Gravity (The Taking) (8 page)

“I’m in,” I say. Then I turn to Gretchen, answering her question before she can ask it. “Early Op training stuff. Jackson was brought up early, too.”

“That’s great,” she says, and I know she means it. Gretchen is nothing if not sincere.

I watch Jackson walk away and feel as though a weight has been lifted from my chest. I’ve made my decision, and I know, in my gut, it’s the right thing to do. Now all I have to do is get home before my parents do, sneak into Dad’s office, and steal his master key to Parliament headquarters.

…

Exactly three hours later and I’m pacing my house, jumping at the tiniest of sounds. I need Parliament’s master key. I know exactly where the key is kept in Dad’s office; I just need to quit stalling and get it over with. But if I’m caught, death would be a mild punishment.

I check my phone for the twelve zillionth time. It’s nearing five thirty, which means by now my parents are en route home. I step around the stairs to the transfer door that leads to our training room. Dad’s office is right beside that door, invisible to an average onlooker. He had it designed to blend seamlessly with the wall so only those he trusted most would be able to get inside.

Trust…I’m one of those people he trusts. And I’m about to betray him. My mind flashes to Dad’s name on the target list. I have no choice. I will help Jackson find a way to stop this.

I rake my hand over the left side of where I know the door to be. A second passes, and then the door slides open. Inside, the office is eerily quiet. A large desk sits against the back wall, Dad’s favorite chair behind it. Other than the desk, bookshelves line the right wall and a filing system, full of old Engineer records, lines the left. It seems obvious to house the master keys in the filing system, but this is Dad’s office, which means nothing is as it seems.

I step over to the bookshelf closest to his desk and pull out the first book on the third row. Inside is a tiny keypad. I type in the code
5-12-12-14
, a combination of Mom’s and my birthdays. A
click-click-click
sounds through the filing system as one by one the drawers and cabinets are unlocked.

I have just started for the third cabinet to the right when the front door announces my parents’ arrival. I race forward and slide the cabinet open but can’t remember which keycard is for Parliament. Is it the gold one or the green one? I replay my dad’s voice in my head. “The Engineers produce red, the Chemists grow green, and Parliament controls the…” I pull the gold keycard off its hook, close the cabinet door, and return Dad’s secret book to the bookshelf.

I’m about to slide out the door just as my mom calls my name. I cringe. It sounds like she’s in the kitchen. But what about Dad? I edge to the doorframe and peek out. Dad is in the foyer, reading a message or something on his phone. His head snaps up, and I lean away from view, my body tensing.

I strain my ears to listen for any movement. After several painful seconds, I hear Dad’s heavy footsteps walk from the foyer to the kitchen. I release a long breath, edge to the door again, and peek out. It’s clear. Yes! I slip out. The door shuts automatically behind me.

I tiptoe away from the door and around the stair rail in the foyer, almost giddy.

I did it. I—

“What are you doing?” Dad asks.

I turn slowly until I’m facing him. “Nothing. Why?”

“Where did you come from? I didn’t see you down here earlier. Did you see her, Claire?” Mom joins Dad at the open doorway that leads into the kitchen.

“There you are,” she says. “We were calling for you. Dinner is ready.” She looks from Dad to me and back. “Grexic…stop it. She’s not trying to sneak out. It’s daylight outside. Kids don’t sneak out during the day. Now come sit down before your food gets cold.”

Dad relaxes his shoulders, but I can still see the questions in his eyes. He thinks I’m up to something. Perceptive as always. Thankfully, I put the keycard in my pocket before leaving his office.

I brush past him and into the kitchen. Mom made a roast, which is Dad’s favorite, so maybe he’ll lighten up. I sit down at the table and Mom sits beside me, Dad across from us. I want to ask about the attack or Zeus walking off the stage. Then I remember that President Cartier is supposed to speak tonight and hope that will facilitate the talk. “Aren’t you going to turn on the T-screen?” I ask.

“Why would I do that?” Dad asks, stabbing a chunk of roast with his fork. “I already know what she’s going to say, and frankly, I’m tired of hearing about it. I’d rather discuss your training. Cybil seems pleased with you.”

