The Escape

by Teyla Branton

  “Yes, ma’am.” Strange that we had so many customs unique to Unbounded, but we still used this mortal term.

  As he fumbled with keys in his pocket, I tried again to reach my thoughts across the distance to Ritter and Jace, but I couldn’t feel them anywhere.

  Mari’s hand brushed against mine, her anticipation clear. I understood all too well—finally, we’d get a good look at the prisoners. Behind us, Oliver glanced up and down the hallway, as if expecting an ambush. He knew if that happened, he was supposed to call up more illusions while Mari and I fought the others, but he was completely untried in battle. I felt a twinge of unease.

  The door opened onto pitch black. One of the guards reached for a switch and the room bathed in light. I stifled a gasp. The walls, floor, and ceiling were covered with silver sheets that were riveted into place, some stained by huge black scorch marks. Thick steel bars stretched across half the small room like a jail cell, and behind the bars, five people sat or lay on the carpeted floor, blinking at the light. There were no pillows or blankets, and a stinking bucket in the corner testified that they hadn’t been allowed a bathroom or privacy. Several of the Renegades looked recently beaten, their cuts sealed and their bruises mottled green as they rapidly healed. The two women looked untouched, though the mistrust in their eyes spoke volumes. Since they couldn’t help but absorb from the air, none of them looked malnourished, but despondency leaked from them. Even so, they had their shields up tight and their expressions were defiant.

  One muscled man stood and faced us, his paleness testifying of confinement. His right eye was a puffy reddened black and one hand held the other arm as if it hurt. “To what do we owe the pleasure of this visit, Triad Vesey?” His voice was a sneer on the last two words. I recognized him from Tenika’s files as Willis Tyrone, one of the New York Unbounded, who was talented with combat. Enclosed in such a small space, he must be near breaking.

  “Shut up!” The Indian guard kicked against the bars, his boot clanging loudly against the metal. “Or do you want another go-round?”

  “Enough,” I told the guard. “Leave us. Do not lock the door.” With Mari here, I wasn’t really worried about getting out of the room, but I wanted to make sure they understood and obeyed. Of course, the rooms were probably bugged to find out anything the prisoners might know, so I had to be careful.

  “But are you—?” the Indian began.

  Leave, I said in his mind.

  His eyes widened in shock as he realized his shield hadn’t kept me out. He dipped his head and hurried from the room, taking the other guard with him. The door clicked shut and I heard no key in the lock.

  “They’ve probably got the place bugged,” Oliver muttered.

  I scowled at him and he shut up. Everyone waited in silence as I studied the room, looking for cameras. I couldn’t see any, but I knew there had to be one. I wished Stella were here. As a technopath, she’d be aware of anything electronic or computerized, and with a few twists of wire could even communicate with it. I could see or hear nothing but the buzzing of the florescent lights overhead.

  “It’s freezing in here,” Mari said.

  I knew why. Cold would keep the prisoners more docile and more eager to visit the lab or wherever else they were needed.

  All the prisoners were still sitting on the carpet except Willis, who stared at me with his disheveled brown hair and angry blue eyes. Edging closer to the bars, I let my gaze wander over the Unbounded. I knew them all from the files. Besides Willis, there was Guenter Simon from Germany and Mandalyn Sharp from England, both combat Unbounded, and another man from Austria who simply went by the name Dragon. He was a pyro, which now that I remembered him, explained the silver layers on the wall. Fireproof, I was guessing. The scorch marks must be where he’d touched the walls as they took him in and out of the room because I knew he hadn’t yet learned to throw his fire. The last prisoner was Francis Bennet, the other New York Unbounded, a blonde with close-cropped hair, a narrow face, and muddy, almond-shaped eyes. I hesitated on her, finding something I’d hoped not to find—a tiny life force glowing inside her belly. “You’re pregnant,” I said to her.

  Coming to her knees, she threw herself at the bars, gripping them with white hands. “As if you didn’t know.”

  I looked back at the other woman. She was also expecting, but she didn’t radiate the desperation I felt from Francis. I pushed against her shield, but it didn’t yield, and I hesitated at using more force. These were allies, not the enemy, and I couldn’t afford to become too spent.

