by Larkin, Matt
A moment later he tucked his legs through the hole and bent over backwards, hanging by his knees and extending a hand down to her. She ran and jumped to grab it, then climbed up his body, trying not to notice the sudden turn of his emotions as she climbed over his midsection.
He slipped through the hole after her.
“Are you using a GD?” she asked.
“What?”
“A gravity dilator? Is that how you did that?”
She’d heard Sentinels sometimes had the devices built into their suits. She’d even used the device a few times, recreationally, for balcony diving.
“No.” He strode down the hall, almost at a run. She followed. A guard with a breather tried to stop Knight, going for some kind of rod at his side. Knight caught him with a fist to the stomach and stripped off the breather. A pair of men were gasping for breath further down the hall, caught too far out of reach of breathers.
Knight had cut out the window and flooded this place with toxic gas. How his sword had done was another question. It must have been a monofilament blade, like he mentioned before. But she wasn’t exactly sure what that entailed. A conversation for another time.
A woman armed with a two meter long staff tried to stop Knight, though she was clearly having trouble breathing. He shoved her against the wall and then down a staircase. Knight dashed down the stairs past the fallen woman without pause. Rachel trotted after, stopping to check if the woman was alive. She lived, though if someone didn’t patch the window, there would be more deaths on her conscience.
Keep the focus. There was nothing she could do about that now.
Knight sprinted down another staircase and Rachel was hard-pressed to keep up. Not only were his reflexes preternaturally fast, he ran and moved like nothing she’d ever seen. It was still a bit hard to believe he hadn’t violated the First Commandment.
Down in the basement, a group of men and women stood inside a sealed lab, clearly concerned, but not apparently armed. The airlock that separated them had only a buzzer, which meant no lock.
In the center of the lab was a tablet projecting a holographic image onto the walls. Dozens of screens were filled with notes and records. God, could that really be it? The Sefer Raziel?
Knight hit the buzzer to the airlock, and Rachel followed him inside. These people weren’t just looking for the Sefer. They’d found it. And might have been on the way to unlocking the path to the Ark itself.
“Stop!” one of them shouted as Knight came through.
“Give us the Sefer and we won’t hurt you,” Rachel said.
“No!” Two of the men ran at Knight.
He moved like lightning, ducking their clumsy attacks. He slammed his hand like a knife under the arm of one and back into the ribs of the other. They both collapsed to the floor. The woman pulled a rod from beneath her coat and moved on him. The rod telescoped out, becoming one of those staffs. Damn. Neat weapon for a place where she’d seen several MAGs jam already. Nothing compared to Knight’s mono sword, of course.
Knight tripped her, then fell knees-first onto her chest and punched her across the face. She lay still, and he left her be, then grabbed the tablet off the center table. In an instant, the hologram shut off and the images vanished from the walls. “This it?” he asked, handing her the tablet.
God, it had to be. These people seemed to practically venerate the thing. She nodded.
“Then let’s go.”
They returned through the airlock. “I guess we can just go out the front door,” she said.
Knight shrugged, and headed up the stairs to the first level. Rachel followed just behind, then turned from the staircase toward the main hall.
The airlock opened.
A man entered, clad in black armor similar to Gehennan soldiers, but this was sleeker. A mask covered his mouth and nose, a green-lit visor over his eyes. His armor had a gray insignia that looked like the old Greek letter Lambada.
Before she could even ask, Knight grabbed her and yanked her back to the stairs. “Go!” he whispered through clenched teeth. “Back the way we came in, now!”
“What?” One soldier suddenly worried him?
“Go!” He shoved her, and she ran up the stairs.
He raced down the hall, then stopped at the window. Glancing down. “They’ve sent a Gibborim. We need to get out of this city, right now.”
Rachel nodded. David had said something about government assassins. Anything that worried Knight sounded like something she didn’t want to mess with. She tucked the tablet inside her jacket and climbed back out the window.
The moment she dropped down, Knight followed her, landing beside her in a crouch. He grabbed her and yanked her along behind him, at a pace she could barely match. He dashed around two alleys and back to the hoverbike.
“Get on.” He started it without waiting for her, so she jumped on the back.
Knight cranked it up and shot away even before she was settled, and she had to clutch her arms around him to catch herself.
She had the Sefer.
God, she really had it.
The secrets of the Angels would unfold before her. The Sefer Raziel had recorded the way to all the truths long concealed from mankind.
Everything she’d lost… Everyone she’d lost to get here. Her career, her family. David. They’d all see now. With the Ark she’d save humanity from themselves. Not everyone would understand, not at first. But one day, one day mankind would rise up and find its true purpose—not in blind obedience, but in struggling to rise above itself.
And maybe then she and David could find a way…
Knight’s hoverbike sped away from Machpelah. If they had been a minute slower getting here, the Gibborim might have gotten there first. It seemed even the Gehennan government was looking for the Sefer. How had they found out?
It didn’t matter now. No one, not the Redeemers, the Lazarus Group, or the Gehennans, were going to take this away from her.
She had to pat the tablet inside her jacket to reassure herself it was still there.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
September 25th, 3096 EY
I have found it. Everyone, all those at NRU who doubted me, even Mac, they’ll see now I was right.
