Crimson rising sa-2

by Nick James

  We rush from the cockpit. Cassius sprints to the back of the cabin and grabs the manual crank.

  As the ramp descends and thick Fringe air spills into the ravaged cabin, I notice that Theo’s chair is empty. I turn to see his body slumped at the side of the room, face down along the wall. No movement.

  Avery peers around my shoulder. “Is he-”

  “I don’t know,” I mutter, too petrified to go and see.

  “Help me with this.” Cassius motions Eva to his side. As she takes over the manual crank, he turns and busts open an arms cabinet with his elbow.

  Without wasting a moment, he tosses a pistol my way. Avery gets one too. Then Ryel.

  When the ramp hits the ground, Cassius gives Eva the last pistol and leads us from the cruiser cabin.

  We stumble into the harsh desert landscape. The sun forces my eyes shut. I relax them little by little until it’s comfortable to open them all the way. The distant buzzing of the swarm sounds behind us. I don’t want to turn and see it.

  We stay close, glancing overhead for signs of activity. I don’t know where the Academy ships went, but they’re not here now.

  Cassius curses. “They’re leaving us to rot out here. Shoot us down so we’ll be easy prey for the vultures.”

  Eva takes in the horizon. “Alkine would never do something like that.”

  I glance at Ryel. His eyes narrow. “I hear something.”

  “The swarm?” I whisper.

  “No. It’s coming from around… ” His words fade as he backs toward the wreckage of the cruiser, treading carefully on the dirt. In moments he’s rounded the corner. I tiptoe after, scared to let him out of my sight.

  Then I notice them, sitting in the distance. The hazy Fringe atmosphere hides them well. If it wasn’t for the reflection of sunlight on metal, I’d think I was imagining things.

  Ships, lined in front of our cruiser in wait. From this distance, I can’t tell if they’re the same ones that shot us down or not. It doesn’t matter. They’re a problem.

  I grab Ryel’s shoulder. “Stay close. We don’t know who’s inside.”

  Ryel nods. “I don’t think we-”

  A bullet whizzes through the air, feet from my shoulder. I flatten against the side of the cruiser. The rush of air silences. I look back at Ryel. His mouth hangs open. His pistol falls to the ground.

  He doesn’t finish his sentence.

  Instead, I watch in horror as he topples, face forward, into the dirt.

  27

  “Ryel!” I fall on my knees beside him and grab onto his shoulder.

  His legs tremble before falling still. I watch the clench of his fingers loosen in the dirt.

  “Ryel.” I shake his shoulder. “Ryel, where did it hit you?”

  No answer.

  The others join us. I see their shadows before I turn around. They stare down, unable-or unwilling-to speak.

  It’s not until I hear the tread of boots that I turn back around. And there they are, seven of them. Agents.

  In the middle stands Agent Morse, flanked by three on each side. His disappointed expression is framed by a lightweight battle helmet. I scan the length of his arm until I reach his fist. He’s armed. They all are.

  I stand. My voice comes out a choked whisper. “You shot him.”

  Morse’s brows narrow. “It was self defense.”

  “He wasn’t gonna hurt you.”

  Eva pushes forward until she’s at my side. “Please tell me that’s a stunner.”

  Morse remains still, his lips a straight, unreadable line.

  “He’s not moving,” I continue. “You shot him.”

  Morse clips his pistol to a holster on his back. “Listen, buddy. You’ve got no grounds to argue with me right now. Do you know how many regulations you’ve broken?”

  “Oh my god.” I stagger back. “You killed him.” I glance from agent to agent, shaking my head. “You all killed him.”

  “Jesse,” Morse continues. “You’ve left us with very few options.”

  “Did Alkine tell you to do this?”

  Morse glances at the nearest agent before answering. “He ordered us to retrieve you. Your transportation has been run to the ground. Mission accomplished.”

  I look down at Ryel. I can barely stand to meet Morse’s eyes. “He was the only one who could tell me anything. He knew about Haven. He knew about the Authority!” Morse motions for two of the agents to approach us. “Calm down. We’ll get you back and make sure-”

  Cassius bolts in front of me, hand outstretched before him. I watch as sparks dance between his fingers, like a broken transformer ready to burst. “You’re not taking him anywhere.”

