Shutdown (Glitch) (12 page)

I hopped over the boulder blocking the bottom of the doorway. The door itself was still jammed so that it was only half-open. I reached back to help Adrien through when three short beeps sounded from the other side of the Med Center. The three-foot-thick metal blast doors in both corridors leading to the Med Center were closing.

Which meant we had exactly thirty seconds to get past the next blast door, and then past one more, to where the pod launch was located. Or else we’d be trapped inside. I took a quick glance out into the hallway behind me. The door was only fifteen feet away, and the path was clear of debris. We’d get there in plenty of time.

I gripped the upper half of Adrien’s body and Sophia shoved from the other side. But his shoulders were so wide, he got caught.

“Sideways,” Sophia shouted, “Turn him sideways.”

I shifted my grip to angle his shoulders sideways through the narrow opening.

“Halt,” a voice called out from behind Sophia. “Turn around!”

My heart leapt into my throat as I looked past Sophia in shock to see three Regs and a slight girl standing right inside the blast door, just feet away from the west entrance to the Med Center.
No!
They must have made it in before the last door had closed. I couldn’t imagine how they could have gotten here so quickly. But then I remembered how fast the Regs had run in the arena.

A smile curved upward on the girl’s cherubic face. She was a teenager, but she couldn’t have weighed more than ninety pounds. She spoke into her arm com, her voice sweet and high-pitched. “We have visual confirmation on Zoel Q-24.”

I held up my hand out of instinct, but no power crackled to life underneath my fingertips. The guards raised their weapons, and in the same half second, I heard the blast doors in the hallway behind me grating as they began to shut. Our thirty seconds were up.

I leapt backward, my grip on Adrien’s elbow like iron. His mother must have had a similar impulse. She threw Adrien backwards with what seemed like inhuman force. Between her push and my pull, Adrien’s body was finally yanked sideways through the narrow doorway. I kept our momentum going as I dragged him toward the blast door with a strength I didn’t know I had. I dropped down to my knees at the last second. With our bodies still slick from the gel, Adrien and I slid under the blast door right before it shut with a loud
clang
.

I heard the dull thud of laser fire behind the door and sat stunned for a moment. Adrien’s mother. Sophia, she—

“We need to hurry,” Adrien said, swallowing hard as he stared at the blast door. He blinked rapidly, like he was trying to shake off the befuddling haze of the sedatives he’d been on while in the tank.

I looked over at him, full of grief. “Adrien, I’m so sorry…”

His jaw tightened and he looked away from me, but he didn’t say anything else other than repeating in a monotone, “We need to hurry.”

Bile rose in my throat, but I managed to get to my feet anyway. Sophia wouldn’t sacrifice herself for nothing. I would get her son to safety.

“Try to put a little weight on your feet,” I commanded Adrien, dragging him to a standing position. I pulled his arm around my shoulder and we both stumbled forward. He was so weak, he had to lean most of his weight on me. With each step I was sure it was going to be too much and we were going to topple to the ground and miss the next door.

No
. The word blared in my mind. We would not fall.
We would not fall.
“The pod’s right past the next blast door.”

We got to the next door with five seconds to spare as it slammed shut. The Regs were probably getting through the doors behind us already. Blast doors were only a hindrance to Regs, not an insurmountable obstacle.

I looked around. The pod door was untouched. I’d been afraid it would have already launched without us, but there was no one else here. I spun around and saw that farther down, part of the hallway I’d cleared this morning had caved in again, no doubt from all the blasts shaking the compound. No one else had been able to make it through.

I felt a jolt of sadness mixed horribly with relief. The pod was still clear for Adrien, but so many others would be killed or captured. There was nothing that could be done for them, though. Adrien, at least, I could save.

I turned back to the escape pod door and clicked it open. The pod was a large cylinder, bare except for the seats and belt restraints lining the circular walls, stacked two high. I didn’t speak, just dropped Adrien’s gel-soaked body into one of the chairs near the door.

“Get your belts fastened.” I turned to shut and secure the door. I clicked through a small interface near the door to start the pod. Lights slowly glowed to life along the floor, and the whir of the engine started.

