“I need to go check on my family and find out what’s going on,” Hadwin says with a heavy sigh. Before he leaves, Hadwin looks back at me from the doorway. “You know what you should do.”
Sayda removes her hand from my shoulder and steps in front of me, staring directly into my eyes. “After everything we’ve been through, don’t lose your courage now.”
I do not have the words to reply. With her gone I am truly alone. What Sayda does not fully recognize is my courage has not been affected, only my will to fight. With Talia in danger, I have none. I have been through so much in the name of Securus already, what more can one person do? This room suddenly feels suffocating. My world has collapsed and this room threatens to crush me along with it. Whatever plagues the people of Securus, I no longer care. All that matters is getting Talia back.
As I think of Talia, my body slowly rises from my chair. If I were to stay here and not help, she would be ashamed of me. I have been beaten down so much, and each time, managed to find the strength to move forward. But if Talia returns, seeing disappointment in her eyes because of my inaction would tear me apart.
“Not if she comes back, but when,” I remind myself aloud. The only uncertain part is whether I will be alive to see her return. Braeden is out for blood, and he will have it no matter what we do. My only hope is to make sure he does not take that blood from Talia.
I leave the constricting room with my mind spinning. My body automatically takes me to the stairs. On the way to the infirmary, my mind remains occupied by attempts to calculate any plan with a decent chance of succeeding. There has to be a way to gain some leverage over Braeden. He does not care if we all die, so threatening to cut off their power supply will not help. Maybe if we threatened to destroy the energy generating equipment he would be more willing to compromise. Then again, he probably has Malin and his men waiting close by in case we try something like that. Only one thing truly matters to the Controller. There is a way to get his attention, but it would be a suicide mission. The biggest problem with that kind of mission is it could not be done alone. That would mean putting more people in danger again.
People spill out of the infirmary as I approach. There are so many lethargic bodies propped up against the wall and lying on the floor in the waiting room that I have to step over them to even get inside. No wonder Rana looked exhausted. The people are obviously sick, though they do not have the same look as when we had the viral outbreak or as the Pellagra patients. Most of these people’s skin and eyes have a yellow tint to them. This is definitely a new illness.
Once inside the infirmary, I head straight for my old exam room, knowing Rana will be there. The exam room has two people on a gurney and two more lying on the floor with only a single blanket separating them from the cold, hard ground. They each have intravenous infusions running, but only a saline solution runs into their veins. Rana is so busy she does not even notice my arrival. Jace almost bumps into me. His tired eyes light up when realizing who stands in his way.
“You came,” he says, managing a weak smile.
“I told you he would,” Rana says, still looking at her current patient.
“What the hell happened?” I ask, shocked by the sheer volume of patients.
“Follow me,” she says, handing the bag of fluids she was about to administer to Jace.
Rana leads me through the hallway, past other rooms that have been rearranged to accommodate the influx of patients. Galen, Adara, and all the other Healers are each busy with their own patients. Even the surgical room is being used to hold the ill people. Near the intensive care unit, Rana stops me in the hallway and leans in close to whisper.
“We don’t know for sure what the cause is, but they’ve all developed a severe hemolytic anemia,” Rana says. “With the number of people affected, some kind of exposure must be responsible. There are too many cases for this to be caused by a natural process.”
Now the look of the sick people makes sense. They are pale and weak because their red blood cells are being internally consumed. One worry immediately comes to mind, Braeden’s sending me another message. How could this be? Talia’s team must have finished gathering the poison boxes Caelum had spread around Securus by now. Even if they did not, the boxes contained The Agent within them and nothing else. This illness is definitely not from The Agent, or I would have returned to a lifeless facility.
We need to figure out how he did this, otherwise we will not be able to effectively help our people. Any further exposure needs to be limited or the entire colony will be overwhelmed. The bitter truth is we do not have the capability to treat this many people. We can use the healthy to transfuse more blood into the ill, but with this kind of disease, that does not solve the problem and could be problematic in itself.
“Are they responding to any treatment?” I ask Rana, already anticipating the answer.
“Partially,” she says to my surprise. “We’re reserving the immunosuppressants for the most severe cases. It does seem to help. The problem with the treatment is we’re already out of our reserves. We need much more than we can produce.”
“Okay, where do you want me to set up?” I ask, not wanting to waste any more time now that the urgency of this devastating new epidemic is clear.
“Not here,” Rana says, looking at me over her glasses. “There’s something you can do that we can’t.”
“You have an idea of where the exposure came from, don’t you?” I ask, guessing at what she is implying.
“Despite what Eyra tells me, I don’t believe it’s a mere coincidence this happened right after Leadership distributed Tailyn’s antidote against her protests,” Rana says with disgust.
“But Talia secured a vote to hold off until the testing was done,” I say before realizing my mistake. Talia was not here to stop her. Eyra must have taken advantage of her absence to get the council to reconsider their position. She is either a spy for Caelum or her thirst to gain power has devoured whatever small amount of empathy for our people she had left.
