by Jacob Gowans
She rested a clammy, unsteady finger on the button.
He could still find me. His reach is endless.
The elevator asked for her to scan her fingerprint, then her iris. Then the doors closed swiftly, making no sound. The claustrophobic sensation she’d experienced on the street returned stronger than before. She tasted her own peril; its flavor reminded her of rotting meat.
Fear. She hadn’t experienced it in years. It was both alien and familiar, exhilarating and crippling. I will not go easily if he tries. He knows that. Killing me will not be easy at all. The Queen flexed her fingers and hands, ignoring the classical music playing from the speakers around her. I’m too tired. Perhaps my death won’t be so difficult after all. He intended to weaken me these last few days.
The elevator came to a stop and the music faded as the doors opened noiselessly. Though she appeared serene stepping out of the elevator, her emotions were a maelstrom. I’ve survived thus far. Perhaps that is a sign of his forgiveness.
She stood in a small antechamber, where the purple obsession abated, but didn’t die. Cream colored walls with elaborate gold designs and thin purple trim gave the antechamber a beautiful and elegant aura. The doors were solidly built and luxuriant, even to the last detail on the knobs. The carpet was plush, adorned with cherubic designs. Near the doors, on the floor across the way, sat a small box wrapped in brown paper. It was no bigger than half of a shoebox, but nothing could have captured her attention more.
Trying not to look at it, the Queen crossed the antechamber to the doors. Her movement activated four cameras mounted around the space. Above and to the right of the doors, a holo-screen mounted on the wall blinked to life, showing a hologram of an unnatural-looking fox or dog resting on a lavish purple cushion. She did not know why she found this holographic fox so aberrant, but there was something wrong with it, something escaping her. The animal’s tail occasionally twitched or flicked, and its mouth moved in unison with the words of the real fox whose voice came through a speaker.
“Thank you for your punctuality, Katie,” the fox said. His tone was neither high nor low. No emotion could be detected except a light pleasantness. It reminded her of the voice of someone narrating a nature program about birds.
The Queen replied with equal care, though she doubted she could fully conceal her own anxiety. “Will you admit me?”
“No. It would not be safe for us to be in one another’s presence at this moment.”
The Queen scowled. “Not safe for you or for me?”
“Both, I think. Please sit.”
“I’ll stand, thank you.”
The fox’s voice became very soft. “Katie, if I planned to kill you, I would not have waited this long. I hope you have come to proclaim your accountability.”
The Queen did not respond immediately. Despite her relief at his words, her instincts told her to not relax. This moment was still as fragile as a tower of cards. “To what do you hold me accountable?”
“For taking unauthorized orders from Victor Wrobel when you knew the decisions he made were not aligned with my plan. For unauthorized entry into enemy territory. For breaching security by stealing a weapon that had not been approved for military combat. For not preventing the arrest of Wrobel. Frankly, Katie, for not acting as I expect you to.
“You had a gun at the boy’s head, but you did not kill him. For that I can find fault with only you. He was unconscious and you had a gun. He emerged from the room almost whole, you with a broken nose. Your actions resulted in no gain of intelligence nor any advancement of my plan. Even dead, Wrobel has proved more useful to me than you.”
The Queen lowered her head a fraction. Every word the fox spoke were echoes of accusations she’d already leveled at herself. Yet hearing him say them stung far worse.
“Are you accountable?” he asked again.
Her voice caught in her throat as she said the words, but they still came out. “I am.”
The graphic of the fox smiled. The gesture brought her no comfort. She wanted to leave quickly, but knew that would be a fatal mistake.
“Thank you for not making excuses, Katie. Nothing ruins an apology like an excuse. I think, in time, you will regain my trust. For now, you will accept that you do not have it, and that you must work for it.”
“Please,” the Queen said, “I can kill him.”
“You can’t.”
“I bested him twice.”
“He was weakened. There is no guarantee he will still be at the next opportunity.”
“Allow me one more opportunity, and I will use the latest—”
“No.” The fox’s voice silenced her. “It is too late. The plan has changed. My new strategy, I think, will be far more effective in obtaining the goal.”
