Just beyond the bend was a large opening where the escalators connected the two levels. Sunlight pooled in from the glass ceiling, creating a waterfall of yellow to fall through the open space. Nature curled through the cracks, stripping the colours off the billboards and walls. The entire complex was huge, rising four levels high and expanded around in a massive dome.
I walked up to the edge of the railing and looked down. Overturned trolleys piled up in the centre on the ground level, creating a mound of metal cages. Birds nested among them, discolouring the silver rims with their crap. I circled around myself and noticed a sign signalling down one of the corridors.
A first aid symbol marked the walls. I walked toward it and gently eased the door back at the end of the corridor. It led to a set of stairs. At the top, a door was slightly ajar. Sunlight squeezed through the gap. Carefully, I walked up the stairs and pushed the door open. It led into an open courtyard eaten beneath weeds and trash. I stepped further out, tilting my head back at the lick of warmth from the sun. The catch of a wire snapping sounded behind me. Before I could react, the door slammed and locked shut.
I spun around and grabbed the handle, jolting it back and forth. “Oh shit! Shit!” I hammered the pistol against the handle before firing at the lock only to have the bullet crack and rebound against the steel panel. I checked the gun chamber to count three bullets left. I cursed my bad luck and turned back into the courtyard. Over the edge, I looked down at the steep four level drop and out across the large, green mossy metropolitan.
Barricades of wired fences crisscrossed safe zones around the city. Beneath the mall, black smoke pulled sideways with the wind, clouding over the sun and towers. The glint of red caught my eye. In the streets below people with flamethrowers worked in clearing out the neighbouring apartments and burning the dead in the middle of the roads. Red lashed out, catching on clothes and skin.
I searched across the courtyard where a small collapse in the foundation created a hole, leading down a slim rock edge and onto scaffolding left behind. I edged onto the slim beam, the wind kicking back the loose corners of the banners and pulling on my jacket. I reached to tuck my hair behind my ears, forgetting it was all gone.
In the windows, I caught my reflection. It took two seconds to recognise myself, the green beanie and thick layers distorted my physique into that of a boy. My bruised face darkened over the bridge of my nose, swelling my eyes into a squint. I knew I was dirty. I could smell it on my clothes and see it in the dried cracks on my hands, but I hadn’t realised I looked this dirty. It discoloured my skin, covering me in brown bruises. I used my shoulder to clear some of the dirt from my face but it only spread it further across my cheeks.
I continued on, carefully sliding my hand along the railing of the scaffolding. The wind shook the metal planks beneath me, causing the entire structure to bounce off the side of the building. I doubled my pace and found a crack in one of the windows large enough for me to slip back into the mall. I stepped into a narrow storage room and onto a wet floor. Puddles accumulating from the passing rains spread mould across the floorboards. Grime climbed the sides, saturating the corners in thick, dripping rot. The reek of abandonment was strong. I walked toward the exit when the floorboards beneath me buckled.
The deteriorated wood snapped and I plunged down the hole, free falling for two seconds before landing on my back on top of a steel table. The falling debris showered down and I cowered to protect my face. As the silence settled, I peeked up into a dark, cold room. It was quiet, still. A distinct metallic smell tickled my nose. I rolled off the table and my feet slipped into dark water. I scrambled back at the icy touch. As far as I could see, the entire level appeared to be flooded.
“Fan-fucking-tastic.” Carefully, I eased myself into the water and felt the chill gripped right up to my midriff. “Cold, cold, cold!” Thankfully, the water level stopped at my ribcage.
I trudged forward, holding my gun above my head and dragged my legs through the water. Plastic bags and other leftover garbage floated on the water’s surface, clinging to me as I waded through the slush. I ducked under collapsed beams, carefully manoeuvring around the sunken furniture and into a stairwell. I climbed up the stairs but a blockade forced me to use the side door to a different part of the mall.
