Eko (NINE Series, #1)

  * * *

 

  In the darkness, Sydel could make out the silhouette of Cohen’s broad back. She longed to rest her forehead on it.

  Just a little longer, she told herself. Hold together just a little longer.

  The sound of rusted metal-on-metal echoed throughout the tunnel. Up ahead, a door broke open, letting in a burst of sunlight. Sydel shielded her eyes with her hand and followed Cohen to the outside.

  They had emerged onto a rocky platform, surrounded by orange-striped cliffs one hundred feet high. The wind moaned through the canyon. Sydel shivered.

  Then Keller Sava blocked out the sun, looming over her. “This is what’s going to happen, Sydel,” came his whispery voice. “You’re working for me now, without question, without argument.”

  Rattled, Sydel sought out Cohen, but Keller swayed to remain in her line of sight. He raised a thin finger to hover right before her nose. “You are going to send out an Eko distress call,” he told her. “In all directions, in as many kilometers as possible. You beg your ancestors to come and rescue you. You say nothing about any of us here.”

  “I’m not - ” Sydel started to protest, but at the sight of Keller’s cold blue stare, she shrank back, swallowing her words.

  “If you do so, without incident,” Keller continued. “I’ll let you leave.”

  No, you won’t. She was quite certain of that.

  When Keller backed off, Cohen took his place. His anxious face looked from Sydel to Keller, who was now climbing down to the canyon floor. Huma hesitated before following the Sava’s path.

  “We can run,” Cohen mouthed to Sydel.

  But his worried thoughts reverberated all around him: Where would we go? How could we evade their hackers, their psychics, their mercenaries just begging for an excuse to attack something? What would Phaira do?

  “Just stay with me,” she whispered, trying to keep her teeth from chattering. “Just stay next to me.”

  Cohen held her arm as she stumbled over the slippery rocks. Every step heightened her fear. She had no idea what might happen. She wasn’t even sure what Huma and Keller were talking about: ancestors, the NINE. When she insisted on going to the surface, she thought to use her Eko to contact someone for help, NINE or not. Incapacitate Huma. Run for her life.

  She wasn’t expecting Keller to come along. But Keller was the leader of the entire operation, it seemed, and eager to begin his bloodquest. He’s here to ensure we don’t try to escape, Sydel soon realized. And he wanted the first glimpse of whoever might come. Maybe even the first kill. This man had no qualms about making a decision to end someone’s life, Sydel could tell. Anything might set him off.

  At ground level, they all took a moment to catch their breath. Dust kicked up and settled again. A bird’s shrieking call bounced off the rocks. The heat intensified. Even as he swiped his forehead with his sleeve, Cohen kept his word and remained close to Sydel, blocking Keller from view. Huma panted for breath, red-faced and leaning against a boulder. For a very brief moment, Sydel felt a twinge of sympathy for the older woman; she was forty years their senior, after all.

  Keller didn’t seem to feel the heat at all. His eyes fastened on Sydel again. “How old are you, Sydel?” he asked, the word ‘old’ drawn out.

  “I’ve told you, Keller; she’s not one of the NINE,” Huma chimed in, smoothing back her silver hair with both hands. “She wasn’t even alive when it happened.”

  “She’s familiar.” The words were said with flat certainty. “Why is she familiar?”

  “That’s not possible, Keller, look at her, she’s - ”

  “It is certainly not possible,” Sydel said indignantly. “I’ve never left my commune before six weeks ago and I never attacked a person in my life.”

  Keller squinted at her. Involuntarily, her right hand twitched. Keller’s gaze dropped to her fingers, and she heard his slight gasp.

  He is afraid of me, she realized. He really thinks I’m one of these NINE.

  A long pause. Then Keller ordered: “Over here. Out of the sun.”

  The group wandered into a shaded area that hadn’t been smothered of life. Huma swept her hand in the direction of the base, hidden inside the cliff. “My students have activated the barriers,” Huma announced. “Your men are at the ready within. Shall we begin?”

  “Now,” Keller told Sydel. “Do it.”

  Sydel’s mind raced. She could pretend to call out to these people, just to appease this man. But when nothing happened, what then? Would Huma give her away? And what of these NINE? What would they do to her when they realized her deception?

  The sound of a metal click echoed through the desert.

  “Oh,” Huma gasped, the color draining from her face.

