Tracked (25 page)

We're halfway there when he hears a woman scream, then the whine of a frightened child. He lets go of me and turns toward their cries. “Phee, get out of here!” he shouts back at me. “I'll meet you at the vac!”

He jogs off, disappearing into the smoke.

Fireworks in the sky. Debris rains as our first fighter is shot down. A rebel drops from the gun deck. The magma cannon is empty, now unmanned. Even as my skull pounds and my weak legs want to give out, I know what I have to do.

The soldiers can't make it back to those vacs without ground support. Cash will die.

I run.

I bolt for the gun deck and scramble up the ladder.
Crouching behind the magma cannon, I center my weight behind it. Wait. No. I don't how to work this. Hank said Cyanese weapons were idiot-proof, but there's a whole bank of blinking switches at the base of the cannon, and it's not as if someone left me rusting directions.

I start to panic, but then I spy the triggered handles behind the barrel. As I get a grip and rock the handles, the barrel moves. I squint through the bull's-eye target tracking screen and slip my fingers through the trigger holds. My hands are shaking; I ignore the pain radiating from the base of my neck. I talk myself into a steady zone.

“It's just a steering wheel with built-in triggers. That's all this is.”

I strain to roll and turn the heavy trigger holds, looking for a target in the sky. At first, I track an IP fighter, but it moves too fast. I'm no soldier—I can't get a lock on it. Instead, I sight their biggest weapon, the hulking artillery vac.

I close my fists around the triggers. CRACK. The charged ball of fiery sap arcs up. The recoil drops me on my exhaust. The magma explodes and dissipates in the open sky.

Rust. I missed. And now the enemy knows someone's manning the gun deck.

I scramble up and try once more. This time, I squeeze every muscle in my core and widen my stance. When I sight the vac again, I take a breath and hold it.

CRACK. The magma screams along a sure trajectory. BOOM. A fiery blast against the aircraft's hull. It's not enough to bring it down, but maybe a few more hits will do the job.

Shots fire across the deck. I huddle behind the cannon, squinting to look for the enemy. An IP blitz bird hovers at ten o'clock; he's seen me and he's ready to take me out.

“Phee!” Cash screams. I flatten myself against the deck and struggle to block out the roar in my brain. I don't know where his shout is coming from. The static chatter in my head and the voices on the ground—I can no longer tell them apart.

“Phee!” Cash is on the ladder, climbing up to get to me.

More shots. The blitz bird's getting closer. I drop, putting my back against the cannon. “Cash! No! Get down! Get out of here!”

He ignores me, jumping up onto the deck.

The crack of gunfire, closer than ever before.

“Phee.” Cash presses into me. As I pull him closer, I see the dark, blooming stain. He's been hit high in the leg.

I jerk and pivot, grabbing the trigger holds, even as I kneel. With teeth gritted and tears in my eyes, I fire blindly, over and over until I hear the blitz bird drop and crash into the courtyard smoke. “Mother-rusting sons of—”

“Phee . . .” Cash's voice is strained. “Climb down.”

BOOM. BOOM. BOOM.

“No.” I claw at his jacket, pulling it off. I tie it around his leg. “I won't leave you!”

“The vacs won't wait any longer. I can't get down.”

“Yes, you can.” I crawl toward the edge of the deck, looking down for an escape route. I see one last rebel vac in the distance. It's already hovering two feet above the ground, but one of its bay doors is still open. Soldiers are pulling evacuees inside.

“We can make it,” I lie. I scan the courtyard again, scouting for signs of other enemy soldiers. A figure darts toward us. I don't have time to remount the cannon and I don't think the barrel will turn all the way around
.

I look back at the figure sprinting straight for us. When he yells, I can't make out the words, but I know the voice. I would recognize it anywhere.

My heart comes to life again, pounding as I watch him dodge and weave. He's an easy target for anyone in the air.

“Bear! Up here!”

A bullet whizzes past him. At first, I think he's been hit, maybe in the back, but then he surges forward, doubling his speed. He's a blur, rushing up the ladder. When he reaches the deck, the roar in my brain turns into a blinding squeal. I can barely see him anymore; he and Cash become fuzzed-out shapes. My eyes roll back for a second, unable to handle the input.

When I open my lids again, I'm seeing little more than dark patches and halos of light. I might as well be blind. I feel Bear's hot breath on my face. I reach out, my fingers graze his chin. “Bear. I can't see.” There's a groaning snarl in my voice—I sound like a frightened animal. “I can't see! You have to get Cash.”

“I've got you. We'll get you down,” Bear says. “I'll carry you, if I have to.”

“I've been shot,” Cash says. When he reaches for my hand, I feel the blood on his fingertips. “Hurry. Get her to the vac.”

Bear locks an arm around my torso.

