by Minton, Toby
The test went on forever, far longer than any fight had ever lasted for Nikki. When Sam finally called a halt, Nikki was beat, in every sense of the word. She was shaky and sucking wind like she'd been running at a dead sprint, and she was utterly humiliated.
She would have loved to say she gave as good as she got, but that would have been a big, sweaty lie. She'd spent more time on the mat than she had on her feet. She took so many punches and kicks that she felt bruised from neck to knees, even though Sam was careful to ease every blow.
Sam, of course, looked perfectly fine. She'd landed a fair number of shots on him—none as expertly softened as his—during the marathon, but he'd shrugged them all off like they were nothing, and he'd somehow turned each one into another embarrassing way to put her on the mat. Which, of course, was where she was now.
She took the hand Sam was offering, and he hauled her to her feet.
"Good job," he said softly when she steadied herself eye-to-eye with him.
She looked at him like he was crazy. What fight had he been watching? Was he messing with her?
"Failure or not, I'm not calling you sensei," she said. "Not happening."
It was his turn to look confused, but he didn't respond. He stepped back as Elias walked up and handed her a bottle of water, which she accepted with surprising enthusiasm.
"Well, sensei, what do you think?" he asked, smiling at Nikki like he thought she'd done something right too. Maybe they were all high.
She looked at Sam around the bottle as she sucked greedily at the water, but the voice that answered wasn't his.
"We have a lot of work to do," Mos said. At least, she would have sworn it was Mos if she didn't know for a fact that he was still bedridden in his room. She looked around as the voice went on, but he was nowhere to be seen. Elias and Sam both pointed to the camera mounted in the corner.
"Not too many bad habits though," Mos said through the speakers. "Not many habits at all. Just a lot of guts and instinct."
Nikki scowled at the camera.
"And a temper," Mos rasped a laugh, then paused. Laughing hurt him, she knew. She'd visited him often enough over the last couple days to know he was gritting his teeth and staring at the ceiling right now. "Instincts are dead on though. She'll learn fast. You boys and girls better watch yourselves. You'll be the ones on the mat before long."
Nikki looked around to see the others nodding seriously. They were all high. Her scowl tried to give way to a proud smile though, mainly because of the feelings pushing through from Michael.
"Fitness is a problem," Mos said. To which Impact and Coop nodded and Sam busied himself looking elsewhere.
The proud smile melted. "Wait—what?"
Elias ignored her as he looked over at Ace. "Do what you need to do."
Ace nodded as she looked Nikki up and down. "We'll start first thing in the morning."
"Start what? We'll start what in the morning?" Nikki asked. Her only answer was a bark of laughter from Coop. That laughter cut off when Ace held out her hand toward him and raised her eyebrows.
"I was betting on Padre, by the way. Pay up."
Chapter 19
Nikki
“Get up, Nikki," the creature said in a jarringly human voice.
During hours of terror-fueled running, Nikki had imagined a thousand horrible outcomes once the black-armored alien cornered her, but conversation was not one of them.
She’d led the creature—the full nightmare version of Gideon’s dark side—on an exhausting chase through twisted, constantly narrowing alleys in Seattle and L.A., and then through the shanties of every free zone she’d ever seen, each one blending seamlessly into the next. Her every stride had been sluggish, agonizingly slower than she knew she could run, like her legs didn’t quite grasp the gravity of her situation, literally. No matter how hard she tried to run, no matter how many clumsy turns she made, the creature stayed right with her. Finally, it cornered her in a blind alley that became the vault the minute she turned and pressed her back into the concrete wall.
The creature stepped through the door and slowly crept closer, looming larger than she remembered, its long taloned fingers stretching out for her as it opened its mouth to reveal razor-like teeth. Then it spoke again.
“Come on, Nikki, get up.”
As the creature gathered itself to pounce, a hand shot out of the darkness and latched onto Nikki’s arm.
