by Lisa Lace
Lizzy began sorting through the simple laser guns that Klowix had gotten them. Bethany sincerely hoped that this last addition was just Klowix being over-protective. For a few minutes, the room was a hive of activity, the Evions finishing their tasks at lightning speed and turning to help the others.
Finally, everything was still, except Trili, who seemed to be having trouble.
Anna looked at her. “What’s wrong?”
Trili was looking worried, which in turn worried Bethany. Few things could fluster Trili.
“The message won’t send. I don’t know what’s wrong. Maybe we don’t have a signal in here?”
“Klowix would have made sure the room has signal.” Bethany may not have known everything about Klowix, but she knew how seriously he took their safety.
“Give it here.”
Trili handed the T-screen over to Culip before looking around the room. “Is everyone ok?”
Ruth nodded worriedly and gazed across multiple screens. “For now.”
Bethany followed her gaze and gasped. The protesters were right up against the door. She could see a few unconscious bodies – at least, she hoped they were unconscious – piled up behind the mob in army uniforms.
Anna whispered to the group. “They must have realized Klowix has humans here. That’s what they’re after – they’re after us.”
“That’s not the worst of it.”
Bethany looked to Culip to see that she’d half taken the T-screen apart; wires were sticking up everywhere.
“They’ve blocked the signal. We can’t get a message to Klowix.”
“But – but surely he’ll know already? I mean, this is looking like a pretty big riot. I’m sure he’s on his way.”
Bethany thought there was a lot more hope in Beoli’s voice than certainty.
“The soldiers there are out of action. We don’t know if they managed to get a message off before they were attacked. People are being kept away from the protests for their own safety; I’m not sure how long it’ll be before someone comes close enough to realize what’s happened.”
Bethany tugged the T-screen out of Culip’s hands, knowing that it was useless, and that if Culip couldn’t get a message out, then she had no chance. But she desperately wanted Klowix right now. This time, she wasn’t afraid of his violent side, the side that could kill without a second thought. This time, that side would be in defense of her, and she’d be safe.
Snia sounded fearful. “What do we do?”
Lizzy went to put an arm around her while Trili began pacing as best she could in the small space.
“We do what Klowix told us to do. We’ve been through every possible way things could go wrong, including broken T-screens and dead soldiers. When Klowix arrives, he’ll give us the code before coming in, just as he said. If anyone else comes through that door, we’d better not let them get in here alive.”
A shiver seemed to go around the room.
“Come on. Everyone take a weapon. Beoli, Ruth, start getting the supplies out, we don’t know how long we’ll be in here for. Culip, keep working on that T-screen, you never know if their blocking mechanism may falter. Bethany, check the weapons. Lizzy, make sure the air system is running as it should be.”
Everyone got to it. Anna followed Trili’s gaze and went down to sit down by Snia, rubbing soothing circles over her shoulders.
Bethany knew that Snia had had a much more sheltered upbringing than any of the rest of them; this was probably the scariest thing that had ever happened to her. Bethany had certainly seen worse than this in the backlands, and even she was terrified.
She tried not to think as she went through the motions of what Klowix had taught her, putting the lasers on test one by one, and pressing the fire button. Each made a small popping sound and turned green for a moment, indicating that they were fully functional.
A loud bang made them all scream. Bethany’s breath caught when she looked at the screens.
They were in the house.
She didn’t know how the protesters had gotten in – by the sound of the bang, she was guessing some kind of bomb – but she knew it wasn’t good. Klowix’s security measures should have prevented anyone from getting this far.
Ruth’s voice was quiet as she handed out the custom-made laser shields Klowix had stored for them. “Put these on.”
Bethany pulled hers over her head in a daze. Was this really happening? Could there really be so much hate between some humans and Evions that it came down to this?
She looked at Snia, huddled in the corner with Anna. How could she ever hurt her friends simply because they weren’t the same species as she was? How could anyone consider hurting her for the same reason?
Culip was still working frantically with the T-screen, but Trili pulled her away.
“Looks like whatever blasted the front door is coming for us.”
Culip stared at the screens. “How did they get a D-grade neutron bomb? Even kings can’t just get one of those, there are intergalactic laws that…”
She trailed off. “That thing will blow us to pieces, this room is too small. Klowix would have left a shield just in case.”
She fumbled around the edge of the wall for a moment before her fingers snagged something, and she pulled what looked like one of the window shields across the door. Bethany typed the emergency defense code into the pad, and a large block of solid steel rose out of the floor.
They all cowered behind it as Lizzy handed out the weapons.
Trili’s voice was just a whisper. “Remember, no one gets into this room alive.”
Culip rolled her eyes. “If they don’t blow themselves up with that bomb. There’s a reason those things are so heavily regulated.”
Bethany’s eyes were glued to the screen as the group of protesters came for the safe room. There were dozens of them, and they just kept coming.
Culip looked at the floor. “If any of you follow a god, this would be the time to pray.”
Bethany had never had a god, and at this moment felt she’d rather settle for the laser in her hands. She watched as the protesters placed some metal device against the safe room door; Culip’s fingers were white as she clutched her shield to her body.
