by Mary Weber
“To use the IC program we used for this week’s Games.”
His gaze widened. “Are we creating a totally alternate reality? We don’t have time.”
Alis frowned. “You guys can do that?”
“Considering it’s a giant electrofusion comp—technically we should be able to run it like one. If we have the right access. Be right back.” She ran to her room and changed back into her slim-suit. When she returned, Heller had read her mind—he was wearing his as well. And Miguel and Claudius had their bags over their shoulders.
“Everyone have the earcoms Miguel gave us?” When they nodded and clicked them on, Sofi pulled on a pair of gloves and slammed her comp closed. She handed it to Heller, who put it in his bag with his own.
She voiced her text. “Ranger, how’s that going on your end?”
“Perfect. I’m in thanks to whoever Vic is,” Sofi read out loud.
“Vic’s my lady AI,” Claudius said. “Hands off.” He leaned in. “And, Vic, what say when I get back, you and I do a proper date?”
Vic paused and blinked. Then batted both eyes and blew him a kiss.
Sofi could only imagine him seated across from her holohead at a pricey restaurant. Eating enough for both of them. She smirked and decided she rather liked the idea, before she grabbed her handscreen and turned up Heller’s and her suits until they were ghosts again.
“Whoa,” Alis said.
“Bien,” Miguel added.
Sofi lifted the planet diagram off her screen and pulled it into a holo. And began turning it with her hands. “Okay, Ranger, try running the Delonese code filter over the FanFight data. And, Vic, can you use the suit data to match the shuttles on a larger scale?”
Vic spoke up. “Already done. When do you want me to ghost them?”
“As soon as we’ve accessed the kids. Then pull both out and bring them to the coordinates I’m sending you now.
“Heller,” she added. “Can you see enough to code in a few distractions without flagging security?”
“I’m on it.” He glanced up with a grin. “Creating replicas of you all as we speak. I’ll leave them in this room for the time being and have another set light up down a back hall once these get found.”
She turned to Danya. “How about your people? What should we know?”
“They won’t all be after us. Only the peacekeepers specifically assigned at given times. In that way, they are comfortable keeping to themselves and allowing the protectors to do the dirty work.”
Sofi nodded to her. “I’d normally take issue with that, but today it works in our favor.”
Miguel’s hand touched her back. “Sof, we need to go.”
Right. She inhaled. And tipped her head to the group. “Ready?”
Then touched her screen and turned a scrapp song on low in their earcoms.
Miguel looked amused and opened the door just as the bass dropped.
44
MIGUEL
THE AFTERNOON FOG CRASHED OVER THE COMPOUND LIKE A wave of perfect timing to cover everything in ice and shadow. So deep that Miguel could barely see his fingers. Or maybe it was that Vic had found a way to thinly stretch the invisible cloaking on Sofi’s and Heller’s suits to act as an almost-shield for the rest. If they stayed close enough. He reached out with his senses and set his hand against Sofi’s as they retraced Heller’s and her steps from earlier. Sofi didn’t react to his touch. Didn’t pull away.
He hoped she knew. Hoped she understood. He’d never been more in awe of her than he was at this moment.
“So far so good,” Claudius whispered. “No sirens.”
Miguel didn’t reply, even though everything in him yelled for them all to shut it. At least until they got someplace with a better visual.
The walk was short and within minutes they were through the door and inside an empty barrack. Sofi dropped Miguel’s hand and looked at her handscreen. Then pointed toward the wall. “It’s saying there’s a door here.” Miguel could barely see her near-invisible self as she strode over and felt around until her hand found the smooth edges of what was a scanner.
“Nice,” Claudius breathed.
“Bizarre,” Alis said.
“This way.” Sofi’s ghostly arm waved them into the metal elevator that looked identical to the one back at the Main Station.
Miguel peered at the security monitor in Heller’s hand. So far Vic seemed to be holding everything pieced together. He’d have to remember to give her a bonus.