“No!” I yell. “I'm not leaving without you both!” I feel the hesitation in Bear even as I fight his hold.

“Take her. They can come back for me,” Cash argues. “Please. Take her. Keep her alive.”

Bear jerks me off my feet and drags me back, pulling me down the ladder. I scream at Cash and fight to hold on to the gun deck, but Bear is too strong. He pries me away and lifts me into his arms, holding me in his fiercest embrace.

“Take me back. Please go back,” I sob. “Please.”

“I'm sorry.” He chokes. He is straining too hard to run and carry me. For him, there is no more room for words, only savage, gasping breaths. My forehead falls against his chest. He smells of ash and burning wood, copper and sweat. I focus on the acrid scent, desperate to sense something beyond the hammering roar in my skull.

The artillery fire on the ground and the sound inside my head—it's all one throbbing bundle of noise, one that matches the rhythm of Bear's pace. In his arms, I am carried forward, rocking up and down, back and forth between flame and smoke.

We stop. I feel more hands, more arms about me. They are shouting and lifting me up into the vac. I lie on a surface that vibrates with movement. I am rising.

“She can't see,” Bear says. “Help her.”

Someone examines me. Checks my vitals. Cuts open my zip-front. Rolls a bio-scanner up and down my body. “I'm getting a bad reading. Interference. A frequency coming from somewhere on her. Lieutenant Kinsey, get over here, check her head.”

Hank kneels beside me and runs his fingers over my scalp.

“Cash Dradha was shot,” Bear shouts, his footsteps retreating toward the bay doors. “I have to go back and get him.”

“Negative,” Hank snaps. “We are moving out. His orders. We'll relay remaining ground forces. They'll pick up Dradha, if he's still alive.”

No. I can't lose Cash.

I hear the groan of the closing doors. A scuffle. The stomp of boots all around me.

“Let me go!” Bear says. “You can't just leave him to die!”

“Wait, back off, soldiers.” A voice asks, “Larssen, is that your blood? Did you get hit out there?”

More voices. More movement. People are scrambling around us both.

Bear slumps beside me. I feel his presence even as my brain is singing death, telling me to go to sleep. He reaches for me, our fingers lace, but they are already pulling him away. I'm too weak to keep his blood-soaked hand in mine.

I don't know where Bear is anymore. They have taken him from me.

The vac boosters fire. We are climbing high. The medics shout to be heard.

“Look at this.” A female medic touches the scar on my neck, the throbbing knot of agony at the base of my skull. My old wound, stitched the night the DP first picked me up. I scream when her fingers knead the spot. “Hand me that bio-scanner again.”

“Something's implanted,” one of them gasps. “I'm picking up the frequency. It's a tracker.”

“What . . .” I choke. I can't even whisper now.

“Get a surgery kit, stat. Clear that table. We have to get it out.” The medic says, hovering over me, “Oh my god, Hank. She led them here.”

The needle sinks into my neck. My fists relax, my fingers uncurl. I have so much blood on my hands.

I am lying in a field of white poppies. Night is coming.
The last peep of sunlight turns the clouds into rosy wisps against a dark sapphire sky. In the afterglow, giant snow- colored blooms droop from the stalks. I am drunk with their scent.

He walks toward me, but I don't have the strength to reach out for him. I open my mouth. I'm so parched, all I can do is whisper his name. “Cash.”

He answers, only I realize it's not him. I open my eyes, and it's just a fever dream. I'm lying on a cot. With the beds all around me, I must be in some kind of field hospital. The open flaps of the giant tent whip in the breeze. In the distance, I see the pale blossoms. Green velvety stalks tower like trees.

I blink and adjust to the dim light. Hank is leaning over me. I try to sit up, but he touches my arm. “Take it easy. We almost lost you.”

When my head hits the pillow again, a growling pain awakens, rippling up my spine and all the way to the base of my skull. “How . . .” My throat is on fire. It hurts just to swallow.

Hank sits on the edge of my cot. There's something in his hazel eyes, but I can't read if it's pity or regret. “There was a two-way transmitter, a tracker. We think Benroyal must have had it implanted the night you were arrested.”

No. The first time I woke up at the hospital. I remember the stitches on the back of my neck. The pain. Bagged and tagged, I was Benroyal's asset from the start.

“I couldn't see,” I croak. “I was blind.”

“You're lucky it was temporary. That tracker could have fried you. Hal took a look at it. It had a built-in receiver, but it wasn't actually programmed to pick anything up. It was only programmed to track you. You weren't supposed to hear anything.”

“But I did.”

“Hal thinks the accident at Sandridge probably damaged it, kicked on the receiver. And when you started picking up chatter on that IP frequency, your brain couldn't handle it. We got it out,” he adds. “But your location had already transmitted.”

