Infinity Rises (16 page)

Margaux is still rage-yelling at the top of her lungs when the gun, its ammo spent, begins clicking like a castanet. Ryan, having already hoisted Brent onto his shoulders again, is halfway back to the garden when Margaux throws the empty weapon to the ground, turns on her heels, and sprints after them.

There are only four functioning Drones left. If I can take them out, then the path to the bus will be clear. I take aim at the first one, but my grand plan is instantly shattered: ten more Drones walk out of the door-shaped holes in the side of the dome.

Even if I could take them all out before my ammo is gone, they’ll probably just keep coming. I don’t want to admit it, but I have no other choice. This battle isn’t worth fighting. We’ll have to find another way. I spring up from my position, sling my rifle onto my back, and take off across the field.

The Drones keep firing, and I keep running, bullets zipping past me on both sides. The Drones are terrible shots from this distance, but even a bad shot can get lucky, and more than a couple come a little too close for my liking. I keep my pace at full throttle all the way back to the garden.

When I arrive, Ryan and a deeply concerned Margaux are crouching next to Brent beside the concrete planter. All the others have started making their way through the brush. I can see the back of Brody about a meter in, swearing and pushing at Dean to move. Ryan has ripped a strip off Brent’s trouser leg and is busy tying it around his wound as Brent grits his teeth, wincing as he grips Margaux’s hand. I’d be lying if I didn’t admit that it brightens my mood a little to see him in pain.

“How is it?” I ask between breaths.

“It’s bad,” Brent growls.

“Shut up,” Ryan says, pulling the knot tight. “It’s not that bad. The bullet took a bite out of his thigh, but he’ll be OK.”

“I’m bleeding!” Brent groans.

“That’s generally what happens when you get shot,” Ryan says, wiping his bloody hands on his trousers.

Brent glowers up at me, and flecks of spittle spray from his lips. “I bet you’re loving this, aren’t you?”

I’m about to tell him just how right he is when another shot zips by. I look back at the Drones. They’re about forty meters out. They’re tromping blindly in our general direction, but they’re still closing in fast.

“Get in there, quick!”

With one eye on the Drones, Ryan pulls Brent to his feet and unceremoniously stuffs him headfirst into the tangled makeshift path the others have forged through the garden.

Margaux follows, then Ryan. The Drones are barely twenty-five meters away. Two bullets pit a tree beside the path, and another zings past so close to my head that I feel the air move against my cheek. Time to go.

I lunge onto the edge of the planter and shove my way into the thicket behind Ryan, awkwardly maneuvering my rifle as it catches on stray vines and branches.

I can hear the dull, thudding footsteps of the Drones getting closer. They’re nearly at the path. I push on behind Ryan without looking back, and it doesn’t take long before he shoves the last few strands of vegetation aside and stumbles out of the brush. I emerge right behind him into a recessed alcove formed by two curved bench seats, almost identical to the one we crawled into when we exited the vents on the opposite side of the courtyard.

Everyone is perched on the seats in silence, anxious fear painted on all their faces. I look back into the thicket and can just make out glints of silver between the matted fronds and branches as the Drones on the other side of the garden tromp and wander blindly, searching for movement. Even though it seems that we’ll be relatively safe where we are, the androids are way too close for comfort. We need to move on.

I walk through the alcove, crouch in the gap between the benches, and quietly push aside the thick leaves of a nearby flax plant. To the right, I see a wide, curving staircase leading up to a row of buildings at the top end of the courtyard. I slowly scan over a wide-open space of empty paving stones, and as I turn my head to the left, my body suddenly seizes with fright. Barely a meter away is the unmistakable triangular muzzle of a Hellion 90 triple-barreled, fully automatic shotgun . . . and it’s pointing directly at my head.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

“Hold it right there,” orders a quiet, graveled voice.

A lone soldier is standing just to my left. I carefully stand, raise my hands, and whisper an appropriate lie in my best frightened-schoolgirl voice: “I’m a civilian.”

“Come out here,” he whispers. “Slowly.”

I walk a few steps out into the courtyard and look over at the uniformed man. His eyes scan me up and down from beneath his raised visor. “Remove the weapon and hand it to me.”

