Jade: Earth's Last Hope Against the Undead (5 page)

“
Dangers?”

The doctor’s smile faded. “Oh yes.” Then he
grinned again. “Lions, tigers and bears.” He raised an eyebrow. “Oh
my.”

Jade wasn't impressed with his theatrics.
She only cared about one thing at the moment. “Where is Trent?”

The doctor scanned the walls of the
conference room, staring at one chart in particular. Jade tried to
discern its purpose, but couldn't. Although she thought she saw her
name listed there, she wasn’t in the mood to try and deduce what
this meant. She felt like fighting this particular morning.

“
He offered to go on a reconnaissance
mission for us?”

“
Reconnaissance? What kind of
reconnaissance?” Jade asked.

The doctor grunted, pushed his glasses up
higher on the bridge of his nose. “Would you be terribly upset if I
told you now was not the time to discuss Trent?”

Jade rose and quickly chucked her apple at
the doctor. The fruit struck him in the cheek, knocking his glasses
loose. They fell to the ground, a red mark formed under the
doctor’s eye.

“
That’s what I think about waiting,"
she said. "If you’ve done something to Trent—”

The doctor stumbled to the floor and picked
up his glasses. He straightened one side and replaced them on his
face. Now he appeared nervous, but ever patient.

“
Trent is fine, I assure you,” he
said.

He went to a corner of the room and
retrieved a long decorative wooden box. He sat it on the table with
care, opening the lid so only he could see its contents. From the
box, the doctor removed a long white-handled sword with an equally
white scabbard and purple sash. The doctor carried the sword over
to Jade and placed it before her.

Jade ignored the sword. Instead she picked
up a pear and bit into it. The doctor went to his own plate, picked
up an apple and bit into it.

“
That’s a nice sword,” Jade said,
taking another bite. Her mouth overflowed with the fruity flesh,
juices running down her chin. “Is it yours?”

“
No.”

Without hesitation the doctor threw his
apple at Jade.

She leaned forward, dropped the pear and
seized the handle of the sword. As she drew the weapon back, she
removed the sword from the scabbard with a ping of metal. And
before the apple could reach her, she'd used the blade to sever the
fruit in half.

What just happened?

The doctor stared at her, his amusement
obvious.

A confused wrinkle formed on Jade’s forehead
as she spoke her question aloud this time. “What just happened? I
don’t know the first thing about swords.”

“
Yes, yes, of course.”

“
But how?” But then it occurred to
Jade. “Did you—what did you do to me? Did you screw around with my
head?”

The doctor seemed pleased with himself. “No,
dear. We merely programmed the training inside of you. The blade
was custom-made far away from here. It's silver tipped, so you can
kill both vampires and zombies alike.”

Jade rose from her chair, infuriated. “I
didn’t ask for any programming. I was happy with who I was.”

“
Yes, dear.”

She turned, flustered by what had happened,
yet oddly enough she couldn't leave the sword behind. She was
attached to it, bound to it, and she knew why. “And this, as well?
This sword, did you program me to need it?”

The doctor shifted, slightly uncomfortable.
“Yes.”

With that, Jade took her sword and
disappeared down the hall. She would wait in her room for Trent’s
return. And when he returned they would leave this place once and
for all. They were better off without these people, their fight, or
their plans and deals. She couldn't have cared less what bargains
they'd made with the vampires. Besides, she wanted to be alone with
Trent and this place would never allow for such a thing.

She heard Trent return late. He entered his
room without even looking in on Jade, and that alone made her
curious.

Quickly, Jade made her way to Trent’s
door, her sword strapped to her back, and knocked lightly.
When he didn’t answer, she tried the door. It opened easily and she
walked in to find Trent’s silhouette sitting up in his bed.

“
Trent, we have to leave.”

He didn’t answer. He sat unmoving, unwilling
to react to her presence.

She moved closer. “Did you hear me? We have
to leave.”

Still, Trent remained still, not even
turning to look at her when she spoke.

What did they do to him?

Jade moved in closer, calling to him.
“Trent?”

Then she was right next to him, seeing the
thing they'd attached to his forehead. Trent’s eyes were wide,
unblinking. He sat, merely recharging like some sort of robot,
controlled by other forces.

Jade tried to remove the thing, but it
wouldn't loosen. She traced the metal band around his head and
under his jaw, and found it secured by a miniscule lock.

It’s some kind of mind controlling
harness.

Her assumption was correct. She could see
that much. But she wondered how long he'd been this way. Could he
be brought back? She had to stay and try.

Before she could try anything, the door was
thrown open, not so much startling her as warning her. Jade drew
her sword in hand with lightning speed, ready to fight.

