Airborne

by Kimberly P. Chase

  While the spider completed its job, Zane focused on the door lock. He pulled a thin pressure pin that looked like a small needle from his pocket and placed it between the two panels holding the unit together. He moved the pin in and out, applying pressure at each new point until the two main pad lock pieces were pried apart.

  A rainbow of different colored wiring tangled together. Zane knew he could cut the black wire to disengage the system, but this was Titon Technologies. They would have a backup for the backup. If he cut the black wire, he knew without a doubt an alarm would go off somewhere else.

  One minute twenty eight point five seconds had passed.

  Zane hurried. He faintly heard the techspider moving inside the retinal scanner as it worked to incapacitate the system.

  The ground trembled beneath his feet.

  What the—?

  Tiny pebbles bounced against Zane’s boots before dropping back to the ground. The up and down process repeated itself four times before it stopped. The rocks lay still as if the whole episode had never occurred.

  Zane forgot all about being careful. Something told him he needed to get in the building now.

  He cut the black wire just as the ground shook beneath his feet again.

  More forceful this time.

  When the retinal scanner light turned green, Zane nudged the door open with his shoulder and almost lost his balance. The second he entered the building, he ran.

  Titon Technologies trembled beneath his pounding feet.

  Chapter 3

  Sky

  Sky pushed his hands roughly through Annemarie’s hair, but it just wasn’t the same. It wasn’t what he craved.

  Shit. He shoved the memory of Aurora’s long, soft hair out of his mind. Determined to forget, Sky pressed his body against Annemarie’s until they were against the wall, his body pinning hers. A muffled moan let him know she enjoyed their encounter, even if it was a little rough.

  Beep. Beep.

  Sky ignored the hail. It was the tenth time his watch had beeped in the past thirty minutes.

  Beep. Beep.

  ‘Damn it,’ he groaned, unlocking his lips from the latest girl he’d been using as a distraction.

  ‘Shouldn’t you get that?’ Annemarie asked breathlessly.

  It wasn’t like Sky to ignore calls, but somehow his techiwatch hail-sign had been revealed. ‘Fuck no. It’s just another reporter.’ Sky buttoned up his pants and bent over to retrieve Annemarie’s top. His attempt to get over Aurora wasn’t working anyway.

  Sky threw the top toward her, hoping she’d take the hint.

  ‘That’s it?’ she huffed.

  ‘Yeah. Get out.’ Screw hinting. Sky turned his back on Annemarie as she pulled the top over her head. He probably shouldn’t be such a dick to her, but right now he didn’t give two flying fucks about feelings.

  He could hear Annemarie hastily adjusting her clothes, annoyance radiating off her in waves. Sky squeezed his eyes shut as the vivid image of what Aurora would have done in this situation surfaced. She wouldn’t have taken his shit. Aurora would have yelled and probably thrown something at him. Sky’s heart rate accelerated in excitement at the thought. A chuckle slipped out.

  ‘What’s so funny? You too good to hook up with a common driller now?’

  Balls. He’d forgotten he wasn’t alone.

  Instead of banging his head against the wall like he wanted to, he turned around and shrugged. ‘I …’ Sky’s voice faltered.

  Who was she kidding? Annemarie had probably wanted to hook up with him just so she could say she’d fucked a Dagan. Sky wanted to murder the reporter who’d leaked that little tidbit of information. Ever since his true lineage came out, others had lost all respect for him—respect that had taken Sky years to earn. No one wanted anything to do with him now. Not even Aurora. He hadn’t heard from her since the day he left.

  ‘Please. Just go.’

  When Sky heard the door click closed, his shoulders relaxed.

  What was wrong with him? Determined to get some semblance of his old life back, Sky changed into his flight suit. There was only one thing that could take his mind off everything.

  Fully suited, Sky walked out of his room, down the barracks hallway, past the kitchen, and into the outer chamber. As soon as the air was removed from the room, Sky pressed the large green button beside him to open the exterior door.

