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I waited for my eyes to adjust, but I couldn’t see more than vague movement. I pulled out my penlight. The polished walls and smooth, dirty floor didn’t look nearly natural enough to be a cavern.
Mr. Sokolov motioned us forward. We trekked through the cool tunnel, its dampness pressing. I flicked my light across the path. The tunnel led through what looked like a wide city street twice my height, with cracked, once-colorful walls. Further in, the roofing was half-collapsed with metal pipes jutting out at twisted angles. No one spoke. My vines tightened uncomfortably around my arms. If this was a trap, escape would be difficult.
After we walked a while, a faint light emitted ahead of us, enough that I shut off my penlight. The structures beyond looked like dilapidated subway cars repositioned into shanties. I frowned. “This was under the suburbs the whole time?”
Pops placed his hand on my shoulder, his fingers tight. “Yes. This place was built before the ‘plague’ went through, and it’s been forgotten by most of the officials who knew of its existence.”
The longer I waited, the more my eyes adjusted to the dim light. Shadows moved beside the metal cars. The scattered vehicles weren’t quite the size of my old dorm room, but it was warmer here than on the surface with its bitter wind, a reasonable place to hide. The cavernous structure reminded me of the base for the Cuban Resistance, except that this subterranean refuge lacked the hustle and bustle of rebels and the soft glow of computer screens.
I glanced back at Pops. “Why didn’t we come here earlier?”
“I couldn’t be sure the rebels would still be here. It has been a long time since I came here last, and they change their hideouts on occasion.” He took a deep breath. “There’s always the possibility that someone with Camaraderie ties will eventually stumble on it again.”
“Where are we?” the mercenary woman interrupted.
Mr. Sokolov rolled his eyes, as if it were obvious we were underground, and then dashed into the semi-darkness. “Help!” His voice echoed, bouncing off the old subway walls.
I flung my vines out and gagged him with thick, newly sprouted leaves. He grasped at the vines and shot me a nasty look, but he couldn’t speak more than a mumbled accusation.
“I thought you said this wasn’t a trap,” the woman and I snapped at the same time.
My hostage tugged on the vines, still trying to break free. I tightened them around his body. No sense in losing him again, though I was careful not to tighten the vines more than necessary.
The woman nodded approvingly. “Good thinking.”
“Hey, Sis... Private Eye? Are you down here?” Quin’s voice echoed behind us.
We both turned as two shadowy figures emerged from the tunnel’s darkness, their features becoming visible once they reached the dull glow of the shanties’ lights.
“Took you long enough,” the woman—Private Eye—muttered.
“Excuse me for keeping an air elemental off your tail.” Quin tossed his weapon between his hands, catching the opposite end as the elderly mercenary came up behind him. “The agent took out Cinder, though.”
Private Eye snorted. “Good riddance.”
The elderly mercenary glared at her.
Pops cleared his throat. “We have company.”
Several shapes emerged from the shadows carrying guns, planks of wood, and swords. One of the shapes raised a rifle. “Put down your weapons.”
I swallowed hard. Pops motioned for Lance to lower his sword and he nodded to me as well. Unfortunately, my vines were intertwined. I feverishly tugged the vines apart, everyone’s eyes weighing on my shoulders.
Once I got our hostage a little bit free, he untangled himself and huddled behind the line of weapon wielders: eight men and four women. They pointed their swords at us and clapped their hands against the edge of makeshift clubs. A few had pistols. If they knew how to fight, we were in trouble. But this was the Community. Unless they were ex-security, I doubted they were particularly skilled.
“What are you doing?” Private Eye pointed at our hostage—Mr. Sokolov. “He’s my money!” All guns pointed toward her. She took a quick step back. “Not that I have much say in that right now. Thanks, Doc.”
I winced. Hopefully she’d hold off on talking about Pops’ past. This was really not a good place for me to have another memory attack.
The spokesman, a man with a rifle, glanced at Mr. Sokolov. “Who are these people?”
Mr. Sokolov peered out from behind a woman with a club. “They’re searching for Ron.”
The spokesman closed his hand around the grip of his pistol. “So you brought them here?”
“She’s his daughter.” He pointed to me and, one-by-one, everyone stared at the vines growing from under my sleeves. Heat flared in my cheeks.
The spokesman lowered his rifle. “Sure she is. How do I know she’s not with Special Forces?”
I snorted. That much should’ve been obvious: we weren’t wearing heavy black body armor with the COE rising sun cogs on our shoulders.
“Ronald Nickleson is my son,” Pops said sternly. “And she is his daughter. If he is here, why not ask him?”
