Silence.
Steel waved his hand, dissolving the blade. I blinked, forcing my vision to return to normal, as he turned his back on me and strode out of the room. His back was straight, his stride was long, and every footstep echoed with confidence.
He didn’t bother to look back.
I returned to bed, too shaken to pursue my original plan. I lay staring at the ceiling, my pulse still thudding in my throat. All I could see was Steel’s face in the darkness, as merciless as an Inductor, as he raised that blade to my throat.
Could he really have done it?
I wasn’t sure. Now that I was safely back in bed, it seemed increasingly unlikely. Even if the camera couldn’t see his quintessic blade, it would certainly have recorded the effects – the slash of blood across my throat, and my crumpling body. Besides, Steel was such an arrogant brat. Surely it had just been bluster. Just a hollow threat …
And yet it hadn’t felt hollow. And no matter what I told myself, the hatred in his eyes had not been false.
In a place like HQ, there were countless ways to dispose of a cadet and make it look like an accident. He could secretly load a death circuit into a Combat and Weaponry training nightbead, so that my opponent would unwittingly kill me. He could lock me in a room of deadly gadgets, or push me down the corkscrew …
I scrunched a fist around my pillow. I was being paranoid. Stupid, really. Steel was just a cadet, and I’d faced far more powerful enemies. I’d survived Inductors, and traitors, and even a protean bomb. A resentful cadet wasn’t worth wasting time on.
Yet even so, as I finally sank into an uneasy sleep, I kept seeing flashes of crimson. The colour leaked across my vision, painting a cold red stain between my dreams.
When I finally peeled myself out of bed, it was ten o’clock. My eyes were crusty and my mouth was dry. Luckily we’d agreed to skip our morning run today, giving us a chance to sleep in before camp.
With a yawn, I yanked on some jeans and a fluffy jumper, scrunched my hair into a topknot and stumbled out from my room into the lounge. A dozen or so cadets slouched around the couches and tables, but there was no sign of Steel.
I released a quiet breath.
Riff, Phoenix and Orbit had claimed a table on the far side of the room. They waved, beckoning me over to join them for a late breakfast.
‘Ahoy, sleepyhead!’ Riff called cheerily, as I approached. ‘It’s Saturday, remember? Don’t sleep the whole day away, or you’ll miss the camp announcement. I reckon we’re gonna …’
He trailed off as he caught sight of me. ‘Geez, Nomad, are you all right? You look like a walrus swallowed you and then chucked you up again.’
I couldn’t help but laugh. ‘Thanks, Riff. You sure know how to boost a girl’s self-esteem.’
‘Yeah, well, I aim to please. Not sick, are you?’
‘Nah, just tired.’
‘Oh, good,’ Riff said, relieved. ‘’Cause if you’re contagious, you can nick off to another table. I’m not getting sick on camp day.’
‘You’re such a caring friend.’
‘Course I am.’ Riff clapped a hand to his heart. ‘I care about you deeply, Nomad. In fact, I care so deeply that I’m willing to sacrifice the pleasure of your company so that you don’t make me sick and get stricken by terrible guilt and shame for the rest of your life. I’m just thoughtful like that, I guess.’
‘Wow,’ Phoenix said. ‘You’re a regular Mother Teresa.’
I headed into the kitchen area and returned with a mug of coffee and a bowl of cornflakes. As I shovelled this mush into my mouth, the others rattled on with their latest theories about our camp destination.
In the comforting light of day, I felt increasingly annoyed with myself. I’d been frightened by an idiot, and lost my chance to investigate the vials before we left for camp. Every swig of coffee gave me a fresh burst of energy – and a fresh burst of self-irritation.
‘Are you quite sure you’re not ill, Nomad?’ Orbit peered at me through his spectacles with genuine concern. ‘You do look rather pale today.’
For a moment, I considered spilling the truth about Steel. But by this point, I was heartily embarrassed by the whole debacle – from my initial plan to my later idiocy – and I didn’t feel like explaining. Besides, I’d only be giving Steel more of the attention he craved.
I forced a smile. ‘Couldn’t sleep, that’s all.’
‘Ah!’ Orbit brightened. ‘Excited about the camp, no doubt? Personally, I very much hope Dragon will send us to Clayton.’