“Well, I’ve only had the one meeting with her. Our training today was canceled.” I stare at Dad, confused. He should’ve known Cybil canceled our training.

“Of course,” Dad says, but I sense there’s something he isn’t telling me.

We spend the rest of dinner listening to Mom talk about her latest research—some variation on healing gel. I try to follow along, but I’m too focused on the time, which is ticking closer and closer to when I need to leave. Finally, Dad excuses himself to his office, giving me my chance. “I thought I might go to Gretchen’s for a while,” I say to Mom as she’s leaving the kitchen. “Is that okay?”

Mom walks over and kisses my cheek. “Of course. Be home in an hour, though. You have school tomorrow.”

I step out of my house and turn left, as though I’m going to Gretchen’s house at the end of my street, but instead I cut across the main road and back up the sidewalk in the opposite direction, toward the tron. I pull my phone from my jacket and message Gretchen:
I’m at your house, okay?
I know she’ll cover me. I just have to think up an excuse to tell her later. So with that handled, I lift the hood of my jacket over my head and slide into the first seat closest to the door.

There is practically no one on the tron at this hour—a few warehouse workers and that’s it. I wait for the stop at Business Park, feeling my heart pound against my chest.

I try to clear my head as I edge around Pride Fountain, past the Engineer building and down the alley between it and Parliament headquarters. It’s darker than dark here. There are no visible doors or entrances.

An average person might think the alley runs to a dead end. After all, there is nothing but a large cement wall at the end, connecting from one building to the other. But I know better. The cement wall accesses the below-ground auto-walk that goes from building to building. This way, Chemists, Engineers, and Parliament members can go among buildings without others seeing them. I’ve never been on that auto-walk, and as far as I know, it’s restricted for lead personnel. Today, I won’t need it.

I reach the end of the alley and find the opening in the walkway that I was looking for. In the dark of night, it appears to drop into nothing, but there is actually a series of steps that leads to the servants’ entrance into the building. I pull out the flashlight I packed, flick it on, and shine it down into the opening, only to fall backward as the light flashes over a person standing by the door. “What are you doing?” I whisper. “You’re lucky I didn’t scream, ruining this before we even start.”

Jackson laughs. “Nah. I trusted you.”

“Well, move over. I’ve got the key.”

“Like a master key?”

“Yeah, I took it from Dad’s office. How else were we going to get in?”

Jackson shakes his head, evidently in awe. “I thought we’d do the normal thing—break in. But this works,” he says as I swipe the card and hold the door for him to get inside. “This definitely works.”

We ease down the hall, Jackson insisting on going first, until we reach the servants’ elevator at the end. A scanner protrudes from the wall beside the elevator. I swipe the card, hoping the master keycard works for all the scanners in the building, and instantly the doors pop open. I guess so.

Once inside, Jackson pulls out a notes tablet and starts clicking through something I can’t see. I lean closer until my arm touches his arm, my face inches from his. “What’s that?” I whisper, unsure if we’re supposed to be all spyish about this or not.

He turns, and I feel his breath on my cheek. He swallows hard. “It’s a map of the security floor. We’re going to duplicate a video chip.”

The elevator
ping
s open before I can ask anything further. We step off into a dark hallway.

“Flashlight?” Jackson asks.

I click it on, shining a thin ray of light down the hall. He sneaks forward, but I grab his arm. “Wait, security cameras.” I point at a two-inch silver triangle stuck to the ceiling.

He smiles. “No faith in me, huh? I had someone take care of that. We’re invisible for the next fifteen minutes.”

“How…?”

“Don’t worry about it. The video library is down here.” He motions to the right, and I follow close behind. We pass door after door. I wonder what lies within these walls. The truth about the Ancients? The truth about our history? I feel as though I’m walking through a morgue of secrets, as gross and decaying as the bodies at the medical one.

Jackson stops at a set of double doors and holds out his hand for the keycard. I hesitate. Stealing it was one thing, but handing the master key to an Ancient is on a whole different level. He must interpret my thoughts, because he steps back, giving me room to swipe the key myself.

A chilly breeze rushes from the room. We slip inside, and the door clicks shut behind us. My heart slams in my chest. We’re here. I’m really doing this.

