Axel grabbed my wrist and extracted my hand from the railing. My fingers tingled all the way to the tips, and a shock shot up my arm. “I told you to go inside.”
My instincts screamed run, but my feet didn’t obey, nor did my infamous mouth. “No.” I turned around. “I don’t want to go inside.”
“They have blasters. It’s not safe out here.”
“You have man-eating beasts.”
“Okay, then watch me kill them.” He signaled to the escorts both on the starboard and port sides of the barge. All lanterns blinked out, leaving the swamps in darkness.
I looked up at the stars and closed my eyes. If God, or whatever force controlled our universe, hadn’t completely abandoned me, I’d prayed he’d hear me now. I wanted this to stop—the killing, the fighting, the posturing—for something better. They wanted what we had, and we wanted what they held. No side controlled it all, but they could. Axel had been right in saying that, but it didn’t have to include the deaths of thousands.
“Everything will be okay. You will see.” He grabbed my shoulders and brought me around. I turned my face away, leaving my eyes closed, not wanting to gaze into his. “Olivia, look at me. You’re killing me.” He used his fingertips to turn me to him. I opened my eyes and took a good hard look into the haunted depths of his soul. “He never loved you.” His lips crushed down on mine, brutal, hungry, as though he’d never taste them again. When I did not kiss him back, Axel pulled away. “I’ve never stopped.”
I reached up to touch my lips, remembering Axel, the man of passion who dreamed of freedom, who’d made me the center of his world. That man had been my hero. “You have a funny way of showing it.” The words came out before I could stop them, slipping off my tongue like acid. Memories. His soft words. It all came raging back with that kiss, and I realized one important thing.
I no longer wanted his love.
His face lost all expression, but anger rolled off him, directed at me as though he realized he’d lost. I was no longer his soul, his reason for fighting. His reasons were his own now, and something told me he did not like them.
“Get inside now.” He stepped back, gave me one more push. “You don’t want to see this.”
He was right. I did not want to watch him self-destruct.
The barge rocked, and I ran to the window. Shouts, screams, and the rumbling of an approaching hover army. Bolts of blue light shot over the water. On a barge to our left, flames engulfed the sails.
I clamped down on the edge of the window and watched as another bolt hit the starboard escort. The craft tipped its nose into the air and began to sink into the bog. I clamped a hand over my mouth to keep from screaming when a crocodile lunged out of the water and grabbed a man by his head, dragging him under. Ferocious splashing ensued, and vomit moved up the back of my throat.
An explosion lit the swamp like day; the methane gasses on the surface ignited.
The crocodile reemerged with the man in his mouth. Another of the beasts had clamped onto his legs, and they rolled, tearing him in two, twisting the man apart in the middle before swimming away, leaving a stream of innards following.
I turned and heaved all over the cabin floor. I’d known it would be ugly, but I had not expected to see such a cold execution. Over and over, my empty stomach clenched and tried to expel what was no longer there. As it settled, I stumbled toward the door and threw it open to see the massacre. My fault. I’d led them here.
“The nets!” Axel barked the order and strode down the side of the barge. Men shoved poles against the triggers and sprang the trap. Nets shot up everywhere. Hovers hit and capsized; a few barely squeaked past, running up alongside the barges, firing shots. Poles hit the hovers, knocking them over, feeding the beasts below. I dashed back in my room and grabbed a knife from a chest Axel kept beside the bed.
I needed to cut the rope holding the nets up. I ran from the cabin and to the aft end, searching for the pulley. Spotting it, I grabbed where it pulled tight and began to saw.
“Olivia. Stop!”
I ignored the order from the other side of the barge, sawing faster, determined to drop the nets and save the few who still lived. As I nearly succeeded, Axel reached me, grabbed the back of my shirt, and flung me across the deck. I hit a stack of crates. For several seconds, my head spun and I couldn’t focus. When the whirling stopped, I stared at my target. The net hung by a strand. One more slice.
