It wasn’t good.
In fact, it was downright dire.
Right in front of us, barely fifteen feet away, ten men were striding back and forth, obviously looking for something. Only, I wasn’t sure I could even call them men. “Humanoid” was the closest word I could think of to describe them. Their bodies were abnormally bulky, leading me to believe they had to be wearing some kind of suit, but they were also covered from head to toe in a black substance that seemed to suck in what little light there was in the forest. Though they had light with them in the form of flashlights and some sort of larger, bright tube, their bodies were like walking black holes. When light moved across them, whatever it was that they were wearing was the opposite of reflective, which confused me because surely the suits had to be made of metal.
Whatever the hell kind of outfits they wore, these were no enforcers. They weren’t even part of the military, not from what I’d seen of military soldiers in the past. I’d traveled past military bases and knew that soldiers, for the most part, were just people. People who had a different sort of job and fought—or would fight—wars for the government if that ever became necessary. But still, just people.
These were something else, something scarier. We knew they were from the Ministry. Nelson had told us so, because their fingerprints had been all over the snare protocol that had trapped her and given away our presence. Although I still couldn’t figure out how the hell any Ministry team would have made it to this area so quickly, I also didn’t think that anyone else would have been just hanging around, waiting to see whether someone was going to break into an old warehouse.
No, if the Ministry had discovered us hacking into their systems and uncovering their little secrets, then the only logical conclusion was that the team that had come after us was made up of Ministry… somethings. I still wasn’t sure what to call them.
I looked back to the people in front of us. They were pacing just beyond where we lay, walking the path on which we’d been running thirty seconds earlier. I thanked our lucky stars that we’d managed to veer into heavier cover and dropped down behind what must have been one of the largest trees in the forest.
That combination of factors had probably saved us and was now the only thing standing between us and the people in the dark suits.
I focused my attention only on watching the men with the lights, and I could see that their suits were a lot like the ones we were wearing. Except theirs appeared a million times more high-tech, sleeker… and definitely more dangerous somehow. They seemed to come equipped with several secondary weapons attached to them, given the odd silhouettes they threw against the light, and I spotted a cutting tool slide right out of the wrist juncture on one of the suits. They were making an awful lot of noise, but that wasn’t because of their suits clanking the way ours had before we fixed the soles.
No, they were making noise because they were absolutely tearing apart the foliage around them, in an obvious search. And it didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out what they were looking for.
Us.
Every muscle in my body contracted at once, as if each part of me had agreed at the same moment that we needed to get the hell out of here, as quickly as possible. I shuddered, and it was all I could do to keep from leaping up and running the other way like the rabbits my little brothers and I had once scared from their dens when we played as children. It was exactly how I felt—like a terrified rabbit, or some other defenseless woodland creature, found by a hawk. Now I was sitting as still as I could, my heart and mind racing as I counted the moments until my inevitable death.
The suits we were wearing were cool, but they weren’t made for war. They were designed for construction. They were nothing more than cheap imitations of the death machines the soldiers were wearing.
Those were suits meant for war, meant for chasing, catching, and attacking. They probably were not for taking prisoners or even asking any questions of those they took down. Our suits had stilts and fingertips that could go on for several feet. Their suits had guns attached to the shoulders and helmets with visors so dark that I wondered if there were even human beings inside.
We were outclassed here. Badly. What on Earth had we gotten into? Why was the government here? We knew that the site belonged to them—or, at least, Nelson had thought so, based on what she’d seen—but what were they doing selling kids? How had they known that we were running a raid on this particular warehouse, on this night?
But if they didn’t, how had they arrived so quickly?
All of which brought me back to the core point: what the hell had we stumbled into? And why, oh, why had I ever thought it was a good idea to go after that site in the first place? This was bigger than anything I’d ever imagined, and there was no denying that it was my fault that we were here.
But that could wait.
Far more important to our lives right at this second was the question of how the hell we were supposed to fight against something like the creatures I saw in front of me. How were we even supposed to get away from something like that? Had any of our other team members managed to escape? Were we the only ones left out here—was that why they were sweeping through the brush like they were, without a care for the noise they were making?
If that was the Ministry, as we suspected, then anyone who’d been captured was now in the government’s hands. We would be in the government’s hands. And that meant that our worst-case scenario had just happened. We’d thought we were doing something safe, going after someone who hadn’t been involved with the government, but we’d been so very, very wrong. We’d been the opposite of safe. We’d been stupid and reckless, and we’d very obviously gotten ourselves caught. The thought was almost enough to make me want to give up, right then and there.
I felt something hit the metal surface covering my right hand, and I glanced down, shocked, to see a hand resting up against mine.
