Page 26
Author: Rachel Bach
Rashid was waiting for me a few dozen feet away. He looked me over, then nodded at my armor case. “You should leave that. It will slow us down. ”
“Nothing doing,” I said. “My case charges my suit. Without it, the Lady’s only got five days of power and no nano-repair. Besides”—I glared at his tactical armor, which didn’t even have a motor, much less anything that could help him run at even a quarter of the Lady’s encumbered speed—“I don’t think you should be worrying about me slowing us down. ”
Rashid held up his hands in peace. “You are correct, I meant no offense. Shall we go?”
I motioned for him to lead the way, but rather than jog into the woods as I’d expected, Rashid walked over to a place where the trees were thick and held out his hand. I was about to ask him what the hell he was doing when I saw a slender, small hand reach out to wrap around his as Ren stepped out of the undergrowth.
“Holy hell, Rashid,” I breathed. “Is that the real Ren?”
“The very same,” Rashid said quietly, grabbing the girl’s hand tight as he set off down the hill. “Hurry, please. They will be here soon. ”
Ren followed him into the forest without a sound, her brown eyes wide and vacant as a doll’s. I looked back up to where Rupert was lying before jogging after them, my stomach sinking further with every step. “Caldswell is going to murder us. ”
“He’s going to do that no matter what,” Rashid replied.
I started to say there was a difference of degree but swallowed the words again just as fast. Now was not the time. Rupert was down, but I had my memories now to tell me just how fast symbionts could heal, so I kept my mouth shut as we jogged into the woods.
The direction Rashid chose led straight down the dell and then up into the mountains. The up and down landscape made me doubly glad of my suit’s help, but Rashid handled the steep slopes on his own without complaint. He kept Ren going as well, carrying her when things got too rough. We made good time, and when we were thirty minutes and five miles of rough country away from where I’d fought Rupert with no sign of pursuit, I decided it was time to get a few things straight.
“So,” I said. “Did you sell Caldswell out, or were you a plant from the start?” When Rashid didn’t answer, I went on. “I’m betting you were in on this from the beginning. Why else would all of my applicants not show up for their job interview?”
“Not showing up for an interview on the Glorious Fool sounds like an excellent act of self-preservation,” Rashid said, glancing at his handset.
“Why did you do it?” I asked, jerking my head at Ren, who was following Rashid like a toy dog on a string. “Was it for her?”
“Yes,” Rashid said, sliding his handset back into his pocket. “But the daughter was a target of opportunity. My primary mission was to infiltrate the Glorious Fool and protect Deviana Morris until we had a chance at a successful extraction. ”
“Guard me?” I scoffed. “Why?”
“Because I heard you were the one who was going to save the universe. ”
I stopped cold. “Dear Sacred King, you work for Brenton. ”
Rashid just smiled.
I looked away with a groan, but I looked back just as quickly when I realized how little sense that made. “If you work for Brenton, why did you fight his merc team on Ample? You killed more of his people than I did. ”
“It was a calculated move,” Rashid said with a shrug. “We needed Caldswell to trust me. ”
My look turned into a glare. “So you killed your own men?”
“They were told they’d be facing a sniper and a Paradoxian armor user,” Rashid replied. “It wasn’t like they were sent in unprepared. ”
“And what if they’d gotten me?”
“Then you’d be safe, the mission would be accomplished, and we wouldn’t be here,” Rashid said, completely unruffled. “As it was, we won, and Caldswell trusted me enough not to bother watching me when he landed here, allowing me to seize the daughter while the Eyes were busy as well as cover your own escape. So you see, both outcomes were in our favor. ” His smile widened. “John Brenton does not waste his moves. ”
I rolled my eyes. “And I suppose extorting the captain for double hazard pay was just more character acting?”
“Indeed,” Rashid said. “Caldswell understands money-hungry mercenaries very well, and we tend to overlook that which we think we understand. ”
I sighed. He had a point. “Okay,” I said. “Excellent inside job. Bravo and well done. What happens now?”
Rashid took Ren’s hand and started walking again. “We hide from the Eyes until the others arrive. I’ve already sent the signal, but it could be hours before we get a pickup, so we’re going to use that time to put as much distance between ourselves and the Fool as possible. Without their daughter, the Eyes will be at a temporary disadvantage. She is what allows them to communicate instantly between teams. But they are still a great threat, especially since you refused to let me eliminate Caldswell’s most dangerous weapon. ”
He said this last bit with a glare over his shoulder that I ignored. “So that’s your plan?” I said, walking after him. “Run and hide?”
“I think I did quite well considering the circumstances,” Rashid said. “We did rescue you right out from under Caldswell’s nose on minimal notice. With your armor, I might add. Certainly that is worth a little hiding in the woods?”
“We?” I asked. “Who’s we?”
Rashid smiled down at Ren. “The daughter helped me. She spoke in my mind and turned off the security on your armor case, which was the only way I was able to get your suit to where you could find it without being shocked to death. ”
That was not the answer I’d been expecting, but it made sense. No one else on the Fool would betray Caldswell. Maat had been busy, apparently. “Is she speaking now?”
