Jailbreak (The Ungovernable Book 2)

by R. M. Olson

  “Hey genius-boy,” Jez whispered, and he sagged back on the cot.

  “What the hell are you doing here, Jez?” he hissed.

  “Just got back,” she said with a grin. He looked at her more closely, and frowned suddenly.

  “Jez? What happened to you?”

  “What do you mean, what happened?”

  She was holding one arm with the other, as if to keep it from moving. He swore, worry twisting in his stomach. “How badly are you hurt? Did you break it?”

  She shook her head. “It’s not broken. Just sprained a bit.”

  “Jez—” He shook his head and slid down to join her. Ysbel stirred in her sleep, and he lowered his voice. “What happened?”

  She shrugged, apparently unconcerned. “Same thing as always. I brought the laundry soap Ysbel needs to manufacture the explosives.” She dropped a bag onto the floor.

  He dropped his face into his hands, swallowing back his anger. “Did your old cellmate do that to you?”

  “She wanted to do a hell of a lot more.” He could hear the smirk in her tone.

  “Jez.” He didn’t raise his head from his hands. “You’re going to get killed. And for some crazy reason, I have no idea why, I’d really, really like to keep you from getting killed.”

  She leaned up against the wall beside him. “Hey, genius-boy,” she said, her voice a little more gentle than it had been. “It’s fine. I’m fine. See? Nothing broken. You think I haven’t gotten beat up before?”

  He sighed and finally looked up at her. “Jez. I talked you into coming on this stupid job. I agreed we could do it. I brought us all here. And if you get killed, I’m never going to stop feeling guilty about it for the rest of my life, OK?”

  She was looking at him strangely, as if she didn’t quite understand his words.

  “Lev?” she said at last. He met her eyes. She was frowning a little, and without her customary smirk, he could see the strain in her eyes, the hint of fear hidden behind her expression.

  “Listen, Lev. I—I’m sorry. I’m crap at being locked up. It’s not your fault. But at least this is something I can do.”

  “What? Get beat up?” he exploded. “Jez, for heaven’s sake—”

  “No, stupid, smuggle stuff. Getting beat up is just a side effect.” She tried for a jaunty grin, but it faltered. “I—never had someone worry about me getting beat up before. Guess I didn’t think about it.”

  “Well, I do, OK?” he said.

  “Yeah.”

  Neither of them spoke for a few moments. She was still watching him, and he couldn’t seem to pull his gaze away from her. “Jez,” he said at last. His voice wasn’t working quite the way it should. “We have to think of a better plan. I’ve heard rumours. That guard is going to kill you. The warden won’t stop him. Now that your back here, how long do you think it’s going to take before he comes to find you in your cell? You’re in solitary, Jez. You don’t even have a cellmate he has to distract.”

  “I don’t know,” she said quietly. She gave what was clearly meant to be a carefree shrug. “Anyways, there’s only a couple days left. Figure I can stay out of his way until then.”

  “Jez—”

  She turned away quickly. “Listen, I have to do this. It’s the only thing I can do, OK? It’s the only thing I’m good at.”

  “It’s not—” he began, then he shook his head. There was no point in arguing the point. “I’m just worried.”

  “I know,” she whispered. “I—thank you.” She stood abruptly and turned away from him, fumbling at her wrist for the button that would activate the lock-pick. She stepped out, then turned and glanced back before she closed the cell door behind her, but when he met her eyes she turned quickly away.

  He waited until after her footsteps disappeared down the hallway. There was something tight in the pit of his stomach, and he swore steadily to himself under his breath while he waited.

  What the hell had gotten into him?

  He was supposed to be logical. He was supposed to know what to do, and what was an acceptable risk. Except now he couldn’t trust himself anymore. Was he worried because he should actually be worried? Or was he worried because that damn pilot had got him inside-out and upside-down?

  He swore again, a little louder, to relieve his feelings, then, shaking his head, he slapped his com, calling a private line to Masha and Tae.

