Beyond the Red (39 page)

Serek sighs. “Roma’s plan will murder more innocents than it will criminals. What happened was horrific, but … it doesn’t justify such a wide-scale slaughter.”

“I agree. But how are we going to stop it?”

He sits back in his seat and shakes his head. “I don’t know.”

I bite my lip. I hate to admit it, but Roma’s plan, if he’s truly figured out how to track by genetic code, is genius. The nanites are already in the air, as they have been for well over a generation—they’re used to eradicate disease, encourage stronger, faster-growing crops and animals, and even to cause rains during severe droughts and heal soldiers on the battlefield. With the right programming, they can do just about anything.

But they need a source of command.

“All Roma has to do is program them to execute redbloods and send out the order,” I say, thinking aloud.

Serek nods. “Correct.”

Standing, I step to the window and find it immediately—a gold and glass winding spire reaching far above even the tallest buildings, high into the heavens. The control unit, from which every nanite command originates, known as the Spire.

“We need to get into the Spire and stop them from sending out the order.”

He sighs and steps beside me. “It’s not that simple.”

“How isn’t it simple? We have to stop this, Serek, we can’t just let them—”

The door slams open behind me and we jump. Serek moves in front of me as Roma enters the room, his eyes livid. He grabs Serek’s shirt and slams him into the wall. “Where is he?”

I start toward them, but a guard grabs my arm and yanks me back. My shoulder burns as I stumble into him. I spin around and slap his face. “How dare you?” I hiss. “Release me.”

The guard doesn’t budge.

“Kora,” Serek says firmly. “Relax. I’m sure this is all a misunderstan—”

Roma laughs and releases Serek. “Oh,
sha
. I’m sure this is an enormous misunderstanding, brother. Evidently you misunderstood me when I told you the boy would be arrested and executed and that my order was final. You also seem to have misunderstood that my word is law, and not even you are above it.”

Serek arches an eyebrow. “I understand those things perfectly, brother.”

“Do you? Then tell me: where is the boy?”

“I’m assuming you mean the half-blood.”

Roma takes an impatient breath, then forces a sharp smile.
“Sha,
Serek. The half-blood. Where is he?”

“Far away from here, I would think. Unless your men caught him?”

Roma licks his lips and maintains the twisted smile. “Do you think this a joke?”

“Not at all.”

“Then you think me a fool.”

“Of course not, brother. You gave an order and I respected it, as I always have. I don’t always agree with your decisions, but that doesn’t mean I don’t honor your word.”

Something changes behind Roma’s eyes—the anger shifts to something else, something uncertain. His gaze slides to me, then back to Serek, and his smile fades. “One of my men claims to have almost detained him, but someone attacked him from behind and the half-blood escaped.”

Serek nods. “As I understand it, he was a trained warrior. Perhaps he defeated your man.”

“He insists there was someone else involved.”

“After what happened in the Arena, I don’t doubt there are some on the streets that might think
Kala
interfered to make way for his escape, thus earning him his freedom. Considering the laws of justice, I’m tempted to agree with them.”

Roma scowls. “You mean to tell me that you have no idea where he is, or how he managed to escape?”

“We all saw how he escaped clearly enough. Certainly you don’t think me involved in such a horrific attack.”

Roma turns away from him and paces back and forth across my room. He twists back to Serek. “My sources say it was an attack from the redbloods, but if I come to learn that either of you were involved in this, I will have you both executed on the spot. Understood?”

“Naturally,” Serek says calmly. “I would expect nothing less.”

Roma turns away and motions for his guards to follow as he storms out the door. The guard releases me and closes the door behind him.

And leaves us in silence.

I cross the sands at full speed. The white ground turns pink and powdery, then blood red as I race across the deserts. Without a helmet, I would never be able to travel this quickly—the sands kicked up by the thrusters below the bike would blind me. But with the visor over my face and a computerized system outlining the land in front of me, I could move at full speed through a sandstorm. And if I want to reach camp before nightfall, I’ll need to maintain this pace all day.

The suns rise above me and heat pours over my shoulders and back, soaking my skin, shirt, and pants in sweat. The kicked-up sand coats me like an extra layer, turning my skin red and creating sickly crimson trails down my arms. I monitor the directional units tracking my position and the distance I’ve traveled in the corner of the visor. In most circumstances, I’d abandon the helmet to avoid being traced, but keeping the location of the camp a secret isn’t a priority anymore.

It doesn’t matter whether they know where the humans are. The nanites will find them without directions.

I still don’t know how we’re going to fight them. I don’t know if we can. I don’t know if it’s even possible. But I have to do something. I have to believe that someone might have an idea, that somehow we’ll pull something together and survive the attack.

Bram—the man I watched shot down along with his wife and son the night of the raid—would have thought of something. He always had the craziest ideas Gray called “fucken miracles”—without his insight, we never would have developed the coms or hacked the locked phasers stolen from soldiers. He would have known what to do. Not that he can help us now.

By the time I near the location, the suns are descending in the sky and it’s far too near sunset. If I blast through the security border like this, I’ll definitely be shot at, but even if I slow down and trace the symbol of surrender on my chest, I’ll be shot at anyway. At least speeding on a bike, I stand a chance of outmaneuvering them and, with any luck, making them miss.