  The barrel of his silver firearm pressed into Cohen’s left temple, Keller’s face held no expression. “Now, please,” he stated to Sydel.

  Sydel’s hands were on fire, but she forced herself to turn away from Cohen’s bulging eyes. Slowly, she peeled open the barriers of her mind, like a flower forced to unfold.

  Then she released one long, wailing cry for help in all directions. As it rippled over the landscape, she kept pushing, her call travelling beyond the canyon, through the trees and trenches. The pressure on her brain intensified. Her body twitched, but she held onto the wave as it spread outwards, further and further, biting her lip so hard that she tasted blood.

  Then, there. Something. Someone.

  The wave stopped. Sydel’s consciousness gathered into a single focus, and swirled around the being that remained so still.

  But there was nothing to latch onto, no emotion around this being: only frank observation of Sydel’s presence. Sydel picked up a flash of green-streaked hair, of black eyes, a blue glow.

  Then the being disappeared.

  Confused, Sydel searched for some flicker of movement. She spread out her senses again, hunting.

  Now and again she caught a glimpse of green. Closer, now. Much closer.

  Someone grabbed her arm, jerking her back to her physical world. Keller glowered down at her. “Well?” He still held the firearm to Cohen’s temple.

  “Someone is coming,” she stammered between gulps of breath. “Right now. Please, please put down the weapon. Please.”

  Keller looked to Huma. She was watching the exchange with a stricken expression. Did Huma pick up on the presence of this being? Perhaps not, the woman just nodded. Keller glanced back at Sydel, clearly suspicious. But he lowered the firearm.

  Pushing Keller aside, Cohen leapt over to Sydel. “Are you okay?”

  Even after that, he was still concerned for her wellbeing? Though Sydel wanted nothing more than to jump into Cohen’s embrace, she gripped her upper arms instead, pushing her nails into her skin, willing her body to stop shaking.

  Keller pushed all three of them in a circle, their backs facing each other. He gestured to his own eyes and then to the area all around. “Nothing funny,” he ordered. Then he spoke into one of those Lissome squares, ordering Xanto to place all the recruits on alert, for the hackers to prepare for blackout conditions.

  As he spoke, Sydel felt a knock against her mind: it was Huma trying to establish an Eko channel. But Sydel had already shuttered up her brain, terrified of the ominous shift in the air, the tension billowing, building.

  A trace of sound rippled over the group, just a faint rustle, but enough for Keller to swivel to the east.

  Then a silhouette emerged from behind the brush at the far end of the canyon. Sydel heard Huma’s sharp inhale; the sound of Cohen’s boot grinding the earth; the click of Keller’s safety being shut off. Sydel’s heart beat faster and faster, almost choking from the spasm.

  The shadow stepped into the blazing sunlight, a mere thirty feet away from them. It was a woman: ghostly pale, with bluish hints to her lips and under her cheekbones. Deep brown hair streaked with green, parted down the middle and folded into multiple braids. The woman wore layers of sha
peless cloth, hanging straight from shoulder to ankle, deep green and teal, with subtle leaf patterns and striped sleeves. Her feet were bare. Her black eyes found Sydel’s. There wasn’t much time.

  Get away from here.

  Huma looked between Sydel and the stranger. She sensed the exchange, but Sydel kept the channel narrow and impenetrable. These people mean to kill you and your kind in vengeance, she told the woman via Eko. Run away.

  The stranger tilted her head. Her gaze shifted to the others. Huma clasped her hands to her chest with delight. Cohen didn’t move or even breathe, so frozen in place.

  Then Keller stepped in front of them all. His finger was tight around the trigger, but Sydel could see his arm trembling, his body pulsing red with energy.

  Go! Sydel pleaded to the stranger. They want to torture and use you to track down the others.

  The stranger didn’t move. But her voice emerged in Sydel’s head: soft consonants, her accent like water rolling in and out. We know. These people have not been subtle. And we learned of your existence some time ago, Sydel.

  We? Sydel recoiled. Her eyes darted to the edges of the desert. You know my name?

  I knew your parents. A long time ago.

  Rough fingers dug into Sydel’s upper arm. The Eko channel broke. Keller was in her face. “What are you doing?”

  “Get off her!” Cohen bellowed.

  Keller swung his firearm in a wide arc. Cohen had already drawn the pistol hidden in his waistband. Barrels aimed at each other’s chests, neither man moved from his position.