  “What is it, Lev?” Masha answered, in her usual clipped, pleasant tone.

  “Masha. We have to think of a better solution. Jez is about to get killed, and I can’t seem to talk her into any sort of caution.”

  There was a moment’s pause. Then Masha said in a wry voice, “Tae just spent the last half-hour haranguing me about the same thing. He seems to think that Jez is in imminent physical danger.”

  Tae’s voice came through his earpiece. “She is. You didn’t see what happened today. I almost thought the guard wouldn’t get there in time. Why the hell does she always have to pick fights with the biggest, meanest person she can find? If she comes back here, she’s dead.” He sounded half exasperated, half worried.

  “And we—may have more problems than that,” said Lev slowly. “I’m not sure if I’ve told you yet, Masha, but apparently there is someone looking for Jez from before.”

  He quickly told her of the note in Jez’s pocket. When he’d finished, Tae swore softly.

  “What kind of trouble has she gotten into now?”

  “I’m sure she’s gotten into a whole lot of trouble in her lifetime,” Masha replied. “That’s not what I’m worried about. I’m worried about how whoever it was tracked her here.”

  “That would mean they’d somehow managed to go back behind Masha’s system-wipe,” said Lev. “That should be impossible.”

  “Should be,” said Masha. “But apparently, it isn’t.”

  “More to the point at the moment,” Lev said grimly, “that guard is hunting her, and now she’s back in his hunting grounds. He’s going to kill her, and I don’t think at this point he’s going to be willing to wait nicely until we’ve made our escape. We’ve got to do something.”

  “Yes. I’m aware of that,” said Masha. “I’ve been thinking it over. As much as I hate to admit it, we probably can’t afford to lose Jez, at least not at the moment. It would take me a significant amount of time to find someone who can fly like she can.”

  “Also, you’ll never find someone who can make your stupid plans actually work like I can, or put tech together like Tae can, or blow things up like Ysbel can, and I promise you, there will be vacancies in all those positions if anything happens to Jez,” he said through his teeth.

  Masha sighed. “Unfortunately, I’m aware of that, Lev.” There was a moment’s pause. “I’ve been thinking about it. I believe I have an idea.”

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  YSBEL, SECTOR 1, Day 9

  Ysbel surveyed the rag-tag group of prisoners arrayed in front of her, maybe thirty in total.

  They surveyed her back, warily.

  They were a motley bunch. Mostly political prisoners. Still … Tanya had vouched for them, like she had for Radic and Ivan, and she supposed that was good enough for her.

  She would have preferred the organized crime bunch, but apparently they were too busy trying to kill each other to have time for an escape attempt.

  Not that they wouldn’t be doing their part. If Lev and Tae managed to get them out of their cells in large enough numbers and close enough proximity, they’d provide the riot all on their own.

  “Alright,” she said at last. “How many of you have held a weapon before?”

  Three hands went up.

  She sighed heavily.

  It was late, and they were gathered in an empty room in the library. Lev had assured her they’d be safe for at least an hour. She kept glancing at the window behind her, involuntarily, as if perhaps she’d see Tanya standing there with the children.

  But no, Tanya was working, and she needed to be too.

&nbs
p; “Alright then. Show me how to hold this.” She tossed a dummy pin-gun at one of them.

  They all jumped aside in panic. Finally, gingerly, one of them bent to pick it up.

  Ysbel looked at them through narrowed eyes.

  “Listen, you useless bunch. You’ll have to stop acting like I’m going to throw an explosive at you. Otherwise we will never get anywhere.”

  “Are—are you going to throw an explosive at us?” asked a timid voice from the back.

  “No,” she said patiently. “If I wanted to kill you, I would have taken the cell block down while you were still inside your cells. I could have, if I’d wanted to. And I didn’t. So, see? There is nothing to fear from me.”

  None of them looked convinced.