“You can’t prevent this.” Axel stood between me and my goal, his chest rising and falling, a snarl on his face.
“Watch me.” I might not be able to contain the sickness, but I could bring an end to this. I tightened my grip on the knife and charged, not at him but for the rope. Ten feet from him, I dove, sliding past him on my belly along the water and blood-slick deck, hitting the end of the ship head first. I didn’t let it slow me. I grabbed the strand and chopped. The net dropped with a loud splash as something connected with the back of my head.
Welcome to hell, Olivia.
Marcus wheezed and coughed into his hand. He studied his palm. Inside lay clots of blood the size of his thumbnail. His body ached, every muscle, every joint. He wiped his palm on his pants, grinding the blood in. He had two, three days. Tops.
“You should have a doctor look at that.” A young officer, one of his squad leaders, nodded to the stain left on his pants. “All kinds of nasty things you can pick up in these swamps.”
“Yes.” He’d found the nastiest—his wife. Marcus ignored the rest of what he said and lifted his hand to shade his eyes from the rain as he counted the returning troops. He reached fifteen and waited. After a couple of minutes, when no others followed, he adjusted his com and called the squadron leader.
“Where’s the rest of the unit?”
The man pushed his hover-jet to the shore and swung his leg over, removing his helmet. He didn’t bother with the com. “You’re looking at it, sir.”
“You left with sixty.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And…?”
“Swamp monsters.”
Marcus stared over the water. The rain poured down, drenching the already-saturated troops. “Monsters?”
“Yes, sir, and nets. The clones trapped us in nets and let the monsters feast. If not for the woman, we’d all be finished. She cut the nets and dropped them.”
Olivia. Why, when she’d been the cause of all of this? Had she lied about not knowing about the virus? Possibly her way to try to make up for it. She might not have infected him intentionally, but she’d still kept the drains a secret. She’d have to do a hell of a lot more to gain his forgiveness.
Marcus coughed and covered his mouth again. This was Axel’s territory. His troops were fighting guerrilla warfare in an environment his men hadn’t even begun to figure out.
If he sent another unit after them, the casualties would be just as heavy, but if he didn’t continue to pursue, the consequences would be much worse. He needed the cure and Olivia had it. If they got away, everyone would die. He had no aircraft, so flying overhead wouldn’t be an option. He’d have to watch and wait for the rebels to come ashore, and they would. He had nature on his side in this situation. The rains were coming, and the river wouldn’t be safe. Even for their barges.
The clone leader knew if he could delay long enough, the virus would take care of them and he could defeat them without a battle. Marcus would have to bring the battle to him. “We have to go in another way. They can’t stay on the river. I need a map. Now.” Even as he spoke, drops of rain splattered his slicker. “They’re going to have to come back on land and I intend to be waiting for them.
“What about air support?”
“I destroyed all our aircraft.”
“Why, sir?”
Marcus debated whether to tell him why and decided the panic the news could induce would be worse. His troops would flee in fear of becoming infected with a plague they didn’t know they already carried. “That’s classified.”
“We’ll
have to cut through the other side, by land.”
“Perhaps.” An itch that raced down the back of his neck. Instinct told him Axel had anticipated that move. Flooding season was here; the rebels would have to head for high ground. He studied the horizon and the mountain range in the distance.
Axel wanted to get deeper into his territory and harder to locate. If Marcus were in his place, he’d employ the same tactics to avoid an encounter. Chasing the rebels through that range could take months.
He coughed again. He didn’t have months. The young officer stood, waiting for orders. Marcus glanced into his eyes and saw the telltale copper spots. Hemorrhaging. No, they had days.
“Gather the entire division. I want all available land-craft and foot soldiers on the edge of that mountain range in two hours.”
“Sir, that range is two and a half hours away in clear weather.”