I know what he's thinking.
You led them to us. You betrayed us. You wounded us all
. How many of his men are injured or dead because of me?

I groan and reach for my neck, but Hank stops me again.

“Don't,” he scolds. “You'll rip your stitches.”

His words trigger a sickening flash of déjà vu. I roll onto my left side and try not to vomit onto the concrete floor. It's then I see who's sleeping in the bed next to me.

“Bear,” I cry out. The whisper is hoarse and hollow.

He doesn't answer, and I think he must be unconscious. When his chest rises, I catch the soft wheeze of his breath, but he is much too pale, little more than a ghost.

“He's going to make it,” Hank reassures. “For a while, we were worried. The bullet in his back tore him up pretty badly. Mary's got him pumped full of anti-gel and painkillers. He'll come out all right.”

“How long have I been out?”

“Couple of days.” He pauses, then slips a flex into my hand. “When we tried to upload the files, the card erased itself. This is all we got. The whole thing's corrupted now. He set us up, Phee.”

I turn it over, recognizing the stolen flex. I read the frozen screen.

You must never grasp at things you are not strong enough to hold.

Rage burns through my tears. This whole time Benroyal knew I had the card. He might as well have put it in my hands. The flex, the implant, the secrets in his study were all just a game to hunt down his enemies. Maybe he suspected James and Cash. Maybe he was certain all along. I think of each move I made, bolting home, running into Yamada, chasing Cash to the sap house. Benroyal tracked every step. He played us. Me, most of all.

“Where is James?”

Hank shakes his head. “We know Benroyal's men boarded his vac, but James wasn't there. It's been complete flex silence, and no one knows where he is. Locus is a mess and the newsfeeds are going crazy. The rumors are wild, Phee. They say Locus was nearly bankrupt. That James committed suicide.”

“Suicide?” The word trembles on my lips. James can't be dead. I know he is. I'm positive he isn't. I don't know which is the lie. “Locus can't be bankrupt. James said he had everything taken care of. Did they kill him?”

“I don't know.”

“What about Cash?”

He looks away. “Phee, I . . .”

Wide-eyed, I wait for him to finish.

“I went back myself, to pick up our wounded, but there's been no sign of him.”

“No.” I sit up. “There has to be something. We have to go back.”

Slowly, he shakes his head. “There's nothing to be done. There's nothing left.”

“But he can't be—”

“That base is smoke and ash. He's gone.”

I shudder, unable to control the ugly, wracking sobs. My sorrow is a silent drowning choke. Hank moves closer, to console me, but I flinch and curl into myself.

“I'm sorry.” He stands up. He knows there's nothing left to say.

After the attack, we never made it to Manjor. Instead, we fled Bisera altogether. We took shelter in the snow-white sea of the Pearl Strand, the neutral border zone between Cyan and Bisera. Here, we make camp and pick up the pieces.

It's been a month since the ambush, and I've fallen into a routine. Wake up. Report to Hank. Do whatever needs to be done. The Cyanese keep sending more supplies, so we usually have our hands full unloading incoming vacs. Otherwise, I volunteer for grunt work or patrol duty or infirmary shifts with Bear. I prefer construction detail. It's not that I'm good at putting up tents or laying brick, it's that I crave the sense of building something. Despite everything, that's why we carry on. Stone by stone, we mend a rebellion.

We worked on the armory today. It's nearly done, and already half full of weapons. We're finished for now, and while the rest of the crew heads to the mess hall for dinner, I slump onto the soft grass outside its front doors. On my knees, I lift my flask, then gulp the last of the water. I'm worn out, but still not tired enough. Can't seem to quiet my mind. I need to take a walk after dinner. Go for a climb. Seems that's the only thing that gets my brain off high alert.

I shouldn't be so on edge. They say we're safe in the Strand. That we've put down roots in ground too sacred to be attacked. I look up, spying the proof. To the east, the forests of giant poppies march up and out of our little valley, every inch hallowed ground. To the west, up the slope, is the Hill of Kings. Nine centuries' worth of tombs still stand, a memorial to better days. Hard to believe Cyan and Bisera built it together. For almost a millennium, they lived in peace and buried their leaders side by side. Every day, I'm drawn to those graves, yet I avoid them for the same reason: Dead or alive, this is where Cash is meant to be. Fallen, he'd be laid to rest. Standing, he'd rally us here.

I close my eyes, and I can still see him, smell him, feel the slick of his blood on my fingertips. The memory's too painful, so I pull a flex from my pocket. On it is the antidote. The one thing that takes the edge off my grief. I've watched this bootleg feedcast a dozen times. I keep watching because it gives me hope. I see it and know our gamble wasn't all for nothing.