Private Eye placed her hands on her hips. “Family or not—either pay me or hand over the girl. I can leave these guys alone.” She flapped her hand at the crowd around us, who muttered their discontent.
“We can talk about a potential job later,” Pops warned, “in lieu of a hostage.”
The older mercenary stepped between the disgruntled crowd and Private Eye. “Enough small talk.” Before Pops could respond, the mercenary’s scream lashed through the cave. I clapped my hands over my ears. Invisible sound waves tossed Private Eye across the room and she slammed into Lance. Several nearby pipes twisted at the sound, letting off vestiges of steam.
I thrust my vines between the older mercenary and the woman on the floor. She stared at the ceiling, dazed. Considering she didn’t seem quite so intent on capturing my dad anymore, I would consider her a potential ally.
The older mercenary opened his mouth. I dropped to the floor. Hard, packed dirt scraped the palms of my hands. His scream reverberated overhead, raining chunks of concrete from the ceiling. I covered my head with my vines as a Community rebel charged the mercenary with her sword, screaming in Russian.
Lance got there first, his face twisted in rage. He struck the man’s chest and then pushed him toward Quin. Quin swung the black rods and the mercenary’s skull cracked as they landed. He quickly stepped back, holding both rods in his hands.
I crawled to Private Eye. “You all right?”
She coughed and took my offered hand. “Thanks,” she muttered, brushing herself off and eyeing the dead mercenary.
“Jenna!”
I caught my breath. Dad ran toward me, then slowed when he saw the dead mercenary.
“Jenna...”
I scrambled to my feet and wrapped my arms around Dad, squeezing him tight. His shirt had a warm, soapy smell. He looked like I remembered, except he had a beard now and his blue shirt hadn’t been pressed for some time. Better than that, he was alive, unhurt, and still human. Tears came to my eyes, though I didn’t want Dad to see them.
“So... she is your daughter?” The spokesman lowered his rifle.
“Yes.” Dad nodded, holding me in his arms. It’d been so long since he’d done that.
“Jenna!” Mom streaked toward us and grabbed me in a firm hug. I staggered on my feet. Dad kept us both from falling. “You’re all right,” she whispered, breathless. She stroked her fingers through the hair that poked from my hat, pausing at the burnt ends.
I glanced at each of them. “How’d you end up here?”
Mom lifted my chin, touched my cheeks, and then placed her hands on my shoulders, examining me for bruises or cuts, any sign I’d been hurt. She raised an eyebrow at my vines.
I smiled, jittery. My parents were safe. Alive! Now we just had to get them out of here.
Mom disregarded the vines and shook her head as if she couldn’t believe I was standing in front of her. “Your father went to give you a good luck gift to protect you from the scan, but when he heard you were arrested—”
“I was labeled as a ‘danger to the Community’ by Commander Rick himself,’ ” Dad finished, wrapping his arm around my mom’s shoulder. “Since I didn’t want Liana to be hurt, I took her with me when I ran.” He narrowed his eyebrows at Pops. For the first time in my life, I saw a bitter, smoldering hatred in Dad’s eyes.
“You remembered this cavern,” Pops said calmly, examining the darkness around us.
Dad scowled. “If you hadn’t kidnapped Jenna, she would’ve been fine.”
I shrunk into Mom’s arms. “I wasn’t going to pass the Health—”
“She’s an only child. Only children are safe!” Dad thrust his finger at Pops. “But you didn’t tell her that, did you?”
“She’s my granddaughter.” Pops said, his voice cold. “As long as the Camaraderie knows I’m alive, she’ll never be safe.”
The vein in Dad’s forehead turned cherry red. “If they thought she didn’t have powers, she would have been fine, no?” He kept his angry voice steady, like the time when he was furious that I’d planted dandelions in the garden and he was afraid CELPP would fine us for planting weeds. “I had a way to protect her. A shield, the one they implanted in my shoulder. I waited for the announcement of when the scan would take place so I could give it to her. But two days was all they gave me. Can you believe that? The scan was announced two days before it was to take place. They normally announce it months ahead of time.”
“You know about powers? And shields?” I stared at him, stunned. “You had the shield removed?”
“Yes, I know about the shield. When the Camaraderie’s agents scanned me, they gave me the option to work for them. I wasn’t interested. I wasn’t a threat, so they implanted a shield in my shoulder instead. Didn’t tell me what it did at the time, but Pops explained later. The thing is, the Community doesn’t scan adults. Not unless they’re acting suspicious. They’re either already shielded or don’t have powers, so they’re safe. I figured I could pass without the shield and I could use my gift to heal myself if something went wrong.”
