Bound to Ashes (The Altered Sequence Book 1) (5 page)

Footsteps. They pause to kick a rock out of the way. What kind of hunter
is
this?

A break in footsteps and a sigh tells me it’s a woman, probably small in stature. Maybe it’s her first mission. Maybe all her hesitation is from nervousness. She’s almost right next to the slab that conceals me. I’m barely breathing and my muscles are frozen in position.

Well, trained killer or not, I’m sure this six-inch thick, seven-foot-tall slab of granite will crush her pretty easily. A pang of guilt hits me out of nowhere. I’m going to kill some tiny woman and not even look her in the face while I do it? But wait. That’s stupid. She’s a human. An
armed
human. Coming after
us
. This is no time for feeling guilty, Dev.

I stand up slowly and brace my hands on the top of the slab. It’s gritty and cool under my fingers, and I push. It’s not as heavy as it looks but it falls over fast. I hear a small cry of alarm and scuffling, the slab falls, and when I look again, it’s flat on the ground and dust is settling around it.

Blood, enormous pools of it—but that’s just my mind playing tricks. As quickly as I thought I saw it, it’s gone. There’s no human crushed underneath.

My plans to end this quickly vanish in the dust. In its place I have a racing pulse and a cold sweat.

She’s not anywhere in the surrounding area. A chain link fence surrounds the parking lot, the skimmer sits parked at the entrance. Huge shelves with metal arms hold slabs of granite. I’m caged. The setting sun casts strange, distorted shadows on the ground. Lots of hiding places for little humans.

She’s definitely new. Most of them like to make a big show about firing round after round at us, usually screaming, like new recruits with some grand vision of being a soldier. But she’s taken a more... subtle approach, I guess.
Really
subtle.

My stupid heart feels like it’s going to beat right out of my ribcage. I scowl and whirl around. Where the hell could she have gone?

Like she’s been there the whole time, the human clutches the rifle white-knuckled and wide-eyed, not ten yards away.

She’s a good foot shorter than me, dressed in form-fitting leather riding gear. Long brown hair, tied behind her head, falls over her shaking shoulder. I’ve never seen that rifle model before. Which is weird, and annoying, because at the CadTech labs we had to memorize exactly what kinds of rifles the military issued and how to take them apart, fix, and clean them. But this rifle is skinny and doesn’t even have anything that resembles a stock. Like it’s made of PVC pipe painted green. And it’s shaking like a leaf.

The human’s eyes bore into me. The rest of her might be shaking, but her eyes are steady. One of them is hazel, the other dark brown. Is that just a trick of the light...?

We’re just standing there staring each other down, I realize, but when I make a fraction of a movement, she squeezes the trigger. It’s easy to avoid her shot. But what kind of noise was that for a rifle to make? Just a puff of air....

She runs. I start, but hesitate, that rifle shot was too weird.... Finally my feet get moving, they skid on the loose dirt. I’m still faster than her. For a human, she’s pretty nimble; she takes a corner on a dime and throws herself under a stack of long metal pipes.

I slide to a stop and I’m no longer in the Qualistone parking lot, but the side lot of the neighboring building, which apparently sold... pipes. Of all assortments. Lots of them are taller than I am and lying haphazardly around the concrete yard. It’s surrounded by a chain link cage like the last one.

Cain
had
to station me in the area with the tiniest hiding places, didn’t he? It’ll be hard not to strangle him next time I see him.

A small scuffling noise to my right. I reach out, grab the nearest pipe, and lash out with it. I spin around and there she is— on top of a tall pile of huge black pipes.

My pipe whistles through the air. She tries to dodge, trips backwards, but there’s a puff of air again. The rifle flies out of her grip and clatters to the ground below.

Something falls at my feet. A little metal cylinder tipped with red fluff. The needle at the end slowly leaks clear fluid.

“What the....”

The human scrambles to her feet as I pick up the dart. A tranquilizer dart. No wonder I didn’t recognize the rifle. I look up at her and her footing is back, but this time she’s got a pistol pointed at me.

