by Terina Adams
“Please.”
I read the confusion then wariness as he shuffled aside, opening a small gap, which spread farther as the other men copied the first, driven by some silent trigger that made them think I was different. Behind their eyes, I saw questions asked, which might’ve led to many answers about the sweepers' sudden appearance in force.
The last man cleared for me, opening the view. Four men knelt on the dirt. Their hands were tied behind their backs, heads bowed. Two men already lay face-down in the dirt, unmoving. The stranger was right; this wasn’t the place to be, but it was the only place for me to be. I was the one who started this. I was the one who could stop it.
A sweeper marched in front of the remaining four men, while a dozen other sweepers stood at varying positions amongst the crowd should anyone decide to act impulsively. Each sweeper, except the one marching out the front, wore their helmets and shields, and not just any shield. These were the heavy-duty, nil-penetration shield Jax and I encountered in the streets of the Aris quarter.
My heart punched along my ribcage. Destruction led the beat.
The sweeper without his helmet looked up at the crowd but said nothing. The moments coalesced to one long expanse of time as the crowd silently watched the watcher.
He shouted, “One more for your silence,” then raised his weapon and fired at the next in line of the four. It was the same fizzle-crackle I heard inside Arlo’s house, a sound that had been confusing although benign but would now ring through my ears, heralding a nightmare. A bluish-white light penetrated through the man’s chest. In response, his head arched back, his mouth frozen in a cry that never came out. I gasped then smacked my hands over my mouth, turning away, but not before I saw the man’s head loll forward to his chest, followed by his body crumpling to the dirt ground of the market space.
The fear spread through the crowd like a contagious disease, infecting me as well as everyone else. I hid behind a broad-shouldered man, numbed, hollowed, and falling down into the dark abyss of destruction. My hands shook with the adrenaline and panic, and more, a blinding rage and strong desire to teach a lesson.
I glanced around me at all the faces of the crowd, feeling a plea form in my mouth. I needed help. Destruction was taking hold. If it did, hell would rain down. My eyes swept onto Arlo, and for a moment, the buildup in me stacked to a grand halt. His eyes were on the enemy, no longer on the dead on the ground, expression set firm on his face. He could descend us into darkness, give everyone time to escape, just like I could bring the buildings down around us or shatter the mind of the marching sweeper. But what about the other sweepers hiding behind their shields? And any action from either Arlo or I would bring the full might of the senate down onto the fringe. The beginning of the war.
Do I just stand here and watch? Allow the sacrifices and become a part of the silent oath?
The sweeper pointed his weapon to the next man in line as he surveyed the crowd. “Will there be another lost to your silence?”
“No.” I pushed past the last guy blocking my way and stepped forward from the crowd into the open space, making every effort to avoid Arlo’s needle stare.
The sweeper raised his weapon, so the barrel pointed to the sky. “Well, this is interesting.”
Whisperings and gasps rose around me.
This was not me being courageous, because I was as scared as everyone else. This was not me filled with destructive power. I wasn’t looking to be a hero. Arlo kept silent and watched men die to keep me hidden. I just couldn’t bear to live with the agony of seeing one more person die because of me.
The sweeper curled a finger, beckoning me forward. A smirk creeped onto his face. A dimple cut into his right cheek. Sky-blue eyes danced with the self-satisfaction that came with winning.
I resisted his contemptuous demand, which earned me a quirked eyebrow from him. He then cast a glance toward some of his comrades standing at the front of the crowd. That done, he returned to me, swung his weapon over his shoulder like he had little care, and lasered me with eyes more suited to a best friend or boyfriend, not a murderer.
This wasn’t the first time I saw a sweeper’s face. This sweeper was no different to the others—disturbingly human, disturbingly attractive, disturbingly boy-next-door, like a serial killer living quietly in your neighborhood, attending church functions, and helping elderly people across the street.
