Legacy (Alliance Book 3) (7 page)

He got in front of the man, and knelt on top of the bones, looking up at his face, the man staring down at him.

“I spent the last two days sitting here like this. I did something shitty and couldn’t think of a worse place to go, so I came here, and sat in this field looking at bones. I’d been here once before, but I was too hurt to pay attention then... I was paying attention now, and I started finding these tiny pieces amidst all of this, not even kid tiny, baby tiny, and the more I kept looking, the worse it got. So many little bones....” He scanned the ground around him and found one of the tiny ones, and clenching his jaw, leaned over and picked it up, holding it out in front of Maxton.

“How old do you think this child was, Maxton? One maybe? I’m no good at anatomy, but it feels little. And charred as it is, I couldn’t tell you what that kid looked like. I can’t even tell if it was a boy or a girl, never mind if it was Zoriner or Alliance. Can you?”

He got up and took the few steps to him. Maxton wasn’t staring at him anymore, his eyes closed, jaw clenched.

“You called my kind cowards before, but you are the one who can’t bear to look at what you did. Open your eyes, and look at it. I promise you this is worse than what Brody was doing to you before, much worse.” He did, and he could see the guilt in his face, and the struggle to hide it.

Brody and his boys were standing next to them now, Loren’s screen out, recording all of it.

“I know how this works, so what I am about to tell you isn’t me asking you to spare me. But I will ask you to not take any action against my men. I was in charge of the lab. It was my call, my mission. My men followed my orders. They didn’t have any kind of choice about it, Ellis. You know that.”

He was looking at Brody when he said it, and waited until Brody nodded his head to keep going.

“We didn’t know what the neuros were programmed for. We just had to get them into the population. That was our mission. We watched it on the screens, but there wasn’t anything we could do about it then, there wasn’t a thing anybody could do to stop it. You can’t kill the code in these things once it’s live, it just can’t be done.... Whatever you may think of me, I couldn’t do that. None of my men could. But you’re right, Zoriner. I did this,” his voice shaky, eyes down.

Maxton finally looked at him again. “It would make more sense for you to do it than them. It should be one of your kind.”

“We are not done with you yet, Maxton, but if we have to afterwards, it’ll be one of us,” he whispered. The man nodded, and Brody had that damn screen out in front of him again.

“Who was she talking to? Was it you?”

Maxton shook his head, “No. She was talking to one of my men, but I have no idea about what. I assumed it was personal, and let it slide. That’s honest. I don’t expect to walk away from this either way, Ellis. I am sure you’ve checked already, and know that I don’t have anybody you can hold over me. There is just me, and I don’t intend to plead for my life, so there is no reason for me to lie to you.... None that I have left.”

Brody signaled something to Trelix and the boys grabbed Maxton by his arms, and walked him back to the flier. He didn’t fight them or look at them, just did as he was told and got in. Brody slumped into the seat across from him.

“I need you to get the man she was talking to to the tower we are in, alone. Loren will set you up with a comm when we get there,” Brody snapped at him in his soldier’s voice.

Maxton shook his head, “I can’t do that. He is my crew. I have to protect him. You know that.”  

“We just need to talk to him, Maxton. We won’t kill him, I promise, and if he talks, we won’t even hurt him. It’s either that or we go back in and grab all of them. I have enough people and guns to do that.”

Maxton glared at him, “I don’t know what you are missing here, Ellis, but I am not giving up my men. For the sake of your crew, I hope you’d do the same in my place. Don’t ask me again. It’ll be a waste of time.” He said it quickly, quietly, and Brody let him be after that.

Drake and Ella made everybody cold sandwiches and somehow managed to heat up tea. The boys took Maxton back to the comm room, Brody going in behind them. Ams was still passed out on the couch, Ella looking at him sadly, shaking her head. Didn’t wake up yet, but the scan was clean, she told him quietly. She just needed more time. She’d watch her, and he knew she’d get him the moment her eyes opened. He grabbed food for Brody and the boys and took a plate for Maxton as well. Brody was still trying to talk the soldier into getting whoever that man was to come, but he could tell it wasn’t working, wasn’t going to work. Loren was doing something on one of his screens, and then he whispered something to Brody, and took him out of the room, signaling to Trelix to join them.

