Rogue (Convergence Series Book 1)

by S. A. Stephenson

  'Then I'll have you right at the helm,' Kit told her.

  Evie smiled, there was something about the way that Kit talked to her that made her feel something new. Something that hadn't been there for a long time. It was similar to how Lux had made her feel but different. They were closer now, and Evie didn't feel like she needed to pull away, she didn't want to run or hide from what she had been trying so desperately to avoid for so many years. Their lips were close and Evie could smell the sweetness of the flowery perfume Kit used, she could feel the softness of her skin as her body moved closer to hers. Their eyes met briefly and Evie expected Kit to pull away, instead Kit wrapped her arm round Evie's waist and held her closely. As the sound of the waterfall crashed around them Evie allowed Kit to kiss her deeply. The moment was feverish, as though it was filling a long void that had been felt by the both of them for far too long. When they parted Evie let out a small laugh and found her nervous awkwardness try and slip back. 'I wasn't expecting that to happen tonight,' she said. 'But I don't regret it.'

  Kit smiled and Evie thought it was the most beautiful sight she had seen. 'Good,' Kit said. 'Before you, I was trying to escape Volt for my own freedom. Now, I want to protect you from having to go back there and keep you safe. You've become part of my heart in a way I never quite expected.'

  'Love isn't so heartless after all,' Evie said.

  Kit laughed. 'No,' she said and Evie thought she was going to kiss her again. 'But we still have a job to do.'

  Evie reluctantly followed her out of the lake, feeling more at peace than she had in years even as they stood on the brink of war. She looked around them. 'I want this to be Cara's final resting place,' she said. 'It's the most peaceful place I've been to in years, and Cara deserves to finally rest.'

  Kit gave her a comforting smile and pulled her into a hug. 'We'll say our goodbyes to her,' she said. 'And hope it's the last one we have to say.'

  There was something about the way Kit made Cara part of both of them that comforted Evie. The two women had never met but were both important to her and she was grateful that Kit was giving her space to grieve, to feel emotions that had never been part of their experience while in Galen's control. Evie could feel her world changing, and found herself welcoming it.

  Chapter Fifteen

  KIT HAD DRIVEN THEM to back to her apartment in a comfortable silence. Evie kept glancing over at her and couldn't help but smile nervously. She hadn't expected to meet someone, least of all in these circumstances. She knew that Kit was focusing on what she had to do, that protecting those who lived in the Stacks was her job and the enormity of the task in front of them wasn't lost on Evie. Fighting for freedom was one thing, going up against a government that wanted to kill you was another. Kit didn't seem fazed by what she had to do, Evie wondered if it was naturally part of who she was or if Volt had programmed it into her. As she dwelled on the thought, she wondered how much Volt could control people's personalities and manipulate them to being the people they wanted in their society. Evie felt a headache brew as she thought for too long and was grateful when Kit pulled up the truck outside her apartment building.

  When they walked through the front door, they saw Rook in the living room.

  'What are you doing here?' Kit asked.

  'I've been working on some new programming and wanted to show it to you,' Rook jabbered, and Evie wondered when she last had slept. 'It's a genetic mapping software to try and track the origin of the virus.'

  'We already know the virus came from a manufactured source,' Kit said as she handed Evie a bottle of beer. 'The Allegiance got hold of it and transported it through the bees.'

  'We also know that it was genetically advanced in the depths Volt,' Evie added. There was an awkward silence for a moment, and Evie chose not to address it.

  'But there's a strand in the code that will tell us what the cure is,' Rook said.

  'It's research my team were trying to do,' Evie felt hesitant, her training telling her that she shouldn't be saying anything. 'When Hawk found out it's why she killed Cara,'

  Rook looked at Kit. 'Because you came close to something?'

  'Because she didn't want us looking at all,' Evie sat down on one of the barstools as a wave of dizziness passed over her.

  'Then why just kill Cara? Why not kill you as well when you were the lead scientist?' Rook asked.

  Evie held her forehead in her hands. 'Because she likes to be sadistic and prolong her torture?'

  'Or because you were close to finding the answer,' Kit said. She thought of the tablet, of what Evie's father had told Jack and could hear the truth dance on the tip of her tongue but knew that she couldn't say anything, she couldn't risk Evie's safety, not now. 'Was Cara carrying anything with her when you got to the city?' She asked.

  Kit saw her try to remember and the flash of agony that crossed her face as the memories of the day came back to her. 'She did,' Evie said. 'But her backpack was lost in the rubble, and I doubt she would bring her notes with her.'

  'She would if she were trying to smuggle them out,' Rook said. 'Your research would be compromised in secured quarters, but here it could be used to our advantage.'

  'We need to find her backpack,' Kit said.

  'You want us to go back to the outskirts of the Spire?' Evie asked. 'The rebels attacked us last time we were there, and hybrids attacked Jack.'

  'But if we can find something that leads us to getting the cure for the virus then the Empire will have no hold over us,' Kit said.

  Evie was apprehensive, and Kit looked over to Rook. 'Can you give us a moment?'

  Rook looked at the two of them before closing the lid of her laptop and walked past them. 'I'll be in the bunker,' she said. 'Computers are better there.'