I can see straight down the barrel. My muscles lock up. A flash of a memory: cleaning and assembling rifles in the labs. Cleaning the barrels was the worst. They were the messiest. I can’t stop thinking about all the ridges in the barrel that puts grooves in the bullet that’s going to blow the brains out of my head. Except it won’t. There aren’t any bullets in this gun. Dammit, Dev, there
aren’t any bullets
, just move—

A puff of air and this time, instead of a tap, it’s a sting. And a cold sensation.

“Ah,” I stagger backwards, sway to my feet, and yank the dart out of my chest. It actually
punctured
?

Puff. Puff.

The human is just a dark shape against the sun, slowly lowering her gun, mismatched eyes trained on me in wonder, or surprise, or satisfaction...? The metal pipe I was holding clangs on the ground. It’s cold all of a sudden.

My knees hit the ground, which is really close, and hard, and way dustier up close, pressed against my face, shifting like I’m sinking into it....

The woman’s voice says, “Two and a half.”

4
• contents under pressure

[Dev]

My head is killing me.

It’s dark until I open my eyes, but it’s so bright it hurts. I can hear my eyes throbbing inside my head and I clench them shut again.

A falling building must have crushed me before I blacked out, or something. My whole body, but mostly my shoulder and chest, throbs and threaten to put me under again. My muscles complain with every movement, even slight. I glance over at my left shoulder, but something’s wrong— my arms hang over my head. I tug, but they’re stuck. A thin plastic cord binds them, tied to a metal ring screwed into the wall behind me.

Images assail my mind. The human. A black form on the pile of pipes, pulling a tranquilizer pistol out of her jacket... Those eyes.

The darts that were sticking out of my chest and shoulder are gone. My jacket, too. I’m exposed. I try to pull my arms down, but it only makes the tingling worse. My hands won’t budge.

“Shit.” My voice sounds small in the empty white room. I’m alone save for the only feature in the room: a floor-to-ceiling mirror across from me.

How long has it been since I’ve actually looked at myself? And wow, do I look like hell. The only color in the room is my yellow eyes. Everything else is grey. Grey skin, faded clothes, chalky dust, white room. My pupils are hardly even visible, they’re just slits, it’s so bright....

Why the hell am I still alive? I thought the humans wanted us dead. They couldn’t also want to... reclaim us, could they?

Oh, why did I even go there.... My chest is heaving with every shallow breath and I suddenly can’t feel my extremities. I stare at the floor.

Chances are people from the labs died along with the rest. The papers said the Northern Alliance’s biological warfare started it, and it spread out of control. Only a handful of survivors. I mean, logically, the Caduceus personnel aren’t still strong in numbers and doing well enough to want us back. For tests... Or worse.

They said to us, back at Caduceus Technologies, if we were ever caught by the enemy to kill ourselves. That way their technology wouldn’t fall into enemy hands. ‘You are not special, you are replaceable.’ But now is different. There’s no such thing as the Northern Alliance anymore. Or Caduceus.

Whoever it is, they caught me. And probably caught the others. And that means I failed.

I yank on my hand restraints, but the cord is tight, they don’t go anywhere. Maybe the sweat will let me slip out, but no luck. What the hell is this stuff made of...?

A click from the door makes me jump, I shuffle my feet under me and back against the wall. My helpful, overactive imagination provides a scenario: humans busting in, gun muzzles pressed against my head, shouting....

Guns. Firearms.
Fire
. No, only use that as a last resort.... I take a breath to ease the tightness.

The door opens slowly and a human emerges. One I haven’t seen before. He’s pretty young looking compared to the humans I’ve seen, though I can’t guess how young. I guess he’s just less worn-out looking. He has dark skin, a broad nose, and a tricky grin on his face that immediately sets me on edge.

“Hey,” the human says, waving casually. He sticks one hand in the pocket of his jeans and scratches the back of his neck with the other.

