It took me a long time to get out of bed to start my day because my chest felt like a heavy weight was sitting on it. While I was in the shower, my chest pain increased—though I tried to ignore it—and my back stung in the hot water. When I looked in the mirror, I had a pretty big scratch in the middle of my back. What the fuck? I didn’t cut my back yesterday, did I? My eyes widened as I realized I’d felt like my back was cut in that nightmare last night… but that couldn’t possibly mean anything. I must’ve done it yesterday and had been hurting in my sleep… right? I shook off the weird thought and immediately started gasping as a sharp pain shot through my chest.
I had no doubt that Orrean had snuck out of the apartment… away from me.
Later that night after I went to sleep, I waited in the field, but Orrean never showed up. I couldn’t blame him. I knew it wasn’t fair for me to ask him to stay with me in a dream when I didn’t want to be around him in real life. I just… wasn’t ready, didn’t know if I ever could be. I didn’t want him to replace Colt, he couldn’t replace him. My and Orrean’s connection wasn’t going anywhere, but neither was the love and connection I’d shared with Colt. He was a part of me, just as integral as my light.
***
Nolan sat between Tabby and me at dinner and literally talked the entire time. I didn’t think I’d even gotten more than four words in by the time I finished eating. He was really excited about learning how to use the technology they had here. He went on and on about the shields they had for cars so the Legion couldn’t trace us, then he talked about the tracking devices they were developing to find Taoree and humans alike so we would know where to go to help people, then he told me how he was helping draw up new maps of all the areas we’d traveled since we’d seen some of the overrun towns, then he told me about learning how to fly one of the smaller alien ships the Independents had on site. He was geeking out like a madman, and I couldn’t help but smile at him.
“Will you come up to the control room after we finish eating? I can show you some of the tools and the surveillance and stuff,” he suggested before finally taking a breath and a bite of food.
“Sure,” I replied. I still hadn’t been, since no one but the leaders and stuff were allowed in there. I tilted my head and asked, “How are you even down there, anyway? I didn’t think we were allowed in there. I thought the control room was only for the leaders or whatever.”
Nolan looked past me, sharing a look with Tabby before looking into my eyes and stating, “Orrean is one of the top-ranking members of the Independents. He thought I could help, so that’s what I’ve been doing.”
I blinked at him. “Oh.”
“Yeah.” He cleared his throat. “I went through training, just like everyone else, but now I’m doing further training in intelligence. Apparently they’re trying to train at least one member of every team so each team will be well-rounded.”
“Hmm. Makes sense, I guess.” I nodded at him. “So will I even be allowed in there?”
“Yep, you’ll be fine if you’re with me.”
“Sweet.”
After we finished eating, Nolan led the way to the control room. Cal ended up coming with us, but Wes and Tabby went back to our suite. When the three of us walked down a long hallway, a sense of misery shot through me as it became vastly apparent that we were missing a crucial member of our party.
“I miss him too, you know,” Cal said as we turned a corner.
After I recovered from the shock of him reading my mind, I asked, “How did you know I was thinking about him?”
Cal sighed and nudged me with his elbow. “You get this look on your face… it’s the same look you had when you stopped talking for over a week.”
I cringed at that. “I’m sorry I did that.”
“I know you are.” After a moment he added, “You’re not allowed to do that again, though, okay?” He stopped walking and faced me, making me stop beside him. Nolan stopped, but didn’t interrupt. “I don’t care what the fuck happens, you’re not allowed to shut down again.”
I took a deep breath and blew it out slowly. I knew I’d hurt him. I could see it in his face, but I couldn’t fix anything I’d done in the past, so I simply replied, “Okay, I promise.”
Cal searched my eyes for a long moment before nodding. “Good.” Then he walked to the control room door with me following behind him.