  Next to them, Huma took a small step in the direction of the stranger. Sydel sensed a ripple: efforts to make an Eko connection. But the green-haired woman ignored Huma. Her black eyes were fixed on Sydel, and once again, the connection clicked in. But before the woman could speak, Sydel sent a final plea down the channel: Please, just go! She cannot be trusted. No one can, you must believe me.

  A shock of cold metal on her temple.

  Cohen’s cry. “Don’t, Keller!”

  Sydel didn’t look at the evil man. She just looked to see if the stranger had left.

  She was gone. Good.

  “That was one of them,” Keller sputtered, between hard bursts of breath. “She’s ruined everything. She’s one of them, I knew it from the start. Huma, you set us up!”

  When Huma finally turned, there were tears in her eyes. “It’s a mistake, Keller,” she choked out. “Sydel was confused; the NINE must have done something to her -”

  The gun barrel pressed into Sydel’s temple. She closed her eyes, waiting for the blast.

  Then Keller grabbed hold of Sydel by the hair. Yanked forward, limbs dragged across the ground, the sand and stone scraped her exposed leg before she caught her footing. Through Sydel’s tearing vision, Keller’s face was a swirl of red.

  “We were like brothers,” Keller was muttering. “I took you under my care, I even looked the other way when it came to this wretch.”

  Cohen lifted his hands. His firearm dangled from his thumb in submission. “Keller, please.”

  Behind Cohen, Huma kept looking back to where the stranger once stood. But there was nothing but sand and wind.

  “Huma,” Keller ordered. “Assemble your people. This isn’t over.” He twisted his hand in Sydel’s hair; she cried out in pain as Keller propelled her up the stony ridge.

  Fifty feet ahead, the entry into the secret tunnel swung open. At the sight of it, Sydel grabbed the hand that gripped her hair, clawed at the fingers, tried to twist away from the man.

  A whistle of air. Sydel’s cheekbone erupted in fire. Her hands flew to her face, just as the grip on her hair released. She dropped to her knees, spots dancing in front of her eyes.

  Over the ringing in her ears, there were the sounds of struggling, grit and rock scraping underfoot, faint cries from the older woman, begging the men to stop.

  But a calm version of Huma’s voice was in Sydel’s head. Disarm Keller. Shut down his brain. It’s the only way.

  Sydel’s vision cleared, just in time to see Keller shove Cohen over the rocky incline. Cohen tumbled, head over feet; red scrapes bloomed on his arms and face before he finally skidded to a stop. Through the cloud of up-kicked dust, Sydel could see Huma in the background. Her hands were clasped to her chest, even as her eyes remained cold.

  You can see that he’ll never stop. He’ll never let us free. You know you can do it. You must do it, Sydel.

  Keller took aim at Cohen’s heaving back.

  “No!” Sydel cried out.

  Keller stumbled. So did Cohen and Huma, as if hit by a gust of wind.

  Then Keller was looming over Sydel again, snatching at her upper arm, hauling her to her feet. As he pushed her into the secret tunnel, Sydel caught sight of Cohen’s scratched, horrified face.

  Then the door slammed shut and everything went dark.

  VI.

  The soldier was right, Phaira mused as she emerged from the storage locker, moving her arms back and forth testing the black body armor. Tight under the arms. No air circulation. Not very well manufactured. She wondered if it would even stop bullets. Some digging had uncovered her missing Calis, miraculously still in one piece; it was holstered on her hip now. A curved knife was tucked in her boot. Her hair was now black, thanks to a CHROMA she found in a restroom, and she had splashed it with water so it hung stringy over her eyes. Mostly unrecognizable, she hoped. She’d kept the stealth suit on under the armor, and she already felt irritable and overheated. The bad temper could only help.

  As she walked into the main space with all the partitions, working on her cover story, a high-pitched alarm went off. The men and women made loud whooping noises, and scrambled to assemble their weapons. Someone pulled on Phaira’s armor, a man with a large scar across his cheek. “Come on! We’re live!” he crowed. There was a mad, excited gleam in his eye. Blood thirst. Phaira remembered that feeling.

