Chapter 17
“I’ve tried to talk to you,” Rowan said. We were sitting in the field again. It was just the two of us, though, no shadow this time.
“Why couldn’t you?” I asked. “It’d be better talking to you than having other dreams.”
“What do you mean?” she asked.
“I had a crazy dream where I got shot,” I said. “A little girl I met yesterday was in it.”
“That is crazy,” she said. “I think the people who are holding me are giving me something that knocks me out fully. I don’t dream when they do.”
“How are you here now then?” I asked.
“I didn’t eat,” she said. “I think they’re putting it in my food. It’s not like they give me anything special when they do. It’s just the usual.”
“What’s the usual?” I asked.
“Bread and soup. It’s not that bad, but it gets tiring after a few years,” she said. “I don’t know how long I’ve been held. I’ve gotten so used to it, I can’t taste it anymore.”
“So where were you before they kidnapped you?” I asked.
“I had a mom and dad,” she said. “I know they loved me very much. My mom was pregnant with my little sister a few months before they got me and my dad. And when they did, she was only a few weeks old.”
“You’re my twin sister, so you do know that they weren’t your real parents. You were kidnapped when we were only a year old,” I said.
“My parents told me I was adopted,” she said, looking down. “They actually told me a few weeks before those people kidnapped me. I was upset, but I knew that they still loved me regardless.”
“But still, if you hadn’t been kidnapped, we could have spent our whole lives together,” I said. “I would have liked another sister my own age.”
“So I have another sister?” she asked, smiling. “Tell me about her.”
“Her name is Lyric,” I said. “She’s six, or six and a half as she likes to say. She looks exactly like us, only much smaller. She just like any other little sister would be, wanting to be exactly like me. I don’t want that for her, though.”
“Why not? You seem like a good person to me,” Rowan said.
“I’m not, though, not in real life,” I said. “I’ve done stuff, really bad stuff, so I don’t want her to be like me.”
“What kind of bad stuff are we talking about?” she asked quietly.
“I’ve killed people. Well, Guards, but they’re still people,” I said. “I’ve got a reputation because of it. People are afraid of me. The scar doesn’t help that much either.”
“What scar?” she asked.
I reached up to touch my face, but when I did, I couldn’t feel my scar. It wasn’t there. “In real life I’ve got a scar going across the left side of my face. I guess I look dangerous or something. I like it, though, because then people don’t mess with me,” I said.
“I guess I’ll see you for real when you come and break me out. If you don’t get caught,” she said.
“So…” I started.
“What?” she asked.
“What was it like with your parents?” I asked. “I mean, they weren’t mean to you or anything, were they?”
“Oh, no. Like I said, they loved me even though I was adopted.”
“I wonder how that happened,” I said.
“How what happened?” she asked, looking confused. “How I was adopted?”
“Yeah,” I said. “I mean, you were kidnapped. I wouldn’t call that adopted.”
“I’m sure my dad didn’t kidnap me,” she said. “He was probably the sweetest man I’ve ever known. Well, for what time I wasn’t locked up. And I know my mom wouldn’t have either.”
“Did they tell you how they got you?” I asked.
“My mom was the one who told me,” she said. “She told me that my dad just came home with me one day after a business trip. He said that he adopted me. They’d been trying to have a baby for a long time, but with me, they were happy.”
“So no strange people coming to them and just handing them a baby?” I asked.
“No,” she said. “They were the best parents I could have asked for.”
“What happened to your dad exactly?” I asked. “Do you remember?”
“It was a long time ago, so I really don’t remember,” she said, shaking her head.
“Try and remember something,” I said. “Anything.”
“It was one night during the summer,” she said. “I’d gone to bed, but my mom was still up with my new baby sister. I heard loud banging down in the kitchen, so I got out of my bed and went to take a look. But when I was just about to go down the stairs when about four men ran up the stairs, one of them grabbed me up and carried me down the stairs. He ran out of the house with me and all I could hear was my mom screaming for them not to take me.”
