Modified- The Complete Manipulated Series

by Harper North

  CHAPTER 12

  “YOU KNOW, I don’t like that Cal’s interviewing Cho alone,” Sky says, plopping down onto the couch beside me.

  We’ve retreated to the cabin we stayed in before everything went downhill. The family who lives here told us to make ourselves at home until Cal makes his decision. They seemed a little more hopeful than Blasty and David that Cal would rule in our favor.

  Sky offers me a sip from the colorful can he’s holding.

  “Thanks,” I say, taking it and gulping down the sugary, fizzy liquid.

  “Fin!” he scolds.

  “I was thirsty.” I change the subject. “You know what I don’t like?”

  His lips press into a thin line, realizing what I’m doing. “What?”

  “That they stole the gun I stole from Cho. Don’t you think I deserved that?”

  Sky pulls my legs into his lap and begins to rub my calf. “Absolutely.”

  “Do you think I’ll ever get it back?”

  He tips his head slightly and stares at me. “Do you think I’m ever going to get my soda back?”

  I scoff and I hand him what’s left of his drink.

  He downs the rest and places the can beside him. “I think you do pretty much anything you want eventually.”

  I snort. “Not true. I didn’t save Drape. I didn’t set the Dwellers free. I didn’t—”

  Sky presses a finger to my lips. “Focus on the dids. Today, you did save Lacy and Talen.”

  “Not yet.” I swing my legs out of his lap. “I need to see them.”

  Sky groans. He already talked me out of this once, insisting I needed to rest, but I can’t. Not until this is over. I won’t sleep until they’re awake.

  I stand up, blinking the exhaustion from my eyes. The sugar from his drink gives me a little energy boost. I should have left more of it for him. He’s moving like an old man as he lurches to his feet. I don’t bother telling him to stay.

  We slip quietly out the front door, so we don’t wake his mom and sister sleeping in the master bedroom. We head down to the beach, but Lacy and Talen are gone. There’s no one here but a bunch of Original children molding lumps of wet sand into towers.

  I march up to the children. I think one of them is the little brat who kicked sand on my head the last time we were on the beach.

  “Where are my friends?”

  The children cower. I have a wild urge to kick their tower over, but Sky takes my arms and tugs me away.

  “They’re just kids. Let’s find Steve.”

  We find him at the top of the hill, guarding the entrance to the storage room and offices. He folds his arms across his chest. “Where do you think you’re going?”

  “Where do you think?” I snap. “To make sure my friends are still alive. Where are they?”

  “They’re in the infirmary. But you can’t go down there right now. Cal is still interviewing the prisoner.”

  I raise an eyebrow at him. “In the infirmary?”

  Steven smirks. “Funny thing about gunshots.”

  I groan in frustration.

  “Come on, Steve,” Sky says through a yawn. “She won’t let me sleep until she sees them. And I want to sleep.”

  Steven sighs and steps aside. “Go. I’ll radio ahead.”

  We make our way down to the room where Elias dropped the bottle of rubbing alcohol. I don’t even know how long ago that’s been, but the odor still stings my nose as we approach. Blasty and David are propped in chairs on either side of the door. Blasty is sound asleep.

  “You can visit your creepy friends,” David says. “But don’t even think about barging in on Cal and your other creepy friend.”

  He pulls up his plaid shirt to reveal the shiny black pistol I stole from Cho at his hip.

  “He’s not our friend.” I loom over him, thinking about how easy it would be to take my gun back from the smug, unenhanced man right now. “And don’t get too attached to that.”

  He laughs, and my fists automatically clench. Sky takes me by the shoulders and pushes me into the infirmary. “Easy there.”

  Lacy and Talen are laid out on the metal tables like corpses. They could have put them in beds. I lean over Lacy and take her hand. It’s still warm, and a faint pulse continues to beat against my palm, but there are dark bags under her eyes. Talen’s, too.

  “Lacy. It’s me, Fin. We got Cho. Can you believe it?”

  My throat constricts and my hands shake. Lacy looks too much like Drape did before he died—so still and pale. I reach up and brush a strand of hair from her forehead.

