The Clash (The Permutation Archives Book 5)

by Kindra Sowder

  Nero and Valdus didn’t let go of my arms or remove the cuffs so, looking at them and then back at Doctor Tee who wasn’t paying attention as he removed something from the bag, I jerked my arms away and nearly stumbled.

  The words that were spoken to me in my lead cage moved through my mind in Cato’s hushing cadence. Don’t make this harder than it has to be. I may have done what they said up to this point, but the urge to survive was welling up in my chest, threatening to spill over. I only had my body to fight back with. If I had my ability, I would’ve torn the place apart to gain my freedom already, but I was stuck. It was then I realized how much I truly depended on it.

  Reaching toward me, Valdus held a small key, removing the cuffs so I could do as the doctor requested. When the metal came away from my skin, it took every ounce of restraint I had not to rub my wrists.

  “What about the prosthetic, Doc? It could be used as a weapon,” Nero suggested.

  I sneered at him, wanting nothing more than to turn him into a pile of decay at my feet. Doctor Tee thought about it for a moment, smoothing out what looked almost like a wetsuit against his chest.

  “Let her keep it. I believe, knowing what little I do about Doctor Aserov’s technology, it may actually help with conduction,” he replied. “Do you really want to carry her in there?”

  Nero laughed, and Valdus groaned in answer. I remained there, frozen in place as I witnessed the exchange. I could run. Or I could try. But I had already seen I was no match for anyone in my current state.

  “Miss Hunter, please,” Doctor Tee requested, motioning with one hand to the clothes that still covered my body.

  I did as he asked, struggling out of the clothes and flimsy shoes with nothing to sit or lean on. The prosthetic still presented some problems when it came to balance, but it wasn’t as bad as it had been. Cool air caressed my skin, causing goose bumps to form over my arms and chest. I would have been embarrassed standing there in only a pair of cotton underwear and a bra, but I had been naked in front of strangers so many times at that point that it no longer fazed me. Crossing my arms, I shivered in place and listened to the snide chuckles and comments from Nero and my brother. I must have been a sight to behold. Pale, covered in cuts and bruises, stitched up in so many places it was unreal – my side covered in sticky blood from where a stitch had popped open.

  Choosing to ignore them, I looked to the doctor who then handed me the suit. I was right to assume it was made from wetsuit material, but there was something different about it. I didn’t want to ask. I didn’t even want to act as if I were interested in the technology that came along with this entire thing, but it was hard not to ponder over. The fabric was smooth against my fingertips, a long zipper running down the back. The interior was a lot like that of the sleeve on my amputated leg that held on the prosthetic, but slightly less jelly-like.

  I struggled into it, pulling hard to keep the material from sticking and pulling at my flesh. I was sweating with the effort so that only made it more difficult. After a few moments, I had it on and zipped up the back all by myself. There was no way I would be asking for any type of assistance. Once the zipper was completely closed, I glanced at Nero and Valdus who had been pulled away by King without my notice. They were speaking animatedly, almost heatedly, but I couldn’t hear about what. Their voices were hushed, and I could only hear faint whispers despite the dome shape of the room that should’ve carried the sound to our ears.

  Doctor Tee cleared his throat, pulling my attention back to him, and when our eyes met, I saw a flash of regret. That was swiftly replaced by the same cold, clinical expression of a scientist that was intrigued as well as indifferent about what he had to do. He only did it for the thrill of discovery, and because he had to. I didn’t care which was more prominent. The fact that he was willing to take part in any of this was enough of an indicator as to what kind of person he was.

  “Do you enjoy your work?” I asked him, not that I genuinely cared. The question was more of a gage to see how far under his skin King had penetrated.

  “Aspects of it,” Doctor Tee replied in a hushed, apathetic tone.