That’s it? ‘Hey’? I’m about ready to rip this wall down to get away and he just walks in and says ‘hey’?

“So you’re awake, that’s good!” He continues, smiling, even laughing a little to himself. “I’m Vinder, okay? Call me Vin, though.”

He waits for me to say something, but I bet he knows it’ll be a long time for that. So he crams his other hand in his other pocket and sways on the balls of his feet, looking all around the room and puffing air out his cheeks. “So,” he says. “How’re you doing? Any side-effects?”

Maybe if I say something he’ll leave quicker. “What did you people do to me?”

“Oh my gosh,” he says all at once. “You can talk. This is going to be so much easier. Awesome. But yeah, horse tranquilizer.”

“...What?!”

“Like, a lot. It really should have killed you, we used way more than what we used on Heydrich and the other guys, but, you know, all things considered....”

“Wait,” I say. “Heydrich?”

“Yeah, know him?”

“You
killed
him?”

“Well I assume four times the lethal dose of Detomidine would put somebody down for good, yeah,” Vinder says, smiling. “I’m surprised James got the shots off, honestly.”

I can’t believe it. They’d kill their own superior officer...? “Let me go.”

Vinder’s dark eyes sparkle and it makes my flesh crawl. “Sorry, dude. Alessandra’s gotta talk to you.”

“Is that why I’m here? To talk?!” If that’s it, then maybe they’ll let me go. At least they aren’t CadTech.

“I mean, yes, and no,” Vinder says, making a weighing motion in the air between his hands. “I can’t explain it, honestly, without butchering it.... Anyway, hi! Welcome, and all that stuff. Sorry for the rough treatment. She’ll be in soon.” He smiles one last time and waves, then heads out the door.

I almost would have preferred it if he
did
come in screaming with a gun pointed at me. That was just... unusual. My breathing is steadier now, though. But I’m just waiting for things to go sour, for the guns to come out. For things to go back to normal.

As the door swings shut, I try to see what’s on the other side in the mirror, but it closes too quickly. I could be miles underground for all I know. And who knows what kind of facility this is.... What if they took everyone else, too? Jules wouldn’t be able to disable them if she was unconscious, and if it took two darts for me, then Ashton would probably go down from less, he’s so skinny.... I can’t get the mental image of them tied up out of my head. And what if they didn’t get the amiable kid as their first visitor? Instead: a rifle butt to the forehead, tied to a chair, blood on the white floor—

I pull again but it’s just another pointless effort. My hands are tingly and cold. I tilt my head down until my chin rests on my chest.

Maybe I’m the only one they got...? About this time, they’re all sitting around, waiting for me, and at least two of them probably worry I’m dead. The sun will set and rise again. But when they go to look for my body, they won’t find it. Then they’ll leave without me.

I want to scream. I wish that pistol the human had was loaded with actual bullets.

The door creaks open again. The human from before, Vinder or whatever, walks in first and looks behind him at another human, and they’re finishing a half-conversation:

“...nice, to me!” Vinder says.

“Too risky,” the woman’s voice says. “I’m bringing it, Vin. Just trust me, it’ll work.” Then she turns to look at me.

It’s her. The one who tranqed me.

“You,” I spit. The cords still won’t budge.

“Calm down,” she says, but it sounds like an order. Her tone just makes me want to kill her more.

Not even the thought of my fire backtracking into my lungs can quench this. I take a deep breath and the muscles contract around the fuel sacs, I can feel the fuel building up....

The human strides forward, whips an aerosol can out of her pocket, and points it a foot from my face. The ‘WARNING, FLAMMABLE’ sign glares at me in red print. But it’s too late.

I cough, and even though I could force down most of the fuel, some of it comes out. I spit it out on the floor beside me, a little flaming glob, and it sits on the white floor and sputters out. I can still feel the slight wavering heat in my mouth and try to put it out. The coughing won’t stop. My body won’t let it get back in. Stop it, stop it—

“Holy shit,” Vinder says, jumping away from the little fire on the ground.