  Sky leans in from her other side. “Hey, Lacy. Thanks for teaching my sister to shoot. She’s, uh, really good at it.” He clears his throat and turns to Talen. He doesn’t say anything, but he gives him an awkward pat on the shoulder.

  Reinhart’s voice interrupts our moment. “How are the Auras?”

  I whip my head around. He steps into the room, looking anywhere but at them.

  “How they were before,” I snap. “We’re still waiting for Cal to decide if we’ve done a good enough job to let them live.”

  “I’m sure he’ll be impressed with my planning,” Reinhart says, mostly to himself. “And I have a lot to offer. Protection. Fighters. I’m a rebel leader, after all.”

  He’s come in here to remind us he’s indispensable. He couldn’t care less about Lacy and Talen as people. Reinhart paces around us with a sharp glint in his eyes. Even in the pale light, I notice the way he works his jaw. The real Reinhart’s coming out now that Elias isn’t here.

  “Seems like you’re having fun impressing other people lately,” I say, thinking of Elias. “But we did the work. This is our victory, not yours. You never even meant for us to make it back.”

  Reinhart crosses the room in an instant, towering over me. “I don’t answer to children. Slags or otherwise. When Cal accepts us, I will be the one in charge of our faction. You can like that, or you can leave.”

  I step toward him, making him back away from Lacy. “And I don’t take orders from Leeches. Ever. Again.”

  Reinhart’s nostrils flare. He wants to punch me—maybe even kill me—but he knows that until Cal officially accepts our offering, there’s still a chance we could rat on him in a pinch. He stalks out of the room.

  Sky and I look at each other. He shakes his head. “Fin—”

  “I know.”

  “If Cho isn’t enough—”

  “I know,” I say more forcefully. It’s not safe to say what we’re both thinking in front of David and Blasty. I don’t want anyone taking that decision out of my hands. I hate Reinhart, but I’d rather make sure Elias is still on the right side before we resort to that.

  I look down at Lacy. Her lips are dry and cracked. They’re both probably dehydrated by now. I’m thinking of asking David for a cloth to at least wet their lips with, but a door at the back of the room swings open and Cal steps out.

  He frowns when he sees us, but quickly smooths it out. “Fin, is it? And Sky?”

  “Yes,” I say, and then add, “Sir,” for good measure.

  Cal ambles over to us, leaning casually against Lacy’s table. He chews on his lip.

  “I’m afraid Cho isn’t going to cut it.”

  “What?” we both blurt, even though I don’t think either of us is that surprised.

  Cal shakes his head. “I’m sorry, but he’s no Destroyer.”

  The floor seems to tilt under me. “He literally destroyed the world,” I argue. “Made the surface completely uninhabitable—maybe for centuries! He was planning on controlling all the settlements and killing anyone—” I catch myself, but it’s too late.

  Anyone who’s been modified. In other words, Destroyers.

  Ice spreads through my veins. Cal is a Natural. Steven, David, Blasty—they’re all Naturals. Of course they’re going to like the sound of Cho’s ramblings. He’s probably convinced Cal he’s a Creator reincarnated.

  “But he’s insane!” Sky protests, voice cracking at the end.


  Cal chuckles. “Oh, he’s crazy all right. And I can tell it goes deeper than that gunshot wound. My only point is that he can’t be a Destroyer if he’s not modified. Just won’t work. The Creators were very clear about that.”

  “You’re not going to let him go, are you?” I reach out to clutch at Cal’s arm. “You can’t.”

  He pats my hand. “You let me worry about him. You need to worry about your friends here—and finding me a real Destroyer.”

  I find Sky’s eyes across Lacy’s still form. They say everything I need to know. He’s with me.

  Cal cocks his head, a faint smile playing across his lips. “They can’t be that hard to find, can they? I mean, you had to pick up those ops somewhere.”

  I shake my head. “Don’t hurt them. They didn’t have a choice about being soldiers any more than I had a choice about being a miner.”

  “I don’t want to hurt anyone, Fin. Least of all these two people you seem to care about very much.” He raises his eyebrows at me. “But I need a Destroyer, or I can’t avoid it.”

