Beyond the Red Page 27

  Serek nods. “As I understand it, he was a trained warrior. Perhaps he defeated your man.”

  “He insists there was someone else involved.”

  “After what happened in the Arena, I don’t doubt there are some on the streets that might think Kala interfered to make way for his escape, thus earning him his freedom. Considering the laws of justice, I’m tempted to agree with them.”

  Roma scowls. “You mean to tell me that you have no idea where he is, or how he managed to escape?”

  “We all saw how he escaped clearly enough. Certainly you don’t think me involved in such a horrific attack.”

  Roma turns away from him and paces back and forth across my room. He twists back to Serek. “My sources say it was an attack from the redbloods, but if I come to learn that either of you were involved in this, I will have you both executed on the spot. Understood?”

  “Naturally,” Serek says calmly. “I would expect nothing less.”

  Roma turns away and motions for his guards to follow as he storms out the door. The guard releases me and closes the door behind him.

  And leaves us in silence.

  I cross the sands at full speed. The white ground turns pink and powdery, then blood red as I race across the deserts. Without a helmet, I would never be able to travel this quickly—the sands kicked up by the thrusters below the bike would blind me. But with the visor over my face and a computerized system outlining the land in front of me, I could move at full speed through a sandstorm. And if I want to reach camp before nightfall, I’ll need to maintain this pace all day.

  The suns rise above me and heat pours over my shoulders and back, soaking my skin, shirt, and pants in sweat. The kicked-up sand coats me like an extra layer, turning my skin red and creating sickly crimson trails down my arms. I monitor the directional units tracking my position and the distance I’ve traveled in the corner of the visor. In most circumstances, I’d abandon the helmet to avoid being traced, but keeping the location of the camp a secret isn’t a priority anymore.

  It doesn’t matter whether they know where the humans are. The nanites will find them without directions.

  I still don’t know how we’re going to fight them. I don’t know if we can. I don’t know if it’s even possible. But I have to do something. I have to believe that someone might have an idea, that somehow we’ll pull something together and survive the attack.

  Bram—the man I watched shot down along with his wife and son the night of the raid—would have thought of something. He always had the craziest ideas Gray called “fucken miracles”—without his insight, we never would have developed the coms or hacked the locked phasers stolen from soldiers. He would have known what to do. Not that he can help us now.

  By the time I near the location, the suns are descending in the sky and it’s far too near sunset. If I blast through the security border like this, I’ll definitely be shot at, but even if I slow down and trace the symbol of surrender on my chest, I’ll be shot at anyway. At least speeding on a bike, I stand a chance of outmaneuvering them and, with any luck, making them miss.

  When I’m twenty leagues from the boundary, I begin to swerve left and right. I twist through the sand without a pattern—a long left, a short right, another sharp right, then left. It slows me down, but it also makes it much more difficult for snipers to land a shot, and I’ll be of no use if I get shot. For the first hundred leagues past the boundary, I move without incident. Maybe I’m wasting my time. Gray did mention they’d lost most of their guard—what if I’m nowhere near one of the posts?

  Then a flash of hot red light races past my shoulder and I swerve faster. Five hundred leagues from camp and the shots increase, racing past my skin, several times way too close for comfort. I move more erratically, speed up and slow down, all the while moving toward camp.

  Then I crest the final dune and face a line of soldiers, armed with long- and short-range phasers. They don’t hesitate—a wall of red and white lights races toward me and I slam the bike down into the sand. I skid several hundred feet and my left side burns. I release the bike—it crashes into a couple soldiers too slow to get out of the way, knocking them over—and I jump to my feet, rip off my helmet, and throw my hands up. “Wait!”

  Miraculously, no one shoots me.

  Sweat and sand cover every inch of my exposed skin. The knocked-over soldiers stand, glaring at me and raising their phasers. I turn to the closest soldier and nod to the com placed in his ear. “My name is Eros. Gray will tell you to shoot me, but I need to speak with him now. The Sepharon are launching a nanite attack that will kill every one of you at sunset. I need to speak with him.”

  The soldier hesitates and presses his hand to his ear. An amateur mistake, but someone is speaking to him and that’s all the news I need. It has to be Gray.

  I just hope he doesn’t order my execution without hearing me out.

  The soldier pulls the silver com out of his ear and tosses it in the sand at my feet. “Put it on.”

  I pick up the blinking earpiece and shove it into place.

  “You’ve got a lot of nerf, you know that?” Gray’s voice says in my ear. “I don’t know how you found us, but give me one good reason I shouldn’t order them to shoot you right now.”

  “I already gave you a reason. Do you want to die tonight?”

  “I don’t know that you’re telling the truth. As far as I’m concerned, this could all be some hodgeshit to trick me into letting you into camp again.”

  I roll my eyes. “Why would I bother breaking into camp when I know you and everyone else wants me dead?”

  “Blazing Void if I know. Revenge. Maybe you’ve got yourself hooked up with bombs. Maybe letting you in will be the reason people die tonight.”

  “I’ll strip down naked to prove I’m clean if I have to, Gray, but you have to let me in.”

