Abandon (7 page)

But I couldn’t tear my eyes from the two men seated at the silver counter: Regional Director Van Hightower and the General Director of the Association himself, Ian Darke.

Vi had to leave, now. I glanced at her, silently pleading with her to turn and return to River, to Rise Twelve, to safety. She spared me a half-second glance before returning her attention to her father.

“Ah, Jag Barque,” Ian Darke said, drawing my attention from Vi. Everything blurred along the edges, the same way it had when I found myself in that impossible situation in the Goodgrounds almost a year ago. Then, there had been so many voices. So many tasers. So many green robes. I’d managed some major speaking damage—until They silenced me.

Now, only Van and Ian stood before me, but I felt just as unsettled, especially with Vi still here.

Darke smiled and threw his arms wide, as if welcoming me home after a long absence. “So glad you could join us.”

I didn’t know how much time we had, but I knew it wasn’t long. Maybe not even minutes. Could I speak, though?
Nope. I just stood there, staring at him. Thinking,
So this is who I’ve been fighting for years.

I mean, I’ve always known it was Ian Darke. His profile in the Resistance is legendary. He’s powerful—and power hungry. His file is rivaled only by Van Hightower’s. If possible, he’s even hungrier for control, and rumor is he’d do anything to unseat the General.

“Hello, Ian,” I finally said. Around us, the images on the walls began to wash into grays.

“Jag,” Ian said, his voice scraping against my eardrums. “No cache, I see.” He
tsk
ed, as if I were a naughty boy who’d taken his feed out early.

“We just want Thane and Raine,” I said. “No one gets hurt.”

Van’s laugh was maniacal. It echoed off the silver in the cavernous room and actually made Vi whimper. Zenn squeezed her arm, then quickly set to work helping a very weak Raine onto one of the spare hoverboards.

Please go
, I begged Vi again, but she didn’t look at me.

“Take them,” Ian said, waving his hand dismissively. “We got what we wanted.”

What? Or who?
I thought, my hands tightening into fists. A distant, barely audible pinging echoed in my head. Thane’s drain couldn’t have been completed; we hadn’t been late.

“Everything you wanted?” I asked, molding my voice into
coolness. If I could keep Van and Ian talking long enough, maybe the no-one-getting-hurt thing would actually happen.

“Except you,” Ian said.

You, you, you
, echoed in my mind. I forced him out, the anger burning through my body with enormous heat. I took a breath to quench the fire inside.

“How’d you get in my building?” Van asked.

“Your city is not as secure as you think it is.” I’d deliberately left River and her team down in the lobby. No need to compromise their identities if I didn’t have to.

Van’s eyes narrowed. His chest rose in self-importance. “I’ve destroyed all the Insider hideouts.”

I crossed my arms and shrugged with one shoulder. “That you know of.”

Rage transfigured his features, and I took a step backward at the change in him.

“You will not leave here alive,” he growled.

“Oh, I think I will,” I said, but my heart jumped as if it might be on its last beats. Just like in the capsule.

I schooled my thoughts, shoving the disturbing reminder of imprisonment to the back of my mind.

Ian snapped his fingers, and a door in the back of the lab clicked. “I’ve heard you have no stomach for confined spaces.”

My breath wisped against my dry throat. I raised my chin in
a gesture to Gunn to get the hell out of there. He’d secured an unconscious Thane to a hoverboard. Zenn mounted his board, and the tethered trio started to rise toward the air duct at the back of the lab, as per our plan. We’d assumed Officers would be arriving on scene via the hallway before we could exit that way.

Gunn held Raine’s hand, his eyes never leaving her face. Vi followed Zenn, a heavy dose of worry coming from her. At least she’d gone with him. I didn’t want to think about what would happen to her if she got caught.

As I remained alone, I logged the direction Zenn steered his board. The ceiling loomed three stories above me. Every wall except the one behind me glared back with metal surfaces. The single door in the back of the lab now bulged with white-coated technicians waiting for the code to be entered so they could swarm inside.

From her position near the ceiling, Vi threw me one last look over her shoulder before the glass wall behind me exploded.