When I finished clicking through the launch sequence, I heard a noise. A loud banging. The Regs were getting through. Henk had estimated when he built the blast doors it would take a Reg at least twenty minutes to get through each one. They must have equipment we hadn’t anticipated.

I swallowed down my terror and sat in the chair beside Adrien, right by the interface. I fastened the belts across my waist and chest with trembling fingers.

I glanced over at Adrien. He looked up at me with his eyebrows furrowed together in bewildered confusion and said, “Sophia.”

Something glistened on his cheek. I couldn’t tell if it was a tear or leftover gel.

I started to say something, but then realized he still hadn’t strapped himself in. I swore and grabbed his straps, clicking them together as best as I could. The banging noise got louder.

I held onto the control stick and said, “Launching in three, two—”

I watched through the pod’s small window as a bright molten red circle appeared on the blast door out in the corridor. I didn’t bother to finish counting. I hit the launch button.

Immediately the pod flew up the chute overhead like a supercharged elevator. The force pressed me down against the seat of my chair so hard it felt like I might slam right through it and out the bottom of the pod.

Several of the packs that should have been stowed securely under our chairs flew out and banged around the floor as the pod rounded a corner and began to accelerate.

After a moment, the buzzing burst to life in my head again. I was too confused by the speed at first, but I finally realized: I had my telek back. We must have gotten far enough away from the glitcher who muted my powers.

I let it expand outward and suddenly the speed and force of the module didn’t seem so daunting. I always felt more in control when my telek was active, like the too-fast world of action and reaction was slowed to an acceptable speed. I felt forward down the tunnel we hurtled down until I could see the whole of it in the projection cube in my mind; it looked like a long worm burrowed under the ground and we were a tiny light traveling through its stomach.

And that’s when I felt the obstruction a couple miles ahead. The whole tunnel was caved in.

Chapter 9

MY EYES WIDENED AND MY
heartbeat sped up. I swore under my breath. At the speed we were going, we’d crash into the caved-in section in less than two minutes. I pulled back my telek from the length of the tunnel and surrounded our pod like a net. I imagined the cords of energy wrapping around it, slowing our speed as gently as I could.

Adrien’s head still pitched forward with the sudden deceleration.

I bit my lip hard as I concentrated, trying to transition to lower speeds more gracefully. It would be easier to just bring our pod to an immediate stop, like putting a hand over a rolling marble, but I couldn’t be sure that Adrien and I wouldn’t end up with concussions, or worse.

Finally we slowed and stopped. And not a moment too soon. I projected outward. The cave-in was only fifty paces ahead. The pod cylinder was on its side at this point in the track. Adrien and I hung suspended from what was now the ceiling, held in only by our buckles. When I released the straps belting me in, I tumbled down to the floor. At least my fall was broken by several of the packs that had become dislodged. I clicked the door-release button, but an error message popped up: E
RROR:
D
ESTINATION NOT ACHIEVED.
A
UTO-LOCKS REMAIN ENGAGED.

I impatiently hit the override button, but when the door finally opened, I was met with a wall of rock.

Shunt. I’d hoped there’d be enough space for us to slip around the sides, but the tunnel around the pod was carved with only inches of clearance. We didn’t have time for this. I was sure the Regs had climbed up onto the pod’s track and were sprinting down the tunnel toward us this very second. I wasn’t sure how far we’d made it—maybe five or ten miles? If it was five, they could cover that distance in ten minutes, maybe less.

I unstrapped Adrien, lowering him gently to the ground with my telek. Then I turned and put out my arm again, ripping out the ceiling of the pod that faced the collapsed tunnel. It was melded steel alloy, but with my power, the top popped off with no more resistance than the lid on a food canister.

I grabbed two of the loose packs from the ground, pulled the small rectangular med kit off the wall, and climbed out through the new exit. I looked back. Adrien was slumped against the wall.

“I’m going to lift you out now.”

He nodded.