The room opened up into a large department store for shoes, bags, perfumes and clothes, most of which were destroyed. Guess you can’t eat leather. I inspected one of the abandoned bags, noting the faded price of $150 scratched down to $100 and again down to $55, when the sound of footsteps spun me around.
“Here! Here!” Voices called from ahead. I dropped into a crouch as people ran past and red flames whipped out. Among the laughter, I could hear a female scream. The flames roared with the pull of a trigger. Orange light erupted up the walls. I ran forward and shielded myself behind a group of naked mannequins.
“BBQ, anyone?” A voice joked once her screaming stopped.
“Ew! She looks like a mangled bird.”
“Aren’t we meant to bring them back to the food court?” A third voice chipped in.
“She was the wrong colour anyway.”
“How could you tell? You fried her before anyone could look.”
“Boss is gonna be pissed.”
“Well, he doesn’t need to know, now does he?”
“Stop fucking around, Aaron, or we won’t get paid.”
“How do we know he will even pay us?”
My grip tightened around the gun. Three bullets but five different voices. Shit! I peeked through the gaps in the mannequin’s legs, catching sight of who I assumed was Aaron wearing a flamethrower backpack. Based on his voice, I guess that he was probably around my age, but stress aged his face with tough wrinkles. Blond hair was already falling out, thinning around his crown.
“If he doesn’t, I’ll take care of him.” Aaron held the barrel up and blasted two puffs of fire, demonstrating his point.
“We need those drugs and you know we can’t get into the safety zones, so whatever survivors you find, you capture them. No more burning.”
“Okay. Okay, let’s keep looking then.”
They stepped out from their circle, revealing the blackened remains of the girl they had run down. The mob turned away and dispersed into groups of two. Two went left, two went right, and one, Aaron, turned toward the department store. Thankfully, I hid among the shadows. He turned his flashlight on and started scanning the store. I moved without breaking from my crouch, darting in between the pillars, careful to avoid hitting the cluster of empty bottles near my feet.
“Whoa! What’s this?” I heard him gasp.
I froze with my back pressed against a column. “Water?”
Water? My eyes widened. You left a wet trail! Nadia, you idiot!
He didn’t call out to the others, a fact I noted quickly. I heard his footsteps walk off and the rolling screech of the security gates unfurl and hit the ground, locking us both in. Caged. Perfect.
I took three long deep breaths, mentally preparing myself for whatever was about to happen. He thinks he’s out for an easy kill. Well, he doesn’t know who he is dealing with.
Chapter Sixteen:
I licked my lips, flipping through all of the different scenarios how this could play out. It was just down to the two of us, but one shot from my gun would alert the others. I needed to be smart about this. Only shoot if I absolutely have to. He walked forward. I watched his movements through the shift of the light in the aisles, casting shadows across the racks and mannequins. He swept up and down two lanes before it suddenly went dark. I took a sharp breath in and strained to hear his footsteps move across the carpet.
Suddenly the light flickered. It went dark and flickered again, this time further up the room. Between each snap of light, he moved. I eased off from the pillar and crept further toward the back. I hid behind one of the registers and laid down on my stomach. The light flickered, his feet moved. I held the gun out, my eyes straining to see into the thick
darkness. Minutes passed. I assumed he had stopped, trying to see me in the dark as well. I kept perfectly still, watching for the tiniest shifts in the shadows.
Suddenly, in a voice that was far too close, I heard him taunt me. “I can smell you.”
I scrambled back just as flames shot out from behind the pillars. Heat skimmed my face. I moved frantically, scrambling for cover. Bottles rattled as the fire followed behind.
“You smell like a sewer.” He laughed.
Shit! Shit! Footsteps chased behind and I quickly shielded myself behind an overturned table. Flames caught on the wood, lighting up the table and catching me on the shoulder. I ran forward again, slapping the flames out of my clothes. I hit the wired gates barricading the department and bounced off. It was too heavy to lift and I didn’t have the time to wrestle them up.