“Then you’d better move.” Olivia was the source of the infection and something told him she also held the cure. Where else would his enemy stash it? Axel had taken her, even though she had nanites that could be tracked and would put all the rebels in danger. He risked a lot for her, to get her back, even though he’d carved her up and ran her off. He might still feel something for her, too, and chances were good he also used her to stash the cure, since he had no intention of ending their relationship.
Axel wasn’t stupid. He had to know by now that Marcus was tracking her—they’d found the clones too quickly for any other conclusion. And the trap Axel anticipated they’d ride into, more than clarified any questions he might have had that the clone leader knew.
If not for the nanites, the entire city would die.
13
I shifted the weight of the pack and stopped, looking over my shoulder. Every step I took was another section in the burial cubes of the Aeropites. The children—sweet, innocent, no hostility in them—had done nothing to deserve what was coming.
Axel came up alongside me, grabbing my arm and steadying me as I picked my way up a clay slope.
“Soon,” he said.
“Soon what?” I slipped, and he caught me. His touch made me angry; the press of his body enticed me to heave. I’d trusted him with everything, and he was no better than my father or General Axis. He could have left me, moved on. I knew Marcus would have stopped the attacks if I’d asked.
“Soon all we’ve suffered will be over.”
His words confirmed what I thought. Axel wouldn’t stop until he’d destroyed Aeropia. I yanked my arm free and grabbed a vine, using it to pull the bulk of my weight over a hump in bank. “What of the children?”
“You care too much for these killers, Olivia.” He’d come up behind me again, grabbing my elbow and moving me around a thick tree trunk.
“They’re babies.” I stopped in place, unable to continue forward, not wanting to take another step. “Marcus isn’t a bad man.”
“Marcus has slaughtered hundreds of our people, and those children you want to protect will grow up to be killers just like him.”
“I told you. I believe it was Pilot, Marcus’s brother. Marcus didn’t have anything to do with it. Where’s your compassion?”
He leaned in and pressed his lips to my ear. His fingers dug into the flesh on my biceps. “Compassion won’t save us, Olivia.”
“Neither will murdering innocent children.” I jerked my head away from him. “Let me go, Axel.”
“I can’t do that. You carry the master strain, the nanites that can create a cure.”
I whipped around and slipped. Axel caught me again. “You put a virus in me and made me the master carrier? You asshole.” I thumped my fists hard against his chest, and he grabbed my wrists. “I don’t even know who you are anymore.”
“It was the safest place I could think to store it. It’s harmless to you. I would never hurt you, Olivia.”
“Really? When you cut me up and ran me off, that wasn’t meant to hurt me?”
“It was meant to save you.”
“Sure didn’t feel like it. When did you plant the nanites in me?”
He looked away.
“No, you don’t get out of this. You tell me. Now.”
“When I had the virus engineered.”
“Four years? I’ve been carrying this disease for four years?”
“You’ve been carrying the antivirus for four years.”
“Axel,” I whispered. “Why?” Tears filled my eyes.
“You are the only one I trust. I needed a cure in case the strain got away from us.”
“For us, but not the others. Even I didn’t think you’d stoop so low. You made me a carrier.” I closed my eyes, wanting to scream. My blood could save them. I alone was the answer, a means to save those infected—and Marcus.
“Please understand. I didn’t do it to hurt you.”
“But you did. Let me go back to save them. I will return to you.”
“What do you think to return to, Olivia. Running? Dying? Living like an animal and scavenging everything you need to survive? We don’t have to do that anymore. We are no more than clones to them.”
“I’ll come back.”
“You can’t be trusted.” Axel snorted. “I’m not letting you go again. I’d rather die first. You can’t leave. You are my soul, all that makes me good.”
“You don’t have one, Axel.” I yanked out of his grip. “And you don’t have me. Not anymore.”
His eyes took on a hardness I’d started to get used to. “You don’t mean that.”
“I don’t love you. I once did, but you destroyed that. Let me leave.” I stepped back.
“To save those beasts?”