“Gave me quite the scare,” Mom murmured, withdrawing something from her pocket. “I didn’t expect him to cut himself to prove what he could do.” She held up a necklace, one with a small, shield-like charm. It looked vaguely reminiscent of the metal ID charm I never wore, or maybe Lady Winters’ enchanted flower charm, except for the five tiny jewels encrusted into its ceramic face.
Emerald. Ruby. Sapphire. Diamond. Amber.
The same jewels of the Elizabeth pendants, enchanted artifacts that gave their bearers special powers—artifacts the Camaraderie’s primary council members wore. This particular artifact, however, could block powers on skin contact.
Pops took the necklace and flinched before holding it to the hanging lights. He looked older, more tired than before without his persuasion power to influence our perception.
I turned to Dad. “You were going to give that to me? How would it have helped with the scan?”
He snorted. “I figured if it blocked my powers, surely it could block whatever powers you might have and fool the Health Scan. I wandered the lunchroom, waiting for you to show up, but when the Health Scan came around and security asked me to leave, I knew something was wrong.”
My cheeks burned. “Dad—I didn’t know you were coming.” I clenched my hands, trying to steady them. If I hadn’t had Tim hack into the health network, which attracted the agents’ attention, none of this would’ve happened. I could have gone on living in peace.
Except... Lance and Tim would have still failed. They would have been turned into beasts or recruited by Special Forces. Pops and Jack would have died in the prison or been tortured and interrogated. The Coalition of Freedom would have fallen apart.
I’d made the right choice, even if I didn’t know it at the time.
Pops twisted the necklace between his fingers. “I’m surprised you kept it after all these years.”
“I didn’t like the idea of people reading my thoughts, or using their powers to influence me.” Dad narrowed his eyes. “It’s been handy. I never had to take anyone to the doctor. I’ve practiced with it, taking it off when I was alone and putting it on whenever I was around other people. Of course, you weren’t around to know that. I spent a lot of time strengthening those powers, but you never came back for me.”
Pops tightened his hand around the shield. “You were safe. The Camaraderie thought you had made yourself part of the Community, so you were free to have a family, free to live a happy life.”
“Except that I wasn’t.” Dad looked at me. “They still came for her. After she escaped, they came for Liana.” His voice was cold. “They would have done the same thing to her that they did to Mom.”
Pops’ expression turned cold. “I didn’t know they would kill her.”
I swallowed hard, feeling like worms were crawling under my skin. I had an idea of where this conversation was going, and I really didn’t want to hear it.
“Three bullets, because you ran.” Dad touched his index and middle finger to his forehead, his neck, and the spot above his heart. An icy shiver ran down my spine. Mom gripped my shoulders, her fingers digging into my collarbone. Somewhere, water dripped in the cavern. “It should’ve only taken one shot, to be efficient. But they weren’t aiming for efficiency, were they? They had a point to make, and they made it very clear. No one runs from the Camaraderie.”
I swallowed hard, numb. He was talking about my grandmother, who had been killed before I was born.
Pops pursed his lips. “Do you want me to say I’m sorry?”
Dad shook his head, almost laughing. “No, Nickolai. I wanted you take me with you before I had a family, before I had people to care about—”
“Don’t call me Nikolai!” Pops thrust the shield charm at Dad. “I tried to save the people who died. I was turning them into monsters, Ron. I had a family to feed, and a guilty conscience, and when I tried to help, the Camaraderie destroyed the whole damn town! I didn’t want that for you. I wanted you have a good life. It was obvious they were giving you the second chance I could never have.”
“A second chance?” Dad lowered his voice. “While I had the fortune to have a family, I had to know that nothing I did could help anyone outside the Community. I had to know that children were failing the scan and being sent away, being turned into monsters because of the work you did. All I could do was try to support my family and keep them out of the government’s eye, because if I couldn’t, they would be taken, too. You didn’t help me, Pops. You condemned me. Then, in spite of it all, you had the gall to kidnap my daughter and put her in the danger you weren’t willing to put me in. You’re a despicable hypocrite.”
Lance came up beside me and put his hand on my shoulder. I quickly closed my hand around his. “Pops didn’t kidnap me,” I said. “He saved my life... and my friends. Even if I had passed the scan, they would have been taken. They would have been turned into beasties.” I squeezed Lance’s fingers to stop my shaking and pulled my vines around myself.
“Beasties?” Dad gave Pops a dark, cold look. “So you did recruit her to fight the Camaraderie. To do what, exactly? To stop what you started?”
“I didn’t start anything. I took an empty job. I tried to make it more humane.”
