|SLATE| RETRIBUTION

by Emery Hale

  I froze, turned back slowly, my eyes returning to the burning wall. What was better to look at? A wall of corpses or two people bleeding out either side of me? Would Grace die? Was Chris already dead?

  That was when my mind came back to the conversation at hand.

  ‘Now, preferably, or I’ll just have to shoot Grace. She is the Medical Response isn’t she? Be a shame to waste such talent.’

  I didn’t move a muscle, I couldn’t risk it. I had to stay alive.

  As my chest moved in and out more slowly, I focused on my breathing. I wasn’t any use to the team if I was freaking out.

  ‘Oh, I don’t think they’ll be bothering us anytime soon,’ Gabriel said snidely. ‘No really, they won’t. You see I had access to this so-called mission, in fact I was the one who assigned it to your dear brother. After your little incident, I knew he’d give it to you.’

  So it was true – Jessica’s brother worked for Trojan? Lily was right? No, I couldn’t believe it, not until I saw proof. That would mean Jessica had to have known about it, they were close after all. She would have told me if her brother consorted with terrorists, right?

  As Jessica talked in my ear and Gabriel responded it all became background noise. Was everything I knew about her family a lie? Did she have connections with Russia? Had Jessica been working for Trojan this whole time? Lily said she was already trained when she got to the Academy: why go someplace to train if you’ve already covered most of it? Everything seemed to be clicking into place – Jessica, what have you done?

  ‘Answer me this then. Willow’s death, was it just an accident?’

  ‘Of course it was.’ Jessica’s ominous figure slowly crept into my line of vision but it wasn’t like a phoenix rising from the ashes, it was a like a demon who walked amongst the flames.

  ‘Who shot her?’ Gabriel asked. ‘It certainly wasn’t us.’

  ‘It had to be.’

  ‘As far as I know, Willow’s father needed her out of the way but I imagine the request wasn’t perceived as literal. He’s high up within the Academy, you see. Didn’t need daughter dearest causing a fuss or exposing him for what he really was. Shame, I heard she had a bright future.’

  So Willow’s death was the Academy’s doing? What had she known that warranted her death? They killed if someone spoke out, they killed if someone knew too much. What secrets did she take to her grave?

  ‘Oh I’m sorry, you didn’t know?’ Gabriel mocked, turning to the wall. ‘That, however, was my idea.’

  Tears burned down my face, evaporating instantly from the heat. How could I trust Jessica? All this time I’d been building her up as a hero, when it was clear she was anything but.

  ‘Better than some bomb, I quite like this town,’ he muttered.

  I wanted to cry, I needed my mum.

  ‘Now I need you to send a little message, Katie, you’re the Carrier after all.’ Gabriel said to me. I shook my head, a small sob slipping out, but he didn’t care. ‘I need you to tell Harkness that Operation Black Scorpion is to be left alone, or no one will survive.’

  Black Scorpion, I’d heard that before, hadn’t Helen mentioned that? How big was this mission?

  ‘Please,’ I begged him.

  ‘Katie,’ he said, ‘be my little bird, deliver the message.’

  Suddenly helicopter blades thundered from above my head, was that the rescue team?

  ‘Ah that’ll be the press – I look forward to whatever spin Thompson runs about this,’ Gabriel muttered.

  Then with a snap of his fingers, the cold barrel of the gun left my head and the endless army disappeared from sight. I wanted to fall forward, curl into a ball, but I remained solid. The fear of the gun still rang in my mind, my nails digging into my palms, my body completely numb, weightless.

  ‘Have fun,’ Gabriel called as he walked away, ‘while you can.’

  Warm hands took mine but I didn’t look, it was her.

  ‘Naomi, we need to get out of here before anyone sees us,’ Jessica said as she pulled me up, but my eyes only gazed at the wall.

  This was who Trojan were: murderers, psychopaths, who only wrecked people’s lives because they wanted to, and Jessica was one of them.

  ‘Look at me.’ I tried to pull away, but Jessica’s hands cupped my face, forcing me to look at her. ‘We need to go – you know the exit route, it’s near here. You lead the way with Lily, I’ll get Grace.’