  Gray makes a noise like choking on something disgusting. “I swear to the suns, kid, if you start stripping I’ll come out there and shoot you myself.”

  I restrain a smile. “So you’ll let me in?”

  “You have five moments to convince me not to shoot you, starting the mo you enter my quarters.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Don’t thank me. You better have a helluva speech ready.”

  The camp falls quiet as I enter the borders. Whispers and glances surround me as I search their faces for ones I recognize. Ones I care about.

  I don’t blame them for staring—I was an anomaly to begin with, and now I’m back with gold eyes, wearing a shirt off the High Prince’s back. I’m covered in sweat and sand, with my hands cuffed behind my back, phasers pressed to my spine, and an escort of men that I helped train. I would stare, too, if I were one of them.

  “Uncle Eros!” Something tiny slips between the guards and slams against my leg. Aren looks up at me, his eyes glinting between strands of sweaty blond hair with a grin wider than a crescent moon. “You’re back! I told Mal you would come back, but he said you got taken away and you were in the desert and not allowed to come back, but I told him—”

  I crouch in front of him and he wraps his arms around my neck, hugging me tightly. I wish I could hug him, but I settle for leaning my head against his, then sitting back on my heels and grinning right back at him. “I missed you, little guy.”

  “I know.” He smiles and buries his face in the sweaty crook of my neck. “Don’t go away again, okay? A lot of people went away and everyone was crying. Daddy went away, too, and Gamma and Gampa.”

  I wince and glance at Gray’s tent with the white Le crest sewn onto it and guards standing outside his station, just fifteen feet away. “Aren, buddy, I need you to go find your mom, okay?”

  He looks up at me with wide blue eyes. The tears glistening in his gaze are a kick to the stomach. “I don’t want you to go away,” he whispers.

  I sigh. “I know, I don’t want to go away either. But Mal’s right; I’m not allowed here anymore. I’m just visiting, and then I have to go.”


  He starts crying. Stars and suns, this kid. I hate seeing kids cry.

  “Will you visit again?” he croaks.

  I want to say yes. I want to say yes in the worst way, just to see him smile. Just to make him happy, if only for a few more minutes.

  But I can’t promise him something that’ll never happen. I won’t do that to him.

  “Half-blood,” a guard says, nodding to the sky. “You’re out of time.”

  He’s right. The suns are moments away from setting. I slip out of Aren’s grip and kiss the top of his head. “I love you, buddy. Don’t ever forget that. But I gotta go now, and I won’t be allowed to come back anymore, so you be good and take care of your mom and siblings, okay?”

  Aren rubs his eyes with the back of his hand. Sniffles. “Okay.”

  I start to stand, but he grabs my arm and shows me a twine bracelet. “Nia made me make it. It’s a protection bracelet, so nothing bad can happen to you when you wear it. I made it for when Daddy comes back, but I want you to have it.”

  “Aren—”

  “Keep it? Please?” His lips tremble and he blinks several times and stares at me with those eyes, which are way too big for his head, and I can’t say no. Not to him.

  I sigh and twist around to show him my hands. “You’ll have to put it on for me.”

  “Okay,” he whispers, and his little fingers work the bracelet onto my wrist. It’s tight as it slips over my hand, but once it’s on my wrist, it fits okay. “I’ll never take it off.” I stand and face Gray’s tent. “Be good, buddy.”

  Someone nudges my back with a warm phaser and we step inside. Gray’s tent is the largest in the compound, but it’s clear they haven’t been here very long because he doesn’t have much set up. A simple bedroll, a pile of bags, and several cases of weapons lined up in the sand. That’s it.

  “Took you long enough.” Gray steps toward me. “Now let’s hear it. Doer die.”

  And so I tell him everything Serek told me. It doesn’t take long—the plan isn’t that complicated. With a few lines of code and the flip of a button, millions of people will die.

  Gray is silent for a full mo after I finish. His face is pale and his fingers are slack. Finally, he turns to a guard standing by the exit. “Uncuff him.”

  The guard steps behind me and removes the cuffs as Gray pinches the bridge of his nose. “You’re sure about this?”

  I nod and dig through my pocket. Hold up the tube Serek gave me. “I’ve been told this will glow when the order is executed.”

  “That’s not helpful.”

  I grimace. “I know.”

  “You’re sure it’s nanites? You’re absolutely positive.”

  “I believe Serek. He’d have no reason to lie to me—at least, not about this.”

  Gray scowls. Runs his hand over his lips. Glares at the ceiling. “We can’t fight nanites.”

  No one answers. There’s nothing to say, because he’s right—we don’t have a single defense against nanites. How can you fight something you can’t see? Something so small that a single breath of air could transport hundreds of thousands into your lungs? It’d be like trying to fight your own cells or the oxygen in your blood.

  Impossible.

  “I don’t know why you bothered even coming here to tell us,” Gray says. “There’s literally nothing we can do.”

  I sigh. “I was hoping maybe someone here would have an idea. And I wasn’t going to stay there while you …” I can’t say it. I won’t say it. I take a breath and start over. “I figured a warning was better than nothing.”

  “I don’t know about that.” Gray turns and crosses his arms. “As the old ones would say—ignorances blessed.”

