AER (The Elements Series Book 3)

by Tracy Korn

  "What are you wearing?"

  "Long story," I answer. "Is your brother around?"

  Farah snorts. "That lazy skod? He's been asleep for hours. What'cha want with him? He owe you some credits?"

  "No," I say, scanning the rest of the bays for anyone else who would know how to find Grisham. "I just need to find a mutual friend of ours." I clear my throat and take her hand, then kiss the back of it. "Do me a favor, beautiful?"

  She takes a step closer to me and breathes in my face.

  "For you? I'll think about it…" she says, angling her chin up at me and lowering her eyelids to half mast. Crite…I don't have time for this.

  I lean in and whisper close to her mouth. "If you see a blonde Cloudy wandering around here looking as lost as…well, a Cloudy in Tinkerer Square…" I let my bottom lip brush hers, and her eyelids close the rest of the way. "Take her to Azeris for me, all right?"

  I take a step back from Farah and kiss her hand again. She opens her eyes, then smiles, and for a second, I'm not sure if she's going to tear what's left of my clothes off, or just beat my brains out with her wrench. I feel the itch of sparks crackling in my hands, then race up the back of my neck, so I suck in a deep breath to cool them out. Lighting up now would be a bad idea.

  "Where you heading in such a hurry?" she asks in a low voice and takes a few steps toward me, her wrench in hand.

  "Told you, I need to find your brother. It's important," I say. "Can you do that favor for me, beautiful?"

  "So long as you promise you'll be around to make it worth my while. Wrangling a Cloudy girl ain't exactly on my to-do list for the evening, wise?"

  "Have I ever let you down?" I say, grinning. Farah opens her mouth instantly in what I know will be no end of examples, so I close the distance between us and kiss her to stop the flow before it starts. She presses her wrench against the back of my neck and pulls on either end, crushing my mouth against hers. Pins and needles start in the palms of my hands, and I ball them into fists against her hips to stop the feeling, then push back from her. She laughs at me.

  "More where that came from if you make it back before I change my mind," Farah says. I cock an eyebrow at her and start to ask her if she remembers what I asked her to do, but she cuts me off. "And yes, I'll leash your Cloudy for you, crite…get then. I'll tell my brother you asked after him."

  "Thanks, Farah. I owe you one."

  "More like 10," she says with another snort, then blows me a kiss off her grease-streaked hand.

  "No doubt," I add, then watch her walk back to the dark pod of bays in the makeshift scrap metal shelter.

  I get about ten steps in the opposite direction, then hear my last name shouted behind me.

  "Wright! Hang back!" I turn around expecting someone far away, but Finn Winter, Farah's brother, has already closed the distance between us.

  His black hair is combed straight back from his forehead, which makes his thick dark brows and round, brown eyes stand out.

  "Finn! Man, I was looking for you."

  "Where ya been? A lot's gone down since you whiffed," he says, looking over his shoulder at his sister. He grabs my elbow and starts walking with me.

  "Finn! I'm not trying to take your shift!" Farah calls after us.

  "I won't be long! I'll cover you later!" Finn yells back to her, but it's lost in a litany of swear words coming from their bay. He turns back to me and laughs. "She's gonna kill me."

  "Well, tell me what's been going down before she does. I need to find Grisham."

  "That's the last place you want to go," Finn says, looking at me like my hair is on fire. I push my hand through it without thinking just to make sure.

  "Why? I need his help to find a friend, and I need to do it before dawn."

  Finn shakes his head. "Tarriff took over his game. Grisham's in exile now."

  "On the Southside, I heard. What's the hole in the sky?"

  "Who told you that?" Finn asks, giving me a side eye as we walk past more crumbling brick buildings and people puffing on Extract, which makes the air noxious with the smell of spoiled oranges every several feet.

  "Crite, is everyone lighting up now?" I cough and pull the collar of my wrecked dive suit over my nose and mouth.

  "Since Tarriff took over, yeah, pretty much. Who told you about the hole in the sky?"

  "Eddie, why?"

