But the elevator also reminded me of a much more sobering thought: Zion. And the instant the limousine entered the darkness, the memories of the wondrous place flooded my mind, and every moment since then, I can’t erase the infectious smiles and children laughing from bringing tears to my eyes.
Just focus on what’s in front of you. Don’t think about the past.
My thoughts are essentially repression 101 at its finest, and focusing on what is ahead of me proves to be a bit easier when I am staring at one of the obscenest public shows of wealth in the world. The mansion itself is four stories tall, with a beautiful brick façade and large glass windows letting in the sun that shines right down the middle of the city street, causing bright rays to reflect off the neighboring skyscrapers onto the mansion.
Despite the cool temperature, being in the presence of such a magnificent structure fills my body with a familiar warmth and wonderment as my nose is tickled by the competing smells of peony and camellia that still manage to grow in bloom atop the hill.
Two men wearing bright red and white suits and holding rifles at their sides stand at the grand glass doors leading into the mansion. The burst of light that pours out from the inside of the mansion hits my eyes as music from a traditional Chinese orchestra echoes from inside the house, the sound so rich that it is impossible to tell whether it is coming from speakers or an actual orchestra inside.
“Dude, is this even real?” Jake squeezes my hand with excitement, which is pretty odd for us, but considering the situation, I go along with it.
“If it’s not real then we have a real problem.” I smile, the shock of this place not hitting me as hard as Jake. Although the imperial mansion is spectacular, it pales in comparison to the wonders of Zion, and even the gold fixtures that line the outside of the mansion are child’s play in the face of the red diamond hallway inside of Zion that led to the place where the Chimera Cube was held.
“I’ve seen a lot of shit in my life.” Jake walks forward, away from the limousine and towards the front doors of the mansion. From his tone, he sounds like a fifty-year-old man reflecting on the horrors of the war in Iraq. “All kinds of shit, but this is a new level for me.”
“Yeah, I agree.” I let my voice echo forward as I remain motionless, not eager at all to follow Jake inside. I already have had a few members of the imperial guard eye me suspiciously over the fact that I am wearing a backpack. The moment I step inside that palace, they are going to want to search me to make sure I don’t have any weapons.
I can’t let that happen.
The moment they find out that my bag has a finger scanner on it, and will only open if I allow it to, they will likely put me in a holding cell until I show them what’s inside. And once that happens… well, no, that can’t happen.
I can’t even go there.
I can’t go inside.
“Woah, c’mon, fella, let’s get this show on the road, I bet they are about to give us free food inside.” He turns to Noah, who laughs at how excited he sounds. “I mean the food in prison wasn’t bad, but I’d like some variety, you know.” Noah nods and Jake eagerly waves me forward as he follows Noah in stride across the stone pathway. After just coming out of prison and being exposed to this lavish of an environment, he is experiencing culture shock.
Meanwhile, I probably look insane as I stare at the mansion unmoving with sweat forming on my forehead and my heart palpitating intensely in my chest. My body is kicking into survival mode, and for my instincts, that only means one thing: run.
“Sam, wake up!” Noah yells, more jokingly than anything. Everyone seems to be in a great mood. Jake is still amidst the initial high of leaving prison, all the troubles we will have to face ahead of us and the fact that the Syndicate is still tracking him nothing more than a hushed whisper at the back of his mind. Not to mention, Noah likely scored some serious brownie points with the Chinese government by allowing us to arrive here all safe and sound.
And then there’s me, casually losing my mind.
“I feel sick, guys,” I call out, putting a hand on my forehead. I know enough to realize that the chances of me running off this hill without getting caught are slim. And the chance of me actually surviving the nearly vertical drop off the rocky hill down to the city streets below is basically none. I need to find a way to get the hell out of here or hide this bag before the wrong person sees it.
“I’m sure there’s a resident doctor who can treat you inside.” Noah stops in his tracks and meets my gaze. He is not the kind of man who likes to share what he is thinking, but his narrowed eyes say all I need to know.
He has noticed my awkward fidgeting and my constant attempts to make sure my backpack is glued to me. He knows there is something I am not telling him, something that I have to hide.
And he won’t let me get away with it.
My first thought is to run away and pretend like I am throwing up into one of the bushes and leave the backpack there only to retrieve it later when our meeting with the president is done.
I rule that bright idea out instantly upon noticing the array of security cameras around the outside of the compound. A randomly dropped bag will trigger suspicion of a bomb, which will send me right back in the place I don’t want to be.
“Just come inside, it’s gonna be amazing in there.” Jake grins, his tone teasing me a bit. Part of him is getting a bit of joy at watching me pretend to struggle. “If you are having a headache again, the mansion will make you forget about it.”
“All right, fine.” I surrender to his constant pressing. I walk forward, the weight of the Chimera Cube in my backpack straining my lower back, not to mention the laser gun and flashlight that are inside as well.
Having top-secret technologies inside a backpack is something new for me, though. And the anxiety of knowing that anyone could steal it from me at any second is crippling.
