Adika arrived a moment later, and gave me an enquiring look.
“Those five are cleared,” I said. “I’m tempted to get the rest of your team in as well. I keep picking up from Lucas that it’s important we get our unit operational as quickly as possible. The sooner you can start your training sessions the better.”
You never argue with the telepath, except when you think something might harm her ability to serve the Hive. Adika folded his arms stubbornly. “You mustn’t do too much today. The rest of the interviews can start at nine o’clock tomorrow.”
I groaned and gave in. I was feeling unnatural wearing such formal clothes, so I headed back to my bedroom, changed into an outfit that was a more adult version of the tunics and leggings I’d worn on Teen Level, and then grimaced at myself in the mirror.
I’d seen no sign that Forge was a borderline telepath, and my obsession with him made even less sense now I’d discovered the trigger was purely visual. I wondered if I should discuss this with Lucas after all, then remembered I’d promised Forge not to tell anyone that I’d known him on Teen Level.
Why had I said that? Was it the old compulsion to do whatever would please Forge? I didn’t think so. I’d just seen his thoughts panicking about the effect on his future career, and had a natural urge to reassure him the same way I’d want to reassure any friend. Whatever weirdness was going on here, I was totally in control of it. I just needed to close my eyes, look at Forge’s mind instead of his face, and the spell was broken. I found it easier to focus on the telepathic view of the world with my eyes closed anyway, so there was really no problem at all.
That night I had the dream again. We walked through the trees and Forge was pleased with me. I was a good girl.
Chapter Thirteen
I huddled in a ball. Eyes closed, back against the rough bark of a tree, soft prickles of grass beneath me. Five armed men stood tensely round me, but my mind was reaching out past them, past the small, soft thoughts of birds, mice and squirrels, following one particular mind. It was concentrating on running and hiding.
“Down corridor, turning left, still running,” I said.
I could hear Adika’s voice coming from the crystal unit that fitted snugly in my ear. I could see the world through the eyes of my target.
“He’s just reached a crossway with a main corridor. He’s planning to ride the belt.”
Adika’s voice barked instructions to the Chase team in response.
“He’s on the belt now. He’s planning to jump. Jumping up now. He’s caught a ladder. Arms hurt. Nearly fell. Climbing up ladder now.”
“Visual on target!” said Forge’s voice.
“Visual confirmed!” said Adika. “Chase team are in position. Strike time!”
This was the danger point where the Strike team moved in to capture my target. A cornered wild bee might fight back, so I had to change focus from reporting my target’s movements to protecting my Strike team.
I dumped my mental link to the target, opened my eyes, and looked at the display hovering above the dataview in my right hand. Glowing dots and names marked the position of Adika and the twenty Strike team members on a spider network of corridors and levels. Tapping any one of those glowing dots would display the view from the camera extension of their crystal unit. That feature was vital for others, but I never bothered with it. Why depend on cameras when I could enter someone’s thoughts and see the view through their eyes?
“Going circuit,” I said.
I hit the circuit button on my dataview. The list of the five names of my current Bodyguard team appeared on the left of the display, while the sixteen names of Adika and the Chase team started scrolling up the right side. The names of the Chase team were currently highlighted in one of red, blue, or green, since Adika had them divided into three groups to approach the target from different directions.
I ignored the Bodyguard team list entirely, since I knew those men were safely next to me. I ignored the coloured highlights on the Chase team list too. I didn’t care what group a man was in, just whether he was in trouble and needed help.
I chanted each name on the Chase team aloud as I checked the man’s mind, tapping the display to send it back down to the bottom of the list as I moved on to the next. “Adika, Matias, Tobias, Rafael, Kaden, Eli …”
I broke off as pain stabbed my left arm. “Eli’s hurt!”
“Eli here. I’m fine. Fell off a girder,” said an embarrassed voice.
“Caleb, Dhiren …” I worked my way through the rest of the minds. “Circuit complete.” I started again. “Adika, Matias, Tobias …”
“Target down,” said Adika.