  “You won’t get into their minds,” Willis said, coming close to the bars. “As you can’t mine. We’ve been practicing since you were here last.”

  Their shields did seem to be stronger than most I’d seen, but would they really keep Delia out? I didn’t know. They would Ava, but she couldn’t break through any shields the way I could.

  I glanced at Mari, debating. “You have to,” she murmured.

  They certainly weren’t going to drop their shields if I asked politely, but that didn’t make what I was going to do any more fun. I pushed my thoughts toward Willis, focusing on his eyes. He was right that I couldn’t get though on my own, but in a half dozen strokes, my imaginary machete broke through the swirling black wall.

  Look at me, I told him. I’m not your enemy.

  Instinctively, he obeyed and just for a moment, I allowed my illusion to falter on my face. He blinked and said, “Do it again.”

  No. They may be watching. Tenika sent me. I was about to explain who I was, but caution urged me to silence. I had no idea if our eventual escape would be successful, and I didn’t want Delia finding information about me, even if only from his unconscious mind. Tell the others to drop their shields. We have things to tell you.

  Francis jumped to her feet and tugged on his arm. “Fight her! You can do it. We know that animal can keep her out.” Her eyes shot daggers at Mari as she spoke, and I realized Francis had met Lew Roberts before. What had he done to her that she called him an animal?

  “Look.” Mari tugged at my sleeve, and I turned to see cockroaches, beetles, ants, and other assorted bugs crawling under the door and from the cracks between the silver sheets on the walls. Even a small mouse squeezed from an impossibly tiny space.

  Francis was a summoner. A variation of the sensing ability, a summoner could send out a call that was irresistible to lesser creatures within range. I wondered if she realized she was even doing it because the bugs might be creepy, but there wasn’t enough of them to be a danger to us. Plus, if there was something shielding the compound, she wouldn’t be able to reach beyond it to find more little soldiers.

  Ignoring the bugs, I turned back to Willis. Is there a camera inside here? Is there anywhere we can leave weapons for you?

  Several more seconds passed as he contemplated me. His thoughts wavered between wanting to accept me at face value and fearing Delia was toying with him. But he did think about cameras, and what I’d mistaken for the smoke alarm was actually something more. Great. At least it was behind us.

  There was also a planter of fake greenery near the lab where they had been depositing things they might use in an escape. Silently, I relayed the information to Mari and Oliver.

  “So, are they going to drop their shields?” I asked Willis aloud. “Or do I have to help them?” I took out my gun to make a good show in case someone was monitoring the cell.

  Making a sudden decision, Willis turned to his companions. “You heard the lady.”

  “What! Are you crazy?” Francis asked. “I don’t care if they shoot me a dozen times and beat me senseless, I’m not letting her anywhere near me.” She spat at us, but the spit passed through where Mari’s shoulder appeared to be, the man she was impersonating being a good half foot taller.

  Francis stared, a horrified expression on her face that told me she was even more afraid.

  Dragon stood and gripped the bars. I stepped back, knowing he’d have to touch me to use his ability. Fire
licked around his fingers, but did nothing to the metal. “What are you?” he grated. Everything about him was pale, from his hair and skin to his eyes.

  Willis touched his shoulder and the fire died. “Do it.” To Francis he added, “Let the bugs go.”

  Their shields dropped slowly and hesitantly to the sound of tiny scurrying feet, and I knew it said a lot about their trust of Willis that they did it at all. Knowing Delia, I wouldn’t. Then again, I hadn’t been tortured and held prisoner for three months as they had.

  Images came from them all at once. Dragon who longed for the woods he loved, Mandalyn who’d asked Guenter to father her child rather than allow her body to be used by the Emporium, and Guenter who had fallen so much in love with Mandalyn and his unborn baby that for the first time in his six hundred years of life he feared death. Francis, who was expecting a baby from the genetically altered sperm of Lew Roberts, the man Mari was impersonating, who both feared for and loved the child she carried. And Willis, who worried he’d just betrayed them all.

