Elements of the Enemy (Alliance Society Book 1)

by C. J. Felver

  And Number four: if Wren was a higher up with AGAS, how did he not know about this place?

  “Um, discreet? Why did he have a bunch of elementals at HSI Labs if he had this place the whole time?” I ask.

  “Well … this is … this is something different. He had more than one venture going on with your kind. Something he was going to keep between me, him, and our business partner.”

  Business partner? Who else would be working with him?

  Wren echoes my thoughts. “Who is this business partner?”

  Rowe glances between the two of us, up at the corner of the elevator behind me, then back to the two of us. He curses under his breath and trains his gaze on the elevator door ahead of him. Guess he’s going back to not talking. I look over my shoulder in the direction he had. Sure enough, there’s a camera hiding there. For good measure, I give it a cute little spirit-finger wave, punctuating it with a one finger salute.

  Yeah, classy. I know. But, Aulder has to be watching, right?

  The elevator jerks to a stop and the doors slide open, revealing a hallway darker than the parking garage we just left.

  “Is there a light switch somewhere?” Wren asks, stepping through the doorway with Rowe in front of him.

  “Not on this end of the hallway.”

  “Where, then?”

  He nods toward a dark shape—a desk, maybe? If I squint hard enough, I can just barely make it out.

  Behind us, the elevator doors close, leaving us alone in complete darkness.

  Time

  The sound of rustling fabric greets me. No matter how hard I strain my eyes, I can’t see anything.

  “Which pocket is your light in, Rowe?”

  “Left breast,” he tells Wren.

  Two seconds later, Wren clicks on the flashlight—a long and slender one, but surprisingly powerful—and a beam of light points directly at what I correctly guessed is a desk. The light bounces around the room, revealing two hallways, one leading to the right and the other leading straight forward. Both ways appear to be absolutely empty.

  Why isn’t anyone here?

  My guts twist and clench. Something isn’t right here. Why would this place seem so empty if it were supposed to be housing something big enough for Aulder to have not one, but two business partners? Things aren’t adding up. And it’s creeping me the hell out.

  Wren hauls Rowe over to the desk and examines the enclosed area. The desk is so neat, there aren’t even any stacks of paper lying around for me to snoop in.

  Wren secures Rowe to the desk, using another set of cuffs to do so. “Which pocket is your cuff key in?” Wren asks him.

  Rowe purses his lips, letting out a slow exhale before answering. “Same one as the flashlight.”

  What Wren pulls out of the pocket doesn’t look like a key at all. It looks like a pen with a hook at the end of it. Huh, you learn something new every day. He tucks it into his back pocket and shines the flashlight in Rowe’s face.

  “Don’t go anywhere.” Wren’s voice is dripping with authority and the promise of consequences. The threat is pretty clear.

  Rowe rolls his eyes and rests his head on the desk behind him. “Think I’ll take a nap.” Of course he will. Why bother telling us which direction to go?

  Wren grabs my hand and pulls me around to the other side of the desk. I lean into him and lower my voice, “Something doesn’t feel right here.”

  “I feel it, too.” He shines the light down each hallway, moving back and forth between the two. His movements are slow and deliberate, allowing us to search each one for threats. Nothing seems different about either direction: vacant hallways, doors upon doors, lacking anything distinctive. “Which way do you want to go?”

  Welp, time to make a decision.

  I glance between the two, debating momentarily. One leads to Aulder and the other doesn’t. Unless neither of them do, then we’ll—

  White lights kick on in the hallway to the right. Talk about creepy. Wren and I share a look. I’m sure my face mirrors his with the way his eyebrows are drawn together, corners of his lips turned down. Neither of us move as we examine the now illuminated area. Everything looks to be the same as we just saw it with the flashlight. Just … brighter.

  “Hey, Rowe. Is it normal for the lights to kick on all on their own?” Wren asks, projecting his voice from where we stand on the other side of the desk.

  “Doctor Harlow has remote access to all electrical systems running throughout the building. He can control it all through his computer.”

