Psion Alpha (52 page)

“You’re dead, Byron,”
Omar growled low enough that the crowd, still chattering in the absolute
darkness, wouldn’t hear him.

Byron heard Omar’s
boots on the mat and blasted again. A thud followed, giving Byron immense
satisfaction. His eyes had adjusted to the darkness enough that he could barely
make out where Omar lay on the ground, stunned and struggling to stand. Byron
knelt beside him and grabbed him by the throat.

Through a jaw too
painful to move more than a few millimeters, he growled, “If you ever speak to
me or Trapper or Otto or Emerald again … if you ever touch one of us … I will
make you pay. Remember this. Remember how I beat you. Before those lights went
out, I beat you. And I could do it again, only next time I will make you look
like the weak little worm you really are.” Byron stood back up and planted his
boot firmly in Omar’s face.

Not more than a minute
later, emergency lights kicked in, illuminating the inside of the arena.
Commander Wu’s face was the first thing Byron saw after his eyes grew
accustomed to the light again. Wu’s gaze moved back and forth between Byron and
Omar, who lay flat on his back on the mat, a stream of blood oozing from his broken
nose. Byron imagined how bad he must look in that moment, leaning against the
cage with a battered face and broken jaw. As soon as it became apparent to the
crowd that the fight was over, the aisles filled with bodies trying to reach
the exit. Byron scanned the faces around him for Emerald, Trapper, and Otto,
but couldn’t find them. He looked again, this time more urgently. For some reason,
he needed to see Emerald. When he didn’t spot her, he left the cage. Clardonsky
could track him down later for all he cared.

As he moved through the
crowd, several students tried to talk to him. They all had questions about
whether he’d won, what had happened to his face, and if the fight would be
finished later. Byron ignored them and pushed forward, looking for his three
friends. They weren’t in the quad. He turned all around but saw no sign of
them.

Where on earth did they
go?

He headed toward the
dorm building, ignoring the bolts of pain shooting through his head with each
step he took. It dawned on him that he ought to head for the infirmary to get
his jaw fixed, but he didn’t want to go by himself. He knocked twice on
Emerald’s door, but she wasn’t there. Disappointed and confused, Byron went
back to his dorm, hoping to find Trapper or Otto. The pain in his face now spread
from his neck to his ear, and he felt it twinge every time he swallowed or took
a step. By the time he reached his own dorm, he was ready to give up and go to
the infirmary alone. The dorm room was unlocked, which gave Byron hope that
Trapper was inside. However, no one was there. Byron was turning to go to the
infirmary when he saw his tablet on the floor, right where someone entering
couldn’t help but see it. Something on the screen flashed. He picked it up.

Byron, we’re in
hangar 3 celebrating! COME QUICK!

Byron started to type a
reply stating that he needed to get his jaw looked at, but noticed that Trapper
was no longer online.
Crap.
He touched his face and instantly regretted
it. Rather than getting examined, he took the last of the pain pills he’d received
when he broke his knuckle and set out for the hangar. Using his tongue, he
probed the right inside of his mouth and felt at least two of his teeth wiggle
with only mild pressure. Part of him wanted to cry, but part of him still rode
the excitement and adrenaline of having just won a second golden skull and
being on his way to celebrate with friends.

The walk to the hangars
took almost fifteen minutes. Despite wearing a coat in the November Siberian
air, Byron’s whole body shivered
by the time he reached his destination
. His jaw still ached,
but the medicine took the edge off and helped him tolerate the pain. Before
entering, he took a second to lean on the door and gain his composure. Then he
went inside.

Only a couple of lights
had been turned on, dimly illuminating the vast chamber and creating an eerie
atmosphere. Byron wondered if they planned on jumping out at him like his
parents and friends had done at his thirteenth birthday party. Then he saw a large
and lumpy shape on the floor right next to one of the wheels of a jet.
Something around it reflected the light off its surface. Byron moved closer
until he recognized it.

Otto. Blood.