Heller scanned the handheld over the access module and the door promptly shut. The next second the lift dropped so fast Miguel’s stomach lurched and Alis’s face turned yellow in the dim.
When the thing stopped its drop, it spun around and opened onto a ledge overlooking a giant, dark, complex system that really did look like a massive hive. A collective gasp went through the lift as the group froze. The place was literally buzzing with activity and noise. Thousands upon thousands of Delonese were moving and working and participating in a societal world he hadn’t even known existed until half an hour ago.
He peered closer. Fascinated.
Then frowned. The only aliens he saw were adults. No kids. He’d never thought to ask anyone, but he was suddenly curious. How long did they live? And how often did they procreate?
“Um,” Claudius breathed.
“Crud. Sorry, guys.” Heller scanned the monitor again and the door slid shut before the lift spun around and reopened on the opposite side. “That’s better.”
“Miguel?” Sofi murmured.
“On it.”
“Hey, Vic,” he said. “I think we’re about ready. Both ships will need to be prepped and waiting to move pronto.”
“Got it, man.”
“Sof, try your scanner,” Heller said. “Something’s frozen with this door.”
Miguel watched Sofi use her handheld on the door. Nada. “It has tighter security,” Danya said.
“Maybe try hitting it.” Alis shrugged. “Always works with my hover.”
Miguel chuckled and dropped to the ground—and jammed his hand into the scanner. He jumped back as the thing sparked and shorted out with a loud zap and smoke. He yanked the casing off and looked through the interior wires, then moved back for Sofi. She peered in and pressed the two farthest back and suddenly the door swished open.
Twenty pairs of very human eyes looked up at them. From twenty very frightened faces.
White gowns.
Shaved heads.
Smooth skin.
They were as clean as the room itself.
And yet the entire atmosphere smelled of urine and fear.
His heart stung. They were all races and sizes, but Miguel doubted any were over the age of seven.
Heller looked around and then peered at Sofi. “Sof, these kids are all too . . .” His voice faded.
“Young,” Sofi whispered.
45
SOFI
SOFI WAS FRANTIC. IT COULDN’T BE. HE HAD TO BE HERE. SHILO had to be with them. She dimmed her slim-suit, and she and Heller became visible again so as not to scare the kids. Then Sofi stepped into the room and scanned their faces even as the panic grew. She strode forward to sift through the children with her hands as she hissed Shilo’s name over and over.
No answer. Just frets and whimpers from the kids they’d just woken.
She reached the back of the room, having looked over all twenty. He wasn’t here.
Oh gad, he wasn’t here.
“Shilo,” she whispered. She forced back the rush of tears in her throat. “Shilo!”
“Maybe he’s in another area,” Heller said from behind her. He moved beside her and leaned down to one of the older kids staring up at them.
“Are you here to take us home?” the boy asked.
“Yeah, in a minute. But are there any older kids here? Like teenager types?”
The boy shook his head, his eyes like saucers.
“Were any others brought in with you?” Sofi asked sharply. “
Like ones who came but the aliens already took away?”
Again, the boy shook his head.
Sofi wanted to shake the kid. This couldn’t be happening. “Are you positive?”
“Sofi.”
She ignored Heller’s hand on her. “Are you certain? These are the only kids you’ve seen?”
The boy’s eyes reddened as he nodded. “No one else is here but us. Can we go home now?”
Oh gad.
Anything left of the ice surrounding Sofi’s emotions shattered right on the spot. At her grief. At Shilo not being here. At the expression of the little boy in front of her.
She looked around, suddenly saw the reality on their faces. The fear. The hope. The innocence. Melting everything within her. For him. For the children with him. She bent down and put her arms around the boy. “Yes, we can go home now.” And in seconds all twenty of them were whimpering and encircling her and clinging to her legs, her arms, her suit, whispering, “I want to go home too. I want my mum.”
Sofi’s ribs cracked wide open twenty times in a row to match each new voice—each tearstained cheek—looking lost and scared and believing that she could save them.
