Burn Out (24 page)

I heard Kale’s voice through James’ com system. “I have a visual on you, James. Good work. Finish her and get back to the ship.”

A roar in the sky made me look up. The Consulate had found us. One ship was about to touch down, and two other small dots in the distance had to be the other ships.

I flicked the switch on The Obliterator and raised an eyebrow at James. “Does this change anything?” My finger hovered over the trigger panel.

He shook his head, and trained both guns on me. A shot tore into me and pain flooded my senses. Everything around me turned blurry and seemed to happen in slow motion.

The roar of the Consulate ship grew louder as it landed. What seemed like fifty soldiers poured out of the ship, weapons drawn. Behind James, I saw Kale’s ship lift in the air and gun for the horizon. I opened my mouth to speak but the pain was too great, so I pointed instead—maybe Kale deserting him would change his mind about shooting again.

James gazed skyward as Kale’s ship departed. He lowered his gun and ran toward me, “Tora! Don’t move. I’m coming—”

That’s when the soldiers took aim en masse at James. A shot ripped into his leg and another went through his arm. My heart lurched despite the fact that he’d just shot me. I couldn’t watch him die. Plus, if they didn’t realize who I was, they’d turn on me next. I gripped T.O. with my last remaining strength.

God help us all. I pushed the button.

L
AUGHTER FILTERED THROUGH THE MIST AROUND ME
. G
IRLISH
laughter. I flew through the air, attempting to locate the source of the sound. The wind caressed my hair, blowing it in tangles around my face. I wore no sunsuit, and the sun warmed my skin, yet didn’t cook it. I broke through the foggy substance and followed the childlike giggles. The sky was a brilliant blue, dotted with a thick substance I knew were clouds, even though there had been no clouds for centuries. The sun was warm yellow in color, bearing no resemblance to the red inferno of Earth. I inhaled the scent of fresh clean air—and flowers. Wildflowers. Somehow I knew what everything was without being told.

“Callie!” I called. Her name felt like sugar in my mouth.
I tried to fly faster. Leaves and flowers floated down on me as I soared through the sky.

“Come and find me,” Callie called back, her giggles echoing in front of me, behind me, everywhere.

“It’s not funny, Callie. Come out. I want to see you.”

The scent of wildflowers grew stronger and a single calla lily floated into my hand. I grasped the flower and inhaled deeply. It was how I’d imagined it would smell. Soft and sweet like my sister, which was why I nicknamed her after a flower.
I’m going to find you, Calla lily
, I’d call after her. She loved it when I called her by that name.

“I picked it for you. Do you like it?” she asked. Callie floated before me, dressed in her favorite floral shirt. She still didn’t look a day over seven years old. This time when I reached out for her, my fingers didn’t touch just air. The material of her shirt felt strange in my hand. Not quite solid, but still tangible.

“It’s really you?” I asked. She nodded and I flung my arms around her to hug her. Her body felt more like a rippling energy wave than human. She blinked in and out of physical form. “Callie, I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have locked the door that day. It’s all my fault.” Tears cascaded down my face and dripped onto her blond ponytail. I tried to smooth her hair with my hand, but couldn’t seem to touch her actual hair.

She looked up at me with shimmery eyes. “It wasn’t your fault. All you ever did was try to keep me safe. I
shouldn’t have gone out there—you warned me.”

How could she forgive me so easily? “Callie, where’s Mom?”

Callie smiled. “She’s around. She’s much happier now. She loves you so much and is sorry for causing you pain.”

This caused a fresh wave of tears. My throat felt like a lump of dirt had wedged itself inside. I’d never let my sister out of my sight again. “I’m so glad we’re together. I’ll make it up to you, I promise.”

Callie cocked her head to one side, as if she was listening to something that I couldn’t hear. She turned around to look behind her. All I saw was the vast expanse of blue sky. Callie frowned when she turned back around. Her voice sounded farther away, even though she remained right in front of me. “You can’t stay, Tora. You’re still needed down there.”

“No way. I finally found you. I’m not going to leave you.” But Callie began to fade away.

She flew to me and kissed my cheek, a buzz of warm energy against my skin. Then she danced out of reach, skimming over a cloud as she moved farther away from me. “Don’t worry, we’ll see each other again before you know it.”