I completed my circuit, then quit checking minds and relaxed.
“Nice run,” said Adika. “Eli, what happened with the girder? Are you hurt?”
“A few bruises. A slight scratch.” Eli sighed. “I assumed there’d be the standard gap between girders, but two were further apart. I swung and didn’t make it.”
“Never assume things,” said Adika. “Regroup at the park now. Our volunteer target for the next training run is Keith’s Strike team leader, so be ready for absolutely anything.”
We gathered together in the park. The Strike team members made a garish group. They’d all been issued with functional outfits in unobtrusive colours, designed to help them blend in with the crowds in any zone or level of the Hive, but half of them were still wearing old training outfits in the colours of different teen sports teams.
Eli’s slight scratch turned out to be a sizeable gash in his arm. Adika got out the medical kit and patched him up. This was our sixth day of training exercises, and half of the Strike team were looking battered.
“Matias, you were out of position at the end,” said Adika. “You need to move faster. More gym time.”
“I’m working at it,” grumbled Matias. “I expected Lottery to assign me to the Purple Zone weightlifting team. If I’d known it was going to throw this at me, I’d have done more running training.”
I laughed. Most of the Strike team would have expected to be assigned to one or other of their home zone sports teams, but their Lottery results couldn’t have shocked them more than mine had shocked me.
“Other than that, it was a good run,” said Adika. “Coming together nicely.”
The Strike team members started chatting now, with Kaden, Rothan, Matias, Eli, and Forge dominating the conversation as usual. Everyone was well aware that these were the five men imprinted for Strike team leader. Whenever Adika split the Strike team into groups, he’d choose his group leaders from among those five. Whenever he had a difficult task to be done, he’d choose one of them to do it. He was grabbing every chance to test them with varied challenges, to see which of them would be his best choice to fill his two deputy positions.
“You have to be careful of those savage girders, Eli,” said Forge.
Eli tugged down his sleeve. “You need to watch those savage walls as well.” He pointed a finger in the direction of the spectacular bruise on Forge’s forehead, but misjudged his distance and poked it.
“Ow!” yelped Forge.
Forge’s cry of protest made me make the mistake of turning my head and looking straight at him. Seeing his expression of pain, I reacted furiously, screaming at Eli. “You hurt him, waste you!”
There’d been several discussions going on between Strike team members, but they abruptly stopped. Startled faces looked at me. Adika’s face was deadpan, but his thoughts were frantically speculating.
… how will our clown of a Tactical Commander react if Amber chooses Forge instead of …
I moved on from Adika’s thoughts into Forge’s head, and found him cursing.
… never going to take me seriously as a potential deputy if Amber protects me like a helpless baby!
I’d upset Forge! I hastily tried to cover my error. “Why can’t you fools remember I feel your pain when I check your heads? Waste it, that’s why I’m running circuits, to find out if you’re
in trouble. Being hit by a score of different aches and pains isn’t funny, and if you start deliberately hurting each other then I’m going to quit. Understand?”
“Sorry,” said Eli. “I meant to point, not prod.”
“All right,” I said, “but please be careful. I had exactly the same thing happen yesterday, when I was in Dhiren’s head and Matias patted him on his dislocated shoulder.”
“Sorry,” said Matias.
I checked a few minds. They’d all accepted this wasn’t about Forge, but about me being overloaded by pain. Adika was yelling at himself for pushing me too hard in the training sessions, wondering if …
“Target ready,” said a voice from my ear crystal.
“You’re too tired for this, Amber, so we’ll finish now,” said Adika.
“No,” I said. “You’ve brought Keith’s Strike team leader over especially for this, so we’ll carry on. I’m just pointing out that you may all be tough and impervious to pain, but I’m not, so stop making it worse for me.”
I’d got them all convinced now, so I quit whining and sent my mind out. It was easy spotting a target in this isolated part of the Hive. I’d no idea how I’d manage when we moved somewhere packed full of people.
