Sidekick (29 page)

He sighed again while rubbing his forehead.

“And you’ll never get away with it,” I said. “The world will know that you are responsible for this riot.”

“Will they?” he asked. “Riots happen all the time, and as far as the outside world knows, none of the prisoners have been implanted yet. In fact, I called the press here tonight to announce that we just got approval. Looks like it has come a little too late.”

I stepped closer to Pierce’s unconscious body. “So you’re going to let all of those innocent reporters die?”

“Well, our statistical models predict that they won’t
all
die. Casualty estimates, while high, do suggest enough footage will make it to air for my purposes.”

My head was shaking in disbelief. “But how are you going to explain all the prisoners breaking out?”

Suddenly the Sultana emerged from the shadows in one of the corners of the room. I jumped.

How had I not seen her? This was getting to be a problem. Maybe I should buy a
Where’s Waldo
book for practice.

This time the Sultana looked like a 20s flapper about to take a train journey. She wore a cloche hat with flowers and beads on the side, and a long trench coat. The outfit covered her tattoos, and aside from being dated, the look was completely normal…except for the gigantic snake wrapped around her body. Guess she had traded the little ones in.

“While I’m honoured to be part of this father-daughter therapy session,” she said in her low musical voice, “it’s time for me to get in my jalopy and go. The money?”

My father looked her over while I squinted at him. There was something about the
way
he was looking her over.

“Oh, come on!” I suddenly shouted.

They both looked at me.

“You’re sleeping together?”

Neither one said anything.

“You are!” I wrapped my arms around my waist. “Oh yuck.”

“Bremy,” my father said shaking his head. “You have always been so…
pedestrian
.”

“She’s half your age!” I shot back. “And you Sultana…Delilah…Amber…whatever. You really think this,” I said gesturing wildly at my father, “is a good idea? I mean you’ve already got a lot of issues to address. This isn’t going to help.”

The Sultana cringed at the sound of her real name, but she recovered quickly, snapping her fingers in the air. Suddenly Pulcinella was at her side.

“Our money,” she said turning to my father.

He waved absentmindedly in the direction of two large steel briefcases.

“Twenty million?”

“Well, I suppose you could count it,” my father said, “but in a few short minutes all hell is going to break loose.”

Pulcinella walked towards the cases. In order to pick them up, he had to put down a strange looking gun. The Sultana moved to take it from him.

“Perhaps you would like this back?” she asked my father. He took the piece from her carefully.

“Why don’t you use it on her?” she asked gesturing towards me. “It might make her personality more tolerable.”

I realized it had to be the gun Pulcinella used to implant Pierce.

My father turned the little weapon over in his hands like he was considering the Sultana’s suggestion.

My eyes darted frantically about the room looking for cover.

But before I could do anything, he raised the gun and pulled the trigger.

Chapter Thirty-Three

“Sammy!” the Sultana shrieked.

She ran over to the clown collapsed on the floor.

She touched the blood pooling at his temple.

Her head whipped round to face my father. “We had a deal!” In a flash, she drew a knife from the folds of her coat. “I let you chip my people! But never my brother! You’ll pay for—”

The gun went off again with a quiet
thunk
. The Sultana’s eyes widened in surprise as she hit the floor, her snake still twisted around her body.

So Pulcinella was the baby brother who went missing. I didn’t know how I was supposed to feel about any of this. I was not a fan of either one of them, but seeing the two crumpled together in a heap on the floor, I couldn’t help but feel something.

“Is she dead?” I asked watching my father lower the gun.

“No.” He placed the weapon on the desk beside him and retrieved his phone. “She’s chipped. The shot doesn’t have to be exact. And unconsciousness is normal. It takes a while for the brain to reset.”

I looked down at Pierce, wondering how his brain was doing. Anger stirred once again in my belly.

“Well, if you’re looking for a thank you,” I said moving my totally hate-filled eyes back to my father, “you can forget it.”