“No,” Rashid said. “She has been silent since the explosion. ”
“Well,” I said. “Thanks for saving my bacon, then. That was a nice shot you got on Caldswell, by the way. ”
Rashid chuckled. “I missed, actually. ”
“Missed?” I said. “You blew a hole in his chest. ”
“But I was aiming for his head. ”
I had to laugh at that. “So,” I said. “Disrupter pistols take down symbionts?”
“They’re the only handheld weapon that can,” Rashid said bitterly. “And only if you get it in the head. ”
That explained why Caldswell had scowled so hard at Rashid’s weapon choice when we’d first hired him, and why the captain and Rupert both carried the things. “I guess this means you’re against the Eyes, then. ”
“Utterly and completely,” Rashid replied.
“Why?” I asked. “I mean, do you think nothing should be done against the phantoms, or do you just disapprove of their methods?”
It felt more than a little awkward asking Rashid why he was against the people I’d just thrown everything away to escape, but I had my own reasons for fighting the Eyes, and if I was going to have Rashid at my side, I needed to know his. Considering how quickly he’d claimed to be against them, I thought it would be a simple question, but Rashid gave my words careful consideration before he answered.
“On the surface, the life of the Eyes is admirably self-sacrificing,” he admitted. “The brave heroes who give their lives fighting a shadow war for the good of the universe. It’s a heroic tale that the Eyes love to sell, and I think many of them believe it. ”
I thought of Rupert standing across from me with his fists clenched as he talked about all the lives he saved. Though I wasn’t feeling very kindly toward him at the moment, I knew Rupert was fundamentally a noble, self-sacrificing kind of guy. A perfect soldier, just like Caldswell had said. And if Rupert hadn’t been so ready to sacrifice me, too, I could almost have admired him for it.
“But you don’t buy the hero act,” I sai
d. “You and Brenton. ”
Rashid shook his head.
“Why?”
He stopped and looked at me. “What would you do if you knew the end of all was upon you?”
I frowned. “Is that a rhetorical question?”
“Unfortunately not,” Rashid said. “What if I told you right now that we were under attack by a powerful enemy who could not be fought or detected. ”
I saw where this was going. “You mean the phantoms. ”
“The word ‘phantom’ is insufficient,” Rashid said with a wave of his hand. “How do you contain a natural force responsible for the meaningless death of billions in a single word? It is impossible. Everything with phantoms is impossible. They are like the earthquakes they cause: unpredictable, unpreventable, and invariably deadly, leaving none to blame but fate. Now, imagine that you are tasked with defending the universe against earthquakes. Impossible, right?”
I nodded.
“Ahh,” Rashid said. “But now, imagine that while you’re waiting helpless for that impossible horror, that unseen death, you stumble over a miracle that could save everyone. Would you take it?”
“Of course,” I said cautiously, feeling around for the trap that was always buried in questions like these.
“Of course,” Rashid repeated, his voice growing more heated. “But what if that miracle came with a price? What if, in order to save your life, you had to sacrifice someone else, someone innocent and completely unconnected to you? A child, say. What if by torturing, enslaving, and eventually sacrificing a child, you could build the weapon that saved the universe? Would you take the miracle then? Would you call it a miracle at all?”
I didn’t have to ask what he was talking about. The memory of Maat’s voice was stuck like a barb in my mind, repeating over and over that Maat was a prisoner and her daughters were slaves. I thought of Ren lying curled in a ball on her bed after the phantom attack, her eyes wide and dead. I remembered Enna clinging to Brenton with her skeletal arms as she cried in great, soundless heaves. I looked at Ren now, who was staring up at the sky like we didn’t exist, and a chill went through me.
“Maat is the only plasmex user humanity has ever produced who is powerful enough to stop a phantom,” Rashid said, his voice tight and angry. “She was the first. But she is only one woman, and she went mad decades ago from handling more plasmex than any human should. So, to keep fighting, the Eyes made copies. Clones at first, but they all died as children. After that failure, they sought a more reliable solution and found the daughters. ”
He looked at me, his face pained. “They test every human girl born in the Terran Republic and Paradox. Those found to be compatible are invited to attend a private school when their plasmex starts to mature at puberty, but it is a lie. The ones who go are taken, and the ones who refuse are stolen from their homes. ” As he spoke, the hand he’d wrapped around Ren’s began to shake. “They are taken from their families, taken from their fathers, taken even from their own minds. And where they were, only Maat remains.
“This is the Eyes’ miracle, Miss Morris,” he said, his dark eyes flashing. “This is their solution to the phantom problem, these girls they wield like weapons, girls who succumb to Maat’s madness and must be put down after only a few years. The Eyes do not care. They replace the broken ones like spare parts, leaving the children who die for their cause without so much as a look back. And those who would care, the mothers and fathers, all they can do is stare at the sky and wonder which star shines on their child’s grave. ”
Strangely enough, the first thing that popped into my head as he told this horrible story was that now I finally understood why Caldswell was so ruthless about keeping phantoms a secret. Even at the time, the panic excuse he’d given me on the ship had rung hollow, especially considering how unbelievable phantoms would sound to anyone who hadn’t bumped into one personally. But the systematic abuse, enslavement, and eventual murder of little girls? That was definitely a secret I could see a man like Caldswell killing to keep. But even so, the real surprise for me in all of this was Rashid.