  I clench the vial in my hand. Stare at the sand.

  Gray faces me again. “What happened to your eyes?”

  I look up. “What?”

  “Your eyes. They used to be green, but now they’re gold.” He squints at me. “What, you get some bizarre alien eye infection or something?”

  “No. There were nanites in my system that made my eyes look green, but when they injected me with tracking nanites, they interfered with the ones already in my body and nearly killed me.”

  He frowns. “Why? What’s your eye color matter?”

  I shift. The truth isn’t going to help me right now, and it’s a long story we don’t have time for anyway. So I say, “It doesn’t.”

  Gray paces back and forth, his hands clasped behind his back. “But you got them out of your system.”

  I hesitate. I might know where he’s going with this, but the answer isn’t going to be what we need. “With help.”

  “How?”

  “I’m not sure. A doctor was in charge—she said something about cleansing my system. Some kinduv filter or transfusion or something. I don’t know.”

  “And I don’t suppose they were kind enough to provide you with one of those filter things when they sent you over here.”

  I bite my lip. Shake my head.

  “Of course not.” He stops and faces me. “Step back a mo—you said they nearly killed you.”

  “Right. But the doctor stopped it before it caused permanent damage.”

  “With the machine?”

  I start to say yes, but then I think back to the incident. I wasn’t really coherent for most of it—all I remember is pain and blackness, but there was something else Kora said, after the fact. Something about the doctor shooting me …

  My breath catches. “The phasers.”

  Gray arches an eyebrow. “Phasers?”

  “Kora said the doctor stunned me to short out the nanites, then used the filter to clean them out of my system afterward. But they were shut down first.”

  “With the phaser,” Gray says.

  A burst of energy rushes through me, quickening my pulse. The phasers—how didn’t I think of it before? “She stunned me, which shorted out the nanites. I think.”

  “You think? This is a little important—”

  “I was barely conscious when it happened, so no, I’m not sure. But that’s what Kora told me.”

  Gray hesitates. Turns to his men. “Spread word to everyone with a phaser to set them to stun. Anyone who shows symptoms of—” Gray gasps and drops to his knees, clutching his skull. Screams slice through the air as the soldiers drop, one by one—some immediately and others writhing in the sand, clutching their heads.

  The vial in my hand grows hot and glows red.

  It’s too late.

  As soon as the door shuts behind Roma, Serek leaps to the desk and grabs the rectangular glass sitting beside the medical unit, his fingers dancing across the screen. I step beside him and peer over his shoulder. He’s writing something, but the words are cut off and mixed with symbols and numbers and the text is flying across the screen so rapidly it’s a wonder he can read it at all.

  “What is that?” I ask.

  “I’m writing a program to shut down the nanites. It might take some time—I’ll need to write a stable enough entry point to get through the security checks installed—but I know it’s possible.”

  Evidently, those rumors about Serek’s technical prowess were true. “How do you know how to get through the security?”

  He stops typing and glances up. His eyes are soft and sad when he says, “I wrote the security program. I’ll be able to get in, but rendering the nanites useless is an entirely different battle—one that we won’t be able to test.”

  I nod. “Is there anything I can do to help?”

  He hesitates. “It will be faster if I do this on my own … but it might be a good idea to listen by the door for any further unexpected interruptions.”

  “That I can do.”

  He smiles grimly, nods once, and resumes his work on the screen.

  I’m not sure how long we stay there, with Serek typing manically through the code while I lean against the door and listen for any potential interruptions—but the hall beyond the room is silent. The few times he pauses,
his fingers twitch, as if eager to continue their work. My body hums with an eagerness to move, to do something, anything, but without Serek’s code, there’s nothing we can do. I close my eyes and pray for Eros. I can only hope he reached his people and figured out some sort of way to defend against the impossible.

  When I open my eyes, Serek’s vial is glowing bright red, and a strange silence has fallen over the grounds. It’s as if the air itself knows what is happening—as if the whole planet is mourning this atrocious act.

  And then the howling begins.

  At first it sounds like a low whistle, or a groan carried on a breeze. I step toward the open window and a chill washes over me as the sound grows, building in intensity like a woman’s cries during a birthing. Serek looks up from the screen, his body rigid and his eyes wide.

  “Is that …?” he whispers.

  “Screaming,” I say. “From the city.”

  It’s the most haunting sound I’ve ever heard—the echo of a cry, repeated and layered over and over again. Pain I cannot imagine, the horror of watching your loved ones die before your very eyes. I didn’t realize there were untracked redbloods in Asheron, but the sound of anguish is unmistakable.

  I spin away from the window and step beside him. “We have to go. Now.”

  He pulls a flat disc the size of my thumbnail out of his pocket and places it on the screen. A blue line slowly traces the edge of the disc, then finally, when it makes a full circle, Serek picks it up, slides it into his pocket, and passes me a phaser.

  We don’t waste time with words.

  He shoves open the door and we race through the hallway, down the steps, and into the screaming outside air. The Spire towers over the center of the complex, a circle of guards spaced evenly around its base. We race toward them without a plan, without anything but instinct and the push of agonized voices carried in the wind.