Fade (18 page)

Jack shakes his head. “No, Celes. It’s too dangerous. You’re not trained.”

“I don’t mean to fight them,” I say. “But it’s obvious they want me. I don’t want anyone else here getting hurt because of me.”

“I’m not sure that this is just about you,” Sebastian says. “And in any case, I agree with Jack. It’s too dangerous. You’re too valuable. We haven’t even begun to understand everything there is to know about you.”

I know then that I have to act now if I want to persuade the Underground leader. Otherwise, he’ll just pack me off to safety, while leaving Jack to face the Others. Thankfully, it’s at that moment that I have an idea.

“We have to hurry, Jack,” Sebastian says. “They’ll notice the downed team soon enough.”

I put a hand on Jack’s arm. “Trust me,” I say. “I can stop them. And they won’t hurt me. Not if they know what’s best for them.”

That’s enough to make Sebastian look at me. “What exactly did you have in mind?”

I swallow. It’s now or never. “I’ll need a jacket of some kind, along with whatever wiring you can stick to it.”

“What are you going to do?” Jack asks. And then he knows, because I feel something pass between us, like a jolt of power. Like whatever happened in the viewing room. As it does, I know that he’s seen what I have planned. “Oh no. That’s too dangerous, Celes.”

“Really?” I ask. “Do you think they want to blow themselves up? You need a distraction, Jack, and this could work.”

Sebastian looks from his son to me, and although he obviously isn’t happy about it, he nods. “It could,” he admits. “And you’re brave for suggesting it, Ms. Caine.”

“She’s not going out there by herself,” Jack says. He seems adamant. “Not if I can help it.”

“Oh, she won’t,” Sebastian replies, then looks at me. “I think I have one or two refinements for your plan, dear…”

A few minutes later, I’m on the surface. Jack has gotten me there, he and his team taking out those members of the Others who didn’t fall to the electrified floor. I’m wearing a tactical vest wired with enough C4 to blow up a small country. At least, that’s what it must look like from the outside. It’s actually a patchwork thing put together in a couple of minutes, and which will never explode.

I see the second wave of Others in their vehicles, and I get ready to move over to them. My hand is held high, wrapped around what is actually my cell phone, but which I hope they will assume is some kind of trigger.

“I’ll be right behind you,” Jack promises, kissing me.

And that’s when Grayson rushes over from one of the Jeeps parked next to the base. “No, Celes. Don’t.”

Jack has his gun up in an instant. So do all the Faders with him. I move between them, but they swarm round me, grabbing Grayson and forcing him to the ground so that they can put some kind of plastic tie around his wrists. He looks up at me with imploring eyes.

“Grayson? What are you still doing here? Did you bring them here? Did you tell them where we were?” I have to ask it.

nt faceKkNo, I swear.”

“But you broke out.”

“They were going to erase my memory, Celes. Take everything I knew about you. I couldn’t… I couldn’t forget you. Now, please don’t do this.”

I know I shouldn’t, but I believe him. “I’m sorry,” I say. “I have to. It’s the best way to stop more people getting hurt. You need to forget me, Grayson.”

Grayson shakes his head. “I’ll never do that.”

In a sudden burst, he’s up on his feet, breaking free of the grips of those who hold him. He’s stronger than he looks. He’s also probably lucky the Faders don’t shoot him. “Let me come with you. If you really want to end this without bloodshed, I can help. You can see the Others?”

I look over to where the vehicles are waiting further back. There’s a small body of people with them. I nod.

“They’re important people, Celes. My father is there. If I take you over, it looks like I’ve convinced the Underground to give you up. If you need a distraction, that will be a good one. Then Jack can capture them without a fight. The Underground can take their memories.”

“You’re suddenly willing to do that, when you wouldn’t let us Fade you before?” Jack demands in a mocking tone. His gun’s still out, I notice. “I don’t trust him, Celes.”

“Well, what’s your plan?” Grayson snaps. “An explosive vest? They aren’t going to be that stupid. They’d shoot Celes before she got close enough to use it. I can get her closer.”

I gulp. I hadn’t thought of that. After all, the Others tend to be more interested in wiping out threats than talking to them. And they’ve killed people like me before. I’ve seen the footage. I look over at Jack. “Can we try it his way?”

Jack starts to protest. “These men are highly dangerous-”

“I’ll jump in front of Celes before they can lay a finger on her,” Grayson says. “You know I will.”

“What I know is that you tipped them off,” Jack counters.

“I didn’t,” Grayson says. “I swear it.”

I believe him. I don’t think he’d deliberately do something that would put me in this kind of danger. Even though there’s so little in my life I can be sure of right now, I’m sure that I would know if Grayson were lying. “I think he’s telling the truth, Jack.”

“You thought that all the years he was lying to you,” Jack points out.

That’s enough to make me angry. “I’m doing this,” I say, in a tone that doesn’t allow for argument. It probably makes me sound like a teenager throwing a tantrum, but I don’t care right then. “Now, un-cuff Grayson.”

Jack cuts the plastic strip and Grayson gets into the driver’s side of the nearest Jeep. I get into the passenger seat.