“What happened after?” I asked.
“I don’t really know,” she said. “They knocked me out with something, so I can only remember glimpses of where I was going.”
“So that’s what happened when you saw Central Headquarters?” I asked.
“What?” she asked.
“Central Headquarters. That’s the name of the building that you saw, the one made completely of glass,” I said. “I just learned the name of it a day ago, so you’re not the only one who didn’t know.”
“Oh,” she said. “Yeah, I guess. Um, all I can really remember is the building and them taking me through a long hallway.”
“Do you remember anything about it? Like which door they took you through?” I asked.
“All I can remember is the number seventeen,” she said.
“Okay,” I said. “Maybe that’s the cell or floor number.”
“Maybe,” she said, shrugging. “After that, I woke up in the cell that I’m in now. I don’t remember anything else.”
“Who knows how long you’ve been in there,” I said. “It must be pretty boring just sitting there.”
“Yeah, well it’s not now,” she said. “Or at least it’s not going to be for any longer.”
“Because I’m coming to get you out,” I said.
She smiled. “Yeah,” she said. “Now, tell me more about what’s happened.”
“Happened?” I asked.
“That Directrix thing you were talking about the last time we were here,” she said. “What is it exactly?”
“It’s what took over after the US government was destroyed,” I said. “And when that happened, they started bombing everyone to gain control. But after a couple of months, they just seemed like they didn’t care about anyone else. They’ve continued bombing every once in a while. The last time was a week or so ago, when they destroyed Chicago. Again. There’s nothing left.”
“If that’s all that’s been happening, I’m kind of glad I’ve been locked up,” she said.
“Yeah, but you’re in the center of it all,” I said. “You’re in their main city and in the most important building. And I still don’t understand why they’re holding you. Or why they took you in the first place.”
“I don’t either,” she said.
She stood up them, and I did too. We just looked at each other, and then I was hugging her.
“I’ll try and get you out as soon as I can,” I said.
“Just be careful, okay?”
“I will,” I said. “And if they catch me, I’m not a bad fighter.”
She laughed. “You’ll have to teach me a few things,” she said. She pulled back and looked at me. Her face changed then, and she looked sad.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“It’s about someone you’re with,” she said. “They’re not who…”
But then everything went black, cutting me off from Rowan and who she was about to say something about.
But I didn’t wake up. Instead, I was outside Central Headquarters in the city. Nothing made a sound as I made my way to the door. Beside it was a screen. I touched it and a keyboard lit up on it. I pressed letters. They seemed like random letters, but then I recognized them. They were the ones on my necklace. When I pressed the enter button, it was accepted. And then the door swung open…
When I woke up, all I could see was Kade’s chest. I must have fallen asleep next to him and we just moved closer to each other until he had both of his arms around me. I looked up and saw he was still sleeping, so I snuggled closer to him. He took a deep breath and then his eyes fluttered open.
“Hey,” he grumbled.
“Hi,” I said, leaning my head back on his chest.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
“How do you know anything’s wrong?” I asked.
“I can feel that something’s wrong,” he said, and tightened his arms around me. “You’re tense.”
“I talked to Rowan again,” I said.
“Yeah? What’d you talk about?” he asked.
“Everything,” I said. “She told me about what it was like for her when she was a kid and what happened the night that the Directrix took her.”
“Did she know that she was kidnapped when she was a baby, so the people she called mom and dad weren’t really her parents?” he asked.
“She said that they didn’t tell her until a couple of weeks before she was taken and that they told her she was adopted. They told her that her dad came home one night from a business trip and said that he’d adopted her,” I said. “And then I had another dream.”
“What was that one about?”
“We’d gotten into the city and I was trying to get inside a building. I think it was Central Headquarters. I had to put in a code and it was the one on my necklace,” I said. “And it worked.”
He pulled back to look at me. “Really?” he asked.
“Yeah,” I said. “I guess my great-grandma knew what she was doing when she put the code on my necklace.” I unzipped my jacket and pulled out my necklace, looking at the engraving on the band.
