Flight (9 page)

He smiles up at me. "Right, you do that. After this mission. You will not be with Tier in any capacity except as his ninth warrior until the day you do quit. You got it now?"

"Yeah, I get it."

"And tomorrow I'm gonna twine you to me and that's the fucking end of it. I'll be in your head every fucking minute of every day. Even after you quit, Junco. Until I die."

I swallow as it hits me. "Why didn't anyone tell me this?"

"You gotta wonder, right? Why didn't they?" And then he gets up and walks out of the tent. Leaving me there alone.

I sit there for a while full of questions and then follow him outside. He's lying on his back by a small fire, smoking a cigarette. I lie down next to him and he offers the pack. I take one and touch the striker as I inhale. "I know why you guys always leave this shit a mystery until the last minute."

"Yeah?" He turns slightly, his hazel eyes glowing in the firelight. "What is it, then?"

"You don't trust me, do you? You all thought if I knew I'd quit and break my promise." I look up and see stars and smile at Orion. On Earth Orion isn't visible to the RR in June. "What more do I have to do to make you believe in me, Isten? I mean, I thought you guys wanted Tier to be saved."

He inhales and then blows out a cloud of smoke towards the night sky. "Everyone hates Tier except us, Junco. Why else would those fucking Archers let him rot in jail like that, put him on trial, make him look like shit in front of everyone?" He looks over to me, the light dancing over his face. "Why did they make you slice your fucking chest open to wipe away a debt that never mattered
to them
in the first place?"

He looks away and takes another drag before continuing. "Lucan gave him all those gifts. All those unsanctioned, illegal fucking gifts and then all of us have to pay the price for his stupidity. And I get it, Lucan picked him long before the 039 ever came into existence. So whatever, I've gotten plenty of gifts from him too. But it's gone way beyond that. They're afraid of him now, Junco."

I recall Tier poking his finger into Lucan's chest the other night and it begins to make sense.

"Not even Lucan can control him. Not after what you did to boost him. That fucking freak show of a mess you made out there on stage that night? You do realize it was a plan by Sera to oust Lucan, right? Give Tier control over everything? He might as well be running the whole show now."

"Wait, what?"

Isten sighs deeply. "Fuck, Junco. I am having a hard time reconciling the two sides of you. Ruthless, skilled killer and helpless, naive teenage girl. Who are you today? Just so I know how slow I should talk?"

"I have–"

"No idea what I'm talking about. Right, I get it – you can pick out Alcor, but not the full moon. Anyway, now Lucan's in love with you, too. It's like some goddamn Greek tragedy playing out before my eyes."

"He doesn't love me like that, Isten."

Isten laughs. "Uh-huh. Right, Junco. He just wants to shower you with gifts and protect you. Fuck, you need to grow up a little." He turns and sits up and I pull back just in case he gets the urge to attack me again.

"It doesn't matter, tomorrow it's over for both of them. Because it's me and you from now on. And I don't know why they never explained it to you, Junco, I really don't, but this was always in the plan. The last time we all talked it over together the purpose of saving you was to get the 039 our ninth warrior and since your skills merged with mine, well, it was perfect. This whole coincidence of you actually turning out to be the honest to God fucking Seventh Sibling for real, was just that. A fucking fluke. We didn't know, we thought you were just a pretty effective fucking clone. And we just wanted you for us." He turns so I can see his face. "That's it, Junco. We liked you and we just wanted you for us."

We sit there listening to the crackle of the fire for several long minutes.

I feel stupid.

But no one has been straight with me and I just don't have the history with these people to understand what's going on. Or, like Lucan said, ask good questions.

"I followed you through sniper school, did you know that, Junco?"

His words snap me back to the present. "What?" I frown up at him. "What do you mean?"

He smiles at me now. "I was with you every fucking second of that training." He looks away and his smile falters. "I was," he hesitates, "not visible, one of Lucan's gifts, so you never saw me. But that's how long we've planned for you to be our nine. I've been waiting for this day a long time and I just don't know what Tier was thinking." He shakes his head, clearly confused. "It was his idea. If he wanted you for himself all he had to do was say so. But the day you guys came back from vacation I asked him and he said it was still on."

I squeeze my eyes shut as the words soak in. "He gave me away?" My throat starts to tighten up a little it hurts so bad.

"Basically, you could say that."

"And Ashur? He knew too? And took me out to dinner and kissed me?"

"He kissed you?" Isten lets out a long sigh. "Fuck, anyone else I should know about?"

"I kissed him back, if that was your next question. You gonna threaten to kill him now?"

He stays silent, but I'm just getting warmed up. "So once again, everyone knew but me, yet they all felt like they could just play with my feelings?"

More silence. I nod and get up. "Wonderful. I'm done for today, Isten. Whatever happens tomorrow, happens. I imagine that if this wasn't in the plan then someone would have stopped you from taking me off-world, so that's just motherfucking wonderful."

I've been sold out yet again.

Chapter Seven

I wake up in the morning and Isten is banging shit around outside. The air is cool and misty when I venture through the flap in my bed clothes. The fake sun is just peeking up over the fake horizon in what I can only assume is the fake east.

"Coffee, Juncs?"

I shake my head and take a seat on a large rock near the edge of a cliff. My legs start to get goosebumps from the chill, and I lean into the sun a little to warm my face.

"Maybe you should put clothes on?" Isten calls from across the camp. "Or learn to drink coffee like the grown-ups?"

I ignore him and rub my legs. "When can we start shooting?"