  'Don't work too late,' Kit told her, she could see dark circles beginning to form under her young eyes.

  'I won't,' she said.

  When she closed, the door Kit turned to Evie. 'I know why you don't want to go back to the city,' she said. 'But we're not going to be able to stay in the Stacks, we can't fight a war from our living rooms, and we need to start moving towards Hawk and Galen.'

  'And you think finding a cure for the virus is the way to do that?' Evie asked. Kit felt guilty not telling her the truth but knew that she had to buy them time to find another answer.

  'The virus was their way of maintaining control,' Kit said. 'By having people dependent on them for a cure, it meant they were able to manufacture the antidotes.'

  'The virus first attacked people decades ago,' Evie said. 'We would have found a cure now if there was one.'

  'Unless you weren't meant to,' Kit said softly, she didn't want Evie to be the one who found out who she was. 'Galen's original government was trying to control a population of people who had lost everything, who were on the verge of destroying what was left of the country. By releasing a controlled virus, that became a plague, it meant that people were made weak, they couldn't fight back against the new government as they shaped the new America. The government released mutants they created to help spread the virus.'

  'But you escaped,' Evie said.

  'Because I saw it from the inside,' Kit said. 'Just like you did but from a different angle. I saw soldiers being created, bred to be the best men and women they could be. Hawk isn't as human as I am, I don't think anyone is truly human anymore, but there were two reactions in Volt if you reacted well to the virus you became a super soldier, if you reacted badly, you were a mutant.'

  'You were a soldier,' Evie said.

  'Until I rebelled,' Kit said. 'Then they continued their testing and began to change who I was, but they raised me a soldier first.'

  Evie realized Volt had created a soldier that was powerful enough to undo everything they had worked for and she saw that Kit was determined to do what she could to end the hold they had over the country. 'Let’s go to the Spire,' Evie said.

  'Are you sure?' Kit asked, surprised by the quick change in her decision.

  'If Car
a knew something, she kept it from me, but if she was trying to get a message out and it's lying somewhere in the rubble, then we need to find it and hope that no one else has.'

  'We'll get the trucks ready and head out in the next few hours,' she said, and Evie watched her as she took a moment to look round her apartment.

  'You won't be coming back will you?' She asked.

  'When I left the FSA I came here looking for somewhere I could hide, somewhere where I was able to make a normal life for myself and for a year, or so I was able to be inconspicuous. Then we started to get some trouble, and someone had to step in. Mutants have been beaten down so they're naturally scared and it's only in the last few years we've begun to believe we can do something,' Kit told her. 'I like to think I helped in some way, and along the way, found my first home.'

  'You'll get to come back,' Evie said as she pulled her close and they rested their heads against each other. 'And we'll find a way for everyone to have a home without the Empire.'

  Kit looked up at her. 'You're abandoning everything you know for this fight?'

  'It's not just your fight,' Evie told her. 'It's all of ours, even people in Volt who are living under military rule and have no concept of what freedom is. Being told how to live is entirely different to being free. Just because we're not in chains, doesn't mean we're not prisoners. We need everyone to fight in this war if we're going to have any chance of winning it.'

  'Get them from the inside,' Kit mused.

  Evie nodded and hoped it didn't mean she would have to go back but ultimately knew that this fight would eventually lead her back to where she had tried to escape from for so long. That if she wanted to be free, she would have to go back and face her capture.

  The next day started sooner than Evie had wanted it to. Spending the night lying next to Kit had made her feel more at peace than she had done since Lux had killed. Even as her mind raced with thoughts about Cara and what she had been working on while spending all those hours in the lab she felt some peace amongst it all. Evie lay in Kit's bed and found herself watching her sleep, wondering what she had gone through as a result of the government she had once been a part of. She thought of the soldiers she had seen growing up, the children who were being forced through military school to become the future of the Empire's front line. Kit hadn't been given a choice in whether she had wanted to be part of this war even after escaping it. Evie knew there was something that could cure the virus, and she had seen how it had made people sick, disfigured people and gave people extraordinary abilities. Kit woke as the sun drifted in through the window, she smiled when she saw Evie next to her and let a moment linger between them where they could simply be a new couple. Evie brushed the hair away from Kit's eyes and saw how the green color mixed with blue. 'Your eyes shift color,' she said.

  'One of my many quirks,' Kit said and then held back a sigh as the realization of the day ahead settled in her. 'Are you ready for today?' She asked.

  'I am,' Evie said quietly. 'I've been awake a few hours thinking about it, and if Cara had some answers, then I want to know what they are.'

  'Even if it might be something that you don't want to hear?' Kit asked.

  Evie looked at her curiously. 'Do you know something?' She asked.

  Kit struggled with her answer. 'Just that sometimes, answers we look for result in things we wish we had never been told,'

  'I don't need protecting,' Evie said to her. 'I'm ready to face the realities of this government, whatever it may mean.'

  'Good,' Kit said as she sat up. 'Because I need an equal partner in this,' she told her. 'I don't want another person I'm in charge of, but someone who can lead alongside me.'

  Evie looked at her and was surprised by the offer. 'I can be that person,' she said.