  Is Cal asking for Reinhart? Was he always asking for Reinhart? The man carries himself like an EHC leader. Cal’s dealt with them before. He’d know how to recognize them after they took his father, and Reinhart wore it on his chest through the entire mission. Even while trying to hide, his ego betrayed him.

  Why did we ever risk our lives to avoid turning him in?

  Because I care about Elias, that’s why. Not the way he hoped I would, but he’s still my friend. And because Sky never stopped caring about me the way I wanted him to, he went along with the insanity.

  I make an instant decision. From now on, my loyalty lies only with Sky, his family, and the two people fighting for their lives on this table. If Elias isn’t with us after all we’ve been through together, just because I don’t return his affections, then he’s against us.

  I swallow my regrets. “We might know where to find one.”

  Cal grins. “That’s the spirit. Since you did us the great service of capturing this cuckoo bird, I promise if you bring me this Destroyer, I’ll wake these two up, and you can all live here happily ever after.” He offers me his big, meaty hand. “Deal?”

  I notice he doesn’t offer us any assistance or even weapons. He probably means what he says, but he’s also not particularly invested in our survival. If we can capture Reinhart for him, great, but if Reinhart kills us, he knows he can still catch him, and without weapons, there’s a fifty percent chance Reinhart kills us. He’s no Cho.

  “On the condition that if we die trying, you still wake Lacy and Talen up,” I counter. “I promise they could be of great assistance to your people.”

  That’s assuming Lacy doesn’t kill everyone instantly when I’m not here to explain things.

  Cal runs his tongue over his top teeth. “I don’t know…”

  “Then no deal,” Sky says. “You know who he is. Send your own men.”

  I shake my head. “He can’t. No mods.”

  “Fine, fine,” Cal says, thrusting his hand at me again. “You die, they live. You have my word.” He places his other hand over his gold badge. I guess that must mean something.

  I grasp his hand. “Then we have a deal.”

  On the way out, I pause beside David. “Can I please have my gun back?”

  “Sure thing.” David grins up at me from his lazy seat on his chair. “Soon as you do what the boss needs.”

  * * * * *

  Like Cho, Reinhart took the biggest house for himself. I know it’s his because two of the former ops are sitting on the porch, guarding the front door when they ought to be asleep—like pretty much everyone else from our team. It also tells me Reinhart knows he’s living on borrowed time.

  I don’t want to hurt the ops, but they’ll likely fight for Reinhart, and that means we’ll probably have to. It might be smarter to rid ourselves of them first, but that also runs the risk of alerting Reinhart to our presence. And then there’s the even bigger wild card.

  Elias.

  I saw him enter a different cabin shortly after we arrived, and Cal stripped us of our weapons. He might have been cozying up to Reinhart these last few days, but Reinhart’s clearly not a roommate sort of guy. We’ll need to act fast while Elias’s still asleep.

  “Let’s circle around,” Sky hisses.

  We hold hands as we walk past Reinhart’s lair like we’re just taking a stroll down to the beach, but then we cut across the sand and take the little path into the trees that go behind the houses. As we walk, I run the odds in my head. Not for the mission, but its aftermath. Elias will be furious, and may try to turn the others against us, or he may have to be taken into custody, too. The remaining EHC ops may revolt since Sky and I haven’t discussed this plan with anyone. We’ve gone rogue, acting as kidnappers—maybe even assassins—for total strangers. Reinhart’s not a popular guy, but how well are our choices going to go over?

  “Calculating?” Sky asks.

  I grunt. “A mess no matter what.”

  I think of Lacy and Talen, almost lifeless on those cold, hard tables. This is the only way I can save them.

  We leave the trail and push through the dense foliage until we’re facing the back of the house. There’s yet another pair of EHC fighters at the rear sliding door, standing with arms folded over their chests. Great.

  Sky frowns at me, silently asking: How do we get past them?

  Frustration gnaws at my brain, but I don’t want to wait. Not with Lacy going downhill, and not with the possibility of Elias dropping in for a visit. I know our chances of overpowering the guards are small. Neither have guns, so unless I—

  “Fin,” Sky growls, but I’ve already stormed into the clearing.

