Rise
Page 27
“So.” Orion shoved his hands into his pockets, even further than they’d been. I wanted to take a picture desperately so I could show him how ridiculous it looked. But I didn’t. I let him continue instead. “What are we doing here?”
“Glad you asked.” Adam grinned again. The light was fading here now too, and it was becoming increasingly difficult to see the others. “There is a warehouse on that small island just up from us. It’s only about twenty feet out into the water. It has a very rickety makeshift bridge built out to it. Single file only. The warehouse is supposed to have been abandoned for years and is technically not there as far as the authorities are concerned. But lately we’ve received word of activities being performed down there that are, shall we say, counterproductive to humans not blowing themselves up.”
“Eloquent,” I pointed out.
“Thank you. I do try.” I could hear Adam’s grin in his words. “Basically, explosives and drugs are reported to be in there, if our sources are correct.”
“We need to clear them out?” Orion ventured.
“Yes. Which is why we have you here, because you’re going to flush them out. And speedy here is going short out the electrical boxes.” Adam reached into his jacket and drew out two pairs of glasses identical in appearance to the ones the Driver was wearing.
I put them on, and lo and behold, they were night vision enabled. Damn, I was good at this. “So fry the electrical circuits, and flush the drugs and explosives.”
“Wow, it’s like you were actually paying attention.” Adam’s sarcasm verged on laughter. “Nicely done, speedy.”
I glanced at Orion, wondering if he was pale, or if it was just the new glasses. “We going then?”
Driver nodded and began to head in the other direction from which we’d come. There were no lights down here, no housing, no streets. Nothing to give away our existence. The moonlight wasn’t strong enough to highlight our presence, because the new moon was tiny.
But the grass kept getting taller, coming up to my waist in certain sections as we moved toward our destination. With an unstable bridge to cross, I couldn’t help but worry for Orion. He’d died by drowning. Surely water wasn’t his favorite thing to be around, not like this.
My mind kept going over how many shadows could hide in grass. What could be lying in wait to ambush us?
I was not cut out for espionage shit. At least this job felt right though. If there were indeed drugs and explosives, we were doing a good thing, right? Almost superheroish.
Adam’s makeshift “bridge” was more of a walking the plank situation than something which instilled the confidence that we wouldn’t fall in the water. Each step I took across the two boards that had been hastily nailed together made me wish muddy water sounded more appealing. It wasn’t near warm enough tonight to take an impromptu dip in dirty water.
Every eight feet, the dual planks were attached to a shaky pylon that only poked out of the water by about five inches. As the water came in to lap at the shore, it swayed up and down, hitting the planks and splashing our feet. The pylons didn’t seem to be sturdy. They wobbled with just the right amount of sway to make me think each step might toss me into the dirty water.
As much as I’d been concerned about him, Orion traversed it with more finesse than I did.
Island wasn’t exactly what I would call this piece of mud with trees growing out of it, but I didn’t have any other fitting word for it either. The ground was sandy mud held together by the roots of the river trees. And the number of trees we had to slog through was astounding. Only the faintly-worn trail gave any indication of life here, and it was one we had to look for.
The warehouse was much larger than I expected, given how small the island appeared to be, and it was more run down than I’d thought possible. Parts of it had collapsed and lay half covered by tree growth that had decided to reclaim the land. Rusting bits of roof had fallen down, but most of it seemed intact. Parts of a missing wall spilled over into the water, contaminating it.
I mean, it was the Schuylkill; the kill part was surprisingly accurate.
Lights shone through small holes here and there throughout the exterior. Their glow was pale but still gave away the culprit’s presence, if anyone tried to make it out to this pile of mud. Like us.
Dilapidated didn’t even begin to describe the mostly tin and steel structure. We waited at one of the unintentional entryways. If the rust around the hole was any indication, it hadn’t started as a door. We could see movement inside, shadows flickering in the dim light that filtered out. It wasn’t a bustling central hub or anything. If the heat signature in my glasses was accurate, there were two people inside. The glasses were a much better measuring stick than judging the shadows.
It took me a while to get used to the way the world moved with this night vision. Given that a soft glow emanated from the hole we surrounded, it wasn’t working quite as intended.
Adam knelt down next to us, lowering his head. His words were so soft I had to concentrate to hear him. “We need to cloak speedy here in order to get the lights and alarms disengaged before we enter, and so that we aren’t blinded by our glasses when the lights go down.”
“Okay. Like we did last time?” I almost made the whole sentence without letting my voice wobble. Adam nodded at me and continued.
“Then we need to subdue the occupants and destroy the stockpile. I’ll leave that to you, Cleaner and Driver. I’ll keep you both under my protection until the first is taken care of.” Adam looked at each of us in turn, and only moved on once we’d nodded our understanding. It was on the tip of my tongue. Oh, how I wanted to know what he meant by subdue.
I hated to be first out of the gate.
Orion moved away from me, and my left side suddenly felt the cold. I glanced after him and realized that strange look had returned to his eyes. Like he was resigned to his job. My scar tingled for the first time in days. The unease in my stomach rose, threatening to choke me with bile. I wished these damned signs would just spell shit out already.