“
What a shame,” Kat said. “Now you’ll
have to be reprogrammed as well.”

“
Is that what you do to us? Turn us
into subservient slaves?”

“
Not me,” Kat assured Jade. “You don’t
serve my will one bit. Trust me. But there is someone,
yes.”

“
Who?”

Kat grinned. “No worries. You’ll meet them
in good time. But you won’t remember a thing about that meeting,
unfortunately.”

Kat drew her own sword. Two others appeared
behind her as well as the doctor. All three fighters parted when
Jade attacked. Before her blade could fall, she saw the thing in
the doctor’s hands, and traced the path of the electric current
finding her.

She felt her body explode with pain. Her
fingers seized as the electricity shot through them and then surged
out of her. Her eyes shook in her head, yet she managed to find
Trent’s face. He hadn’t even thrown her a glance of concern. Then
darkness found her.

When she woke, she found herself strapped
down to a dentist's chair. The cruelty of it all was that
Trent was the one to finish securing her. The only free limb
was her right arm.

As Trent finished his work on her right
foot, she quickly glanced about the room. The doctor sat at a desk,
thick magnifying glasses indicating he was engrossed in delicate
work. Smoke rose from a soldering iron he held in his hands,
manipulating a device much like the one Trent wore on his head.

That’s for me. If I don’t get out of here
now, he’ll put that harness on me.

She scanned the room and discovered her
sword. It was out of arm’s reach. The table it sat on, though, was
close enough to grab hold of one leg. But it looked heavy,
difficult to manage. Still, if she didn’t try—

Trent moved to her right arm, showing no
signs of caring whether she was awake or not. She knew she'd need
to do something fast, but what? Then an idea surprised her from out
of nowhere, yet another piece of information they had programmed
into her.

She thrust her fist up straight like an
arrow. Her hand struck Trent in the jaw, jarring him, but doing
nothing more than to cause him to stumble backwards. He leaped back
at her, committed to her fight. The commotion alerted the doctor
who went directly for the electric device he'd previously used to
stun her .

Jade grabbed the leg of the table and
tugged. The table shook closer to her, but the sword only shifted a
few inches. She did it again, and again, and again, as Trent moved
close enough to grab her. And in the background, the doctor now had
his device and was taking aim.

She stretched, finding the handle with her
fingertips. She rocked, jerked, and found the hilt. The electric
device fired.

Jade swung her blade free of the scabbard.
Her thrust deflected the end of the device into the wall where
several sparks shot out of its end. She balled up her fist around
the handle of the sword and punched Trent again. This time he
stumbled back farther. She used the time to sever her restraints
and freed herself.

The doctor dove for the door, but Jade threw
her sword to stop him. She back-flipped toward the doctor, kicked
him in the face and retrieved her sword before he landed hard on
the floor before her.

Jade held her foot to his throat. “Stop
him.”

The doctor tried to scoot away, but Jade
pressed down harder.

“
Stop him, I said.”

“
Okay,” The doctor choked out the
reply, reaching into his pocket. Jade’s blade traced his hand as he
dug out another device. He depressed a button and Trent froze.
“There.”

“
Give it to me.”

He held it up and she snatched it away and
tucked it into her own pocket.

“
Get up.”

He stood, with difficulty, and she steered
him over to the chair. “Now, you are going to remove that device
from Trent.”

The doctor nodded.

“
And when you're done, you're going to
explain how it works.”

He nodded again.

“
And then we’ll be on our
way.”

“
Trent, are you okay?”

He nodded his head, a red indentation still
bright on his forehead.

“
Good, we have to go.”

Trent glanced at the doctor tied to the
chair with makeshift restraints. “What’s with—?”

“
Don’t worry about that right now,”
Jade said. She gathered the things she needed, shoved them into a
sack, and threw it over her shoulder. “We have to leave
now.”

Trent followed her and they entered the
hallway, ready to escape. Jade glanced back and thought she saw
something odd.

Is the doctor smiling?

Trent asked, “Since when do you have a
sword?”

“
Hush,” Jade said. Together they
braved the darkness of the corridor, searching for a way
out.

CHAPTER 2

Into the Horde

Jade pulled Trent behind her. He stumbled as
they headed down the hallway, following the turns and decline until
they came to a metal ladder and climbed up to reach the
surface.

At the top she pushed open the hatch and
exited into a star-filled night. The moon was bright and large and
lit everything aglow with white radiance. Three vampires lay in
wait for the escapees. One of them, the one Jade had seen speaking
to Kat that night, only watched.