I pull the strap up over my head and offer up my rifle. The soldier steps forward, carefully takes it, and slings it over his shoulder. “There are more of us,” I say, calmly turning to face him.

The soldier lowers his gun, I lower my hands, and he calls toward the nook. “You can come out now.”

The trembling voice of Professor Francis issues from the bushes. “Is it safe?”

“Yes,” replies the soldier. “Please come out of there.”

There are shuffling sounds behind me as the sorriest-looking, most ragtag bunch of people I’ve ever seen emerges in a tight group out of the nook and into the courtyard. Everyone is dirty, bloody, scratched up, and clearly exhausted. Maybe it’s mostly due to his “poor me” demeanor, but Brent looks especially rough as he limps pathetically, his arm slung over Margaux’s shoulder for support. The same goes for Dean, still gormless, propped up and being half-dragged along by Brody. The soldier looks over all of us. “My name is Private Carter. If you’ll follow me, we’ll get you cleaned up and have a medic take a look at your wounds.”

There are quiet sighs and looks of relief on some faces, but not on Ryan’s. His expression flicks to one of high alert. “The command modules!” he blurts at the soldier. “The R.A.M. is tracking the command modules!”

Private Carter nods. “It’s OK; we know. As soon as we realized that, we ditched them all into an open space and it blew every single one to pieces.”

“Where is that infernal machine?” the Professor asks, nervously scanning the area. “Did you defeat it?”

“No, but don’t worry,” replies the soldier. “Without the modules to hone in on, it stopped moving. Now it’s just standing there.”

Margaux raises her hand. “Excuse me, sir, but . . . there are robots with guns—”

The soldier raises his hand, stopping Margaux short. “Your shots alerted us to the situation. A sniper is being positioned on the roof to take the rogue androids out. I was sent to retrieve you from the alcove.”

“You knew we were in there?” Otto says, frowning at the soldier.

He nods. “We were watching from the window of the command post upstairs. Saw you all duck into the garden.”

“Then what was with the gun pointing?” I ask.

“Sorry about that. Just making sure you didn’t mistake me for a robot and put me down, too.”

Private Carter nods toward me. “You can shoot, and you . . . ,” he says, pointing his finger at Margaux. “Remind me never to get on your bad side.”

“If you don’t mind, Mr. Carter . . . ,” pipes up Professor Francis. “I would appreciate it if you didn’t encourage my students’ abhorrent behavior. I find your cavalier attitude very disconcerting; this is a tragedy of monumental proportions. Many innocent people, including my colleague Miss Cole, four of my students, as well as your very own men, and a Blackstone employee have all been killed.”

Private Carter nods. “I apologize; I didn’t mean any disrespect. You’re right, of course. I’m not very good at dealing with civilians.”

The Professor gives Private Carter a teacherly glower. “In fact, two of my students are still missing. Their names are Jennifer Cheng and Amelia Dee.”

“I’m sorry, sir. I haven’t seen them, but squads are still sweeping the complex. I’m sure they’ll find your missing students.”

Brody thrusts a hand in the air, but the soldier’s easygoing mood has shifted, and he waves it down. “Please, there will be time for more questions later. We’re getting everything under control, but the main computer is still malfunctioning and communications are down, so, as a precaution, please follow me to the temporary command post. I’m sure that as soon as the medic has checked you out and we’ve cleared Dome One, we can send you all home.”

Private Carter turns and heads off down a lamppost-lined path along a row of the very same buildings that, only a few minutes ago, we were running behind in the opposite direction. As everyone begins following Private Carter, I decide to lag in the back. I stare at Otto; she catches my loaded look and hangs back, too, as the others file past. We let them walk on a little before following at a distance. I scan past the group, farther down into the courtyard. The abstract sculpture we saw before is about fifty meters away, and beyond that, in the distance between some trees, I can make out the shape of the stationary R.A.M. It looks like there are soldiers moving around it, most likely trying to secure it while they scrape what’s left of their fallen comrades into body bags. Otto taps my arm. “Everyone is safe with the soldiers now,” she whispers. “Do you think we can slip away somehow?”

I nod. “Yeah, but we’ll have to wait for the right moment.”

“They’re gonna come looking for us as soon as they find out we’re gone,” says Otto.