I look up at the woman, who hasn’t moved a muscle. How the hell did she know? I never use my fire. Almost ever. How could they have known?

She lowers the can with a clink and says, “I don’t have time for this, and we need to talk.”

My mouth is clamped shut to stop the coughing and calm the fuel sacs. Fine. Let her talk.

“Okay?” She’s glaring daggers at me.

I let a few breaths pass through my nose and I say, “Fine.”

She flips the can back into her coat pocket and puts her weight on one foot, arms crossed. “My name is Alessandra Mead. I have lived and worked at this facility since before the war came and before the virus hit. I’m the one my people count on for survival. Now can I trust you to not attack me if I let you go?”

If things get bad, I can take these humans out with no effort. Even if my head is still pounding. “Yes.”

She looks at me a while longer, as if to try and discern if I’m lying, then procures a pair of wire cutters from her other pocket. “Hold still, then.”

She’s way too close. I try to get out of the way, but she doesn’t mess around— the cords holding my wrists are cut in one snip. I yank my arms down and back away as soon as I can, putting a comfortable distance between me and the humans. Vinder looks at me almost sadly, or concerned, and the Alessandra woman just gives me that steely glare. I want to tear the looks right off their faces— I don’t need their sympathy.

“Alright,” she says, patting the wire cutters on her open palm. “Now. Let’s just get this out of the way. We know who you are. We know what you and your friends are capable of. We read about you in the papers, we saw you on the news. The fact that Caduceus Technologies got away with playing god was all over every form of media. Even after that, after all the shit went down with the virus and societal collapse, we knew you were living nearby. Got it?”

I break out into a cold sweat from the mere mention of the labs. I try not to show it.

“About a year ago a guy calling himself Heydrich came around commanding a small army of survivors all armed to the teeth with high-tech military weapons and tech. This, I think, you’re aware of.”

She should see my bullet scars.

“What you don’t know is that we recently injected him and his commanding officers with lethal doses of Detomidine and offed the others at mealtime with high doses of Tricaine Methanesulfonate. In other words,” she smiles for the first time, “we’re free.”

“What’s this got to do with me?”

“I’m getting to that,” Alessandra explains. “The thing is, we don’t hate you or want you dead. That was them. This is us. And we
need your help.”
 

[Alessandra]

The man I know only as E4-17 stands in the corner of the room. The room used to be storage, but was cleaned out for a makeshift interrogation room, and it makes me sick. We’re supposed to be the good guys. He looks like a war prisoner, and he doesn’t even know why he’s here. No wonder he’s angry. I would be, too. Maybe if Heydrich hadn’t wanted them dead so bad, they would have trusted us to begin with, and I wouldn’t have had to do what I did.

I grip the wire cutters tightly. His big yellow cat eyes are staring at me like he would much rather roast me to a crisp than talk to me.

I guess this is what it feels like to have your heart broken.

His shirt is torn and his shoes are worn out, and I feel like it’s all my fault. He absently rubs the raw spots on his wrists where the industrial zip ties dug into them. I’m not going to say anything about it, especially to Vinder, who’s shaking in his boots, but the zip ties are stretched. The zip ties with 175-pound tensile strength rating are stretched. Almost broken. For an under-fed survivor of the collapse of society, I’d say he’s doing pretty well.

The words that need to come out spin in my brain and buzz like angry insects. How am I supposed to explain this? The way he looks at us... furrowed, stifled, hesitant. Those cat eyes watching our every minuscule movement.

“You and your friends are the only ones that can help us survive.”

My heart’s in my throat, this better work....

“You’re lying,” he says. Of course. To him, I’m just another stranger behind a rifle scope.

“Gonna have to put a little more faith in me than that,” I answer, smiling. I hope he knows it’s sincere.

He glances away and just barely, his breath comes out as an impatient sigh. He’s either too stubborn or scared to formulate a response. He grinds his teeth.