We were both quiet for a long moment.
“Are you okay?” Kade asked.
“Yeah,” I said, playing with my necklace. “I was just thinking about something she said.”
“And…”
“She was going to tell me something either about you, Xander or Loryn, but everything disappeared before she could,” I said. “It’s kind of worrying me.”
“There’s nothing to worry about,” he said, and kissed my forehead. “Everything is going to be fine.”
We both heard someone walking toward us, so we both sat up, brushing off some on the dirt that had stuck to us.
“Finally you guys are up,” Xander said. “We’ve got to get going if we want to get these last few miles in. The sun’s already started to go down.”
“Where’s Loryn?” I asked, looking around for her. She was nowhere in sight.
“I’m right here,” she said, coming into view. “I had to do something real quick.”
“So if we’ve got to get going now, why not go?” Kade said.
I stood up and grabbed my vest from beside where Kade and I had fallen asleep. I put it on, and then strapped on the guns to my legs. I put my earpiece in one of the vest pockets since I wouldn’t be using it anytime soon. Because when we did use them again, we’d be in the Directrix.
It had only been about an hour and the sun was completely down. We were almost to the city, though. And with every step I took, the more nervous I got. My entire body was tingling with excitement.
“How close are we now?” I asked. The trees were getting thinner, so I knew we had to be close.
“I don’t know,” Xander said. “You tell me.”
That’s when we got to the edge of the trees and all that was in front of us was the Directrix. Not just a camp and a couple of Guards, but an actual city. The buildings were all black down toward the ground level, and then as you looked toward the top it turned into glass. They were everywhere you looked.
But as you looked farther away, there were regular looking houses, only they were humongous. That was probably where everyone in the city lived with their families. It was hard to believe that the people who ran the Directrix actually had families, though. I wondered what they were teaching their kids about the people who lived outside of it. Maybe they taught them that all of the people who lived outside the Directrix were savages, killing everything just to make a point or gain some kind of control. How ironic would that be? Wouldn’t they be talking about themselves?
“Let’s go,” I said, and started walking.
Kade grabbed my hand and pulled me back. “Rayney, wait,” he said. “We’ve got to come up with a plan before we do anything.”
“I’ve got a plan,” I said. “Get my sister and kill anyone who get’s in my way.”
He smiled. “That sounds like your kind of plan, but we’ve got to come up with one that involves all of us.”
“And what were you thinking?” I asked.
“Well,” he said. “I was hoping that we’d be able to find where they store all of their equipment, like their helicopters. And while we’re looking around for a way to get in, Xander can be disabling the transmitter on one of them. That way we’ll have a way to get out of here.”
“I’ll be able to do it,” Xander said. “Plus, our helicopter was getting a little old. We could use a new one. It’s another thing for Ryder to play around with.”
“The way that I was going to take you guys to get in was through the hangar,” Loryn said. “That’s where they keep all of the helicopters and jets.”
“They have jets?” Xander asked. “Well, there’s something we didn’t know about.”
“There’s probably a lot we don’t know about the Directrix,” Kade said. “But we know what we need to right now.”
“Okay,” I said. “What about when we get inside?”
“I’ll stay with the helicopter,” Xander said. “It’s probably going to take me a while to disable everything. That’ll give you enough time to get in and out, if you don’t get caught.”
“The three of us will be looking for a way in,” Kade said, looking at me and Loryn. “You two stick together, though.”
“Fine,” I said. “I’d be able to take on a few Guards by myself…”
He smiled. “I know you would, but that’s not what we’re thinking about right now,” he said, giving me a look.
I knew what he was thinking. Since Loryn knew her way through Central Headquarters and if she and I got in, I’d be able to get to Rowan that much fast so we’d be able to get out.
“About getting into the city,” Loryn said. “You do know they’ve got a force field around the entire thing, right?”
“What?” I asked. “And you just decided to tell us now.”
“I know how to get through it,” she said.
“Good, because if you didn’t, we’d be screwed,” Xander said.