“That’s why we’ll have to move fast and stay out of sight,” I reply. “We’ll head deeper into the compound, lose them any way we can, and hope like hell that Richard Blackstone hasn’t been evacuated.”

“If he was even here to begin with,” says Otto.

“Well, I guess we’re gonna find out,” I reply.

“Stop dillydallying, you two!” Professor Francis shouts. Up ahead, Private Carter is standing beside a doorway in one of the buildings, and everyone is filing in past him.

“I’m ready to go whenever you are. I’ll follow your lead,” Otto whispers with a determined nod, and we quicken our pace toward Private Carter.

The door is a fire exit just off to the side of the building’s main entrance. The cracked glass and bent frame are obvious signs that it’s been kicked in. We sidle past Private Carter and follow the echoes of the others’ footsteps up four flights of narrow stairs, through a stairwell door, and into a large, open-plan office. Desks have been pushed aside, cubicle walls have clearly been moved into particular positions to serve new purposes, and there are soldiers everywhere—more than thirty at a quick count. Some are organizing weapons and equipment, others are helping the wounded to and from a partitioned section in the corner, and some are hovering around a desk that has been pushed up against the windows overlooking the courtyard. Light from outside is filtering in, but the room has that distinctive dimly lit look you get from an office devoid of electricity.

Among all the activity, the desk is definitely the center of importance. A thick power or data cable of some kind is snaking out a window, and I can see the light of computer screens in the spaces between the murmuring soldiers.

Private Carter and another soldier carrying a sniper rifle emerge from the stairwell door, brush past me and Otto, navigate around the rest of our little group, and walk toward the desk. Private Carter unslings my rifle and props it against a cubicle wall.

“The civilians have been retrieved, sir, and Private Sekula here has dispatched the rogue Drones with sniper fire. He told me it was like shooting fish in a barrel,” he says, jabbing a thumb at the smiling man standing beside him.

One of the men hunched over the desk straightens and addresses the two soldiers. They’re standing in the way of his face, but I can hear his voice. “Good job, Sekula,” he says. “Get back on the roof just in case any more of those robots wander this way.” The soldiers salute the commanding officer, and as they move off to their respective duties, my eyes go wide.

The Commander is tall and solidly built. He has olive skin, thick, black, neatly side-parted hair, and a macho, yet distinguished, moustache. He’s also divorced, forty-six years old next November, drinks expensive tequila, and smokes Cuban cigars. The reason I know all this is because that man is Captain Javier Delgado, Covert Field Operations Supervisor, security-clearance-level nine, and . . . the commanding officer on thirteen of my previous missions. This is not good. I’m on a personal, unsanctioned mission. If he sees my face, there are going to be some serious questions coming my way—questions I’d most likely be answering in a military prison cell.

Captain Delgado looks over at our little band of misfits, and I quickly sidestep behind Otto. “What are you doing?” she whispers. I don’t reply; instead, I grab her arms so she doesn’t move and peek around the side of her frizzy brown hair.

Captain Delgado leaves the soldiers at the desk and joins our group. He nods at Percy and then extends a greeting to the Professor, grasping the old man’s hand and shaking it firmly. “For a moment, I thought we lost you at the Security Station. I’m glad to see you made it out safely.” The Captain scans the front row, and I quickly duck down out of sight behind Otto’s back, only barely avoiding being spotted. “I see a few new faces,” says Captain Delgado.

“Oh yes, these are some of the other students that I mentioned,” replies the Professor. “Everyone, this is Captain Delgado. He and his men rescued us when the power failed and the second dome collapsed.”

“The dome collapsed?” Brody blurts.

“‘Disintegrated’ is probably a better word,” says Percy.

“We found these three wading through chest-deep black sand,” Captain Delgado says, waving a finger at the Professor, Percy, and Dean. “How is the young man doing?” he asks, frowning in Dean’s direction. “Any improvement?”

“Sadly, no,” replies the Professor. “The neural device that linked him to that infernal robot seems to have done quite some damage to his mind. I don’t know how I’m going to explain any of this to their parents.”

“Well, I can tell you right now that you won’t,” says the Captain. “I’m very sorry about what happened in Dome Two, Professor, but the waiver you all signed is ironclad. None of you can speak a word about anything that has happened here. Ever.”