Phoenix blinked. ‘Um … isn’t that just a suburb in Melbourne?’
‘Yep,’ Riff said. ‘There’s a really good dumpling joint near the train station.’
‘Oh, but it’s far more than that!’ Orbit said, eyes wide. ‘Don’t you know there’s a synchrotron there? It would be such a wonderful opportunity to study an exceptional piece of machinery.’
‘Or an exceptional bowl of dumplings,’ Riff said.
As it turned out, we didn’t have to wait long to find out our camp destination. Halfway through my bowl of cornflakes, an announcement rippled through the lounge; our destination would be broadcast at noon via the notice screen.
By 11.45, the lounge was full. A crowd jostled eagerly around the screen, which hung from the back wall. Normally, it broadcast our briefing timetables or exam schedules. Today it was blank, apparently in preparation for the big news. A murmur of excitement filled the air, as people laid out their final theories – or placed their final bets. Even Archibald the skeleton seemed to be leaning forward in anticipation.
My friends and I waited at our table, not particularly keen to deal with the crowd. We could see the screen from here anyway, and I had no desire to join an impromptu stampede.
Eventually, Riff started humming an AC/DC tune to pass the time. He was a skilled musician, with a knack for singing and playing the guitar – but even a talented hummer starts to sound like an irritating bumblebee after a while. After ten minutes of this assault on my eardrums, I was wondering whether it might’ve been a better choice to get trampled.
‘Riff,’ Phoenix said, finally, ‘I have a serious question for you. Are you physically capable of shutting up for twenty seconds straight?’
‘I’m training for my future career as a rockstar.’
‘A rockstar?’
‘Yeah, exactly. Just need a decent name for my band, and I reckon I’ll be good to go. What do you think of The Corkscrews?’
‘Sounds like a torture implement,’ I said. ‘So it’s probably about right.’
At 11.55, the door of the upwards corkscrew swung open, and several more cadets strode into the lounge. Steel walked in front of the group, his chin high and his eyes hard, while a cluster of cronies bumbled along behind him. As he approached, the other cadets moved out of his way, providing a clear path to the best view of the screen.
Finally, at 12.00 exactly, the screen flickered to life. The HELIX logo flashed onto the screen, followed by a simple message in a clear, blue font.
CAMP NOTICES
A reminder that camp is a ‘Technology-Free Zone’. Any phones, tablets or unauthorised gadgets shall be confiscated. This includes HELIX medallions, which should be left behind in Melbourne.
A metal detector will be used at the camp entrance to enforce this rule.
Meet on the rooftop at 6 pm with your packed belongings. Latecomers WILL be left behind.
There was an outbreak of excited murmuring.
‘The rooftop?’ Frost demanded. ‘Why the rooftop …?’
I glanced at the others. The reason seemed obvious to me; we must be flying to camp in a Chameleon jet, stored in a hangar on the HQ rooftop. It was how we had travelled to London, after all.
‘Chameleon, right?’ I said.
Phoenix shook her head. ‘The camps are always in Australia, so cadets normally take a bus. Being stuck on a bus for ten hours straight is supposed to prepare us for boring stakeouts or something. I wonder why …’
>
She didn’t have to wonder for long. At that moment, a second message flashed onto the screen.
SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT
This year’s Wilderness Training Camp will be held at Otorohanga, North Island
New Zealand
Instantly, the room erupted: shouts and whispers, cries and gasps of surprise.
‘New Zealand?’ Phoenix whispered, her eyes wide. ‘This can’t … I mean, it can’t be a coincidence.’
I thought of Nephrite, with her urgent news. I thought of her grandfather, Mariner, murdered in his cottage near a town called Otorohanga. And now Dragon had chosen that town, of all places, as our destination for the week.
‘Dragon’s sending us to a crime scene,’ I said. ‘Why?’
My answer came a moment later, when a flustered-looking agent pushed through the crowd towards us. He was tall and scowling, with a battle-scarred face and a torpefier holstered at his hip.
He crooked a finger, beckoning us into a quiet corner. The other cadets were so busy chattering among themselves that no one noticed as we disengaged from the crowd.
