War_Apocalypse

by JC Andrijeski

Balidor didn’t answer that, either.

  A scattering of frowns and angry eyes aimed at Jorag and Yumi, but Balidor could feel they didn’t disagree, either.

  Chandre’s voice sharpened. “Even if we found the moles, where would we take all of these people? We have many humans here now… List humans. We cannot simply abandon them here, when we are charged with protecting them. Can we, in good conscience, take them out of here, either? Knowing the disease might kill them in a matter of weeks? No.” She shook her braids, her dark mouth pursed. “No. We must take the fight to them in some way. We must go after them directly. And not on their terms.”

  Balidor glanced at Chandre, feeling a harder coil of emotion leave her light.

  He knew Chandre wanted to go after Cass herself. Perhaps she was even angling for that very thing right now. Looking at her, though, Balidor doubted her words were so calculated, at least not consciously.

  The East Indian seer’s red eyes swiveled to his.

  “What do you think, Balidor?” she said. “You have an opinion on this, I would swear on it. You have dealt with this Menlim before.”

  Balidor hesitated, glancing at Yumi.

  Yumi raised an eyebrow at him, giving Chandre a look that held more scrutiny. Clearly, she’d noticed the intensity of charge in Chan’s light, as well.

  After a pause, Balidor shrugged, speaking frankly.

  “I think you are right. Shadow is clearly banking on Alyson’s psychology in an attempt to draw her out in the open. It is likely only his first attempt. The second might be a direct assault… or perhaps he intends to combine the approaches, drawing off our telekinetic seers before going after us here. In any case, the divisiveness these tactics will surely cause among our ranks is intentional as well, so I would expect many seers to be killed as they attempt to elicit a response from us. Possibly even specific loved ones of ours. Or children.”

  He glanced around at the pale faces at the table before adding,

  “He knows how the Bridge is likely to respond. He knows, too, that the Sword will be confused, conflicted and afraid from seeing Menlim himself. Refusing to give us a visual on Cass is surely a calculated move, as well.”

  Pausing, he faced Chandre directly.

  “Of course it is a trap,” he said, blunt. “We all know this. He knows we will assume this, and that the Bridge’s advisors will be dead-set against a meet. So it becomes a question of the trap’s primary intent… and if there is more than one.”

  Glancing around the table again, Balidor added,

  “We mustn’t forget, however… there is real cheese in this trap. Seers will die. Perhaps thousands, even tens of thousands. There is also Cassandra and Feigran. Whether Cass is fully converted or not, we are certainly meant to believe Feigran is.”

  Chandre frowned. “Do we have any further intelligence on her? On her abilities?”

  Balidor gestured in the negative. “No. But Feigran’s transformation was most assuredly a message on that front, as well. Shadow is converting them, but he is also doing what he can to awaken them… and to trigger their abilities. I am sure Cass is being transformed similarly.”

  Balidor glanced at Wreg.

  “We need Nenzi’s eyes and light on this.” Hesitating only a half-beat, he added, “I’d also like to bring in Varlan.” Seeing Wreg frown, he held up a hand. “We will keep an eye on him. But I don’t think he’s an asset we can continue to ignore.”

  Wreg nodded, signaling his agreement in seer sign language. Grunting a little, he glanced around the conference room with a frown.

  “You know damned well what he’s going to say about this,” the ex-Rebel said. “Nenz. He’d sooner gnaw off his own arm then let her anywhere near that fucker right now. If she tries to pull rank on him, expect a serious fight. He might even try to get her removed from command, or take her out of the hotel by force. He’s already threatened it. Truthfully, I think he’d be furious if we even talked about a possible meet in front of his wife, given how he’s been reacting to her condition so far. I think we’d better not assume he won’t overreact to this… especially if he agrees this is really Menlim. It might make it difficult to use him strategically at first. Until he calms down, I mean.”

  Balidor nodded, feeling the truth of this, too.

  Realizing there would be a fight no matter how it happened, he sighed. He was about to speak again, when Chandre cut him off.

