"Are you sure you want to be the one controlling him?" Ras said.
"It has to be me," Selene answered. "I have to be the one to dispose of her." She walked behind Gideon. "And I'm going to use Gideon to do it.”
"Soldier," she yelled to a man just outside the training room door. "Get in here."
The soldier obediently walked to her, but Gideon saw fear in his eyes.
Selene moved Gideon into the center of the room and beckoned the soldier to follow. "Defend yourself."
Gideon's leg swung in a swift kick towards the soldier's head.
The soldier pushed it away.
Gideon saw his hand, balled into a fist, come back to punch the soldier in the face. He tried to stop himself, but felt the impact of his fist on the soldier's nose.
The soldier fell backward. Blood spilled from his nose.
Gideon closed the gap between them. Grabbing the soldier by his uniform, he threw him into the wall. Gideon saw the soldier's head crack against the wall before he slid unconscious to the ground. Gideon stood up straight, his hands to his sides.
Selene moved towards Gideon until she stood right beside him and released her mental hold.
Gideon immediately lunged at her. But as his hand wrapped around her neck, he felt the control device turn on and he was forced to his knees at the soldier's side. His eyes were locked on the crumpled solder's bleeding body.
"He needs help," Gideon wanted to call. "Someone, he needs a doctor." But he could no more talk than move. He heard soldiers enter the room and skid to a stop. Neither spoke, but their shallow and quick breathing told Gideon all he needed to know.
"Get him out of here," Selene said with an annoyed and disappointed voice.
Gideon couldn't move as the two new soldiers maneuvered around him to care for the unconscious man. Grabbing him by his arms they pulled him from the room.
Selene had turned off the device. He felt in control again. He turned to see Ras protectively by Selene's side. He stood and wiped the blood from his hands.
"You didn't need to do that to him," Gideon said. "He was your soldier, here to protect you."
"My soldier, here to do what I command. You would do well to learn from him."
Gideon shook his head at her. He wanted to run from her. Or to fight her. Instead, all he could do was glare at her and the vicious man who stood next to her.
"How does it feel to finally be doing what I say?" Selene asked.
"No one should be forced into anything. Least of all me."
"You could have acted on your own and you chose not to. You now have to do what I say when I say it. I control you. Literally." She adjusted the headband across her temples "Let's do it again. I want to make sure that when you kill Evangeline, it's done properly."
Gideon lunged towards his mother, ready to strangle her but only moved a fraction when he felt the device grab hold of his movements and he was forced to stop.
"Ras, you be the one to fight him this time, then you can tell me what I need to do to improve.”
Ras moved into a fighting stance in front of Gideon as Selene moved to the side of the room.
Selene made Gideon take a swing towards the huge man. His movements felt slow and jerky. As he hit Ras face, Gideon could feel his bones cracking. He wanted to cry out in pain. Instead, he listened as Ras told Selene how to readjust the swing then try again. He fought against each movement, though nothing he did could stop it. He was a prisoner inside his own body.
For hours he fought Ras. When he felt he couldn't possibly fight any longer, Selene invited her soldiers into the room. And he continued to fight them. She kept pushing him until he was sure he was going to collapse. But he never did. She wouldn't let him.
Selene laughed after one soldier got a very hard kick in the stomach. The rest of the soldiers were also moaning in pain.
"We should stop," Ras said.
"Very well," Selene said. "Turn it off."
Gideon's muscles relaxed. He fell to the ground, once again in control of himself. He covered his head with his arms. It pounded. His muscles hurt. His hand throbbed. "What are you doing to me?" Gideon asked.
"I told you that you'd be the one to kill her," Selene said. "I heard that she can fight, so I'm making sure I'm able to control you well enough that I can't lose. When we capture her, and I assure you that we will, we're going to make such a show that no one will want to defy me again."
"You will not capture her," Gideon said. "She is to smart for you.”
"She is not smart. She is nothing. She has only been successful because others have helped her. Toralei. Dorry. You. But now she has nothing. And nobody. She is all alone. She can't hide for long."
"She isn't alone," Gideon said. "She will never be alone."
Selene started laughing. "You and your idealistic way of thinking. Haven't you learned by now that no one defies me and gets away with it?" She handed the headband to Ras. "Take him to the crags. I'm done with him." Turning to Gideon, she continued, "You can walk on your own, or Ras will make you."
Ras put on the headband as if threatening him.
Gideon lifted his chin and looked at her defiantly. "I will never do anything for you willingly, mother," he said.
Selene looked like she was going to explode. She grabbed the headband from Ras and put it on.
The pain started instantly in his head. He had no control, and couldn't even cry out. His breathing labored, he felt like there was a clamp around his ribs, cutting off any type of air. His eyes started to blur. Selene's face was the last thing he saw before everything faded to black.
***
Gideon floated in and out of consciousness. In the background, he could hear someone calling out his name.
"Captain Merak."
He blinked. He was in a cell now. Not so much a cell as indentation of stone with bars on the only way in our out. A thin blanket lay to his side. His head pounded. He grabbed both sides of it and closed his eyes as tight as he could and forced everything back to unconsciousness.