“As always, Brianna, you mistakenly think everything is about you.” He brushed an invisible speck of dirt from his sleeve. “I need to explain how the prisoners escaped. Who better to blame than the city’s most notorious criminal? Thankfully, for everyone’s sake, she will be killed in the riot.”

I opened my mouth to shoot something back, but he cut me off.

“I think this conversation has run its course. Don’t you?”

He leaned over and pressed a large button on the console of the main desk.

Suddenly I heard what sounded like a thousand barred doors opening at once. I looked out the window. Dazed prisoners shuffled out from their cells.

My father pressed another button by a microphone. He leaned over and simply said, “Herd.”

The circus-bots were back in action. It was hard to see from the windows of the eagle’s nest, but the room’s dozen or so black and white monitors provided a view of the events below. The performers steered the prisoners into the main rec area towards the old fortune-teller, the one Sultana had referred to as mother, still draped in her black cloak. She led them to a large barred door.

I thought about begging my father one last time not to do this, but I knew there was no point.

“Bart,” I whispered. “It’s time for Plan B.”

“You have got to be freaking kidding me!” he shouted. “You told me we weren’t doing that!”

“Well, now, we are,” I whispered furiously, turning my head some more so that my father couldn’t hear. “Haven’t you been listening? We’re kind of out of options.”

“I am not the computer on the Starship, you know,” Bart said. “You can’t just say make it so.”

“Bart,” I snapped.

“Fine, you do your part,” he muttered. “You’re lucky I didn’t take your
stupid
comment in front of Ryder seriously and kept working on it.”

My eyes shifted back to my father. He was back at his phone, probably getting ready to enter the code for the kill switch.

Time to wing it.

“So what are you going to do with me?” I asked loudly. “Still planning on a locked facility? Please tell me it has cable.”

“I think we’re past that, Brianna,” my father said without looking up. Something a little like hurt stung in my chest. “Your sister and I have gotten closer as of late. I won’t have you ruining that. Soon the demonstration will be over…as will the story of your life…an amusing tale without substance,” he said distantly, “just like your mother’s.”

It was now or never.

I lunged for my father, grabbing at his lapels. “Please, please, please don’t kill me! I’ll be a good girl!”

“Brianna, stop,” my father said with surprised disgust.

“I swear I’ll be a good girl! Don’t kill me!”

My father snatched one of my hands to stop the assault. Luckily, it was my left hand because my right hand was now curled around his phone.

“Grab her!” my father ordered the boxers.

Uh oh. I had forgotten about them.

They quickly lunged for me, but not as quickly as my thumb was flying.

Texting. My former life had equipped me with some skills after all.

The tall boxer yanked me off my father, hard. The phone slipped from my hand and shattered on the floor.

He and I both stared at it.

“Well,” I said taking what I feared might be my last breath. “I guess that settles that.”

My father gave me his best withering look and reached into his breast pocket, pulling out another phone.

“Don’t do it!” I shouted.

My father looked up at me then tapped the screen one last time.

He flipped the switch.

Chapter Thirty-Four

At first, it sounded like a distant hum.

Then it grew louder, and louder still, until the sound was deafening.

Hundreds of prisoners began screaming with rage.

I heard Pierce moan, but I couldn’t take my eyes off my father. He wasn’t looking at me, though. He was looking behind me.

“Throw her in,” he ordered.

I felt warm breath on my neck.

I turned.

The Sultana’s face hovered inches from mine, her dead eyes staring through me.

My gaze flicked to the floor. Pulcinella was still down but his fingers were twitching. The recovery rates must be different for different people. There also had to be specific frequencies for each group of minions. The kill switch must have only affected the prisoners.

The Sultana grabbed my arms and pulled me towards the door.

“Seriously?” I screamed at my father. “You’re seriously going to kill me?”

He didn’t bother to answer.

I struggled against the Sultana’s grip as she dragged me towards the walkway.

“Come on!” I yelled, searching for life in her blank eyes. “You’re not going to let him screw you like this?”

Nothing registered.