  “Alright, you.” She pointed at the woman with the makeshift weapon. “I showed you how to fire it. It’s just like a heat-gun, but it will have a wide, short range instead of a long narrow one. Now you show me.”

  The woman raised the mock gun with trembling hands. Ysbel shook her head in disgust.

  “No. Give that to me.”

  She took the weapon from the woman, spun it around, and pointed it directly at the woman’s belly. The woman froze.

  “There. You see? You don’t have to aim very well, because at this range, I would melt a hole the size of my shoulder in whatever this is pointing at. As long as you’re not aiming for a leg or an arm, that will take whoever it is out. Even if you are aiming for a leg or an arm, my experience is that someone whose limb has been melted off is thinking about something other than trying to fight back. Now.” She took two steps backwards. “At this range, I will not melt all the way through anything, but I will cause a serious burn that will cover her whole torso, and possibly hit the person beside her as well, if they’re close. It will not kill her instantly, but it will certainly make her question her choices.” She took four more steps backwards.

  “Now. From this range, I will be giving her third-degree burns over her entire body. The beam here is wide enough that it will catch at least one person standing on either side of her, if they’re standing close. So you have to be a little careful at this range. You see, it’s now weak enough that there is no melting skin, which is not ideal for us, but—” She shrugged. “You must remember, I am making all this with very limited materials. So I am not able to do nearly what I’d like. Now.” She stepped forward and handed back the mock weapon to the terrified woman in front of her. “You see? Very simple. Now, let’s practice.”

  It wasn’t an unmitigated disaster, she admitted to herself grudgingly as the terrified prisoners filed out of the library an hour later. They had actually seemed to catch on to the concepts fairly quickly. Still—

  “This is the problem with trying to get an armed revolt going with a bunch of political intellectuals. In a prison made up of political prisoners, you would think I would get at least one assassin or a terrorist,” she grumbled as she rejoined Lev in the cell. He was glued to his com, scanning some sort of information he’d pulled up, like he’d been doing since the guard left. He glanced up.

  “You got them all locked back in?”

  “I think they locked themselves in to get away from me,” she grunted. He raised an eyebrow.

  “I did tell you that they were intimidated by you.”

  She snorted. “Terrified is probably the better word. Every time I made a movement, they practically hit the ground.”

  He seemed to be trying to hide a smile.

  “It’s not funny,” she grumbled.

  “It is a little funny,” he said, managing with clear effort to keep a straight face. She rolled her eyes.

  “Alright, it is a little funny. This is what I get from working with your kind of people. I don’t think any of them have killed a single person in their lives.”

  “Some people would look at that as a good thing,” said Lev mildly. “At any rate, Jez’s friend came to talk to me over lunch. He said he knows some people, and I’ve asked Tanya to vet them. If that goes through, I’m guessing you’ll have exactly the kind of people you want to train.”

  Ysbel glared at him. “You think I want to train people who would be friends with Jez? On purpose? Without any sort of coercion? What kind of lunatic do you think I am? I think I prefer the stupid intellectuals.”

  This time Lev did grin, and he slid down from the bunk. “How is it coming? Really?”

  She shook her head. “Pin-guns take almost no skill to use. As long as they can keep from killing each other when they’re aiming for the guards, I think we should be fine.”

  He nodded. “That’s good.” He glanced down at his com. “I’ve been going through all the information I have, but it’s not going to be enough. At some point, I’m going to have to get the chip with the guards’ schedules on it. We need everything to run smoothly, and the only way for that to happen is if we know exactly where the guards will be when, and exactly when the shift changes.” He shook his head. “Tae and Masha and I are still working on how to make that happen. But we still have a few days.”

  “And Jez?”

  “Still alive, anyways, which is honestly surprising. ”

  “Good.” She paused. “She was right, you know. If you use that girl for what she’s good at, she’s very, very good at it.”

  Lev gave a small smile. “Who knew that annoying everyone who’s big enough to beat her up would be a skill we needed?”