  He bent down and removed something else from the bag that sat at his feet. A plastic bag that crinkled loudly in the relative silence. He ripped it open and reached into it – obviously no need for gloves in this setting. It was unsettling, but I watched with fascination. The thought crossed my mind to attempt to run again, but I knew that attempt would be futile. If I died while trying, I couldn’t stop the madman on the other side of the room from enacting his plans. That made the decision to stand there and do what the doctor asked even easier, much like when in the Spartan Compound. I may have been able to kill everyone in the place without effort, but there were other factors at play. Other factors that could make the entire situation worse instead of better. Because of all of those reasons, I stayed put, only moving enough to adjust my stance or to breathe.

  Of course, letting this happen was worse than anything else I could imagine, but I didn’t see any other alternatives. If I ran and they killed me, it wouldn’t matter. My lifeless body was just as useful, but not desired if it could be avoided. If I died, there was no way for me to do anything. If I died, I would be a martyr and a symbol for the others if they could continue to carry on after this. Cato’s vision showed that I would live past these moments, and we had already determined nothing could be changed, so I remained in hopes I was correct in my assumption. The decision was a difficult one.

  I just trusted I was making the right choice.

  Fingers brushed my temples and something cold and hard pressed against it. I fought the urge to jerk away from it, and met Doctor Tee’s deep brown eyes once more with questions burning in my mind.

  “Wh…?” I stammered.

  “I wouldn’t worry about what these are, Miss Hunter. You have much bigger worries,” he interrupted as if that would cease my curiosity. Or my fear.

  “Doctor, please. You won’t help me, but you can at least give me this,” I stated, pointing at what I assumed was an electrode on my temple.

  He placed another on my left temple, then another in the center of my forehead.

  “These help to pull the kinetic energy from your telepathic ability into the reactor, so it can be harnessed to create the reaction you can produce,” he snapped. “Mr. President, she is ready.”

  “Wonderful,” King exclaimed.

  That was the hint the conversation was over. I wouldn’t be getting anymore answers from him. Not from anyone.

  With a wave of his hand, King ordered Nero and Valdus to my side, each man taking my arms and jerking me to stand in front of the open door with the intimidating lock. It seemed to lock from the outside only, and took a special key or device to engage it. I stood in the threshold with my betrayer and my villainous brother beside me, just waiting to push me inside at King’s order.

  “Remember, we have a small window of opportunity to vacate the city once the process begins. The reactor will take a few moments to prime, and once it begins to extract the energy from Ms. Hunter, we have a total of five to ten minutes to make sure we are as far away from Washington D.C. as possible,” Doctor Tee explained.

  “Yes, Doctor, all precautions are in place as well as transport. The failsafe has been prepared just in case something was to delay our departure,” King assured him.

  Shouts and gunfire shattered the silence – from soldiers I hadn’t seen or heard on our way in. Possibly put into formation after our descent. Over the rapid shots, pained cries, and surprised shouts, I heard one voice among the fray.

  “Mila!” Ryder’s voice echoed.

  I turned quickly enough to catch a glimpse of him dressed in full combat gear, automatic assault rifle aimed and poised to fire as he pushed through the glass doors with a multitude of other soldiers behind him.

  And, just like that, my g
aze was ripped away from him as I was thrown through the door – landing face-down on the floor. I slid painfully and came to a stop as the door slammed shut, metal grinding against the glass as the lock slid into place. The sound of metal on metal came next, followed by a deep, resonating hum.

  The blue light began to grow. An electric buzz rang through my mind and stung my flesh where the electrodes touched me. I was trapped, and everyone that had come to save me would perish.

  Chapter

  ELEVEN

  Energy rampaged through my body, starting inside my brain and moving down my spine to branch out through my nervous system. My muscles spasmed slightly, but I held myself up on my arms as I watched in shocked horror. The blue that illuminated the space around me only grew brighter. The reactor was priming just as Doctor Tee stated it would, which meant we were running out of time. The only way I knew to stop this and to save us all was to remove me from the machine – take off the electrodes and get me as far away as humanly possible.

