Both of Akiko’s eyebrows shot up, and her mouth dropped open. “Did you just say what I think you said?”
“Probably,” I replied, swallowing hard. I hadn’t meant to say it, it had just slipped out of my mouth.
“Parker is pregnant?” Akiko asked, the look of complete and utter shock still plastered on her face.
“Yes.”
“And it’s yours?”
“Yes.”
A bark of a laugh burst from Akiko’s lips as she released her hold on my wrist. “Oh, I really don’t want to be either of you when Kiskei finds out.”
“That makes two of us,” I agreed with a heavy sigh. I hadn’t meant to admit it to her, but there really wasn’t a point in lying. The truth was going to come out as soon as Parker started showing anyways.
Still giving me a you’re-so-fucked look, Akiko reached past me and pulled a holster from the weapons wall, and slapped it into my hand.
“You’re not going to stop me?” I asked suspiciously.
“Kiskei is going to kill you the moment he finds out you knocked up his daughter. So I figure either way, it’s your funeral.”
“Thanks for the vote of confidence,” I said flatly as I strapped the holster around my hips.
“I did warn you,” Akiko said with an amused smirk as she walked back to the operations station.
I pushed a clip into the TranqGun. “Yeah, well, some things are worth walking through fire for.”
I looked over at Akiko, all amusement had left her face. “Let’s just hope you don’t burn for this, then.”
And that’s when what I was about to do hit me like a punch to the gut. That there was a very real chance this time that I wouldn’t make it back out alive.
I shoved the TranqGun into its holster as I walked back over to the operations station. I scrawled a message onto a piece of paper, and then I held it out to Akiko. Her eyes looked dangerously uncertain.
“Look, if I…if I don’t make it back I want you to replace me as the Director of Technical Research and Development.”
“We are not talking about this, it’s bad luck,” Akiko said in a toneless voice.
“Probably,” I answered wryly. “But look, this code will get you into everything. Every file and system I’ve ever made. Just read it to KARA and you’re in.”
Akiko looked at me a moment before she looked down at the piece of paper, and took it.
Her brow furrowed as she read it. “This is a date.”
“It is,” I agreed as I walked toward the door of the Bus.
“Why January, 8th 1997?” Akiko asked uncertainly as if her desire to not know and her curiosity were fighting for dominance.
I just smiled at her weakly as I turned, and stepped off of the Bus. January, 8th 1997 wasn’t a date that would be on record anywhere but in my heart. Because January, 8th 1997 was the day I met Nualla. That day so long ago in that hall when a little girl hadn’t let a broken and damaged boy chase her away. The day when our lives had converged. The day we started down the path that had lead us to today. The day I had become Travis Centrina.
PATRICK
I had skidded around the corner just as the officers had opened fire. A tranq dart whizzing past just shy of my shoulder. And then I had bolted down the corridor, running as fast as I could with Nikki in my arms. She was more awkward to carry than Nualla, mainly because she was about three inches taller and thus only three inches shorter than me. And if I hadn’t been an Amurai, I doubted I would have had the strength to carry her.
I had continued to zigzag through the facility until I was certain I had lost them, and then I had just continued running. But now I was hopelessly lost myself.
Where the hell are you going? Aku shouted within my head.
Fuck if I know! I shouted back.
I darted through a doorway only to realize that I was in the cafeteria. And that a shootout of some kind had recently taken place there. Casings littered the floor along with overturned tables, benches, and the bodies of a few facility officers. Though if they were tranqed or dead, I didn’t know.
As I took in the aftermath of the battle, I heard the click of a gun. Turning slowly to the right, I saw someone I was pretty sure was Shawn, leaning up against the wall, a TranqGun aimed at me.
“Hey,” I said slowly, swallowing hard.
“Hey,” he echoed, the sound coming out drowsily and muffled through the black fabric mask that covered his face just below his eyes. “Are you, you?” he asked, the TranqGun still firmly fixed on me.
I looked at him a moment longer before I looked down at Nikki, and then back at him. “Yeah.”
He let out an exhausted sigh, finally lowering the TranqGun, and pulled the mask down around his neck. “Good, because I really didn’t want to shoot you.”
I stepped into Shawn’s little fort of overturned tables, and set Nikki down carefully against the wall next to him. As I released her, her head slid across the wall until it rested on Shawn’s shoulder.
He looked at her for a moment before he asked. “Is she hurt?”
“Sick, I think.” And I hoped to the gods I was right.
He nodded once slowly, and then pressed his lips to her head, his eyes sliding closed.
As I watched him, I realized he was dressed in a uniform that was similar to the Protectorate—tight black pants, black knee-high boots, long black cut-resistant undersleeves, and a black kimono top—except that it also had a wide hood and an Eastern-style cuirass adorned with an intricately embroidered dark gray lotus on it. He also had a black obi sash, but instead of around his waist it was tied tightly across the middle of his ribs. And that’s when I realized that Shawn had been shot.
“Shawn, you’re bleeding!” I said as I looked at the damp spot on the obi.