  “Well,” said Ysbel, “in fairness, that is how she escaped last time.”

  He chuckled softly, shaking his head. “Alright. Well, I still have some information to go through, but you should get some sleep. You’ll be training prisoners again tomorrow, probably in two shifts.”

  He was right.

  She wasn’t sure if she’d manage to sleep, though.

  “You know,” she said quietly as she lay down, “my Tanya hasn’t changed at all. She’s gotten older, perhaps, like I have. But she’s just as beautiful as she was the last time I saw her.”

  “She is a beautiful woman,” said Lev softly. “I can tell how much she loves you.”

  “Her hair is short,” she said. She closed her eyes, picturing Tanya’s familiar face. “I will miss her long hair, I think. Of course, if she wants her hair short, she is still beautiful. I would love her if she were bald. But I loved her long hair.” She paused. Talking like this hurt. She’d known it would hurt, and she hadn’t done it in so long.

  But they were so close now. Only a few more days.

  “And the children.” Her voice cracked slightly. “I didn’t think they’d recognize me. It’s been so long. They were only babies when I saw them last. But—” She paused, swallowing hard. “Do you think she really recognized me? Do you think Tanya talked about me enough that she really knew who I was?”

  “Well,” said Lev, with a faint smile in his voice, “she certainly was giving me the stink-eye, and Tae too. I think she must have recognized you, or else she liked you the moment she saw you. Tanya said you were Mama, and she knew who she was talking about right away. She must have talked about you frequently.”

  She nodded, unable to speak for a moment.

  Little Olya. She was older, but the determination in her face was just the same as it had been when she was a three-year-old.

  “I imagine Tanya had her hands full with that girl,” she said at last. “We both did, back when—” She broke off suddenly, choking on tears.

  Lev, in the bunk above her, was silent.

  “You know,” she said at last, in a low voice, “my children grew up in this place. I will have them back soon. But they grew up in this stinking part of hell, and I lost them for five years. We will get them out. And then, one day, I will kill the person who sent them there.”

  There was another long silence.

  “I suppose whoever it is would deserve it,” Lev said at last, quietly.

  The next day, for the first time, as she started on her daily work shift, she noticed the glances the other prisoner were sh
ooting in her direction were not only terrified. They were looking at her with some curiosity, and even grudging respect.

  She frowned as she worked.

  She avoided people, as a general rule. Tanya liked them, but she liked them better from a very far distance.

  Still … there was something surprisingly pleasant about the camaraderie of that day’s work shift.

  Maybe the stupid political prisoners weren’t so bad after all.

  And maybe it felt more gratifying than she’d imagined, knowing they’d be breaking these people out of the hell-hole they’d been trapped in for however many years now.

  She was standing in line for the prisoner count prior to their dinner meal when a guard stepped through the line of prisoners and tapped her on the shoulder. She turned slowly, and the guard took a small step backwards.

  “Um. Prisoner,” he said, in a voice that was ever-so-slightly nervous. “Please come with me.”

  She frowned and cast a quick glance over her shoulder at Lev. Or at least, to where Lev should have been standing.

  He was gone as well.

  A sudden knot tightened in the pit of her stomach.

  They couldn’t afford something going wrong. Not now. Not when they were so close to the end.

  The guard led her down a long hallway and into what looked like the guards’ office. “Have a seat,” he said, gesturing to a low chair. She sat cautiously, noticing as she did so that he’d stepped back and was covering her inconspicuously with his weapon.

  She could possibly move fast enough to get it away from him.

  But probably not.

  The door opened a moment later, and the warden stepped into the room.

  “Prisoner 1554,” she said brusquely.

  “Yes, ma’am,” Ysbel grunted in reply.

  The warden placed her hands on her desk, leaning forward to look Ysbel in the face. “I’ve been hearing rumours. There are things going missing. Production is going down. And it turns out, there’s something funny about your records. Yours, and four other prisoners who came in with you. I don’t like complications in my prison. Do you understand me?”