Rush (14 page)

I cut him a sidelong look. He’s standing rigid and still, not even breathing.
Every man for himself
. He keeps insisting on that. And at the park, he told me not to feel guilty for being alive when others aren’t. But if he stands by his own philosophy, why does he look like the world is sitting heavy on his shoulders, his muscles tense, his lips pressed to a thin line?

Richelle’s picture dances to the left, nudging Luka’s down. She’s at the top.

Then comes my picture. I feel like I’m looking at someone I’ve never met. The girl looks pale and pained and wild. There’s fear in her eyes, but the tilt of her chin and the set of her mouth say she’s not quite out of the game, yet. She is me, but not me. Topsy-turvy I go, and then I’m in rank above Jackson and below the others.

Two columns of numbers pop up beside our images. The numbers beside Richelle’s name are red while everyone else’s are white. Red, like her con. Red, like her blood.

“What are they?” I ask.

“Scores,” Luka says. “The first column is our score from the last mission. The second column is cumulative for all the missions. The rank is according to the cumulative total.”

I stare at the numbers. Richelle had the lowest score for the last mission, but the highest cumulative total. That’s why her name is first. “Richelle was kick-ass,” I whisper.

“Yeah,” Tyrone says, his voice catching. “She was. And she almost made it out.”

My pulse kicks up a notch because I think I understand, but I barely dare hope. “Her cumulative score was nine twenty-five. How much did she need to make it out?”

“If she’d hit a thousand, she’d have been done.”

“Done . . . you mean finished? Finished with the . . . game?”

Jackson makes a sound of denial, but not because I’m way off base. It’s because, for some reason, this is something he wasn’t ready for me to know. I whirl toward him. “If she hit a thousand, she could have . . . what? Left? Retired? Escaped?”

“All of the above,” Luka says.

“It’s a rumor. You don’t know for certain,” Jackson says.

“So just to be clear, the rumor is that a thousand points buys your freedom?” I wait for Jackson’s nod. “And we get points for killing”—I glance at Luka—“Sorry. I mean
terminating
aliens?” Again, Jackson nods.

“How many?” I ask, and when no one answers, I ask louder, “How many points?”

“Five for a sentinel. Ten for a specialist,” Luka says. “A leader’s fifteen. A commander is twenty.”

So few points. It would take a very long time to get to a thousand. Maybe that’s the plan. Maybe whoever is running this bloody game wants to dangle the dream of freedom without ever delivering.

I turn to Tyrone. “You told me this. In Vegas.” I struggle to recall what he said. “You talked about multi-hit points and bonus points for . . . stealth hits. And . . . penalty points.” I pause. “When I first woke up here, I heard you say something about the boy who was here before me. . . .”

Tyrone’s expression darkens. “He was all about getting out. He didn’t care about the rest of us.”

“He was a griefer,” Luka says.

“Another gaming term?”

He nods. “We use it for someone who causes grief. He stole hits. He’d let me or Tyrone or Richelle wear down the target, then dive in and steal the hit. Steal the points. He couldn’t care less if we got killed. He just wanted the points for himself. He wanted out.”

“Doesn’t everyone want out?”

“Yeah, but we won’t sacrifice our teammates to get there.”

I cut a glance at Jackson.
Every man for himself
. The more I find out, the more I think he’s full of crap when he says that. From what I saw on the last mission, he’s no griefer. None of us are.

I turn back to the scores. Richelle’s from the last mission is only twenty-five. But I remember the way she fought, and I’m certain it should have been higher than that.

“Her score is so low last time because she died. She lost points.” I stare at Tyrone. “You said we have to pay for weapons. How else do we lose points?”

“Twenty-five per injury.”

I stare at Richelle’s score, wondering how many injuries—and how much pain—she suffered on that last mission to bring it so low. I feel sick.

“If your con goes beyond yellow-orange, you lose even more,” Jackson says.

“So I lost points last mission?”

“Yes.”