  "Ears…" Finn spins his finger in the air close to his chest, trying to hide the gesture. "Follow me."

  CHAPTER 26

  Blackwater

  Jazz

  Arco's wall of ice goes up again, but there's nothing I can do about it. Not here, and not now. He doesn't believe it's not my fault that I'm connected to Liddick. He doesn't believe it's nothing personal…but I also know the only reason he doesn't believe any of that is because at this point, if I'm honest, maybe I don't even know myself. Could Liddick really be the one tapping into my channel? Who was the man with the eyepatch?

  It's going to get heavier, more confusing, the deeper you go into the Grid, Lyden thinks, but I don't answer him as we make our way back to the circle of consoles around the virtuo-cine chairs and the column of colored Grid layers. The Platform layer at the bottom looks like a dark, churning sea that is so real I half expect it to splash over the edge of the base. Strips of color shoot upward, then bleed into a thick blend of bands that range from black to purple to yellow to white, and everything in between.

  "Pirate ships, baby!" Avis says, vibrating with excitement as we move past the white consoles and take our seats again around the undulating color column.

  "We tweaked their codes in the med bay—two-second delay for adrenaline and cortisol. That should prevent the freeze in pulling them out next time," Liam says. Eco nods, but he's not happy about something.

  "What's the problem?" Arco asks him abruptly, and I stare for a second wondering if his latency Empath receiver ability is getting stronger. Eco looks at him like a machine, expressionless as the white lights over his cheekbones start to flash red and blue every few seconds like flames that are trying to catch.

  "The code evolved again while you were all getting your diapers changed," he says. Jax puts his forearm in Arco's chest to keep him in place.

  "You're welcome to load all these patches into the Glyphs yourself," Arco says through his teeth.

  "Happy to. We'd be done by now and wouldn't have to worry about World War Four breaking out against the three organizations that just happen to sustain life as we know it right now," Eco says, looking away like he's bored.

  "Enough," Tark sighs, then turns to Arco. "You're the only ones who can see the incarnation of the original message Jack embedded, which happens to have The Seam's message on the flipside. It's designed to reach Empaths, not Alpha Channel testers," he adds, glancing back at Eco in admonishment.

  "Let's just get this over with. One down, right? Three to go?" Arco asks, walking through Jax's arm and climbing into his virtuo-cine uplink chair.

  Calyx nods. "Jazz, if you hear or see anything…internally again, just try not to panic. We'll be monitoring, and the best thing you can do is wait for it to pass, all right?"

  "Why is it even happening?" I ask. "Why now? Just because I swallowed the biochip, so it's working like the NET?"

  "That's the only explanation that makes sense…and if you're getting messages that clearly, it must mean that whoever is on the other end of them is getting closer."

  I nod, reenergized. My dad, Liddick, everyone…maybe they really are getting closer. I look over at Arco expecting to see the same enthusiasm, but he's studying the ceiling, the muscles flexing in his jaw with all the words he's not saying. Immediately, the excitement of a second ago crashes into the hard concrete floor. Does he actually think I have any choice in this with hearing Liddick? That I can just announce hey, anyone who's coming into my head without my permission, you can stop now, I'm good!

  He doesn't understand. He knows how he feels, but he doesn't know why…he doesn't like that you're connected to
Liddick, but he knows it's not your fault, Lyden thinks…speaking of people coming into my head without permission.

  I don't care. I can't control what Arco thinks. I can't even control what I think lately.

  Yes, you can. It's not going to be easy, but you're not alone. I'll try to run interference in there if Liddick taps into your channel again.

  I nod as Calyx starts counting down. "All right, we're dropping you about a third of the way through the storyline. That's where the algorithm predicted it would be most likely to encounter the Glyph. Ready for upload in five…four…three…two…."

  I don't hear the last number over the rush of the ocean and something creaking close by. Everything is blindingly white at first, but then I start to make out dark shapes—long lines and blocks that come into focus. Voices emerge over the sound of the sea, but I can't understand the words they're saying for several more seconds. I feel a hand grip my arm, and that's when everything snaps into focus.