“They’re not all beasts. Some are children, women. They are no different from us, struggling to survive. Together we stand a chance, divided we will destroy each other. Can’t you see that? Can’t you see we are all human?” I screamed in his face. “That’s right, human. It’s about time you start acting like it.”
Axel pulled me into his arms. “Forget him, Olivia. You belong to me. You’ve always belonged to me.”
“You above all others know that’s not true. Nobody owns another person. You are not my keeper, and you never will be.” I pulled free, shoved him back, and turned to follow the group who worked their way in a zigzag fashion to the top. “Let me go.”
“No.”
“They’re closer than we thought.” A warrior handed a scope to Axel who peered into it and adjusted the range.
“How did they catch us so fast?” The army sat at the bottom of the slope, slowly picking their way to the top. Axel didn’t appear worried, if anything, hopeful.
Not liking the expression on his face, I glanced back to see the men moving up the slope, dark spots against the red mud. They’d had been forced to abandon their vehicles to climb. We’d picked our way up the mountain for the last hour, and I was wondering if we’d ever make it to the top when the group stopped, and, for a moment, I thought it was to rest.
Axel had reduced Marcus and his men to their most primitive, balancing the battlefield, and now he held the high ground.
It took me seconds to process his intent. “No.” I could scream it out, but they wouldn’t hear me. They were too far up the slope to escape anyway.
Axel looked over at me but addressed his second. “Prepare the mudslide. We’ll bury them.” He lifted the binoculars to his eyes again and swept the slope. He stopped at the closest group, one I’m sure Marcus accompanied. “Stubborn bastard. Let’s see how you like this.”
I looked in the direction Axel did. The troops zigzagged along the mountain, digging the spikes of boots into the slippery surface in a chopping fashion with each step. One stopped, lifted his head, and pointed. I couldn’t see his face clearly, but I knew who it was. “Marcus.”
“She’s mine,” Axel growled.
Marcus gave him a salute and smiled.
Axel pulled back from the scope. How could he know? He glanced again into the lens and smiled before giving the order. “Mov
e. Get to the top.” He spun around. As soon as we were at the top, he’d trigger the trap, and Marcus and his men would die.
Unless… I stopped and glanced over my shoulder at Axel, studying his face before I shifted my attention farther down the slope to the approaching troops. I looked back at Axel. No good deed ever went unpunished.
I didn’t know what Marcus would do. Did he blame me for the illness? My body contained everything they needed to stop it. Still, I didn’t know how Marcus would react, but I knew how Axel would. He wouldn’t bury me. In my heart, I knew. I bit my lip and chose to take a chance. “I love my people. Please understand I don’t do this to hurt any of you. I never wanted to hurt you. But those men down there, they are as much my people as you are.”
“Get up the slope, Olivia. You’re holding up progress.”
I didn’t say anything. I jumped, twisting and landing on my ass. As I hit the ground, the surface gave way under me and a clay shoot, formed from runoff, rocketed me toward the bottom like a missile.
Axel reached out as I raced by and stumbled, almost losing his footing.
I lay back, crossing my ankles and folding my arms across my chest, and went with it, picking up velocity, letting gravity take me.
“Stop her. Bring her back alive!” If he triggered the mudslide, I’d die, but if he didn’t, the enemy would have the cure. Axel had some choices to make and I’d banked on the fact he still loved me. I trusted Axel was more man than beast. My life depended on my being right. I’d gone with my gut, gambled on our past, and won. Axel wouldn’t trigger the mudslide with me at the bottom of the slope. As I drew closer to Marcus and his men, I wondered what he would do with me.
Three men followed my descent, heading for their deaths in an attempt to stop me.
Axel barked orders behind me. “Get the rest to the top and continue.”
I looked back to see him close his eyes and jump. So be it, right into the enemies’ open jaws, and when I got there, I’d find a way to save him. I owed him that much, beast or not.
The Book of Olivia Page 15