His eyes blurred as
tears screwed up his vision. There was no way that Otto could still be alive
with so much of his blood spilled out around him. Mumbling his friend’s name in
a low, strained voice, Byron stepped into the puddle and pulled on Otto’s
shoulder until he could see his friend’s face. Otto’s eyes gazed upward, frozen
and glossy. His mouth opened partway in a permanent expression of surprise. A line
of red adorned his neck from ear to ear. More redness coated the skin and
soaked much of Otto’s clothes. On the underside of the jet, Byron discovered a
grinning, flaming skull painted in his friend’s blood, along with the words:

I AM ELITE

He staggered back from
Otto, leaving bloody boot prints. If Otto was dead, who else had died with him?
Trapper? Emerald? He rounded the body of the jet and saw multiple people
waiting for him. For a brief moment he thought this might be some sick joke:
Otto playing dead on the floor, the darkened hangar, the message from Trapper.
He wished it was a joke, no matter how disturbing.

Instead, Byron saw Trapper
holding a knife—the missing knife that had belonged to Trapper’s grandfather.
He also saw Emerald gagged and bound with tape, lying on an oily, dirty metal
table meant for repairing jet parts. And then he saw Diego, Omar’s best friend.

“Walter Byron,” Diego
said in a welcoming tone. “Congratulations on beating Omar today and earning a
second golden skull. You must be so proud.”

Byron sensed someone
moving behind him. He heard a sound like compressed air being released at the
same time something sharp poked him in the back. Pure electric current flowed
through his body, bringing him to his knees, and finally flat onto his stomach.
The pain that wracked his jaw when it hit the concrete nearly rendered him
unconscious.

“Move quickly,
Markorian,” Diego told his friend. “Hands and feet like I told you.”

Byron’s gaze went from
Diego to Emerald to Trapper as Diego’s friend taped up his wrists and ankles
without any care for Byron’s comfort. Markorian didn’t stop until Byron was
bound like an animal, palms and feet pointed in directions which rendered his
blasting harmless. He noticed the shock had also made him incontinent, soaking
his pants in his own urine. During all this, Emerald watched with terror-filled
eyes that released new tears each time she blinked.

Once Diego knew Byron
posed no threat, he knelt next to him. “I smell your fear, Byron. I think you
do, too. Pungent, isn’t it? As for your girl, Trapper’s going to kill her. You
get to watch, you lucky dog.” He stood back up.

Byron adjusted his head
by craning his neck so he could see what was going on. Trapper still held the
knife like a dagger, watching Diego as though he waited for orders. His left
hand still dripped Otto’s blood.

“Trapper,” Byron
called. His voice came out thick and garbled from the swelling in his face and
his restricted jaw movement. Each syllable brought agony, but he didn’t mind it
so much now. “Trapper, please. Put down the knife. Please. Why are you
listening to Diego? He hates you. Remember the things he did to you? Please put
down that knife.”

“Trapper doesn’t listen
to you, Byron,” Diego explained. “Only me. Isn’t that right, Trapper? Go ahead
and kill her now. The same way you killed the others. When you’re finished,
write the entire litany with her blood. It will represent a culmination of your
efforts.”

Trapper moved the knife
toward Emerald’s neck, his handsome face contorted in revulsion and hatred. His
eyes fixed onto her neck as he grabbed her hair with his blood-crusted left
hand, and, with his right, he drew the knife to her skin.

“You love her,
Trapper!” Byron shouted. “You told me you love her! How can you kill someone
you love?”

Trapper stopped and put
his bloody hand over his mouth, smearing dark red across the lower half of his
face. “I can’t, Diego.” He set the knife down as though it burned him, then
gingerly backed away. “He’s right. I love her.”

“No, you don’t,” Diego
said.

“I—I do.”

“
You don’t!
”

Trapper shook his head,
then nodded it. Then he grabbed his hair and pulled on it while he screamed and
roared like a lion. The scream went on for a long time, a wounded, raging sound
filled with primal energy. Trapper no longer seemed like the handsome, fun boy
Byron had met almost two years ago, but a tortured, soulless man trapped in a
nightmare. “I CAN’T DO THIS, DIEGO!”