  Scrambling away, my muscles spasmed again, and my back met the cool glass wall behind me. Somehow, I could feel the water flow through its transparent prison, running through the reactor in what I only assumed was an attempt to lubricate and transfer my energy more easily through it. I wasn’t truly certain, but all I had were guesses.

  My thoughts jumbled, quickening while the current moved through the electrodes and my brain again. The oncoming sensation felt much like when I was about to seize, but different somehow. My entire body warmed, sweat trickling down my back. At the base of my amputated leg, I felt the same electrical current move through it and down my prosthetic. Shouts echoed outside the dome, muffled in my ears as the hum only grew louder and louder. I watched the light brighten, frozen in place except for my racing heart. My arm shot up to protect my eyes, but did nothing to stop the searing pain that assaulted my retinas from the advancing glare – especially when reflecting off the glass opposite me.

  Terror tore through me, and then I heard my name again, followed by struggles and rapid gunfire. The sound of my name tore my gaze from the reactor, causing me to rise to my knees and turn toward the muffled sounds outside the dome. Our soldiers, the Fallen Paradigm’s soldiers, had King, Nero, Valdus, and the few soldiers of King’s left that didn’t lay sprawled on the ground in puddles of blood on their knees with hands on their heads. Ryder, Julius, Cecilia, and Gaia ran toward me while John Baker and Ajax held my captors at gunpoint. Valdus and Nero made a motion to strike, and I cried out to them, but my reaction wasn’t fast enough. Those running in my direction turned in just enough time to see the two men strike, grab King with lightning quickness, and run toward safety. Ajax and Baker rose to their feet, beginning to take off after them.

  “No, let them go! We have to get Mila out of here!” Ryder shouted at them.

  My eyes shot to Gaia, who was the first to reach me. She dropped her gun, fell to her knees before me, and placed her hands on the glass, which was already beginning to warm with my energy. Her palms began to blister, but she didn’t back away. She stayed right there with me, tears in her eyes as another shock ran through me, clearly visible in a wave of blue electricity that ran from my head down to my toes and into the floor along the metal rods.

  “Mila, hold on. We’re going to get you out!” she yelled over the noise of the machine.

  All I could do was nod. Another agonizing shock moved through me. I cried out, and my back arched involuntarily with the voltage, my fingers clenching and unclenching as if they were attempting to dig into the glass itself. My head fell forward when it ebbed away, but I felt another building within my body, my eyes glowing even brighter in my reflected image. Gaia was blurry, and I couldn’t tell if it was because of the assault on my body or the water that ran between us.

  Ryder sank to his knees beside her, placing his hands on the glass as well. He didn’t even flinch from the heat when the water inside began to bubble and boil between the layers of glass.

  “Mila, baby, look at me! Look at me!” Ryder cried out.

  My eyes met his, and just as they did, another wave rushed throughout my body. Screaming, I threw my head back and closed my hands into fists. It passed again. I beat on the glass with my fists, hoping I could somehow break it with sheer force of will.

  “How do we shut the damn thing off, Baker?” Julius shouted.

  “It’s too late. We have to get her out of there. It’s the only way now according to all the documents,” John roared over the deafening buzz.

  All the while, Gaia, and Ryder watched as I writhed in agony as wave after wave crashed into me, taking all the energy that I had until there would be nothing left but an empty, dead shell of what used to be a human being.

  “Get out of here!” I screamed before another surge could take hold.

  My jaw clenched down hard, causing my teeth to grind, as pure white-hot agony set my nerves on fire. I was a raw nerve ending that only felt a deep, resonating pain that reached down into my soul like the hand of God.