* * *
Nikki lurched up with a shout, tangling herself hopelessly in the sheets and nearly smacking her head on the angled concrete above her fold-down bed.
“Fun dream?” Ace asked, pulling her hand back from Nikki’s arm. She arched an eyebrow as Nikki tried to salvage what little dignity a twisted, sweaty t-shirt and obviously terrified expression would allow.
“Didn’t think so,” Ace went on. “Look on the bright side though.” She tossed a pair of shorts and a long-sleeved exercise top onto the bed. “Your heart rate’s already up. That’s half the battle on day one of a new program.”
Nikki stared at the clothes in confusion as Ace waited.
“What time is it?” Her voice wasn’t as thick with sleep as it usually was in the morning. Maybe that was another “bright side” to waking up in terror.
“Later than I’d like,” Ace said with a roll of her impressive shoulders. She was wearing a similar getup of shorts and a long-sleeved running top. She filled hers out a lot better than Nikki would though, and her thigh muscles looked like they could crack walnuts. That didn’t bode well for whatever this “program” was going to entail.
“If I had my way, we’d have been on the trail well before first light,” Ace said, still waiting like Nikki was supposed to be moving. She wasn’t. “But with those creatures out there at night…”
Nikki started to pull on the shorts but stopped as that sunk in.
“There are more of them out there?” The too-high pitch of her voice tore away the last shred of dignity she’d held onto. She’d heard the others talking about the creatures, but she’d let out-of-sight keep the reality of them well out of mind. The thought of walking outside right into their claws was too much to shrug off after her latest nightmare.
“Only at night, according to Cole,” Ace replied gently. She hadn’t missed the tone. “I don’t think they like the smell of him. He says he’s found signs of one or two on the far shore, but they haven’t crossed to the island yet. Not since the night Mos got hit.”
Nikki finished pulling the shorts on, keeping her face averted. She didn’t know what her expression looked like, but if it came even close to matching how she felt, the shame would be too much to bear this early in the morning. She slid off the bed and busied herself changing shirts. Not that it mattered. Ace had turned away and was eyeing Nikki’s two-pair shoe collection.
“Are these the only running shoes you have?”
“Why? What’s wrong with them?” Her tone was a jarring mix of whine and challenge, at least to her ears. She loved her pink sneakers. They were old, yes, and a little worn in spots, namely the soles, but they were the shining jewel of her hand-me-down wardrobe. They were the one item she’d paid for with carefully hoarded ration pogs. They were an indulgence she’d chosen simply because she’d wanted them, not because she’d needed them—the only indulgence Michael had ever let her have without complaint.
Ace nudged one of the shoes with her toe. She looked less than impressed. “They’ll do for today. We’ll see about getting something better tonight.”
Just like that. The way these people looked at money, rather, the way they disregarded it, still surprised Nikki even after all this time. She had money at her disposal now too, if she asked, but parting with even a few coins pained her. She couldn’t wrap her mind around putting as little thought into a purchase as she did which shirt to wear for the day. She just couldn’t get used to it.
She snatched her sneakers out of Ace’s disapproving eyeline and sat down to put them on. Don’t listen to her, babies, sh
e thought as she pulled them on reverently. There’s nothing better than you.
Ace didn’t give her much time to dawdle. As soon the last knot pulled tight, Nikki was hustled into the hall and toward the galley, which was fine with her. All that running in her nightmare had worked up an appetite.
Unfortunately, food was not part of Ace’s program. They bypassed the enticing smells coming from the kitchen and headed up the steps to the church. When Nikki complained, in the nicest possible way, Ace just chuckled and said, “No need to waste food,” whatever that meant.
A grueling half hour later, Nikki understood. If she’d had any food in her belly, it wouldn’t have stayed there.
What started as a casual jog in the crisp morning air quickly turned into a series of sprints up every hill they encountered on the island trail. By the third one, Nikki was mentally cursing the cold air searing her lungs. By the fifth, she was vocally cursing Elias for getting her into this. He, of course, was nowhere to be seen.