“Don’t go!” I screamed. I fought as my body propelled itself down toward the planet below. Air currents ripped through me as I descended.

“No!” I yelled. Nobody listened.

I heard Callie’s faint voice despite the distance. “I love
you, Tora,” she called as I went back through the clouds. My view was obscured by the fine, white vapor.

“I love you too, Callie,” I called back. Her small, tinkling laugh answered me, spreading warmth through my chest. Though my body felt more solid and heavier with each second, a great weight lifted from my shoulders.

“Ms. Reynolds.” It wasn’t Callie’s voice. No clouds, no flowers, no leaves surrounded me. No nothing, except blackness.

“Ms. Reynolds.” The voice grew more insistent.

My eyes opened a crack, allowing a sliver of light to penetrate. I squinted and squeezed them shut again. My throat burned. God, I craved water.

A hand touched my arm and shook it. A firm shake, definitely not gentle. “We need you to wake up now.”

“And I need water,” I croaked, keeping my eyes shut tight. When a bottle was pressed into my hands, I forced myself to open them. Damn, the light was bright in here. Maybe I was dead; maybe I’d died on that strange planet. Other hands propped me up into a sitting position.

Everything was blurry, yet I managed to bring the bottle to my lips with a little assistance from the various other hands in the room. I sipped the water. It was cold. My eyes opened wider. The water was cold. This was what cold was. Where the hell was I if not dead, because who had cold water?

A man in wire-rimmed glasses and a shiny silver coat approached me. “Ms. Reynolds, it appears you’ve been shot.”

“No shit. Tell me something I don’t know.”

A murmur ran through the room. How many people were in here anyway? Trying to look around made me dizzy and my vision blurred further. “Sshhh, take it easy. You’ve been through a lot.” More hands leaned me back against the pillow. I took the bottle with me, not caring that I was sloshing water down the front of my gown every time I took a sip. If I was in a gown, this had to be some sort of medical facility.

I gulped the rest of the water, then waited for my vision to clear. The room was stark white, which only made the light seem brighter. I waved my empty bottle in the air, and someone brought me a refill.

“How’d I get here?” I asked, looking around. There were eight or nine figures in the room, and they all wore long coats. Only the man in wire-rimmed glasses had a shiny silver coat though. He must have been the one in charge, because he addressed my question.

He scoffed. “You mean before or after your little bomb destroyed two of our ships? We had to stop chasing Commander Stark to come back and retrieve you. He got away and many of our men’s lives were lost thanks to you.”

Kale’s last name was Stark? Though I wasn’t happy he got away, it meant Alec, Markus, and Lucy were safe—for now at least. I attempted to sneer at the wire-rimmed man, but choked on my water. It dribbled down my chin. “You know that eyeglasses went out of style like two hundred years ago, right?”

One of the women in the room, dressed in a shiny green coat, smiled. “He thinks it lends an air of authority.” She shut up after Mr. Wire-Rims shot her a nasty look. I wondered what one had to do to earn a shiny coat. I’d like mine in lavender.

Wait. Clothing reminded me of my satchel. I swiveled to check around me. “Where’s my bag?”

The man pushed his glasses up higher on his nose. Did no one else realize how crazy it was to wear glasses as an accessory? “Your bag is fine … it was on your body when you triggered the bomb. Now, about you. We found you after receiving the distress call on the com system,” he said smoothly.

“What distress call?” I asked, genuinely confused.

The man came closer. I felt his touch even though he wasn’t near enough to reach, and shivered. “The young man was worried that Tora Reynolds—only survivor of the great Dr. Micah Reynolds—was going to be ambushed.”

Young man? Had Markus found a way to contact the Consulate? If not, who the hell were these people?

“I’m sorry. I’ve been rude,” the man said, peering over the glasses now. I had a strange urge to rip them off his face and smash them. “I’m Dr. Sorokin.” He extended his hand to me. I reluctantly shook it, his hand cold and clammy against mine. I took it back, rubbing it against my gown.

“You were lucky. The shot only hit your shoulder.” His smile stretched awkwardly across his face.

“Huh? Only one shot?” I distinctly recalled there being
two guns, one of which was B.K. One shot from B.K. would have blown me apart. Maybe I was dead and hell was a place with people in eyeglasses and shiny coats.

