As the aircraft shifts back to its upright position, throwing all the chairs and operatives back onto the rug carpet in a haphazard manner, my chance at having the cube back is slim, but still a number slightly above zero. And anything is better than nothing.
I slam into the carpet, the pain burning in so many different places in my body that I’m not even sure if my head hits the rug first or if my ribs did. Either way, both hurt like hell.
“You son of a bitch,” Drew hisses, diving at me before he even regains his balance. I’m able to kick him while maintaining my aim at the operative in front of me. Then I push myself off the ground in one erratic motion. If it weren’t for my heart pumping so fast and the absurd amount of adrenaline rushing through me, it would be impossible for me to react that fast.
I’d be dead.
But with the stakes at hand, my body is operating at a level that it hasn’t hit before. The exhaustion has gone, my muscles feel limber and stronger than ever, and the pain has managed to be nothing more than a dull ache in the back of my mind.
When the high from this moment fades, I will crash. I won’t even be able to stand up. But until that comes, I feel like a machine. A machine tapping into the last energy reserves deep within my core, the desperation to survive bringing out both the best and worst in me.
If I die, this world dies with me.
Nothing is more motivating than that. Nothing is greater than the fear than knowing that if I lose, the Syndicate may win everything.
“Screw—” The moment I hear Drew’s voice right behind me, I take the liberty of jabbing the back of the gun into his face. The pain of that thing hitting into his teeth must be excruciating. Out of the corner of my eye I see blood squirt from his mouth, his eyes rolling back into his head as his consciousness almost escapes him.
If it were just me and Drew in this room, I would win easily. Not only do I have the slight upper hand in strength over him, but years of training in combat in virtual worlds have prepared me for almost anything in the real world.
It’s the dozen other people in this room, almost all of them standing up and pointing their guns at me, that will be the end of me. I have no chance at shooting all of them without me ending up dead first.
There’s only one way out of this.
I duck down and swivel the barrel of the rifle away from the operative right in front of me. As I anticipated, they fire a bullet in my direction right as I move my gun, but I duck out of the way in time. In the split second that I am exposed, I manage to lunge at Drew. He drops his shoulders and drives his head into me to attempt a takedown, but his move is sloppy, leaving his neck exposed for me to put him in another chokehold. But this time I don’t have to worry about restraining him with both my arms. As long as I have his neck in my grip, the rifle will do the rest of the talking.
“Let me go!” He bites into my left forearm, his teeth ripping apart my flesh and likely tearing a few of the ligaments in my wrist apart. That part of my body is already so fucked that I don’t even want to look at it and knock myself out of the zone I’m in.
The Chimera Cube can fix it later. The blood dripping out my thighs and wrists and making it difficult to grip the rifle is the least of my worries despite the fact that the burning sensation of having all my layers of skin ripped off only grows by the second.
“Do you see how it feels?” I smile, forcing his body into the same position that I had him in before. His torso shields most of my body from the gunfire, my head behind his, so that if any of the operatives decide to take their chances and shoot at me, they will be wiping out one of their bosses. If the council has any way to watch these events, there is no way that they will be able to react fast enough.
I have the upper hand.
Now, I just need to get Jake in here.
“If you even move, I will shoot you.” I jam the rifle into his temple, the heavy, long gun awkward to hold with one hand. For a hostage scenario like this, a pistol would be ideal, but beggars can’t be choosers when the future of humanity is on the line.
“If any of you shoot at me, if any of you even move forward, he dies.” My voice echoes off the walls, the harsh cadence as it rings in my ears sending chills coursing down my spine. I hover my finger over the trigger, letting it dance back and forth in the air just to tease everyone. We are at the front of the aircraft, the light from the holograph cutting through my body, my position as ideal as it gets.
All the operatives are now out of their precarious positions underneath the furniture. Most of their masks are slanted on their faces and the black robes they wear over the bullet-proof vests are ripped by the mass of furniture and items that spilled onto the wall. Ai’s body still remains motionless in one of the chairs, her black hair the only part of her body visible from underneath the chair that has toppled over.
Everyone remains silent at my words. They probably figure that eventually I will give up, that there is no way I can get out of this alive. But I have an idea that may be just crazy enough that it will work.
“If you don’t do exactly as I say, I will keep shooting your head until your body is nothing but bloody chunks,” I whisper into Drew’s ear, my eyes remaining locked on the operatives ahead. I keep my voice low so that the council has no way of hearing me through the microchip implanted in Drew’s neck. “Take your hologlasses out of your pocket and contact Jake.”
Drew remains motionless at my words, a series off high-pitched squeaks escaping from his throat as he gasps for air. “Are you deaf, or should I fire this rifle and see if you hear that?” I increase the tightness of my grip around his throat, a satisfying feeling coursing through me as he pulls out his hologlasses from his pocket with his arms shaking.
There’s something about this revenge thing that feels really shitty afterward, but unbelievable in the moment.
Nothing beats this rush of endorphins.
