by Melissa West
He swallows hard as he looks up at me. “A while.”
My heart sinks into my stomach. “I don’t have a while. Zeus is planning his attack right now. I’ll be lucky to survive the next few weeks.”
Emmy cups my face with her hands. “You strong, child, remember that. Where you place your mind, greatness will follow. Have faith. We do.”
Chapter 13
I make my way to the Vortex, my mind so distracted that I don’t notice Madison calling my name until she is practically shouting in my face.
“Hey, are you all right?” she asks, running to catch up with me.
I shake my head to focus. “Yeah, just tired. How are you?”
“Good. You missed training yesterday. Were you sick?”
I open the door and hold it for Madison to go ahead of me. “No, Zeus requested to see me.”
She gasps. “Zeus, wow. What did you do?”
I balance my gaze on her, wishing I could tell her the truth. So far, Madison is the only Ancient to talk to me beyond Vill and Jackson. I hate to lie to the only friend I have here so far, but telling her will do no good. “He wanted to make sure I was in RES training as he requested.”
She looks puzzled. “Why wouldn’t he just ask J.C.?”
I open my mouth to spit out another lie, when Jackson walks through the doors with Mackenzie. He holds the double doors for her, and she smirks my way. No doubt her attempt to remind me that I am nothing here. As though I need that reminder.
“Do you know Kenzie?” Madison asks in awe.
“Not really. I—”
“Let’s go!” Jackson shouts at us from the door. “Training is about to begin, and you’re out here gossiping. Focus!”
Madison rushes through the doors, her face bright red. I glare at him as I slip past him and into my spot in the lineup. That was so unnecessary. I stare forward, unwilling to look at him.
“Today, we will continue reflex training. Each of you will pair up and practice on each other. We will walk the floor and correct as needed. Get started!”
I glance around for Madison, who thankfully waves me over, because I have no idea what we’re supposed to get started doing.
She walks to a table against the wall, grabs a pair of blindfolds, and passes one to me. “We take turns.”
“Doing what?”
“One gets blindfolded and the other attacks. The goal is to use your other senses to defend yourself.”
Mackenzie walks up before I can respond, clearly enjoying herself. “Is there a problem?”
“No, no problem.” I slip the blindfold over my eyes, wishing I could do this without her or Jackson in the room.
“Well go ahead then,” Mackenzie says.
Madison hesitates. I can hear her breathing grow heavy. She doesn’t want to hit me, but even she must know that Mackenzie doesn’t take well to weakness. I hear her draw in a long breath and then she throws punch after punch. I block the first few, but she’s an Ancient and even though I’m trained, I’m new to this, and she’s faster. Her fist connects with my jaw, and I stumble back, narrowly keeping myself from falling down. I shake my head to try to clear the pain and step back up. “Nice job,” I say.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t—”
“What are you apologizing for?” Jackson says. “Hit again.”
Madison waits.
“I said, hit again.”
I grit my teeth to keep myself from screaming at him. I know he’s only doing his job, that he can’t show favoritism, but this is absurd, as though he’s intentionally being harder on me just to prove a point.
Madison pulls back to punch, but my anger has taken over now. I grab her fist and flip her around, shoving her hard to the cement ground, harder than I intended. She gets up slowly, and I realize in my haste, I might have actually hurt her. “I think it’s my turn now,” she says, and I can tell she wants them to leave as badly as I do.
I don’t take off my blindfold. “Fine, switch, but I don’t need to remove my blindfold. I can do this with my eyes closed, in the dark, with twice as many coming at me. You know that.” I spit the words out at Jackson before I can stop myself.
Jackson steps up to me, rage radiating off him. “Your arrogance is going to get you killed.”
I lift my head. “Don’t belive me? Then you go against me.”
A hush settles over the room, and I realize the others have stopped fighting, that they’re all watching us. I hear Jackson removing his jacket. “As you wish.”
I focus all my energy on Jackson, on his breathing, on the smell of his skin. I give everything I have over to my senses, listening, feeling, so when he throws the first punch, I’m ready. He hits again and again, me deflecting each hit or spiraling out of the way. We go on this way for a few minutes, my breathing growing heavier, then when I think he’s about to stop and I momentarily drop my guard, he sweeps my feet out from under me and I fall hard, my head cracking against the cement. I try to get up, but the pain is overwhelming. I lay my head back down and give xylem a chance to heal me, though I know it will take longer with me being only half Ancient. Several seconds pass before the pain begins to recede to a dull ache and I sit up, pulling the blindfold from my eyes.
Jackson regards me, then turns to address the group. “There is no room for arrogance here. Is that understood? Arrogance yields mistakes and mistakes will get you killed. See this as a lesson to you.” And then he leaves the room without another word.
I follow after him, ignoring Madison’s call for me to stop, and find him outside, pacing by the bridge.
“What was that?” I ask, seething.
“I could ask you the same thing.”
“You just made me look like an idiot. Now they think I’m a weak fighter.”
He shakes his head. “Now they think you’re the toughest fighter in the room. How long do you think the rest of them would stand against me? Not a quarter of as long as you did. I just did you a favor.”