“I brought you some food, if you are hungry,” he said as soon as they were alone.

Maxton ignored him.

He leaned on the far wall across from him and closed his eyes. He remembered that he still hadn’t really slept, and he felt in danger of passing out, so he shook his head, hard, and drank a few sips of cold coffee from the small thermos he left here earlier. It wasn’t helping, at least not yet.

“When did you sleep last, Zoriner?” It caught him by surprise, the question. Didn’t make sense for him to ask. He needed hot coffee, but there was no way to make it now. He needed to do something, just to stay awake. Maybe he could get something else out of this man, get him to answer at least some of the questions he had in his head that nobody bothered to ask.

“Who ordered your mission?”

Maxton shook his head, “We never knew those things, Zoriner. The calls come in on an encrypted channel and we do what we are told. I don’t know who did this. I don’t know why they would either. I told you everything I could already. I told Ellis that just now, too, only I don’t think he believes me. The point I’m trying to make is you’ve tapped me out. You can end it now. I won’t hand over any of my men. That part Ellis believes. So you got everything you were going to get from me.”

He was sitting in that same chair against the wall, feet tied again. He could see his wound bleeding, but Maxton wasn’t paying any attention to it. He was looking at his face, asking him to pull the trigger. And he knew he’d probably have to do it, but for now he wanted to fix him up, stitch his wound for him. He knew it didn’t make any sense, but it felt right to do this.

He ran to Ella and grabbed a med kit, noting that Brody and his boys weren’t in the room, and raced back. Maxton’s eyes were closed when he got back, head leaning back. He looked asleep, only he had a feeling he wasn’t.

“I am going to stitch you up, Maxton. Try not to move.”

Maxton glared at him, “Waste of med supplies, Zoriner.”

He ignored him, poured antiseptic on a gauze pad and wiped the blood away from the wound. Maxton leaned his head back and closed his eyes. He could see his breathing change, but he didn’t move when he stitched him up, didn’t say anything either. He put a bandage over the wound when he was done and walked away from him, looking out the window.

He didn’t want to kill this man, but he had a feeling Brody wouldn’t let him go. It was too much of a risk. The man was a soldier. He’d do what he had to do if they let him go, and that would likely mean him telling the Alliance about them. And the girls. They couldn’t risk the girls.

“It’s easier than you think, Zoriner. You can just think of all those dead kids in that field, the little charred bones, and pull the trigger. Or tie my hands in front of me and hand me a gun and I’ll do it for you, if you can’t. Truth is, it’ll be a relief.”

He turned around and the man was watching him. “Ellis can’t let me go. I wouldn’t either, if I were him, so don’t beat yourself up, kid. I’ll make it as easy on you as I can. Just don’t make me kneel, or shoot me in the back, if you can help it,” he said calmly, softly, without any anger, and closed his eyes again.

He slid down the wall across from him, and put his head in his hands. He was no longer in danger of falling asleep at least. Somewhere in the still thinking parts of his brain he knew that it wasn’t really Maxton who killed all those people, that he wasn’t lying about that. It seemed wrong to make him pay for it, and he didn’t think he could pull the trigger. He seemed decent. And he had a feeling his earlier outburst was deliberate, that he said all those things to get Brody pissed off enough to just shoot him. He remembered the way his face looked on that field, the pain in it, and knew for sure the man meant what he said, that he wanted out.

He heard the door open and watched a very flushed Brody shove a young soldier inside, letting him stumble. His hands were tied behind him, and his face bore the marks of a few well placed punches. He looked at Maxton, and the man was scowling. Somehow they got him then, that’s where they took off to like that. Brody dropped the kid into the chair he was using earlier, turning it so he was facing Maxton, and Loren tied the kid’s feet at the base. Maxton put his head down, not wanting to see what they would do to one of his men he guessed.

He watched Brody rip the kid’s jacket off him, nothing slow or calm about it. Trelix and Loren left the room without a word. Brody took his knife out and put it under the kid’s chin, lifting his head up, and held the screen with the texts on it in front of the his face. He moved to the window, so he could see all of it, so he could stop it, if it went too far. He had a feeling it would, Brody looking the way he did. The kid blanched when he saw what was on the screen, but didn’t say anything. He looked about their age if not younger by a year or two.

