by Azalea Ellis
I grew dizzy as my breath heaved in and out of my chest, too fast for comfort. I looked down at the link on my arm, pulling up the time. Zed was about to enter a cleansing session. A horrible certainty filtered down from my head, settling in my stomach like a living thing. I turned, almost mechanically, and sat back down in the corner of Blaine’s office.
Then I pushed my awareness outward again, ignoring the headache. It took me a few minutes to travel unnoticed to the vents around the lab they used during Zed's sessions, but I still arrived before he did.
Scientists and researchers bustled around the room, most wearing white coats. I could hear them clearly, chatting as they prepared the equipment. Two in the corner were working on a glass screen set into the wall, examining the display that my Perception didn’t even come close to being able to render at this range.
"This subject has been amazingly successful," one noted to the other. My heart sank, and I focused my hearing on them.
“He is Redding’s brother. I wonder if that has any bearing on it, or if it’s solely due to the fact that he’s been forcefully kept alive through the initiation by her healer. Hawes, wasn’t it?”
“Samuel Hawes. Interesting Skill if I ever saw one.”
Zed’s entrance cut off whatever reply the second scientist had been going to give. He smiled wide and greeted all the scientists by name.
To my slight surprise, they greeted him warmly in turn. Maybe they weren’t doing anything nefarious, but I was still going to monitor them to make sure, since the true measure of their trustworthiness was what they would do when they thought no one was watching.
They did some diagnostic scans and then ran Zed through stress tests, taking samples of everything as he ran on a treadmill, caught small balls as they shot at him from machines, lifted weights while answering their rapid-fire logic questions, and so on.
My worry morphed steadily into a fatalistic dread. He was performing more like a Player than a normal human. A weak Player, true, but they hadn’t had him for long, yet. I swallowed. Maybe it was just talent. He’d always been better than me at anything physical, and he was smart.
My desperate hopes died as they laid him out on a device that looked similar to the diagnostic machine they’d used the first time. But this time, as he lay on the slab like it was an operating table, they put him to sleep. Clear walls rose up from the sides of the slab, curving over and enclosing him like a stasis chamber, or a clear tomb. They gathered all around his prone form. Then, clear tubes and needles grew from the glass all around him, piercing his flesh in hundreds of places.
I clamped my hand over my mouth, holding back a whimper. I took a moment to reassure myself that Blaine hadn’t noticed anything amiss, keeping the majority of my focus on the room hundreds of meters away.
Then one of the scientists pushed some buttons, and the glass lit up with electricity, though I couldn’t tell what it was displaying. "Everyone knows their task for today?"
They all nodded, and he tapped on the screens. The needles injected something into my brother in a slow, continuous stream. Each of the scientists began to tap away on their section of the screen. The machine seemed to have control over the substance, sending signals to the liquid and directing it as they wished.
Some of them worked on his bones, others on his joint and muscles, others on his very organs, augmenting his lung, his heart, his kidneys. One was even doing something to his brain.
I watched them work for over an hour, biting into the skin of my palm, which I held clamped over my mouth still. I wanted to rush out like the angel of death and kill them all. I wanted to save Zed, but I held myself back, knowing that would be the worst thing I could do.
NIX mustn’t know I knew, or I wouldn’t be able to save us, to fix everything.
So, I stayed silent while the needles withdrew and the machine sealed all the little holes they’d left. I watched as they woke Zed up and told him they were making slow progress removing the Seed as he gingerly moved his aching body. I did nothing as they told him it looked like the Seed had made some permanent changes for the better, and everyone smiled.
I watched Zed leave with movements slow and stiff, and rage and helplessness burst against my insides. I memorized the feeling.
Chapter 6
Do not look for my heart anymore; the beasts have eaten it.
— Charles Baudelaire
Once Zed made it safely back to the cafeteria and sat with the team for dinner, I released my awareness, and leaned back against the wall with my eyes hooded, watching Blaine work. Chaos roiled inside me, as if it could feel my distress.
Blaine seemed oblivious. He pushed his glasses up, and absently scratched at the light dusting of stubble across his cheeks. Too stressed out to shave for the last couple days, maybe.
I listened to the ambient sounds he’d turned on, and his earlier assertion that we needed to keep our preparations secret from NIX. Was that a ploy to make me more trusting, or had he been loyal the whole time? I didn’t know, and I needed to find out. The suspicion was like a gnawing worm in my gut. I had to find some sort of proof.
I stood up, and had to steady myself on the chair when the room spun dizzily. I was starving, I realized, and the last meal of the day was about to start. I considered joining the Player members of my team in the cafeteria, but instead grabbed a few nutrient bars off Blaine’s desk, and headed back to my little room while eating them, more than a little distracted from my surroundings. Thankfully, most of the other Players were also in the cafeteria, so I didn’t run into anyone hostile enough to start a fight.
I hurried through the curving hallways back to my quarters. My face felt like a skin-mask, calm and deceiving, a barrier between me and the real world. I'd been so stupid.
Birch waited for me outside my room, posted beside my door like a little four-legged sentry. He mumbled angrily when he saw me, no doubt peeved at being left alone and waiting outside.