I look back at his weirdly low score. It’s doubly confusing because even though his score is the lowest, he’s the only one of us who has some sort of rank insignia or prestige badge next to his name. It’s bronze colored, in the shape of a star, and at the center is another, smaller star. “And you?” I ask. “Did you lose points?” He must have because I remember him killing Drau, but his score doesn’t really reflect that.

“I seem to lose points every mission.” There’s a thread of dark humor behind the words.

“He leaves the hits for us,” Luka says.

I don’t know what he means. And then I do. I remember how Jackson kicked the weapon out of the Drau’s hand rather than shooting it. He only used his weapon when he had to, when it was absolutely clear that I wasn’t going to figure things out without a little help. And I remember the way he leaped in front of me and used his body to shield me from the Drau’s weapon, twisting to take the shot in his back.

It’s almost like he doesn’t want to gain points. Or like he wants the rest of us to gain points instead of him.

I flick a glance at his oddly low score. “Don’t you want to be free?”

“The thousand points is a rumor,” Jackson repeats.

“You don’t believe it?”

“I don’t know anyone who made it to a thousand.”

I inhale, ready to fire my next question. Instead, I pause. Jackson’s careful with his words. He doesn’t waste them.
You
don’t know for certain, he said to Luka, not
we
don’t know. That implies that Luka doesn’t know, but does Jackson? And saying that he doesn’t know anyone who made it to a thousand points isn’t the same as confirming or denying the truth of the rumor.

I glance at the scores and frown. “Why didn’t I see these last time?”

“They came and went before you woke up,” Luka says. “You didn’t need to see them. You didn’t have a score yet.”

“Who’s been in the game the longest?” My gaze slides from Jackson to Luka to Tyrone.

“Jackson was already here when I got recruited,” Tyrone says.

I nod and look at Luka, who says, “They were both here by the time I came on board.”

So Jackson’s been here the longest, but his cumulative score is the lowest. Then mine. Then Tyrone’s. But he’s been here longer than Luka. . . .

“Why is your score so low?” I ask, rounding on Tyrone.

“It’s higher than yours,” he points out.

“I just got here. I haven’t had time to build a score. You have.”

Tyrone swallows, and then says, “I didn’t try as hard as I could have. In the beginning, I thought it was fun. Exciting. I thought I was researching
my
game. Then . . . once Richelle showed up . . . I didn’t try as hard as I might have. It was a chance to . . . to see her. To be with her.”

We’re all quiet for a moment. I turn to Jackson. “You’ve been here the longest. Why is your score so low?”

He gives that lazy shrug I’m coming to recognize. “Guess I’m not very good,” he says, lying through his teeth. He’s good. Better than good. He’s making a choice to keep his score low, and I want to know why. Suddenly, it feels like the most important question of all.

“Do you get points when you use your knife?”

“We jump in thirty,” he says.

“That’s not an answer.”

“It’s the only one you’re getting.”

I narrow my eyes at him. “I’ll figure it out.”

“Will you, now?” He offers a close-lipped smile. “Game on, Miki Jones.”

WE’RE PULLED INTO COOL, DAMP DARKNESS SO COMPLETE that I can’t make out even the hint of a shadow. Fear flicks its forked tongue. Palms damp, breath coming too fast, I stand perfectly still, waiting for my eyes to adjust, but as the seconds tick past, I realize they aren’t going to. We are entombed in utter darkness, and the only thing that tells me I’m not alone is the rasp of someone else’s breathing.

There’s a snapping sound, like a twig being broken in two, and then a greenish light illuminates a ring about five feet in diameter. I’m inside the ring, along with Jackson, who’s holding a phosphorescent wand that looks like a pregnant version of the glow sticks you get at concerts. I can just make out the shapes of Luka and Tyrone a few feet away, at the far edges of the ring. It’s Luka who’s breathing rough and hard, and after a second I realize that I’m there right along with him. I need to slow it down before anxiety turns to full-on panic. Deliberately, I do my thing: breathe in, hold, breathe out.

On the next inhale, I notice that wherever we are, it smells like sulfur and damp rock and something slightly unpleasant and halfway familiar: Kelley’s hamster cage.

