The Adjusters (37 page)

“Those kids,” Aziz said, spluttering blood. “They’re maniacs.”

Henry gave him a hard look. “That’s what you wanted, isn’t it? Trained killers?”

Aziz reached out and grabbed his arm. “I think my leg is broken. A million dollars if you carry me out of here.”

Henry pulled away from him in disgust.

“Two million dollars!”

Henry stood up slowly and looked down at the general. “The main gate is that way,” he said, pointing. “I suggest you crawl.”

With that, he walked through the broken glass into the house, ignoring the curses General Aziz was throwing at his back. The interior of Mallory’s house had been ripped apart. Books had
been pulled from the shelves and strewn about. Paintings torn from their hangings. Ornaments dashed against the wooden floor.

Henry went straight for the office area. Mallory’s desk was relatively untouched. He searched through papers and books, looking for a single object: Mallory would have one of the SPIDIR
Initiators in his house. He was sure of it. Casting stuff aside on the desk, he found nothing and tried the drawers…locked. Then he saw it: an Initiator. It was lying right on the floor
– Mallory must have dropped it. He snatched it up and cast his gaze around the interior of the building, noticing for the first time the smell of burning coming from the kitchen. He followed
the smell and saw devastation: pots and pans thrown all around…knives jammed into the wooden work surfaces…

And in the middle of all the chaos sat a single figure.

Gabrielle.

She was cross-legged on the floor with a pair of kitchen scissors in her hand, all her attention focused on cutting what remained of a Picasso painting into tiny pieces that she had arranged on
the floor in front of her. Henry approached cautiously, but she showed no sign of knowing he was there.

“Gabrielle?” he said, kneeling before her. “It’s me. Henry.”

She didn’t look up from her work. “Henry? Aren’t you supposed to be dead?” Her voice had a distant, lifeless quality to it.

Henry placed a hand on her shoulder…

Lightning fast, she lashed out with the scissors, almost slashing his throat. Henry caught her wrist and held her firm. The girl’s eyes blazed with an insane fury.

“Destroy!” she spat. “Malcorp!”

“No!” Henry said, holding her arm tight. “It’s over! Do you hear me? Malcorp is finished. It’s over!”

He held the Initiator to the base of her skull.
I hope this works,
he thought.
If it doesn’t, forgive me.
He pressed the red button…

For a few seconds Gabrielle continued to stare into his eyes, but then something seemed to crumple within her and her whole body went limp. The scissors dropped from her fingers and her head
fell forward. She let out a sob.

“Henry,” she said, leaning towards him. He put his arms around her, praying he’d done the right thing – that shutting down her SPIDIR implant hadn’t caused brain
damage.

“Gabrielle?” he asked softly. “Are you okay?”

For a while she was silent…motionless… But finally she spoke. “I couldn’t stop myself… I hurt you…”

“It’s okay,” Henry said, almost laughing with relief. She could talk normally, which surely meant she wasn’t permanently damaged. “You’re going to be
okay.”

He looked around at a sound from the direction of the kitchen. There was someone else in the building.

“We have to get out of here,” he said, rising to his feet and pulling her up. “We need to find Fox and the others.”

Gabrielle looked at him through tear-filled eyes and said, “Blake.”

Before Henry could react, the kid ran from the kitchen, hitting him full force. They flew across the room towards one of the intact windows and smashed through, landing in a sea of glass. The
Initiator flew from Henry’s grasp and landed on the other side of the patio. Groaning with pain, he rolled onto his back, but Blake was already rising into a crouch.

“Hello, Henry,” he said with a smile as he raised a fist. But then a look of confusion crossed his face.

“It’s over, Blake,” Henry said, jumping to his feet and holding up his hands. “Malcorp isn’t in control of you any more. You don’t have to do this.”