"Keep trying," a familiar voice rasped before the man started coughing a deep and painful sounding cough.
"Captain Merak, wake up." It was the first voice again. He didn't want to answer it, but couldn't force himself back into the darkness of his unconscious mind. He opened his eyes slightly. Everything was shadowed in the dim light but it still made his head pound.
His throat felt dry. "Who's there?" he said, still clutching his head and squeezing his eyes shut again, trying to control the pain. The pounding in his head only surged as he spoke and he became acutely aware of how sore everywhere else felt. All his muscles felt like they'd been stretched and pulled and used in a way he'd never used them before.
"It's me. Recruit Corgy, sir," the voice replied then seemed to hesitate before adding, "And there are others here, too.”
Gideon peeled his eyes open and tried to focus without increasing his headache. He moved his eyes from side to side and concentrated on deciphering the images in the shadows. He focused his eyes. Outside his cell, he could see the dirty faces of recruits he'd once taught.
Their dirty faces looked at him from their own cells across the tunnel. Their own cells were scattered across the small cavern walls. No symmetry existed.
"You need to eat, Captain," Corgy said. His voice came from above and only then did Gideon realize Corgy must be in a cell above his own. "You missed the bot's bringing your food. They won't leave it unless you take it from them. I saved some of mine for you.”
"I'm in the crags," Gideon said.
Corgy cleared his throat. "Yes. But don't worry about that now, worry about eating."
Gideon saw a hand reaching down with a roll in it. He crawled to the bars and reached for it. "Thank you, Corgy." He took a bite. It was stale and hard to swallow. "How long have I been here?" he asked.
"It's hard to keep track of time, but you only missed the one meal," Corgy answered.
"Who is the voice I heard next to me?" Gideon said.
"He doesn't sound well."
The man next to him took a labored breath. "It's me, Gideon."
The words hit home so quickly that Gideon couldn't respond right away. The voice came from his childhood. The man who had been his greatest hero before he'd turned into his forever nightmare.
"Dad," Gideon said failing to keep the mixture of emotions from his voice. "What are you doing here? What's wrong with you?"
"Selene," he whispered. He was struggling to catch his breath.
"He was brought down here right after you escaped with Birdee," Corgy said. "He's been beaten. I think his ribs and lungs have been damaged, but no one has been here to care for him. It gets worse by the day."
"Stars," Gideon said. "We need to get him help."
"After what he's done, he deserves to be here," a voice said.
Gideon looked at where the voice came from. It took a moment for him to recognize the girl. But finally it came to him. Her name was Jenna. A quick learner, talented, and sharp-witted. But one of the most negative people he had ever encountered. If he remembered right, her father had been a member of the original resistance. She was a child of the resistance.
"It's true," Zeke said. "I do deserve to be here.”
"Maybe you do deserve to be here," Gideon said. "But you need help."
"Nobody helps those in the crags," Jenna said. "You of all people should know that, seeing how you left us last time you were here."
"They helped where they could Jenna," Corgy snapped. "Or have you forgotten that we get more food now?"
Jenna sneered and turned her back on them.
"You need to rest General," Corgy said. "The more you talk, the worse it gets. I can answer the Captain's questions.”
Gideon listened to his father's breathing as it evened out and became less stressed.
"He sleeps a lot," Corgy said. "It's better for him that way." Then he paused uncomfortably. "Was Lena captured, too?" he asked.
Gideon took another bite before answering. The bread wasn't flavorful, but he needed time to gather his thoughts before answering. "No, she wasn't with me when I was taken," he said. He wasn't sure he could call it taken, he was activated and came without a fight. He couldn't fight. He couldn't do anything.
"I figured you guys would have still been together. We all saw it when you were at the facility, how much you liked her that is. When you showed up here together to rescue Birdee, we were pretty shocked to see you. At the same time, it made sense that you'd still be working together."
"We were together for a while, but then I left with Thora," Gideon said.
"The servant, Thora?" Corgy said.
"She's not a servant," Gideon said defensively.
"Oh, sorry, I didn't know," Corgy said, still obviously confused about why the servant who worked in the facility wasn't a servant. Corgy cleared his throat again. "It's just that Lena said she'd contact us, and hasn't," he said. "Some of the recruits thought she must have been captured."
"She left you with a com device," Gideon said, suddenly remembering. When they rescued Birdee, Lena took a com device off of one of the guards. Giving it to Corgy, she had promised to get in contact with them. "Do you still have it?" Gideon asked. As he jumped to his feet, his sore muscles burned in protest.
"Yes, of course," Corgy said.
Gideon stretched his arms trying to ease the knots in his shoulders. "Let me see it," he said. "We can call her for help."
He heard Corgy shuffling around in the cell. "You can't use it, Captain," Corgy said. "The guards will hear whatever you say in their devices. We tried to use it after you had left and ended up being searched by the guards. It's a good thing our cells are riddled with pockets in the walls. I hid it inside one. I knew the guards wouldn't be able to see it even if they looked hard. There's not much to do here, so you get to know your cell pretty well." Corgy was rambling.
"Corgy, just get him the device," Jenna snapped.