Jace’s, I thought, mentally placing the men who had dropped down on either side of me. I shut my eyes and drew a deep, shuddering breath, and felt the tension in my muscles grow more controlled, the fight-or-flight instinct gaining more direction. Right. I wasn’t here by myself. If I knew anything about Jace, it was that he wouldn’t let me get hurt, not if he could help it. Then I thought of Ant and shifted my left hand just enough so that the back of it brushed against the back of his through our suits. I felt his leg shift to touch mine, and my heart almost imploded.
It was the stupidest possible time for it, but at that moment, I remembered what it was like to have family, to have people you cared for so deeply, you’d do anything to protect them. And to know that they’d do anything for you. That if you were in a bad situation, you would either all get out together or you would all die together.
I didn’t know about the boys, but I voted for the former option rather than the latter, and I guessed they would agree with me. There would be no dying tonight.
If we were careful, we might be able to turn around, hidden by the tree in front of us, and make our way in the opposite direction of the soldiers. Of course, we couldn’t know whether we’d be able to stay hidden. We couldn’t even know whether we were hidden. I wouldn’t put it past the Ministry to have X-ray and heat-sensor technology built into their visors.
If that was the case, it was better just to run and get it over with. If we were lucky, we could dodge and weave around the trees and take whatever hits we had to until… until what? It wasn’t like we had a real direction. We had been lost and wandering before the soldiers had turned up. Now we were lost, wandering, and pursued by men in murder suits.
But I wasn’t willing to give up, not yet, and I could see Jace wasn’t, either.
He turned his hand so that his thumb was up, then carefully raised it and tilted his wrist until his thumb was pointing behind us. Then, slowly, carefully, he moved his hand three times, gesturing that we needed to go backward. A minute later Ant turned his own hand and gave a simple thumbs-up. So backward it was then. And we wer
e going to be sprinting again.
I gulped, but I didn’t see much choice in the matter. I cautiously turned my hand on its side and pushed my own thumb into the air.
The three of us had just started the process of oh-so-slowly getting our hands and knees under us when I looked up and saw that all ten soldiers had turned their visors right toward us and started walking.
The three of us jumped to our feet as one, whirled, and started running as quickly as our feet could take us. Flying deeper into the undergrowth, we prayed that it would be enough to hide us for a bit longer, until someone showed up to save us or we figured out what our next move would be.
I couldn’t feel my feet and my ankle felt like it was on fire, but I wasn’t going to let it stop me.
We flew through the forest, dodging trees, changing angles and directions suddenly and for no apparent reason except that Jace, who was leading, decided to do so. Though we weren’t using the comms to speak to one another, I realized what he was thinking: the soldiers would almost inevitably assume that we’d run in a straight line, directly away from them. That was what anyone would have done, try to get as far from the ones pursuing them as they could, as quickly as possible. It was certainly what my instincts were screaming for me to do, and every time Jace suddenly jerked to the left or right, I had to fight my own urge to go crashing forward instead of turning to follow him.
It helped that Ant was right in front of me, his hand grasping mine as he yanked me forward, keeping me on the right path. I wasn’t sure how much he was actually helping, but I did realize that every step I was taking was about half as long as it should have been. He was increasing the distance I covered while I was in the air. It was probably the only thing keeping me on my feet and allowing me to maintain the same pace as Jace. It also ensured that I didn’t do anything stupid.
But my body seemed to be dangerously close to doing something stupid regardless. The air was burning in my lungs again, and I wasn’t sure I could take another step, let alone the many steps I knew we needed to take before we found safety. I was more than slightly disturbed to find that my fight instinct was terribly lacking. Instead of wanting to turn and fight for myself and for my friends, my body could think only of self-preservation.
I certainly had never considered myself a hero, but there was something deeply disappointing in knowing that when push came to shove, I was weaker than I would have liked.
Suddenly, a voice came over the comm, and I almost screamed in response.
“Is that you guys? I’m coming up quick on your left, and I’ve got Allerra with me!”
I gasped and jerked to the right as an enormous body came crashing out of the trees right next to me, and then I did scream when that body grabbed my arm and yanked me back into line.
“Watch yourself!” the disembodied voice shouted, its tone somewhat distorted by the static that was still dominating the comm line. “If we stay on this path, I think there’ll be a clearing up ahead!”
“A clearing’s the last thing we need, Zion,” Jace’s breathless voice snapped. “In case you haven’t noticed, there are a couple people after us. A clearing isn’t going to give us any place to hide.”
I chanced a glance to my left, and common sense came crashing back. Zion.
Of course.
If I’d been thinking clearly, I would have realized that I knew the voice—that I knew the sense of confidence in its delivery. Rushing along right next to him was the slight girl I’d barely had a chance to register earlier, when we’d dropped off suits and equipment with the decoy team in the field.
Allerra, a girl so small that I’d been surprised she was included at all. She didn’t look any older than sixteen, and I’d thought she was both too young and too green to be on a raid of that magnitude.
But she was keeping pace with the men, and I didn’t see her jerking and weaving like I had been. Perhaps I’d been wrong about her. After all, how old do you really have to be to know that you want to fight against the injustice of a government that takes people’s babies?