  Then like a saint, she ran over to Grace, slowly helping her up. I watched as she carefully threw Grace’s body onto her shoulder in a fireman’s lift. I then realised Kayson was doing the same with Chris.

  Two wounded, possibly on the edge of death.

  I turned and took the lead with Lily who rubbed at her wrists. Soon we picked up the pace to a slow jog as the sound of helicopters and cars became louder, slicing through the silence of the trees we clung to. The jog became a sprint as we headed into a dense forest, the exit path covered well enough that we could get back to the vehicles unnoticed. But if that was so secure, why did I feel like what just happened meant the whole world would be watching?

  CHAPTER 25

  Nighted

  Overtaken by night or darkness.

  NAOMI JADE

  The kitchen, equipped with a dining table, chairs, two pastry cookbooks and a knife with remnants of butter and toast crumbs. The dorm house was meant to be a sanctuary but instead it felt like a prison block. Grace and Chris were in the hospital ward while Jessica, Lily and Kayson were going over what happened with Quinn. I could hear them yelling from the next room but I didn’t care to listen. I’d done my job, not much I could do now.

  Blood stained my shoes and ankles, sinking into the cracks and lines of my shaking hands – how could anyone do this? What I’d seen was horrific, disgusting and cruel, and by evening it would be plastered all over the news.

  If Thompson had control of the press and sway over the public, what story would he spin to cover this? In my mind there was no doubt, terrorists walked amongst us. If Gabriel was just the messenger then he must have superiors. We just had to figure out who.

  When my mum got the footage from the lapel camera she could go to print – an inside video of the man himself. It was proof that terrorists existed and wanted to wreak havoc. No, not wanted – they needed to. Today showed how far they were willing to go; human life didn’t come into it. On the ride back I was filled in by Jess on what she and Grace had found. Inhumane didn’t begin cover it.

  The door to the kitchen opened and I found that I pulled myself straighter as Jessica walked in – however, she wore a soft, honest smile. I didn’t know what to make of her: there was part of me that didn’t trust her but the other part, my heart, told me I should. Jess sat across from me at the table but she was cautious, as though approaching a scared animal.

  ‘So, Katie,’ she joked pushing hair behind her ear. ‘I’m glad you didn’t use your own name. If someone were to go after her, I don’t think I’d be too bothered.’

  ‘Jess!’ I said, horrified. I knew Katie wasn’t the best person but that was no reason to wish death on the girl.

  ‘Oh, relax,’ Jess said. ‘It was a joke, miss serious.’ How could she be so happy after what happened? We were at the same place right? You know, with the wall of burning people. ‘Now I know this was a one-time thing but given the situation, I think you did quite well.’

  ‘What do I get, a report card?’ I snarked, my eyes falling to the table. I couldn’t look at her.

  I wanted to ask her about Trojan, I needed to know if what Lily told me was true.

  ‘No, what’s up with you?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know Jess, probably the hundreds of deaths we just witnessed, maybe it was Grace and your so-called boyfriend bleeding out either side of me, or you know what? It could have been the gun Gabriel put to my head.’

  Jessica sighed, reaching for my hand but I snatched it back. ‘No, you don’t get to do that.’

  Jessica pulled back herself.

/>   ‘Naomi, it’s me.’

  ‘Is it though?’ I asked. ‘Is it really? How do you know Gabriel?’

  She stuttered. ‘He works in the Government.’

  ‘So you know all the MPs?’

  ‘No, he uh – he worked with my mum for a couple years but I’ve never personally spoken to him.’

  I scoffed – of course she would deny it. Like she would tell me anything. I’d need the whole team in here to get the truth out of her.

  ‘Stop lying to me,’ I said. The lie was clear and I knew she was holding something back.

  ‘I’m not lying,’ Jess said adamantly, but I only shook my head and leaned back in the chair.

  ‘Your brother sent us there, he was the one at Thames House meant to be in control. Next thing we know our comms are knocked out and I get a stupid message to tell Harkness!’ Now it was coming out, I couldn’t hold it back anymore. ‘So, I beg you, tell me everything.’