“Hey, don’t run! I just want to chat,” the boy shouted and I dropped to the ground. I weaved around the racks until I had my back to a wall. The perfume bottles on the shelves rattled as I bumped into them. I took a bottle off and popped the lid open. I dabbed a piece of paper into the bottle and sealed the lid again, leaving a tail of paper on the outside.
Flames crawled across the room and smoke pushed Aaron into a crouch. I lit the tail end of the paper and pitched the bottle at him. The perfume bottle shattered on the ground beside him, exploding into a mushroom of orange flames.
He screamed, panicked.
Smoke thickened the air. My vision blurred among the rolling black fog. It was so hot. Another explosion shook the entire complex. No doubt, it was from his backpack. I ran for the stairwell but fire barricaded the door. Footsteps returned and the screech of the gate rolling up barely made a sound above the crackling fire.
“Aaron? Aaron,” Voices screamed into the pit of flames. I charged through, needing air, needing to escape the smoke and heat. In my blindness, I accidentally collided with one of them. We both hit the ground. I didn’t stop. I scrambled back up and continued to run into the open space, coughing constantly.
“Who the fuck was that?”
“Oh my god! Aaron is dead!”
“It was him!”
“Get him! Get the guy!”
I bolted into the mall, down the long laneways where old shops fortified their stores behind steel doors. Gunshots hit the walls around me. I couldn’t stop coughing. It ached to breath. I crumpled and crawled behind a standing billboard. I hung my head in between my knees. Breathe, Nadia. Breathe! I heard them getting closer, their voices getting louder, clearer, their shots better aimed with the closing range.
I kicked off again. I needed an exit. I need to get outside where I could hide. I ran hard down a corridor only to have a person cut me off. He grabbed my shirt and flung me to the ground. In the momentum of his throw, he stumbled off balance too. I jumped back up, not pausing to check the gash on my arm.
“He’s here! Here!”
Their feet built into a stampede. I reached the end of the building where large windows faced outside. I was on the second level, too high to jump safely to the ground. I spun back, remembering there were escalators leading from the second floor down to the first. There was a way out. Smoke tickled my throat and I found it hard not to cough.
In the distance, their numbers grew. More joined the chase. They were laughing, enjoying the challenge. They found me quickly out in the open. I ran into the sideway hallways and pushed off the walls of the narrowing corridor. They were fast, excited, and caught up to me quickly. I felt an arm grab my sleeve but I swung myself around, smashing a plank of wood across the girl’s face. She dropped back but where she fell three more took her place. I pulled a shelf down from the wall on top of them, creating a small blockade, and I hoped it would give me enough time to disappear.
I kept running hard even though all I could hear were the clicks of my own shoes hitting the tiles. I turned left and right erratically, trying to find a way through the maze when I saw a streak of sunlight. I ran toward it. At the end of the hallway the room opened up into a large food court stripped down into an emergency first aid base. White tents were pitched in front of portable fences where queues of people once stood, waiting for food and supplies. I guess that was back when people still cared. Now, the base felt as dead and empty as the rest of the building. Handcuffed to the fences were three gagged girls. Beside them were a few boys all carrying the Asian gene. It was hard not to notice the familiarities between the women. They looked like me.
“What the hell?”
“Nadia?”
I spun around at Diesel’s voice. He stepped out from the large, white tent and pulled the surgical mask down from his mouth. “What are you doing here?”
I glanced at the girls then back to him, my mind unable to form the connections even though the clues seemed obvious.
“I-I… But… What are you doing here?” I panted.
“I thought I told you to stay in the chemist.” I walked forward and Diesel quickly tried to pull the curtain back to hide what he was working on. “I didn’t think you would want to get involved.”
I shouldered past him. Inside the tent were papers of maps, accounts and sketches of the soul imprint. Mixed within them were lists of ingredients. Bombs. Explosives. A virus.
“Diesel, what—”
“I’m just calling this plan B,” he quickly explained, chasing in after me and shielding his work. I cursed myself for not understanding what was on them. I hated how ignorant I was.
“And the girls?”
“They are auditioning.”
“For what?” I demanded.