When I walked in, I had to squint my eyes from the sudden onslaught of a million different lights and screens everywhere. The buzz of electronics made me tense because it reminded me of the buzz of a flying alien ship. I shook off the uncomfortable feeling and looked around, noticing how much the control room resembled that circular alien hut someone—who would remain nameless—had taken us to in the Taoree camp behind our old houses. I followed Nolan over to a Taoree I hadn’t met yet.
“This is Gledia,” Nolan said.
“Nice to meet you,” I replied, shaking her hand. She gave me a small smile that reached her dark-green eyes before going back to the strange device in her hand.
Nolan pointed at a skinny guy with black-rimmed glasses, short brown hair sticking up in all directions, and grey eyes that were examining me intensely. Nolan said, “This is Owen. Owen, J.”
I shook the guy’s hand. “Nice to meet ya.”
He eyed me, nodded and replied back, but I didn’t hear him because I saw an alien sitting in the corner. He looked almost exactly like a certain alien I wasn’t thinking about at the moment, though I knew it wasn’t him because I couldn’t sense him, not the way I could sense Orre—I mean, that other alien.
I stepped closer to the practical-stranger and said, “Hello, Ozias.”
The Taoree smiled at me, then stood to his full six-eight height. “Nice to see you again, Jeremy.” He held out his hand, offering a kind smile.
“Right,” I replied, hesitantly shaking his hand. I was happy that I didn’t feel any weird pull like I did with you-know-who. “You’re twins, aren’t you? He told me he was the youngest.”
Ozias huffed out a little laugh. “Technically I’m fifteen minutes older than him, so that is not untrue.”
I nodded. “I didn’t even know you were a part of the Independents until you came by medical.”
“J,” Cal whisper-yelled at me, “he’s the freaking leader of the Independents, you ass.”
My eyes went wide. I couldn’t believe I’d forgotten that. “Oh, right.”
Ozias chuckled. “I’m glad you made it here, Jeremy. I’ve heard a lot about you.”
I cringed. “That doesn’t sound promising.”
He chuckled again, then turned to Gledia, who handed him a piece of paper. As he read it, I noticed that he had one of those weird tribal tattoos on the back of his neck, and behind one ear.
Before I could stop myself, I blurted, “What’s with the weird tattoos?”
“Jesus, J,” Cal huffed under his breath.
Ozias smirked at me. “They’re a sign of freedom. My brother, older brother that is, took away many things from my people before we even came to Earth. Many of our freedoms that we used to take for granted were suddenly stripped from us. We had curfews, and limitations on where we could travel, who we could talk to; so many, many things were taken from us. Some small, some large.” He rubbed his tattoo, though I didn’t think he realized he was doing it. “He outlawed inkings, or tattoos, as you call them, years ago. When we came to Earth and fled his rule, my Balu—mate, wife—and I and some of our friends decided to show our independence from his tyranny.” He pulled down his collar so I could get a better look. “This is just one way we feel united… and free.”
As I examined his tattoo, I realized it was written in Taoree. I didn’t even know I could read Taoree, but apparently I could because his tattoo read United and Free. I whispered, “It’s beautiful.”
He stood and smiled at me. “Thank you. You met Alleean, she’s the one who brought you in and happens to be my Balu. She designed it.” He waved his hand around the room. “Nol
an wanted to show you something, I think.” He winked at Nolan, then turned so his back was to us as he started typing on some kind of alien computer.
Nolan cleared his throat. “Let me show you our surveillance.”
I followed him over to a large screen. He sat in the chair and pulled out a keyboard, then started showing different areas of the world. He showed a picture of Earth, as in, from outer space. Then he hit a button and the screen switched to a shot of New York City, or at least what was left of it. Some buildings were on fire, and there were people running around in the street, though the camera was too far away to see if they were still humans or not. Then he hit a few buttons and he showed the cul-de-sac we’d lived at our whole lives. There was some trash floating around in the yards and on the street and a body on the sidewalk. My mom’s minivan was still in the driveway.