When they reached the open space where Impact practiced his flying, Ace finally called a halt and started stretching. Nikki dropped to her butt on the damp ground and tried to catch her breath. She had a lot to say—none of it nice—once she could breathe enough to speak.
“Don’t get too comfortable,” Ace said. She wasn’t breathing heavily at all. Her cheeks were a little flushed but that looked to be more from the cool air than exertion. Was she some kind of machine?
“You need to stretch while you’re warm,” Ace said. “But don’t do any bending over for a minute. Let your pulse rate drop a little. I don’t want you passing out on me.”
“I’m fine,” Nikki lied. What she was was out of shape. Badly. Or so she guessed. She’d never been out of shape. She’d never gotten this winded from running.
“You’re out of shape, kid,” Ace said.
For once, hearing somebody say she was right was the last thing Nikki wanted.
“I can’t be,” Nikki said, standing up faster than she should have and grabbing a foot to try to mimic Ace’s balanced pose. “I’m seventeen, and I look fine.”
Ace looked Nikki up and down and shrugged like she wasn’t convinced. What was that supposed to mean?
“What? I’m a teenager. Teenagers don’t get out of shape.” She knew it was more than youth that had kept her in shape up until now though. She’d never worked out, per se. She’d never had to. Nikki and Michael had always stayed tight and toned and had the cardio systems of gazelles, thanks to their power.
“They do if they spend four months barely getting out of bed.”
Nikki’s look must have matched what she was feeling. Ace immediately went on. “With good reason, I know. I might have done the same in your place. But you can’t lie around forever and expect to stay fit. And you can’t keep eating like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like Coop,” Ace said with a smile as she switched legs.
Nikki followed suit, with the switching, not the smiling. After a couple of false starts she got her balance. “What’s wrong with that? He seems to be in good shape.”
“He is. He’s also twice your size and hasn’t missed a day’s workout since puberty. He needs that many calories. He burns them. You don’t.”
“Yeah I do.” Nikki shifted to match Ace’s new stretch. Strangely, this one took more balance, even though she had both feet on the ground. Once she got settled, though, it did feel pretty good on the leg stretched out behind her. “You don’t see me gaining weight, do you?”
“Well…” Ace trailed off and didn’t seem fazed by Nikki’s glare.
“Well what?” Nikki kept her voice down, sort of.
“Well,” Ace paused to switch legs, and Nikki nearly crawled out of her skin. “You are getting a little hippy.”
After three unsuccessful tries, Nikki managed to respond, but repeating was the best she could do. “Hippy?”
“You were also breathing like a bellows after just a warm-up run, so—”
“What do you mean ‘hippy’?” Then the rest of what Ace said sunk in. “What do you mean ‘warm-up’?”
Ace laughed and rolled her neck and those impressive shoulders. “Honey, we’re just getting started. Let me introduce you to your new best friend—the shuttle run.”
A few minutes later, Nikki had the satisfaction of telling Ace she was wrong. She and the shuttle run would never be anything but mortal enemies. It wasn’t the shuttle run she cursed, though, as the morning wore on. It was Ace, and Elias, and even Michael for building this nasty new nightmare and leaving her stuck in the middle of it.
Chapter 20
Padre
Nikki’s first full day of training went better than expected, from every point of view but hers.
Padre and Elias ran Nikki through some basic footwork and blocks, as well as some targeted training on controlled falling, something she really could have used before the evaluation. Nikki picked everything up quickly. They had to show her a technique only once for her to mimic it perfectly. Her instincts were sharp, just as Mos said.
Unfortunately, her strongest instinct was the urge to attack. Offense was her default setting, which played havoc with defense training. She had to fight her gut reaction to every attack in order to make herself use one of the techniques she’d learned instead of going on the offensive. The result was hesitation, and often a fall to the mat, which her increasingly frustrated expression told Padre was no better than failure in her eyes.