“Good.” I climbed out through the top of the pod. My mast cells immediately reacted to allergens in the damp tunnel air, but I was practiced enough at deflecting it that I could still lift Adrien’s body out, in addition to keeping the cells under control. Splitting my focus like this used to be difficult. But after months of intense practice, now I didn’t even break a sweat.

It was pitch black in the tunnel. I must have busted the circuitry on the pod’s emergency lights when I took the top off.

In spite of my resolve to stay calm, panic bubbled up in my chest at the darkness. I hastily touched the panel on my arm for light, but it was paltry and only illuminated a small sphere around me. At least Adrien looked a little more alert. I set him down on his feet and he managed to stand on his own, but he still had to lean against the tunnel wall. It was clear that we’d never be able to outrun the Regs.

We were trapped in the dark underneath a mountain, with murderous machine men headed straight toward us. And I had absolutely no idea what to do next.

I tried not to think of the Regs coming down the tunnel behind us. I tried not to think about the fact that, back in the compound behind us, Adrien’s mother was probably dead. Too many things not to think about, and that wasn’t including the collapsed tunnel in front of us. My body started to tremble.

Stop
. Focus. I squeezed my eyes shut for one long second and took several deep breaths. First one thing and then another.

I needed to clear the tunnel. With my eyes still closed, I lifted an arm to move the largest chunks of rock and steel to the sides of the tunnel. The rocks scraped against each other as I moved them and the steel beams screeched.

I could already feel the rest of the mountain threatening to crash in from the weak spot above. Dirt sifted down, so I held up my other arm and kept the rest of the rock back. Sweat began to bead on my forehead. Splitting my focus on two objects was one thing, but holding this much mass back while also keeping my mast cells in check was far more taxing.

I looked at the small hole I’d made and realized there was no way I’d be able to get the pod through. Even if I cleared enough of the fallen rock out of the way, the walls were too close. Wherever I moved the pieces of rock, they’d only cause another obstruction.

Adrien finally spoke up. “We should fly out of the mountain.”

“We can’t.” I knew it wasn’t his fault, but I couldn’t help how sharply my words came out. “The tunnel’s too tight. The pod isn’t flying anywhere. And we’re still at least fifteen miles from the Surface.”

He just stared straight at me, his translucent gray eyes uncanny in the dim light. “We should fly out.”

“I can’t fly!” I said. He was obviously still not able to think straight.

“Why not?” he asked. “You just made me fly out of the pod.”

I was about to respond back that he was being ludicrous, that of course I hadn’t made him fly. I was simply using my telek to make him occupy another space where gravity didn’t matter and—

Oh.

Right. Wow. I blinked in surprise.

I’d only ever lifted other objects. I’d never really thought about lifting myself. A distant repetitive
thunk
ing noise echoed down the long tunnel behind us. It must be the Regs. They were gaining on us.

I raised Adrien up behind me and tugged him forward on an invisible leash. He floated along until we were well past the rubble. I released my hold on the ceiling, and more rock crumbled in and sealed off the tunnel behind us. It wouldn’t keep the Regs back for long, but it might help.

“Now,” Adrien said. “Fly.”

The absurdity of what he was asking struck me all over again. I couldn’t
fly
. But I also realized I didn’t have any choice except to try. I’d never be able to outrun the Regs on foot.

I closed my eyes and let the telek buzz in my ears until it was a steady drone, then I pulled out of myself and felt the shape of my own body in the tunnel. It was such a small thing to lift myself off the ground. Easy, even.

What I hadn’t expected was the disorientation. I tried to steady myself with my feet, but there was nothing but air. I lost focus and plummeted back the two feet to the ground, landing unceremoniously on my backside.

Adrien laughed, then stopped, looking as surprised at the sound as I felt. I stared a moment longer than I should have. Had I imagined the sound of his laugh? It had sounded so normal, so
Adrien
. Which was doubly absurd considering our position.

I closed my eyes again and lifted my body off the ground. I tried to focus only on the projection cube in my mind. Tried to ignore the rest of my senses that were screaming
Oh-shunting-hell-I’m-not-touching-the-ground!