  How convenient. So this guy is leaving us a trail of breadcrumbs?

  “Do we follow it, or do you think it’s a trap of some kind?”

  “I wouldn’t necessarily say it’s a trap. More so, it’s his way of controlling the situation, hoping to control the outcome,” Wren says. “Whatever is waiting for us at the end of this hallway, we probably won’t like it. He may not even be there himself, but what other choice do we have?”

  “Right,” I say, steeling myself and taking the first steps toward the light. “Let’s go.”

  As we move forward, I can’t help but feel like we’re being watched. I’m not surprised by it. There are cameras everywhere. I shake off the feeling and keep on. Aulder better be at the end of whatever path he’s leading us on.

  The next section of lights ahead of us comes on, the one we just passed turns off. I glance back at the main desk. I don’t know what I expect to see, but I can’t see anything. Everything is doused in shadow.

  For comfort, I mentally reach out, feeling for the water at my sides. It’s still there, waiting for my command. Wren draws a gun from the back of his pants. The sight gives me flashbacks. The feeling of cold steel pressed against my temple taunts me. I clench my jaw to get rid of the feeling before my stomach starts to churn.

  I must be super obvious, because he looks at me like I’m a wild animal about to flee. “Hey,” his tone is soothing, laced with concern. “Are you okay?”

  “Uh—” I let out a puff of air, rubbing the space between my eyes. “When I was, uh, taken … The guy, he—” I suck in a deep breath. Why is this so difficult to say out loud? “He held me at gunpoint when he took me.”

  There. I said it.

  And my shoulders actually feel a little lighter.

  “Cleo, I had no idea. I’m sorry. I can put it away. I’ll never do anything to make you uncomfortable or cause you harm.”

  “No, no. It’s fine, I’m fine.”

  We continue down the hallway, lights clicking on and off as we go. It’s pretty unnerving. My mind starts to see figures lurking in the shadows as the eerie feeling from before seeps further into my pores. Every single hair on my body is standing on end. And last I checked, I don't have Peter Parker’s Spidey Sense.

  “You said you’d been with AGAS for a long time. How old were you when you were recruited?” I ask. Not that the silence is awkward, but I desperately need a way to fill it. My mind is wandering to places it probably shouldn’t.

  Wren seems a little startled by my question, but doesn’t hesitate to answer. “They recruited me six years ago. I was eighteen and fresh out of high school.”

  Huh, so that makes him only a couple years older than me. Good to know. “It’s funny how six years can seem like so long, but also like the blink of an eye.” His time with AGAS must have been rough on him, not giving him any other option than to grow up pretty quick. It seems like they took advantage of his naïveté.

  “Time is a fickle thing,” he muses.

  I hum in agreement. We continue down the ominous hallway in silence, reaching the first turn. Before I can ask if we should go left or right, the lights solve the dilemma for me.

  The silence stretches on as we’re led further into the building, turning this way and that. The conversation did nothing to distract me.

  If we don’t get to whatever destination Aulder has planned soon, I may just go insane. How did he end up with Rowe as a business partner?

  Wa
it a minute. I’m forgetting about the other partner. I guess it’s a trio, then. But … who’s the other partner? Whatever their reasoning is for staying under the radar, I’d say it’s a smart move.

  Only, something nags at the back of my mind.

  It just doesn’t make sense to me that Aulder would be running two facilities. Rowe said it was for something different than what was going on at HSI Labs, but what else could he possibly be doing other than cooking up meds to separate elementals from their abilities?

  Turning my attention back to the handsome guy beside me, I ask, “What are we missing? Rowe mentioned another business partner. And … what could they possibly be doing here at this secret lair?”

  Wren rubs his jaw, scratching at the five o’clock shadow forming there. A thoughtful noise escapes his lips. The lights around us get brighter as the next section comes on, but it’s brief, the last one turning off a moment later.