“I don’t need favors. I can fight. You know that. I don’t need you using me to make a point to the others.”
Some of the other Ancients have come outside now, and Jackson glances up, clearly aggravated. “This conversation is over.”
I turn away from him and slam the door to the Vortex, not stopping until I’m down the spiral steps and pounding my way to Cybil’s room. I’m tired of this, tired of Jackson’s split personalties and Cybil pretending she’s insane. I want the people I know to act like the people I know, so I can focus on what I have to do, because right now, I need solidity in my life. I need support.
I close the curtain and scrutinize the room, taking in every angle, and while I can’t physically see any cameras, I know they’re there. Zeus would never allow the humans to go unwatched. Which makes what I’m about to do all that much riskier.
I slide my chair roughly across the floor so I’m directly beside Cybil. Like before, she’s sitting with her legs crossed on the bed, staring out into the room as though she’s blind. I hesitate, and then sit down on the bed across from her. I mimic her pose so she’s forced to look at me, though her eyes are not at all focused on me—or anything else.
I mouth the words, “Cybil. We are running out of time.” And then wait for a reaction, which doesn’t come. I scoot closer to her until our knees touch. “Cybil,” I say out loud this time. “I know what to do, but I need your help.” Still, nothing. I draw a long breath and crack each of my knuckles, one after another like I do when I’m in deep thought.
I have no choice. Zeus walks around as though everything is in perfect order. Emmy appears more nervous with each visit. And I’m no closer to learning anything from Lawrence. This has to start and it has to start today. I slip a tiny knife out from inside my pocket. The knives here have stone hilts and they don’t retract the way ours do back home, but they’re still sharp. It’ll do what I need it to do today.
I take Cybil’s hand and press the point into her skin, watching for a reaction. Nothing. Blast, Cybil, don�
��t make me do this! “I know you’re in there. I know it. I can feel your thoughts as though they are my own. You’re too much of a soldier, Cybil, to go down like this. I know you. And I hope you’ll forgive me for what I have to do.” And then I stab the knife into her hand, cutting straight through so the knife tip comes out on the other side of her outstretched palm.
She screams and flails around, but she doesn’t do what I thought she would do—ask me if I’m crazy or call me out or something that says she is still the Cybil I know. I start to worry that maybe she really is gone, when a set of guards storms into the room. They take in Cybil’s hand, the knife still wedged through it, and then both are on me. The larger of the two—a male Logean who has at least a foot and a half on me and well over one hundred pounds—tosses me up against the wall. Jackson isn’t here to order them to stop and something tells me they were waiting for this moment to prove to me that I’m no better than the rest of the humans here. The guard’s hand wraps around my neck and he holds me against the wall in a death grip. I fight against him, kicking and clawing. My air supply is dwindling fast. Tiny stars flash across my vision. I put forth one more solid kick, but it’s no use.
My body feels heavy, my head aches, and then I hear a voice beside the guard. “Drop her now, animal, or I click and your brains splatter across your buddy over there.” The guard drops me to the ground and I suck in breath after breath, my eyes roaming up to see Cybil with a gun pointed at the guard who had me pinned to the wall, the other guard passed out on the floor.
I smile up at her despite the pain in my neck and head. “Nice to have you back.”
Chapter 14
“You have to be the most stubborn person in existence. You realize that, right?” Cybil follows me out of her room so a pair of Logeans can clean up after the mess we made. Thankfully, both guards appear to be in working order now—or at least they will be. Cybil rubs the hand I stabbed, now tightly wrapped in those purification bandages the healers use. “Was it really necessary that you stab me? Couldn’t you have just told me what you were going to do?”
I crack my neck, torn between excitement that I have Cybil here with me and frustration that she’s reprimanding me. “What was I supposed to do? You weren’t caving. Law is acting all weird. Zeus is asking about some entrance. I’m—”
Cybil abruptly grabs my arm, silencing me and I turn to see two guards marching down the hall, Zeus close behind.
“Ah,” Zeus says, clasping his hands in front of him. “So wonderful to see that your health has improved, Cybil. You may join us in our discussion.” He claps twice to call attention to himself. “Attention! Attention!” A few moments pass, and then one by one people step out of their rooms and into the spacious hallway.
They look uneasily at Zeus as though he could cause them to burst to flames just by looking at them. The fear he has evoked in these people is enough to make me wish I could take out Zeus, right here, right now. And then as soon as the thought completes in my mind, Zeus’s head snaps toward me, his lips pinched together tightly. “Now, now,” he says, his voice low but direct. Then he turns back to the crowd, though several of them continue to stare at me with curiosity.
“Today, you will all embark upon a new journey here in Triad. We have nursed you to health. Most are now strong and capable. It is time that you take your rightful posts in our societal system.”
“What are you saying?” a man calls out, and it’s as though his words slapped Zeus in the face.
Zeus lowers his head, his hands connected behind his back. “If there is one thing that I wish could be ingrained in your feeble minds, it is that of manners and respect.” His head jerks and he blurts, “Respect: a feeling of deep admiration for someone or something.” He eyes one of the guards and in a flash, the guard is in front of the man and then the man is limp on the ground.