“Dr. Nickleson—err, Pops—has a point,” Quin put in. “Technically, the beastie plants were already in production when he got involved. He only improved the formula and oversaw the workers at a plant in northern Russia. He was never a member of the Camaraderie of Evil, though he was on the right track.”
Private Eye nodded vigorously. “Exactly. According to the files, they were going to ask him to take the place of Sanjorez, but after Nickolai was discharged for shutting down the plant prematurely, they asked Brainmaster. “
I stared at her. “What? They were going to ask him to—”
She nodded. “I’ve been studying them for a while now. Wanted to know what I was getting into when doing mercenary work. Granted, that snooty couple got to the pendants first, but—”
“Private Eye,” Quin said, “now’s probably not the best time.”
She glanced between Pops and Dad, whose murderous expressions matched. She took a quick step toward Quin. “Just trying to help.”
I swallowed hard, shaking. Dr. Nickolai Nickleson, not a technician, but an active member of the Camaraderie’s primary council? I could picture him wearing the emerald pendant, which did nothing to dispel Lady Winters’ memory seeds. Her flower charm felt hot against my chest, where it had somehow managed to get nestled between my shirt and my skin. Pops might have taken the position, if only to make it better. Anyone would have been better than Lady Winters—
A young woman swung her legs from the edge of a hospital bed. A cool draft blew in from the overhead air vent. “The Health Scan is safe, right?”
“Of course.” I handed her papers from the white counter, typed in both Russian and English. “The Community is safe.” I passed her a pen, and she signed the line to join Commander Rick’s army. But if the Community was safe, we wouldn’t need to turn those with powers into beasts. If Miss Black’s training went well, I might be able to convince Lord Black that my powers were better used elsewhere, rather than in the transformations and in formulating the stinging green liquid that numbed my skin as I was pulled from a beastie tank... I struggled, trying to break free of a technician’s grip. He dragged me through the corridors and tossed me into a room with horrible, hissing gas. Something burned in my muscles. Itched. I needed to break free. I wanted to claw at something, tear away the walls, anything to get rid of that horrible sensation and the burning fire under my skin as the transformation began, my vision blurring into darkness, a pure blackness comprised only of the stench of rotting flesh. My bones knitted to metal... pain, so much pain... too many voices crying for mercy from the radiation that pummeled us, merging us as one—
Something slapped my cheek. My eyes shot open.
I stared up at Private Eye, who rubbed her hand as she muttered obscenities. My face was damp, my whole body numb, the sting of the slap welcome after the horrible memories Lady Winters had left behind.
“Are you okay?” Lance cradled my head in his lap. A number of faces peered over me. I took a deep breath and shuddered. Lady Winters was dead, but the seeds she planted were still very much alive.
“What did you do to her?” Dad demanded, furious. I wished he wouldn’t talk so loud. My head throbbed like someone was pounding a bass drum inside it.
“I didn’t do this,” Pops said coldly. “Lady Winters did. She attacked Jenna and left a memory of beast transformation in her head. It reoccurs in times of stress.”
Thanks a lot, Pops, for putting that so... medically. I rubbed my forehead, easing away the pain. I needed to think of pretty morning glories and planting seeds in soft soil. Not beasties. If I distracted myself, maybe the horrible images would go away.
Dad closed his hands into fists. “Times of stress? You didn’t even have the decency to protect her from telepaths?”
“If I knew Lady Winters was going to be there, I never would have sent her on that mission!”
“Excuse me—” Private Eye stepped innocently between Pops and Dad and clasped her hands together. “Might we talk about that job you had in mind? Jenna looks like she’s about to have another attack.”
I lifted my head, and then decided it was easier to let Lance hold me. Either Private Eye really cared about getting paid, or she was genuinely concerned. Either way, I didn’t mind a change of topics.
Pops nodded. “Let’s talk in private, shall we?”
“Thank you.” She and Quin followed Pops into the darkness of the man-made cave. The rest of the rebels gave them a confused look, but no one stopped them.
“Come on, Jen.” Dad motioned for me to follow him. “It’s time we have a talk.”
I cringed. The raised eyebrow promised a lecture. Lance helped me stand. I closed my eyes for a moment, waiting for my vision to clear. “Coming, Lance?”
“No,” Dad said. Lance blinked, taken by surprise. “This is just you, me, and your mother.”
“Sorry, Lance,” I grumbled. He gave me an apologetic smile before chasing after Pops.
Dad watched him disappear into the gloom. “Is that the same Lance kid from high school?”
I blushed. They must’ve had the same suspicion as Anna, never mind that she didn’t actually know us. “Yeah, that’s him.”
“Come, then. We’ve got a lot of catching up to do.”