  “This is just a guess, but I’m willing to bet whatever he was doing, it didn’t involve his science board. I don’t think he’s been concocting serums here, but seeing as I didn’t know about this place and I was one of his advanced team lieutenants, it seems like he kept this secret pretty tightly guarded.”

  Funny, that’s what I was thinking. So, this either means we won’t have many AGAS members here to slow us down, or Aulder hasn’t trusted Wren for a while. Really, either one is possible.

  “I had a feeling something like this was going on, though,” he continues. “Not to say ‘I told you so,’ but I’m pretty sure I mentioned the probability he had something like this going on.”

  Oh my gosh! How could I have forgotten he said that? We were at his place when Wren shared his suspicions of Aulder having an under-the-radar spot. “You called it, alright. But do you think he’ll give up whoever his mysterious business partner is? Because my money is on a solid no.”

  He chuckles. “You’re probably right about that. All we can do now is follow his labyrinth and hope he’s waiting at the end of it.”

  I bite back an aggravated groan, ready to be done.

  We’re missing another piece of the puzzle and need to find it before we lose our chance. What a shame I’ve never had the patience for puzzles.

  Curious

  “Are we going in circles? I think we’ve passed these rooms before,” I say, noting the numbers beside the windowless doors. We’re reaching the end of the hall where it splits off into two directions. All of these hallways end up running into each other, like city blocks. Each one looks the same, too. Cream colored walls, gray floor tiles with blue accents here and there, white drop tile ceilings. And entirely devoid of any distinct characteristics, like nice paintings in frilly frames that most hospitals and doctors’ offices hang on their walls.

  The lights turn off and a metallic clatter ricochets through the hall, coming from the left corridor at the end of the hall, cutting off whatever Wren was in the middle of saying.

  The eerie feeling from before returns, smashing into me like a freight train.

  Rustling fabric alerts me to movement in the shadows beside me. In the same moment, Wren clicks on the flashlight he took from Rowe, shedding a bit of light into the darkness. I survey every spot as he sweeps the beam across the room, looking for anything that doesn’t belong. It’s a fruitless effort. Nothing in the area has changed.

  But what in the world could have made that noise?

  I turn to Wren. He’s still inspecting things, as if we could’ve missed something the first time. “What the hell was that?”

  “I’m glad you asked, Miss Daniels,” a voice drawls over the loudspeaker. Aulder’s self-righteous, condescending timbre acts as a bucket of ice dumped over me. Goosebumps prickle my skin and anticipation twists through my veins, ready to enact revenge.

  There’s only one problem. Where is he?

  There must be microphones mounted along with the cameras in the ceiling. How else would he have known what I asked?

  “Alright, douchebag, which curtain are you hiding behind?” I ask, letting my irritation seep through my tone. My gaze lingers on the camera above us.

  “While I’d love to tell you, it’s much more entertaining watching you flounder. Your attitude is amusing,” Aulder replies with another insidious chuckle.

  When I get my hands on this guy …

  Wren drops a hand on my shoulder and I jump. He leans close to my ear and whispers so low I can barely hear him: “We need to try to lure him out. I’d bet he has something up his sleeve. Something worse than AGAS.”

  I glare back up at the camera, pushing every ounce of my animosity through that I can. “Whatever your endgame is here, I don’t care. Consider it finished. I won’t let you continue playing puppet master. Show yourself and face me!”

  Adrenaline courses through me, chasing away all the fatigue. Steel-like resolve replaces the irritation I’ve been feeling for the last hundred laps of walking around this godforsaken building on this prick’s whim.

  Behind me, Wren’s presence is both reassuring and encouraging, reminding me I won’t have to do this alone. Knowing that is more than enough to boost my confidence.

  Aulder makes a deliberative hum over the loudspeaker: “I don’t think I will. Not yet anyway. You see,” I can picture the arrogant look on his face as he speaks—always so proud of himself and his choices, “I’ve been working very hard on a particular project. One I happen to hold in a higher regard than the serum your dear father helped me to create. Though, I must say, it’s in desperate need for a … demonstration … of sorts.”