  The ops snap to attention, moving their arms to block the door.

  “You can’t go in there,” the first one sneers, and I can hear the unspoken “slag” hanging in the air. It makes ramming my knee into his groin a lot easier.

  He gasps and drops to his knees. The other guy lunges for me, but Sky plows into him with enough force to bring him to the ground. They grapple, but Sky is on top, so I finish with my guy, clocking him on the side of his head. He falls onto his face.

  Now the other op has Sky on his back, trying to dig his thumbs into his eyes while Sky struggles to keep his hands over the man’s mouth. I deliver a swift kick to the side of the man’s head, and he collapses onto Sky’s chest. Sky grimaces and wiggles out from under his bulk.

  “Did you kill them?” he whispers.

  “Probably not. Let’s get this over with.”

  Sky slides open the back door. Inside, something is bubbling, and someone is humming—probably some off-key EHC anthem.

  We follow the sound into a small kitchen. Reinhart has his back to us, waiting for a coffee pot to fill.

  “Allen, is there a problem?” he asks in his usual smug tone.

  “It’s you or Lacy,” I say, and his head snaps around straight into my fist—so hard his jaw cracks. Even stunned, his fists come up swinging.

  Sky shoves him against the counter, but Reinhart lands a punch in his side that doubles him over. I seize the coffee pot and the machine sizzles as it drips more of the scalding hot liquid onto itself. As Reinhart lunges at Sky, I swing the pot at his face, sloshing coffee straight into his eyes.

  Reinhart screams, backing into the counter, pressing his palms against his eyes, and then screaming again as the coffee burns them. He blindly fumbles for the faucet. Sky latches onto his neck, tugging him backward as he claws at Sky’s arms, gagging.

  “Reinhart!”

  The second op from out back runs into the kitchen. He takes in what’s happening and launches himself at Sky’s neck with grasping fingers. I swing the coffee pot again, shattering the glass against the man’s jaw. Blood and hot coffee run down his neck as he hits the floor, whimpering.

  “Let’s go!” Sky shouts, dragging Reinhart backward, out of the kitchen.

  I wrench open a drawer
and grab a large kitchen knife sitting inside. Better than nothing. The two ops from out front barge into the living room, but I point the knife at Reinhart’s stomach.

  “Stay where you are!”

  The ops freeze, uncertainty flickering over their faces. Without guns, they’re helpless to get across the room in time, so they run back out the front door, yelling for help.

  “Hurry! We have to find Cal,” I say.

  “I knew it!” Reinhart roars, thrashing wildly.

  Sky stumbles out the back door, nearly tripping over the first op, still prone on the ground. I poke the knife into Reinhart’s chest, and he flinches. “Stop. Moving.”

  Reinhart quiets immediately, falling slack in Sky’s arms. He opens his eyes and blinks, but they don’t focus on anything. Then he moans like a wounded animal, and guilt floods my core. The man looks so pathetic right now—old.

  “I’m blind,” he whines, then lets out a string of curses.

  Someone is crashing through the underbrush, and I can only hope that it’s Cal or David—someone who knows what’s happening and can help.

  “Fin? Sky?” a familiar voice asks.

  I turn to face Elias. He stands at the edge of the trees, pain and betrayal sweeping over his features.

  “What are you doing?”

  His voice sounds small, strangely childish.

  “I’m sorry, Elias,” I say. “There was no other—”

  An explosion sounds in the distance, rocking the ground under our feet. The lake sloshes onto the beach and the pale evening light flickers as the mirrors vibrate above us.

  And then the power goes out.

  CHAPTER 13

  AN EERIE MOMENT of stillness descends on Elysian Beach.

  Then the screaming begins.

  Children. Women. Men. Footsteps pound the path in front of the houses.

  “Fin, let him go,” Elias says, holding a hand out like he’s calming some wild beast. “We need him. Cho’s army is coming. He’s the only military leader we have on our side.”

  I shake my head. “The only side Reinhart’s on is his own, Elias.”