A quick glance around reveals little. My field of view is restricted by the light of Jackson’s glow stick. I can make out walls and a floor of stone. I’m guessing the ceiling is more of the same, but I can’t see it. The light fades away into claustrophobic darkness before it hits the top of the cave. Cavern. Tunnel. Whatever. The hamster cage smell takes on new meaning. Is that bat guano?

In a distant recess of my brain I hear a whisper, just as I did in the alley in Las Vegas:
enemy
. Something’s out there, hiding beyond the ring of light. Instinct tells me far beyond it. The threat isn’t imminent, the feeling of horror just a whimper rather than a roar.

I make a hand motion at my lips, asking if it’s safe to speak. Jackson leans close and I whisper against his ear, “Where are we?”

He turns his head and whispers back, “In a cave.” He’s smiling. I can hear it. Pushing my buttons has become one of his favorite pastimes.

I take a deep breath and clench my fists by my sides, but at the same time, the knot of tension inside me eases a little. He wouldn’t be teasing if we were about to be attacked. “And where is this cave?” I whisper, syrup sweet.

“Puerto Rico. It’s one of the largest cave systems in the world. We’re in an isolated part of the system that hasn’t been mapped.”

Getting that answer was easier than expected. I gesture at the glow stick. “Won’t the light give us away?”

“Our arrival gave us away.” He’s not whispering anymore. “We might as well be able to see.”

Well, that’s comforting.

“Our arrival gave us away, like it did in Vegas?” I ask, remembering what Tyrone told me that first night.

“Yeah,” Tyrone says. “But there aren’t a lot of people here to mask us, so we’ve been dropped farther. Less chance the Drau’ll be able to pinpoint us. And once we’re here, the con scrambles our signal. Makes it tough for them to get a lock. But we’re in for a bit of a hike.”

I look over at Jackson. “Why not just drop us right on top of them? The advantage of surprise, you know?”

“They don’t publicize their exact location,” he says. “We know the general vicinity. Our cons don’t get a lock on them until we’re dropped in.”

“So we’re dropped in blind? Sort of knowing where we’re going, but not really?”

He shrugs. “Once we’re here, the con figures out the rest of it.”

Yet more comforting information.

“In Vegas, if the Drau knew we were there even before we went inside, why didn’t they attack?” I ask. “Why didn’t they come out into the alley to get us?”

“They don’t want to risk being seen. Not yet. They aren’t ready for humanity to know they’re here. They’d rather face us in confined spaces and”—he sweeps one hand before him, indicating our surroundings—“underground caverns where there are no human eyes to see them and alert the world.”

I frown. “Why?”

“Humanity will be easier to kill if they don’t know what’s coming.”

I shudder, horrified by that. “Why don’t we tell someone then?”

“Like who?”

“The police. The government. I don’t know.” I glance at Luka and Tyrone for help.

“Who’d believe us without proof?” Luka asks. “And, trust me, the game won’t let us bring out proof.”

“How do you know?”

“Been there, tried that. Brought my weapon back once. Shoved it in my pocket to make sure it came with me. Only, it disappeared at some point during the respawn. Took pics with my phone. When I got back, there were no pics.”

“You mean they didn’t turn out?”

“I mean there was nothing there. Like I’d never taken any. And before you ask, I tried more than once. So trust me, trying to tell anyone isn’t an option. If I came to you a week ago and told you I was part of a game that really was fighting off an alien invasion, would you have believed me?”

He has a point.

Jackson tosses a glow stick to Tyrone. Then he turns back to me, offers an easy shrug, and says, “We’re it, Miki. We’re the defenders. Don’t you get that?”

I’m starting to, and I can’t say I like it.

“We and the other teams,” I say, and glance at Luka to see if he’s surprised to hear that. He isn’t. So he does know there are others even if he can’t see them.

Jackson tosses another glow stick to Luka. They snap the sticks, then attach them to their harnesses so their hands are free. I wait, but Jackson doesn’t offer a light to me. “Forget someone?” I hiss.