… kill people. I’m going to kill people in a horribly gory fashion and spread lots of blood around. Waste it, I feel stupid thinking all this stuff. Blood, blood, blood. Death. Blood …
“Target acquired. It’s a woman. About six corridors out. Thataway!” I pointed.
“Eli, you’re in charge of Bodyguard team,” said Adika. “Chase team divides into four groups now. Rothan take red group, Matias take blue, Forge take green, and Kaden take yellow.”
The names on my dataview shuffled around and changed colour as Adika spoke. Eli and four other men clustered round me as my bodyguards, while the rest gathered into four groups and headed out on chase duty.
“Target is heading directly away from us,” I said. “She’s found an express strip. I see numbers. I’ve got a position. She’s on … No, she isn’t. She’s picturing a sign that isn’t really there, lying in her head to try to fool me.”
“I told you to be prepared for anything.” Adika sounded amused. “You’re dealing with an experienced Strike team leader.”
“Trying to work out what’s real and what’s lies. She’s circling round us. She’s in the vent system, about eight corridors out. No, make that more like six cors. She’s circling anticlockwise. I’m feeling a cold wind.”
“She’s close to an air conditioning unit then,” Adika muttered to himself. “There are four possible ones in our area. Any more clues, Amber?”
“She’s lower than us. Three, maybe four levels. Still in the vent system. Still circling anticlockwise.”
“Only one possible air conditioning unit matches that height. She can’t crawl too fast, so we’ve got speed over her.” Adika started barking instructions, getting his net of Strike team members into position.
“She’s gone up at least one level,” I reported.
“Still in the vents?” asked Adika.
“Yes, it’s cramped in there.”
“She can’t go up a level in the vent system unless … Got her position!” Adika snapped out more instructions.
“Opening a vent cover. Coming out. Ouch, cut a finger. Turning right and running down corridor. Riding belt. Jumping. Climbing a maintenance ladder.” I gabbled. “She’s level with us now and still climbing. She’s thinking about me.”
“She isn’t going for the dolls,” shouted Adika. “She’s going for Amber. Bodyguard!”
Five handsome young men pressed up against me, protecting me with their bodies. If this had been a real threat, I’d have been scared to death, but in training it was rather fun.
I wondered how I’d feel if Forge was among the bodyguards piled against me. I hadn’t been in that situation yet, I hadn’t even had Forge carrying me, because he was never assigned to Bodyguard team. I’d been worried that was because Adika had guessed something was going on between me and Forge, until I caught Adika thinking about physical fitness levels. He kept assigning Forge to Chase team duties because he was one of the fittest men on the Strike team.
I’d been relieved by that. I didn’t need the complications of Adika interfering in this. There was the hideous possibility of him ordering Forge to be … friendly … to me. Forge wouldn’t like that. I was almost sure I wouldn’t like it either. When I looked at the world with my telepathic view, I was fascinated by Lucas’s glowing mind, while Forge’s thoughts were no more appealing than the rest of the Strike team.
As a telepath, it all seemed very simple, but when I looked with ordinary human eyes everything abruptly reversed. Lucas was attractive, the Strike team were all handsome men, but one glimpse of Forge’s face drew me like a magnet. I was in control of the situation, of course I was, but …
I realized I’d let myself be distracted at a key moment in a chase. Stupid, stupid, stupid! I concentrated on my target mind again, and found it somewhere totally unexpected. “She’s right above us now, coming through the ceiling!”
“Strike time!” shouted Adika. “Anyone in range, get her now!”
“Going circuit. Adika, Forge, Dhiren, Caleb, Rafael …” I was hearing shouting voices that weren’t coming from my ear crystal. I looked up and saw a tangle of bodies landing in the branches of a dwarf oak just ahead of me.
“Target down,” said Adika.
I stopped chanting, and watched Strike team members scramble out of the tree and release the target. The startlingly tall, blonde woman dusted off a few stray leaves.