  Tenika sent us, I told them, trying to focus in spite of the deluge. It was like being in the middle of a room with numerous large-screen TVs all playing at high volume. Only they were streams of sand thoughts instead of TVs, and far more realistic. To my surprise, fear wasn’t the dominating emotion; determination to endure won hands down.

  We’ve figured out how to impersonate them, I continued. We’re working on an escape, but have been unable to make headway until today. We’ll leave weapons in that planter. Maybe you can find some way to keep them with you.

  They had a place, I realized from the thoughts. Behind one of the silver plates they pried from the side wall of their prison at night when the cameras wouldn’t pick up the sight. I smiled at how Willis had first distracted me with the planter so as not to think about the real hiding place. My admiration turned to pity when I realized they had collected only one butter knife, a pair of scissors, and a piece of sharpened wood. Not much against assault rifles.

  Do you know anything about a sixth prisoner? I asked. No one did. Well, keep an ear out. We’ll be coming again, but I can’t say when. Just be ready. I’m sorry there wasn’t time to get a cell phone we could leave you. Ours held far too much information to leave within Emporium territory, especially since we would have needed to bypass the safeties to allow the prisoners access. But I’ll be able to contact you once I’m inside.

  You must be Ava’s granddaughter. This from Willis, and I sent him a private affirmative response. Delia or no, maybe he deserved that much.

  Raising my shields around my own mind, the cacophony shut off. “Come,” I said to Mari and Oliver. “I’ve seen enough here.”

  Oliver rushed to open the door. I went through first and both guards outside came to attention. “I will see the director now. But we’ll stay only a short time.” I glanced at Mari.

  “Twenty minutes,” she said.

  Not a lot of time to scope out the rest of the building, but it would have to do.

  “This way.” The Indian motioned forward. “Dr. Tunns is in the lab.”

  “Are there cameras in the hallways?” I opened my mind, once more pushing through his shield. Did it seem marginally thicker than the last time or was it my imagination? Maybe I was growing tired.

  “Only near the sealed exits and the hallways outside the lobby. We also have cameras in the lab and in the cells. I can order more if you wish.” He was telling the truth as he knew it.

  “No, that’s sufficient.” As we approached the hallway with the planter outside the lab, I added, “I want to see the director alone. My companions will wait out here and you will join them once you show me inside.”

  He leaned over to open the door, glancing at my companions. “As you wish.”

  I swept through the door after him, as Mari and Oliver readied to dump weapons into the planter. There wasn’t much more than a gun and knife for each prisoner, along with a couple of extra magazines, but these were far better than a butter knife. I didn’t know how Willis and the others would retrieve them, but they had apparently worked out a system of sorts.

  An Unbounded waited for me in the lab behind a desk, a woman, which shouldn’t surprise me but did, given what she’d done to Francis. I had to remember that Dr. Tunns was an Emporium agent first and a doctor later. I saw in the Indian’s mind that Delia had met her before so I didn’t ask for an introduction.

  “Delia,” Dr. Tunns said, standing as I approached. Nearing Delia’s age, she could have been my own mortal grandmother, from the white gray hair to the gentle wrinkles around her eyes. “Nice to see you again.”

  So we were on a first name basis, were we? I couldn’t see any sign of her first name in her mind.

  “Wait,” I told the guard as he started to leave, wanting to be sure that Mari and Oliver had enough time to do their thing. “I need a drink of water.”

  “In that cupboard,” Dr. Tunns said. “Please sit,” she added to me, indicating a chair in front of the desk.

  “I prefer to stand. I won’t be here long.”

  “I thought you weren’t coming for another week.”

  I watched the guard remove a bottle of water from the cupboard. “I wanted an update.”

  “I sent an update already.” The reply was casual but there was steel in the doctor’s voice that told me she’d known Delia a long time and didn’t exactly trust her. Her shield was thick; I’d need the machete.

  “I wanted a personal update,” I amended. “And I was in the area.”

  The woman inclined her head in acknowledgement as I took the bottled water from the guard. “I’m sorry we don’t have cold water in the lab.”