  What. The actual. Hell?

  What is he talking about a demonstration? What is this project?

  “As it happens, Cleo, you and my former lieutenant have provided me with just such an opportunity, and I’d be a fool to pass it up.”

  “Do you enjoy the sound of your voice, dude? Because everything you just said can be summed up in about seven words. ‘I can’t fight you, I’m a coward.’ That’s all you had to say.” If he won’t come right out and face me, I guess I’ll have to poke the bear and force him out. I can almost hear his scowl, and bite the inside of my cheek to hide the smile it gives me.

  “Cleo Daniels, you overestimate my patience,” he growls. I imagine his teeth are clenched. Consider the bear poked.

  Beneath my feet, the floor gives a slight vibration. Two doors open up. Wren shines the flashlight on them, but it flickers out. He slaps it against his hand, but the thing still doesn’t work. A figure steps through each doorway. The doors ominously click shut behind them. Both figures look to be muscular, but I can’t see much about them with the lights still cut.

  Is it too late to take back what I said about Aulder taking the bait? Because yeah, that definitely isn’t what’s happening here.

  Wren drops our dead, borrowed flashlight as he steps into a fighting stance. I summon a water sphere in front of me. It spins and swirls as it floats, waiting for my next command.

  One of the figures circles around us. Every step is sure and calculating as he takes his time. There’s something familiar about the movement, but I can’t place it.

  We’re surrounded now. Whether or not we’re evenly matched is a whole other question. Knowing Wren is armed with a gun makes me feel better. Not much, but enough. Our opponents don’t appear to be armed, but I’m sure Aulder wouldn’t pit them against us otherwise.

  I draw strength from Wren as we stand back-to-back.

  For a moment, the four of us stand motionless in the dark hall. A chill sweeps down my spine. I’m helpless to suppress the shudder from rolling through me.

  The guy across from me holds both arms bent in front of himself. His movements are slow and precise, in a strange and unnatural way. Flames burst from his palms, licking their way up his fingers and casting an orange glow over his face, showcasing dark hair barely sweeping over his shoulders.

  My gasp can be heard throughout the hallway. Wren stiffens behind me, but I know he wouldn’t dare take his eyes of
f of his own opponent, one I’m guessing is also an elemental. What was it I said about seeming unarmed?

  This must be what Aulder was talking about when he said we were useful. Keep us in a creepy as fuck facility, keep us compliant—probably with drugs—and use us to fight his battles for him. He’s seriously sick and twisted. My jaw is clenched so hard I don’t know how my teeth haven’t cracked under the pressure.

  I take a tentative step forward, uncurling my fists and holding my hands out, trying to look as non-threatening as I can. When my opponent doesn’t make a counter move, I take another, and another. My water sphere trails along behind me.

  “Cleo!” Wren whisper shouts. “What are you doing?”

  “Shh,” I say with as little inflection as possible, hoping not to startle anyone. “Trust me.”

  I’m going out on a limb here. This could be the worst decision ever. Now I’m within arm’s reach of him, but I have to try. I won’t be able to live with myself if I don’t.

  “Joe?”

  He doesn’t stir, doesn’t move, doesn’t … anything. No hint of recognition, no acknowledgment at all on his bearded face. Joe doesn’t even make eye contact with me. Pangs of disappointment spear my chest, worsening my already sour mood.

  What have they done to you, my friend?

  Was this really what Aulder had planned all along?

  Either lose your elemental powers or lose your soul.

  “Oh,” Aulder says, “you recognize him. This night is promising to be quite entertaining.” I growl at Aulder’s antics, determined not to let him get to me. My resolve is slipping faster than I’d care to admit. “In a way, your attitude while you were in my care reminded me a lot of your friend here. It took an awful long time to gain his compliance. He was remarkably stubborn and refused to cooperate, forcing me to formulate new ways to be persuasive.”

  Aulder’s laughter morphs into screams, which echo through the loudspeaker, cut off abruptly with the crack of his neck snapping.