The Queen knew nothing of any changes in the fox’s plans, but she dared not speak those words. The fox, however, discerned her thoughts and fixed his eyes upon her like two trained bullets seeking their mark.
“Nor will you know for now. As I said, trust is earned.”
Forcing her voice to remain steady and her face to freeze in its neutral expression, she asked, “What can I do to regain your trust?” No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t conceal the pleading in her own voice.
“The solution is simple.”
The word solution was a punch to the Queen’s throat. He doesn’t mean that solution, she told herself, but the damage to her composure had been done. The fox smiled again. She wasn’t sure if this time his expression was more malicious or if her eyes had deceived her. A trickle of sweat fell from her scalp down her temple.
“Open the package, Katie. I think you will find the solution inside.”
The Queen prayed that the package would not hold what she most feared. Willing her hands to stay steady, she ripped open the parcel. Contained within the box, she found a glass flask containing a pale red liquid. Her heart thudded in her chest as her stomach turned over. No, I can’t do this. I can’t drink this. As she picked it up, a tear fell from her left eye. She fixed her eyes on the fox’s and imagined herself strangling him while she gouged out his eyes with her thumbnails.
“You promised me . . . ” she hissed at him.
“You broke the agreement—”
“You promised me!”
“I warned you.”
“YOU PROMISED ME!” She shook the bottle of solution in her fist. It fizzed angrily against the glass.
“Drink it.” The cold fury in the fox’s voice was warning enough. The Queen knew if she protested anymore, she would be killed. With the twist of her wrist, the stopper popped out, and a second tear fell, this time from her right eye. “All of it.”
The smell emanating from the nozzle was foul and burned her nose. She brought the bottle to her lips and drank. The taste was terribly bitter and stung her lips, tongue, gums, and throat all the way down. Her stomach cramped and she clutched it, doubling over, trembling from the heat rippling across her body. Saliva fell freely from her lips as she fought away waves of sickness.
“Now you are common. You are like every other Thirteen and Aegis. How do you like that, Katie?”
Shut up. Shut up. I hate you. These words became a mantra that she repeated several times until the pains of peristalsis subsided.
“I said, ‘How do you like that, Katie?’” he repeated. The perfect calm had returned to his voice once more.
“I hate it.” The trembling slowly subsided. “You know I hate it.”
“Then use it as motivation to regain my confidence, and I will give you back the freedom you so treasure. Now to business: Wrobel is dead thanks to my well-placed agent. The information he gave them was minimal, but the information he still gives us is invaluable, especially as my plan nears the final stages. The same agent now has the full attention of Alpha Command, which takes eyes away from us as we make our next move. I will need you to go to Johannesburg and retrieve something I want very much. Are you willing and ready to do that? It will be your first step on t
he road to redemption.”
The Queen’s mouth tasted of acid. Her stomach ached in protest to the invasion of the solution. The rage inside her was a tidal wave of emotion bristling with raw power built for destruction, but she knew what her answer would be.
I hate you, fox. Forgiveness for such a betrayal would never come. New tears fell as she bent her head and got down on her knees. The only difference between these tears and the two drops shed only moments earlier was that these were a farce.
7.
Tawhiri
Saturday May 18, 2086
The Betas gathered into teams and filed off to their respective starting places. Jeffie fell in step next to Sammy. “Don’t be shy about giving me ideas if you have them, okay?”
“I told you—”
“I know, I know. I’m saying that I’m open to suggestions if a brilliant strategy strikes your brain.”
“You got it.”
Jeffie grinned at him and put a hand on his shoulder, then pulled it off as though he’d burned her. Her expression turned stony and her face reddened as she muttered an apology.
Sammy looked back at her, unashamed. “You don’t need to be. We’re friends.”
She opened her mouth to reply, when Brickert butted in. “So what’s our plan? Do we even have a chance?”
“Thanks for the vote of confidence, Brick,” she said.