  I could barely see everyone past the boiling water and the haze of pain, but I saw enough. Gaia and Ryder’s faces were twisted in grief, tears streaming down their cheeks. They couldn’t do anything. They could just watch my suffering and hope they could put a stop to it. Everyone scrambled to stop the machine, looking everywhere they could around the panel Doctor Tee had been working on when I originally came in. I beat my fist on the glass again, smearing it with sweat tinged with blood. Iron hit my tongue, and I fought the urge to spit it out onto the floor. Slamming my fist against the glass again, I cried and shouted to the heavens, wishing for the torture to cease. Energy buzzed under the electrodes, zapping through my brain and down my entire nervous system with such speed and ferocity my heart skipped a beat trying to keep up.

  “Go,” I sobbed, shouting at the top of my lungs to make certain I could be heard.

  Pressure began to build inside my skull again, signaling another pass of voltage. I wasn’t certain how much more I could take, and each passing second was more excruciating than the last.

  “No, we’re not leaving,” Gaia yelled in reply.

  “Not without you, you hear me?” Ryder shouted. He stared at me, making certain our eyes met.

  I saw the resilience in them, and I knew none of them would be leaving no matter what I said. Even if it meant they died along with me. I glanced at Gaia and spotted Julius rushing around with Ajax and John Baker around them, and I knew those were some of the truest words I would ever hear in whatever remained of my life.

  “I d…” my words were cut off by the shudder-inducing rampage that racked me with electricity.

  This time, it felt more like a mixture of one of the seizures I’d had on the plane, and the barrage of the energy that continued to pass through me and into the reactor with such violence I felt like whatever made me me could shake free of its skin at any moment. Panic laced the air as my vision swam and darkened for a moment, the smell of ozone permeating my nostrils.

  Gaia’s screams pierced the atmosphere, and Ryder cried out, shouts erupting even more fervently now. My vision faded back and what I saw in the glass shocked me. My eyes glowed an even more vibrant blue that had spread throughout my body in a network that outlined my entire nervous system in startling detail. Every nerve fiber was perfectly visible. The reactor pulsated behind me and whirred loudly, humming so noisily that I swore I could hear it in my bad ear.

  “Back up. I’m going to blow this thing apart!” Baker yelled, pushing everyone away from the dome.

  His hands came around Gaia and Ryder’s arms, jerking them away. He fought him but still backed away even though they didn’t want to leave me.

  “You’re going to want to hide behind something,” he yelled again. “Now!” Kneeling in front of the glass, his deep brown eyes met mine, and he opened his mouth to speak, “Mila, I’m going to need you to get b
ack if you can. I know it hurts.”

  My head jerked back and forth. My entire body shook, and my legs felt weak. I couldn’t stand without falling, that much I was certain.

  “I…I…c…. can’t,” I stammered past the shivering.

  His hand rested just on the other side of mine as if to comfort me somehow, which I appreciated when the pressure began to build inside me once more.

  “I’m going to need you to try. Can you try for me?” he beseeched.

  My voice shook violently as I answered, “I’ll try,” with a nod that didn’t feel like a nod.

  Placing both hands on the glass, I struggled to rise to my feet with a grunt of effort. My legs wobbled, and I fell back down to my knees, sobbing so hard that my shoulders shook. Every part of me was on fire, each passing second much closer to another surge of energy that could possibly damn near kill me. My mind was already in a thick fog, and I knew it would be coming soon. I had to stand up. I had to get out if it meant saving myself and everyone in Washington D.C.

  “Come on, Mila. One more time. You can do it,” John assured me, supportive in my effort.

  I clenched my teeth and poured every ounce of strength I had left into one swift motion, rising to my feet even though my legs nearly gave out. My breathing picked up, and my heart skipped another beat, my vision blacking out for all of a second before the image of my brilliant surroundings shifted back into focus. The soles of my feet were slick on the smooth floor, but I kept my footing with will-power alone.

  Before my vision turned black again, I saw John run toward the panel while everyone else hid as best they could behind whatever they could find. Pressure continued to press on my skull, almost as if I was about to explode, and pure voltage ran through my entire body – blazing hot and excruciating beyond words. Every muscle spasmed and my mouth opened, producing a feral cry.