She was being unnecessarily hard on herself, a trait Padre suspected hadn’t been part of her nature before losing Michael. The change made perfect sense to him. In one preventable moment Nikki had lost her brother—the one person in her life who treated her like she was special, and she'd lost her power—the one thing she believed made her so. Her sense of self-worth had bottomed out so now she was compensating as best she could, overly so in some cases.
Whether she saw it or not, her progress was exceptional over the next couple of days. Mos was right that it wouldn’t be long before Nikki could hold her own against the rest of the team, seasoned fighters all. If she could shift her way of thinking, of course.
And if Ace didn’t run her to death first.
Padre trusted that Ace knew what she was doing. Ace ran physical training for a reason. She knew more about whipping soldiers into shape and keeping them there than even Elias. Padre knew that. But that didn't stop him from surveilling Ace’s first session with Nikki. Nor did that knowledge make it any easier to watch Ace try to find Nikki’s wall, the point of exhaustion where the little voice in her head told her she couldn’t take another step.
Nikki ignored that voice and pushed past the wall through sheer stubborn will, making Padre and her other hidden watchers proud. Only then did Ace let her rest, and only long enough to take on enough food and water to keep her on her feet. Then it was off to gym for combat training, where Elias and Padre pushed her just as hard.
Breakdown day was universal SOP for special operations. They’d all been through it. Perhaps that’s why it was so hard to watch. Padre remembered exactly how it felt.
He wasn’t the only one who watched that first day with interest. Elias watched every minute from the command center before he took over with combat training. Mos did the same from his room. In fact, the only member of the team who didn’t watch—either openly like Coop and Gram, or from the privacy of a rerouted security feed like Kate—was Impact. He maintained a sullen distance all day, mostly due to orders to refrain from his own training to give Nikki space.
Days two and three were less strenuous than day one, but Padre knew sore muscles and fatigue made those days hurt that much more. Nikki didn’t quit though, not that Padre expected her to. He knew the woman she hid behind that sarcastic, occasionally obnoxious demeanor was stronger than even she knew.
She was wearing down emotionally, however. Padre saw it in her eyes on day four as she repeated—for the tenth time—every block they’d taught her. Creating muscle me
mory was a matter of time and repetition, heavy on the repetition, and Nikki had a host of memories to make. She didn’t complain or ask how much longer she had to do the same motions over and over. She pressed on in silence, pushing through the weariness and frustration. Instead of quipping and snapping the way she normally did, she started to draw in on herself. She started quietly doing as ordered, which was a bad sign.
Wearing her down was a necessary part of the building-up process. The logical part of Padre knew that. He also knew the training was doing more than just giving Nikki skills she lacked. It was keeping her distracted from the alien predator problem, a problem they were no closer to solving.
Magnus Cole was spending every night prowling the island, trying to catch the creatures if they came ashore. But he’d had only one encounter, one that added another creature’s body to the burn pile. Cole claimed the creatures’ numbers were increasing, but without crossing the Sound at night, he couldn’t confirm. The predators avoided him, so he was sticking to the island to keep them at bay. But if their numbers were increasing, it was only a matter of time before they made the crossing.
As the pack swelled, their confidence would grow in kind, if they were anything like other pack hunters. Their wariness of the predator in Cole would weaken until they no longer saw him as a threat.
Nikki didn’t need to know that. She didn't need to be worrying about the pack, on that the team agreed. They had designed her training regimen to keep her too busy to give the creatures any thought. If their attempts to distract, however, led instead to emotional collapse, they would accomplish nothing. With a class of one, they couldn't afford the usual attrition rate for this level of training.
Nikki needed a friend right now. She needed someone who’d been through this, someone who had an idea of what she was feeling, someone who could make her smile and laugh and shake off today’s pain so she’d be ready for tomorrow’s.
Padre wasn’t sure he was the right person for the job, considering how he’d failed her, but none of the others were stepping up, even though they clearly recognized the same signs he did.
