Ignacio stops fast enough to leave trenches in the thick layer of pebbles and dust with the heels of his boots. He latches his hand onto my arm. “What is that?”
“What’s what?” Sara asks from the back of our procession.
“Those vibrations.”
Everyone stops and listens for a full three seconds before Mattea asks, “What is it, Branwynne?”
I don’t answer right away even though I know exactly what it is.
For the others, this is all new. Well, the reality of it is.
For me, there’s no mistaking the rumble in the ground or the massive cloud of dust and sand rolling toward us from up ahead.
I’ve seen them before. I’v
e fought them before. There were fourteen of us before—fifteen if I count the Auditor—and we barely escaped with our lives.
I turn to Libra and feel my voice catch in my throat.
“It’s the Army of the Unsettled. The real one!”
“What do we do?”
“Run!”
No one needs convincing. Without another word, we bolt like hell across the expansive patch of land, back toward what we hope will be the safety of the woods.
The Unsettled have little training and crappy aim. But they make up for it with wild-eyed relentlessness and sheer numbers.
Kress once called them a moving city. It’s true. Their entire population drives around endlessly in a miles-long caravan of old RVs, buses, campers, and fleets of construction vehicles.
Most threats out here consist of small pockets of desperate people struggling to survive. I’ve seen it all first-hand, and it was terrifying.
Being chased down by the Unsettled…that’s another brand of terror entirely.
Their moving city is molasses slow. But it doesn’t matter how fast we run. Their fleet of chase-down vehicles—at least a dozen modified, two-person Skid Steers—are way faster.
We can’t get back to the woods and the foothills fast enough, so we make a break for a cluster of dunes and boulders in the distance. Maybe we can lose them in there.
But it’s too far, and the Unsettled are too fast.
In seconds, the Skid Steers grind to a stop and surround us, kicking up pebbles and sand, and cutting off any hope we might’ve had of escape. We shield our faces and cough as the dust cloud sweeps over us.
The advanced recon hunters—all teenagers—hop down from their vehicles, and we tighten our defensive circle in preparation for their attack.
There are at least twenty of them, all dressed in an array of patchy rags, similar to what we saw in the VR-sim. They’re armed with a variety of knives, machetes, spiked gloves, and long-handled, bladed and spiked gardening tools wrapped in razor-wire.
“We can take them,” Ignacio declares through gritted teeth.
“I think you’re right. But they’re not the problem.”
