Lockdown (The Fringe #4)

by Tarah Benner

  Since the brawl in the gymnasium got Ursula moved to isolation, my fellow inmates have made it their mission to ostracize and intimidate me. They haven’t beaten me up again, but only because the warden has taken it upon himself to supervise daily exercise.

  As soon as he’s convinced that the trouble has passed, Ursula will be back in general population, and I’ll be as good as dead.

  After three days, it’s clear that this place was designed for suffering. My entire body is battered and bruised, and sleeping on a concrete floor doesn’t help.

  The dimensions of my cage make it impossible to curl up on my side without banging my shins into something, so I have to lie flat on my back like a mummy with my head next to the toilet. The controllers don’t like inmates sleeping with their heads by the bars, because occasionally an inmate will reach over with a homemade shank and slit the throat of the person in the cage next to her.

  Since all the women here hate my guts, I’m not pushing my luck.

  My “bedroll” is a thin pallet about as thick as my hand. It absorbs the moisture dripping down the walls onto the floor, and the wetness seeping through the fabric seems to activate the odors from all the people who slept on it before me. The smell is a combination of stale sweat and rotten food, but that’s not what keeps me awake.

  All throughout the night, the steady drip of water from a thousand leaks is covered by loud snores and gnashing teeth. Lots of the women talk or yell in their sleep.

  One lady is completely nocturnal and uses the nights to scratch coded messages into the back wall of her cage. Whenever there’s a lull in snores and moans, I can hear the high-pitched scratch of a bent spoon on stone.

  Meals are usually lumpy gruel made with lukewarm rice and whatever the canteen had left over from last week’s meals. Tiny pieces of vegetables are mixed in with the mush — not enough to constitute a full serving, but enough to deliver a nasty surprise of soggy spinach or half-disintegrated mushroom. In the middle, there’s usually a tasteless protein cube that’s still partially frozen. Even the water has a rusty aftertaste.

  But the worst thing about life in the cages is that I have no diversions — nothing to distract me from the awful reality that I’m facing ten to twenty years of this while Eli is tortured by Constance.

  At seventeen hundred, all the cages are unlocked except for mine, and the other women shuffle toward the gymnasium.

  I want to feel relief, but it can’t be a good sign if they’ve decided to segregate me from the others entirely.

  Sitting motionless in my cage with my knees drawn up to my chest, I listen to the hubbub of voices grow quieter as the inmates filter through the doors. As soon as the gymnasium door slams shut, I hear the clank and screech of the door at the opposite end of the tunnel.

  The sound of the warden’s rubber-soled boots echoes in the narrow passageway, and I can tell by the second pair of footsteps that he’s leading someone new down the tunnel.

  “Miss Riley, you’ve got a visitor.”

  “Harper?”

  I must be dreaming. I know that voice. But there’s no reason for him to be here.

  “Harper . . .”

  I turn my head and squint. The yellowish overhead lighting in the tunnel that seemed so dim when I first arrived is suddenly blinding in its intensity. The visitor moves to block the worst of it, but that makes me squint even harder.

  A familiar face is swimming just beyond the bars of my cage. The light behind him gives his head an odd halo effect, and I can’t believe who it is.

  “Blaze?” I murmur.

  “Hey.”

  “Five minutes,” says the warden, shooting us both a stern look. “This is your last free pass, Riley.”

  Two visitors in less than twenty-four hours. I’m not even supposed to have visitors, but I think my ass-kicking made the warden feel sorry for me.

  As my eyes adjust and Blaze’s full face comes into view, I realize I’m not dreaming after all.

  He’s standing in the tunnel sporting a freshly pressed set of gray Recon fatigues and a neat crew cut. When he hunkers down to take in my ragged appearance with those stunning blue-green eyes, I suddenly wish I’d had the forethought to run a hand through my tangled hair.

  “Blaze . . . what are you doing here?”

  “I came to see you,” he says with a ghost of a smile that doesn’t look quite right.

  “Did you come from training?”

  He shakes his head and drops his gaze. “Medical ward.”