  “Condition?” she said, bristling. “What condition?”

  A few of the seers glanced at Balidor, looking away uncomfortably.

  “Are you blind, sister?” Wreg said, his voice hard.

  “Blind?” Chandre stared around at all of them, her eyes holding an open anger. “What are you talking about? What is wrong with the Bridge?”

  “She is pregnant,” Jax muttered, glancing apologetically at Balidor.

  The Adhipan leader only sighed, waving at him that it was all right.

  He didn’t see the point of attempting to keep it a secret anymore. Everyone inside the construct had noticed the extra presence to a degree, at least when it became prominent for whatever reason. At this point, it needed to be discussed.

  Jax added, “The Sword has been reacting to that fact somewhat––”

  “––Psychotically,” Wreg supplied bluntly. “As per usual. We’re pretty sure he hasn’t told her, and being human-born, she likely has no idea, since the developmental stages aren’t the same, especially in the beginning.”

  Chandre stared at him, then around at all of them, her face paling.

  “Gods, no,” she said. “Don’t you see? That’s what this is about! But of course they would want the child!”

  Balidor, Wreg and Yumi all frowned in her direction.

  “The thought had occurred to us––” Balidor began drily.

  “No.” She shook her braids, scowling. “Not Shadow. Cass. Cass would want the child.”

  She gestured angrily with a hand.

  “Shadow, he played on this weakness in her all the time. He would traumatize her, getting her to remember things from her past… then fill her head with the importance of family, of finding one’s true family, of salvation through familial love. He hammered her with this crap the whole time we were there. It is how she came to see Feigran differently––as one of the Four, one of her true brothers. Menlim vowed everything would change for her once she was reunited with those who belonged to her. Don’t you see?”

  Staring around the table, Chandre bit her lip, looking at them as if they were dense.

  “Do all of you know nothing of Cassandra’s past?” she burst out. “She was abused constantly, through most of her childhood. Her mother drank and often left her alone, sometimes staying away for days. Her father hit her and left her open to sexual abuse by other men, even while Cass was very young. She had an uncle who raped her.”

  Pausing, she added darkly,

  “All her life, Cass wanted her own child. She told me that even in high school, she wanted a child. She wanted something of her own to love. She said she probably would have gotten pregnant at an early age, if not for her friendship with Jon and Allie. She confessed to me she still thought of it at times… that it was a fantasy of hers.”

  Chandre’s face hardened before she added,

  “It was important enough to her that it was a point of contention for us. She wanted a partner who could give her a biological child.” Pausing, she added, “Allie was part of this emotional issue for her, too. Cass was very jealous of Allie for having parents who loved her… Allie in particular, more than Jon. She felt guilt about this, but that jealousy bordered on resentment at times, even then. She admitted to me once, it was a relief to her that Allie and Revik couldn’t have children for a few hundred years. She was afraid she would resent this, too.”

  “I thought the Bridge’s human parents were dead?” Garensche muttered, glancing around at the rest of them. “Aren’t they dead?”

  “They are,” Wreg affirmed.

  “T
hen why would Cassandra––”

  “You are totally missing the significance of my words!” Chandre snapped.

  “Sister!” Balidor raised a calming hand. “We are hearing you!”

  “No,” Chandre said. “You are not! If Shadow gave Cass a child… Alyson’s child… and convinced her it was hers to keep, that it was her destiny to be the mother, Cass would not be rational about this. If he convinced her they are traitors, insane or dangerous, then promised to give her their child to raise, perhaps to save that child from them…”

  Chandre trailed, gesturing with a hand that the conclusions were obvious.

  Balidor felt something in his heart and light react to the hunter’s words.

  He had felt some of what Chandre described in Cass. That intense heart pain, the crippling loneliness. He hadn’t known the specifics, nor had he looked, but he felt these things on Cass even in Seertown, when he first met her as a human. He hadn’t known about the child abuse, but she was clearly traumatized from her time with Terian, and attached to Dehgoies and Alyson in a way that implied a fear-based dependence.