Blake shook his head violently, as if trying to clear it. “My grandfather…” Blake’s voice trailed away. His expression was full of pain, as if he were having to fight
the ingrained programming harder than the other adjusted kids. Henry guessed that was the result of being Mallory’s grandson…an extra layer of brainwashing because of the family ties.
Poor kid.

“Your grandfather was using you!” Henry said. “Just like he used all the other kids at Malcorp High. He turned all them into robots…test subjects…”

Blake’s face contorted, his mental struggle clear. “And now you’re the one giving us the orders. Is that right?”

Henry shook his head. “No. I’m setting you free…”

He stopped talking as Blake reached behind his back and produced a twenty-centimetre-long kitchen knife. He looked at the blade in his hand and then at Henry.

“I’m sick of having all of you in my head.”

From the house, Gabrielle gave a cry. “Blake! No!”

Blake’s expression flickered and he looked at her with recognition in his eyes. “I’m sorry,” he said softly. “But this has to end.”

With a cry, he flew at Henry, slashing the blade in front of him. Henry ducked to one side as the knife swiped in front of his face. His back was to the edge of the pool and there was nowhere to
go as Blake came at him again, bringing the knife low to catch him in the stomach. Instead of trying to dodge – Henry knew from their previous encounter that Blake was faster and stronger
than him – he threw himself at his attacker. They collided and Blake staggered back, completely off-balance. Henry used his weight to twist them over into the pool.

They hit the water and sank to the bottom, still holding on to one another. As they touched the bottom of the pool, Blake’s mouth opened, expelling a stream of air bubbles. He struggled to
slash at his opponent with the knife, but Henry held his arm firm. He released just a little air from the corner of his mouth and tried to stay calm…

Blake thrashed his legs in an effort to kick towards the surface, but Henry wouldn’t let him go. Outside the pool, the big kid had the upper hand, but he was in Henry’s world now.
You might have super strength,
Henry thought grimly as he held on for dear life,
but I’m a swimmer.

And I bet I can hold my breath twice as long as you.

Sure enough, as the seconds ticked away, Blake’s efforts to free himself became more desperate. He had expelled all of the air from his lungs, but Henry still wasn’t letting him go.
Blake’s mouth opened reflexively and he choked… The knife slipped from his fingers and was lost at the bottom of the pool… His movements were weaker now… His eyes rolled
into his skull…

Henry allowed a little more air out from his mouth as Blake’s body began to go limp. Just a little longer… He couldn’t risk giving his attacker a second chance…

Blake’s body gave a spasm as he gulped water into his lungs, beginning to asphyxiate…

Henry kicked towards the surface of the pool, dragging Blake with him. Unconscious, the other kid had become a dead weight that threatened to slip through his fingers, but Henry gave it
everything he had. If he didn’t get Blake out of the water, the kid was dead. Breaking the surface, he gasped air into his lungs and tried to heave his attacker out. His muscles screamed with
the effort… Blake began to slip down to the bottom of the pool…

Gabrielle reached down and grabbed Blake by the back of his shirt, heaving him up with a cry of effort. With the last of his strength, Henry pushed too. Between them they hauled Blake onto the
patio, where he lay motionless.

“He isn’t breathing!” Gabrielle said.

“Get him on his back,” Henry said, pulling himself out of the pool. As Gabrielle pushed Blake over, Henry kneeled by his side. He laced his fingers together and placed his hands on
Blake’s sternum, trying to remember what he’d learned in life-saving class. He pushed down hard, forcing the lungs to expel the water they’d taken in. Blake’s body shook.
Henry pushed again…and again…

Blake choked, coughing up water. His breathing came in ragged gasps, but he was alive. Whatever fight had been in Blake was gone now.

“You did it!” Gabrielle said, cradling Blake’s head in her lap as he gasped for breath.

Henry didn’t waste a second, moving for the fallen Initiator. He retrieved it from the other side of the patio and repeated the process he had used to shut down Gabrielle’s SPIDIR.
Then he looked at the kid who had been intent on killing him just a few minutes before. Blake stared back at him blearily.