I yanked my face back toward Jace, who was still in front of us, just in time to see him bend slightly left to get around a group of trees, and then veer right again. He might not have liked Zion’s idea of the clearing, but it seemed that he’d decided to head for it anyhow. Not that I blamed him. If Zion said it was a good idea, I was inclined to think he knew what he was talking about. I wasn’t sure what it was about the man, but he definitely gave the impression of having things under control. I’d watched him at our meet-up at the warehouse and seen how he handled Marty, as if he’d already known the double-cross was coming and had a plan.
He wasn’t the sort to panic under pressure.
I silently agreed with Jace about doing what Zion had said we should and picked up the pace so that they wouldn’t leave me behind.
I was spurred on by the fact that the soldiers pursuing us had now started shouting—in horribly robotic voices. I hoped they only sounded that way because they were being fed through some sort of filter to maintain anonymity. Perhaps those intense helmets they were wearing had that sort of thing built into them. Along with megaphones, since those voices were definitely carrying farther and more loudly than I thought they should be.
Unless those helmets also came with a truly bizarre set of extra sound effects, they also now had dogs with them. I couldn’t imagine why they’d need them, given that they weren’t actually having to track us. They clearly knew exactly where we were, and unless we somehow managed to lose them in the next minute or so, they’d know exactly where we were going.
They didn’t need dogs to sniff us out.
That hardly mattered, because the very idea that they had them sent both fire and ice rushing through my veins, giving my feet wings that they hadn’t had before. I hadn’t been the same around dogs since that military house we’d hit on my second mission with Nelson’s team. It held at least half a dozen rottweilers, and we’d barely made it out of there alive.
The last thing I needed was a reminder of that close call.
But the canines were behind us, barking in delight at their jobs. They were after us, and they had their orders, which I could only assume meant death for us. I was certain that no zip line was going to drop from the sky to save us, not this time.
We were in trouble. Big trouble.
As we raced, the ruckus from the sky suddenly grew louder, momentarily returning to the forefront of my consciousness. Whoever was up there above the forest had continued their battle, and the explosions now coming down around us were terrifying. Who the hell was actually fighting up there?
Marco, Julia, and Alexy had disappeared from the comm line almost immediately upon the Ministry’s invasion of the warehouse, and I hadn’t really thought much of it at the time. But I wondered now if they’d been shot right out of the sky. I knew they had no way to defend themselves. The best thing they could have done was identify the Ministry airships, turn on their stealth coverage, and run for the hills, leaving the rest of us to fend for ourselves. It was probably what I would have done, and I hoped their drive for survival was like mine. At least that way they’d be alive to come back and collect those of us who survived.
If they were involved in the fight taking place over our heads, though, they didn’t have a prayer.
But if it wasn’t them fighting against the Ministry up there, who was it? I really didn’t think the Ministry airships were just fighting amongst themselves.
If there were more soldiers on those ships, at least that bit of drama was keeping them occupied. It now occurred to me that the clearing Zion had been talking about might be the very clearing we needed—the meeting place we’d arranged with the rest of the team before we started our raid. If it was, would we find anyone else there? Had the decoy team made it out of the parking lot and to safety before everything went to hell in a handbasket? Was there a chance we’d come to that clearing and find everyone there and intact, ready to stand with us?
&
nbsp; “Zion, do you know what happened to the rest of the team?” I shouted suddenly. “What about the decoy team? Did anyone else get out of that parking lot alive?”
After all, if we had more people on our side, surely that was a good thing. It would give us a better shot at success.
When he responded, it was with a growl of frustration.
“I lost Nathan almost immediately. He went out cold as soon as we hit the smoke and was yanked away from me by the first soldier we came across. I couldn’t do anything. I grabbed Allerra here and ran like hell. Don’t know what happened to anyone else. Don’t know if those soldiers are shooting to kill or taking people alive. Either way, I wanted out of there. For all I know, we’re the only ones left.”
That was exactly what I was afraid of. I was about to answer when I stepped directly into a hole and the ankle that had somehow been holding together finally gave out, sending me sharply to the ground. My head hit a rock, making a disturbingly metallic clanging sound.
Then everything went black.
3
When I woke up again, I was flying. At least, that was what it felt like, until the space right next to my left ear started growling and then shouting at me.
“Dammit, Robin, what the heck do you think you’re doing, going down like that? Do you think we have time for you to just be falling down on the job, acting like there aren’t murderous soldiers behind us with dogs?”
That sense of humor in this sort of situation could only come from one person, and I immediately looked up to see Ant, his lips pulled back from his teeth in a snarl as he huffed for breath. He seemed caught between panic and fury.
I ran quickly through the things that I remembered: the dogs, the explosions above us, my ankle, and finally the fall.
I’d hit my head. Ant must have been the person closest to me at the time.