I cleared my throat, but my voice was still hoarse as I said, “Change it, Nol.” It was just too fucking much to look at. I didn’t need yet another reminder of how much the world sucked right now.
He immediately changed the screen to some farmland I didn’t recognize. He flipped through a few more pictures, or videos, or whatever the hell they were. It didn’t make any sense. How was he doing that?
“I don’t understand, Nol. Won’t the Legion realize you’re hacking their system and eventually track us?” I finally asked.
He grinned up at me. “These aren’t Legion satellites. The Legion is completely ignoring all human technology—besides vehicles, obviously. But they’ve left everything else alone, choosing to use Taoree advances instead, which gives us a bit of an advantage. They may have better technology, but this has been our home for thousands of years, and we’re finding ways to use that oversight against them. We’re bouncing our signals off of human satellites. We’re not even on their radar.”
I furrowed my brow. “How can you be sure they won’t know what we’re doing?”
“Don’t worry, J,” he said, “Ozias is a brilliant hacker, and so is Owen.”
I glanced over at the two in question and noticed that they were both already staring at me. I raised my brow in question and Owen immediately looked away, blushing slightly, but Ozias just smirked at me before turning to Owen to resume whatever conversation they were having. I followed suit and let Nolan overwhelm me with his vast knowledge of everything in the control room. I seriously couldn’t even follow most of the conversation. Cal kept smirking at me, knowing full well that neither of us knew what the hell Nolan was talking about, but that neither of us wanted to tamp down his enthusiasm.
I may not have understood half of what Nolan said, but I did get that he was helping the Independents come up with a plan for taking down the Legion’s satellites. He also told us that there were other Independent bases. Apparently the Independents had set up all over the world, though this base was the central headquarters because Ozias was, in fact, in charge of the whole damn Resistance.
Ozias, Owen, Gledia, and a human military guy named James were planning an attack on the Legion’s main base, once we discovered where it was, though Ozias was sure it was somewhere in North America. He was also sure that Emperor Thelonious had moved from his original headquarters in Ohio once he’d started activating the Qiren. He went into hiding so the government wouldn’t have time to hunt him down before things went to complete shit.
The Independents wanted to set up our attack so we could strike from the south while the Northern Independent Base attacked from the north. I wasn’t allowed to see much of the plan, obviously, only that there was a plan forming to take down the emperor and all his fucking minions. Though it’d be months before we could attack. So the first priority was to track down that bastard Thelonious.
The entire time I was there, I kept glancing at Ozias, sneaking peeks at him whenever he wasn’t looking. It amazed me how much he looked like Orrean, only he seemed younger somehow, less serious. Orrean may have been fifteen minutes younger than Ozias, but his life as a spy, living with the enemy and keeping his true nature hidden for so many years, had aged him in a way that Ozias hadn’t experienced. Orrean was always so serious. Quiet and serious. Lost in his own head most of the time. It made sense when I thought about it. I couldn’t imagine what it felt like to have to hide in plain sight like that. To have to pretend to hate humans and want them dead while secretly trying to save them. To live in such a hostile environment for so long where one wrong word could mean death.
I respected what Orrean had done for us. For humans at large, and for what he’d done for my family and me. For supplying information on the enemy while risking his life to do so. I even felt like maybe I was on my way to forgiving him for omitting so much information about the state of our relationship for so long. I would forgive him. I knew I would. I wanted to, even. But I just wasn’t ready to face everything that came with forgiving him. Not after Colt. Not so soon after losing the person I loved and wanted to spend the rest of my life with.
Ozias looked over at me and sent me a sad smile, almost like he knew where my mind had drifted. He even patted my back as I walked past him to leave the control room.
When I went to sleep that night, I expected to find Orrean in my dreams, part of me wanted him to meet me there. But he never showed up, even though I waited by that damn fence all night long.