On the tiny screen, Charles Benroyal sits inside the Castran Assembly House. He is near the dais, watching from the sideline of the visitors' gallery. Up front, he is barely visible, hidden in a tight knot of suits. Around him, Sixers and feedcast crews fill the space, while politicians occupy every seat on the floor. Predictably, the real public's been forced outside, onto the atrium and steps of the House. For this particular press conference, there's only room for the allied elite.

Prime Minister Prejean stands at the grand podium. Above him, Castran flags and corporate banners. Before him, a panel of bulletproof glass. On the periphery, soldiers in black, lined up in neat little rows.

It is the day after. The day after the mountain rally, the day after the ambush, the day after everything. Prejean takes one step forward and begins his formal statement:

“Yesterday, citizens of Castra and Bisera came under attack in a series of calculated and deadly terrorist acts. During yesterday's rally, His Highness Prince Cashoman Dradha was taken by force. We do not know if he is alive or dead, or whether or not he's being held for ransom. Phoenix Vanguard, who was one of our own, is also missing, and we are devastated by the loss.”

Was. Already, I belong only in past tense. When he pauses, I zoom in on Benroyal. King Charlie's expression is grave and tight, but his eyes dance. I'm certain he knows exactly where I am. And where Cash is. Behind the mask, he is smiling at me.

Prejean continues. “As of this afternoon, the facts are few. Midway through yesterday's rally, Miss Vanguard disappeared. Her rig exploded, but no evidence of her remains have been found. And while we are certain Prince Dradha was kidnapped, we have not yet determined whether she was the victim of a tragic accident or a willing accomplice in violent, treasonous acts.”

Again, the look. That secret smile in Benroyal's eyes. Prejean's words—I bet every one of them was scripted by Benroyal. Of course, the vague explanations and omissions make sense. King Charlie is waiting. He doesn't yet know how he'd like to twist the facts. Cash and I, we are cards to hold. Later, he can lay our bodies on the table.

“At this time, the Castran Circuit Control Board is currently investigating Locus Informatics and a wager that may be linked to yesterday's attacks. As of now, all shares are frozen. Our administration gratefully acknowledges the contributions of Benroyal Corporation, which has generously offered to fund operations of the courts, until these matters are settled.”

Benroyal can barely keep a straight face. He pretends to close his eyes, as if lost in private anguish, but I know he's savoring victory. He doesn't see what's coming.

Prejean begins to wind down the speech. “Yesterday was a terrible day for our nation, but we are proud of the heroic efforts made by officers of the Interstellar Patrol. After discovering a terrorist base, our men and women made a valiant stand to rescue Prince Dradha and capture the enemy. Tragically, five officers were wounded and eight were killed. We salute these fallen soldiers. We grieve with their families.”

I scan the faces in the chamber. They've lost no sons or daughters. On the floor, no one is mourning.

The prime minister makes his final plea. “And it is for these fallen brothers and sisters, I beg. For Castra. Because our very way of life is at stake, and we must do whatever it takes to root out our enemies and bring them to justice.”

He is nearly breathless now, carried away by his own words. You could almost believe them. At last, he stares into the cameras. His eyes don't scan the floor anymore, because this message isn't meant for the gallery. It's meant for the rest of my world, for South Siders in their living rooms and for those who stand outside.

“Today, I ask you, our citizens, to help. When Domestic Patrol officers knock on your door, share any information you have. If you are able and of age, answer the enlistment call. Stand with me, and contribute to the cause of freedom.”

When he finishes, the soldiers take one step forward. Crisply, at attention, they salute the audience, while the
Sixers
and
politicians
politely
applaud.
Quickly,
I
scan
the sea of people and pinpoint the bogus feedcaster, a second before he reaches into his bag. He slips two steps closer to the dais. The pod of raw sap barely fits in his hand. It's a small, gray, thin-skinned ball, the kind designed to rupture easily when used for fuel. But the pod doesn't stay in his grasp for long. In one quick, desperate stroke, he hurls it.

“Give us Abasi!” he shouts as it bursts against the bulletproof glass. The dull thud is startling, and the murky splatter still makes my stomach twist. It's like watching a corpse hit the ground. The entire chamber sucks in a breath, and for one long second, holds it. Then the IP guards descend on the rogue dissenter. They pounce and drag him from the House.

And it begins.

The chamber doors part, gasping open like an intake valve. As the IP guards pull the man through it, a spark of anger pistons through the crowd in the atrium, igniting a roar so strong, it breaks through the lines of the soldiers. A riot is born, and the feedcast ends with the sound of a thousand shouts as the mob surges into the House. The cut's so abrupt, you'd almost miss the eye-blink of footage. But it's there. I see the look. I freeze the screen and stare at him.

Benroyal isn't smiling anymore.