Getting away from Caelum’s forced servitude already feels like an impossible mission, even without our own people unintentionally sabotaging our efforts every step of the way. A big part of me wishes I could take Talia, my family, and my friends away from here, leaving the rest of these people to rot in their own stupidity. Only, Talia would never allow it. She sees the good and potential in everyone. She would never believe they were not worth saving. So now I am faced with finding a way to save Leadership from their repeated attempts at self-destruction. Unless we can uncover proof Eyra is a spy, the only way to lessen her corrosive influence on the council is to use her own tactics against her.
Chapter 17
I stand next to the podium in our Leadership meeting room with my arms crossed in front of me, waiting for the council to arrive. The Coden in front of me has a message sent from Arluin. He and Seonah have decrypted more of the documents from Caelum. This one was so urgent, he did not want to wait to tell me in person. I turn my Coden off and watch as the council members slowly trickle in. Each of them shows hints of surprise when seeing me. My return has not yet been announced, and the message Cyrina sent when calling for this meeting was intentionally vague. I did not want to give anyone time to plan excuses or rebuttals.
The room is nearly full, but remains completely silent. Everyone watches me, waiting for a clue as to what is going on. I let them wonder while waiting for two specific people to arrive. Of course, they come in together. Janae’s already fair skin goes white when seeing the anger in my eyes. She immediately turns away to find her seat. Eyra, on the other hand, shows no visible response to my presence. As always, she appears confident, acting as if my appearance was expected. As soon as she takes her seat, I step up to the podium to speak.
“What were you thinking?” I demand of the group, though my eyes do not move from Eyra. “Does it really only take a single day without Talia for you all to lose your minds?”
“To what are you referring?” Eyra sa
ys, pretending she does not already know.
“You know exactly what I’m referring to,” I say, hitting my closed fist against the podium. “We don’t have the time to play political games. Your idiocy is already costing lives. This is what happens when you rush action without considering the consequences.”
“Games? Do you really want to talk about rushing to action without considering the consequences?” Eyra fires back, now standing up from her chair. “You’re the one who’s responsible for our most dangerous and uninformed missions. How many of our best people have been killed in the process?”
If it were not for the room full of people, I would have already shoved my boot down her self-serving throat. I hold my reply while attempting to contain my growing rage. The council watches as I walk toward her with measured steps, deliberately standing uncomfortably close. “Without me and the sacrifice my friends have made in the name of freedom, where would you be? Everyone in this room would be an unwitting slave to Caelum. My friends died so you could have a chance at life away from Caelum. Don’t you dare disparage what they’ve done for Securus. They sacrificed everything for our freedom. All the while, you’re safely underground, killing our people in a selfish attempt to gain political power. And don’t think I’ve overlooked the fact that the Guard you insisted on coming with me turned out to be a spy for Caelum. Isn’t that convenient?”
“If he was a spy, he fooled me just as he did you. I simply assumed since you cleared him for the last mission, he was a capable addition to the team,” she argues, taking a step back from me and turning toward the rest of the council. “More importantly, there’s no evidence the newest outbreak is related to anything we’ve done. For all we know, this disease could be related to your trip to Munitus. After all, we were cleared of the review. Now, as soon as you leave on your expedition, Caelum’s Soldier Guards return and our people fall ill. Isn’t that really why we’re missing our leader?”
As expected, Eyra refuses to accept any responsibility for her actions. Even if I cannot prove she is collaborating with the Agents of Guidance, her defiant reaction gives me exactly what I was counting on to make my point to the others. I walk away from her and turn on my Coden to distribute Arluin’s message to the council. “Everyone, turn on your Codens. You’ve all been sent a decrypted file from Caelum. This council needs to understand what happens when people like Eyra refuse to accept responsibility for their actions or to learn from their mistakes.”
They all see the same thing on their screens:
Kagen, this is the newest entry we’ve decrypted from Caelum’s database. There’s more, but this couldn’t wait.
-Arluin
Methods of Guidance protocol number four:
As a backup method of security, we added a pair of engineered substances to the standard nutrient mix supplied to the settlements. The first component will rapidly deplete vitamin B3 from the occupants, inflicting a Pellagra-like illness. This illness will become fatal unless the reaction is deactivated. The only way to do so is with the second component, which binds to the first, inhibiting its function.
The deactivating component is inherently unstable except when bound to the depleting component. A continuous supply is necessary to maintain equilibrium. Because of this fragility, the occupants will never be able to alter its structure or function with their available resources. More specifically, they will never be able to wean themselves off of the mix by administering the deactivator alone. The substance will disintegrate without the support of the complete mix.
The stable component is more vulnerable to alteration. In anticipation of this, we have engineered it such that an alteration intended to deactivate its core function will trigger a severe hemolytic anemia. This will prevent the occupants from subverting this method of control as well as alert us to the attempt.
As a precaution, we have developed a detoxification protocol. This protocol was deemed necessary by the Patron of Leadership to ensure this method could never affect the people of Caelum. This method proved quite useful during the attempted escape by the occupants of Securus in the past. We have no reason to believe it will be any less effective in the future.