“Henry?” he croaked. Then his gaze fell upon Gabrielle and it was as if he was seeing her for the first time in a very long time. He reached out and took her hand and smiled at her.
Finally he said, “What happened?”

“You didn’t make the swim team,” Henry replied, placing the Initiator in his pocket. “Where’s Mallory?”

“He went to the medical centre,” Gabrielle answered.

Henry nodded and started towards the house.

“Be careful!” Gabrielle called after him. “He’s seriously mad.”

Henry looked over his shoulder at her. “So am I.”

Crossing through the wrecked house, Henry ran down the stairs leading into the garage. He looked over the vehicles, his eyes falling to rest on the largest: a Hummer with a sparkling black paint
job. Practically a tank.

Perfect.

The keys were behind the ignition. He grinned.
Guess Mallory never thought he’d have a car stolen from his own garage.
Turning the key, the giant engine roared into life. Directly
ahead the automatic garage door was closed. Henry looked around. No sign of a door control.

No problem.

A second later the Hummer smashed clean through the garage door, sped up the ramp onto ground level and screamed across the complex in the direction of the medical centre…

“Come out, come out…wherever you are!”

Trooper Dan stood in the doorway of the lab. Globes in the ceiling illuminated rows of medical equipment and gurneys covered with sheets. The cop closed the door behind him and locked it with
the key, which he placed in his pocket.

“No way out,” he called into the room, scratching his cheek with the metal claw on his left hand. “You may as well give yourself up.”

He took a few paces towards one of the gurneys – the space below it was hidden by a sheet.

“Come on, girl,” he said, voice reasonable. “I ain’t gonna hurt you… I’m just gonna rip your head off…”

He grabbed the gurney and slashed his claw through the sheet. There was nothing underneath. With a cry of rage, he picked up the trolley and threw it against the wall.

“Get out here now!” he screamed, veins bulging in his neck. “Don’t make me search for you!”

At the far end of the room, Fox crouched behind a vat of what appeared to be human brains, trying to still her beating heart.
Have to stay calm,
she told herself.
Have to
think.

There was only one way out of the lab – through the locked door. And the key was in Trooper Dan’s pocket. Fox looked around for any other exit from the room. There was
nothing…no doors…no accessible ventilation shafts…

Which, she realized, meant one thing…

If she was going to get out, she had to fight the cop.

There was a crash as he attacked another gurney, slashing at the sheet and then kicking the trolley against the wall in frustration when he found she wasn’t hiding beneath it. He continued
forward. It would only be a matter of time before he found her…

She looked around for something to use against him. She was no match for his physical strength, of course. Even the damage to his hand didn’t seem to be affecting him – if anything
it had made him meaner. And goodness knows what they’d pumped into him to take away the pain.

Another crash and a table went over.

“I think I’m getting warmer!” Trooper Dan said. He grabbed a rack of surgical equipment and pulled it over with a mighty clatter.

Fox looked around. Near her were several pieces of electrical equipment: what looked like an ultrasound device, some type of centrifuge and something that she recognized from hospital dramas on
the TV.
A defibrillator
– one of those machines they used as a last resort to get a patient’s heart pumping again
.
It basically gave them an electric shock. The machine
sat on a trolley, its two paddles resting in cradles on the front.

Checking round the edge of her hiding place, Fox saw that the cop was still ten metres away. Although he appeared to be out of control, he was taking his time over his search –
systematically working his way from one end of the lab to the other.
He’s enjoying this,
she realized.

“You know,” Trooper Dan said, his voice almost conversational once more as he threw over another trolley, “when I’m finished with you, I’m gonna go find your
cripple momma and put her out of her misery. Would you like that?”

Ignoring his words, Fox crept across to the defibrillator and reached up to a
power on
button on the side. Flipping it, she winced as the machine emitted a high-pitched whine. A light on
the side indicated that it was powering up. A sign read
Do not use until fully charged
.