  "Are you all right?" Arco says, holding onto me a little too hard. I twist to loosen his grip.

  "I'm OK; are you?"

  "Yeah, stay close to me, all right?" he says as the wooden ground under our feet shifts upward, causing me to stumble into him. He catches me and reaches for the railing at our side to steady us both, and his eyes go wide, flickering in the sun. "For once you listen to me," he says around a smile, which makes heat rush into my cheeks even with the cool sea spray misting everything.

  "Arco, I—" I don't even know what I planned to say…something like it's not my fault, or you have the wrong idea about this connection I have to Liddick, but none of those words come out. He stares at me, waiting, and I have no choice but to shake my head, dismissing everything. His face slips from warm and anticipatory to neutral again, distant, safe behind his wall, and I take a deep breath to fill the empty space spreading in my chest now.

  "No! Let go!" Myra suddenly yells from somewhere. Arco spins around, but neither of us see her right away. A tall man with a long white shirt and a black scarf tied around his head is trying to drag her away from the railing, but she won't release it.

  "Hey!" Arco yells across the deck, and Lyden is already running toward them.

  "Put her down!" Arco yells again, then takes off running too, but he doesn't reach them before Vox rushes over to the man and kicks his kneecap as hard as she can. The man lets go of Myra immediately and collapses to the floor.

  "You're everywhere there's trouble, aren't you?" Lyden laughs, gathering Myra into his arms while Fraya rushes over.

  Vox shrugs. "It's what I do."

  "Is everyone all right," I ask, running over to them and looking specifically at Myra until she nods. "OK, so we're on a pirate ship now?"

  I scan the horizon in every direction, but there's no land to be found, just endless, churning black water.

  "Stowaways!" the man who grabbed Myra yells, which summons about ten other men toward us. Two finish climbing down from the ropes dangling from the enormous sails, then the others make their way to us from different sides of the deck. They're all dressed in the same loose, lightly colored shirts and tight, dark pants, some of which are tied off around the shins while others are just ripped and tattered on the edges. "Brazen as daylight too, just standing starboard!"

  "We're not stowaways!" Myra's voice cracks at the man with the scarf.

  "Then what are ye?" another man asks, this one short and tanned with no hair at all, I notice, when he pushes his scarf back from his forehead to wipe off the sweat, then pulls the whole thing down around his neck.

  "We're…" Lyden starts, but then seems to freeze. He pushes both hands through his dark hair and pulls in a deep breath. Why is he suddenly so afraid? His anxiety grows and spreads to the point that my own chest starts to tighten with it.

  What's wrong? Breathe. This is a cine, remember? I think toward him, and my chest relaxes a little.

  It's all the water…he finally thinks. It was just a flashback; I felt the itch starting—the itch that means the gills they put in me are opening.

  I don't know what to say for several seconds. What advice or comfort could I possibly give him to help him relax. I have no idea what it must be like to have actual genetically modified gills, let alone all the trauma of nearly drowning as they tested them out over and over again. I stop trying to think of what to say and instead, start trying to feel…to imagine. I'm terrified.

  It's all right, you're not alone, I think because it's the first thing that comes to mind, but also, because I think I'm halfway saying it to myself.

  Lyden nods, then takes in another deep breath and blows it out like he's getting ready to run a race.

  "Listen, we'll work for our passage, all right? We didn't mean to stowaway; we just…got lost," he says, but the angry looking men don't seem appeased.

  "Are any of you sick!?" Fraya shouts above all the grumbling of the men gathering more and more closely around us. They stop advancing and look around for her. She steps forward from the rail where Arco and I were just standing, stumbling to keep her footing for a second as the boards under our feet angle upward, then level out again with the rolling sea. "I'm a doctor—if any of you are sick, I can help you," Fraya says again, lifting a black bag at her side. Where did she get that?

  "Bring her to Royce! Make a hole!" a man in the distance yells.

  "Make a hole for the cap'n!"