“What about getting out?” Kade asked.
“The force field is used for humans only. The helicopters are able to go straight through it, so that shouldn’t be a problem. But if they figure out that we’re getting out with a helicopter, they can switch to a different force field where nothing gets in and nothing gets out.”
“That could be a problem,” Xander said. “Let’s just hope we get out before they can switch it on.”
“Okay,” Kade said. “Are we ready?”
“Let’s go,” I said.
As we made our way toward the city, everyone was looking somewhere, checking to see if anything had spotted us already. Loryn was looking at the ground, though. I didn’t know why. Her lips were moving, too, like she was counting something. And then she stopped, making me, Kade and Xander stop, too.
“It’s a few feet from here,” she said, and took off her backpack. She set it on the ground and unzipped it.
“What is?” Xander said.
“The force field,” she said. “It’s two hundred and fifty steps from the edge of the trees.”
“So how are we going to get through it?” I asked.
She looked around in her backpack for a second and then came up with what looked like a can of spray paint. “This,” she said, and took off the cap. She sprayed something in a big arch, going all the way to the ground. “The spray scrambles the field. And if you’ll give me your tracker for second…”
Xander took his out of his vest and handed it to her. She pressed a few buttons on the screen and a different one came up, not the tracking screen. She pressed one more button and then she handed it back to Xander.
“And now we can walk through it,” she said, smiling. “It only holds for a minute, so come on.”
We made our way past were she sprayed, and after we did, there was a crackling sound and then it stopped.
“The system repairs it after,” she said. She held up the can. “This comes in handy, doesn’t it?”
“Where did you get it?” Kade asked. “And how did you know how to use it?”
“Traded for it,” she said. “The guy that had it had gotten in here tons of times. He even taught me how to use it.”
“Now that we’re in, which way do we go?” I asked, looking at Loryn.
“Well, the hangar is right next to Central Headquarters, which is on the very edge of the city. Why they built it there, I don’t know. But it’s convenient, because we don’t have to go that far.”
She looked toward the city and to the right. There, standing hundreds of feet taller than any other building, was Central Headquarters. Just like Rowan told me she remembered it looking like, it was made entirely of glass. There were several lights on throughout the building and we could even see a few people walking inside it.
“So that’s it?” Xander said, still looking at it.
“That’s it,” Loryn said. “My dad loved that building. If only he knew what it would be used for.”
We started walking forward toward the low-lying building next to Central Headquarters. The hangar, just like Loryn said.
“Is anyone going to see us?” I asked. “I mean, we can just waltz in there without anyone seeing, can we?”
“They don’t care about out here,” Loryn said. “And once we get to the doors of the hangar, I know a code that freezes the motion sensors so they don’t know anyone is in there.”
“You do know all of the codes,” I said.
She smiled. “That’s what I get for sneaking into my dad’s office and memorizing all of them.”
Once we got to the doors of the hangar, everything felt like it was actually real. I was going into the Directrix – sneaking in – and rescuing my long lost sister from being held captive for however long they’d had her.
Loryn touched the screen on the right side of the door and punched in a code. The screen turned green, indicating that it was accepted, and then door opened.
The inside was nothing like I’d even imagined. Weapons of all kinds lined the walls, ammunition stored on shelves below them. The helicopters were farther back. There had to be at least a hundred.
“This isn’t the only place they store everything,” Loryn said. “There’s a bigger one with more a couple buildings down from here. Plus, there’s a level under this one.”
“How are we supposed to get out of here if the helicopters are stored under a roof and there’s no exit besides the door?” Xander asked.
Loryn walked over to the side of the building to a control panel next to the door. She searched through the buttons and then pressed one. It was quiet for a second, but then an area of the roof disappeared above one of the helicopters in the middle of the bunch.
“That’s how we get out,” she said. “Now, you go get started on one of them and we’ll go look for a way in.”
Xander ran toward the helicopter and opened up the door. He got in and started playing around with the controls. I turned toward Kade.
