Eko (NINE Series, #1)

  * * *

  The most accessible memory was the night Huma first heard the voices: a young woman with sore shoulders, standing in a kitchen, looking through potted herbs to peer out the window. The first whisper made her still. The second made her body swell with fear.

  Every room was searched. Then the great, winding streets outside, Huma’s heart pounding as she searched for the source for the voices in her head. The cacophony grew into a blistering roar, the view tinted white with terror.

  Then the noise began to fade. Within minutes, the world went silent again. Huma panted on her front porch, staring at the purple, florescent-lit sky, her tears frozen on her cheeks. Wonder seeped in, the memory taking on a faint orange glow.

  Artificial. Outside influence. Too many times relived, Sydel noted. And there was something else mixed into the moment: a rumbling hunger for more, a hunger that bordered on panic...

  Sydel put the recollection aside. Then she carefully lifted other strands of memory, flimsy as gossamer, searching for truth.

  Huma, meeting with the Sava cousins, just as she had said. Huma hitchhiking, buried in libraries, holed up in hostels, developing her Eko and Nadi skills. Huma, sitting outside of Sydel’s cell, rehearsing what to say.

  At the edge of the cluster, something caught her eye: something deflated, faint and flickering. Sydel removed the strand and coaxed it into clarity. A grey, crumbling memory: a baby boy sleeping in the crook of Huma’s arm. The memory was cradled with nervous, thrumming love, infused with the same kind of wonder as the woman’s psychic awakening.

  It gave Sydel pause. Did she want to know more about this woman’s other life, before her decades-long search for power? On the surface, there was no other memory of a son. Huma made no mention of it when she talked about her Eko development. Had she abandoned her family in the name of knowledge?

  Still another part of Sydel twitched to move to that section of Huma’s brain that connected to the spine and to shut it off entirely. She could do it with a flick of her finger.

  Sydel opened her eyes. Before her, Huma was pale and sweating. Cohen stood between the two women. His eyes turned to Sydel, questioning. What do you want to me to do?

  Sydel shook her head. As she took Cohen’s hand, Huma wiped her brow with her sleeve, worship in her voice. “Your abilities are extraordinary, Sydel, just extraordinary. So delicate. I barely felt any pain. To think, I might hold that kind of mastery very soon…”

  Finally upright, Sydel gripped Cohen’s elbow. His arm was warm and solid, as always. She used his strength to gather her courage.

  “You have no further to evolve, Huma.”

  Huma’s eyes went wide. Then they slowly narrowed. “What?”

  “You are at the peak of your gifts. You have been for some time now. It doesn’t matter who you meet, or how much you study.”

  “That’s not true,” Huma stuttered, drawing to her feet. “I have been evolving for over twenty years, every year growing stronger -”

  “In your perception, perhaps,” Sydel corrected.

  Huma’s nostrils flared. Subtly, Cohen angled his frame so he stood just in front of Sydel’s.

  “I don’t believe you,” Huma said finally. She sniffed, smoothing her silver hair back with both hands. “How could you possibly know such a thing? You are remarkable, Sydel, but you cannot speak to everyone’s ability to evolve. When we finally make contact with the NINE - ”

  “All that talk, and you’re still so eager for war and death?” Cohen interrupted.

  “I have never wanted their deaths, you idiot,” Huma snapped.

  “No?” Cohen countered. “So infusing weapons with that energy, getting Sydel involved in all of this, it’s for what? For fun?”

  In his anger, Cohen took a step towards Huma. She raised one hand. “Step away from me, Cohen Byrne.”

  “And what about when this is done?” Cohen growled, the veins in his neck bulging. “What’s your plan after that? Going to kill me when I’ve served my purpose?”

  Sydel could see the tentacles of Huma’s mind, rising, readying to strike. “Enough!” she commanded.

  Cohen and Huma continued to glare at each other. Then they turned to look at her.

  “You say you want to save them,” Sydel continued. “So prove whatever authority you hold and send me now, Huma. Now, or nothing. Send me to the surface to end all of this.”

  V.

  No visible cameras. Hallways in disrepair. Oxygen vents choked with red dust. Phaira gawked at the base’s condition as she followed Emir and the henchman down the stairs. This was the gathering place for a powerful mafia family?

  Then the halls began to brighten. Ahead, lights were strung around a metal door labeled 1. When the mercenary entered the keycode and held the door, Emir shuffled over the threshold, taking his time so Phaira could slip under his arm.