  ‘What are you talking about?’ she asked, like I was the insane one.

  ‘You – what the hell are you really doing at the Academy?’

  ‘My mother enrolled me.’

  ‘Really? See, I find that odd, cause if you trained with the so-called Pyramid Delegates all your life, I don’t see why you had to come here, unless there was another reason.’

  Jessica let out a righteous laugh. ‘I’m sorry, you think I’m a double agent?’

  ‘Well you’re not making sense!’ I exclaimed. ‘You tell me one thing but Lily another!’

  ‘Lily doesn’t know what she’s talking about,’ Jessica told me. ‘She thinks that everyone’s a double agent.’

  ‘Jess, seriously.

  ‘There’s nothing to tell.’

  ‘Stop lying to me!’ I slammed my hands on the table. ‘For once in your life tell me the truth!’

  Jessica looked utterly stunned, her mouth gaping like a fish out of water, but no answers came, not one fucking syllable. There we had it, ladies and gentlemen, Jessica-Grace Winters, blessed with many miraculous skills but incapable of telling the truth.

  Then something changed: her body language, then her face, and finally her eyes, became softer. Jessica’s eyes flitted down to the table and she picked at her nails.

  She bit her lip and took in a breath, and as she spoke, she didn’t look at me once.

  ‘I was trained with the Pyramid Delegates from a young age,’ she said. ‘My mother wanted me there, my older brothers didn’t.’

  ‘Why are you at the Academy?’ I asked.

  ‘My mother did enrol me, there isn’t another reason. Just somewhere to put me while she got on with her life.’

  Was this the truth? Or could it just be one lie after another? I felt sorry for her, no mother should act the way Charlotte did, but there was something about the whole story that didn’t make sense.

  ‘Who are the Pyramid Delegates?’ I asked.

  Everyone was talking about them, how they’d been infiltrated for years, but I hadn’t a clue who they were or what they did. Jessica hesitated, like she was trying to think of a way to worm out of the question.

  Surprisingly though, she answered me.

  ‘They are a separate agency within the Scottish Parliament, they provide training for agents with vulnerable children. My mother put me there when I was five, all the way through to when I met you. Then she enrolled me here and I left. No one knows about the Pyramid Delegates, not unless you have background in the services.’

  I held up a hand.

  ‘Wait, so let me get this straight, the Pyramid Delegates train children and then palm them off here when they’re old enough?’

  Jessica nodded. ‘If you want to look at like that, then yeah. I don’t know who runs it, before you ask – I had a teacher but she gave a fake name and I can’t remember what she looked like.’

  What was this country creating? Jessica was nearly nineteen now, whatever they’d done would be cemented into her bones. Had Lily been through the same thing? What about Quinn or Grace? I know we needed people to stop Trojan, but kids? How was that fair?

  I went to Jessica’s house once – even as I think back everything about it was fake. The house was big but not grand, the style inside minimalistic, although now I saw it as practically empty. It must have been a safe house like in the movies. Wouldn’t taking me there have been a breach of security? Did she trust me that much?

  ‘I’m not the bad guy here.’ Jessica sat a little straighter in her seat. ‘I’m not a double agent. Everyone around here just loves to jump to conclusions.’

  ‘You say that like it’s our fault for assuming,’ I countered, my eyebrows furrowed.

  ‘Well . . .’ she trailed off, blowing out a breath.

  That was it, if she was going to get cocky then I was finished with her stupid Team Lead persona.

  ‘Did you kill your brother Charlie? Sorry not kill, murder.’

  ‘You taking the piss?’ Jessica asked, bolting up from her seat.

  I nearly shrunk back – the glare on her face was the one that could challenge Harkness – but I stayed still. She wasn’t the one in power here, not anymore. I stood up firmly from the table, arms crossed and face blank.

  ‘Did you murder Charlie?’

  ‘Fuck off Naomi, I can’t believe you’d even ask me that!’

  ‘Tell me the truth.’

  ‘You’re a bitch.’ she said, but the name didn’t hurt me. ‘My own brother and you think I killed him?’

  ‘You might have had your reasons, I never met him. I just want you tell me the truth.’