"Sorry, Birch," I said absently, striding through my door as it slid open and then closed behind us. I didn't turn the light on, and ripped the bedding off my little nook, spreading it onto the floor. I sat, and tried to focus despite myself. It took a while, but I was finally able to search my bedding and every inch of my room for monitoring devices. I'd done it all before, and destroyed everything I found, but I was newly suspicious, for good reason.
I turned the lights back on after finding nothing, then stopped. I looked up at the light. It was too high for me to reach normally, even with my size, but I took the spartan stool from the corner of the room and stood on it, then reached up to the light panel in the ceiling. It came open after I pried at the edges with my claws for a few moments. The tiny black camera and microphone attached to the edge of the light inside did not surprise me.
I'd never noticed it before, because its presence was disguised by the electric activity of the light, when I searched for the buzzing of mechanics, and it turned itself off when the light did. I'd thought the little bump next to the veiled light was just part of the mechanism.
I detached the spying bug and debated whether to crush it or keep it in place, pretending I didn't know it was there. I crushed it. Whoever was on the other side would have seen me find it, and if I suddenly allowed it to stay, unlike what I'd done with all the other devices I found, my deviation would set off alarms.
Once I was as sure as I could possibly be that my room wasn’t being monitored, I moved across the hall into the team barracks. Zed was in the top bunk and sleeping already, though none of the others were there. Had he not been able to eat much? I watched him sleep for a bit, then reached up and put my hand on his forehead. The skin was hot, and when I spread my awareness toward him, I felt the strange substance all throughout his body.
He woke when I took my hand away, and stared blearily at me for a moment. “What are you doing?”
“Come with me,” I said instead of replying.
He groaned. “Do I have to? I don’t feel very well. I just wan
na sleep.”
I grimaced. “It can’t be that bad,” I said. “Get up and come over to my cell. I want to show you something.” I tried to keep my tone light, while I conveyed the seriousness of the situation with my expression.
He frowned, then got up, stiffly making his way down to the floor and following me to my room.
“Just in case,” I said. “I just found another hidden camera in the light fixture. I might have missed some of them in the team room as well.”
He looked around the dark room in sudden distrust. “Oh. Is that what you wanted to talk about?”
“No. I want to talk about the cleansing session you just had.” I could only hope that whatever NIX had done to him didn’t allow them to monitor what went on around him, or to hurt him remotely. As I explained what I’d seen, and the epiphany I’d had, he sat weakly on the side of my bed, listening in horror.
When I got to my suspicions about our former Moderator, he interrupted me. “Wait,” he said. “If that’s true, I think Bunny is up to something tonight. He seemed nervous. I didn’t think anything of it at the time, but Kris asked him if he’d help her to sew the button-eyes on her doll after dinner, and he said he couldn’t because he had something to do. You should do your astral-projection thing and find him.”
I didn’t need any more convincing than that. I took a couple deep breaths, and pushed my awareness out along with the heat radiating from my body, ignoring the icepick spike of pain that shot through my head with every heartbeat. Skill overuse had its consequences.
I found Bunny in Commander Petralka’s office, close enough to my own quarters that I had a mostly clear impression of it and its occupants. His presence didn’t surprise me, but my hands still clenched in my lap, and my fingernails almost itched with my body’s desire to lash out.
He was talking—reporting—to Commander Petralka and another man who shone with power. Another Moderator? “ . . . shows a continued general distrust of NIX, which is mirrored by her squad. Performance-wise, she seems to be excelling, as expected,” Bunny said.
“But she still believes herself to be valuable enough for us to fear?” Commander Petralka said.
“As far as I can tell, she’s overconfident to the point of being cocky. Moods have been dimmed somewhat by the loss against squad Ridley, but she’s the type to focus single-mindedly on overcoming the obvious obstacle. The antagonism of the other Players will provide plenty of conflict for her to focus on in the near future. Though I’d keep an eye out for serious injury. She likes to make bold statements where everyone can see. Ridley in particular might be a target.”
“And her mental state?” This time, it was the other person, who’d spoken before Petralka got a chance to. She shot him a subtle glance of irritation, which he either didn’t notice, or didn’t care about. Interesting.
“I’ve noticed subtle signs of emotional turbulence. From the stresses of the situation, perhaps. Despite the slight instability, I see no reason for concern.”
“Team relations?” Once again, it was the man. Something about him was a little strange. Almost as if he was simultaneously paying full attention and absolutely no attention at all to everything in the room.
“Control over the team is good, no signs of insubordination or insurrection. She has a way of making those valuable to her feel like they’re . . . important, in a larger sense, and from there they rush to fulfill her expectations. Even Mendell’s young niece and nephew both have an obvious desire for her approval.”
“Do you still believe she may attempt to take revenge on Kilburn for the death of her teammate Black?” Petralka asked. This time it was the man who glanced at her, though I couldn’t tell anything from his expression.
Bunny nodded. “Any competent psychological evaluation would have told you she was lying when she agreed to let it go. She doesn’t believe in forgiveness. She understands retribution, and her own value as the center of her universe. But I actually don’t know if she’s planning something, or just biding her time.”