  Inside, four men and woman were hunched over makeshift Lissome stations, their faces awash with blue light. One of the men had greasy black hair and a long nose, and looked utterly miserable.

  Lander, Phaira recognized him. Was he the consolation prize for losing Anandi? Did they kidnap him and force him into service, like Cohen?

  “Wait here,” the mercenary said, jerking his head to the other hackers. “Don’t move or touch anything. Say anything to them and you’ll get a hole in your head.”

  Emir nodded, putting his hands behind his back. Phaira slid along the wall as the mercenary keyed in a code to the door on the opposite side of the room.

  “Excuse me, sir?” Emir’s voice rang out.

  Phaira twisted out of the henchman’s eye line as he leaned back into the room. Holding her breath, she glanced at the others in the room. Her flurry of movement had been noticed; their eyes were moving between the mercenary and where she stood. But no one spoke.

  “Could you ask Mr. Xanto if I might have a chair?” Emir continued. “I can’t sit on the ground like these young folks.”

  The guard huffed with impatience and turned away again. But now Phaira was close enough to slip through before the door slammed shut.

  On the other side of the threshold, two flights of stairs coiled down, surrounded by rock walls. Red dust floated everywhere. Phaira stepped into the henchman’s footprints as he clomped down to the middle floor, to the door labeled 2. But when he passed through the door, Phaira stayed on the platform. Finally alone, Phaira took in a few long, deep breaths. Stretching the overworked muscles in her legs and back, she wondered how much longer the charge in the stealth suit would last.

  Before her, the door to Level 2 opened again. The same mercenary headed back up to the first floor, with a second man following: dressed in tailored black, a head of white hair on a relatively young face.

  Keller Sava? Or Xanto?

  Mid-step, the white-haired man paused, as if sensing her presence.

  Then he continued his ascent. Sheets of dust fell through the stairwell. Phaira pressed her body into the wall, waving off any wisps of red.

  When they were gone, Phaira peered into the second floor through the door’s tiny window. As dusty-looking as the one above it, this space was larger, but far more crowded with men and women: guns slung across their backs, cleaning their weapons, arguing with each other.

  A bunch of bored mercenaries crowded into an underground space? she thought. I’m surprised they haven’t started their own bloodsport.

  Phaira moved away and leaned over the platform’s railing, peering down to the bottom of the rocky tomb. The top floor held the hackers; second floor, the muscle. Bottom floor: Huma, maybe?

  She heard the door click open behind her, and froze against the rail. At the edge of her vision, she saw the silhouette of yet another man, heading for the stairwell. She turned her head just a little to see.

  The physical similarity to Theron was striking: that same square jaw and jet-black hair, but his eyes were pale blue instead of amber, and there was a snake-like quality to this one, a twisted
meanness in his face as he bounded up the stairs.

  Keller Sava, she knew it.

  And in his rush, she realized, the door hadn’t closed behind him.

  Sliding across the platform, Phaira used two fingers to ease the door open, as if a breeze pushed it. Then she slipped inside.

  For several moments, she remained flat against the wall, observing each mercenary who walked by: their build, their weaponry, their awareness. Every variation of hair and skin color, build and muscle and scars, weapons over backs, weapons strapped to thighs. But the hired men and women had no cognizance of their environment, only themselves, it seemed.

  And no sign of Cohen, she noted. Her chest panged.

  But now I really need to get out of this suit. Too many people in this space. Someone is going to run into me.

  The easiest option was to assume the appearance of the group. So Phaira focused on the female recruits. There weren’t many, but a few wore the same bulky black body armor: likely provided by the Savas as partial payment for services. Some of the women wore scarves over their faces, or metal half-masks.

  Then Phaira overheard one of them complaining. “It’s too tight under my arms. If I move too much, it cuts off the circulation and my hand goes numb.”

  “So get another in a larger size,” the other woman growled, gesturing to her own blood-red body armor. “Should have brought your own. Don’t whine to me about it. Go get them to bring you another.”

  “I wasn’t whining,” the mercenary shot back. Her armor clicked as she walked through the partitions, and into a dim passage. Phaira stayed close to the wall, following.

  Within the corridor, a blonde woman emerged from a door and almost ran into the masked soldier.

  “Watch it,” the mercenary snapped, shoving the blonde away. “Go and get me the next size up of this torso armor. Now.”

