Masked (7 page)

D
eath was
no stranger to me. I'd seen my fair share; experienced the loss of that final calling; survived the fallout of that fatal blow. But I'd never seen it on such a scale as this.

Wánměi, for all its brutal history, is a peaceful nation. Controlled in its grief. Graceful in its heartache. Serene in its lack of remembrance.

For what was wiped if not a death?

I knew differently now. I'd seen with my own eyes just what being wiped had meant. And it haunted me. Daily. My dreams were filled with those we'd loved and lost. And yet the thought that they still lived plagued me.

We were very good at forgetting.

We should not desire for more than we have. Wánměi provides all that we need.

It had provided a form of death.

Even that had been clean.

No blood or loss of limb. No crushed legs or punctured lungs. No broken arms or caved in skull. No horrific injury... at least, not physically.

Unless you call the removal from all that you know a physical injury.

Where the wiped were now was anyone's guess.

But they were not dead. Not like the row of white sheet covered corpses that lay along Quay Street. Lined up as though soldiers marching on parade. The warm night breeze lifted the corner of one sheet, a dust covered, blood coated shoe poked out from beneath.

I let a slow breath of air out; I was so exhausted.

"Giving up already, Elite?" Alan's voice drifted over the subdued rumble of a city-state recovering.

"The Civil Defence has found no others," I offered, but he would have been aware.

I watched as Alan looked toward the edge of the crash zone, as they were calling it. The edge of the largest debris to have fallen. The Sky Tower had stood some three-hundred-and-twenty-eight metres high.

Not any more.

"They'll keep searching through the night," Alan commented. "They won't stop. Will you?"

When had I ever stopped? It felt like I'd been running, fighting, searching for something for all of my life.

I didn't reply. My tired, gritty eyes sought out the only form of comfort that mattered.

"Where's Trent?"

Alan spun in a slow circle, his combat boots coated in things better left not said. He'd been in the thick of it. I hadn't seen him for the past hour. But Trent had stayed within sight of me the entire time.

The first kernel of something with no name unfurled inside my stomach, reaching cold fingers towards my heart.

I stood up from where I'd been resting; my legs shaking from over-use, my muscles screaming for a hot bath.

My heart beating too swiftly.

"Where is he?" I said again, and maybe it was the roughness of my voice, or maybe Alan suddenly realised that Trent wouldn't leave me alone to face this horror, but Alan's head whipped 'round and dark, narrowed eyes landed on me.

"When did you last see him?"

I frowned, my eyes searching. "A quarter of an hour ago, maybe?"

"Where was he then?" he demanded; no hint of the challenge so often apparent in his tone when he speaks to me.

"Over there." I pointed to the side of Quay Street, under the overhang of a theatre that had missed the brunt of the damage, but not come off completely unscathed.

Its roof had caved in on one side, adding to the rubble from a nearby building which had become the landing pad for the aerials and antennae atop the Sky Tower's spire. Wires and metal struts and the once smooth, now dented, spire itself lay tangled in amongst concrete blocks and rebar, glass and steel framing.

There had been people in that building. And the theatre next to it. Trent had been helping organise their extrication from out the front of the cracked glass windows that made up the theatre's doors.

I hadn't seen him go inside.

I followed Alan in a daze towards where I had indicated last seeing Trent, and watched as he assessed the ground for some sign of him. Collapsed from exhaustion, maybe? It didn't seem a far stretch to assume Trent was as tired as myself.

"He's not here," Alan offered unhelpfully. His eyes flicked up to the theatre entrance, torch light arcing in that moment across the darkness inside. A Cardinal walked out a few seconds later, followed behind by a Civil Defence Force Search and Rescue Squad member. They pulled the doors closed and proceeded to wrap bright yellow tape through the handles, sealing the building up, and marking it "CLEAR."

My eyelids fluttered closed. They felt too heavy. My chest ached. I heard Alan question the Cardinal and SRS member; the words a hazy undertone, much like a low hum to my battered mind. I turned my back on them. The Civil Defence Force were extremely thorough. I knew the answer even before Alan's voice rose and his words cut through the hum.

"Just let me check. He was standing right here!"

"We know," the Cardinal replied levelly. "We've been working with him for the past two hours. But he didn’t come inside. That was
not
part of his instructions."

"Well, where is he?" Alan demanded.

"Have you tried the command post? He may have reported there with walking wounded."

He wouldn't have. Or, at least, he wouldn't have left
here
without first letting me know.

Trent was nothing if not a competent leader. And he wouldn't abandon his team.