  “What? Why? Is Lenny okay?” I ask, thinking of her gunshot wound.

  “Lenny’s fine. I was just . . . getting debriefed.”

  “Oh my god,” I murmur. “You were deployed. I completely forgot.”

  Blaze was scheduled for deployment before I was arrested, but there had been no cherry-popping party or any of the usual fanfare in Recon since those four cadets died. I mentally run through the days I’ve spent here so far, making sure I didn’t lose any time. There’s no way Blaze was out a full week.

  “It uh . . . didn’t go well,” he adds. “I came back that same day.”

  My heart sinks. That can only mean . . .

  “Derek got shot right as we entered the town,” he says in a hollow voice. “We never even saw it coming. Heat mapping showed the area was cleared, but I guess something malfunctioned.”

  “Is he all right?” I ask, thinking of the jovial private with kind eyes and an easy smile.

  Blaze meets my gaze and shakes his head slowly. “He was dead before he hit the ground.”

  I put a hand over my mouth to stifle a gasp. I feel as though I’m going to be sick. “What did you do?” I ask.

  Blaze shrugs, and his eyes dart from side to side in a lost sort of way. “I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know he was dead at first. I mean, I knew, but I couldn’t accept it.”

  He takes a deep breath, and I know that what he’s going to say next is costing him great effort.

  “I bent down to see if there was some way he was alive, but they were still shooting. I knew I had to get out of there, so I pulled him up over my shoulder and ran.”

  “You carried him all the way back to the compound?” I ask in disbelief, closing my eyes at the heartbreaking image of a frantic Blaze dragging his dead partner miles across the desert.

  “No,” he says, his voice cracking. “I tried. God, I tried. But he was so heavy, and it was just too far. Eventually, I had to leave him.”

  He swallows, and I can tell this bothers him more than anything.

  “I’m sorry,” I whisper.

  “Yeah . . . me, too.”

  We both fall silent for a moment, and my chest fills with hatred for Jayden and the board. It doesn’t make sense, but something tells me that Jayden knew there were drifters congregating near that town.

  “What did Jayden say?” I ask.

  A look of intense distress and anger flits across Blaze’s tortured face. “She was furious. Said I should have completed the mission . . . not run back to the compound like a coward.” He meets my gaze. “She threatened to demote me.”

  “Bitch. She’s not going to demote you.”

  “She sounded pretty serious.”

  I shake my head. “She couldn’t even if she wanted to. We’ve lost too many people as it is.”

  As soon as those words leave my mouth, I wish they hadn’t. Blaze’s eyes glaze over the way they did when he was telling me about Derek’s death, and I reach through the bars and squeeze his arm once. “There’s nothing you could have done,” I say firmly. “None of that was your fault.”

  He nods, but I can tell it’s only to appease me. No matter what the facts are, Blaze will always feel partially responsible for Derek’s death. He’ll think that if he’d just been more alert or reacted quicker, there might have been some way to save him.

  “What about you?” he asks in a hoarse voice. “Are you all right?”

  “Yeah, I guess.”

  “Come on, Harper,” he says, t
hrowing me a “cut the bullshit” sort of look. “I’m not stupid.”

  “I’m fine,” I snap. But I make the mistake of turning my face toward the light. That’s when Blaze catches sight of my black eye and sucks in a burst of air between his teeth.

  “Holy shit! What the hell happened?”

  “Nothing I can’t handle.”

  “Did a controller do that to you?”

  “No. Although he might as well have,” I add bitterly, thinking of Paxton.

  I raise my eyebrows. “Let’s just say that treason does not go over well in here.”

  Blaze shakes his head and runs a distressed hand through his short hair. “Shit. We have to get you out of here.”

  “I don’t see how. My lawyer says I’m doing ten to twenty years.”

  Blaze shifts so he’s sitting on the filthy ground in front of my cage and places a hand on the floor between the bars.

  “That’s actually why I’m here. When you and Parker were arrested, I knew it was all bullshit. So while I was under observation in the medical ward, I tracked down that useless piece of shit who calls himself a lawyer. He wasn’t very helpful, but he did give me a copy of your case file.”