  Regolith swirled into the airlock, coating everything in a light gray dust that they’d probably never get rid of. As the door sealed behind him, Sky’s gaze was pulled to the large blue gem hanging in the dark sky.

  Earth.

  The blue planet was tinged with chunks of brown, but it was pretty nonetheless. Sky pretended he could actually see the world rotating at its six hundred and fifty miles per hour pace.

  It was a lonely feeling, watching the world move on without you.

  Was anyone looking toward him now? Aurora? Man, that girl had screwed over his whole view of the world. Literally. Somehow his heart, the one that used to belong to the universe and flying, had been stolen by the fiery redhead that had stormed into his life six months ago. Sky didn’t want to mindlessly fly anymore … Aurora made him think bigger than that.

  Did anyone down there—besides the Academy, of course—know they were risking their lives mining to help them?

  These sorts of thoughts could send the sanest person over the edge.

  Putting those feelings aside, Sky pushed into a fast walk, using the one-third gravity to easily propel forward. As his boots scuffed against the regolith, sand floated into the air before slowly settling back to the ground, leaving a fog-like cloud in his wake.

  ‘Captain, we need you to board the ship,’ Mark, the lunar chief’s voice called over the radio.

  Sky nodded, but then realized no one would see it. The mic near his throat, detecting vocal vibrations, projected his voice back over the radio. ‘Yeah, I’m on it.’

  ‘Sir, we can’t continue moving until you’ve safely lifted off. We have a schedule to keep.’ Mark’s tightly polite voice came through his helmet. Before Mark knew Sky was Skyller Dagan, he would’ve just barked the order out. Now, things were always asked politely. No one treated him the same anymore.

  The lunar bulldozers seemed to pause in their tracks. They wouldn’t start digging until Sky was inside the lunar transport, flying away from the mining station. He wasn’t trained in lunar drilling, but taking his frustrations out in physical labour sounded spec-fucking-tacular.

  He’d been spending too much time in his own head. It was time to focus on the one thing he loved more than anything in the world—flying.

  The lunar transport stood in all its glory before him. It wasn’t the sexiest aircraft he’d ever seen. The chunky metallic vehicle sitting on six sturdy legs was meant for hauling, but that didn’t mean he wouldn’t fly the hell out of it.

  Sky knew without looking that his footsteps left deep indentations behind him as he strode toward the hatch. He entered the payload bay and ignored the cargo piled inside. Usually he measured and recorded the freight’s contents for the Alliance—and for weight and balance like a good pilot should—but the instrument panel called to him.

  A pale blue glow lit the instruments and cockpit. As Sky slid into his seat, a peace he only achieved while flying settled over him.

  Flicking switches in a beautiful flow of memory, Sky prepared to get the hell out of there. He quickly closed the open hatch and plotted his coordinates to the space station. He’d done this same routine over the past few weeks that he didn’t even have to think about it anymore.

  ‘Lunar transport ready for launch,’ Sky stated over the radio. The hum of the lunar transport had done more for his state of mind than the random girls he’d been with over the past couple of weeks.

  ‘Transport, you’re cleared for departure. Your coordinates to the station look good, but you’ll have to adjust when you get closer.’

  ‘Yeah, got it, thanks.’ Sky refrained from roll
ing his eyes and announcing that he had done this a thousand times. Of course, he knew he’d have to adjust his course. The space station was constantly moving as it rotated around the Earth. But at least that was a challenge. Kind of.

  Sky flipped the rocket ignition switches in the upward position. ‘Burn on one and two.’ He didn’t need to make all the call outs, but being an instructor at the Academy for a semester had stuck with him.

  Green lights flickered across his engine instruments. ‘Launch in five …’

  Sky pushed the throttles full forward, letting the rockets gain full power before launch.