Warning: Unstable Portent Reaction. Limit use.
I quickly checked the warning, but that was all it said. I didn’t have time for this right now. What the hell was this Portent crap it kept telling me to stop using? There was nothing in any of the information I had at my disposal that let me know what the danger with Portent was. With effort, I pushed those thoughts aside, saving them for the future, again.
Right now, I had my own job to concentrate on. Cloaked by the Driver, I moved in quietly. Luckily, there were shadows abounding in this space. I really didn’t want to think about how they got electricity here in the first place. Perhaps a generator.
Concrete was cracked all over the place with greenery struggling to push through. I suppressed a sigh of relief that the electrical breakers seemed to be on the side I’d entered from. I could see two people sitting at a table each. One of them sorted through small bags, but I couldn’t make out anything else. The other had some different powders, wires, things that looked vaguely bomb like, I guess. They were skinny and clothed in thick material, but I couldn’t see anything else through my glasses. It was too bright.
Except for the dog. It hadn’t moved, and I realized it was half asleep with what looked like a bone in front of it. I’d see if he was okay after we were done with everything. Moving along the side of the building was rather easy with the way the wall had fallen to conceal a portion of the room. The shadows were thicker here. So deep I could almost hear them speaking to me, calling my name. Damned imagination.
I could feel the eyes on me, but maybe that was just my team. Wishful thinking only went so far. But the electrical breakers were within reach. I reached out my hand to touch it and closed my eyes tightly before releasing a measured surge of power that made the box snap, crackle, and sizzle. Somewhere outside the makeshift warehouse, I could hear a buzz powering down.
The lights w
ere down, the alarm was done, at least for a few minutes. I didn’t think for a minute it called the police anyway. This island didn’t seem like it was zoned for explosives and drugs.
The two workers had stood up when the power dropped, confusion spreading across their faces. Even with the tinge of green, I could see the fear begin to rise. Meanwhile, the dog lifted its head, and shrank back, like it was trying to hide itself.
Maybe it had smelled us by now and realized there were too many of us. Or maybe it could see the shadows too.
I watched from my safe spot as Driver and Orion moved into the space. They moved through the space with practiced ease, their footfalls making no sound at all as they approached the workers. Driver reached his hand into his pocket slowly and pulled out something small that I couldn’t identify.
But the sound that echoed throughout the metal structure was unmistakable. My stomach flipped and tried to choke me. The gunshot was so sudden and unexpected that I jumped, watching in shock as the worker on the right stood for one second and then began to fall forward as the third eye in his head slowly began to ooze blood.
I watched it all as if I’d somehow slowed time. Every movement precise and enhanced, every sound elongated like a wail. Wait, dealing with them meant killing them? Didn’t that make me an accessory to murder? I could feel the blood drain from my face as I grew pale.
The worker’s body hadn’t even hit the floor yet when I blinked, switching my gaze to Orion. His eyes held a sadness I hated seeing in them and a blankness that scared me. And I knew without him having done anything, what he was about to do.
I watched him as he motioned with his right hand. It was a casual flick of the wrist, like it was something he did every day. Something sleek and powerful shot through the air, hitting the second worker in silence. But it tore through the man’s head, blowing half of it away and out the back. Blood spattered all over the small bags the man had been working on, mingling with it, splattering onto the ground like someone had dropped pancake mix.
How could he do that? Why did he have to do that? They could have just knocked them unconscious. Hell, I could have sent enough electricity into them to knock them out like a taser would. It was obvious their instructions had been to kill their targets. And it was obvious Orion had done it before. It explained so much, why it seemed to make him both happy and sad that I was in SC now. Damn it. He couldn’t hide the truth from me anymore.
I kept seeing the head, over and over again in my mind. Exploding like a dropped watermelon. Orion had done that. My Orion. Who I’d known for my entire life. Took another’s. What if they’d had kids, what if they’d been forced into this? How did we know what their circumstances were? None off it warranted ending their life at all.
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What the everliving fuck did SC have in its programming? Ice cold fucking hearts?
I sat there, huddled in on myself, trying to digest everything while Orion flooded the electronics and explosives, while he destroyed the drugs we’d come to clear off the streets. Sure, that was good. But taking two lives? Two lackeys?
I couldn’t wrap my head around it. Oh, wow, what an insensitive comment, even if it was only to myself. My stomach tightened, bile rose, but I forced it back down.
I needed to get out of there, now. Slinking away the way I’d come, I encountered Adam at the back entrance. My head was still spinning. So many thoughts at once. In hindsight, I should have exited out the front. Or just run and boosted myself as fast as I could.
He took one look at me and nodded, before returning his attention to the murderzone in front of him. Of course I didn’t matter. I’d done my job, played my part in the massacre. But the dog. I didn’t want to risk them finding the dog. They weren’t even on the right side of the warehouse for that. And if something happened to it, I feared I’d go all John Wick.