“Yes, just the one,” he said, eyeing me strangely. “We certainly wouldn’t know otherwise, being that your bomb blew everything to bits.”

I sat up again. That didn’t make any sense. James said himself that he was a perfect shot. Missing any vital organs was one thing. Missing me entirely using one of the deadliest weapons in existence was highly unlikely. All I knew was that if I had it to do all over again, I would have killed them all the second I had the chance. I’d never let myself be vulnerable again.

“Ms. Reynolds, you know that you’re quite famous due to your father. You got lucky—we were already on the way to see what the holdup was regarding a business matter. Your way of thanking us was not very hospitable.” His eyes narrowed at me. “The only reason we didn’t kill you for your treason is that you are of some value to the Consulate due to your … weapons abilities. The caller said that you’d be able to take us to your father’s guns.” He touched the sleep pad, towering over me with his pasty self. “We should reach Caelia by nightfall.”

Of course. I was on a Consulate ship—one of the three must have been far enough away from T.O. to avoid destruction. It explained why I dreamed I was flying. Somehow he thought I knew where the guns were, and he didn’t know there was someone else who could fire them.

“How long have I been asleep?”

He frowned. “Two days. So you do know where Kale was taking the guns?”

“Yes,” I said. I’d play along until I had a freaking clue what exactly was going on. I shrugged, trying to look nonchalant. “Generally speaking, that is. Kale took the map with him, so we need to find him first. Maybe I could do it without the map. Let me think. Kale said he was going to the moon of the planet five light-years away from the western side of Caelia, no, maybe it was the fifth moon of the planet three light-years, no, maybe it was a planet, not a moon—”

“Enough!” He slammed his hand against the wall, then grabbed a com device and barked orders to someone about needing more meds for my “attitude.” He turned to me and smiled, his teeth shining like razors beneath thin lips. “Rest a little and then we’ll talk more about where to find Callie.”

“Excuse me?” Goose bumps rippled down my arms.

“Callie. The caller told us just today that you knew where to find Callie City.” His eyes searched my face, as if the map was etched across it with an
X
to mark where the guns were. I’d spit at him if I had the energy to lift my head off the pillow. His voice was a low growl. “A few of the outlying moons and planets have had rogue cities established by those who don’t appreciate the wisdom of the Consulate. I’m sure your city can be found among them.”

“Sure … Callie City. Yep, that’s where they are.” I
couldn’t decide whether he or Kale was the bigger asshole. My eyelids threatened to shut any second, then flung open. “Today? How did you talk to him today?”

The jerk smirked at his fellow Consulate members as he addressed me. “You haven’t even asked about your companion—the one who saved you. It was a miracle he survived that explosion himself. He’s sustained some kind of trauma though—he wouldn’t speak after telling us about Callie City. When you’re up to it, we’d like you to visit him. He’s down the hall.”

I closed my eyes, trying to ignore the bodies bustling about in the room. James was on board the ship. A woman lifted my arm, murmuring something about meds, then injected something in my arm. Lazy warmth flowed through my veins, and fatigue enveloped me. I quickly understood how you could get addicted to stuff like this.

My brain’s processing ability grew limited as the pull of sleep intensified. So James had called the Consulate to rescue me. He’d called them before he even shot me, meaning he’d planned it all along. Did that mean he was working with the Consulate? It was hard to wrap my head around the fact that he’d shot me, yet had also saved me. I had so many questions for him, if I didn’t kill him first.

Eventually I knew I’d have to come up with answers about the guns for the shiny, bespectacled man. However, my father always told me to look at the bright side, and at least I’d accomplished my goal of getting the hell off of Earth. I had no idea where my father’s guns were, but I
intended to find out as soon as the meds wore off.

My tenuous grip on consciousness slipped, and I drifted back into the dream realm. No matter. I’d take their drugs. I’d sleep for now. But I would wake up again. And I’d grow stronger. I’d make them sorry they ever saved my ass from that ship. I’d make them pay for my mom, my dad, and especially, Callie. I’d be worse than any burner they’d ever seen.

After checking my vital signs, I heard the last of the shiny coats leave the room. At last, I was by myself.