The five friends reached the portal to the large cavernous interior of Beta headquarters: the Arena. Kawai peered inside. “Is it just me or does it seem like there’s a lot of warm air coming out of the room?”
Jeffie led the way inside. Sammy quickly discovered that the air wasn’t warm, it was stifling. Within a minute, the first drops of sweat formed on his brow and dribbled down his nose. Barely enough light shone in the Arena. Jeffie led them along the passage until it shrunk into a cramped crawlspace. Between the humid air and the claustrophobic feeling of the tunnels, the only nice thing about this Game was Sammy’s perfect view of Jeffie’s backside as she crawled in front of him.
As they passed turn after turn, continuing on Jeffie’s straight-ahead course, Sammy realized that they were in a maze.
“Any ideas?” Jeffie asked him over the com.
“Not really,” he replied. “Finish as soon as possible so we can get out of this crucible?”
Jeffie laughed. “I’m thinking we should stick together. You agree?”
“Yeah. Probably a good idea.”
“And quit staring at my butt.”
“What—no—I—”
“Kidding.”
Unfortunately, Sammy did not get his wish of getting out of the Arena early. They crawled around for the full hour, and only bumped into one person, whom they quickly deactivated. Because Asaki’s team had the most players remaining, she won.
Jeffie was not happy, but she held her tongue. Despite the intense heat they’d suffered inside the Arena, Tawhiri gave the Betas little time for a break. Five minutes after the first match ended, the next began. Sammy dreaded what they might find inside this time.
The good news was that the heat was gone. The bad news was that in its place was a frigid cold air that had an even greater effect on their sweat-soaked clothes and heat-accustomed bodies. Also gone was the maze and tunnels, replaced with a new surprise. The Arena had transformed into a giant office building. The setting had much more detail than anything Byron had ever cooked up for them. In fact, Sammy might have believed they’d walked into a real building if everything hadn’t had that dull gray metallic sheen.
“I’ll tell you, Major Tryhooli better have a good severance package.” Brickert folded his arms tightly against his chest. “He’s gonna kill us on his first day!”
As Sammy walked past a desk, he ran his fingers over the surface where two pens and a box of papers sat. Neither the pens nor the paper budged when he tried to move them; it was as though all the objects around him were trapped in a static three dimensional image.
“A—Any orders, J—Jeffie?” Kawai asked through chattering teeth.
Jeffie turned to Sammy, but he shook his head. “Come on, you’re honcho. You have to make the decisions.”
Jeffie grumbled as she surveyed the room. “Give me a sec to think.”
A network of cubicles and open desks divided the center of the floor from the ring of enclosed offices surrounding them. Come on, Jeffie, Sammy thought, surely you can see that this is the perfect area to—
“Maybe . . . we’ll lay some traps,” she finally said.
There you go.
Once Jeffie had made her decision she stuck with it, putting herself with Brickert and Natalia in the offices near the stairs, and sending Sammy and Kawai into the cubicles a few meters away.
Sammy and Kawai crouched low in their little nook. As they waited, they hugged themselves to stay warm, which was more difficult now that they’d stopped moving. Pressing against him to share body heat, Kawai’s breaths came out as snakelike hisses through her clenched teeth until Sammy motioned her to be quiet with a finger to his lips. Every ten seconds Sammy’s body gave a long shiver and then relaxed. The cold Arena reminded him of his first night on the run with Toad, how they’d jogged long into the night until finding a small shanty for shelter. At least ten minutes passed in this manner before anyone stepped into their ambush: a team of three. There was enough light for Sammy to recognize Li, Strawberry, and Brillianté. Jeffie gave the order and everyone attacked.
Sammy and Kawai got there first, catching the threesome off-guard. With one blast, Sammy took out Strawberry, immediately aiming a second one at Li, who blocked it. Jeffie’s team came up from behind to help Kawai take out Brillianté. Between Sammy, Brickert, and Natalia’s efforts, Li had no chance.