“So I’ll go with Loryn and look for a way to get in,” I said. “And if we do, I’ll message you so you can meet us.”
“Okay,” he said. “And if you don’t message me, I’m going after you anyway.”
I smiled. “Quit worrying,” I said. “This is going to work. I know it will.”
“Do you know where you’re going when you get in?” he asked.
I walked closer toward him and whispered to him. “Rowan told me she remembered a number and that’s all she could,” I whispered. “I think that’s the cell number or the floor she’s on.”
He wrapped his arms around my waist and hugged me to him. “Just be careful,” he whispered.
“I will,” I said, and pulled back.
He took my face in his hands and brought my face to meet his. He only kissed me for a second, but it was all I needed. He pulled back and smiled. He let go of me and I ran toward Loryn.
“Do you know the fastest way in?” I asked.
“I’ve got an idea,” she said. “Come on.”
I followed her out of the hangar and out into the night again. We hung close to the side of the building, trying to keep out of sight of anyone who was walking in the building and would be able to see us. It was a big disadvantage, trying to keep out of sight next to a building that was made completely of glass.
Loryn paused and leaned back against the wall. “Okay,” she said. She glanced near the building and then looked back at me. “Do you see that door over there?”
I looked to where she indicated. There was a door there with a screen next to it…and it was the same one in my dream.
“Yeah,” I said, and looked back at her.
“Okay, we’re going to have to run over there,” she said. “We have to be quick or they’ll see us.”
“Okay,” I said. “I’m quick.”
“Good,” she said. “Now, go in three, two…”
“One,” I said, and started running toward the door.
We made it there in a few seconds. We both landed against the wall, trying to press ourselves close against it to keep out of sight. We stood there for a moment, trying to catch our breath and make sure no one was coming out to get us.
“Are we good?” I asked.
“Yeah, I think so,” she said, she turned toward the door and the screen beside it. She touched it and it lit up. She looked confused.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“They changed the setup of everything,” she said.
“What? Are we going to be able to get in?” I asked.
“I don’t know how to work these,” she said, touching the screen.
She moved through one screen and onto another. And then she smiled.
“Something good I hope?” I asked.
“Yep,” she said. “I found the right place to type in the code.”
I watched as she tapped the screen again and a keyboard came up. She typed in a code and then pressed enter, but nothing happened. She tried another one, and nothing happened again.
“What’s happening?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” she said.
“Can I try something?” I asked.
She shrugged and moved over so I could see the screen. I typed in the code that was on my necklace, and then pressed enter. The screen went blank.
“What did you do?” she asked, smiling.
Before I could answer, the door opened.
But instead of the empty hallway I was expecting, five men walked out. One was dressed in a suit and the other four were Guards, their weapons drawn and aimed.
Only at me.
I looked over at Loryn. She was still smiling.
“Good work, Loryn, darling,” the man in the suit said, smiling at her.
“Thank you, Daddy,” she said, still smiling.
“Daddy?” I asked, looking at her. “I thought your dad was dead?”
“Oh, did I say that?” she asked. “I’m sorry. I must have forgotten to tell you I was lying.”
“We’ve been expecting you to try and break in,” Loryn’s dad said. “We just didn’t think you would trust Loryn fully to let her come with you.”
“But she did,” Loryn said, laughing.
“How could you?” I asked her.
“Enough,” her dad said. “Bring her in.”
I turned and started to run, but the Guards were faster. They caught me by my hair, dragging me backward. They caught my arms as I tried to swing at any of them. I especially wanted to do some damage to Loryn’s face, but she was right in front of me then, and I couldn’t move.
“It’s amazing how stupid you’ve been,” she said, laughing again. “How do you think I knew about how to get in?”
“You bitch,” I said through my teeth.
“And you haven’t even seen me at my worst,” she said, a sinister smile on her face. “Sleep well.”
The Guards tilted my head to the side and I saw Loryn pull out a needle and syringe. The last thing I felt was a sharp sting in my neck and then all I saw was black.