When they returned to Beeroth, Knight bypassed the Royal Palace.
“What’s going on?” Rachel shouted, trying to be heard over the hum of the bike and the roar of the wind.
Knight shook his head, so she just held on, wondering what he was up to now. He drove her to a run-down area of the city where half the apartments didn’t even seem to have lights on, and most of the others had no windows at all. Knight parked the bike in an underground garage.
“What are we doing here?” Rachel asked. This place looked like the worst Gehenna had to offer—which was saying something.
“It’s too dangerous to go back to the hotel. The government is looking for us now. They’ll start by checking places like that.”
Rachel frowned. She should have thought of that herself. Excitement over the Sefer might be getting the best of her. “So what’s this place?”
“I live here.”
Oh.
She followed him to an airlock, then up a flight of stairs. All the doors they passed were closed. No name plates, no sign of other people, save the flicker of lights under a few doors. Not the kind of place where you had tea with the neighbors.
Knight’s apartment was around the first corner. Predictably, it had a key card lock. Maybe a guy like him wouldn’t want a DNA or retinal scanner anyway. He swiped the card, and yanked open the door.
A light flickered on inside, revealing a dirty mess. A handful of clothes were littered on the sofa, dishes crowded the breakfast bar, and not a single decoration added any life to the place. Nothing except a set of odd hand-to-hand weapons hanging on the wall.
Rachel walked over to the display. There was another sword, similar to the one Knight had with him, and an empty set of hangars. More interestingly, a knife blade hung t
here, attached to a short handle by a wire-thin cord. “What is this?”
Knight approached behind her. He made no noise when he walked, but she could feel his presence, the warmth of his body as he stood a little too close. His emotions had jumbled, a mix of anxiety, attraction, and maybe even a slight hint of caring. “A mono katana and mono kyoketsu.”
Well that was helpful. “What does that even mean, exactly?”
Knight turned her to face him, his hands firm on her arm as he pulled her around. For a moment, he watched her eyes, and she felt her pulse quicken. What did he intend here? Because she wasn’t about to let anything happen. No way. She couldn’t.
After a few breaths he drew the other sword from his coat. “The sword compresses for concealment, but the important thing is the monofilament—a monomolecular edge of carbon nanotubes.”
Rachel grunted in sudden understanding. A strand of super-bonded molecules like that would be able to sever other molecules, meaning it could cut through most substances and never lose its edge. No wonder Knight had been able to cleave through metal, armor, and reinforced glass so easily. “And the kio-whatsit?”
Knight shook his head, smirking a little, and hung the sword on the wall. “Kyoketsu. A retractable whip knife using the same technology. More dangerous to wield.”
Rachel nodded, and moved to the couch, pushing aside a shirt she hoped was clean so she could sit. “I don’t suppose you have anything to eat?”
Knight gave her that lazy double salute again. “I’ll bring us a pizza. Don’t leave while I’m gone.”
Where would she go?
Knight went for the pizza—odd to think a guy like him enjoyed pizza. But, then, why not? For all his bravado, all his attempts to come off as this apathetic killer, he was still just another guy. Wasn’t he?
Rachel took a quick tour of the apartment. Other than the washroom, it was a single open room. A small kitchen and breakfast bar, the sofa in front of the wall screen, and an open area in one corner—the only clean spot in the entire place. A mat covered the floor in that corner. Where he trained?
She paused, confused. Something was missing. The whole place had no bed? What kind of apartment had no bed?
Rachel returned to the couch. A pile of take-out boxes covered the coffee table. Underneath, she found a pamphlet. She flipped it open to a view of the Pinnacle on New Rome.
A travel brochure. It showed off the stark white buildings and golden lights that composed the capital city, the crystal clean canals that connected the world, and the hover races on the southern plateau. The back side mentioned the exorbitant prices to lease property there.
A few minutes later Knight returned with a piping hot pizza. The smell of garlic, onions, and foreign peppers filled the room and set her stomach growling. She hadn’t eaten in—honestly, she wasn’t sure how long. Almost a day, probably.
“You’re paying for this,” he said, setting the pizza on the coffee table.
“Yeah, okay.” No surprise. “You don’t keep much stuff, do you?” She grabbed a slice of pizza and inhaled the scents briefly before digging in.
“A man needs few things outside his purpose.”
Rachel laughed, almost choking on her pizza. “His purpose? And that long hair, so carefully styled to look unstyled and rugged, the all black leather… all that’s not an affectation? You try so hard to make people think you don’t care what anyone thinks, but you obviously do.”
Knight scowled and folded his arms.
“Oh, come on,” she said. “I’m teasing you. It’s not a bad thing that you’re human like the rest of us. You don’t have to work so hard to seem so professional all the time. How about this New Rome thing,” she said, nudging the brochure. “Even you want a vacation, huh?”
A sudden shock ran through her, like a wall had slammed down over his emotions. His eyes narrowed, then he stalked off to the washroom. “I need a shower.”
What had just happened? She sighed. She hadn’t meant to offend him. But he really should lighten up a bit. The man was wound so tight he’d snap one day. Maybe it wasn’t her problem. The mess of contradictions going on inside his brain was more than she could sort out, even if she wanted to try.