  “What?”

  He nods. “I’ve been looking at it, and I think there might be a way out.”

  If Blaze hadn’t just suffered through a devastating deployment, I would cut him off before he spits out some impossibly hopeful idea. But I can tell he needs to feel as though he can save someone right now, so I keep my mouth shut.

  “I checked the compound bylaws,” he says, speaking faster. “Recon cadets are supposed to get a full year of training. We can be sent out in three months under the supervision of a higher-ranking officer, but we can’t legally operate on our own.”

  “So?”

  “So you never completed your training,” he says, eyes flashing with excitement. “You were under Eli’s supervision the entire time, so you can’t be held responsible for the crimes you committed during deployment. They’re directly related to your Recon duties, and Recon has to assume all liability for you until that one-year mark.”

  “But I did all those things they charged me with,” I sigh. “I lied to Jayden. I talked to a drifter — although, technically, that’s not even in my file . . . and I flat-out admitted to the smuggling.”

  “Did they read you your rights?”

  “No.”

  “So that charge will never stick. Natasha Mayweather isn’t a controller, but she is a compound official. If she didn’t read you your rights before you were arrested, they can’t use your statement as evidence in a trial.”

  The fact that Blaze has done all this research on my behalf makes my heart ache. His intentions are so pure, but he doesn’t realize it’s all in vain.

  “It doesn’t matter,” I murmur.

  “What do you mean it doesn’t matter?”

  “I mean . . . the law isn’t going to help me, Blaze. They want me put away. And now that I’m here, they’re going to do everything in their power to make sure I stay here.”

  “Who?” he asks, brows furrowing. “Who wants you put away?”

  “Constance.”

  Blaze stares at me, looking caught between what he wants to say and what he thinks he should say. “You really think some shadowy espionage unit wants you put away?”

  I let out half a laugh. Blaze is Shane’s son. How can he be so naïve?

  “What? You think Constance is a myth or something?”

  “No, but I know they only get involved with serious shit. I’d be surprised if they’re even still active.”

  “Still active?” I splutter. “Where do you think Eli is right now?”

  Blaze gives me a blank look. “Didn’t he get released? I asked about him at the front desk. They said he wasn’t here.”

  I drop my chin to my chest and shake my head, trying to rein in the wave of hopelessness threatening to overwhelm me.

  “No,” I whisper. “Constance has him . . . and he’s in serious trouble.”

  “What?” asks Blaze, keeping his voice as gentle as he can. “Harper, do you know how crazy that sounds?”

  “Where is he, then?”

  “I don’t know. I haven’t been back in training yet, but . . .”

  I shake my head. Blaze can sense I’m about to lose it on him, so he backtracks a little just to keep me with him. “I’ll look for him as soon as I get back to Recon, but why would Constance have him? And why would they want you put away?”

  “Because I know things they’ve done,” I murmur, glancing down the tunnel to check for controllers. “Things they don’t want getting out.”

  “Like what?”

  I lower my voice until it’s just barely above a whisper. “Ask your dad about Sullivan Taylor.”

  “The undersecretary who was killed in the bombing?”

  I nod slowly.

  “You’ve got to be kidding. You think the board would allow Constance to bomb the compound and take out an elected official?”

  “You don’t get it,” I snap. “The board doesn’t ‘allow’ anything. None of this is within their control. Constance has all the smartest sociopaths in the compound on their side — people from every section, including Jayden. She’s been trying to have me killed since Bid Day.”

  Blaze looks as though his head is about to explode. He still doesn’t believe me, but being the son of an EnComm merchant-turned-crime lord has given him supernatural negotiation skills. He’s well-accustomed to dealing with unreasonable people and side-stepping major points of contention to salvage the big picture.

  “Okay,” he says. “Okay. This still sounds insane to me, but if Constance is out to get you — if Jayden is out to get you — you need to make a deal with them.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Why not?”

  For the first time since he arrived, Blaze sounds slightly exasperated.