My arm was wrenched backward by someone behind me. I yelped, looked over my shoulder and into the blankness of a sweeper’s visor, where his eyes would be. Funneling destruction deep, deep within his eyes, into his mind would be so easy—if I could get past the shield in time, which bent and warped to keep me on the outside of its protective fold and to keep him in. Besides, the effects would not end with him. No, they would only just begin, and the catastrophic results would decimate the fringe.
The sweeper behind pushed me toward the other sweeper, the one with the sky-blue eyes. He caught me with one hand like it was a game of catch, snorted a laugh, but didn’t let me go. Fingers digging into my upper arms, he said, “I heard you had children with you.”
I held his eyes. “You were misinformed.”
“Is that so?” That smirk again, revealing him as a soulless killer.
He released his fingers from their painful grip on my upper arm and backed up until he was in line with the remaining three men, all the while keeping his sky-blue eyes on me. “Your silence brings death.”
Do I spare a man’s life to surrender two more, or do I allow this man to become that sacrifice? It was my choice. The life of a stranger for two children, my friends?
The sweeper lowered his weapon from his shoulder and nestled the barrel against the closest man’s temple. “This life is on you,” he said as if he could read my heart.
“Don’t do this.” It was all I could think to say. It was nothing more than a filler to slow time to the inevitable.
The sweeper spat out a laugh. He craned his head back and belted out another laugh, which rattled through the air like gunfire.
With the disturbance behind me, the sweeper’s laugh cut off in an instant. I looked over my shoulder as a sweeper pushed through the crowd, dragging Nada and Azrael by their tatty clothes. A large knot welled up in my throat, chest seized in a vice as I watched them brought forward.
Nada would not look up at me. His features scrunched up in defiance. Maybe it was good he wouldn’t meet my eyes, because he didn’t need to read my horror. His stare matched Arlo’s, seething anger, bubbling fury, too much for a small boy to juggle inside. Azrael’s eyes filled with tears as she glanced at me. I reached out to take her hand, but the sweeper who brought them yanked the two away from me.
“It was only a matter of time before we had what we wanted.” He waved his weapon. “Separate them.”
Sweepers grabbed Nada and Azrael and dragged them one way, while another pulled me in the opposite direction. Azrael screamed and fought but was swept off her feet as the sweeper hoisted her under his arm. Nada swung out, his fist meeting air, powerless against the speed and skill of a trained fighter. The sweeper pulled him close, pinning his hands to his side, his shield descending again in case anyone in the crowd thought this was the time to defy, which left me powerless.
Destruction flashed hot in front of my eyes, disordering my mind. For one blurry moment, I lost sight of everything around me and felt like I was plunging into a deep abyss. I staggered forward only to meet a firm wall of resistance, but I didn’t see what it was, because I closed my eyes, scrambling to claw my way out of this mental confusion and the slipping grip on destruction. Someone grasped my left wrist, and the dull pain gave me something to focus on. Pain was good for my control. Pain always brought me back.
Sky-blue eyes stared into mine, his fingers an uncomfortable manacle on my wrist. “Give me a reason, sweetheart,” he whispered.
I turned around, but he jerked me forward. Stumbling along, I saw Nada and Azrael disappearing in the opposite direction. My eyes swe
pt the crowd then caught on movement above. Up on the rooftops of a building, I saw the four of them.
Chapter 22
They got what they came for; perhaps I was the bonus add-on to the cargo they’d come chasing. At least for now, the fringe people would be left in peace.
The sweeper opposite me kept his face hidden behind his helmet. Although facing my way, his gaze could be turned inward to his cephulet. He wasn’t sleeping, not with the rigidity in his body, looking like a predator ready to pounce.
There were five others in the utility with me, each concealing their face behind their helmet, the secret to their factional nature also hidden, but their shields were down. I wasn’t threat enough. With six in the utility, I was helpless.