“Take off the vest,” he says. “You’ll be safer without it, believe me.”

I trust him enough to do it. I also don’t like what he said before about the Others shooting me. Grayson looks over at Jack.

“You know I’ll keep her safe.”

“I know I’ll kill you if you don’t.”

The two stare levelly at one another for several seconds, until I know I have to intervene. “Are we doing this or not?”

Grayson nods. “We’re doing this. My father will listen to me. You’ll see.”

He puts the Jeep in gear and we set off towards the Others’ perimeter.

TWENTY-ONE

G
ray drives the Jeep out steadily, exactly as we planned. It’s a bold move, and I’m relieved to see that the Others appear so surprised at seeing a lone jeep come out of the Underground’s complex towards them that they don’t fire.

Though that could have something to do with the man at the front of them with his hand up. His temples have Gray hair, and he’s dressed like the others, all in black. I recognize him as Grayson’s father. Presumably, he’s worried that his son would be caught in any crossfire.

We’re close now. Close enough that I’m a little nervous. I trust Grayson. Of course I trust him, yet now we’re well past the point where the Faders could rescue us if something goes wrong. We’re certainly past the point where they can ambush the Others easily. When I mention that to Grayson though, he shakes his head.

“I have to get closer for them to be convinced I have you with me, Celes; that this is peaceful. We can lead them back afterwards.”

“Are you sure?” I ask, and fall quiet, because at that point I notice something the Faders should have picked up on. Grayson has a gun in his pocket. It’s not enough to frighten me. After all, I don’t believe that Grayson would ever use a gun on me, but it’s enough to worry me. After all, the Grayson I know wouldn’t be carrying a weapon at all.

It’s too late at that point, though, because Grayson brings the Jeep to a halt just yards from the Others’ vehicles. He steps out, and what I hear him say next makes my blood run cold. “I brought her, just like I said I would.” He smiles. “Now let’s go get those freaks inside.”

My mouth drops open, and a brief wail of anguish comes out. Grayson?
Grayson
could do this?   I get out of the Jeep, staring at him. “I… I trusted you.”

“And I trusted you!” Grayson snaps back, his eyes flashing with anger. “I loved you once, but you disappeared, and I didn’t even know if I would ever see you again. I was a mess, a total mess, and
you
did that.”

“I didn’t have a choice,” I say.

“Yes, you did.” Grayson looks at me without compromise. “There’s always a choice, Celes, and you chose to hurt me. Well, I chose to stop hurting, and if that means stopping loving you, so be it. You didn’t even tell me what you were.”

“I didn’t know,” I insist.

“Liar. My dad knew. When he and his colleagues came to question me, they knew all about you. They
told
me all about you. And from what I’ve seen, he’s right. You’re dangerous.” He points to the Underground. “They’re dangerous for wanting to harbor you.”

“I’m not dangerous!” I still can’t quite believe Grayson would do this to me.

“Yes, you are.” That’s from Grayson’s father. Richard. I remember his name now. He moves forward, handcuffs in one hand, but Grayson takes them from him.

“I’ll handle it,” he says, and that only makes it worse, somehow.

I glare at him. At all of them. “You don’t even know what I am!”

Grayson’s father shakes his head, almost sadly. “I do, Celestra. After all, I’m the one who first caught the news of you, all those years ago.”

I try to make sense of that. “But that… that was the Underground.”

Grayson’s father laughs. “We hadn’t quite got to that point by then. You see, I’m a scientist. I explore the unknown. At that point,I was a colleague of someone you might know. Sebastian Cook. We were on the same mission. We worked for NASA, we were among those who picked up the rather interesting signals that come from you. Only they weren’t from this planet. They were out close to Mars, and moving rapidly. So you see, Celestra, I do know what you are, and I know where you’re from, too.”

I don’t know whether to be terrified by that or almost grateful. After all, this is one of the few people who can give me the full truth about myself. I’ve been waiting for this moment almost since the Underground Faded me. I try to look confident.

“What am I then? Where do you think I’m from?”

The older man shrugs. “We have good reason to believe you’re the last remaining survivor of a hostile planet close to Mars. Our telescopes and satellites weren’t able to detect the planet, but it was always there. By the time we might have detected it though, it was gone.”

“Gone?” How can a planet be gone?

“We believe it was destroyed, leaving just a few, very dangerous, survivors behind.”

We’re back to that theme then. I try to talk to them. I’m not dangerous. I’m just a teenage girl. “If I’m so dangerous, then why let Grayson befriend me, get close to me?”

That doesn’t even make Grayson’s father hesitate. I know then that he used his son without a second thought. “We didn’t know for certain that it was you, at first. After all, the woman and baby we were trying to locate could have been anywhere. Grayson getting close to you gave us the optimum opportunity to observe you.”

Observe me. I have to look at Grayson then. “Was that all it was?” I demand. “Was it just you observing me? Doing your father’s dirty work? He really put you in danger for that?”

I can barely think of all the things Grayson and I have been through together. We weren’t just a couple. We were
friends
. Best friends. We had been for years. And we’d come close to being so much more on several occasions. Only the fact that I had wanted to wait had stopped it.