Psion Beta (29 page)

When the four climbers weren’t rehearsing the mounting process, they watched the other team members do their work. Al wanted everyone knowing exactly what the others were doing at any time during the mission. They worked and worked at it for a week until Sammy believed he could mount each cam blindfolded and drugged. When he told this to Al, the response was, “Good, that’s exactly what I want.”

Al’s team was excused from the Game on Saturday so they could begin running mission scenarios. Sammy felt no sense of loss; by the time Al called it quits, he had an ache in every “climbing muscle” in his body. On the way to his room, he saw his friends in the rec room, but didn’t stop to hang out. His eyes almost needed props to stay open, and he’d have time to do all that tomorrow. After days of consuming work, and with an even more stressful week ahead, Sunday promised to be a nice break.

Nine months ago you were nothing more than a juvenile anarchist
, Sammy told himself as he stared at his reflection in the bathroom mirror
. Now look at you. Don’t even have time to hang out with your friends.
The thought almost made him laugh, but he realized it wasn’t very funny. In fact, it wasn’t really funny at all.
Who have I become? I’m nothing like the person I was a year ago.
The questions danced in his mind late into the night.

He awoke late the next morning with a headache and a sore body complaining that it hadn’t finished sleeping. After showering, he headed to the cafeteria. A few Betas were hanging around, but none of his friends. He sent a text to Brickert asking where he was, and ate breakfast while waiting for a response. When nothing came, he sent a second text.

Still nothing.

He had a nasty feeling that he’d been left out, and he tried to shake it by searching headquarters for his friends. He asked around, but no one had seen them. Frustrated, lonely, and hurt, he went back to his room, picked up a book he’d grabbed from the library, and flopped onto his bed. He hadn’t been reading for more than ten minutes when Brickert poked his head in the door.

“
Hey, Sammy. Come on, let’s go.”

Sammy sat up in bed. “Where have you been? Why didn’t you answer my texts?”

“
We’re out on the grounds goofing off.”

Sammy saw the pink spots on Brickert’s nose and cheeks, the watery eyes stung by cold. “Are you crazy? It’s November.”

Brickert just shrugged it off. “It’s not bad out today.” Sammy started to argue, but Brickert cut him off. “Are you coming out or staying in, Mr. Bookworm?”

He gave Brickert a petulant stare. “I’ll come outside, but I’m taking my book . . . just in case.”

“
Just in case what?”

“
In case you-know-who isn’t in a good mood and ignores me all day.”

“
She’s not evil, I’ll tell you. And she’s been talking about you all week—saying nice things, too.”

“
Why didn’t you tell me?”

“
Probably because I’ve hardly seen you since Sunday, and whenever I do see you, you’re just running off somewhere else.”

“
Come on, not my fault. I hardly get time to eat.”

“
Relax,” Brickert laughed as he pushed Sammy out the door. “I’m not saying it is your fault.”

“
So . . .” Sammy dropped his voice so no one might overhear. “What’s she been saying?”

“
Oh, you know, she wants to marry you—have your kids—that stuff.”

“
Har. Har.” Sammy pushed Brickert in the back and messed up his hair as they walked onto the grounds.

Brickert had been right. It was an unusually sunny day for early November, but the wind had teeth. Not that it mattered. All Sammy thought about was how Jeffie had been “talking highly” of him.

They found the girls lounging on a sunny spot of grass with Asaki and Brillianté. Sammy could hear them talking in the distance, laughing at something. They sounded almost . . . mischievous.

The laughter ended the moment Sammy arrived. Something was fishy, and when he looked at Brickert, he could tell his friend knew something about it. Then, almost imperceptibly, Jeffie scooted over from Brillianté so he had room to sit by her. How could she go from evading him the past two weeks to wanting him next to her? The answer didn’t really matter. He was happy with what he got.

“
Hiya, buddy,” she said with a goofy smile.

“
Hiya back,” he answered. “What have you guys been doing all day?”

No one seemed to want to answer until Kawai finally spoke up. “Nothing much. Just hanging out.”

“
Uh, huh.” He didn’t believe a word of it. “What’s the plan for the rest of the day?”

“
We were thinking of checking out the water works they just put in over by Hilltop,” Jeffie answered. “Want to get wet?”

“
Serious? I’m already cold just sitting here. If you’re really going, I’ll just watch.”

“
Sure you will,” Jeffie said, smiling wickedly.

The afternoon spent at the water works with his friends was the only real bright spot in Sammy’s week. Monday sent him back to the grind, with extra hours after sims to prepare for the mission. The days slipped away quickly, and before he knew it, it was Saturday, and they were conducting their last rehearsal before show time.

“
NO!” Al shouted to Kaden during one of the run-throughs. “In an emergency, use the nearest exit. For you, that’s the one in the back of the factory.”

It was Saturday afternoon, two days before the mission, and tensions were peaking. They’d been working scenario after scenario the last five evenings, and Al had thrown the latest and toughest at them: a detonating bomb-cam. They had practiced it several times, but still struggled to meet Al’s expectations. His frustrations mirrored the rest of the team’s.

“
Sorry, Al,” Kaden responded as he wiped the sheen of sweat from his forehead, “it’s just that all of the other exits are on the other side of the factory. I keep forgetting about the one in the basement.”

“
I didn’t mean to lose my cool. My bad.” Al looked even sorrier than Kaden. He checked his watch and made a grimace. “Let’s take a fifteen minute break. Sammy, can you stay behind for a bit?”

“
Yeah,” Sammy answered, not at all surprised by Al’s request.

Jealously, he watched everyone else file off to the cafeteria and went to Al who was staring at his hand-held panel, digesting the information it contained.

“
I don’t know, Sammy,” he said, shaking his head as he read more data. “Do you think we’re going to be ready by Monday morning?”