"Oh, yeah right," Corgy said.
Gideon heard the shuffling of Corgy's feet across the rock. And then his dirty hand reached through the bars of his cell. Gideon took the com from him.
Gideon examined the device in both hands. It was small, about the size of his palm. It was the same type of com device that the Priestess used for all her soldiers. He knew it well. He tried prying open the back using his fingernails to slide between the grooves. When that didn't work, he put it on the floor and gently stepped on it.
"He's breaking it," Jenna called.
"I'm not breaking it," Gideon said. "I'm cracking the outside so that I can get into the inside of it." He heard a crack as the outer protective barrier started to break. Picking it up in his hand he used his fingernails again to slide between the cracked casing and broke a piece off. After that, it was easy to get inside the device.
He held it up to the dim lighting of the cell. It was hard to see the tiny pieces of the device, but after studying the insides for a few minutes, Gideon was fairly confident that he had found what he was looking for. A little gold dial was placed at the top of the com device. "I'm changing the frequency channel. Every radio has a frequency that lets you talk to others on the same frequency, if you know what you're looking for, you can change it."
"The Priestess has all the frequencies monitored," Jenna snapped. "You're not just going to be able to call your stupid little girlfriend."
Gideon glanced at her. "That's why we send a signal out that only someone really smart will be able to pick up," he said with a little bit of snark.
Satisfied that the frequency was where he wanted it, Gideon started tapping on the device. The same rhythm over and over.
"What are you doing?" Jenna said.
It seemed she didn't want to be happy with anything but she was curious about what was going on. It annoyed Gideon.
"It's an old language. One created on the original planet."
"It's morse code," his father rasped. He hadn't been sleeping at all. He'd been listening.
"A friend and I taught ourselves the language at the IMA. The Priestess' Defenses aren't trained in morse code."
"And Lena is?" Corgy asked.
"No," Gideon said. "But my friend Tarek knows it. And the Priestess isn't the only one who monitors all the channels. I'm hoping Evren will pick up the pattern on the com's he's monitoring. Tarek will know it's from me."
"It's not going to work," Jenna said. "Then you're going to get us all punished."
"Jenna, do you have any other ideas?" Corgy said, sounding annoyed. "The Captain at least knew what to do to get a message out without being caught. The least you could do is be quiet. Even if it doesn't work, at least he's doing something which is more than I can say for you."
Jenna huffed and walked back into the darkness of her cell.
Gideon heard some of the other recruits moving around too. Maybe the novelty of him being there was over and they went back to their normal routine of doing nothing all day. "It will work," Gideon said. "I just hope it works quickly."
He continued tapping the pattern. He slid to the ground and leaned his pounding head against the wall. He tapped until the pounding of his hand and his head became one. "It'll work, and then we'll be able to come up with a plan that can get all of us out of here."
"Gideon, you must hurry," Zeke said. "Selene's plan is falling into place. Soon she'll control everything."
The recruits who hadn't moved away from the front of the cells looked at him with a mix of hope and doubt.
"We're going to stop her," Gideon said. He may have been grasping at straws, but if this was the only straw he had, he was going to use it. Use it until he wore it out. He held tightly to the com device, tapping the pattern over and over and praying that the right people would hear it, and answer.
Chapter Eleven
Lena sat in the records room pouring over her father's letters. She had re-read these particular letters from her father to a man named Wildee Corvus at least a dozen times. Lena knew Wildee was Birdee's father from
her time researching children of resistance leaders when she was at the Defense Training Facility.
A knock came on the cave's wall. Lena looked up to see Birdee hobble inside. She was walking now or at least taking a step with her good leg and dragging her bad one to catch up.
"Where's Tern?" Lena said, not used to seeing Birdee without him by her side.
"I ditched him when he went to get me some food. I wanted ta see wha' I could do on my own. He won' have much trouble findin' where I'm at. My tracks are pretty distinctive."
Lena chuckled. "Have a seat, you're just the person I wanted to see."
Birdee pulled out a chair and fell into the seat.
Lena stood and pulled another chair for her leg to be propped up on. Since her knee was splinted straight she had a hard time sitting if it wasn't elevated.
"How are you feeling?"
"I'm good," Birdee said. "My ribs are still sore, and my leg is always a dull pain, but I'm alive thanks ta you."
"It's because of me this happened to you in the first place." Lena couldn't keep the guilt out of her voice.
"No, it's because of Selene," Birdee said forcefully. "It is Selene that is the one ta blame. Don't forget it. You are trying ta save us. You're trying ta change things." The jovial Birdee who always lifted Lena's spirits at the facility now wore a heavy look on her face like she'd seen too much for her happiness to handle. "What ya looking fer in here?" Birdee said, pulling herself closer to the table.
"That's actually what I wanted to talk to you about. As I was looking to see if could find more people, I came across this." Lena pushed the binder toward Birdee.
Birdee looked at the page then her head jerked up. "This is my father's handwritin'," she said, not hiding the shock in her voice.
"Yes. Did you know that my father had asked your people to help?" Lena asked.
The Mir Chronicles- The Complete Series Page 54