  The man charged through the open door to the stairwell. The mercenaries filed in the same direction, heavy boots stomping, weapons clicking in holsters. Following the crowd, Phaira heard muffled orders echoing from below. She looked over the platform railing and took in the scene: the door marked 3 was still closed. Instead, the men and women poured into a concealed door on the bottom floor, built into the red rock wall, now swung open for entry. The white-haired man, Xanto, ushered the mercenaries into the tunnel within.

  A secret way to the outside? Energized, Phaira slowed her descent down the stairs, letting others push past her in their eagerness. She caught a glimpse of red hair in her peripheral vision: there was Nox, along with all the others.

  Shouts came from within the hidden passage. Xanto ducked inside, yelling something that Phaira couldn’t make out. Ten paces ahead of her, halfway between the second and third floors, Nox was also craning his neck to see.

  Then Huma emerged from the tunnel, pushed through the crowd and through the door marked ‘3.’ Her heart in her throat, Phaira gripped the railing, ready to vault over and leap down to the bottom floor.

  Then her little brother emerged from the same tunnel.

  Cohen! she almost burst out. But the mercenaries were shoving him back into the darkness. He battled back, throwing his weight into people, grabbing at the wall for leverage.

  Nox elbowed past the waiting mercenaries, yelling to Cohen: “What are you doing? What’s wrong?”

  “He’s going to kill her!” Cohen shouted over the others. An elbow smashed into his nose, snapping his head back. As Cohen stumbled, one of the mercenaries shoved him across the platform, headlong into the door marked 3. At the same time, two men grabbed Nox on either side and propelled him into the tunnel. Phaira saw Xanto leaping on Nox’s back, just before the door sealed, its seams now invisible to the eye.

  The silence was deafening. Three mercenaries were left: two men, and that masked woman with Phaira’s Calis. Their hands hovered over their weapons as they surrounded Cohen on all sides.

 
Phaira sprinted down the final stairs, streaked past them and leapt for her brother.

  Cohen saw her coming and lunged. She ducked under his swinging arm. Then with a quick turn, she knocked out his knee and flipped him to the ground. He hit the metal platform with a loud bang. As the impact reverberated off the rocky interior, Phaira placed her boot to the small of his back, ordering: “Stay down!”

  Cohen’s body stiffened. Then he went limp.

  In the time it took for the mercenaries’ faces to move from surprise to suspicion, Phaira unsheathed her knife and flipped it to a horizontal grip, took a step over Cohen’s body and waited. As it always did when she was about to battle, the world slowed down and everything sharpened into focus. She saw how the mercenaries’ muscles flinched, the tension betrayed in the tightening of their jaw, noted their dominant hand, their stance, their likely plan of attack; it all assimilated in a matter of seconds, bundled into her mind, like a chemical reaction about to burst.

  One of the mercenaries drew out his blade, holding it vertically, like a dinner utensil. The knife flashed in a wide arc, aiming for her face. Phaira deflected both blade and arm, and made a series of fast, precise slashes to the exposed underarm, the half-inch of exposed rib and belly, ending with a direct stab into the upper thigh.

  As the man gasped, bleeding into his hands and dropping to the floor, the woman with the metal half-mask leapt onto Phaira’s back. She was strong, her grip cutting off Phaira’s airflow. With a quick burst, Phaira twisted and threw her to the floor. On the way down, she snatched the stolen Calis from the woman’s holster, flipped it and smashed the butt of the gun into the mask, twice, then a third time. The woman howled, her hands to her broken, bleeding mouth.

  The red walls turned blue. The shock-round blast missed Cohen’s leg by only a few inches. Phaira swung her Calis around, the laser target landing in the center of Nox’s forehead. Nox lifted both hands for a split second, before clasping them together and driving his fists into the back of the third mercenary’s head. The shock-round clattered to the platform.

  Phaira lowered the Calis. Nox lowered his arms too. They stared at each other. Familiar. So familiar.

  Then Cohen jumped to his feet. He’s gotten more agile, Phaira thought, before being crushed in a hug.

  “I knew you’d figure out where we were,” came Cohen’s muffled voice.

  He’s stronger too.

  “Okay, okay, Co, come on,” she gasped.

  As he released her, Cohen’s face switched back to panic. “Keller has Sydel. He went crazy; he’s in there with her, and now Huma too. I think they might kill her.”

  Phaira turned to the door marked 3. “Do either of you know the code?”

  Cohen shook his head, crestfallen. “They change it every day. And this is the only way in.”

  “There’s always another way,” Nox corrected.