“B-but . . . ,” stammers the Professor. “I have to tell them
something
.”

Captain Delgado puts his fists on his hips and clears his throat. “You can tell them that this was a tragic industrial accident. A computer malfunction caused an explosion that sadly resulted in the deaths of three students and a teacher, and rendered a boy catatonic from the trauma of witnessing said tragedy. That’s what you will say. That’s all any of you will be permitted to say.”

“
Four
of my students were killed, not three!” barks the Professor. “And those children have very wealthy and powerful parents who . . .”

“Who are not nearly as wealthy or as powerful as Blackstone Technologies,” Captain Delgado says, leaving the Professor gaping at him like a fish on dry land. “Look, Professor, I’ve lost eleven good soldiers today. It makes me wanna tear a new one in whoever’s responsible, but I know my place. And my lips are staying zipped.”

The Professor doesn’t say a word, but he must be fuming, because Captain Delgado sighs and does his best to look consolatory. “Professor, I don’t know why on god’s green earth anyone would authorize a school field trip to a classified research facility, but it happened, and people died. None of this is your fault, but the truth is you’ll probably lose your job. On the bright side, the settlement you receive from Blackstone Technologies will make you a millionaire.”

Making sure to avoid being seen, I cautiously peek out from behind Otto. The “my word is law” expression on the Captain’s face is all too familiar, and I know exactly how completely helpless the Professor must feel right now. I can’t count how many times I’ve stood in front of Captain Delgado and had to bear his smug authority, but you just can’t win when someone else is holding all the cards. And Professor Francis knows it.

“Apparently, the
truth
is whatever you say it is, Captain.” I can’t see the Professor’s face from where I’m standing, but I can hear the bile coating every word.

Captain Delgado gives the Professor a patronizing smile. “Now you’re getting it.”

The Captain casually waves an open hand toward a far corner of the office. “We’ve set up a temporary infirmary. The medics can take a look at your injuries. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have some rather important issues to deal with.” And with that, Captain Delgado turns and walks back toward the huddle of soldiers.

I breathe a sigh of relief as Ryan lets out an altogether different exhalation. “What a complete assho—”

“Mr. Forrester!” Professor Francis hisses, cutting Ryan short. “There is no need for that kind of language . . . but if there were, I might be inclined to agree with you wholeheartedly.”

At the Professor’s coaxing, everyone begins moving toward the infirmary area in the corner. I make sure to stay on the opposite side of the group as we go, as far away from the eyes of Captain Delgado as possible, which, considering that he and I are in the same room, isn’t far enough for my liking. Otto, observant as ever, glances from me to Captain Delgado and back again as we all weave and bump past the sideways looks of the busy soldiers. Cubicle walls have been set up to provide a reasonably spacious separate region for the infirmary, and I do my best to nonchalantly glide behind the nearest one. Just inside the area, two office couches have been pushed together to form a waiting room of sorts. A soldier with a bandage wrapped around his forehead is dozing at the end of one couch, his helmet, combat mask, and visor resting on his lap. Further in, six desks have been pushed against the windows and far wall to act as makeshift beds. Five of the desks have soldiers lying on them with various shrapnel and blast injuries. The sixth desk is empty, and a rubber-gloved soldier is standing over it, wiping blood from its surface with a wet sponge. He looks over at us. “Need any help?” he asks.

The Professor nods at the soldier. “Yes, thank you.” He guides Dean and motions at Brent to come forward, as well. A concerned-looking Margaux, a pathetically mewling Brent, a vacant Dean, and the Professor all make their way toward the medic’s desk as Otto, Brody, and Ryan take a seat on the empty couch. Unsurprisingly, Otto pulls her slate from her satchel. I perch on the arm of the couch beside her, giving me just enough height to peek over the top of the cubicle wall and keep a wary eye on Captain Delgado. Percy wanders past us and flumps down beside the bandaged soldier on the other couch, absentmindedly chewing on a fingernail. Otto pulls some gum from her shirt pocket. She peels a piece, pops it into her mouth, then offers the pack around. I shake my head, but Brody and Ryan both gratefully take a strip.