Oh heck. This is what Miguel has been seeing. What he’s been doing.
And this is why he does it.
She glanced back at him.
“Okay, amigos.” He was speaking quietly, in a tone that sounded adorably cheerful. Like a spark of hope and sunshine in the midst of a pee-stained, fear-laced room. He picked up the smallest child and put her on his hip. “What do you say we get out of here, eh? Anyone ready to get home?
“Shhhhh.” He handed the child off to Claudius and whispered, “Okay, see this dude here?” He put his hand on Claudius. “And this woman?” He pointed to Danya, who already had one kid on each hip. “These guys are kind of like secret superheroes. And they’re going to lead you to a ship that’ll take you to your moms and dads. But in order to do that—” He held a hand out to the next closest kid. “I’m going to need you all to hold hands and follow them single file. You got that?”
“Everyone hold hands.” Danya moved through the group, pulling them to their feet.
Sofi stared at Miguel as any last crumb of hate or bitterness or grief she felt for him dissolved into the beauty of his soul. As if her very bones called to him, recognizing the reckless, whispered heartbeats of who he was at the core.
He was a completely different person than he portrayed day in and out on the tele.
Miguel glanced up and caught her eye. And cocked a brow. She smiled.
“Sofi, I think—”
Heller’s voice was cut off by a massive alarm that was so loud it shook the walls.
Sofi flipped around as the kids broke into weeping and screeches. She grabbed their hands and began pushing them into the lift along with Claudius and Danya.
She could already see the blue dots moving on her handscreen. They were coming from below, not above. She shoved the last of the kids at Claudius. “Take them to the shuttle.” She could also see a number of small red dots. They were on the floor below and to the right. What the—?
“Sof,” Vic’s voice said. “What’s going on?”
“The security’s been triggered.”
“Not on our end or yours.”
Sofi stalled. “What do you mean?”
“I mean it’s internal. Not us. Meaning someone alerted them. Sofi, you guys need to watch your back.”
Sofi looked over. They were all in but the lift was straining under the weight. She looked at Miguel. He glanced down at the screen. He’d seen the red blips too.
“Heller,” he said, his gaze locked on hers. “Get us to the surface.”
The tech scanned his handheld against the module and the door shut, and the next second the lift rose, stopped, and opened, practically spitting them on the floor. “Let’s go,” Sofi hissed, grabbing little hands and helping them hurry.
The ghosted shuttle was waiting just outside the barrack, door open, shimmering in the late-afternoon light as if ethereal. The child closest to Sofi gripped her fingers and oohed at it.
The captain was waiting. “Ambassador Danya, I received a note from Delon, as well as you, requesting an immediate departure.”
“Thanks, Vic,” Sofi murmured.
“Gotcha covered, girl.”
“But are you wanting me to take all of you?” The captain eyed the kids. “Because this thing can hold twenty—twenty-two at most.”
Miguel stepped forward. “Captain, I’m ordering you to take all the children, Ambassador Claudius, Danya, and Heller.”
“Not me,” Heller cut in. “Ranger, Vic, and I can monitor the shuttle from here. But I told Sofi I wasn’t leaving her alone in this. So I’m staying. We can catch the next shuttle.”
The alarm got louder. Heller glanced at Sofi. “And in the meantime, we can hold them off.”
She nodded as she helped them load the kids on board. Then Claudius and Danya stepped on.
“Gotta go if we’re going to have enough fuel. I’ll make sure shuttle two’s on its way to pick you up.”
“Wait, where’s Alis?” Claudius suddenly looked behind them.
A second later the door sealed shut and the ship glimmered like an apparition in the light. Then disappeared.
46
MIGUEL
MIGUEL FLIPPED AROUND TO STARE AT SOFI AND HELLER. ALIS.
Miguel’s knuckles went white just as a click sounded in his earcom.
“Hello, Miguel.”
The group all turned to him. She was in their earcoms as well.
“Where are you?”