Shut tight with the enemy, destruction seared the underside of my skin. I’d be spiraling into a pit of manic despair if it deserted me. My passivity and weakness stirred its embers, but so too my fear. Destruction had no tolerance for those parts of me. It gave me courage, but it also wanted me fierce. Caught, confined, any possible solutions hopeless, and destruction rose within, consuming, magnifying, swallowing the sane side of me, electrifying my senses, charging my mind for revenge. It felt seductive but also dirty. The horrible things I’d already done. I couldn’t open the gate to destruction and accept the courage it gave without being feral. I wasn’t strong enough to resist. And so I accepted neither. I squashed destruction back down, suffered the pain like an unmet need, suppressed the part of myself that gave me strength.
The senate had me, thanks to another stupid mistake I made. Now Nada and Azrael, thanks to me, were in the senate’s hands. What would Jax be feeling right now, seeing the last of his family disappear? Alithia would curse my name forever. I promised her I would keep her daughter safe. She stayed behind, because she believed in me, and all I did was get her daughter caught.
I managed to do the one thing Jax tried desperately to avoid. The senate now knew people were moving between dimensions, bringing others back into their world, others capable of the same strength as them. Was there any possible way the senate would discover Mum and Ajay? I didn’t want to think about them; it hurt too much. It felt like I let them down, betrayed them.
They would graft me and replace the tattoo from Islia with the truth. Then the torture would begin. They would want to know everything, about my father, how I got here, my reason for being here, who I was connected with…. I buried my eyes behind my fists. If only I could shift. If only I’d been one of the lucky ones. I wasn’t, because I’d never been lucky or special. Nothing came easy to me. Jax lied to make me feel better; I wasn’t good with my factional nature. I’d been a clumsy mess.
I lowered my hands from my face when I felt the utility slow. The sweepers didn’t respond in any way. They were nothing but statues… robots. Mechanical whirrs, small adjustments in positioning, next came the vibration, gentle enough it was like one of those massage chairs back home. A louder clunk thudded through the hull behind me and under my feet.
The six sweepers unbuckling their harnesses was the signal we landed. The closest to the exit punched a panel, and the door slid aside. One remained behind, the one who’d sat opposite me. With his approach, I pressed as far back as I could in my seat. He bent and unclipped the buckle. “Get up,” he ordered with his weird tinny voice straining through his helmet.
“Where are we?” Not sure why I asked, as I didn’t expect him to answer me.
“Home for you. Depending on how you behave, it could be a short time, or it could be permanent.”
“Is it the Dome?” If only I could see his facial expression.
This time, his answer was to grab my upper arm and pull me to my feet. “How about you check it out for yourself?”
Destruction crawled its tentacles underneath the indent of his fingers. If I had the ability to ignite his skin, he’d be screaming right now.
So he’d release me, I walked ahead to the opening then out onto the platform where the other sweepers waited. No metal platforms here—under my feet was a solid, thick arm of concrete, giving it a sense of importance and permanency. There were a bunch more docking stations, but ours was the only utility here. The long arm of the platform extended around in an arc before being swallowed by a large tunnel protruding from the belly of a huge concrete block. Maybe it wasn’t made of concrete, but it was just as ugly and desolate.
The remaining sweepers lowered their shields over their bodies. The guy who followed me out did the same. Protocol or caution? “Walk,” he ordered.
The desert made the compound appear so barren, no Califax in sight. I glanced over my shoulder, more to check if I could see the city behind in the distance, but the sweeper must’ve thought I was checking him out. “Eyes front.”
The blue moon, yellow sun, and an expanse of golden sand to the horizon, the only interruption were a few rocky outcrops. Flat, unwelcoming, deadly. No one could survive out here, which was why the compound was here. This was the only sanctuary, an ominous, forbidding sanctuary. A hot wind raced across the desert and barreled along the platform like a diesel, bringing with it grit and the smell of newly baked ceramics. An unforgiving heat, a life-stripping heat.
“Where did they take my friends?”
“It’s not your place to ask questions,” the sweeper beside me replied.
“Is there somewhere else they take kids?” This earned me a shove in the back from the sweeper behind. I got the message.
The domed tunnel loomed, a dark gaping hole, coming to life the moment we neared. Giant panels overhead flicked on in succession, creating an upside-down runway effect.
