Rebellion (Zero Series) (4 page)

She nodded and sat silently for a minute. “I’ll see
what I can do. Gather up all the paperwork you have on it and I’ll get
started,” she said. I began collecting all the reports I could find about the
gauntlets and I brought them over to her. She looked at the size of the stack
and sighed. I set them down and mouthed “sorry” to her. She started reading the
papers and I walked over to the table and sat down across from Frost. He looked
over at me with an annoyed look on his face.

“What’s your problem?” I asked.

“I thought we weren’t going to bring her here yet,”
he said.

“I wanted to bring her here. You didn’t for some
reason. She can help us,” I said getting mildly annoyed myself. I could see
Frost getting angrier as the conversation progressed.

“Can we talk outside?” he said almost yelling.

“Yeah let’s get out of here,” I yelled back.

We walked out to the wasteland and I turned to Frost.
“What is your deal?!” I yelled.

“You want to know what my deal is? How about that
Jet’s dad works for Kraken? Is that good enough?!” he said.

“What are you even talking about? Her dad doesn’t
work for Kraken,” I said.

“Yes he does. He has been seen with Kraken agents all
over Marsh City. He is in their inner circle!” he said.

“You are so clueless! You never even thought to ask
one of us about it? Her dad is in Kraken so he can get top grade medical
supplies for Jet’s mom,” I yelled.

“Medical supplies? For what?” he asked.

“She has radiation poisoning. She was in a building
that was next to a Kraken lab that had a radiation leak and now she needs the
best medicine available to keep it under control. He could only get it by
working for Kraken. They have no other attachment to them,” I said.

“How was I supposed to know that?” he asked.

“You could have asked me or her even. Instead, you
are cold and rude to one of our friends based on an assumption,” I said
angrily.

His face turned red and he said, “I’m embarrassed.
I’m really sorry.”

“Don’t apologize to me. It’s Jet that you need to
apologize to,” I said. He walked back into the tunnel and I stayed outside to
give them a minute. I leaned against the tunnel and looked off in the direction
of the city. I found myself hoping that Jet would have luck with the gauntlets.
I was deep in thought when Flare walked up and tapped me on the shoulder.

“Anyone home?” she asked.

“Yeah sorry. I was thinking,” I said.

“What about?” she asked.

“Your moron boyfriend,” I said.

She let out a heavy sigh and pulled out a small box
of cigarettes. She removed one and stuck it in her mouth. She flicked her
fingers and a small flame emerged and lit it. “What did he do?” she asked.

“He was being extremely rude to Jet and when I
confronted him, he started spewing some misinformed garbage about how Jet is
affiliated with Kraken,” I said.

“I told him to drop it. I guess he didn’t though,”
she said.

“No. I made him go in there and apologize,” I said.

“Is she here now?” she asked.

“She insisted that she come tonight. She wanted to
use the shower,” I said.

“Ah. She really likes you, you know,” she said.

“Does she?” I said slightly embarrassed.

“Come on. Don’t pretend to be so clueless,” she said
flicking some ash away.

“It doesn’t matter. We couldn’t be together. I
wouldn’t want to put her in jeopardy. If Kraken found out where I was or that
we were connected, they would kidnap and torture her,” I said.

“You say it like she is a helpless child. Maybe you
should think long and hard about it. You may find that some things are more
important than others. Things could go south pretty quickly once we get things
rolling in the Insurgency,” she said putting her cigarette out with her foot.

“You understand where I’m coming from right?” I
asked.

“I get why you would be concerned but you can’t
protect everybody. You may as well enjoy your time with people while you have
it,” she said.

“That’s really profound,” I said jokingly. She
laughed and we started in towards Sanctum. As we got in, Frost was pulling a
small generator over to Jet’s workbench.

“Where is Jet?” I asked.

“She is taking a shower,” he said.

“Well that was quick. Did you talk to her?” I asked.

“I apologized and we are fine now,” he said.

“Good. We can’t have you being a jerk to her
throughout this whole thing,” Flare said.

“That’s very funny. Did you bring some real food for
us?” he asked.

“Yeah. I was able to scare up some potatoes and
chicken,” she said. She handed me the bag full of food and I proceeded to go
into the kitchen area to cook the items. After we all ate a small dinner of
roasted chicken and potatoes, I decided to see if Jet had made any progress on
the gauntlets.

I approached the bench and before I could say
anything, Jet said, “These reports are amazing. The technology is so intricate
and advanced.”

“Have you made any progress in learning about them?”
I asked.

“All I have learned is that they run on a certain
type of fusion cell that is now nearly impossible to acquire. Kraken has done a
stellar job at sweeping the city and confiscating technology,” she said.

“How would we go about getting some of them?” I asked
sitting down across from her.

“I don’t know. Maybe Thread could ask around for us.
Until then I can only learn about the circuitry and make sure that it is in the
correct position,” she replied.

“Alright. Next time we are in the city we can stop by
Thread’s shop and talk to her about it,” I said.

“Okay. Oh one more thing. Where am I going to sleep?”
she asked.

“I hadn’t thought about it. You can have my bed. I
can sleep out here,” I said.

“We could share a room. There is no need for you to
sleep out here with no bed,” she said.

“Are you sure? I don’t want to put you out,” I said
nervously.

“It will be fine,” she said.

“There is only one bed,” I said back.

“We can share one,” she said.

“I can sleep on the floor in there,” I said.

“Come on. You don’t need to do that,” she said.

“I can, it’s no problem,” I said with my face getting
gradually redder.