Shawn’s eyes fluttered open, and he looked at me and then down at his torso. “Not so much anymore, that bullet just grazed me,” he said as he touched his ribs. “Luckily the one that got me in the leg was a tranq,” he continued, his speech getting a tiny bit slower with each word.
I looked down at the small snagged hole in his left pants leg that I had overlooked before.
“I can’t move my legs,” he said as he noticed me staring.
Oh this is so not good.
That’s not our only problem, Aku said uneasily.
My eyes darted back up to the door, but there was no one there.
“I commed the Bus for help before this thing shorted out,” Shawn said as he held up something that may have been a pair of digital glasses at one point, but was now a shattered mess. And if the bloody green gash just shy of his left eye was any indication, the culprit had probably been a stray titanium bullet.
“What bus?” I asked Shawn in confusion.
Patrick, Aku said urgently within my head.
What?
They are turning it back on.
Turning what back on?
We need to leave them—it’s not safe.
What’s not safe? What are they turning back—?
A horrific pain raced up my spine, and I fell against the overturned table, gasping, my back arched nearly to the breaking point. It felt like every nerve ending in my body was on fire…or worse. And just when I thought I was going to pass out, the pain was gone again.
As I sucked in huge gulps of air, I realized Shawn was calling my name. My vision blurred in and out again until he finally leapt back into sharp focus.
Shawn looked slowly between me, and and Nikki. “What just happened?”
I pushed myself back onto my knees, coughing. “I need to borrow your wakizashi.”
“No way in hell, Kiskei said not too—”
“Shawn,” I said cutting him off. “You have to trust me.”
He looked at me fo
r a long moment before he finally sighed. “Take it. I really can’t use it at the moment, anyways.”
I slid the wakizashi out of its loop on the hostler at his hip. I was much better with a katana, but some of the corridors were much too narrow for one to be of any good. As I looked down at the wakizashi I realized it wasn’t a normal Japanese blade. “How do I get the scabbard off?”
Shawn looked at me cautiously as he reached out and pressed the top of the pommel. And with a smooth click-woosh, the scabbard retracted like a set of nesting dolls to become the guard of the sword.
“Well that’s…special,” I commented, arching an eyebrow.
“Amurai special issue.”
Patrick, Aku urgently reminded me.
I looked back up at Shawn and Nikki. “Look, I don’t want to leave you but…it’s not safe for me to be here right now.”
Shawn looked at me in confusion for a moment before realization dawned in his eyes. “I should have shot you.”
“Probably,” I agreed as I backed away slowly, and then turned and ran.
The Masks We Wear
Tuesday, January 1st
PATRICK
I turned the corner, and ran smack into someone. On reflex and instinct alone, I swung out Shawn’s wakizashi to rebalance myself, and nearly succeeded in slicing Nathan across the middle. He just stared at me, and I blinked back at him in shock.
After swallowing hard, Nathan took a step toward me. “Aku, ko Amurai suna Kalo—”
I pointed the borrowed titanium-coated blade at him, and stated as tonelessly as I could manage, “Sorry, Aku’s not here right now.”
All the color drained from Nathan’s face. “Patrick?” he asked in an unsteady voice.
“At the moment.” And even as I said it, pain flashed behind my eyes. The barely contained rage bubbling to the surface as my mind tried to switch over to the other me—to Aku.
“Patrick, I can explain—”
“There is too much blood on your hands to ever explain this away,” I growled as I moved the blade closer so it was nearly piercing his shirt. And that’s when I noticed it—how much of a disheveled mess his hair was, and that his hands were bound with thick plastic zip-ties.
Wait? Why was Nathan bound?
As my mind raced to find an answer someone screeched to a halt at my right, and I whipped my blade in their direction. Wide, familiar, black-blue eyes stared back at me through the dim light from beneath a wide black hood and a set of digital glasses. He had only stopped a fraction of an inch from skewering himself on Shawn’s wakizashi.
“Travis, what the fuck are you doing here?!” I asked in surprise as I lowered the blade.
“Rescuing you,” Travis answered with a heavy breath as he pushed back the wide black hood.
“Excuse me?” I asked in stunned disbelief before I finally processed what he was wearing, a sick feeling starting to settle into my stomach. Travis was dressed just like Shawn had been, except that his mask was pulled down and hanging around his neck like a weird scarf. A small pack and holster strapped hastily around his waist so the fabric of obi sash and cuirass laid unevenly.
“Wait, you’re not a—”
“Of course not, I’m an Amurai Protectorate,” Travis replied, jerking his head back.
“A what?!” I asked in startled exasperation.
Travis let out a huff. “Never mind, tell you—”
With a grunt Nathan lunged at us, but I was far too fast for him to take me by surprise. I whipped my blade around so quickly it made a whistling sound as it cut through the air, stopping it just a hair short of slicing into his neck.
“I wasn’t done talking to you,” I stated with a deadly calm.
Nathan swallowed hard, and held up his hands in surrender as he sank down to his knees.