I flex my hands to keep them from shaking. The room is nothing but floor-to-ceiling cabinets, a thousand different drawers, and a single T-screen. Each drawer is labeled with a number and letter sequence that makes no sense to me, but Jackson goes directly to a drawer labeled CIV3. He pushes the door in, which should make it pop out, but it doesn’t budge. He pulls on it and tries to wedge his keycard inside it, his face growing redder and redder. I glance around, wondering if the library has a locking system similar to the one in Dad’s office.

I walk to the center of the room and peer around. Where would they hide the keypad? No, they wouldn’t use a keypad here. They would use a scanner. I study the room, the walls, the lights, each of the cabinets. Then it hits me. I turn back to the door. No one would think to scan the outside scanner once
inside
the room. Maybe…I step out and swipe the master keycard. Instantly, a series of clicks sounds through the room. “There,” I say. “That’s better. Now, can you tell me what we’re looking for?”

Jackson stands, shaking his head. “Brilliant, Alexander. Really brilliant.” He opens the drawer, exposing three rows of tiny squares. He pulls one out. “This is a video chip. The
C
stands for Chemist, meaning the building.
IV
is the floor and
3
the lab number. So this drawer holds the camera readings from that lab. Your dad took me through the Chemist lab yesterday. Lab 3 was blocked off, the glass in the door covered so no one could see inside. Why? There has to be a reason. I think it has to do with the war strategy, like maybe the Chemists are coming up with something. I don’t know what. But I’m hoping this chip” —he holds it out to me— “will give us a clue.”

“But why—”

“I’ll explain later; we’ve only got a few more minutes.” He loads the first chip into the T-screen. A lab. Chemists coming and going. But nothing unusual. He loads the next chip and the next, cycling through ten or more, all as boring as the first. I’m beginning to think it’s not here when he inserts the next-to-last chip. A lab fills the screen, but this lab is nothing like the rest. It looks like a bomb went off in the room. Jackson and I both lean closer to the screen.

“Do you—”

“Shh,” Jackson says. “Did you hear that?”

My ears strain, but I don’t hear anything at all. I shake my head, my pulse racing. He shoves another chip into the T-screen and types a series of commands I don’t recognize.
REPLICATING
flashes on the screen.

“Come on, come on,” he whispers. Finally, both the chips pop out. Jackson returns the video chip to the drawer, grabs my hand, and yanks me from the room. He rounds a corner and presses against the wall. Several seconds pass. There’s nothing. No sound. No light. Then a soft
click…click…click
echoes from the hall perpendicular to where we stand. It grows louder and louder, until I’m sure someone or something can hear my breathing or sense my fear.

I tug on Jackson’s arm, but he shakes his head. We can’t just stand here! I glance down the hall and back to Jackson, then the clicking stops.

“Go.” Jackson urges me backward.

“Go where?” I whisper, glancing down the hall behind me. There’s an emergency stairwell door at the very end, but we’d never make it without being seen. The clicking starts again.

“Go now!” he says. I race for the door, slam through it, and barrel down two flights of stairs before I stop to see where Jackson went. I look up, my heart pounding, to see him at the top of the stairs, watching the door. Thankfully, we were only on the third floor so the level I’m on should have an exit door to outside. I scan the open stairwell and sure enough, there’s an exit sign above a door on my left. I glance back at Jackson, unsure whether I should run for it or wait for him. He tilts his head to listen, and I do the same. We wait in silence for what feels like an eternity, then Jackson leaps from the top of the third-level stairs down to the ground level where I’m standing, his face filled with excitement.

“We did it!” He lifts me into the air. “That was crazy. Amazing. I can’t believe we weren’t caught. I can’t believe you came. That was so—”

“Hey! Put me down!” I wiggle out of his hold and then I hear movement at the top of the stairs and my blood turns to ice.

Jackson jerks around, angling me behind him.

“Hmph, you must have been pretty vexed to fondle a human,” a voice calls from the third-level steps where Jackson had stood just moments before.

It takes a moment for my brain to process that the voice is Mackenzie Story’s and that she just called me a human, which means she must be…

“Blast, Kenzie, where was the warning?” Jackson says. “I thought you were a guard or something.” He pushes open the emergency exit door.