“Get down.” Her voice was barely audible, but everyone heard. Bethany put her back to the steel block, sandwiched in between Snia and Trili.
The bang was so loud that Bethany thought for a moment that her eardrums had been damaged. Damaged eardrums or not, she knew what to do. The others were with her as they popped their heads over the barrier and started shooting. It didn’t matter that there was too much smoke to see so much as a few feet ahead of them. Klowix had said that anyone who came through the door without the code was an enemy and must die.
Bethany wasn’t sure if it was a few seconds or a few hours that she stood there, shoulder to shoulder with the others, coughing in the smoke, pulling the laser trigger repeatedly. Her hearing slowly returned complete with a ringing in her ears, which resolved into enraged shouts and cries.
Bethany was startled when she felt the laser being yanked out of her hands. Someone grabbed her by the hair and dragged her over what felt like broken glass and into a room that was only vaguely recognizable as what had once been the lounge.
Bethany’s vision cleared as she blinked the smoke out of her eyes. There were bodies everywhere. About seven protesters had all of them huddled in a group, all except Beoli. Bethany looked around in panic, but couldn’t see any sign of her. Ruth elbowed her in the side and shook her head very slightly.
One man spoke to them. “We can make this easy, or we can make this hard. Tell us which of you are humans, and the rest can go free.”
No one said anything. Bethany knew they wouldn’t – and that was what worried her. What lengths would these men go to make them talk?
One of the men muttered to what appeared to be their leader. “Scare them. The Evions will reveal themselves.”
Culip’s hand found Bethany’s, and she squ
eezed hard. Bethany squeezed back. She knew that if Evions were startled or afraid, they would automatically start using their super speed, like an instinct. She could almost feel the Evion girls holding their breath, praying that their bodies wouldn’t betray them.
One of the men threw something at them. In mid-air, it exploded. Bethany screamed and threw her hands up to protect her face. When the smoke cleared, Anna was on the floor.
Snia bent down to help her up, and Anna tried reassuring her. “I’m ok.” She had a nasty graze on her arm, but didn’t look too badly hurt.
“They’re tougher than we thought.”
“Should have known, living with Klowix. What’d he do, induct you into the military?”
No one answered.
“I’ve had enough of this. Beat them until someone confesses.”
Surely, this couldn’t be happening. Bethany knew that someone must have heard the explosions. Help had to be on its way.
Before any of the men could make so much as a move against them, Beoli came flying out of nowhere. Screaming a battle cry, she slammed into the leader. Her laser was broken, but that didn’t stop her. She used a sharp, broken edge to stab him in the neck. Blood sprayed into the air, and they both went down.
“Now!” Trili’s order didn’t even need to be given. They all knew this was their chance to turn the tide, possibly their last chance.
Anna leapt onto the man Beoli was wrestling to the ground. Bethany didn’t see what any of the others were doing. She had her eye on a metal leg that had come off one of the couches. She dove and grabbed it, swinging wildly. It made contact with one of the men, and he went down with a scream.
Klowix might have trained them for this, but they were not soldiers. It seemed only a few breathless seconds until they were all disarmed and huddled back in the circle of men, each nursing small wounds.
One of the men practically snarled at them, stepping up into the place of his dying leader, kicking the bleeding body out of the way. “Right, we’re done asking. You first.”
He grabbed Beoli’s arm and pulled her upright, only to hit her so hard across the face that Bethany thought she heard bone snap.
“No!” Bethany ran forwards, catching Beoli as she fell. “It’s me! I’m the only human, the rest are all Evions!”
The others burst into protests, but their captors weren’t listening. Bethany could hear what they were hearing – the screaming sounds of emergency hovers approaching.
One of them shouted in a near-panic. “Just take her and go! We don’t have time!”
Snia threw herself at the man dragging Bethany away, clawing at his eyelids with her fingernails. She was flung back and hit the table, crumpling to the ground. Suddenly Culip was there, but she didn’t attack, or even try to get Bethany free. She simply clung to her for a second, her fingers tight on Bethany’s dress, before she too was pulled away.
The world was flicking strangely as Bethany watched her friends fight the retreating group. Anna was throwing bits of broken brick at them while Lizzy tried to revive Beoli and Snia. Ruth was trying to strangle one of them with a piece of curtain, while Trili threw herself at a straggler. Bethany thought that she saw Trili tear at the man’s skin with her teeth, but perhaps she was seeing things.
She was so disoriented and dizzy that she could do little to resist as they dragged her away.
Chapter Twelve
Klowix had told her not to go down without a fight, and Bethany didn’t intend to disappoint him. She screamed, kicked, writhed, and scratched, anything she could to break free or injure her captors. Eventually, they seemed to decide she was too much trouble conscious, and she felt a dull blow to the back of her head.
When Bethany awoke, it took a few moments for her to remember where she was and why. Her head was throbbing and she still had a slight ringing in her ears. She lay still, pretending to be asleep, as she did a mental inventory of her body. Her left ankle was aching, but it didn’t feel broken. She could feel dried blood on her back from a few painful scratches, though she couldn’t tell how deep they were.