  Morse steps back. His face remains firm. “You must be the brother. The Pearlhound.”

  “Ex,” he says. “Take one step closer and I ignite every one of these sparks.” He clutches his pistol in the other hand.

  “Okay.” Morse nods. “We’re gonna turn this into a standstill? This is not in your best interests, Fisher.”

  I move to Cassius’s side, pistol raised. Eva and Avery do the same. We’re not much against seven armed agents, but it’s something. They’re not gonna get away with this.

  “By any means necessary,” Morse continues. “That’s what the captain said.” He glances over his shoulder at another agent. “Johnson?”

  The man jogs backward a few steps before turning and sprinting to the nearest ship.

  I squint. His silhouette disappears in the haziness. “What’s he doing?”

  Morse taps his foot on the dirt. “You wanna play, Fisher? We’re gonna play.”

  “You don’t know-”

  “No,” he interrupts. “You don’t know. Smuggling some kind of explosive on board the Academy, staging a jailbreak.” I think back to the red Pearl knocking me from the Academy’s brig. Falling from the open hole. “It wasn’t an explosive.”

  “Sneaking into a secret bunker,” Morse continues. “Hijacking a shuttle and leaving it in the middle of a Fringe town.” His eyes widen as he notices my pained expression. “That’s right, buddy. We followed you to Syracuse. We followed you all the way to the swarms. The list keeps getting longer, all the things you’ve done.” He pauses. “I don’t understand it. The Academy is your home. We’ve fed you, taken care of you-”

  “You haven’t done anything,” I interrupt.

  “Maybe not, but that ship is filled with people that want the best for you. And you’re spitting in our faces. Where’s the trust, Fisher?”

  My hand shakes as I keep the pistol forward. “Locking me up in the brig? Refusing to listen to me? Do you know what it feels like to have an entire chunk of your life tossed out? Maybe it’s bad. Maybe I shouldn’t even be thinking about it so much, but you haven’t even given me the chance to figure any of this out.”

  Before Morse can respond, an agent to his right pushes forward and removes his helmet. I stare at the guy’s youthful face in astonishment. Even when I recognize him, I can’t get out his name. Eva has to.

  “Bergmann?” she says.

  August Bergmann crosses his arms, helmet hanging from the tips of his fingers. “Look, Fisher. Alkine wants you back and he doesn’t care how we do it. Cooperate, and I won’t have to kick your puny little butt. You know I can do it.” My mouth hangs open. Bergmann’s not even out of training yet. He’s still probationary. “Does he know you’re here?”

  Morse steps forward. “Captain Alkine allowed me to make the appropriate arrangements. I thought it would be best to bring men you were familiar with.”

  Anger seethes inside me. Sure, I’m familiar with Bergmann, but not in a good way.

  I watch as Agent Johnson returns from the haze, only he’s not alone. A second figure approaches beside him. As they near closer, I realize it’s Skandar.

  I hear a sharp intake of breath as Eva realizes what she’s seeing, but she keeps it at that. Skandar glances over at us. He doesn’t smile. His hands are free. I don’t see any bruises or marks on hi
s face, but his body language-his posture- seems different than usual.

  Morse grabs hold of Skandar’s shoulder and pulls him forward. “You’ve got nowhere to go.” His eyes focus on mine, then he nudges Skandar in the side. “Tell him, Harris.”

  Skandar grits his teeth as he looks up at me. I keep my eyes on Morse for another second before turning. “What is it?”

  Skandar shrugs. “Jesse… ”

  Morse prods him. “Just spit it out, okay?”

  Skandar glares at him before continuing. “They brought me back to Alkine’s office after those agents captured me. I thought he was gonna be pissed. I thought maybe he’d throw me out of the Academy.”

  “Go on,” Morse coaxes. “He doesn’t care what you thought.”

  He shoves his hands in his pockets, looking like he wants to sink into the dirt and disappear. “Okay.” He takes a deep breath. “So instead of throwing me in the brig, he opened a file. It was… it was things they’ve been saying about you.”