“Make no mistake,” Zeus says to the man cowering below him. “I will be respected.”
He slowly walks down the center aisle, tsking and mumbling to himself as though he were two people trapped inside the same body.
He moves his hands back and forth, arguing with himself, and I realize that he is so much worse than I ever could have imagined. Strict, I can handle, even mean, I can handle, but outright crazy is another level of evil. Crazy does not understand limitations because a truly insane person who errs on the side of enjoying evil doings does not have a conscience to slow him or her down.
With Zeus, we have no idea what he will do next because he himself likely doesn’t know. What will set him off, what will calm him down, could be the same thing depending upon the day and his mental stability at that moment. Watching him argue with himself in hushed tones, his back to us, is like watching a bomb ticking toward its explosion, knowing you have no way of predicting when it will go and having no way of stopping it.
I glance sideways at Cybil, who looks as freaked out by the whole thing as I do. Then my gaze travels to the rest of the humans. A few have backed into their rooms, trying to hide from the potential madness. Others stare, mouth gaped, eyes wide.
Zeus stops at the top of the steps, turns around, and then the doors behind him open and ten or more RESs march through the doors, down the steps, and face the humans. One pulls out a tablet and addresses the crowd. “If your name is called, step forward.” He calls out names, one after another, men and women, then he says, “Cybil Lee,” and I turn, wide-eyed to Cybil.
“What is this?” I whisper.
She hesitates, glancing at the men and women who have already taken their place with the RESs. “They’re Operatives…all of them.”
“Are you sure? How do you know?”
Her voice is rich with worry. “We keep tabs on all Ops, even the ones stationed outside of Sydia. Your dad made sure I knew them all by name. They’re Operatives, Ari, I’m sure of it.” Her name is called again, and she starts for the group, giving me one more nervous glance as she’s sorted into a line.
The last name is called, and Zeus claps his hands again. “Congratulations, those of you called will join a specialized division of the RESs. The rest of you,” he says, turning to face the other humans, who are all out of there rooms now—some men, some women, others children, “will depend upon your government to determine whether you live or whether you die.”
“What?” I scream, stepping toward him.
Zeus’s eyes flash. “I have issued an ultimatum to the leaders of Earth. We cannot maintain life on Loge. To show them how seriously we take this matter, we will publicly kill one human each day until they agree to coexist and agree to make me one of the world-wide leaders. The death will be broadcast randomly to all T-screens on Earth. They have until tomorrow morning to make their decision. That is all.” He leaves before I can take another step forward. Fear and shock ground me to the spot. He can’t do this. I won’t let him do this.
The RES start for the doors, pushing the Operatives they selected to go with them. Cybil’s eyes dart back to me and I shake my head, as completely in shock as she must be.
I need to call home. Now.
…
I go immediately back to my room, eager to tell Jackson what happened. I search the house, even going out back to the shower, but he’s nowhere to be found. Then I slip into our room and find him asleep on the bed.
I close the door quietly behind me and edge near. He’s lying on his stomach, sprawled out across most of the bed, one hand tucked under a pillow, the other extended as though to cover an invisible person beside him. His pants hang low on his hips and one of the legs is kicked up to his knee. His T-shirt is a wrinkled mess across his smooth, toned back, exposing a sliver of skin just above his pants. He looks so peaceful, more peaceful than I’ve ever seen him. I go over to the edge of the bed and sit down beside him, lost in the easy rhythm of his breathing. I should wake him—he would want me to wake him—but I don’t.
My eyes trail over his messy hair, across his closed eyelids, to his parted lips and it’s as though I’m back in
Sydia, kissing him with recklessness in my room, wishing more than anything that all the problems would go away so I could just enjoy that moment—for at least a moment. Now…it all feels complicated. My heart, my body, every nerve and pulsing vein wants him.
I can’t deny it, almost like an invisible force pulling me to him. And it’s always been that way. The moment I learned Jackson was training to become an Operative, I became secretly fixated on him. I watched the way he moved and carried himself as though he were the one training to become the next commander, not me. But even though I feel this incredible force between us, I can’t make my mind move past the lie. I’ve been here for weeks, learned more about him than I ever knew on Earth, but it still doesn’t feel like much.
I know he cares about his grandmother above anyone else. I know he hates Zeus, yet on some level also respects him. I know he is a very skilled fighter and that he finds pride in knowing he’s stronger and faster than most. I know his friends adore him, and I know they are very loyal to him. But beyond those things, what do I know? I used to think Jackson hid his true thoughts to be mysterious, but now I think he does it because he’s seen and experienced things worse than most people and he’s afraid to let on just how jacked up he might be inside.
The thought makes me so sad for him that it takes all of me not to lay down, wrap my arms around him, and promise to never let go. My eyes flash back up to make sure he’s still soundly asleep, and then move down his broad shoulders, over the contours of his back, before finding the sliver of skin again. I’ve seen him with his shirt off, but this is different—we are different—and I shouldn’t be looking at him this way, especially without him knowing, yet I can’t take my eyes away.