The League

by Camille Picott

  All four of my cuffs beep. I crash to the floor. My wrists and ankles burn. As I push myself onto my hands and knees, a shock of electrical current strikes out from the cuffs. I scream and drop back to the floor, writhing. The current snaps off, but it takes a long moment for the agony to subside.

  When the pain clears, I hear Taro shouting my name. I flop onto my back, trying to catch my breath. It occurs to me that I should leap at one of these guys, try to fight my way free, but my entire body feels like rubber.

  One Leaguer separates himself from group. He’s the only one with a different design on his SmartPlastic mask: a blue sea serpent that twines up his right cheek and across his forehead.

  The sight of that mask sends a cold shock through me. My hands begin to shake.

  The man behind that mask smiled after he executed the Stanford girl. He smiled after he dropped bombs on refugee camps and blew up college dorms full of kids.

  The shaking spreads to my legs. My heart pounds. I am living my worst nightmare, breathing my greatest fear.

  “You may call me Imugi,” the man says, speaking with his familiar Asian accent. The only part of his face that moves is his mouth. The SmartPlastic mask conceals all expression. “Mine is the only voice on this ship that matters. You are both wearing electromagnetic handcuffs, a lovely new product from your rivals at Anderson Arms.”

  There’s a beep and a thud. Taro lands next to me on the floor. He doesn’t even have time to lift his head before electrical currents shoot through him. He arches up against the floor, mouth open in a silent scream. I watch helplessly, fighting tears. When the current shuts off, he collapses, gasping. I reach out and grasp his hand.

  “I expect good behavior from both of you,” Imugi says.

  I nod weakly. Taro grunts.

  “Get them up.”

  We’re hauled to our feet, our hands ripped apart. I stumble a few steps, still weak from the shock treatment. Two soldiers flank me and force my feet forward.

  We’re led into the warren of the ship, through twisting steel hallways with doors and walls covered in flaking beige paint. The lightbulbs stutter in their sockets, casting a shuddering luminescence. I try to take note of our path, but after ten minutes or so I’m completely turned around. Everything looks the same. The only thing I can be sure of is that we’re going down, deep into the bowels of the ship with Imugi.

  • • •

  We descend a staircase, and instead of entering another hallway, I find myself looking down into a large brightly lit room. In the middle of it, surrounded by half a dozen soldiers, stand a teenage girl and boy.

  It takes me a moment to recognize the tall girl with short red hair and the lanky boy with sandy locks concealing his eyes. My first look at Hank and Billy in the real-world makes my heart drop. I wish they’d gotten away.

  Hands shove us into the room. The soldiers step aside so we can be herded into the center. I get a better look at my friends. Both wear black Global jumpsuits. Hank’s jumpsuit is ripped and covered with dirt. Her eyes are puffy and red. Billy’s face is a mass of purple bruises. He has a wide-eyed look of shock. They stand very close together, holding hands. Both have cuffs around their wrists and ankles.

  Beyond them, just over the tops of their ears, is the bright-gold disc of a media drone. It makes a slow circuit around the room, red and blue lights blinking.

  The red light means it’s on and recording.

  The blue light means that everything happening here is streaming as a live video feed into Vex.

  13

  The Team

  I stare at the Vex camera, horror ringing my gut.

  This is it. Hank, Billy, Taro, and I are all going to be executed. Our brains are going to be shot out of our skulls. Our murders will be broadcast across America for all to see. All my preparation and here I am: a helpless smart girl in the hands of the League.

  “Miss Hom.”

  I flinch at Imugi’s voice but force myself to turn toward him. Whatever he’s got in store for us, I’ve got to hang on to my dignity as long as possible.

  “This is your team.” Imugi gestures to Hank and Billy.

  “Huh?” I blink at him, confused.

  “This is your team,” Imugi says again. “You will lead them in all assigned tasks.”

  Does this mean we’re not going to be executed? I try to keep my voice neutral. “What kind of tasks?”

  “That remains to be seen. Most likely, it will involve genetic engineering or weapons development.”