  The blonde in white nodded and scurried in the other direction. As the masked woman stalked back to her companions, a glint by her waist caught Phaira’s eye. It was one of her 765-Calis pistols, neatly holstered in the women’s belt: dirty, but the prototype design unmistakable. Phaira bristled at the disrespect. Huma must have brought them in and dumped it with the rest of the weaponry. But that meant that the other one had to be in somewhere.

  Down the hall, the agent in white ducked into a storage locker. Silently approaching, Phaira lifted her hand to check for the HALOs at the nape of her neck: still stacked, still active.

  Phaira peered around the doorframe. Inside, the agent pushed through racks of black-plated armor. Stacks of weapons were piled in the corners of the room, some older models of rifles and assault weapons, some that she’d never seen before. Somewhere in this pile was the other Calis, she could feel it.

  The sound of heavy footsteps behind her. Phaira flattened her body against the wall, turning to check the source of the noise.

  Nox.

  Drenched in sweat, glowing with adrenaline. Slapping hands with another burly soldier before pushing through a door, twenty feet away.

  When his companions passed her, Phaira moved.

  The restroom held lavatory stalls and space to change, to shower, or just to sit. Nox had flopped onto one of the threadbare sofas, eyes closed, one arm slung over his stomach. The space was empty, otherwise.

  Still in stealth mode, Phaira slid to the end of the sofa and rapped her knuckles twice on the wall by his ear.

  His eyes popped open.

  “Nox,” she spoke.

  Nox inhaled. He sprang to his feet, strode to the open restroom door, closed it and dragged a chair in front of it. Then, with a quick turn, Nox sat down, elbows over knees, looking down at the floor and muttering: “Here to save the day?”

  Phaira’s temper flared. “Really, Nox?” She yanked off the suit’s hooded mask off and discontinued the current. Her white-clad body returned, a shock after so many hours as a living ghost. Nox didn’t seem affected by the reveal, though. His face remained dark and sullen.

  “I’m here for Sydel and Cohen,” Phaira said shortly. “And you, although you’re making me reconsider.”

  “Then you’re being stupid,” Nox retorted. “What’s your plan, Phaira? You’re surrounded by mercenaries. Pretty foolish to come in like this.”

  “Says the guy who works for a syndicate,” Phaira shot back. “What are you thinking? Why would you get involved with these people? And then to put Co in their path - I can’t believe you did that, Nox. I can’t believe it.”

  “Hey, I didn’t know they were going to recruit him,” Nox objected, though with less venom than before.

  “Recruit! Is that what this is called?”

  “It was freelance work,” Nox continued, ignoring Phaira’s outburst. “Just a temporary job, like all the other times, some side money before going back to the offices. They’ve always treated me well. Keller showed up one night, so I introduced Cohen, just to brag a little. But I don’t know, they decided that they wanted him to work. I tried to stop them, I really did. But you weren’t there, you don’t know.”

  Phaira said nothing.

  “I had a plan, you know, to get him out,” Nox said defiantly. “I’ve been working on it….”

  “Sure you were,” Phaira interrupted. “Sure looks like you’re planning an escape, Nox, you and your friends out there. No, I think you like it here. And Cohen is just getting in the way of your fun.”

  With a growl, Nox slammed his fist into the restroom door. “You never hear me,” he spat. “You always saw me as lesser, someone to just use as needed. Well, guess what, Phaira, the Savas think I’m a valuable asset. They think I’m worth having around. I’d rather be here than back at that office desk.”

  His voice dropped. “But I would never force Cohen into doing the same. I’d take a bullet for that kid and I will if I have to. This was all a mistake.”

  The freckles on his face grew darker. “And I don’t need you to save me. It would be nice if you saw me for once, though.”

  A thousand words swam through her brain: declarations, accusations. There were years of memories between them, but she didn’t recognize the man in front of her.

  Then again, he probably doesn’t recognize me either.

  But there’s no time to get into it.

  Phaira unclipped one of the HALOS from the base of her head and flung it at Nox. At the last second, he snatched it out of the air. “What’s this?” he demanded.

  “You’re so smart, you figure it out,” Phaira said, pulling the hood back over her head. “I’m getting Cohen and Sydel. Do whatever you want, but stay out of my way.”

  Nox’s glare wavered. Disgusted, Phaira restarted the suit’s electrical current. Within seconds, she was already invisible and at the exit.

  There was one last thing to do, though. Silently placing one foot on the chair, she shoved it with all her might. Nox tipped over with a shout. Phaira slipped through the space where his body once sat, her mind fixed on the contents of that storage locker.