“I know Li is very excited to see you guys,” Noah says, smiling as I catch up to them both. The guards outside the door nod at us as we walk inside, and I sigh as the warm, crisp air indoors hits my body, causing my cold, closed-up pores to expand.
Immediately upon walking inside, I feel a wave of red light pass over my body. I look up and see that there is a scanner built into the doorway, a scanner that detects weapons, and other objects that are not permitted in the imperial palace.
I can’t imagine that the Chimera Cube and turquoise laser gun my dad put in my backpack made out of some sturdy synthetic material is allowed in.
Well, this sucks for me.
“Stay there.” A man wearing an identical red and white suit to the two guards outside the door narrows his eyes. An entire group of imperial guards stare at me menacingly, their guns all locked and loaded and ready to be fired upon me at a moment’s notice.
I freeze in place along with Jake and Noah, it taking every ounce of strength inside me to combat my natural instinct to run away.
If I run away, they will tackle me. I’m trapped.
I let my eyes wander to the massive chandelier in the opening hall of the mansion. The chandelier is covered in different-colored gemstones and a has a thin diamond-encrusted metal rod holding it up to the ceiling. One tiny earthquake is all it would take to send the heavy structure toppling to the floor, destroying millions of dollars.
The scanner above my head beeps again and I gulp. The red light disappears, its heat fading from my skin as I await my fate.
I’ll run, and then I will find a spot where I can unleash the power of the Chimera Cube to kill them all.
I smile back at them confidently, the melody of the strings plucking away soothing my ears. Soon, this entire mansion will erupt into chaos. The marble floors will be covered in blood, the brick walls will be chipped with gunfire, and the sweet aroma in the air will be replaced by that of death.
“You may proceed forward,” a robotic voice echoes in my ear, this time seeming to come from the same speakers in the house that the music is echoing out of.
The three of us step forward out of the doorway and onto the marble floor tile, and in the same instant the music blasting over the speaker crescendoes.
I’m such an idiot.
Now I realize that they were never going to search my bag. Instead they scanned it and have some sort of machine learning program analyze it, and of course it didn’t pick up on the Chimera Cube—whatever atoms compose it are probably not even on the machine’s radar for a list of unaccepted materials. And as for the laser gun, I will write that one off as the artificial intelligence not being intelligent enough (the irony, I know) or maybe it was luck.
Either way, I worried all for nothing.
I breathe a sigh of relief, whilst at the same time letting my own self-deprecating thoughts scream in my mind. I should know better by now than to get worked up over nothing.
I only have so much energy in a day, and wasting it on things that don’t require it may mean I have nothing left when it comes to the moments when my own survival is at stake.
But when I connect with the Chinese president, who walks down the red porcelain staircase at the center of the entrance hall, the circle fuck taking place in my mind stops.
A huge Chinese flag drops down from the ceiling right in front of the chandelier. The sound the fabric makes when it falls from a compartment next to the skylight dozens of feet above startles me. The flag itself contains hundreds of square feet of fabric, and due to the way in which it is oriented, the five yellow stars on the red flag are positioned a few feet above our heads.
Noah nods at the president, who in reality is an emperor, as he steps down to the bottom of the staircase. Everyone in the room seems to be more rigid in this man’s presence, and even the group of Chinese diplomats positioned around a grand dining room table off the entrance hallway seem to hold their breath as he walks by.
I don’t dare say a word.
Not out of fear or surprise, but out of respect of the heavenly aura that this man seems to be surrounded in. When he approaches the bottom of the staircase, the imperial guards part ways at the bottom, holding their rifles straight up in the air in what must be a scripted ritual.
The president is wearing a suit, no different from the thousands I have seen American businessman and politicians wear. He has black hair, dark brown eyes, and a chilling smile that reveals his crooked teeth and rigid jawline. His small forehead and short, yet extremely buff body make him look like an action figure that is perfectly sculpted for destruction.
His eyes analyze every part of me. And I only know this because I can feel his stare picking apart my clothes, the same hoodie and sweatpants that I used to break Jake out of prison. It’s been such a busy day that Noah hasn’t had time to change either, and my body is running on fumes to try and keep pumping forward each second.
I don’t have patience for whatever game this man is playing. Not after being wired for over twenty-four hours straight, the trauma, anxiety, and adrenaline making it impossible for my heart rate to even come down to a stable level.
I open my mouth, a faint squeal escaping from my throat as I try to say hello. In the tension of the moment, I don’t even recognize that the music stopped playing. All I can feel is his will driving into me.
Then the moment fades away so fast that I look around, questioning if it really happened or whether my lack of sleep is leading me to hallucinate. The music booms out of the speakers again, and the president continues to walk forward, the dramatic procession continuing as if he didn’t stop to stare at me for a solid five seconds.
We all remain unmoving as he comes within a few feet of us. The guards finally close the doors behind us, the honor of being formally welcomed into the mansion now officially upon us. The sounds of the car horns and hundreds of thousands of people roaming the city streets dissipate in an instant, leaving my mind entranced by the new world we enter. A world where instead of the dark shadows of the skyscrapers and smog from the pollution looming over every waking moment, light and warmth radiate everywhere.