  “That’s okay.” I uncapped the bottle and drank before nodding at the guard to leave. “Well?” I prompted, unsure how to continue. I’d broken into her mind but there was nothing in her current thoughts that would do me any good. Almost as if she was purposefully thinking of mundane things to frustrate Delia, and too many questions about things I should already know would reveal my subterfuge.

  Dr. Tunns sighed. “The two women are progressing nicely. For the one, we are almost assured of a sensing Unbounded, given the mother’s summoning ability and the father’s genetics. If the boy Changes, of course.”

  “You are sure it’s a boy?”

  “It’s early yet, but the tests give every indication. I know you’d hoped for a girl, but that’s one thing we can’t do with one hundred percent accuracy yet. The other is a boy, too. We’re about to begin postconception experiments on him in the hopes of increasing his chances of being Unbounded, but it’s a dubious process. The pregnancy will likely terminate before the fifth month. But at least then we’ll be able to start over with altered sperm. We had no idea she’d turn to one of the other prisoners in her effort to thwart us. Renegades of her generation are generally more conservative.”

  “You mean you messed up.”

  She stiffened. “As you told me the last time.”

  “What about the rest?”

  “We sent ten altered samples of the pyro’s genetic material to headquarters. Two have already resulted in pregnancies. We verified your findings that one of the combat Unbounded had an ancestor who was a blaster, so we’re working on enhancing that aspect of his genetic material now before we send it along. In all, things are proceeding exactly on time.”

  “Any sign that we’ve been detected by the Renegades?”

  “None that have been reported to me.”

  “Very well.” I drank more water and took a step toward the door.

  “As for the other, he’s a capable technopath, but he has a strong sense of right and wrong and he’s decided we’re wrong.”

  I set my foot down carefully. Was she talking about the new prisoner who’d so far been kept away from the others? I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to learn more.

  “I am having about as much luck as his previous doctor,” Tunns continued. “Which basically means no progress. Maybe after a few session
s with you, he can be put to use, but in light of your experiments with mind manipulation, I believe that too much force will render him useless for anything but his genes. I guess in his case nurture completely dominates nature.” She sighed. “At any rate, in today’s world technopaths are invaluable, so that makes it worth keeping him alive for his genes alone.”

  I wanted to ask who the man was and what we’d been trying to convince him to do, but I should already know all those things.

  The doctor bent over and began typing something on a laptop that was connected to a large monitor on her desk. “You want to visit him now? I’ll just check to see if he’s awake. He went nuts on us earlier and we had to sedate him. I left a light on so we could observe him.”

  I moved around the desk so I could see the monitor. A live picture on the screen showed an unconscious man sprawled on a carpeted floor. I stared, blinking to clear my vision. No, it can’t be. The light was dim, but I was certain I wasn’t mistaken.

  “Looks like he’s still out,” said Dr. Tunns. “With how much they gave him, I’d be surprised if he wasn’t. However, he should be awake within the hour, or maybe two, if you want to wait.” She gave me a mirthless grin. “Or would you prefer him unconscious?”

  I wanted him any way I could get him, but without a private way to contact Ritter to gain more time, I couldn’t agree. “I can’t today,” I said. “But I’ll be back.” I wanted to tell her not to mention my visit to anyone, but I couldn’t think of any excuse that would fly. We’d have to come back for the hostages before Delia’s next visit and hope that in the meantime she didn’t become aware of our deception. “This is an unofficial visit anyway,” I added. “I mostly wanted to check on the Renegade prisoners.” I tore my eyes away from the screen and forced myself to walk toward the door, where I hesitated. “That reminds me. Please see that the prisoners have pillows and blankets. I want them to equate my visit with a reward. Besides, it’s cold in there and we don’t want anything to happen to those babies, do we?”

  The director had climbed to her feet and followed my path. “The babies are fine, and given the rate of Unbounded regeneration, they won’t feel the mothers’ discomfort, but I agree that at this point we won’t gain anything by depriving them further. Maybe it will actually help them become more compliant.”