‘Nomad?’ he asked abruptly. ‘Riff, Orbit and Phoenix?’
‘Yeah, sir, that’s us!’ Riff said, and performed a completely unnecessary salute. ‘Ready and waiting for your command, sir.’
The man’s scowl deepened. ‘Dragon wants to see you. I’ve been asked to escort you directly to her office.’
‘Now?’ I asked.
‘Yes,’ the man said. ‘Now.’
Dragon’s apartment looked, if possible, even more hectic than usual. The maps and photos now lurked behind a collection of freestanding whiteboards and electronic screens. On these sprawled a new collection of maps – not of the world, but of one specific country.
New Zealand.
Dragon had circled the town of Otorohanga, in a rural part of the North Island. It was surrounded by countryside and bushland, and the only nearby towns were tiny specks. This trip would be nothing like our mission in London. There would be no crowds to hide in, no sea of faces.
We would truly be alone.
As we entered Dragon’s penthouse, the agent who had summoned us took his leave. He vanished into the dark of the downwards corkscrew, leaving us to bumble into the apartment on our own.
My heart skipped a beat when I spotted Nephrite. The tall Kiwi agent wore a bulky combat vest, and had tied her black hair into a bun at the nape of her neck. Her slim hands were clenched, her eyes were narrowed, and her glare was pointed directly at Riff.
It took me a moment to realise that Riff had started humming under his breath again. Unfortunately, the large apartment – with its sleek tiled floors – served only to amplify the volume.
Dragon gave him a flat look. ‘Don’t quit your day job, kid.’
Riff looked slightly surprised, as if he hadn’t even realised he was humming. He gave her a wounded expression. ‘I thought I sounded pretty good.’
‘Aye, sure you do,’ Dragon said, ‘if your definition of “good” is an intoxicated platypus trying to play a harmonica.’
That was enough to shut him up.
‘Now,’ Dragon said, ‘I’m sure you can guess what’s happening here. I need agents on the ground in New Zealand, and I need ’em there quick. Unfortunately, I ain’t got a lot of options to choose from.’
‘Why not?’ I asked.
‘Because you’re not going to a city,’ Dragon said. ‘You’re going to a tiny town in the middle of nowhere, and I can’t just plonk down a random team of agents without arousing suspicion. The Kiwi bosses’ll kick up an almighty stink if they find a foreign branch of HELIX running a covert mission on their turf.’
‘Couldn’t you just tell them the truth?’ Phoenix asked. ‘Maybe they could help.’
Dragon shook her head. ‘Someone at Auckland HQ deleted Nephrite’s ID from the database. Means someone can’t be trusted, and I’m not about to let ’em know we’re on to them.’ She paused. ‘Lucky for us, there’s another option.’
She swiped a screen with her finger, pulling up a photograph. It showed a collection of wooden cabins, surrounded by scraggly bushland. ‘There’s a campground just southwest of Otorohanga, owned by the New Zealand branch of HELIX. They send their cadets there a few times a year for wilderness training.’
‘So you’re sending us there,’ I said, as the pieces clicked together. ‘That’s our cover, isn’t it? If you send all the cadets there for camp, no one will suspect we’ve got a secret motive for being in the area.’
‘Exactly.’
‘Hang on – what happened to not sending us into danger again?’ Riff said. ‘I mean, I’m pretty sure I remember something about “innocent kids, can’t risk your lives again, yadda yadda yadda …”’
‘You won’t be in any danger,’ Dragon said sharply, ‘unless you take that tone with me again.’
Riff looked sheepish.
‘You kids’ve got one job, and it’s the safest job on the mission. All I need is a bit of information. Then you can get back to toasting marshmallows, or swinging around in the treetops like deranged monkeys, or whatever other shenanigans you get up to on those camps.’
‘What’s our mission, then?’ Phoenix said. ‘Is it about those “vials” you were talking about the other night?’
Dragon pulled up a fresh image on the screen. This time, it was not a photograph, but the front page of a scanned document. It looked old and dusty, its pages yellowed and its ink faded. A massive red stamp adorned the cover, declaring the contents to be ‘HIGHLY CONFIDENTIAL’.