Diego took two steps
toward Trapper and Emerald. His face showed no concern, only interest. “She
doesn’t love you. Why should you love her? Has she ever kissed you?”

Trapper wiped his eyes
and shook his head.

“Has she ever made love
to you?”

Again Trapper said no
with his head.

“Yet you told Byron
that she did. You told Commander Wu you slept with her. But you didn’t …
because she doesn’t love you.” The power in Diego’s voice astonished Byron.
He’d never heard someone speak with such authority and persuasion. The more he
spoke, the more Trapper’s expression changed from sorrow to anger.

“She does love you,”
Byron told his roommate. “She cares deeply about you.”

“I lied for you,
Trapper!” Emerald screamed. A length of tape dangled from the corner of her
mouth. “I told Wu I slept with you to give you an alibi, you slimy piece of—”

“Shut her up!” Diego
laughed. It sounded like a light and pleasant dance. “Isn’t that what you’ve
always wanted, Trapper? A sister like Emerald? Because that’s how she loves you
… like a sister would her brother. Won’t that be something? To kill three
people in this hangar today: one who was your loyal friend, one who loved you
like a sister, and the other who loved you like a brother.”

“What will I have left
when they’re dead?” Trapper asked. He still didn’t sound like himself. The
inhuman shouting had stopped, and in its place was the voice of a grown child
waiting for instruction from a parent. None of this made sense. Where was the
normal Trapper? How had Diego done this to him?

“You’ll have me.”

“Diego is not your
friend, Trap. What has he ever done for you?”

“Oh, I’ve done far more
for him than you have, I think,” Diego answered. “I’ve given him direction.
I’ve seen him for who he truly is: a man with deep, powerful urges that must be
sated and controlled. Poor Trapper fought for so long against those urges for
too long. They burst like a river breaking through a dam. Didn’t they, Trapper?
You remember the night when you beat on Xian like an angry toddler hitting a
rag doll because he kissed Emerald on the cheek. You remember the shame you
felt after seeing what you did. What did you do to atone for that?”

“I beat myself,”
Trapper answered, his lisp suddenly gone. “My own face. I wanted it to look
like someone had jumped both of us.”

“See, Byron?” Diego
asked, gesturing to Trapper. “I know him better than you do. I figured that
out, and you didn’t. I knew Otto better, too. Did you know Otto was hooked on grade-buster
pills? I did. He hid them in his socks under his bed until Commander Wu found
them when his room got tossed.” Diego laughed again. “You are blind, Byron. And
arrogant and self-righteous.

“It wasn’t you who told
Trapper how to get out of his dilemma. I did. I said to him when Xian woke up,
‘Trapper, if someone doesn’t silence Xian, he’s going to cause a lot of trouble
for the person who attacked him in the dojo. But that someone can’t just kill
him, he has to make it look like someone among us is very sick—deeply, deeply
disturbed.’ And that’s when Trapper knew what to do. And that’s also when he
knew I was his
true
friend. I helped him. I cared.”

Byron didn’t buy it. He
looked at Trapper for some kind of confirmation, but Trapper’s face showed no
emotion, no connection to what was going on. “What about the other deaths,
Trap? Tell me those were someone else. Right?”

Trapper looked at
Byron. The corners of his mouth turned down, his forehead wrinkled; his eyes
showed pain and guilt.

“Why?”

“They suspected me,” Trapper
moaned. “Commander Wu kept coming back to me, questioning me. Diego taught me
how to beat the lie detectors. And he told me if I didn’t kill again—kill someone
I didn’t know—someone I had no connection to, they’d figure out it was me. So I
did.”

“Tell him the rest,
Trapper,” Diego urged. “You might as well, you’re on a roll now.”

Trapper’s hands covered
his eyes as he cried.

“Tell him, Trapper!”
Diego’s command was saturated in authority. Even Byron felt a strong compulsion
to tell Diego whatever he wanted to know.

“I liked it!” Trapper
shouted through his sobs. “I liked cutting them. I liked painting with the
blood! I love the smell, the warmth, the taste!”