Sammy did not bother to hide his dumbfounded expression. “Are you joking me?” he asked Al.

Al did not answer him.

“
Al, this team is very ready to go.”

“
But you just saw that we still can’t—”

“
Get out in the minimum amount of time. In the worst possible scenario. One which we have almost zero chance of facing. I understand, Al. You’re worried. You’re supposed to be. But we’ve all made it out way under the maximum amount of safe time on several runs. Be optimistic. Everything’s going to be fine. I’m not lying. This team is very ready.”

Al’s serious expression gave way to a reluctant smile. “You’re right. Thanks. I get it from my dad. I always get really worked up about the unknown, you know?”

“
It’s cool.”

“
How do you feel about the hot fields? Better?”

Sammy shook his head grimly. He hated the hot fields. “Truthfully, not much better. Why not send one of us into the inner room? It’d be so much—”

“
Mission rules. You have to be within viewing distance of another Beta at all times.”

Sammy kicked the floor lightly with his shoe. Stupid rules. “I’d like to have a few runs through it again . . . just in case.”

“
Okay. Then let’s do it again.”

One of the scenarios Al threw at them was based around a temporary return in power from a secondary source. This caused the hot fields on the top floor to come back to life, and cut off access to all escape routes for Kobe and Sammy.

The inner room on the top floor had no windows or doors. The only way in or out was via one of two long, low hallways about six or seven meters in length. Within these hot fields were a dozen revolving heat beams threatening anyone who dared to attempt unauthorized entry. The beams were hot enough to burn clean through human flesh and bone, leaving a surprised intruder with a finely cauterized stump.

Normally power in the halls turned off when Martin and Cala flipped the breakers, but if a backup system kicked in while Kobe and Sammy were in the inner room, they’d be stuck. The only way to turn a hot field off was manually deactivating it at both ends of the hall. And that meant someone had to go through first. Al had appointed that task to Sammy. In his first few attempts getting through, he’d “lost” three legs, four arms, an ear, and half of his head.

The hot fields were nasty enough with the lack of maneuverability and extreme danger, but the heat rays were also completely invisible. Learning through trial and error, he’d figured out where the beams were by watching which direction the beam emitters faced. After several attempts, he’d made it through without touching a beam, but his success rate was still only about sixty percent.

After the break ended, Al asked each partnership to go and work on their toughest assignments. Sammy went to a sim room with Kobe and loaded up the hot field scenario. His partner leaned lazily against the wall, observing. His first attempt ended badly, caught in the back by a beam. He didn’t even realize he’d messed up until the hologram shut off. He suppressed a long string of swear words and went back to the panel. On the other side of the room, Kobe let out a long audible sigh. Sammy was about to saw something rude, but held his tongue.

He was more wary during attempt number two. Moving into the field, he gingerly sidestepped the first beam, keeping an eye on both the next one and the one behind him.
Here it comes . . . Here it comes . . .

“
Watch your heel, it’s about to sweep back your way.”

Kobe’s voice surprised Sammy. He’d never offered his help before. But without thinking, Sammy pulled his foot to a safer spot, then swiftly slipped under the next beam.

“
You have just a few seconds now before it doubles back and takes your head clean off.”

Again following Kobe’s advice, Sammy hovered in a squat to allow one beam to go over him while the other passed harmlessly under him. Kobe kept up a constant stream of direction, and Sammy managed to get through the hot field in record time. He loaded it again. This time he relied more on Kobe to watch his back.

Just after his sixth attempt without a mistake, Al summoned everyone back to the Arena for one last run through. It went very well, despite a kink thrown in as a surprise. In fact, Al could not think of a single point of improvement. “Great work, guys. I don’t think anything will happen on Monday that we can’t handle. Tomorrow is off. Monday morning we leave for Rio.”

There were no cheers as the team broke up to gather their things, no high fives, just an anxious silence. Al approached Sammy as everyone else was leaving.

“
How did the hot fields go?”

“
Real well. I think Kobe and I can guarantee you that if we need to make it through, we can do it.”

“
I’m sure you won’t, but I’m happy.” Al gave Sammy a pat and left the room.

With a slight frown, Sammy watched Kobe put on his regular shoes. He did not know what to think about him now. Kobe had given him so much trouble. But all of a sudden, he didn’t seem like such a terrible guy. In fact, Sammy felt a certain kinship knowing that if nothing else, he could trust Kobe with his life.

“
Hey, Kobe—thanks.”

“
No sweat.” Kobe shrugged his shoulders so casually that it looked anything but casual. “But this doesn’t mean we’re friends.”

“
Believe me, I know.”

Kobe let out a bark of a laugh. “And I’m still gonna call you hot shot.”

“
I wouldn’t have it any other way.” 

Sunday morning was long. Trying to avoid thinking about the mission only made Sammy think more about the mission. The gnaw of fear, the wrenching in his stomach, the sweaty palms were all constant reminders of what waited for him tomorrow. To make things worse, he had the oddest sense when he woke that he was forgetting something. He checked his com calendar, but nothing appeared on his schedule.

To help keep his mind off the mission, Brickert and Jeffie forced him outside even though the temperature had dropped dramatically in the last week.

They played blast ball, a game Al said had been invented long before his time at headquarters. Jeffie was probably the best at it because of her accuracy with blasting. She particularly enjoyed knocking Sammy’s ball off course. Thanks to her, he came in last every game. When they’d finished, he again had that same sense of forgetting something.

“
What’s that look for?” Jeffie called over to him, reading his face as only she could. Brickert tossed a ball to Sammy, who blasted it midair and caught it.

“
Nothing,” he said, then he threw the ball at her.

She redirected the ball via blast back to Brickert. “C’mon . . . tell me.”