  Balidor hadn’t noticed any resentment towards Allie, not then, not around Dehgoies or anything else, but Chandre’s words rang true with what he knew of Cass.

  He was about to speak, when Wreg broke the silence.

  “I still can’t reach them,” he said. “And now I can’t reach Chinja. Will someone else try?”

  Balidor turned, staring at him. Enough of an edge lived in Wreg’s words that instead of being annoyed he’d interrupted, he frowned. They’d sent Chinja down to find out what the delay was with Jon bringing up Allie and Dehgoies.

  “All of them are silent now? Chinja, too?” Balidor frowned. “What about Jon?”

  Wreg’s mouth hardened more. “I can’t reach him, either.”

  Balidor entered the construct at once.

  Disengaging the security protocols around separate constructs, he pinged all four of them, loudly. Every seer in the hotel should have heard it. All three of them certainly should have answered him at once. When none did, he raised a hand to his organic link, activating it with his fingers. He used his light to key in each of their security codes, trying their headsets.

  Nothing.

  “Did you try?” Wreg said.

  “Yes.” Balidor clicked out, leaving the organic channel open. “I can’t reach them, either.” He glanced around, saw others in the room trying, as well.

  Chandre’s face paled more. “And this is not a concern to you? To all of you?”

  Wreg glared at her, his black eyes hard. Then he looked at Balidor.

  “Nenz was going to talk to her today,” he said. “After he spoke to Maygar. He had a whole plan to have lunch with her, talk to her, tell her the truth. I thought maybe that’s why I couldn’t reach them.”

  His jaw hardened more, just before he glared at Jorag, then back at Balidor.

  “I thought that might be why it took Jon a while to find them.” Wreg scowled. “That, or he was avoiding interrupting… whatever. Something personal. I was giving them the space to wrap it up, and for Jon to deal with it. But it’s been too long. It’s been too long for any of that. And now I can’t feel Jon at all.”

  “You can’t feel Jon at all?” Balidor said. “How long?”

  “Five, maybe six minutes. He just disappeared out of my light.”

  Balidor stared at him.

  Then he moved, motioning Wreg, Jorag, Chandre, Yumi and Neela towards the door. He already had his hand on his sidearm.

  Wreg was on his feet, too. Within seconds, he was halfway to the door.

  “How much time?” Balidor said. “In total? Since Jon left to find them?”

  “Thirty minutes.”

  Balidor nodded, once. “Weapons. Pull two teams…”

  He trailed when he saw Wreg’s eyes. The ex-Rebel was already in the Barrier.

  He didn’t need to tell Wreg anything.

  Balidor pinged Tarsi up in her room, using the frequency they’d arranged to use only if the damned world was coming down around their heads.

  He didn’t bother with a greeting.

  The hotel might be under attack. Wreg and I are going after the Bridge and Sword. Whereabouts unknown. We’re starting in the basement. I need you to run the teams overseeing the refugees and human civilians.

  Understood, was all Tarsi said.

  He’d walked most of the way to the elevator by the time he clicked out. He glanced at Wreg, but the other seer’s face was unreadable. Not even a sliver of light leaked past the dense shields that had fallen over his normally dark gold aura.

  “Chinja’s unconscious,” Wreg said, low. “I just had them check via her headset. It didn’t set off any alarms because the program registers sleep the same way.” His black eyes met Balidor’s. “Nenzi either isn’t wearing one, or it’s cut off. Same with Allie and Jon.”

  Balidor nodded. His eyes never left Wreg’s light.

  He knew what would happen if Jon ended up being under threat. He’d seen mates fight for mates before. Wreg’s stillness was only due to the steel-like control that had fallen over his light––a control he’d cultivated over centuries of life and death situations.

  Balidor glanced at Chandre. Noting she had a gun in her hand, even as Jorag handed around extra magazines, he motioned the female hunter towards the stairs.

  “Take a team,” he told her. “Move fast, sister.”