  ‘Three … two … one …’

  The vehicle jettisoned upward, pushing Sky into his seat. The vibrations rumbled and purred around him like thunder. Unlike on Earth there wasn’t a stream of fire trailing behind him, just an upward, invisible force that propelled the vehicle out of the moon’s atmosphere. It didn’t take much power to leave the moon’s surface and Sky sometimes missed the adrenaline pumping, balls to the wall take offs on Earth.

  Pocked crater marks turned into a beautiful pale glowing moon as Sky flew further and further away. Zero gravity returned, but he didn’t notice. The Earth un-obstructively stood before him. And again, his traitorous mind turned to thoughts of Aurora, wondering what she was doing right now.

  Chapter 4

  Zane

  The inside of Titon Technologies was a madhouse. People were running around yelling. Lights flickered on and off as security guards tried to gain control of the situation.

  Idiots. All of them. Like panicking will help.

  The building shook for a few seconds longer before coming to an abrupt stop.

  Then absolute silence. Like everyone didn’t know what to do now that the shaking had stopped so they just stood there.

  Eventually, a few broke out of their reverie, returned to their simglasses and moved on about their lives like they could only take so much chaos in one day. Must get back to their alternate realities, he thought.

  His ears hummed at the quick change from chaos to peace. If he hadn’t felt it for himself, Zane would never have believed he’d just experienced an earthquake. The closest fault line to Orlando was over two hundred miles away and had remained calm for, well, forever.

  Zane didn’t take the opportunity to admire the enormity of the building or the amount of tech that decorated the walls like he wanted to. Instead he used the jostled crowd and distracted guards to his advantage.

  He ran down a side hallway toward where he thought the elevator shaft would be from the Titon building plans he’d hijacked last night. The one that they’d tried to disguise as a waste chute on the original construction plans. He wasn’t positive that his hunch was right until he spotted a metallic door labeled Disposal at the end of the hallway.

  Even from this distance, Zane knew the door had a security system.

  He wondered if this really fooled the average person. Wouldn’t people wonder why a trash disposal entrance needed security?

  Running with his gaze lowered, he bypassed the retinal scanners, hoping the guards would be too distracted to notice the alarms that triggered as he ran by. When he reached the door, Zane threw his last techspider down and watched as the metallic legs clicked up the door and into the crack. A few seconds later the green operational light above the elevator door blinked off. No wonder these things were illegal.

  Zane squeezed his fingers into the door crack and pulled the doors manually apart. When he got inside, he grabbed the techspider from the electrical door component. The elevator returned to operational status. There were only two floors indicted on the screen in front of him. One labeled top floor and the other labeled waste disposal.

  ‘Waste disposal,’ Zane called out. It wasn’t like they’d be stupid enough to label it ‘secret laboratory’.

  His stomach rose when the elevator began its descent. He dropped for thirty seconds before coming to a stop. The doors automatically opened, revealing a room filled with waste. Shocked, Zane stood there dumbfounded. Was it really just a disposal room? His instincts screamed that he was right. That Collin Titon was hiding something down here. Something that would help explain why Zane was the way he was.

  Just as he was about to leave the elevator and dig through all of the trash, the doors closed.

  The elevator descended again.

  Zane stopped counting time after three minutes. Oxygen hissed through the vents in the elevator.

  While he calculated that a fifty-mile an hour drop for three minutes put him two and a half miles below the surface the elevator continued to descend a bit longer before the doors opened.

  The hallway was dark, the air stale and musty. When Zane stepped off the elevator, the lights did not automatically turn on.

  ‘Lights on,’ Zane commanded. When nothing happened, he pressed his hand against the closest wall. There wasn’t a hand pad either. He ran his fingers across the smooth wall until he felt a small lever sticking out. He moved it.

  The lights came on.

  Huh.

  Dust coated the floor and Zane’s footsteps left a trail of footprints in his wake.

  If this didn’t scream super-secret laboratory, he didn’t know what did. Only a few people had access to the elevator he’d just come from. Zane doubted even Aurora had ever stuck around in the elevator long enough for it to take her down any further.