I landed on top of Van, his hot breath searing my face. I scrambled away from him as a team of silver-suited Enforcement Officers entered the room from the hallway. One of them handed Ian, then Van, a pair of sound-canceling headphones while I wiped blood from my forehead and felt an ocean of pain coming from my back.

Trapped, trapped, trapped
, I thought.
No way out. Can’t get out.

I stumbled toward the back of the lab, pulling my folded hoverboard from my pocket.

Trapped, trapped, trappedtrappedtrapped.

“Expand,” I croaked. The board did nothing, as it didn’t recognize my voice when it was filled with particles of glass, dust—and fear.

I jabbed at the buttons and leapt on the board as the first electro-spheres dropped at my feet.

“Up!” My board shot toward the ceiling, which I rammed with my skull. My back arced when the techtricity hit me, and my board faltered.

Go
, I said in my head.
Go.

Maybe I said it out loud. Maybe I didn’t. But my board went. I’d fallen to my stomach, and that suited me just fine as my board careened only six inches from the ceiling. There was so much pain in my back, it felt like it had caught fire.

Out
, I pleaded, the edges of my vision turning dull. My head felt heavy and soft. Voices shouted below me. Electronics sparked, sending bright bits of techtricity into my path.

Blood dripped from my chin, pooling on my board. I felt so, so tired.

Trapped
, I thought as a very solid wall loomed closer. My mind looped on that thought.
Trapped, trapped, trapped.

Through it all, I heard Ian’s voice. “You’ll never get out of here alive.”

Was he right? Maybe. But he didn’t have to be so arrogant about it.

Out
, I thought. “Please,” I said aloud.

I managed to maneuver the board along the perimeter of the room. Below me, smoke curled, men shouted, and electro-spheres continued to discharge. No escape presented itself in the next corner, so I made another right turn. Soon I’d be back where I started, and I knew what waited for me there.

Up ahead I spotted the air duct. Zenn had already removed the vent. Two feet from the opening, my board bucked. A new pain radiated from my thigh. I lifted my body enough to peer over the edge. A grappling spider spread its legs, hooking itself to my craft.

Ian would then reel me in like a bloated fish. Cage me in that capsule again. Death would be better. My breath clogged my lungs. I couldn’t think clearly; I’d lost so much blood.

“Deactivate,” I said, brushing at the spider with my hand. “Dislodge.”

The spider obeyed my voice, retracting its legs before the green lights of its eyes winked into darkness.

A small—possibly pointless—victory. My board now vibrated because of the damage, my thigh was bleeding, and I’d passed the air duct.

I looped back around and positioned myself below the opening. An electro-sphere landed on the board next to my head. I snatched it up, intending to launch it right back to the floor.

Instead I held it. Felt the humming tech beneath the ball’s aluminum surface. If I timed it just right . . .

I checked my position again. Straight up to freedom.

I dropped the e-sphere. Said, “Up.”

My board obeyed, and the sphere detonated about five feet below me, sending a shock wave of techtricity in all directions.

Including up.

I rode the wave through the duct system as far as I could. After that I twisted and turned and doubled back inside the ventilation system until it spat me out into the too-bright sunshine.

Oxygen greeted me, and I couldn’t suck it in fast enough. I expected EOs to be hovering, but a commotion on the ground had drawn them all away.

I recognized River’s tangled hair in the fray before I nosed my board toward the ocean. Clever girl.

I did not have the strength to sit up. Or speak. For now, breathing was enough.

The soothing sound of the ocean called at me to sleep.
What can it hurt?
I thought. I closed my eyes against the malicious sunrays bouncing off water.

I thought,
I’ll just rest for a minute.

I thought,
It’s a twenty-minute flight anyway.

I thought . . .

10
.
After our return to the hideout, Vi had attended to Raine, who’d lost consciousness on the flight.

Then Vi turned her attention to her father. Neither of them looked good, but at least Vi was alert, which was more than I could say about Thane.

Now she chewed her nails as she paced the length of the war room. Back and forth, back and forth. I couldn’t watch Vi anymore, worried about her beloved boyfriend. I returned to the hospital nook, where Pace was working over Raine. “How is she?”