  Nodding, Chandre didn’t need another word. Touching her earpiece, she motioned for Neela, Jax, Anale and Jorag to come with her as she jogged for the door to the stairs.

  Before they’d reached it, a loud, jarring tone vibrated the construct overhead. The alarm was physically silent but Balidor saw seers wince and duck in reaction. The wailing, non-physical sound spiraled upwards, growing harsher.

  Breach alarm.

  Just then, the construct dumped a tightly packed bundle of information, images and knowing into Balidor’s light.

  “Underground!” he said, speaking loudly in instinct, even though the alarm was silent.

  Wreg nodded. The ex-Rebel’s eyes were now coal.

  He entered the first elevator that opened with Balidor on his heels. Garensche, Yumi, Neela, Holo and Illeg followed.

  “Ditrini,” Wreg said, chambering a bullet in his organically-enhanced gun.

  Balidor nodded grimly, then receded into the Barrier. He pinged four other teams, sending one to the roof, the other three to the lobby.

  Information continued to come at him from the Barrier, hitting him in staccato bursts. A picture slowly began to form around what was happening.

  “They came in through the caves,” he said. “They knew about the entrances. Someone let them in. They got past the Barrier key without setting it off. The alarms hit when they got to the security perimeter, so whoever helped them didn’t have the codes.”

  They definitely had someone on the inside.

  Wreg scowled, checking a second gun as the elevator descended. “I know. I’ve got people looking for the mole, for any signals in or out of the construct during the relevant time. Vik’s got Varlan on it, too; they checked him, and nothing could have gotten in or out of that cell.” He gave Balidor a murderous look. “We’ll find that fucker and skin them before this is over.”

  Balidor only nodded.

  “We’ll need more weapons,” he said. “And armor.”

  Wreg grunted, still checking guns. “Basement armory’s not cut off. Yet.”

  “Has anyone checked the roof?”

  “I’ve got people headed there now. Can you feel any of them? Below or above?”

  Still scanning, Balidor shook his head, once. “No.”

  “Neither can I,” Wreg confirmed. “We might need to use physical links. They’ve got control over some part of the construct.”

  Balidor nodded to that, too.

  The elevator car grew indistinct around him as he fought to see through the block. He waited for the floors to tick dow
n, to get them to the basement. The alarm continued to scream into his light and his mind, but he barely heard it now.

  Chandre was right.

  Cass was the one they should have been worried about. Feigran and Menlim were nothing more than a distraction.

  The thought made him feel sick.

  The whole building trembled, and the elevator along with it. The lights flickered overhead as the elevator slowed, then slowly began picking up speed.

  “Not an earthquake,” Wreg said. “Explosion.”

  Balidor didn’t answer. His mind and light continued to chew over what it all meant, what waited for them below. They didn’t have much time before they’d be in the middle of it.

  Ditrini told them what would happen. He said when Shadow and his people next came, they wouldn’t come for Ditrini himself, or Dehgoies. They wouldn’t come for the List humans, or Maygar, or any of the others they were protecting at the hotel.

  They would come for the Bridge.

  He found himself checking his own guns compulsively as the elevator car sank through floors. As they passed the lobby level, he glanced at Wreg, who now looked overly pale, as if he’d had his own set of thoughts.

  Without thinking, Balidor grabbed his arm, gripping it hard.

  Wreg looked at him. His black eyes held fear now. Behind that, a harder intensity shone. Both things held more than Balidor could put into words.

  Neither of them spoke, but understanding passed between them.

  For the first time, perhaps, that understanding was complete, without any caveats or doubts about one another whatsoever.

  Whatever this was, they entered it as brothers.

  It didn’t exactly make Balidor feel better, but he did feel less alone.

  39

  MOLE

  REVIK GLANCED UP at the second explosion.

  His light retracted, then flared out, twisting and reconfiguring over his head.

  Not like it did him much good.

  Locked behind the organics of the cell, he couldn’t see anything apart from what lived inside these four walls. He dove back into the Barrier anyway, fighting the organic and Barrier structures locking the three of them inside the fifteen-by-twenty space.