  'I know,' Kit said with a smile and kissed her. 'We should get ready,' she then said quietly and with a note of sadness.

  They made their way out to the barracks, Rook and Lil were packing up a truck for them to use. Lil gave Kit a sympathetic look. 'Ready to go Chief?' She asked.

  'Do we have everything we need?' Kit asked.

  'Locked and loaded,' Lil said.

  'Then let's head out,' Kit said.

  They had begun their drive into the city, Rook and Lil were in the back seat with Rook tracking them on her GPS system. Evie looked at the cityscape around them, and she had seen photos of how the city had been before it had fallen during the blood wars. The skyscrapers that once had towered high into the clouds had now been reduced to rubble or were now just derelict buildings.

  'Is the whole of the city like this?' Evie asked.

  'Just the parts that were poor before the war broke out,' Kit said. 'There's a prefecture not too far from here that's still part of the Volt and is a whole new metropolis founded on building military technology.'

  ‘Nox? It's where we get all of our military weaponry from. I only visited once but still had clearance so I could request technology from the engineers. We were never told it was part of the Spire,' she said.

  'Control of information is predominant in a military zone,' Rook said. 'Questioning everything should become second nature.’

  'That sounds like a lot of effort for a government,' Lil said.

  'When you want to run a dictatorship you put extra effort in,' Rook commented.

  Evie looked out of the window of the truck at the new world around her, the reality that was now staring so blatantly at her. 'We knew for a long time that we were spoon fed false information,' she told them. 'We met escapees who had been dragged back to Volt and wanted to tell people what it was really like on the outside, at first no one wanted to believe them. Volt was there to protect us, and it was the safe zone from the plague, mutants and freedom fighters who wanted to threaten how we lived. But the more stories we were told, the more the few of us who listened began to have doubts. If you were suspected of becoming unpatriotic you were removed from society, it happened to a couple of people, and when they came back, they were suddenly declaring their support again for the Empire.'

  'Brainwashing techniques are at their finest in the Shard,' Kit noted. 'They used them on us as kids, made us forget where we were from, but deep down you can't forget the place that you used to call home or the people who were once your family.'

  An uncomfortable lull fell over the truck at that point. Rook was the first to break it. 'What if we can't change the country?' She asked. 'What if no matter how many attacks we make, or how big we can make our army, they'll ultimately still win?'

  'We'll win,' Kit said. 'We have to believe that we will, otherwise what's the point?'

  They continued to drive in silence until they reached the site that Evie had never wanted to see again. Kit pulled the truck to a stop and Rook, and Lil was eager to get out after being cooped up at the back.

  'Are you okay to do this?' Kit asked Evie when she sensed her trepidation.

  'If we do find something, it means that Cara was working on the inside to try and find something that would end the experiments and the virus,' she said. 'And she kept it from me.'

  'It was likely that if she was working on anything it could have been dangerous to both of you,' Kit said.

  'What if she was onto something and following me out here stopped her from finding an answer?' Evie asked.

  'We can't work with maybes,' Kit said as she opened her door. 'We can only work with facts, and we'll only know what they are when we find something.'

  Evie took a moment and then got out of the truck. She felt the rubble under her feet, the smell of smoke drifted past her and she made her way towards the site where Cara had been killed. She could see blood stains on the stone, and she looked away. She forced herself to look back, the blood that belonged to her friend.

  Rook and Lil were searching through the rubble, and Kit could hear the beeping of Rook's machine. Kit went to Evie, who was kneeling over the ruins.

  'Your friend shouldn't have died here,' she said.

  'Neither should have
Kingsley,' Evie said.

  There was a loud beeping from behind them, and when they turned around, they saw Rook and Lil stood over a piece of rubble. 'There's something here,' she said.

  Evie and Kit went to join them, and they began to pull the rubble away. Evie spotted it first, Cara's gray backpack. She reached under the loose stone slabs and pulled it free. The four of them sat in expected quietness as Evie flipped open the top and when she looked inside all, she could see were crumpled papers. She pulled them out and looked at the bag again, but it was empty.

  'This is it,' she said.

  'What does it say?' Kit asked as Rook took the bag.

  Evie straightened out the pages and felt her stomach lurch when she saw Cara's familiar handwriting. She had seen it so many times, on birthday cards, silly little notes, under doodles she did when she was bored. 'They're algorithms for creating human genome,' Evie said as she looked through the equations. 'Cara was trying to create a strand of DNA that would cure the virus by using blood from mutants and humans.'

  'Is that what this is?' Rook asked, and they saw she had found a vial of blood in the backpack. 'Secret compartments,' she explained.

  Evie took it from her and looked at the label. She saw Cara had written EF098+MZ241 and looked at it curiously.

  'Why would you pack a vial of blood?' Lil asked.

  'In the hope that someone outside of the wire would be able to do something with it,' Kit said.

  'We can run it through my computer,' Rook said. 'It will tell us what Cara was looking for.'

  They packed up and headed back to the Stacks, Evie carried Cara's backpack on her lap, knowing that there was something in the code that she had written that they had been looking for since Lux had tried to escape. She could only hope it was something they could use against Galen and her government.