  Chills raced across his arms as a sour taste coated the back of his throat. Was he here as a child? No memories resurfaced, but the creepy feeling stuck with him as he walked down the tomb-like hallway.

  Minutes passed as he explored from the hallway, uncovering rooms hidden behind all the dust. Various equipment and outdated computers occupied most of the rooms. Overall, the place looked like it hadn’t been touched in years. Papers lined the floor and tables. Like everything had been quickly abandoned and left in place.

  It was time to get this over with. If there was any information about his genetic alteration, Zane knew it would be here. He’d waited his whole life for answers and lately it seemed that each answer only brought another question.

  He strode to the first door, purpose filling his steps. There wasn’t a retinal scanner or keypad, so he assumed the door would automatically open.

  No such luck.

  Zane jammed his shoulder against the door, but it didn’t budge. Shit. He kicked it and the force reverberated back up his leg. He glanced around, hoping to find some sort of tech that would make the door open. Yet he saw nothing of the sort.

  An unusual knob thing stuck out of the door. Nothing else kept the door closed.

  Zane touched the knob and felt a slight movement. Exerting more pressure, the knob turned as he pushed.

  The door swung silently open.

  Pushing away his confusion as to how that would be a good way to keep people out, Zane waited for an alarm to go off. When he didn’t hear anything, he stepped forward more boldly and moved toward the computers. When he waved his hand over a projector, a holographic double helix swirled before him.

  Perfectly comfortable in the dark, Zane continued to search every corner of the forgotten laboratory. Posters of genomes from various animals and humans covered the sidewalls. Microscopes with dried blood beneath their scopes lined various tables. Everything hinted that this was a place they experimented on genes, but where was the information he needed?

  Zane depressed the ‘on’ button on the closest computer, hoping it would come to life.

  Nothing.

  The screen remained blank.

  He turned over papers, coffee cups, and tech so old he wasn’t sure what they were used for. Every once in a while he’d see that double helix, like it was some sort of logo.

  Zane continued down the line of computers, trying each one.

  When none of them worked, he grabbed the only computer that had a fingerprint scanner on its lower right corner. Glancing at his techiwatch, Zane calculated he’d been down there for forty-five minutes. No way would
he have time to hack into them all now. The confusion upstairs wouldn’t last long and Zane had to get out of the building before he was discovered. He’d gotten what he wanted. If there was anything about what had been done to him, Zane felt certain the information he needed would be on one of these computers.

  Whatever had happened here was a mystery. There was no indication of a cover-up. Everything looked as if it had just been abandoned. He stuck the laptop in his side bag, adjusted the shoulder strap and walked back to the elevator. No desire to look further pressed him; he only wanted to get the hell out of there.

  As Zane stepped into the elevator, the doors automatically closed and took off before he could vocalize where he wanted to go. When the elevator flew past the disposal level without stopping, he swallowed.

  The elevator soared through the main floor on a mission of its own.

  Up. Up. And up it went.

  Shit. The elevator was taking him to the top floor. Zane didn’t have time to try and override it. The elevator came to an abrupt stop and the door opened.

  He sucked in a sharp breath.

  Chapter 5

  Aurora

  When the shaking finally stopped, Aurora picked herself up off the floor. She needed to find her dad. Really anyone who could explain what the hell had just happened would work. Sweat trickled down her back as she ran from the room.

  Collin Titon was halfway out the door by the time she caught up to him.

  ‘Dad,’ she called, hoping to catch him before he made it to the elevator.

  He paused, glancing over his shoulder. His hair was still wet from the shower and his face was lined with worry.

  ‘What’s going on?’ Aurora persisted.

  Her dad held the elevator door open, so it wouldn’t go anywhere. ‘There’s alarms going off everywhere and the guards need me downstairs. I’ve gotta go take care of this.’

  ‘Wait. But what was that?’ Aurora had never felt anything like it in her life. He couldn’t just leave her here without answers.