“Tell him that we fell behind because of some issues and that you want him to meet us on the ground,” I whisper as he projects the holograph on the device out in front of me and brings up Jake’s contact information. “That Jake needs to come inside and teach me a lesson.”
He quickly types something along those lines and sends it to Jake. The text he sends to him has a black font and green background, and as Jake starts to type back, his communication willed by the power of his thoughts alone, the message appears with a red background.
The words are all that matters. I don’t know whether to be happy or disgusted by his response.
Jake: I’ll teach that fucker a lesson any day. Wanna land in the clearing up in the forest?
Drew responds without me even having to direct him. He types one word: Yes.
Jake responds to that with nothing but an emoji of a demon face with large horns and an ugly beard. I never even knew Jake used that emoji—something tells me he picked that behavior up from the same guy whose butt is currently all up in my groin and whose body odor combined with the smell of alcohol infests my nostrils.
“Land this thing, now.” I move the barrel of the rifle from his temple to his cheek, my right arm starting to shake a bit from the energy I must exude to keep the rifle pointed at him. My other arm is completely numb after being bitten by Drew’s sharp, bloody teeth; my body totally unprepared to fight my next enemy.
But I must power through it anyways.
Drew obeys my command, knowing that no one on the council can save him from this. For once, I finally have the power. His life is in my hands after years of him trying to rip mine apart.
I can finally do the same thing to him.
My balance teeters a bit as the landing gear of the aircraft brings the plane to a soft landing onto the grass clearing in the middle of the pine forest. I have no idea what part of the world or what country we are in, but as I see the other identical Syndicate aircraft land right next to us, I know that I am in the one place in the world I am meant to be.
The Chimera Cube is so close to being mine again.
/> I nudge Drew to open the door as I pull us back to the far edge of the aircraft, making sure to maintain a careful grip on his body. As soon as the door opens, he starts to struggle and scream again.
But he’s too late to warn Jake about what awaits him inside. Jake walks up the ramp that leads inside the aircraft with the same black backpack with the hundreds of pages of patents inside slung around his shoulder. He is followed by members of the council that are wearing black robes with diamond chains over them. They likely commanded the Chimera Cube to produce billions of dollars of precious metals in their aircraft.
They have no idea that I am here to take their precious world-domination toy away from them. I focus my eyes on the one setting on the holographic control panel that will create the chaos I need to make the cube mine.
Then Jake enters the aircraft. At first, I am a bit self-conscious because I am practically naked, still wearing the same flimsy white cloth that I have been imprisoned in. The fact that my junk is hanging out quickly becomes the least of my worries. Jake walks in between two of the operatives, holding the cube up, a wicked smile on his face as he prepares to torture me with it.
It doesn’t take long for him to notice that something went wrong. For a split second we lock eyes, part of me hoping that I could see the Jake that I once knew and loved inside.
All I see is darkness.
It only makes it easier for me to let the monster inside me come roaring out.
Chapter 9
I turn off the lights.
At first that sounds like a pointless thing to do because the natural light of day will pour in through the windows, rendering my move useless. However, night shift mode on the aircraft causes a thin film of darkness to hang over the glass walls and for all the lights inside the aircraft to shut off.
I hit the setting to close the door to the plane immediately after I tap the night shift section of the holograph, swathing the room in darkness. I’m betting that two things happen in the next second. First, that all the operatives miss when they fire at me and fail to see me run through the darkness, and second, that Jake isn’t fast enough to form a force field around him before I can tackle him to the ground.
I push Drew’s body to the side and bound forward. Each millisecond that passes by both feels like a year and like it never happens as I initiate my last-ditch effort to consolidate the cube under my control. The operatives press down on the trigger as soon as the lights go out, one of the bullets connecting with my left foot while another one hits me in my right shoulder.
If it wasn’t for the adrenaline in my system and the fact that my mind is already numb to additional inputs of pain, I would collapse to the ground. But the monstrous force of my ambition keeps me upright as I jump over one of the leather chairs that is knocked on its side and prepare to make the Chimera Cube mine again. On the way down from my jump I stumble, my injured legs unable to propel my body far enough over the silhouette of the object.
I drop the rifle in the process, the gun only weighing me down as I dash towards Jake. Although I may regret not having it when I come face to face with him, I only have a handful of seconds until Drew recollects himself and turns back on the lights, which will lead to my painful and swift death.
I could have killed him first, but I know that every hundredth of a second I waste with the Chimera Cube in my hands, I may be losing my tiny window to get it back. I may lose my window to save the world.
In the second it takes me to erupt past Drew’s body and toward Jake, who stands at the end of the row of Syndicate operatives, another bullet connects with me, this time in my back. I feel a rush of blood wash over my brain as my consciousness fumbles between the darkness of the room and the permanent darkness that marks death.
The echo of the dozens of bullets that are shot at me make it impossible for me to hear if Jake has had the time to utter a command to the Chimera Cube, the low, white glow of the cube the only thing my eyes are focused on. In fact, the cube is the only object I am able to see amid the darkness that my pupils have far from adjusted to.