“You don’t know?” This was the man.
“This has nothing to do with my infiltration capabilities,” Bunny said with a mix of indignation and fear. “Eve—Player Redding, excuse me, likes to work with a certain measure of secrecy. She likes to be the only one to know all the pieces of her plan, and when she’s ready, she reveals everything in such a way as to build the team’s excitement.”
“What about the locations of their families? Have you gotten any information about that?” the man asked.
“You mean you haven’t found them yet?” Bunny clamped his lips shut as frowns deepened on both of the other two’s faces. “Well, I haven’t, because I didn’t know you needed that. But I’ll find out before the next report,” he said.
There was silence for a moment, and then the man waved his hand at Bunny. “You may go.”
Bunny didn’t wait to be dismissed by Petralka. As he walked down the hall away from her office, he muttered to himself, “Damn creepy Thinkers.”
Back in the office, Petralka said, “Her arrogance is a good thing. It shows she doesn’t suspect the truth, or our strategy to subdue her if need be. I’ve commissioned the cell on level sub-seventeen to be readied for a high threat-level occupant.”
I almost lost control of my grip on my awareness, then. But I clung desperately to the commander’s office, and managed to stabilize it. I needed to hear this.
“This entire situation is precariously balanced,” the man said. “It is an exceptionally delicate situation. You must do away with this volatility.”
Petralka’s back stiffened. “I’ve been doing the best I could, with the strictures on my available courses of action from your side. You wanted her strong? We’ve done what you said, applied just enough pressure to make her desperate, and now she’s got a new type of Seed entirely, and it’s got all the destructive capability you could hope for. You wanted her here, with room to analyze? She’s here. I can’t complete two conflicting goals at once.” She stood up, facing the man, though he was much taller. “Either you want the situation on lock down, or you want her to continue to develop freely.”
“There are more ways to control a situation than brute force,” the man said, enunciating every word. “And more ways for you to fail than just not following our instruction. Your two sources of inside information are both unreliable. This ‘Bunny,’ the Rabbit group Moderator. His interest lies almost entirely in self-preservation. He may nominally be doing this for the good of our world, but his Skill is dangerous, and he grows much too free with its use. He attempted to calm us.”
Petralka’s eyes widened, and the man continued. “And Blaine Mendell’s loyalty was never in question. It is to his niece and nephew, and only to them. It was clever, to use his sincere hatred of us to ingratiate himself with Redding and her team, but your petty little revenge for your niece’s defeat, putting those children in the mock battle? The reason he follows our orders is because we keep them safe. If we fail to do that, he has no reason to comply.”
Commander Petralka pressed her lips together. “I’ll say it was a warning, and a punishment for not doing a satisfactory job of keeping us informed of Redding and her team’s actions, previously. For cutting off our access to their VR chips and GPS trackers. It can be used to cement his loyalty. They didn’t get seriously hurt.”
“And Redding’s brother? If he dies . . .”
“He’s not going to die. As long as he keeps getting the nutrient paste for the nanites, he’ll thrive. My scientists are ecstatic at how well he’s responding. He may be the first working solution to the lack of sufficient Seed material. And as long as we’ve got him, we’ve also got Redding. I have this under control.”
My awareness snapped back to me, then, and I slumped over to the floor. The room spun around me, and I swallowed hard to keep my stomach from heaving up my nutrient bar dinner.
“Whoa, are you okay?” Zed asked, grabbing me by the shoulder and helping me to sit up again.
>
Birch mewled anxiously, butting me with his head as if to keep me from falling over again.
I groaned and waited till the room stopped spinning. There would be no more extra-sensory Perception for me that day, though I wished I could go back and listen to the remainder of the conversation between Petralka and the man Bunny had labeled a Thinker. “I’m okay,” I mumbled. “Just a bit of backlash from pushing too hard.”
Once my stomach had settled, and Zed had forced me to take a couple headache pills that helped with the throbbing pain, I explained what I’d heard. Then I sent Zed back to the team barracks, because we needed to act normally, and both of us were feeling so wretched that sleep was necessary before we could start to formulate a plan of attack.
A nightmare woke me after a few hours. I turned on the light to push back the darkness, and lay back down, thinking of what I’d learned, and hoping that some solution would present itself to me. I was absolutely screwed. The whole team was.
I’d been like a puppet on a string.
I sat up and reached under the mattress of my cot for my pack, withdrawing the second largest band of silver loops the Oracle had given me. With a deep breath and a roll of my neck to stretch the tense muscles, I sat cross-legged on the floor to puzzle it out.
I meditated again, forcing my brain to put all its energy into fixing what could be an answer for my problems. I strained, pushing and pushing for hours. And then I started to bleed, again.
My eyes caught my own desperate reflection in the surface of the first crimson drop as it fell onto the silver bands in my hands like an omen of doom. It splattered, spreading more than such a small amount of liquid had any right to. And then the next drop of blood fell, and suddenly it was a steady dribble, as the sensitive skin inside my nose succumbed to the onslaught of Chaos.