As soon as the three were deactivated, Jeffie led the group downstairs to set a similar trap on the floor below. The layout was exactly the same, so they chose the same places. This time they waited much longer, at least twenty minutes, before Jeffie made the decision to proceed down one more floor. Sammy knew what was going on in her mind. She had to press the attack in order to stand a chance at winning because of Asaki’s greater numbers. The downside, of course, was that her smaller team stood little chance of winning a direct confrontation with Asaki’s.
As they moved into position to set up their third ambush point—exactly as they’d done on the top two floors—Asaki’s team emerged from the floor below with Jeffie’s group still in plain sight.
“Attack!” Jeffie cried as she led the team forward.
The doorway to the stairs bottlenecked Asaki’s team, which helped Jeffie, but Sammy thought rushing into a battle like this was a poor strategy. They pushed forward, meeting Asaki, Kobe, and Kaden on the front line. Kobe and Kaden pressed a strong counterattack, making it difficult for Jeffie’s front line to get many good blasts off. Behind them, Miguel and Rosa used jump blasts to rain down their fire. Only a moment after Jeffie deactivated Asaki’s helmet, Miguel took down Natalia.
The fighting continued, but Jeffie’s team played pure defense to prevent any more deactivations. Sammy noticed that Asaki’s team had already lost two players—Cala and Levu—from a skirmish with Li’s team. For the moment, Jeffie and Asaki’s teams were evenly matched in numbers, though not in skill.
Smelling the fear of their opponents, Kobe and Kaden pushed the front line even harder while Miguel and Rosa kept up the aerial assaults. On Jeffie’s orders, Sammy and Brickert hung back while she and Kawai shielded for them. Brickert took shots at Miguel when each opportunity arose, and Sammy targeted Rosa, but it was an impossible situation. The teams had reached a standstill, no one willing to do much more than shield until Kaden found a way around Kawai’s defense and took her down.
“Retreat! Get back!” Jeffie ordered. “We can’t let Kobe and Kaden get around us.”
Sammy and Brickert followed orders, giving up ground in order to avoid the twins’ double team.
“Jeffie, if we’re going to win we need to do something drastic
,” said Sammy.
“Do whatever you think is best as long as it helps us win.”
Sammy tapped Brickert’s shoulder and made three motions with his hands. Brickert nodded and gave a thumbs up. With that, Sammy launched into action. Using a moderate jump blast, he planted his feet on the wall to his right and walked its length. To support himself, he used one hand in a constant blast, the other he used to fire repeatedly at Kobe and Rosa, the two Betas closest to him. Kobe turned and shielded with his left hand, firing blasts back at Sammy with his right hand. Kaden shot down Brickert off the opposite wall almost immediately, but in turn was caught by Jeffie.
By the time Sammy was done with his wall walk, Rosa had hit the ground, leaving Kobe and Miguel flanked by Jeffie and Sammy. Miguel held up Sammy long enough for Kobe to deactivate Jeffie, forcing Sammy into a two-on-one situation.
Now would be a great time for my anomaly to magically reappear.
But it didn’t. His com told him that he had ten minutes left before the Game ended in a loss, so he pressed the attack. It was a hard fought battle between himself, Miguel, and Kobe. He refused to yield ground to them, while also preventing them from going vertical to surround him. Twice Miguel tried to jump over him, but both times Sammy met him in the air, shielding carefully while also rebuffing him with his legs or torso. The second time Miguel lost his balance on the way down, landing on his back, vulnerable.
Sammy didn’t hesitate.
With only Kobe remaining, the equation became much simpler. Even without an anomaly to show him what to do, Sammy had more speed, skill, and experience. He pushed Kobe around with blasts, kicks, and forward jumps until Kobe’s body language told Sammy all he needed to know. Feigning right, Sammy jerked his body left and caught Kobe’s flank with his foot. Pushing Kobe’s hands aside, Sammy fought through until his blasts reached Kobe’s helmet.
The lights came on in the Arena as everyone’s suits reactivated. Kobe got up quickly and took off his helmet. Sammy braced himself for an angry reaction, but instead saw that Kobe wore a huge grin. “Good to know the world has gone back to normal,” he joked, smacking Sammy on the arm. “We’ll get you next time.”