“Here is what’s going to happen, Brandon. I need to know how you know this woman, and I need to know what she had you do for her and how you did it. I get that out of you, and I let you walk out of here with all your parts. Or I put lots and lots of holes in you with this, until you tell me anyway, and you will, and you walk out of here or not with whatever parts you have left.”

He glanced at Maxton’s face. He was looking at the kid, eyes worried, “Ellis, this kid has only been with us for two months. I don’t think he’s done anything to anybody. The people in this city, that’s on me. I was in charge. I pushed the bloody button. You can do with me what you want for it, but please, don’t do this. He’s a kid, Ellis, he’s just a kid.”

Brandon was staring defiantly at Brody, not talking. Brody got the tape out, cut off a strip and taped his mouth shut, the kid looking up at him, jaw clenched. And then he watched his best friend run the knife into this kid, over and over. He was still trying to swing at him when he had him by the arms, until he finally wrestled the knife away from him. The kid was bleeding hard, his head on his chest.

Brody pinned him against the wall, reaching for the knife. “I told you to leave, if you couldn’t take it. You need to leave, Riley. This is between me and this kid.” Brody was digging into his neck with his arm, choking him, but he knew he couldn’t let go now, knew that he’d kill the kid, so he held on with everything he had, staring his best friend in the eyes, and Brody finally let go of him and took a step back.

“Take a walk. He isn’t going anywhere, and by the looks of it, he can’t tell you what you want to know now,” he croaked at him, rubbing his neck, and walked him to the door, not handing him the knife back. Brody’s hands were in fists, and he looked furious, but he nodded to him and walked out, slamming the door behind him. Still smart enough to know that he lost control then. He’d have to deal with his anger at him later.

He peeled the tape from the kid’s face, and a pair of steely gray eyes stared at him, something familiar in that look, too, only he couldn’t quite place it. He had six wounds in him, two that looked deep enough to need stitching, and he noticed for the first time that his chest was covered in scars, the same kind he carried on his back, thin white lines, and some round ones too, the kind he never saw on anyone before.

He moved him away from Maxton a bit and crouched in front of him with the med kit, not saying anything. The kid flinched when he cleaned the wounds, and he hoped he wouldn’t scream.

“Brandon, I don’t want to put that tape back on your face, but I’ll have to if you scream, okay?”

A small nod. The kid gasped and shut his eyes tightly when he did the first wound, but he didn’t scream, and the other one wasn’t as bad. He cleaned up all the blood and bandaged him up as best he could. He wished Ella could do this part, but he didn’t want her to know what Brody did to this kid, couldn’t bring himself to tell her, or anybody.

“Thank you for this, Riley. For not letting Ellis kill him,” Maxton’s voice, strained, quiet. And then he was talking to Brandon, softly, “Son, unless you’re protecting someone you love, tell him what he wants to know. I don’t know what it is you did that he was talking about, but whatever it was, I think it’s personal for him, and that means he won’t stop. Just tell him.”

The kid shook his head, “I can’t, Maxton. I am sorry, but I can’t,” and he was looking at him again, not Maxton, eyes still familiar, and between what Maxton just said about protecting someone and these steely eyes watching him with half curiosity, half hatred, he saw Hassinger in him, saw her eyes staring at him at the compound, before she swung the whip at his back. And he knew who the kid was, only he didn’t know what to do with the knowing.

Maxton must have seen it in his face, that he figured it out. “We already know I am not leaving here, Riley. Tell me what you know, and maybe I can help you keep this kid alive. Something tells me you disapprove of your friend’s methods.”

The kid wasn’t going anywhere, and he looked like he could use a break anyway. He pulled the jacket back on him and buttoned it up, wanting to cover up the damage Brody did to him, and then helped Maxton from the chair. He untied his feet, and walked him at gunpoint down the hall, to the closet room Laurel hid in that one time.

“Are your men scanning this place?” Maxton shook his head. He flicked the lights on. There were no windows in this room, and unless they were running scans, it should be safe. He had Maxton sit on one of the small chairs by the wall, and paced, trying to think of the fastest way to do this.