Besides, she had the Sefer. She took out the tablet and turned it on.
A hologram displayed, showing a series of symbols and diagrams. She passed her hand through it and it flipped to another section. It was some kind of code. She paged through it. Hundreds of pages of code…
Her mind wouldn’t focus. God, this was going to take forever. She needed to get off Gehenna before anyone found her. But if the Sefer led her to something here, then leaving would only make things more complicated.
Knight had protected her, he’d done his job. She supposed she should pay him. Especially if she was thinking of staying here a few more days. And maybe she should apologize. Antagonizing him… she didn’t think she had anything to fear from him, but still. Maybe he didn’t deserve that. Let him have his eccentricities. Everyone had secrets, she supposed. Herself included.
He came out from the washroom in pants, but shirtless, revealing hardened muscles and a fair number of scars. Cuts, scratches, maybe even slug wounds. It didn’t surprise her that she could make out every chiseled muscle of his abdomen. It did, however, leave her feeling a little flushed, and damn glad he wasn’t an empath. If he could feel what she felt right now… God help her, the man was a killer. Besides, part of her still dreamed of working things out with David. She could show him the Sefer, prove she’d been right about everything. He’d come back to her, then.
She forced her eyes away from Knight’s abdomen. Look at his face. “New Rome is a beautiful place,” she said.
His eyes went blank. That wall was there. Not like a man trained to fight off empaths, but like a man trained to hide his feelings even from himself. “What do you know about it?” It wasn’t a question, more an accusation.
Rachel leaned back on the couch. “I grew up there. My family was rich, corporate background. But I didn’t get on very well with them. Not after I was a teenager. I moved out to go to university as soon as I could.”
Knight’s face had lost a bit of its edge. “Is it… can you really look down on white clouds?”
“From the upper stories of buildings or the Pinnacle, sure.”
His face was unreadable, but an almost child-like awe drifted off him. It was like rays of light, poking at her consciousness through holes in his armor. At last he sat down beside her and grabbed a slice of pizza. He didn’t speak until he’d finished eating it. “The water is really clear, and blue?”
The closeness of him, the tentative, almost fearful opening of his emotions left her a little lightheaded. But she found herself smiling, just a bit. “So clear you can see the shimmering bottom of some of the canals. Once David and I went rafting down a canal and passed over a school of rainbow fish. It was beautiful.” She paused for a moment, drinking in the slight anticipation of his emotions, which set her skin tingling. “You’ve never been off Gehenna, have you?”
Knight licked his fingers clean of pizza sauce, then stared at the blank screen when he answered. “Kesitahs don’t convert to much. It’s damn hard to earn the kind of money I’d need to make it to New Rome.”
“That’s where you want to live… That’s why you wanted to be paid in Mizraim credits.”
“Would you want to live here?”
Shit no. “Even paradise has its flaws, though, Knight.” Sometimes, she’d almost choose the overt horror of a place like this over the subtle fear, the knowledge that your every action was watched and judged against the weight of doctrine. Someone was always watching, always telling you how to live.
Rachel pulled off her headscarf, then brushed out her hair. She could feel it, when his interest sparked, when his arousal piqued, and she couldn’t help but luxuriate in it, drawing out each motion. “Listen, Knight, sorry if I overstepped myself earlier. It’s not my business how you… It’s your life.” She p
ulled credit chips from her jacket. “It’s most of what I owe you. But I need you to let me stay a few days, until I figure this Sefer out. I’ve got to break the code, I’ve got to know what it offers.”
If she turned it over to Galizur and Quasar Industries without solving it herself, she couldn’t be guaranteed they would share the knowledge. In fact, QI was a megacorp specialized in weaponry and space technology. It was a reasonable bet they would want the secrets for themselves.
Oh, Galizur would pay regardless, but she had to do this for more than the money. The fate of humanity was at stake. If the Redeemers got the book, nothing would change. And in a way, that was the greatest tragedy. Mankind would remain forever mired in tradition, unable to think for itself or rise above its past. And if another megacorp claimed the Ark, with that kind of power, with that kind of technology, the edge might well allow them to overtake the entire Conglomerate. Void—they could well challenge Mizraim itself.
“We should leave Gehenna,” Knight said, though his underlying emotions drove at her core. Lust and desperation and… loneliness?
“Soon. I just need a bit more time.” Her voice sounded husky in her throat. She tried to focus. They’d really done it. He’d helped her get perhaps the most precious relic in the universe. He’d kept her alive and…
Knight moved to stand directly in front of her, and she felt her eyes drift down to his tight muscles. With him standing less than a meter away, she could see the faint lines of scars marring the otherwise perfect abs. Those weren’t just battle wounds. That crisscross of lightened skin had to come from torture. Angels above, what had this man been through?
She brushed her fingers over the scars and he shuddered. His lust surged, flowing through her like fine wine. She knew she was drunk on it. Dangers of empathy. If she didn’t push him away now she wouldn’t be able to stop… What was… Her heart trembled, her eyes blurry and intoxicated. Impossible to say where his desire ended and hers began.