  “He’s right. Wait here,” Phaira told Cohen. “Get those three out of the way,” she added, nodding at the three writhing bodies on the platform before leaping up the stairs.

  In the rush to get outside, the door marked 2 had been left ajar. Phaira peered into every partition, searching for stragglers. She only found clothes crumpled, food left half-eaten, satchels dumped on the floor. All abandoned to avenge some twenty-year-old wrong. Orchestrated by four children who never forgot what was lost.

  Four. The number stuck in Phaira’s head as she searched. Four children fused together by their violent loss. Four people forever connected. Trauma brought people closer together. Not apart. She knew that first-hand.

  The corridor was equally deserted. But Phaira found her target in the storage locker with all the weaponry: the agent in white, cowering behind the door.

  “What are you - ” the woman began, then yelped as Phaira grabbed her by the neck.

  Cohen and Nox stared as Phaira propelled the agent down the stairs. When they reached the bottom platform, the agent hit the door face-first. On the ricochet, Phaira was behind her, twisting her arm in a joint lock.

  “The keycode.” Phaira ordered, torqueing the shoulder.

  “Don’t hurt me!” the woman gasped. “Please, don’t hurt me! I’ll give you whatever you want, whatever I know. Just don’t kill me!”

  Phaira released her. The agent in white slid to the floor and covered her face with her hands.

  “You were coerced?” Phaira asked, faintly sympathetic.

  “Well, not exactly,” the woman in white whispered through her fingers. “I have a lot of gambling debt - but please, let me go. I won’t tell anyone, I swear. Here, here are today’s codes to all the doors.” She shoved a crumpled piece of paper at Phaira. “Please. I just want to go home.”

  “Go,” Nox said suddenly. “Get to the surface as quickly as possible. Then take cover.”

  The agent slid her back along the rock wall. When she hit the stairs, she took them two-by-two until she reached the top door and disappeared through it.

  Phaira tossed a HALO at Cohen and showed him how to activate it. Then she offered the last HALO to Nox.

  He shook his head. “I have one.” As he pulled it from his pocket, his eyes flicked to hers as he looped it around the back of his head. Was there an apology in his expression? She couldn’t tell.

  Phaira punched in the keycode for the door. Cohen went for the handle, but Phaira stopped him, looking back at her old friend. “Come with us, Nox. Come on. Just like old times.”

  Nox held her gaze, and slowly shook his head.

  “The hackers are still trapped,” Phaira said, swallowing her disappointment. “And Emir Ajyo. White beard, older man. Anandi’s father. Will you get them to the surface?”

  Nox’s profile was unreadable. “I’ll see.”

  Then Nox leapt up the stairs, following the agent in white.

  Impatient, Cohen yanked the door open and lifted his Vacarro firearm to his eyeliner. Ducking through the threshold, he swiveled back and forth, searching the floor, and then gestured for her to follow. Watching her brother, Phaira couldn’t help but smile. He moved so differently, so full of confidence. Nox must have taught him well.

  Then she dropped her smile, drew her Calis and followed him.

  Together, they crept down a narrow hallway. The lights were even dimmer on this floor, casting hundreds of shadows. A series of doors stretched down either side of the corridor, a few ajar. Inside, Phaira could see small beds and dressers.

  Pale light glowed at the end of the hall. In the open space, amidst low-burning candles, six bodies sat in a circle, slumped forward. What were they doing? Shielding the base? Shielding the soldiers? Both were likely. She wondered if they were using that Zephyr mixture.

  There was a gentle knock against Phaira’s brain. She jumped, pointing her Calis to the right, then to the left.

  Movement in the circle of followers. Huma. The older woman’s face was heavily lined, aged by twenty years, her face white with fear, her cape streaked with red dust. Her hand lifted in Phaira’s direction. Her fingers shook.

  “You,” Huma gasped. “Why can’t I - ”

  Phaira didn’t hear the rest. Her vision sharpened, until there was no one but Huma in her view, fully illuminated. I’ve waited a long time for this, she thought, slowly and emphatically, for Huma to hear.

  “Where’s Sydel?” Cohen roared.

  Huma faltered at Sydel’s name. Her mouth opened and closed with no sound.

  Then Phaira heard the unmistakable click of a safety being released. She snatched Cohen by the arm and yanked him into one of the tiny bedrooms, just as the floor exploded with gunfire.