  My grip loosens on the handle of the pistol. “Who?”

  “The Drifters,” he mutters. “All sorts of stuff. Good things, bad things. Alkine had organized it all. I don’t know… he ran it through programs or whatever it is guys like him do. And he showed me this thing… he called it ‘the fork.’”

  Eva shakes her head. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Skandar’s eyes meet hers, then quickly move away. “It showed these two lines… one pointing up to the right, one to the left. The one on the right had you as some kind of savior. But the one on the left… ”

  Morse’s brows furrow. “Intelligence has led us in two directions, Fisher. Direction One: You use your Pearl powers and save the world from whatever invasion is supposedly at our doorstep. Direction Two: You’re the reason for the invasion. You get out-run around here like some kind of fugitive-and something happens. Something triggers. Half of the Drifters we’ve spoken to warned us to keep you close… said that there are people-things-out here that’ll find you. It all keeps coming back to one word. Ridium. Whatever the hell that is.” He pauses. “I knew you wouldn’t hear it from me. That’s why I had to bring Harris.”

  I shake my head. “Ridium.” I rub the bracelet against my thigh, then consider the pendant around the red Drifter’s neck. That makes me think about the warning scrawled on my chest. I can’t feel it anymore in this heat, but I know it’s there.

  I am already here.

  I close my eyes for a second and I can see the symbols-burned flesh.

  Morse sighs. “Alkine wanted you safe, yeah, but he also wanted you close until he knew what we were up against. Our intelligence doesn’t jibe. It contradicts itself and trails off on tangents. Maybe it’s a problem with the translation. But the fork… we’ve got two overriding roads here, and we can’t ignore either one of them.”

  My grip tightens on the handle of the pistol. “He should’ve told me. Why didn’t he tell me?”

  “How are you supposed to explain something like that?” Morse takes a step forward. “How are you supposed to tell a kid that he might be responsible for the invasion of an entire planet?”

  Avery moves to my side. “You don’t know anything for sure.”

  “That’s right,” Morse continues. “And the worst thing you can do is lash out when you don’t know the facts. We don’t know, Jesse. And until we do, you’ve gotta stay with us. You might call it a prison, but that’s not what it is. The Academy is our base of operations. Gallivanting around in the Fringes? It’s getting you nowhere.”

  “So he lied to me,” I say. “Again.”

  “If Alkine would have told you the truth, you’d have gone running off like you always do.”

  “Yeah?” I glare at him. “Well, I ran off anyway, didn’t I?”

  Cassius brings down his fist, but keeps the pistol aimed on Morse. “I don’t like this. These guys will say anything to get you back.”

  I meet Skandar’s eyes, analyze his expression. It’s not the Skandar I’m used to. He doesn’t give me any secret wink or smile to show that he’s lying. He barely looks at me at all. He wouldn’t play along with this if he didn’t believe it was true. Whatever Alkine showed him, it convinced him somehow.

  Morse clears his throat. The dryness of the air is getting to him. “Come back with us, Jesse. We’re family. We’re doing what we can.”

  I swallow a mouthful of thick atmosphere. “I… ”

  A voice comes from behind me, breaking my concentration. I glance over my shoulder to see Theo limping toward us, head low and arms at his sides. “What the hell is this?” he coughs. It nearly sends him tripping into the dirt, but he catches himself, keeping a slow pace toward the center of our standstill. Sweat drips from his hair. His shirt is torn in at least three places. Even more than normal, he looks like an animal.

  I hear the cock of weapons behind me as every Academy pistol locks onto the boy.

  Theo continues to approach. His right foot drags along the dirt. He coughs into his arm again, then pulls the sticky hair from his face. “Leave me in there like you thought I was dead,” he continues. “Like you wanted me to die.” He stares at the ground as he mumbles. I can barely see his face.

  Avery moves to let him pass. He stops several feet behind me.

  Morse motions for the other agents to hold their fire. “It’s just a kid.”

  Theo cackles under his breath, which only elicits more coughing. I picture his body laying against the wall, still.

  Morse frowns. “This a Fringer you picked up, Fisher?”

  I shake my head.