“To play your decoy. It’s just a way to get the Blue Dons off our backs. Don’t worry, I haven’t harmed them.”
“Does that mean those kids work for you?”
Diesel’s expression hardened. “Did they touch you?” I didn’t need to answer. I smelt of smoke, no doubt he could guess what happened. He turned to get his gun. “Stay here. I’m going to fucking kill them all—”
“That’s not the point, Diesel. You can’t keep making these decisions on your own. I thought we had a deal!”
He turned back to me and snarled. “I do what is necessary. You’re just too weak to handle it.”
“What? I am not weak!”
“Yes, you are! You cling to this illusion of a kind and caring world, but it is not like that. Stop dreaming! You know what it is like here. We’re all past saving.”
“Hiro isn’t,” I shouted and then stepped back, surprised at the thought. A thang of jealousy hit me.
“Are we always going to fight over this? When are you going to trust me?” He lowered his voice. “Aren’t you tired of always struggling? It’s not fair, Nadia, and guess what? It’s never going to change unless we change it. The system they have in place will always bring us back here. The Elite have their world, and we have ours. I will never be anything more than a criminal. No amount of good deeds can wipe my file clean. And no matter how many people you try to save, you will not be shown mercy.”
My lower lip trembled. He said the words I feared to think, that all of this was a pointless torment. Exhaustion became a part of my daily routine. I honestly couldn’t remember a day when I wasn’t tense with anxiety. My skin was never clean of wounds. My mind never rested.
“You don’t have to always be the good guy, Nadia. You don’t owe anything to anyone and they don’t always deserve to be saved.”
My mind tipped back to Hiro. To his clean skin. To his stress-free face and his blissful ignorance. I was envious of him. It wasn’t fair how he was allowed peace in a world collapsing in war.
Diesel’s head bowed in his heavy thoughts. “This isn’t just about your moral compass. I need this.” His voice shook.
The vulnerability of it chilled my cheeks. I knew that sound. Fear. The possibility of dropping into madness, of becoming a drifter rattled Diesel’s foundation. It rattled mine too.
“I’m sorry.” I took his hand gently. “I trust you.”
Chapter Sev
enteen:
I found myself fascinated with the idea of a utopian world. The fascination came from the large poster set up in front of the train station. I stood on the outskirts of one of the larger safety districts, my hands tucked into the deep pockets of my jacket. In front, on a large billboard, was a world of green. Fresh water. Clear skies. A smiling woman taking a long drink from a bottle. It took up the entirety of the station wall and I couldn’t tear my eyes away from it. Even with the heavy rain hitting the bricks, pulling on the rotting paper, the idea grew inside me. People rushed past with their heads down and their shoulders hunched. It was sad how they couldn’t see the beauty of this green heaven just meters above their heads. And above that, on a large flickering monitor screen, was my face.
A sum of five million dollars rewarded for my safe return to the Elite. Hm, so they never stopped looking for me. I looked up at myself. My large, deep green eyes looked fierce. I never smiled for cameras before, so why would this picture be any different? My boyish disguise may be able to trick the common person, but I still held onto my misgivings about the machines.
Cameras ticked and hummed on all points of the station corners. Diesel walked past me without a glance. As planned, he loaded the decoy Hiro and Nadia onto the train. He sat them by the window, making sure they were seen. He scattered pieces of mine and Hiro’s hair around them, leaving DNA. Glancing at the girl, I could have mistaken her for me as well. She looked more like me than I did right now. I was a rain-drenched nobody, cold and damp in five layers of jackets smelling of shit.
My broken wrist strained when I clenched my hands. The whistle blew and the doors rattled closed. I walked closer to the billboard, tore a section off, and pocketed it. The train moved along the tracks, slowly at first but quickly picked up speed. With it, I hoped my existence would disappear into the dark mountains too. The roaming helicopters were fast to pinpoint our bait. Sirens blared over the thumping of rain, advising the train to stop.
Soul Finder (The Immortal Gene Book 2) Page 14