  “What?” My mouth falls open. “How am I supposed to do that?”

  “By employing that brilliant mind of yours, of course.”

  “Just because my dad is a genius doesn’t mean I am.” I feel like I’m in a very small box, with all four walls collapsing in on me.

  “I beg to differ.” Imugi pulls a computer tablet from the back pocket of his uniform. “You are the only student at Global Arms who scored one hundred percent on the entrance exam.”

  I hear audible gasps from Hank and Billy. Taro’s eyes widen. I feel completely exposed.

  “My dad hired some hackers to fake the score,” I say weakly. “No one can score one hundred percent. It’s impossible.”

  “Is it?” Imugi flicks a finger. Six soldiers descend on Taro with the ferocity of an avalanche. They pin him to the ground.

  “Taro!” I lunge toward him. As I do, the cuffs are activated. I fly across the room and smack into the wall, my head rebounding off the surface. Pain shoots through me.

  Taro strains under the men, veins standing out on his hands and neck. He eyes lock with mine.

  I’m released from the wall. I crash to the floor and scramble into a crouch, eyes swinging wildly from Taro to Imugi and back again.

  Imugi holds out the tablet. I make no move toward it.

  “You are a math prodigy,” Imugi says. “Perhaps the most gifted mathematician of the century.”

  “I’m not,” I whisper.

  Imugi ignores me. “I’ve selected a problem for you. Solve it and save your friend.”

  “What?”

  “I dislike repeating myself.” Imugi flicks a hand.

  There’s a flash of steel. It moves so fast I can barely track its movement. There’s a snick, and Taro’s left pinkie flies across the floor.

  Hank starts screaming, a long shrill sound that seems to have no end. Taro is silent, but he bucks against the pain. His muscles bulge, his eyes seem about to pop out of his sockets, but he doesn’t cry out. The Leaguers struggle to keep him down as he strains against them. Hank collapses onto Billy, muffling her tears against his shoulder.

  They cut off his finger. The realization comes sluggishly, a monster rising slowly out of a mud pit. They cut off his finger.

  Imugi wordlessly extends the tablet to me. The threat of the knife hangs over Taro’s hand. I snatch the tablet. On the display is a problem using three different modes of heat transfer with non-homogeneous boundary conditions thrown in. I’m so freaked out I can hardly focus on the numbers.

  “You’re taking too long,” Imugi says. “Shall I cut another?”

  “No! Just give me a second.” I close my eyes. The problem blazes on the back of my eyelids. I slide the numbers around in my head, and the problem unfurls like a flower in time-lapse video.

  My eyes snap open. Everyone stares at me. Taro is pale and panting, looking like he might pass out.

  “Six hundred seventy-three point four seconds,” I say. “The answer is six hundred seventy-three point four seconds.”

  Hank looks woozy, but I can’t tell if it’s from the violence or the fact that I mentally calculated the problem in less than ten seconds. Billy’s wide eyes are glued on Hank.

  “Are you sure about that?” Imugi plucks the tablet from my hand.

  Doubt slithers through my belly. I can still see the original problem in my head. I whip through it a second time, just to make sure.

  “Positive,” I say.

  Imugi smiles, an exp
ression that turns up the corners of the plastic around his mouth. The rest of his face is eerily motionless.

  “Very good,” he says. “I am glad to see you are living up to our expectations. I hope, for your friend’s sake, that we won’t need another demonstration of your brilliance. It would not take much effort to remove the rest of his fingers.”

  Feeling as though I’ve been whipped with a crowbar—to say nothing of what’s been done to Taro—I say, “No, Imugi.”

  His smile widens. “Very good. Now, tell me, who are these people?” He gestures to Hank and Billy.

  “My team,” I whisper.

  “I can’t hear you.”

  I take a deep breath to control my shaking voice. “My team.”

  “That’s right. Your team.”

  I sneak a glance at Taro. Pain creases the skin around his eyes, but he’s alert under the pile of Leaguers.