I close my eyes as I take one more step, almost within arm’s reach of the cube. I won’t find out until it’s too late if there is a force field surrounding him or not. I won’t find out if I messed up until my body has been thrown across the plane, the loss of blood and agony finally getting the best of me.
But as I enter the last few feet of space between me and Jake, I don’t feel any electric shock. He didn’t react fast enough. The shock of the chaotic scenery and sudden blackness give me the extra handful of seconds I needed to attack.
I grunt as I slam into him, dropping my shoulder into his chest and bending my knees to weaponize every muscle in my body to take him down. My only goal is to cause him as much pain as possible in the process so that he will never wish to hold the Chimera Cube again.
The initial takedown is effective. I channel the inner linebacker within me and manage to force his body to the carpeted floor without a problem. But he still holds on tight to the cube, the outline of his smile visible in the dull light that radiates off the cube.
He knows he has the upper hand. He knows that all he has to do is hold on to that cube for another second and the lights will be turned back on and every operative in sight will have a clear shot at me. He has no idea what I’m capable of.
He has no idea that underestimating me was a mistake, underestimating a desperate human hell-bent on revenge and survival is even a bigger mistake. That deadly combination of emotions allows me to push through the pain that has reduced the mobility of my limbs and overwhelm his grip on the cube. I wish it were as simple as ripping a piece of candy from a child, but the process of stealing the most powerful technology in the world from a man who betrayed everything in his life to make it his is a lot harder.
But I don’t give up. I put my right hand on top of the cube, and use my left arm to fend him off from hitting it away and say the one command that gives me a fighting chance at living.
“Five-foot force field.” I double-tap the cube immediately after I say the command, the green wave of light surging over the cube the moment that the lights are turned back on within the aircraft. The rifles continue to fire at me, this time their shots actually accurate, but it doesn’t matter.
The operatives are unable to break through the electric wall even if they tried for years. Their bullets do nothing more than ricochet off the force field in a messy array of sparks. My plan has worked. I outsmarted Jake, threatened the hell out of Drew, and now have the Chimera Cube at my fingertips.
But it’s far from over.
I have to get out here alive. I have to free Ai from her restraints. And this is the moment where any ideas I had about how to proceed stop. I thought I’d be dead by this point, and the fact that my willpower is still carrying me forward and that the muscles in my legs haven’t given out yet are two things that I didn’t expect.
“Just give up! Just stop trying to resist!” Jake hisses, spit flying from his mouth onto my face as he refuses to let go of his grip on the cube. We are both engaged in a messy battle for control of the cube, and the second one of us has a clear advantage, we can deliver a command that will end the other’s life.
Now, I finally see the determined expression on his face up close. A new side to Jake is out in full colors now, a side to Jake that he must have inherited from Drew. It’s a cold, arrogant side to him that wants nothing but power.
The Syndicate have brainwashed him into thinking that their vision for the future is the only one that matters. What he doesn’t realize is that they are going to use him the same way they used my father. And I want to save him from that.
“You don’t have to be doing this,” I say as he forces himself on top of me, our bodies rolling over on the floor like two kids fighting over who gets to use their favorite toy. “You know they are lying. You know that in the end you are gonna end up just the same as me.”
His expression is unmoving at my words, his grip
on the cube only tightening as he drives his knee into my thigh. I wince as the already flayed section of my thigh deals with yet another blow. Every section of my skin feels like it is being drowned in a pool of acid, an icy sensation overwhelming my lungs as the pain swathes every bit of my being. Even the highest level of endorphins rushing through me are staring to cave underneath the pressure of the agony.
I feel the darkness tugging at my eyelids, the loss of nutrients and blood from my system bringing me to the verge of implosion. The ringing in my ears doesn’t do anything to help my situation. With the gunfire continuing to hit the outside of the force field and Drew yelling at the number of other Syndicate operatives that have now entered the aircraft, my mind is overloaded with sensory information.
“I’ll never let myself become like you,” Jake says, nearly ripping the cube right from my hands as he jerks to the right. “I’ll never let myself be anything like James.”
He tries to tap one of his hands on top of the cube so that he can deliver it a command, likely to deconstruct the force field, but I hit his hand out of the way just in time. But he has the advantage. He towers above me, his flabby body doing all the work to keep me pinned to the ground. The open wounds on my hands lather the cube in a thin film of red blood, chunks of my skin rubbing off onto the white surface.
He knows that if he can hold me off for a few more minutes, I won’t have any life left in me to combat him. So I make my last move on him while I have the chance.
I take one of my hands off the cube, allowing him to easily rip it right from me, and punch him in the face. My motion is fast enough to catch him off guard, causing him to fall flat on his back with the cube on his stomach, the power of my punch instantly causing blood to drip out of his nose.
His eyes roll back into his head, any look of arrogance and pleasure dissipating from his eyes as his body shakes with rage. I jump on him while I have the chance. In the brief moment that he is knocked onto the ground next to me, I wrap my hands around his neck in an effort to choke him.
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