"He's not here," I said loud enough for Alan to hear.

"I think we've established that, Lena," Alan growled. "But where would he go?"

I shook my head. The Cardinal and SRS member watched on, offering no assistance. They looked bone-tired, too. But they'd recognised me, and their interest was piqued enough to use exhaustion as their excuse to remain where they were standing and watch.

I felt like I was always being watched lately.

"He wouldn't go anywhere without letting us know," I insisted.

Alan frowned, my words tumbling over inside his thick skull. A thick skull that, when applied correctly, housed an intelligent mind.

It took him three seconds.

"The hospital." I nodded, that ache inside my chest becoming a pressurised pocket about to explode. "Come on," he instructed, slipping into the rebel leader role smoothly, just like he and Trent had rehearsed.

I'd never thought I'd be taking instructions from Alan.

We nodded farewell to the Cardinal and Civil Defence Force rescuer, and made our way towards the staging point and the ambulances there.

A sense of organised chaos surrounded us. People bustling from one spot to another, red lights flashing, generators humming, commands wafting above the clatter of trolleys and stretchers and beeping machines. Most of the injured had already been transported, just a few remained. Perhaps one of them Trent.

Hope left an acrid taste on my tongue.

Alan tried to gain access to the emergency tent, but was turned away. His anger billowing up like a mushroom cloud, erupting in heated words and tight fisted hands and hunched shoulders.

I slipped past him and the Cardinal who refused entry, and simply walked into the tent unobstructed.

"Hey!" the Cardinal called from over my shoulder. "You there! Halt!"

I couldn't see Trent, but that didn't mean he wasn't here. Or that he hadn't been, and had already been transported to the National Hospital at Muhgah Foh. I couldn't see him, but hope, that fickle bitch, swelled inside me despite the lack of provocation.

"Citizen!" the Cardinal called, his tone demanding attention.

"Good luck with that," Alan murmured at his back.

"You, get outside!" the Cardinal yelled at him. While someone, a field doctor maybe, hissed, "Quiet!"

I turned to face the Cardinal, his arm out in front of Alan who was on his toes peering at each of the cots in the makeshift emergency room. The look on his face said it all: He couldn't see Trent, either. My stomach clenched and twisted, the acrid taste becoming bile.

"You!" the Cardinal repeated, having seen I was paying attention now, "are not allowed in here."

I stared him down. So easy to do; it's how I've been raised. Rebellion or not, I was an Elite. An Honourable. Above reproach or disdain. "Do you know who I am?" I asked, my voice hollow, my words like a whip.

"I don't care who you are," the Cardinal shot back in a valiant attempt at authority. "You're not wearing the security tag that allows you back here."

"Don't you recognise her?" Alan asked, falling into the role so easily.

We hadn't practised this one. More often than not, Alan and I butted heads. But he knew immediately what I was doing. Or he was just extremely efficient at taking advantage of a situation when presented it. He edged his way around the distracted Cardinal for a better look at the beds.

"Who are you?" the Cardinal asked, a little more uncertainly.

"She's The Zebra," the doctor, who'd told us to be quiet earlier, said. "How can I help?" he asked, turning to me once he'd reached my side. He had a kindly, if somewhat tired face. For some reason capricious hope soared.

"Trent Masters," I started, my heartbeat almost drowning out the words.

"I know him," the doctor advised.

"Has he been in here?" Alan rushed to ask.

He shook his head. My heart plummeted.

Along with any hope at all.

"Not that I'm aware," the doctor advised. "And I've been here nine hours. If he has, it would have been in the short breaks I've taken. Possible," he added with an apologetic shrug of his shoulders.

"When was your last break?" I asked.

He laughed, it was weary and traumatised and lacked any real mirth.

"The last one?" He looked at his watch. "Huh," he managed. "Four hours ago."

Trent hadn't been here.

"And you would have seen
everyone
who came and went in here during that time?" Alan pressed.

"Thank you, Doctor," I said numbly before he could reply. "Wánměi above all others," I offered out of habit as I turned to leave.

The doctor didn't return the once-obligatory reply.

"Lena?" Alan said, chasing me outside.

The Cardinal who'd attempted to deny us access to the tent stood only a short distance away, and watched on without a hint of embarrassment in his dark eyes. His expression a mix of something lethal and awed.

I hadn't yet got used to the looks I received. Trent wasn't often recognised, despite his image having been on every vid-screen when Wánměi was freed. Somehow I was more memorable. Even when I'd taken the black streaks out of my hair.

I fingered it now, noting how streaked in dust it was. A small sound escaped as Alan came alongside.