  Imugi faces the drone. “Ladies and gentlemen,” he says, “allow me to introduce three star students from Global Arms’s elite Virtual High School. Their team leader is Sulan Hom, daughter of the renowned Dr. Hom. As you can see, she is a gifted mathematician in her own right.

  “This next girl is Henrietta Simmons, a skilled hacker. She has successfully hacked such constructs as the Cyclone and the Dirigible. She holds the record for the fastest hack of the Medusa.”

  Constructs are obstacle courses built by hackers, for hackers. The Medusa is the most infamous; only a handful of hackers have ever beat it.

  “The boy is Billy Long,” Imugi continues. “He designs Touch programs when he’s not in school. His Vex alias is Uncle Zed. He’s the world’s most infamous Touch programmer. His black-market profits are . . . impressive.”

  I goggle. Billy is Uncle Zed? The skinny boy in front of me looks like he wants to crawl in a hole and die. I never stopped to wonder at the casual way he gave me free black tech. It all makes sense now. From the look on Hank’s face, she wasn’t aware of his secret identity, either.

  “As you can see,” Imugi says to the drone, “I have assembled a world-class team. It took minds like theirs to come up with the nuclear bomb. Each of these children, if well cared for, will live for at least another sixty years. Who can say what they will create in that time? This team can put you on the path to power. They are a long-term investment.”

  I exchange looks of horror with Hank and Billy. What is going on?

  “As I’ve demonstrated,” Imugi says, “this team can be easily guided when presented with the right motivation. I will throw in the merc boy as a bonus. He should provide years of motivation if you’re careful.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, an auction lot like this only comes along once in a lifetime. The auction will take place in Vex at a soon-to-be-revealed location. Opening bid is fifty million. Bidding starts tomorrow evening at eighteen hundred hours, Pacific Time.”

  14

  Riska

  I am not okay. We’re about to be sold on the black market like high-end cattle. Nothing is even close to okay.

  Imugi pulls a small remote control out of his pocket and presses a button. The blue light on the media drone turns off, which means the public show is over. The red light remains on.

  “You all did very well tonight,” Imugi says to us. “By now, the entire world knows the Anti-American League has stolen four of America’s children and intends to sell them into slavery. Not a single parent in your country will sleep well tonight.”

  “Is that your grand scheme?” Hank spits, fear bright in her voice. “To throw America into a state of insomnia?”

  I flinch. For once in her life, could Hank put a filter between her brain and her mouth?

  Imugi takes a step toward her. “I thought a clever girl like you would have a bit more imagination than that.” His words roll out like silk.

  Hank wilts visibly with each syllable. She looks like she wants to turn and run, except there’s nowhere to go. Billy wraps his arms around her. Imugi is three steps away from them.

  “I’m the imaginative one.” I put every ounce of insolence I can muster into those words, hoping to draw Imugi’s attention from Hank.

  My ploy works a little too well. Imugi swivels toward me, dark eyes fixing on me like bullets. I force myself to hold my ground. Sweat breaks out along my spine and armpits.

  “Oh, I’m well aware of your imagination,” Imugi says. “I know everything about you, Short Stuff.”

  “Don’t call me that.” The words come out before I can stop them; anger infuses my terror.

  “I’ll call you anything I want.” Imugi is so close I can smell his sweat.

  Periphery movement catches my attention—Taro, still pinned to the floor, shakes his head at me.

  “You were saying?” Imugi asks.

  “Nothing.” I force my eyes to the floor.

  “I thought so.” He chuckles. “Don’t worry. Your Vex jaunts into the merc club aren’t anything I plan to highlight at tomorrow’s auction. You are going to make the League very wealthy.”

  He turns away. I struggle to hide my relief, to keep my face composed.

  “Get the merc boy bandaged up,” Imugi says. “Make sure his hand doesn’t get infected. Secure the rest of the team.” He strides up the stairs and out of the room without a backward glance.