The people in the room stare at their Codens long after they have finished reading the message. Their blank stares give away the disbelief that this really is their fault. Eventually, Janae puts her head down to hide her tears. The only one not shaken by the news is Eyra. Her calculating eyes tell me she is searching for her next move, refusing to concede defeat. I will not allow her the opportunity.
“I’ve already instructed the Research Department to stop producing the altered protein and arranged for the ill to be given extra servings of the nutrient mix,” I tell the stunned group.
“You have no authority to make such a decision without the approval of this council,” Eyra objects.
“Get used to it. Until Talia returns, all Leadership actions related to Caelum must be cleared by me first,” I say firmly while glaring directly at Eyra. “I may not be head of Leadership, but I will not allow your impatience to kill us all. If you don’t like it, then we’ll see how forgiving our people are when they find out who is responsible for overruling Talia to distribute the altered poison.”
As expected, no one objects to my decision. I end the meeting and dismiss the council. While the others leave, Eyra stays in place, defiantly returning my stare until we are alone.
“You know they took Talia before the outbreak started. Distributing the cure wasn’t what tipped off Caelum. You did. Before this is done, the rest of the council will see that,” Eyra says before leaving.
She may be right, but I do not care. I am in no mood for her political games. Eyra is lucky we have no proof she knew about Baran, or she would already be rotting in the Detention Center. I wish we could detain her for calling new vote to overrule Talia, but with the changes Talia has enacted within Leadership, that was within her legal rights. Eyra has been careful to make sure her actions do not actually break our laws. Even so, with my taking over all Caelum related decisions, her ability to cause further damage should be limited. Since she remains free, I will have Seonah keep an eye on her electronic activities to make sure she does not attempt to contact Caelum.
This has been a long day, and it is barely dinner time. Despite having very little food lately, I have no appetite. I would rather go back to help in the infirmary or retreat to my quarters. But my mother and Arluin would come to find me if they do not see me soon. I have to show up for them.
I trudge down the stairs, one at a time. Each step feels steeper and steeper. No matter how hard I try, my mind refuses to stay focused. My anger at Eyra and the thought of Talia being held by Braeden tears me up inside. When I get near my family’s level, something unexpected awaits. The voices of the people are exceptionally loud. With the precarious health of our colony, I was expecting them to be lethargic. Outside the stairway stands a group of people with their backs turned toward me.
At first, no one seems to notice as I push my way through the crowd to see what has them so riled up. When they finally do notice me, the people I pass turn quiet as I move inward. The people in the front continue yelling and cheering for something.
After moving past another clump of bodies, I catch a glimpse of three men fighting against two others while the bloodthirsty crowd cheers them on. Fights are typically stopped immediately by our Guards, but for some reason they are off to the side watching like everyone else. Normally, I would break this up, but right now I do not care. I move to the side, intending to go around the brawling men. As I do, the faces of some of the men are revealed.
I instantly charge to the center of the crowd, knocking over multiple people in the process. Two of the three men fighting are the same ones who were heckling me in the hallways when I lost my temper. They are both attacking Eldin, who is managing to hold them off remarkably well despite being outnumbered. Eldin is a good man, not to mention the fact that he saved my life on the Death Detail. I will not all
ow these cowards to team up on him like this.
When I burst through the inner ring of people, an audible gasp ceases their bloodthirsty cheers. As I sprint to help Eldin, my anger and frustration take over, distorting my sight and thoughts. Instead of two dark haired, young men circling Eldin’s powerful frame, all I see is Braeden and Malin hurting Talia. My momentum carries me into the closest man.
The impact of my shoulder barreling into his chest sends him backward. His feet fly into the air. The back of his head smacks against the floor before his momentum flips his body over. He lands face-down on the ground. Even though he obviously has been knocked unconscious, I kick him one more time to make sure.
Looking at his motionless body prone on the floor, Braeden disappears from my vision, leaving behind a man with a younger face than expected. Eldin quickly subdues the other man, grabbing him in a choke hold. With these two under control, I turn toward the third man in this group of instigators. Instantaneously, another surge of adrenaline and rage pulses through me. The third man is much bigger than the first two. He throws his prey into the wall. Only, the bloodied man bouncing off the wall is not another random person. It is my little brother, Arluin.
The assailant does not see me coming until my elbow lands on his flank, knocking him away from Arluin. When the man turns around, he appears more amused than injured by my attack. Arluin tries to get up to help, but falls back on the floor. His pain fuels my fury even further.
I meet the sinister gaze of the pale skinned attacker as he gets in position to fight. He shows no fear or alarm. In fact, he looks to be thoroughly enjoying himself. The crowd whispers in anticipation. They want to see what happens.
My mind flashes back to the Death Detail when Balum was circling me with his spear. Only now, I have ended up in this situation feeling like it is all for the amusement of the mob around us. The man lunges at me. I turn to the side to deflect his punch, but my dodge is too slow. The blow lands on my jaw, sending sparks scurrying through my vision. As soon as the sparks disappear, I see the attacker reaching out to grab me. In an instant, I am weightless. He sweeps my legs from under me, throwing me to the floor.
The Seat of Power (The Securus Trilogy Book 3) Page 18