Beneath the HELIX logo, the title page read:
CASE FILE #7689
The Red Sky Vials
Report prepared by the following field agents:
* Dragon
* Mariner
30 July 1984
Reviewed by the Case File Evaluation Unit,
HELIX Global Headquarters
WARNING: Sharing any portion of this case file without written permission may result in prosecution. Punishment includes dismissal and/or imprisonment, depending on severity of breach.
‘Imprisonment?’ Riff said, taken aback. ‘Geez, they don’t muck around at Global HQ, do they?’
‘No,’ Dragon said. ‘They don’t. Now, I’ve just obtained permission to share this file with you. Okeanos wasn’t happy about it, mind you, since you’re only cadets. But I’ve earned a bit of leeway over the years, and you kids proved yourselves in London.’
We all nodded. Okeanos was the mysterious leader of HELIX, working at Global HQ on the other side of the world. Although I knew few details about him, he was Dragon’s boss – and ultimately, he was ours as well.
‘Plenty of old secrets wrapped up in this case,’ Dragon went on, ‘and we can’t risk spreading ’em around. The bosses are trusting me with this – so don’t you dare screw it up.’
‘Wouldn’t dream of it,’ Riff said.
Dragon glared at him. ‘This ain’t a joke, kid. The clock is ticking, and a heck of a lot of lives are at stake.’
Riff nodded, looking more serious.
‘Back in the 1980s,’ Dragon said, ‘I was sent on a mission in Auckland, supporting a Kiwi agent called Mariner. He was a good man, and a good agent. A gang of Inductors had developed a deadly weapon, so it was our job to find it – and to destroy it.’
‘The vials?’ I asked.
Dragon nodded. ‘The Red Sky Vials, we called ’em. Mariner was the one who came up with the name. Three glass vials, each containing a partial strain of a magical virus.’
Orbit gasped. ‘Biological warfare?’
‘Exactly.’ Dragon looked grim. ‘On their own, the vials are harmless. But when all three are mixed together, they create the Red Sky Virus. It spreads like the plague, and it kills anyone it infects. But the interesting part is that it only infects a very limited pool of victims.’
‘Who?’ I asked.
‘Sorcerers,’ Dragon said, ‘whose quintessences are primarily composed of their o
wn magic.’
There was a long pause.
Then her meaning hit me, and my insides chilled. This virus would not kill ordinary people, whose quintessences were dormant. And it would not kill Inductors, who slaughtered or injured their victims to steal their magical strength.
It would kill us.
If the virus were unleashed, every HELIX agent would face a terrible choice. In order to survive, we would have to kill or seriously harm another, to steal their magic and render ourselves immune to the virus.
‘To survive the virus,’ Dragon said, ‘we must all become Inductors.’
Dragon handed us each a flat metal folder. ‘It’ll open to your fingerprint. Read it carefully, but don’t let any of the other cadets catch you. This is a top secret mission, and I don’t want any tricky questions.’
When I touched the folder with my fingertip, a brief flare of light rippled across the metal. The HELIX logo on the cover pulsated, flickering.
‘Each of the three vials had a name,’ Dragon said. ‘The Sunset Vial, the Midnight Vial and the Sunrise Vial. The case file has a bit of information on each of them, in case you need more background intel.’
‘But what happened in the eighties?’ Phoenix asked, frowning. ‘Surely you destroyed the vials?’
Dragon hesitated. ‘Well, we caught the Inductors responsible. The genius who’d created the virus got himself killed in a shootout. Afterwards, we sent in a gadgeteer to inspect his laboratory, to catalogue his experiments. Didn’t find much, since the Inductors had trashed the place when they realised we were onto ’em.’ She shrugged. ‘We burned the lab to the ground, just in case. We had orders to destroy the vials too, but …’
‘But you didn’t?’ I said, incredulous. ‘Why not?’
Dragon glared at me. ‘Wasn’t up to me, kid. Mariner was my boss back then, and he called the shots. He reckoned we should keep the vials safe in case of emergencies – maybe one day our own gadgeteers could mutate the virus, create a biological weapon of our own …’
‘Seriously?’ Riff said. ‘I mean, even I reckon that’s a dodgy idea.’
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