Bethany finally opened her eyes to see a dim room. She was shoved in a corner while about five men argued viciously with each other.
“We should kill her now!”
“No, he’ll have it up in a few minutes.”
“We may not have a few minutes – trust me, none of us wants Klowix to catch us with her.”
“We need to make an example, that was the whole point – let them see a filthy human killed on live feed, see how many will stay here after that.”
Bethany closed her eyes again. She was in more trouble than she’d thought. She had to escape now, before they decided to kill her sooner rather than later. She wriggled a bit, only to find that her arms were tied behind her back. Worse, there was something sharp jabbing into her side, and she couldn’t get it out.
She peered down, trying to see if she had a shard of broken glass or something to worry about. She saw nothing but a small tear in her dress. Bethany suddenly remembered Culip, her hands clutching Bethany’s dress for a moment before she was taken away.
Culip wouldn’t just let them take her, not without fighting back. The others had been fighting back and losing. Culip was smarter than all of them, though; perhaps her way of fighting back was to give Bethany a chance to save herself.
Bethany tried to twist her hands free to see what the mystery object Culip had left her was. Unfortunately, though they had used simple rope and not the metallic binding string that law enforcement officers on Telion often used, it was thick and tight, and she couldn’t get it off.
She tried to control her breathing and think. Klowix said that panic could kill you as surely as the enemy could. If you let your mind get away from you, you were lost.
Bethany glanced around, looking for something sharp.
A sixth man entered. “Bad news. They’re blocking the frequency, they probably realize what we’re trying to do. I can get it back up, but it’ll take a few hours.”
This gave Bethany an idea and she coughed weakly. A few heads turned towards her, and she slumped against the wall, pretending to be weaker than she really was. Gathering her resolve, Bethany pinched the sensitive inside of her cheek in her teeth, and bit as hard as she could. She could taste blood in her mouth and bent over, coughing as hard as she could.
When they saw the blood, one of the captors came to her. “We can’t have her dying now, not if we want to put her death on the live feed.”
Bethany started wheezing and choking.
Hands quickly untied her and pulled her onto her side, roughly shoving a bundled-up coat under her head. Bethany choked for a bit more before quieting, nestling her hands in front of her as she let her breathing ease up.
“Should we get a doctor?”
“No, she seems fine now. Humans are so weak. She probably won’t last long; but then, she only needs to last a few hours.”
Bethany closed her eyes, pretending to have slipped into unconsciousness again. She had what she wanted; her hands were untied.
She listened as the men went back to the other side of the room and back to their discussions of how best to kill her. Bethany risked opening her eyes a fraction, but only saw their backs to her.
Carefully, she reached into the rip in her dress and brought out a small disk. She cupped it in her hand, looking at it for a moment before closing her eyes again, trying to remember what it was. She knew she’d seen something like this before.
The memory suddenly came back to her. Klowix had stowed these all over the house – emergency beacons, he called them. If Bethany could get this in contact with something electronic – anything – it would steal energy from it and send out a distress signal to every soldier on the planet. More importantly, it would also send it to Klowix’s personal T-screen.
Bethany risked another glance at her captors. She didn’t see anything electronic. The room seemed devoid of anything that could help her. She took a deep breath, holding in h
er fear. She just needed to get the message out. Only once she’d done that could she could give in to fear.
She tentatively called out to them. “Hello?”
The men ignored her.
“Please… I need something to eat. I have a medical condition. If I don’t eat, I could lapse into a coma and die.”
That got their attention.
“No way Klowix would have chosen a defective one.”
“He’s not that far gone.”
“What if he has? This is the only one we’ve got.”
“Get up!” One of them finally yanked Bethany to her feet. “Come on. You’d better not be lying to us.”
Though it turned her stomach, Bethany leaned on him for support, as though she was too weak to walk by herself. He brought her through to a tiny, dirty kitchen. Wherever they were, the place obviously hadn’t been used for years.
He shoved her toward the fridge, and Bethany stumbled, clutching the beacon in her hand. She put her hand against the fridge, as though holding herself up, pressing the beacon against the cold metal. It warmed at once, and Bethany let it fall to the floor. It had done its job. Klowix was on his way.
“You want food or not?”
Bethany opened the fridge and grabbed the first thing her hands touched – some kind of fruit that must be unique to Telion, because she’d never seen it before. She sank down at the table and ate mechanically, waiting. How long would it take Klowix to get to her?
She should stay in this room, if she could. The beacon would have auto-destructed after sending out the signal, a safety measure against it being discovered, and it would have sent this room as her exact location. Klowix would come directly here, and she wanted to be waiting for him.
“I’m so tired.” She let her head sink onto her arms on the table.
Her captor grunted in disgust and kicked a chair out of the way on his way out, muttering about how weak humans were. Bethany kept her breathing deep and even, in case one of them came back, counting the breaths. When Klowix got the message, he wouldn’t wait. He’d take the fastest hover and come at once. How far away was he?