“I won’t let you. The bed is big enough for both of
us to share,” she said, “I’m putting my foot down.”

“Alright,” I said, “I’m going to stay up a little bit
later and read through some papers.”

“Don’t stay up too late. You have a rebellion to
run,” she said going into the bedroom.

I guess it still hadn’t hit me yet. The Insurgency
was alive and I was running the operation. I was going to have my chance to
take down Kraken, to avenge the deaths of my parents, Frost’s parents, Pipes
and everybody else who had died and suffered at the hands of Hades. I started
reading through the papers seeing if there was another project I could start
while Jet was working on the gauntlets. I read for hours and just became progressively
more confused as the night wore on. I decided that it was time to get some
sleep, but I didn’t want to intrude on Jet while she was already asleep. I
looked around the room for extra blankets and pillows. I found some and made a
small makeshift bed under the workbench. I laid down and stared at the
underside of the bench and gradually drifted to sleep.

The next morning I awoke to Jet sitting on the ground
next to me reading through a scientific report. I rubbed my eyes and sat up
forgetting that I was under the workbench and cracked my head on the table. It
scared Jet and made her jump. She said, “I thought we talked about this last
night.”

“It was really late and I didn’t want to wake you
up,” I said groggily.

“I couldn’t sleep at all. I was awake all night,” she
said.

“I didn’t know that. Besides, I said you could have
the room,” I said.

“I don’t understand you,” she said in an exasperated
tone. She got up and walked to the other room.

“What was that about?” Flare asked as she brought me
a cup of coffee.

I took the cup of coffee in my hands and said, “Last
night I offered to let her have my room but she insisted that we share. When I
actually went to go to sleep, I made a small bed out here.”

“Do you remember what we talked about last night when
we were outside?” she asked.

“I do,” I answered.

“I thought you were going to make an effort,” she
said.

“I kept thinking about upset I would be if I lost her
and it stopped me repeatedly,” I replied.

“You need to get that out of your head. You think she
doesn’t worry about something happening to you out there? She does and she
doesn’t let it stop her from making an effort to get closer to you,” she said.

“I already lost my parents. I don’t want to lose
another person I care for. I need to do some thinking. Can you talk to her for
me?” I asked.

“I can try. She may want to hear it from you,” she
said.

“Let me know how it goes then. I have some work to
do,” I said standing up, “Have you seen Frost?”

“He is in the armory looking at the different
pieces,” she replied. I thanked her and went to the armory. I found Frost
trying on a silver helmet.

“I wouldn’t go with that one,” I said taking a drink.

“It doesn’t fit anyway,” he said.

“I was thinking, we may need more room,” I said.

“More room?” he asked.

“Yes more room. If we are going to be gathering war
supplies, we will need more storage space,” I said.

“Hmm, good point. There is still a lot of cave in the
back that is unused but it needs to be flattened out if we are going to store
anything there,” he replied.

“Do we have any explosives?” I asked.

“No,” he answered, “Even if we did, we couldn’t use
them. We don’t want to run the risk of the explosion being heard in the city.
You could use your spike to flatten some of the stone out in there. It would be
quieter and safer than using explosives.”

“We can give it a try. I don’t know if I could muster
enough power to clear that away without completely losing control and knocking
the cavern down,” I replied.

“Maybe we should wait until Jet figures out the
amplifiers,” he said.

“Maybe,” I said walking out of the room.

Frost followed behind me, “What’s the matter?”

“Nothing,” I replied, “I… need some air.” I walked
out through the tunnel to the entrance to Sanctum. When I reached the outside,
I found myself staring off towards the city. I felt strange. I finally had
revived the Insurgency and would work towards avenging my parents and all of
the fallen, but I was still being haunted by the sight of Pipes being killed. I
wanted to help people. I couldn’t stop Pipes from being executed. How was I
supposed to save all the citizens of Marsh City? I turned around and looked
into the forest. I had never been in there before. I came to the edge of the
trees and stopped. It was dark and seemingly dangerous inside. I felt the need
to continue on into the woods. I walked for what seemed like an eternity
towards the center. I came upon a large orange flower that had yellow spots on
the petals. There were red barbs sticking out of the center. I leaned in closer
to examine the interesting plant. I reached my finger out and poked one of the
petals causing a barb shot me in the neck. I got dizzy and started to stumble
around until finally I fell into unconsciousness. I opened my eyes and looked
around. Everything was blurry and spinning. I saw a pair of black shoes at the
end of a pair of legs wearing a gray suit. I instantly recognized Hades’ suit
and I felt anger well up inside me.

“Zero. I knew you were weak,” said Hades.

“No…” I whispered. I was barely able to talk. I
looked up and saw his evil face. Something was different though. His beard was
shorter than normal. It was trimmed down to his face. He approached me and
crouched down next to me. His face was so close and his eyes were intimidating.

“You will fail. You cannot unseat my rule. I have
taken measures to ensure that I can never be defeated,” he said in his deep
voice.

I tried to stand up but my limbs were so weak. “I
will stop you. I will give the city back to the people,” I said.

“You couldn’t even save Pipes, your parents, or
anyone who was in the resistance,” he said laughing.

I felt a rage inside me unlike any I had ever had. I
felt the gene spike acting up and I couldn’t control it. A great force exploded
out of me, but Hades was unfazed. The power continued to grow with my anger. I
pushed so hard on the ground that my fingers moved into it like it was butter.
Hades screamed over the sound of the destruction, “Even now you cannot stop me.
At your full power, I still stand strong.”