Gunn wouldn’t leave Raine’s side, and he didn’t glance
up when he answered. “She thinks she’s Arena Locke.” His sigh came out in bursts. “She seems to remember me, though. She called me by my name. When I said her name was Raine Hightower, she . . .”

“She’s been Modified,” Pace said. “It’ll take time.” He put his hand on Gunn’s arm and gently pushed him back a step so he could administer meds to Raine. She lay on the bed, her eyes closed. Her skin looked like white plastic, and her hair like translucent strands of wire.

Raine and I may not have seen eye-to-eye on some things, but she was a dedicated Insider. A friend to Vi. A friend to me. “What can I do?”

Pace stepped back and Gunn filled the empty space next to Raine. He stroked her hair and leaned close. “Your name is Raine Rose Hightower,” he whispered. “I’m Gunner Jameson, and I love you.”

Pace swallowed hard and wouldn’t look at me. “Gunner is going to stay here and tell her what her life used to be like. Sometimes the unconscious mind can recover more than when it’s awake.” He returned to his medical tools, leaving me with Gunner and Raine. I’d spent the better part of the last two months with them. My chest felt so tight. What would I do if that were Vi?

I knew what I’d do. I’d do exactly what Gunner was doing.
I’d hold her hand and tell her I loved her and beg her to come back to me.

“Gunn,” I said. He glanced up. “Come get me if you need me.”

He nodded and returned his attention to Raine. I strode back to the war room, catching Vi’s hand as she paced past me and looking her in the face. She opened her eyes in surprise as I leaned forward. I didn’t want to kiss her—fine, I did—just get close enough to achieve some measure of privacy.

“I love you,” I whispered, in case she had forgotten, or didn’t know, or just needed to be reminded. She didn’t say it back, but her icy demeanor melted a little. She searched my face for an answer I couldn’t give, and then collapsed into my arms. I comforted her without words while the minutes ticked by. I wondered how long we’d have to wait for Jag to come back. If he came back at all.

Vi pushed away from me, anger in her features because of my thoughts. “He’s going to come back.” Vi extracted herself from my embrace and resumed her pacing.

“Maybe someone should fly out and see if they can find him,” Saffediene suggested from her position at the table.

“I’ll go.” I practically leapt toward my hoverboard. I couldn’t stomach staying in the cavern for another second,
with Vi’s anger and the equally awful and exciting promise of becoming Jag-less.

“I’ll come with you,” Saffediene said. I didn’t care. I just had to get out—now.

*   *   *

After flying for twenty minutes over open water, my nerves had settled. But now my gut was rolling with uncertainty. Jag had been missing for an hour and a half. He could be anywhere. He could be dead.

Saffediene voiced my thoughts. “We should’ve seen him by now. The barrier should’ve ended back there.”

I slowed to a hover, turned, and searched the distant city skyline. Dark clouds engulfed the sky, blotting out the sunlight we could’ve used to recharge our boards.

“Where are you?” I whispered. True, the General Director was in Freedom, and no one had been expecting him to be so far from his stronghold. But Jag was notorious for being able to get out of any and all situations.

But he got caught in the Goodgrounds
, a doubtful voice said in my head.
And who knows where he’s been for the past eight months.

He certainly hadn’t been on vacation. When Gunn and I busted him out of his holding cell last month, Jag was covered in blood and could barely stand. He’d also refused to
say anything about his whereabouts or what had happened. Anyone else would have to report, tell every little detail. But not Jag.

He lived with his demons, just as I lived with mine.

But where was he now?

“Wouldn’t Starr alert Gunn if Hightower or Darke had him?” Saffediene asked.

“Yeah,” I said. “If she could.”

The city stood serenely against the storm clouds rolling in, all smoke from the explosion erased. Seconds became minutes became who knows how long. I half expected to see Jag come careening from one of the tall buildings, but he never showed.

“There,” Saffediene said, pointing out toward open water. “Come on!”

She launched her board farther out to sea. I followed at a slower pace, scanning the endless water and finding nothing. We flew toward something only she could see. “Can you see him now?”

I couldn’t. But I trusted Saffediene.

Finally, after another few minutes, I saw a flash of light on the horizon. “Is that . . . him?”