A woman in a blue jumpsuit much like doctor scrubs walked toward us surrounded by a halo of shimmering light. She wore her hair in a tidy bun on the top of her head, which suited her pinched expression, as did her straight back and purposeful stride. Both communicated military-style competence and a lack of humor, and most likely a lack of compassion as well. Her critical eye swept the entirety of my body in a blink. Judging by her expression, she wasn’t impressed with what she saw.
“Has she been screened?” Even her austere tone matched her appearance.
“All data has been sent through.”
Her eyebrows were a thick black line drawn in an arch above her eyes. A tattoo marred the inside of her wrist. Grafted. Unlike the sweepers, she could not use her factional nature. The idea sent a tendril of tingles deep down inside, squelched immediately when I refocused on the ripple of faint light as it ran across her shield, the lesser sort of shield, one more easily penetrated. But I could not puncture her shield quick enough before the sweepers retaliated.
“Take her through.” Voice like a blade, it was as though she’d read my hastily scrambled then scrapped plan.
Her eyes settled on me as we passed, echoing disinterest, but the sort of disinterest that made someone apathetic to injustice. I held her gaze, but nothing new flickered behind her eyes. Maybe she didn’t even see me as a person.
When we entered the tunnel, I looked up at the ceiling high above us to the collection of piping and beams and God knows what else running its length. The harsh lighting heated the top of my head. Our boots smacked in stereo around the curved walls, a countdown to us reaching the other end. What would I have to do to bring all this down? Could I do it? And who would I sacrifice for my escape?
This was what it meant to be dangerous; all of a sudden, it became an attractive option. I could justify the end result, but it would still amount to the same thing. Worst of all, one day soon, I wasn’t going to be questioning myself on this issue, because the time of choices would be gone, replaced by the time for action.
The sweepers’ long strides swallowed the distance of the tunnel, and we stepped out into a cavernous room, so large a handful of trucks could maneuver in here with ease. The bright light reflected off the floor like glare from the sun, but it did nothing to disguise the deep gray of everything around me, a color to suck the fun from a soul.
The sw
eeper behind nudged me in the back with a hard point, which had to be his gun. All this looking meant I lost my pace, and that was his friendly reminder.
We continued across the cavern, heading for a small black panel at the far side. With the faint scrape behind, I turned my head. The sweeper blocked my view then nudged his weapon forward and took a step. I was forced to comply if I didn’t want him walking over me. I spun back and staggered forward through the open door, only to pull up short to stop myself from bumping into the sweeper in front.
The door behind us closed with a soft suction sound, locking me into the confines of a small gray space with six sweepers circling me, each facing inward. Destruction flared up with the sudden arc of adrenaline now lacing through my veins. I fisted my nails into my palms, looking for that pain, anything to steal my attention, harden the barracks. I couldn’t win this. Don’t even try. The gentle shift under my feet meant we were moving.
Shields up, weapons held to their chests, intimidation that worked. Destruction didn’t cower, which meant the fight against it became harder. My balance gently shifted again as we came to a halt. Behind me, the sudden wash of new air followed the noise of the door opening.
“Get out.”
If not for the energy ripple from their shields, my face would reflect in each of their helmets. My head reached the level of their chins. My eyes reached the level of their weapons. Cocooned within the circular wall, this should be intimidating. It would be if destruction obeyed. It didn’t. Instead, it formed its own wall, cutting me off from common sense, which would keep me alive.
Get out.
My feet wouldn’t listen, because they were no longer on my side. The sweeper in front butted me with his weapon, sudden and hard, to push me backward out the door. I saw his weapon coming with time enough to snap out both hands and latch onto its girth. The move was so sudden I succeeded in yanking it free. But he was a sweeper. I was surrounded by a wall of them, each trained like any battle-hardened soldier back home. The weapon was in my hands, but he reacted as fast, his fist colliding with my jaw. I reeled backward as the weapon was snatched from my hands. I fell and fell, nothing behind to stop me except the solid, cold surface of the floor. When it hit, the wind was punched out of my lungs.