  “Jayden doesn’t trust me,” I say slowly. “And any deal I could possibly make with her would involve throwing Eli to the wolves. I won’t do that.”

  Blaze sighs. I know he’s heartbroken that he couldn’t save Derek and that he can’t save me, but I didn’t ask for this. I didn’t ask for him to find a way to fight my case, and I didn’t ask him to come here.

  Blaze is such a hopeless good guy that I never see his next words coming.

  “What has gotten into you?” he asks.

  The question isn’t angry or accusatory, but it’s so full of disappointment that looking into his eyes physically hurts.

  “Nothing,” I whisper, fiddling with the frayed edge of the blanket. “I’m just tapped out. I don’t have any moves left.”

  “C’mon, Harper . . .”

  “They beat me, okay?” I snap, throwing up my hands. “I don’t know what else I can do.”

  Blaze is silent for such a long time that when I look up, I half expect to see him gone. Instead, I’m taken aback by the disgust coloring his expression.

  “Don’t be pathetic, Harper,” he says in an even tone. “Just because Eli isn’t here to save you doesn’t mean they’ve beaten you.”

  My mouth falls open at his accusation, and my hopelessness instantly shifts to anger.

  “You need to keep fighting,” he says, rising into a standing position and turning down the tunnel. “Or you’re not the person I thought you were.”

  seven

  Sawyer

  Even though I managed to squeeze in about six hours of sleep back in my compartment, I’m still tired and distracted as I beam Xavier’s and Kimber’s vital signs from the monitors to my interface.

  I spent most of the night tossing and turning in bed, worrying about Harper and wondering what I said that made Celdon so angry.

  It’s not as though I haven’t criticized his extracurricular activities before. Clearly he’s in deep shit, and he doesn’t want me to know what’s really going on.

  I shouldn’t have let him leave my compartment the way he did. I should have ke
pt pressing him until he told me the truth.

  Running through all the possibilities is as frustrating as searching for anomalies in Xavier’s and Kimber’s health data. I’m supposed to be reporting anything out of the ordinary, but their vital signs are maddeningly textbook.

  Kimber has been quiet and withdrawn each time I’ve come in to check on her, and she’s reluctant to talk about her and Xavier’s ordeal. She’s still asleep, but when I glance through the small window into Xavier’s room, I’m startled to find him staring right at me.

  A shiver rolls down my spine. He couldn’t have seen me checking the monitors. It’s as if he’s been waiting for me the entire time.

  His probing green eyes are so vibrant and unyielding that they seem to look right through me.

  For a few seconds, we just stare at each other. Then he tilts his head slightly so that his bright red hair falls to one side. He nods to beckon me in, and an uneasy feeling sinks into my gut.

  I back away from the door, acting as though I didn’t see the gesture. But a second later, I hear the crackle of the patient intercom over the door.

  “Miss Lyang.”

  I take a deep breath and press the button. “Yes?”

  “Could you come in here, please?”

  His voice is smooth and entitled. He’s summoning me like his personal servant.

  Caleb saw that Xavier made me uncomfortable the other day, so he’s gone out of his way to handle his tests ever since. But Caleb is off duty, so Xavier is officially my problem.

  Swallowing down my nerves and irritation, I place a shaky finger on the intercom button. “Just give me a minute to suit up.”

  An off-putting laugh comes through the speaker, and I can almost hear the smirk form on his lips. “Of course.”

  Several dark-green hazmat suits are hanging on hooks along the far wall in the support zone.

  Hating Xavier the entire time, I pull my hair into a messy ponytail and select the suit that’s closest to my size.

  It takes me several minutes to slink into the sticky rubber leggings, zip up the front with my clumsy gloved hands, and secure the mask and hood. By the time I’m all suited up, I’m hot, sweaty, and annoyed.

  I flip a switch on the wall to illuminate the red light in the contamination reduction zone, warning anybody entering the isolation area that the middle corridor is in use. Then I punch my nine-digit code into the keypad outside Xavier’s room and open the airtight door.