  Another man, this one very dark skinned and thin walks quietly up to Fraya and grips her arm. He doesn't seem hostile at all, but I see the wince on Fraya's face when his fingers close just above her elbow.

  "I'm going with her!" I say, taking several steps toward them both. Arco moves quickly in my wake, but before I can tell him to stop, two other men grip his arms and hold him in place. He struggles against them, which only makes them more irate.

  "It's OK! Stay here and keep watch," I say, thinking of the Glyph that has to be here somewhere, and wishing for once that Arco could hear my thoughts like Liddick, Vox, and Lyden can.

  "Royce is your captain?" Fraya asks, shifting the loop handles of the black bag around her forearm and tying off her long, auburn hair in a knot at the nape of her neck as we walk. I look back at Arco one more time and nod. He understood what I meant about keeping watch…good.

  The tall, skinny man still holding Fraya's arm looks down at me and suddenly grabs mine, too. Instinctively I pull back, but his bony fingers are like a vice.

  I close my eyes for a second and make myself take a breath—stop tweaking…it's just a cine…I think, grateful that Arco didn't see the miniature struggle.

  I look up at the man, whose irises are actually nearly black. I nod once, and he pulls us toward a narrow doorway. Once we get close enough, it opens on its own, but nothing is on the other side except endless dark and the sloshing of water, which seems magnified now.

  "Scale de rope," the man says with a thick accent I don't recognize. He motions to the right side of the door opening with his hand like he wants us to get out of the way. When we cross, he rolls his eyes, making the black irises disappear completely so all I see are his bulging white eyeballs against his nearly black skin. "De rope! It's right dare!" he says again, pointing to the upper right corner of the doorway.

  "What does he want us to do with the rope?" Fraya whispers to me.

  "Take it! Scale de rope!"

  "He wants us to get the rope, I think. It must be hanging just inside the door…" I say, then close the distance between the door and where I'm standing.

  On the inside of the frame, I feel the sharp fibers of the thick rope as I pull it out.

  "This?" I ask, holding it up.

  "Yes. Dat. Scale now," the man says, and the breath I've just taken stops hard and cold in my throat. I cough until I restore my composure.

  "Sorry, what?"

  "Scale! Descend. Now!" the man answers.

  "You want us to lower ourselves literally, on this rope? Into…the water down there? How is there even water down there?" I ask, feeling m
yself start to stammer, so I bite my inner lip.

  "Descend," the man says through his teeth this time. "De cap'n down dare."

  CHAPTER 27

  Southside

  Liddick

  Finn's dark eyes narrow just enough that I know not to ask questions—not here. I nod, and we walk on in silence until we get to the edge of Tinkerer Square. The dark pavement with the occasional sand bleed showing through gives way to mostly sand with a few patches of dark pavement. The Southside is the most decrepit part of the Badlands. The faded spray paint on the cement block buildings is crumbled away in places, leaving incomplete art and writing. It looks like someone splashed gray paint over the graffiti, and any second another splash will come to wash away the rest of the tagging. The street lamps spill daylight into the darkened alleys, but I know better than to look down any of them. The last thing I need right now is to be followed by some tweaker.

  "All right—we're past the noise now," Finn says, letting out a heavy breath.

  "What happened to this place?"

  "Tarriff, man. He drove Grisham out about a month ago. Wired everything from Tinkerer Square to the edge of the Southside to keep heat on the street. Eyes. Ears…"

  "But why? We were starting to fix this place," I say, looking over my shoulder to make sure we're not being followed by anyone in the alleys we've just passed.

  "Power. Tarriff came into some credits recently. Got himself some new GE teeth just like the Cloudies, and suddenly, Extract is all over the street. Grisham thinks someone is supplying him, and he's funneling the coin somewhere, after his kickback, of course. Nobody can process milkweed at the rate he's putting it out there."

  "Is Grisham trying to fix this?"

  "He's locked down, man, but at least he's got people out there reporting back," Finn answers after a long pause.

  "And you're one of them, aren't you?"