When I’m twenty leagues from the boundary, I begin to swerve left and right. I twist through the sand without a pattern—a long left, a short right, another sharp right, then left. It slows me down, but it also makes it much more difficult for snipers to land a shot, and I’ll be of no use if I get shot. For the first hundred leagues past the boundary, I move without incident. Maybe I’m wasting my time. Gray did mention they’d lost most of their guard—what if I’m nowhere near one of the posts?

Then a flash of hot red light races past my shoulder and I swerve faster. Five hundred leagues from camp and the shots increase, racing past my skin, several times way too close for comfort. I move more erratically, speed up and slow down, all the while moving toward camp.

Then I crest the final dune and face a line of soldiers, armed with long- and short-range phasers. They don’t hesitate—a wall of red and white lights races toward me and I slam the bike down into the sand. I skid several hundred feet and my left side burns. I release the bike—it crashes into a couple soldiers too slow to get out of the way, knocking them over—and I jump to my feet, rip off my helmet, and throw my hands up. “Wait!”

Miraculously, no one shoots me.

Sweat and sand cover every inch of my exposed skin. The knocked-over soldiers stand, glaring at me and raising their phasers. I turn to the closest soldier and nod to the com placed in his ear. “My name is Eros. Gray will tell you to shoot me, but I need to speak with him now. The Sepharon are launching a nanite attack that will kill every one of you at sunset. I need to speak with him.”

The soldier hesitates and presses his hand to his ear. An amateur mistake, but someone is speaking to him and that’s all the news I need. It has to be Gray.

I just hope he doesn’t order my execution without hearing me out.

The soldier pulls the silver com out of his ear and tosses it in the sand at my feet. “Put it on.”

I pick up the blinking earpiece and shove it into place.

“You’ve got a lot of nerf, you know that?” Gray’s voice says in my ear. “I don’t know how you found us, but give me one good reason I shouldn’t order them to shoot you right now.”

“I already gave you a reason. Do you want to die tonight?”

“I don’t know that you’re telling the truth. As far as I’m concerned, this could all be some hodgeshit to trick me into letting you into camp again.”

I roll my eyes. “Why would I bother breaking into camp when I know you and everyone else wants me dead?”

“Blazing Void if I know. Revenge. Maybe you’ve got yourself hooked up with bombs. Maybe letting you in will be the reason people die tonight.”

“I’ll strip down naked to prove I’m clean if I have to, Gray, but you have to let me in.”

Gray makes a noise like choking on something disgusting. “I swear to the suns, kid, if you start stripping I’ll come out there and shoot you myself.”

I restrain a smile. “So you’ll let me in?”

“You have five moments to convince me not to shoot you, starting the mo you enter my quarters.”

“Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me. You better have a helluva speech ready.”

The camp falls quiet as I enter the borders. Whispers and glances surround me as I search their faces for ones I recognize. Ones I care about.

I don’t blame them for staring—I was an anomaly to begin with, and now I’m back with gold eyes, wearing a shirt off the High Prince’s back. I’m covered in sweat and sand, with my hands cuffed behind my back, phasers pressed to my spine, and an escort of men that I helped train. I would stare, too, if I were one of them.

“Uncle Eros!” Something tiny slips between the guards and slams against my leg. Aren looks up at me, his eyes glinting between strands of sweaty blond hair with a grin wider than a crescent moon. “You’re back! I told Mal you would come back, but he said you got taken away and you were in the desert and not allowed to come back, but I told him—”

I crouch in front of him and he wraps his arms around my neck, hugging me tightly. I wish I could hug him, but I settle for leaning my head against his, then sitting back on my heels and grinning right back at him. “I missed you, little guy.”

“I know.” He smiles and buries his face in the sweaty crook of my neck. “Don’t go away again, okay? A lot of people went away and everyone was crying. Daddy went away, too, and Gamma and Gampa.”

I wince and glance at Gray’s tent with the white Le crest sewn onto it and guards standing outside his station, just fifteen feet away. “Aren, buddy, I need you to go find your mom, okay?”

He looks up at me with wide blue eyes. The tears glistening in his gaze are a kick to the stomach. “I don’t want you to go away,” he whispers.

I sigh. “I know, I don’t want to go away either. But Mal’s right; I’m not allowed here anymore. I’m just visiting, and then I have to go.”

He starts crying. Stars and suns, this kid. I hate seeing kids cry.

“Will you visit again?” he croaks.

I want to say yes. I want to say yes in the worst way, just to see him smile. Just to make him happy, if only for a few more minutes.

But I can’t promise him something that’ll never happen. I won’t do that to him.

“Half-blood,” a guard says, nodding to the sky. “You’re out of time.”

He’s right. The suns are moments away from setting. I slip out of Aren’s grip and kiss the top of his head. “I love you, buddy. Don’t ever forget that. But I gotta go now, and I won’t be allowed to come back anymore, so you be good and take care of your mom and siblings, okay?”

Aren rubs his eyes with the back of his hand. Sniffles. “Okay.”

I start to stand, but he grabs my arm and shows me a twine bracelet. “Nia made me make it. It’s a protection bracelet, so nothing bad can happen to you when you wear it. I made it for when Daddy comes back, but I want you to have it.”

“Aren—”

“Keep it? Please?” His lips tremble and he blinks several times and stares at me with those eyes, which are way too big for his head, and I can’t say no. Not to him.