Chapter Eight
After two weeks of training, Hawk finally decided to release me to my team, so I was going on my first mission. I even got my own set of camo, which everyone—Taoree and humans alike—wore. Apparently the Independents wanted humans to recognize us as friendly—probably a good idea so they didn’t attack us or run away—so they’d started making the camo out of their special material that was harder to puncture, but still looked like the human army uniform. I wore Colt’s blue hat everywhere I went and no one had said a word to me about it, even though it wasn’t a part of the uniform. Everyone knew what that hat meant to me, and they probably knew I’d wear it whether they told me I could or not, so they didn’t even bother. At least I had it on backwards so it wouldn’t get in the way of my vision.
We also had small packs filled with basic essentials in case anyone got separated or stuck away from base, and each of us had a belt that was filled with weapons and a ricah—a communications device—so we could contact our team or the base if we needed to. It was hooked up to an earpiece which every single one of us had in one ear.
I’d gotten good at using my linhu to guard, not only myself, but several people around me, too. The only thing that sucked was that I couldn’t shoot, stab, or even punch anything through the linhu. It blocked me from being hit, yes, but it also didn’t allow my weapons to pass through, so I couldn’t really fight anything if my linhu was in front of me. But it was nice as a backup.
I’d also developed better fighting skills, with and without a shoian, and with many other weapons. I’d had a crash course in healing, but I’d developed that skill pretty well already, thanks to Wes. Because I had an affinity for healing, I could push my light through a juhere to heal anyone more efficiently and effectively than a juhere could by itself, though I could obviously heal Wes and Orrean without one. But I’d also learned basic first aid in case I couldn’t spare my light and needed to stabilize someone or more than one person at a time. Each of us was made to memorize about a million maps so we’d know where known Legion camps were, and we had to learn how to use a Taoree locator device, and how to read it, so we could give our exact location if shit hit the fan. I was feeling pretty good about finally getting out of the base and running a mission.
Orrean had been respectfully keeping his distance like I’d asked. He was still staying in the same suite as me because my brothers, Mandy, and Tabby wouldn’t let me kick him out since he was ‘part of our family.’ But he’d done a great job of leaving before I woke up and sneaking into his room before I got home or after I went to bed, so he wouldn’t run into me. Not that I’d asked him to go that far or anything… I wasn’t that much of an asshole. He s
eemed to need the distance too. The only reason I knew what he was doing was because I could sense when he was nearby. Even if I couldn’t see him, I could feel him. Some nights he wouldn’t even come home, which always made me worry, causing me to have a restless night thinking about where he was staying or what he was doing. I knew I had no right, since I’d told him to stay away from me. But I missed him. I hadn’t even seen him since that day in the training room—not counting when we dream-walked, but I chose to pretend that didn’t happen… it hurt too much to remember, anyway. So I hadn’t seen him until this morning.
Apparently as soon as he found out that I was leaving the safety of the base, he just went ahead and added himself to our team… even though he hadn’t trained with us at all. But he was one of the higher-ups of the Independents, so he got to do what he wanted. Everyone on my team was grumbling about it and shooting me looks since they blamed me. Actually, Nolan, Wes, and Cal were all perfectly happy about it, but the rest of our team felt like they had a boss looking over their shoulders to watch every little move they made. I couldn’t really blame them for being mad.
As far as Orrean went, he hadn’t said one word to me that day. He was trying to keep his distance, though I knew he’d had his eyes on me nearly the entire time we were walking around. I just ignored him, even though being that close to him after weeks apart made me want to hug him and breathe him in.
“I don’t get it,” Wes said quietly as we walked down what appeared to be an abandoned neighborhood. We were split up into smaller groups of two or three, and unfortunately my brat of a brother was in my group, along with a Taoree named Sanjha that hadn’t said a word to me yet. I didn’t think she liked me much.
“There’s lots of things you don’t get. What exactly are you talking about here?” I asked with a smirk.
He pushed my shoulder. “Shut up, dick. I don’t get why we were sent to this town when it’s so empty.”
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