He's busy packing ammo into the rifle bags but he stops and gets up, then walks over to me. "Hey, look, if this isn't want you want, just say so, OK? I just needed to vent last night. I'm not really interested in trapping you in my head for eternity based on a plan we made years ago and you had no say in."

"Actually, I've thought about it quite a bit." I look over to him and he's still and silent, waiting for my words. "If we are twined, and it's forever, then that means you can't give me away to anyone else, right?"

He pulls me up to his chest and squeezes. "I'd never give you away, Junco. Ever."

"Yeah, sure." I breathe in and then out again. "That's what they all think at first, then poof. My world is ripped apart all over again."

"Well," he pushes me back so he can see my face, "this one's a done deal. So, be very sure."

"I'm very sure. Just do it."

He lifts my chin up a little and smiles. "It's supposed to be special. Let's go shoot first. Then we can see how we work together without the twine. It'll be a good before-and-after comparison."

I smile, but none of this makes me happy and none of it makes me feel special.

Flying up the mountain isn't a option with the gear so we start hiking shortly after breakfast, which was a mylar packet of something I didn't even bother trying to identify. I just sucked it down under duress and then drank a whole bottle of water. It took about an hour to get to the first station but now that we're here, it's worth it. I walk over to the large red sandstone outcropping that makes my heart ache for my home and peer over. Even though I know this is a fake world, the beauty of it stuns me silent. Like Earth.

Ever since we landed, this place has been tugging me back to the blue marble and it's troubling in a way I'd rather not admit to right now. If fake Earth can create these feelings, what will happen when my boots are back on the ground for real? Will I have second thoughts about coming back?

"Junco?" I turn and find Isten studying my face. "What's going on?"

I have to swallow to make the words come out. "It looks like home, that's all." I turn around and go back to my rifle bag. "What are we shooting here, anyway?"

"Whatever you want to use. Your favorite, I guess. I'm gonna use the TAC9." He smiles at me. "That's my favorite."

I can't even muster a smile, so I just pull out Big Boy and lay out everything I need to take one cold-bore shot and make it perfect. Isten shows me where to stand so I can see the target across the valley. It's on the other side of a thicket of conifers, hardly visible with just my eyes, but through the spot scope it's as big as a house.

When I'm ready he waves me on first. I lie down on my belly, then crawl up to the edge of the cliff until I'm as close as I can get and still keep the bipod level. I spread my legs, snuggle myself down into the sandy dirt, and start breathing. In out. Up down. In out stop. Up down stop. In out stop. Up down stop. That's how I do it. It's a little chant I have to block out the world and remind me to only shoot on stop.

Once my breathing is normalized I reach back in my head for my last official data on previous engagement, input some new ammo ballistics, and then I let the infrared do its job as I do mine. I check conditions where I'm at, find the wind in the valley, then watch how it moves, as best as I can tell from what I can see, at the target.

I slide up to the scope and line things up with the mil-dots, run the calculations real quick in my head, then press the output button to see if the one-shot agrees with what I just came up with.

It almost does.

In cases like this I trust myself over a machine. I adjust the scope for my own personal observations and get back into my breathing. In out stop. Up down stop. In out stop. Up down stop.

I take my shot and watch with a smile as the target flashes purple.

Kill.

I scoot back on my belly until I have dead space between myself and the target, then get to my feet and smile at Isten for the first time today.

"Nice job, Snowbird."

"I'm sure you'll do almost as well, Isten. Don't worry."

"Honey, watch and learn from the master."

I wave him on and he repeats what I just did almost in every detail. His rifle is self-contained as far as DOPE goes, but I can tell he's trying to make it look more complicated than it is. There's no way Isten could shoot as well as me using a manual scope. Not if they never taught him how. And even if he did watch me in sniper school, he never actually did the training–

The pop of his shot jerks me back to reality.

"Kill, baby." He scoots back and stands up. "And it didn't take me all fucking morning to get it done, so huh!"

I smile at him. "Nice job. I mean, for a guy who relies on a computer to tell him when to shoot."

He nods his head up and down at me, a scowl on his face. "Yeah, you wanna do this, Junco? You wanna little competition, then?"

I let out a giant grin that spreads across my face and up into my forehead it's so wide. "Isten, you could never match me when it comes to this. You might own me in fighting, but in long-range shooting, I own you. I'm not a sniper, I'm an assassin. And that means the only time I take two shots is if there are two targets, everything is cold bore, and either I do it or it doesn't get done. So, you can get as cocky as you want because I will kick your motherfucking ass out here."

He smiles and pulls me into his chest to hug me. "You're right, Junco. I've seen you in action. Remember? But I'm still pretty good." He shrugs. "Come on, let's trade weapons. I actually can shoot with that barbaric thing you like to use. Not that it matters. But on the field you might only have a weapon like mine available, so better get familiar with it."

We spend the next hour shooting each other's weapons, then hike on to the next station and work on our spotting. In the field you can't be snipe all the time, it's way too exhausting, and that's why you need your partner. It only makes sense, then, to have one of ya shooting while the other spots out the target, checks wind, and all that good shit. If you're in a team situation, you rely on your spotter to give you honest, reliable feedback, which you then input into your rifle before taking your shot.

Isten is much better at spotting than I am and he's ready to clock me after I fuck up and make him miss a few.

The third station is an automated stalk site. We make some quick ghillies and run through the various methods of concealment and advance towards the target on the other side of a rolling hill. The first few tries we're spotted early and it zaps us with short bursts of green laser fire that burn through our clothes until we stand and surrender. On the fourth try we make it to the target, which is only about three hundred yards away from my estimate, but it takes us most of the day to stalk over there and take it out.