  The Leaguers move like well-oiled gears. Battered metal cots are wheeled in. Our wrists and ankles are secured with the cuffs to metal rails along the top and bottom of the cots. Our beds are lined up in a row. Taro and I are on the ends, with Hank closest to me and Billy next to her.

  Disinfectant and gauze is mechanically administered to Taro. All lights except one are shut off. Navy-blue jumpsuits file out.

  We’re alone except for the media drone, which makes lazy circles over us. The blinking red light tells me it’s still recording. It may not be streaming into Vex, but I have no doubt League soldiers are monitoring our every word.

  • • •

  There’s so much to say, but silence squats on us like an overweight toad. The drone hums overhead.

  “Sulan!” Hank whispers.

  I turn my head to look at her. She motions with her eyes to the far corner of the room. I raise my head and squint into the darkness.

  At first I don’t see anything. As my eyes adjust, I see the barest outline of a black wing. A pair of feline eyes catch the light, twin mirrors looking directly at me.

  My breath catches in my throat. I drop my head back onto my pillow, struggling to control my expression. I can’t let the League see hope on my face.

  Riska. He’s here.

  How did he get free? How did he get here—wherever here is—and how did he find the very room where I’m being held? It doesn’t make sense.

  “What is that thing?” Hank says, her voice barely a whisper.

  “Um, my pet.” The answer sounds lame, even to my ears, but I don’t know what else to say. I certainly can’t explain his presence.

  Riska eases out of the shadows, wings silent against the air. His muscles bunch as he prepares to attack. He zips forward and smacks into the drone, sending it flying across the room. It collides with the wall over Hank’s head with a crack. I twist my head and catch a final glimpse of it. The golden disc, scrunched from the impact, slides to the floor. Both lights are dark.

  Riska lands on my chest, purring. He kneads with his claws and rubs his head against my chin. I drop a quick kiss onto his fur before raising my head to better see my companions.

  “We don’t have much time,” I say. “Riska’s bought us a few minutes. We need a plan. Any ideas?”

  “What is that thing?” Hank asks again.

  I shake my head. “I’ll explain later. Any ideas on how we’re going to escape?”

  Silence.

  Billy clears his throat. “Anyone familiar with Smoke’s Heist of Black Vault?”

  “That’s just a myth,” Hank says. “No one could hack into Black Vault in such a short amount of time, not even Smoke. Even if he did, Black Vault booby
-traps its tech against theft. Smoke’s avatar would have been vaporized the minute he touched any of the products.”

  “What’s the Heist of Black Vault?” I ask.

  “A hacker legend,” Hank says. “A cyberthief named Smoke hacked into NorAm Bank and wired out a big chunk of change. NorAm cybermercs came after him, trying to trace the wire and get the money back.”

  “Black Vault sells Vex security packages,” Billy says. “They’re top of the line. Most people can’t afford them.”

  “Supposedly,” Hank says, “Smoke led the cybermercs to Black Vault. In less than ten seconds, he hacked into Black Vault, stole one of the nastier security programs, and set it loose on the cybermercs. He turned the mercs to pixel dust and got away with millions. It’s the hack all hackers talk about: breaking into a site of a security thug like Black Vault.”

  “Can someone tell me how this is important to our current situation?” Taro asks, speaking for the first time since he lost his finger. His voice is hoarse. My chest tightens at the thought of the pain he must be in—pain I am directly responsible for.

  “The point is that we may go into Vex defenseless, but we don’t have to remain defenseless,” Billy says.

  There’s an instant change in the room. Hank goes very still on her cot. All skepticism leeches out of me.

  “Go on,” Taro says.

  “Well,” Billy says, “let’s say a person has, ah, an uncle with severe post-traumatic stress disorder. That person’s paranoid uncle might make him build booby traps in Vex.”

  “Booby traps in Vex? What sort of booby traps?” Taro asks.

  “Nasty ones made from Touch.”

  Booby traps designed from Touch. My skin tingles. The possibilities are limitless in the hands of the right designer—in the hands of someone like Uncle Zed. For the first time since being captured, I indulge in a few seconds of hope.