“With the Delonese. I’m sorry I had to slip away so quick. It was getting a bit heated in there. And I had to hedge my bets. I think I made the right decision, though.”
“Alis, what did you do?”
“Exactly what I needed to. What you didn’t have the guts to do.”
Sofi glanced up at him. Her eyes burning in determination. Sofi pointed to her handscreen where the other red lights were flickering, smaller but there. Just down a floor from where they’d been.
Where was the second shuttle?
“Back in the room, I tried to argue,” Alis continued. “I tried to give you and me a fighting chance to get out of here alive, reputations intact. But you sided with her.”
Miguel glanced at Sofi.
She raised a brow and snorted. “Dang right, chick.” Then was flagged in a message from Vic. Other shuttle is down. Delonese were able to decloak it. Best suggestion is hide until I can regain access to its controls.
What about the kids’ shuttle? Sofi typed back.
Still in control of it. Gave it an extra boost so it should be out of the atmosphere soon. No sign of space station loading weapons.
“They got to you, too, didn’t they, Alis?” Miguel looked to Sofi and made a motion at her and Heller that they head back into the metal lift. He pointed to the red blinking dots and mouthed, “Up here we’re sitting targets.”
They nodded and shut the barrack door. Then hurried for the lift.
“You and me, baby. Days ago. We’re the pawns. Except you got the blackmail, I got the money.”
Sofi scanned the wall mount and the lift moved down and then to the right, like a vid game.
Miguel frowned. “What’d you offer them, Alis?”
“Whatever they asked for. Wasn’t hard. Especially when I saw what was on the line for their way of life and Earth’s future.”
“What’d they ask for?”
“Same as you. Corp 24 on a platter. And if I threw Sofi in, an extra few years of peace.”
He stalled. “Sofi? ¿Qué—?”
“Corp 30 knew you wouldn’t go for that part. Apparently your emotions aren’t as hidden to some—not that I would’ve ever guessed. At least until we got here. And Corp 13 didn’t care one way or another. So they hired me as the backup. To ensure the job was done.”
The lift stopped and Sofi spun it around.
&n
bsp; “At the risk of the children’s lives we’re saving.”
“I think you mean at the safety of our children’s lives and future. We play our part and contribute, and the Delonese leave us to continue our lives. How could that be too complicated to understand, Miguel?”
Sofi turned and stared at him in the dim light, her brown skin and graceful body stiffening at Alis’s insinuations. The lift stopped again, and Heller just kept focusing on his handheld.
Miguel’s stomach sank.
“Come on, this way,” Sofi whispered just as the door opened into a dark hallway that smelled of formaldehyde and mint. They slipped into it and began walking.
“What CEO Hart and Ms. Gaines did with that explosion was to protect the human race. We should be thanking them. If the world had discovered that some of their players had been altered by the Delonese, they would’ve had a hissy fit. And for the Delonese—it’s more than just experimentation and study, you know. It actually means something—it’s worth something.”
“You’re speaking of the greater good?” Miguel said casually, encouraging Alis to keep talking.
“The lesser of two evils, the greater good—yes, however you want to word it.”
Miguel stood quite still as he watched Sofi freeze, then turn toward him. He saw the look in her eyes. His voice went cold. “Who was altered? Which players?”
“That ultimately doesn’t matter, does it? What’s important is that the programs will go on and Corp 24 and their Altered invention will go under.”
“Bien, it doesn’t matter. But who was altered, Alis?”
“Good-bye, Miguel. Take care. And be careful. I’m guessing you have about two minutes before they find you.”
47
SOFI
“GUYS, DID YOU HEAR HER?” HELLER CHOKED. “SHE SAID TWO minutes. I say we call it quits and—”
“And what? Our ship is gone.” Sofi moved cautiously down the hall as the alarm continued to blare.
Why weren’t there any guards or med workers in this section? The place was a ghost town.
“Right. So maybe we just turn ourselves in. Or make a run for it.”