It was in that moment that Travis seemed to finally realize that the rumpled mess in front of us was Nathan Jordash, or Connolly, or whatever his last name really was. The same Nathan that had organized the attack on The Embassy. That had tried to blow Nualla to pieces. That had murdered our parents.
In one quick motion, Travis leveled his gun at Nathan. As the trigger clicked part of me just wanted him to pull it—for this all to be over and done with. But we needed answers—I needed answers—and we weren’t going to be able to get them from a dead man.
“Don’t shoot him!” I shouted quickly as I pushed Travis’ gun toward the wall.
Travis stared at me, his eyebrows shooting up in shock. “It’s a TranqGun you idiot! I wouldn’t just shoot—”
Nathan moved suddenly, and we both leveled our weapons at him. He put his hands up in surrender, but we didn’t lower our weapons—not this time.
“As I was saying, I wouldn’t just kill him. Not right away, anyways. I want answers first,” Travis stated, the words turning into a growl at the end as he glared at Nathan. In that moment I didn’t think I had ever seen him look more menacing. “Why?” he barked out.
“Why what?” Nathan asked in confusion.
“Why did you murder them?” Travis clarified, a sharp edge creeping into his voice.
“Those in The Embassy?” Nathan asked, furrowing his brow.
“Our parents. I know why you murdered all those people in The Embassy—you’re Kakodemoss—it’s what you do,” Travis accused through gritted teeth.
“I didn’t murder your—”
“Don’t lie to me!” Travis shouted, the hand holding the TranqGun shaking a bit. “Three of these in your chest will stop your heart. So don’t you dare lie to me!”
Travis and Nathan stared at each other for a tense moment before Nathan looked away. “We killed them because we were ordered to,” Nathan stated simply, his voice devoid of remorse. “I was supposed to kill you as well, but I didn’t.”
“What?” Travis replied, the aim of the TranqGun wavering a bit.
“You looked so much like him, even at that age, that killing you should have been easy. But when it came down to it, I just couldn’t do it. You were a child—a child who had done nothing—and I just couldn’t bring myself to kill you,” Nathan admitted, unable to meet our eyes. Either because he was ashamed of letting Travis go. Or because he had ever considered killing him in the first place.
“You expect me to believe that bullshit?” Travis sneered in disgust as his grip on the TranqGun tightened.
“It’s the truth,” Nathan replied, finally meeting Travis’ eyes. “Children are…precious.”
“Don’t you dare spout that crap. You murdered hundreds of people!” Travis shouted with revulsion.
“And not one of them was a child!” Nathan shouted back defiantly. There was something in his eyes. Some emotion I couldn’t quite place. A strange mixture of indignation, and unfathomable sadness.
And then the pieces all clicked into place, like the pressure pin on a landmine.
“We only replaced what Joshua Centrina stole from us.”
“…would clone Jane’s precious Patrick.”
And I realized why they had wanted me—needed me—so much. Part revenge, part desperate longing.
“You had a son,” I stated on a startled breath.
Nathan’s eyes darted to me, softening. “Yes, a real son, not someone we adopted and changed. A child born of our flesh. And your father took our Patrick away. Killed him in cold blood just because of what he was.”
It might have been the truth, but I didn’t think it was as simple as all that. Because if my father had felt nothing when he had killed their son, my parents wouldn’t have named me Patrick.
I looked over at Travis, and all the color had drained from his face as if he had realized the very same thing.
“That’s still not an excuse for everything you’ve done,” Travis said in a low, strangled voice.
&
nbsp; Nathan raised his chin a fraction of an inch, meeting Travis’ glare, unflinchingly. “And that’s for the gods to judge, not you.”
Travis glared back at him with loathing before a tiny, nearly inaudible sound emanated from the comm on the glasses. In a rush his face went slack, and the remaining color drained out of it.
“Travis?” I asked uncertainly.
Without answering his gun arm jerked up suddenly, and he shot two tranq bullets into Nathan.
“What the fuck?!” I yelped.
“It wont kill him, just make him sleep for a real long time,” Travis said unapologetically before he started running down the hall.
“Travis, where are you going?” I called after him. My eyes darting between Nathan, who was rapidly falling unconscious, and Travis who was running carelessly down the hall.
“Parker’s in trouble,” he called back without stopping.
“What?! How?” I asked as I abandoned Nathan, and started after Travis.
Travis looked over his shoulder with panicked fear raging in his eyes. “Her comm went offline.”
The Machanta
Tuesday, January 1st
PATRICK
We ran flat-out down the dimly lit corridor until we reached the next intersection. When we were halfway through a wave of nausea hit me, and a strobe of flashing memories cluttered my vision.
“Why are you stopping?” Travis called out over his shoulder. And when I didn’t answer, he stopped and turned around to look back at me. “What’s wrong?” he asked uncertainly.
I stared down the hallway that crossed our path. There was something down there—something that was very, very important.
“You go, I…” I said distractedly, my eyes still fixed at the end of the corridor. At the single black door in a sea of white walls and doors.
The Other Side of Truth (The Marked Ones Trilogy Book 3) Page 37