“It is a pleasure to meet you, Samuel.” The president speaks into a device around his neck in Mandarin, but the words are seamlessly translated into English for me to understand.
I shake his hand back, not knowing what to do or what else to say except appear to be thankful. This man is one of the most powerful, if not the most powerful politician in the world.
But when I shake his hand, I feel like an equal.
I feel like one day, this entire palace will be mine.
He introduces himself to Jake, delivering him the same soft handshake that he greeted me with. Then he turns to face the flag behind him and the procession of people approaching us from either end of the hallway, all with food and drink in their hands.
“Both of you, go enjoy yourselves. Try and forget about everything that has happened recently.” He smiles. I’m still adjusting to hearing him whisper in Mandarin, only for his words to be translated into perfect, unbroken English milliseconds later. “The only thing that matters here is the Party. And soon that will be the only thing that matters in the entire world.”
A gorgeous woman appears right in front of me as the president steps backward. Only when she hands me a drink does the thought cross my mind that he never told us his name. He doesn’t even have to introduce himself, just his presence serves that purpose fine for him. Everyone already knows he is President Li.
“Try it.” The woman giggles, her smooth, beautiful skin and lips calling out for me to kiss her. She seems like just the person who can fill the gaping hole in my heart now—hell, everyone here does.
I can’t find it in me to say no to her, even though the liquid is clear as water and has an unfamiliar grainy smell. When it hits my throat, I know it’s some form of liquor, and it is then when I try to hold back my discomfort by tensing up my facial muscles, which only makes my displeasure look that much more contorted.
I am too tired to care, though.
Even with the dozen women who appear out of nowhere, and seem to be in their early twenties, all of them having a flirtatious energy radiate off them, all I can think about is survival.
The girl in front of me runs a hand through her thick black hair, her breasts protruding through her dress and bouncing up and down as she laughs at my expression. She is so close to me, tantalizingly close, that part of me wants to let her climb all over me.
“It’s baijiu,” she says, her hot breath whispering into my ear.
I nod, taking another swig of the drink because that’s what she seems to want me to do, along with the group of girls who are gathered around me, appearing to be my personal hype squad. I have no idea what drink she is talking about, but the excitement springing inside me is quickly winning out against the adrenaline.
I don’t even want to be with someone. I can’t even stand the idea of being with another person after the Syndicate killed Riva. I can’t let my mind get distracted, not when I have the most powerful technology in human history on my back.
But the desire of my own mind to escape is too great.
Everything from the last few weeks comes back to me. The pain, the torture, the desperation, and the loss. The fantastical visions of Zion flood my mind, along with the horrific explosion of the truck filled with battery acid. I remember Reno’s protective bark, Riva’s cute smile, and my dad’s firm hand on my shoulder, all of the things that I never appreciated enough in the moment that I will never get back.
I think about all the pain they went through, all the hell that the Syndicate has caused this world starting with my mother and going to all the fourteen million people who died in the genocide that is The Last Migration.
I drop the glass on the floor.
The girl standing near me steps back as the circular glass shatters into thousands of pieces upon impact with the marble.
Everything I have been trying to suppress hits my mind with the coming wave of exhaustion. Every memory and every ounce of pain that I never wanted to feel comes back.
&nb
sp; Tears pour out of my eyes as my brain begins to enter a state that I am acutely familiar with, but never wanted to go back to.
I’m having a mental breakdown.
And the only thing I can think about is that my dad never got to escape the truth, and it eventually killed him.
And it’s going to kill me too.
Chapter 3
I’m not a fun person.
I never thought I was. I was never the one to party, never the one to go out with friends (well, that’s mainly because I would have to have friends to go out with), and was never the one to do anything spontaneous.
I know, I sound like a terrible person to be around.
That’s far from the truth. I’m a decent guy most of the time (key word is most), I do my best to be there for those around me, but I always manage to get caught in my desire.
Mainly my intrinsic need to win, or more accurately put: to destroy.
Except there are moments in life when we want to escape, when taking one’s mind off a problem seems like the only solution to it. The second I saw those beautiful women, who are some of the top Chinese models, I caved into that desire to escape.
But sometimes the moments we try and get away bring us closer to our reality than we ever intended.
And it was in that moment when I lost it.
I mean I completely tossed away all rules of normal social behavior, the emotions too heavy for my mind to function correctly. I cried, the tears spilling out of my eyes with more intensity than they have in years, and my breaths becoming short and sporadic as my body entered a state of hyperventilation.
The strong man I have presented to the world crumbled in an instant, and all the horrors washed over me, making me question my own existence on this earth.
This voice, this terrible, despicable voice that is nothing more than a manifestation of the pain inside me, begged me to give in to it. It pleaded with me that there is an easy way to end this, a way in which I don’t have to worry about governments and secret organizations killing me, or deal with the guilt knowing that I could have done more to try and stop them from murdering those that I love.
The Conspiracy Chronicles Boxset 2 Page 2