  ‘Get out,’ she demanded, but I didn’t stop.

  ‘Tell me the truth, that’s all I want.’

  ‘You have no idea what you’re talking about!’ she screamed.

  ‘Then tell me!’

  Jessica stayed quiet after that. She couldn’t push me away anymore, there was no going back. The entire house sounded like it had come to a complete standstill, the voices from the other room turning to whispers.

  ‘I want you in a car and out of here before seven o’clock tomorrow,’ Jessica said, her voice low, almost like a growl.

  ‘You’ve got to be kidding me,’ I said, exasperated. ‘Jessica, I’m not going anywhere.’

  I felt like I was on an endless merry-go-round, we kept going over the same issues time and time again.

  ‘Yes you are. Like you said, you had a gun to your head, you don’t have the stomach for this. You’re not made for this world, understandably.’

  ‘Don’t make this about me, you’re the one with the issues here.’

  ‘Me?’ she asked. ‘I didn’t stand about like Katie’s pet for years, I didn’t become an inferior human being with no social life. The only reason Kayson met you was because I told him to.’

  Jessica didn’t look at me, but I knew what lay behind that stone cold façade of hers: anger. She was angry at me for pushing one too many of her buttons, but it only made me want to dig deeper.

  ‘I’m sorry, you take drugs even though you don’t know what they do to you, you’re repressing your emotions and basically live oppressed. Don’t talk to me like you have some higher power.’

  ‘I don’t run at the first sign of trouble,’ she snapped. ‘Quinn told me what you said to her, you were ready to run out that door.’

  ‘But I didn’t.’

  ‘You wanted to, though.’ Jessica turned around to face me, trying to calculate my next move. ‘All you want is security – well I apologise, but not all of us have that life. Some of us actually have to fight for it. I fought for you that night in the theatre, you wouldn’t be here without me.’

  ‘You pranced around a stage!’ I shouted. ‘You didn’t do anything!’

  Jessica scoffed but she didn’t reply, she just turned away and stared into the sink.

  She was impossible to talk to, how did anyone get a straight answer out of her? Oh wait, that’s right, they didn’t. In high school she wasn’t like this, she was confident, always smiled and had tha
t air of sophistication, but now I knew better. She was a murderer.

  ‘I want you out by seven o’clock tomorrow,’ Jessica repeated.

  Oh, if she thought I was going down without a fight, she had another think coming.

  ‘You know what?’ I said, ‘I’m gonna take James’s laptop with me.’

  I headed for the door but within the blink of an eye Jessica was in front of me, blocking the path. I smirked.

  ‘Evidence.’ I tried to move around her but she just followed me. ‘What?’

  ‘You’re not taking the laptop.’

  ‘Why?’ I asked. ‘Cause it has your dead brother’s name on it? I’m sure that’ll make for a great read on the train home.’

  ‘You’re not taking it,’ she told me.

  ‘Yes I am.’ I took in a breath before standing toe to toe with her. I was the one in control here, not her. ‘You scared, Winters?’

  If she wanted to play at this game so could I.

  ‘Of what?’ she asked. ‘You?’

  ‘Of what I’ll find on that laptop. There’s always three sides to a story, and in this case it’s mine, yours and the truth. Get out of my way.’

  I tried to barge past her but that was when she grabbed my wrist with an iron force that made me halt. I slowly turned my head but she didn’t show any sign of letting go.

  ‘Kayson will escort you to get your things from Quinn’s room. Then, you’re gone.’

  ‘I’m not leaving.’

  ‘I will drag you,’ she threatened.

  Then I laughed.

  ‘Do it.’ I challenged without thinking.

  When I tried to take my wrist back she used the momentum against me, spinning my body around and pinning me to the wall. I sucked in a breath as my head smacked against the cold concrete and a sharp pain shot through my arm, but I didn’t give her the satisfaction of a cry.

  Lily was right, she was too far gone.

  ‘You will leave. All the videos are stored here, the camera phone is in Quinn’s drawer, and I will decide what we do with them. Not you. I don’t ever want to see you again. Quinn can mail your things back to you,’ she growled in my ear. ‘Now get out.’