The dog, I could save the dog. I needed to save the dog. So, I rounded the building and crept up to the opposite side from where I’d been. There, right where the building was collapsing on this side, the dog sat huddled under a cabinet. His coat was dark brown, and the same colored eyes stared up at me in fear until I coaxed him out with the peppermint that was stuck in my pocket. I didn’t even remember where I’d gotten it. But I grabbed the dog, hugging him and tried to fight back tears that started prickling my eyes. I never cried.
But then again, Orion had never killed anyone in front of my eyes before. He’d never mentioned this. He’d only said he knew that agents could die.
Shit.
He’d also insisted that I wouldn’t understand. He was right. I didn’t. Not at all. This was why communication was key.
I stood up and staggered out of the building toward the makeshift bridge. My only hope was to keep the night glasses on, or the water would look like pitch black certain death. The lights beyond the bridge, on MLK Jr Drive cast painful spots in my eyes. Everything hurt. My chest, my heart, my brain.
There was only one answer to this. I had to run. So I did. I picked up my pace and ran. I let the adrenaline course through me, the fear and loathing I felt, and let my feet pound the pavement.
Only when I reached the edge of the populated areas, did I remove my glasses and I looked down to realize that the dog had followed me. Maybe he wanted another peppermint. Maybe he knew that we’d just shared something pretty fucking horrific.
Maybe he wanted to know if they expected me to kill people too. Because I sure as hell did. Because I sure as hell wouldn’t. And then I’d be the one they killed. Would Orion do that too?
I didn’t have a leash, and the dog didn’t have a collar anyway. He looked like a mix of some sort. Maybe a bit of a German Shepherd and a sheep dog or poodle. But he stuck to my side like glue as we began to walk further into town, and I welcomed the comforting warmth of his presence.
Should I go home? How would I face Orion? What would I say? I crouched down and threw my arms around the dog again, burying my head in his fur. He licked my hand and wuffed softly into my hair, with a faint scent of rotting teeth and peppermint. “Yeah. I know.”
Pulling myself together, I stood up, determined to make it back home and figure out the other shit later. I needed to sleep, even though a part of me wondered if I’d ever sleep again, or if those visions that kept replaying in my mind were just going to be on an infinite repeating loop.
Orion hadn’t even hesitated. What had they done to him?
The lights changed before I could cross the street, and I stood there, hands clenched as Wick sat beside me. Maybe it wasn’t the most original name, but it was the best I could do at short notice with my brain on strike.
The lights sounded their alarm, allowing me to cross. Which was good, because I hadn’t really been paying attention.
But when we got to the other side, two people stood in my way. At first, I thought they might be Adam, or the Driver whose name I’d never actually gotten. But they weren’t. Dressed in charcoal grey—thus proving my point that it worked just as well as black—they stood side by side.
“Dare Harvey, we need to speak with you.” The one on the left spoke with a foreign lilt that I couldn’t place.
“What’s this about?” I asked cautiously, scanning the area for a way to run from them. The odds of them catching me was pretty slim. Wick pushed up against my leg, and I could feel more than hear the growl in his throat.
“It’s about Second Chance and the partition you have in your mind.” The girl on the right spoke. She had blond hair, cut just below her ears. Her expression was so serious it made her button nose a little red. Or maybe that was just the reflection of the streetlights.
It was like the one on the right had just told me we were taking a stroll in the park. I blinked, trying to process the words. How did they know?
But they weren’t having any of that. “We all know what we’re talking about. We need you to come with us right now, because Nya couldn’t explain it to you like she needed to.”
“Wait, you know Nya?” Okay, so they knew the program, and they knew Nya. Surely it would be okay to listen to what they had to say, right?
The guy rolled his eyes and crossed his arms, sandy brown hair falling into his eyes, which he impatiently pushed behind his ears. I knew him, I’d seen him before.
“Shane?” I blurted before I could stop myself. He’d been with me in the ambulance way back when all of this started.
“So, you do remember me. Good.” He took half a step closer and lowered his voice. “Ever wonder why there are no Runners?”
“You’re saying it wrong.” The girl interrupted, scowling. “We don’t have time to play twenty questions right now.”
Shane sighed. “Fine. Dare, you’re a Runner, you’re an eel. Eels aren’t rare, they’re just able to control the brain on a level that SC hasn’t caught up with yet. It’s the one advantage we have. We need you to come with us, to trust us. You’ll be home by sun up, I promise.”
“Why should I trust you?” Wick ruffed right next to me, like he was punctuating my question, even if he didn’t seem quite as put out anymore.
Shane eyed me for a moment and the smile he gave me was filled with sadness. “Because we know a lot more about the questions you’re asking yourself. Especially your questions about Orion.”
Wait, so these people, one of whom rode with me in the ambulance ride that started this all, knew about Orion? “What do you know about Orion?”
The crack in my voice betrayed me. I was far more upset than I’d realized. I glanced down at Wick again. His big brown eyes watched me intently, like he was telling me: hey there human who saved me, I’ll protect you if this turns out to be a trap.
Shane waited for a moment, glancing up and down the oddly empty street. “We know about the changes in him, and we know how to answer all the questions you have about eel’s powers.”