  Theo takes a deep breath. “You’re freaking useless. All of you.” He coughs again. “Jeez, I feel like I’m about to puke.”

  He raises his head and stares at us all for the first time. Avery gasps. I take a step back from the shock of it.

  Theo’s eyes glow a bright red-a glow that matches the energy from the red Drifter. Gone are the pupils and whites. It’s pure light, like someone carved out his eyes and replaced them with tiny generators.

  Sweat pools on his face. His legs shake beneath him.

  The agents raise their weapons again. Morse shouts. “What’s wrong with him?”

  Cassius puts more distance between himself and the boy. “I don’t know.”

  Theo smiles. “Did you morons do something to me when I wasn’t looking?”

  Bergmann nudges Morse’s shoulder. “Shoot and ask questions later. That’s what I say.”

  Theo stretches his right hand into the air, waving it in slow ripples like he can barely keep it up. “I feel like I swallowed a Pearl.”

  Morse tightens his finger against the trigger. “You gonna tell me who this kid is, Fisher, or am I gonna have to shoot?”

  I grit my teeth.

  Theo’s lips curl into a wide smile and his hand drops to his side. Despite my better judgment, I lean in closer to get a look at him.

  Then come the sounds, like enormous daggers slicing through the air.

  Choking. Sick, wet gurgles.

  I spin around and lose my footing as I watch the ground rise up to attack the agents.

  Sharp knives of black metal slash up from the dirt, protruding with such force and speed that they’d be impossible to dodge. There’s one for each agent, the tip of which slams into their bodies and doesn’t stop until it juts back out the tops of their heads. Armor doesn’t stop it. Nothing does.

  Ridium. Buried underground. No longer.

  There isn’t blood at first. It’s too quick for that. The noises alone are enough to send me into a dizzying shock. The agents freeze in horrific, unnatural positions before the blades retract into the dirt, leaving massive incisions.

  Then comes the crimson. Blood spilling onto the dirt, quickly darkening the brown.

  I watch in horror as all seven agents topple to the ground in lifeless heaps. Skandar stands in the middle, looking like he’s about to faint.

  I can’t quite process it. My mind’s still stuck several seconds in t
he past. Seven agents, dead. Morse. Bergmann. Gone.

  Skandar stumbles over to meet us, face drained of color.

  Theo closes his fist. He wavers in place before letting out one last chuckle. I turn to see the red fade from his eyes. Before anyone can say a word, he sinks to his knees. His face plants into the dirt. I watch his shoulders rise and fall. He’s unconscious, but alive.

  Everything’s quiet. Nothing but the swarm on the horizon.

  We bunch together instinctively, staring at the bodies of the fallen Academy Agents, trying to understand it. Their eyes stretch open, staring at the sun. Soon they’ll be barbequed in this heat, cooked meat for whatever predator wants to swoop down and get them. I never liked Bergmann, and what little I knew of Morse I liked him even less, but they didn’t deserve to die. Not like this.

  My bracelet buzzes. So does Cassius’s. They tremble like they’re applauding the scene around them, like they have minds of their own. Cassius and I look at each other.

  Black. The daggers from the ground, the seamless bands wrapped around our wrists. I know he’s thinking it, too. It’s more than just the visual. It’s instinctive. It all fits together.

  Ridium.

  I grab my chest and feel the indentations of the symbols beneath my shirt. I am already here.

  A blast of triple-digit heat throws my hair to the side. My bracelet settles, but I feel it in my heart, now. I don’t know if I’m making things better or worse. Have I set something terrible in motion just by coming back to the Fringes? Why didn’t Alkine tell me about this “fork” before? If the possible consequences are so horrible, I should have been the first to know.

  I repeat Morse’s words over and over in my head. The troubled look on Skandar’s face lingers with me. And then I remember the red in Theo’s eyes, the same red that carved this warning into my skin.

  I’m being followed. These aren’t just random events. It’s because of me.

  I don’t know what step to take.

  Legs shaking, I take a seat on the ground. The heat will consume me if I stay put much longer, but I can’t move. Maybe Alkine was right after all. Maybe I’m dangerous. To myself. To everyone.