“He was never going to give you that twenty million! And by the way, while you were unconscious, he told me you’re next! You’re going to die in this riot too! He said that! He really did!”

Once on the steel grate platform, the Sultana pushed me up against the guardrail.

I looked over my shoulder to the chaos below. The main gate hadn’t opened yet. Very angry, jaw-snappy, finger-tearing inmates were pooling in alarming numbers. They weren’t ripping each other apart yet, but you could tell their slow brains were working up to it.

“Bart!” I screamed not caring who heard me. “What’s happening?”

“I’m working on it!” my ear bud yelled back.

I grabbed fistfuls of the Sultana’s coat. She could try to push me over, but I wasn’t going to make easy.

Suddenly a large snake’s head popped in front of my face.

“Go away you,” I moaned, weaving my head from side to side.

Seconds passed as we struggled. The Sultana couldn’t get me over, but she kept trying…no frustration on her face…no determination…no nothing.

Then it occurred to me. Maybe I could use her zombiness against her.

I rested all of my weight on my back, pinned against the guardrail, and swung my legs up and over to the other side, keeping my grip on the Sultana. I positioned my toes on the inch of flooring before the drop. We faced each other, waist-high fence between us. I then let go of her coat and grabbed for the railing.

Sluggish thought seemed to cross over her face. I hadn’t fallen. She hadn’t completed the job.

She swatted a hand at my head, but I held tight and squatted lower.

I could feel the alligator pit thrashing beneath me.

There was only one way out of this. I needed to get her to lean over.

She bent towards me, trying to knock me from my perch.

I moved my hands to the fence’s lower railings, dangling one leg towards the crazed horde.

The Sultana leaned further over the edge. She couldn’t quite reach me.

Come on. Come on
.

She rested her waist on the railing and teetered even closer.

That was it.

My chance.

I pushed up with everything I had in me and grabbed her coat front with one hand, yanking her forward as hard as I could.

The Sultana’s body flew over the top of the safety rail and somersaulted into the melee below.

I didn’t look down.

The bloodthirsty shouts from the prisoners were bad enough.

I climbed back over the railing.

Time to get out of here.

Maybe I could slip out while my father wasn’t looking.

I shot my eyes over to the eagle’s nest. Nope, he was looking…and pointing…and from what I could see, he was shouting something to the effect of
Get her!

I turned to run in the opposite direction only to see the sword-swallowing, fire-breathing brothers plodding towards me. I turned back the other way. The contortionist and juggler now blocked the other end, swaying in spot.

Trapped.

“You can still change your mind!” I shouted to my father.

He walked through the reinforced glass door of the eagle’s nest. “I’ve wasted enough time on you, Brianna.” He looked at the circus-bots. “Do it!”

I shut my eyes. No need to see what was coming next.

I felt large hands wrap around my arms. Then my feet left the platform. I was being lifted off the walkway.

Higher and higher.

Then it stopped.

The hands suddenly let go, and I fell back down onto the platform.

I opened my eyes.

Circus-bots all around me were dropping like flies.

“Bart?” I yelled.

“What’s happening?”

“They’re dropping.” I scrambled to peek over the bridge at the scene below. The prisoners were dropping there too, falling over each other like sleeping puppies.

“Are you serious?” Bart shouted.

“I’m serious!”

“I am Master of the Freaking Universe!” I could practically see his fleshy arms shoot up in a victory pose.

Suddenly my father’s legs appeared right in front of me.

“What did you do?”

The now cavernous hall echoed with deadly silence.

I looked up into my father’s eyes. Gone was his typical icy glint. His eyes now flashed hot with rage.

He gripped my arms roughly and pulled me to my feet. “I said, what did you do?”

“Well,” I gulped, “you might want to invest in a better antivirus program.”

Something snapped in my father.

I was suddenly very aware that it was just him and me.

Up until now, despite all of the evidence to the contrary, part of me believed my father wouldn’t actually kill me. Maybe call off his minions at the last moment.

Now, all doubt was gone. He didn’t need to say it, but he decided to anyway.