“I got far too close, Adika. You mustn’t let a target get anywhere near that close to your telepath.”
“More practice, more gym time,” said Adika grimly.
I felt horribly guilty. Adika was embarrassed and angry, and my whole Strike team were upset and blaming themselves, but I knew this was my fault. My team depended totally on the information I gave them, and I’d let my mind drift off into thoughts of Forge.
Adika was looking past me now, frowning at something. I turned to see what he was looking at, and saw blood pouring down Forge’s face.
“Forge, that’s a nasty looking injury,” said Adika. “You’d better go to the medical area and get it treated. In fact, you’d all better go there. We’ll be heading into more populated parts of the Hive soon. A mob of young men together is unusual enough, without them all having visible cuts and bruises as well. Medical will issue you each with special antiseptic makeup to match your skin tones, so you can make yourselves look respectable.”
The Strike team headed off in a depressed group, and Adika started talking to Keith’s Strike team leader. I slunk off to my apartment, and sat there brooding on what had happened. Today had just been a training run, but when we were doing this for real … A single lapse of concentration by Keith had led to the death of Megan’s husband. If I let myself get distracted, then one of my Strike team could be the next to die.
Chapter Fourteen
I sat under a maple tree, with a circle of expectant birds around me. I threw a handful of birdseed, and watched them eagerly fly in pursuit. A moment later, the birds scattered as the Strike team ran past me and started their third lap of the park. Adika was in the lead, with twenty figures chasing after him. They were looking a lot less colourful these days, because Adika had insisted they give up their old Teen Level training outfits and wear the officially provided clothes instead.
A park of our own had seemed an indulgence, but it wasn’t. The Strike team needed it for training, and the rest of us needed it as a place to relax. The last few weeks had given me a whole new view of not just the park, but the whole Hive. I’d never realized there were interlevels between the proper levels of the Hive, holding vents, waste disposal, plumbing, and all the other services. I’d walked along corridors and never suspected labyrinths of maintenance areas were hidden behind some of the walls. I’d never even worked out the obvious fact th
at the park on one level took up two levels above it to give the extra ceiling height, and one level below it for tree roots.
I’d been blind, but now I’d seen all these places. I’d climbed ladders, and crawled through interlevels and vents, both as a watcher in the minds of the Strike team, and in person. Adika said it was vital to understand the areas the targets could hide in, and he was right. Once I’d been there myself, it was much easier to make sense of the clues I picked up from target minds. When they left the corridors and entered the bowels of the Hive, visual clues were far less important than things like the feel of maintenance mesh, or the heat of a nearby lighting duct.
I got off lightly compared to the rest of the team. Adika didn’t send me down waste chutes, since those were both smelly and dangerous. I only did a small fraction of the physical training they did as well. Adika just wanted me fit enough to run from danger as a last desperate resort.
Lucas strolled up and stretched out on the grass by my side. Fran came a few minutes later, and carefully dusted off a bench before sitting on it. Megan arrived and sat next to her, but with a significantly large gap between them.
The budding friendship between Fran and Megan had ended a few days ago. I’d only seen a glimpse of the crucial argument in Megan’s thoughts. She’d been annoyed by Fran saying something insulting about Adika.
I didn’t understand Megan’s feelings about Adika. For that matter, Megan didn’t seem to understand them either. Megan had over a decade more experience than me. I’d thought that would help her know precisely what she wanted in life, but instead it seemed to complicate things. Whenever I saw her thoughts, at least one of the levels would be agonizing over whether she should give in to her attraction to Adika or stay loyal to her dead husband.
Adika spotted us as he finished the third lap of the park, and left his team resting while he came over to sit on the grass facing me. I could see him glance across at Megan, and her dodge his gaze. I wondered if there’d been another clash between them. In theory, a fight between Adika and Megan was none of my business. In reality, it meant I’d be dragged into an emotional whirlpool the next time I had to read Adika’s mind.
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