"He was never here, was he?" he said quietly.

"No," I agreed.

Alan let out a defeated breath of air.

"And he wouldn't have left you without telling you why."

"No," I agreed. Again.

"Then where is he?"

I had no idea. But when I lifted my head for one final, futile search, I noticed something - or someone - who was missing as well.

The entire street was devoid of the Masked. When only an hour ago it had been teaming with jewelled disguises covering furtive eyes.

We'd lost the wager. Both Alan and I. And we hadn't even known that they were betting.

That we were pitting ourselves against
them
, and not each other.

They'd won. We'd lost. And what we'd lost was more than I could hope to survive.

We hadn't caught a Masked.

They'd caught one of us.

They'd caught the rebel leader of Free Wánměi.

But why?

T
he streets were deserted
as we walked back towards the base.
S
ilence an unusual accompaniment to the heartbeat of Wánměi. It was a stunned and battered quiet. Lost and frayed. We'd survived so much and yet I feared for what was to come.

Alan tried a pay phone, but the line was dead. We looked up, again and again, at the once abandoned street-cams - hoping the next would show some form of life - but they seemed as vacant as the rest of the nation. Empty eyes staring down at us from frozen faces.

The walk was a long one. Haunted thoughts, marred further by tragic images. I could taste death. I was breathing it. Living it. Hope seemed so very far away.

Paul met us at the apartment building's front door; an indication that at least something was working farther away from the crash zone. He searched our faces but didn't pass comment. Just offered cool water and wet cloths as he locked and bolted the apartments’ doors behind us. Simon had placed the entire building on lock-down, it seemed. Our neighbours more than happy to obey his commands.

And then I realised, it wouldn't have been Si who'd done it. My tired eyes landing on the shadows that crept out from the corners of the entranceway, statue still, bodies on alert, dark eyes watching.

Always watching.

Cardinal red cloaks the only slash of colour to be seen. I met the gaze of one of them, noting the laser gun in his hands, a finger resting ready on the trigger.

And didn't say a thing; anger unfurling from deep inside me, waiting for an opportunity to lash out. The elevator doors closing softly behind Paul was the only incentive I required.

"Is Trent here?" I demanded, as Alan leaned forward, equally as eager as me to embrace hope. To give it one final, futile chance.

But hope is mercurial. Wisdom is more reliable.

"No," Paul replied, the word heavy. They knew. "But Si has something he wants to show you."

"And the President?" Alan asked.

"Hanging ‘round like a bad smell."

"In the tech-room?" Alan pressed.

"Si tried to keep him out, but Tan wanted to see what was happening on the streets. And those Cardinals are holding big fucking guns."

"What's our vision?" Alan asked. It was so easy to see him leading the rebel army.

And yet so hard as well.

I leaned back against the mirrored wall of the lift and concentrated on breathing through the dull ache in my chest.

"Not twenty-twenty," Paul advised. "Street-cams were mostly operable for the first few hours post the fall, but more and more went off-line as the day progressed. Si doesn't think it's by chance," he added.

The lift doors dinged at that moment, adding to the heavy weight that hung on the air. My eyes found Alan's. A wealth of unsaid words were shared.

We had enemies at every corner. And some staring us right in the eyes.

I stepped off first, noting the Cardinals dotted down our penthouse floor. Their positioning couldn't have been random; one stood outside each apartment door, as well as the emergency stairwell. I was relieved to note our apartment received no more attention than the others, and the safe-room and armoury access hadn't been located at all.

I walked towards Si's apartment, knowing that's where I'd find Tan. The need to go to
our
home, the home I shared with Trent, was all consuming. But drawing attention to my father's Shiloh unit was not a wise move at present. We'd need it, of that I was certain. But flicking the switch, as Trent liked to call it, was not possible. For more reasons than one.

The Cardinal on the door opened it for us; an action that surprised me. They'd seemed so militant, not moving unless under command. But then, perhaps our egress had been granted. Permission needed - and given - to enter our own building, our own homes, our own tech-room.

This had been a mistake.

Simon sat in front of the vid-screens once we’d crossed the room’s threshold; blond hair still cut in a model fashion, looking so out of place on the rebel. He would grow it again, I knew. But the rebellion of that action no longer counted.

His eyes met mine and then immediately flicked to Alan. His acting leader. The one who’d decide how we progressed from here.

Tan stepped forward catching my attention, his face a mask of concern. I would have gone to him, let him hold me as he'd done so often over the years. But anger fuelled my words.

"What have you not told us?" I demanded.

He halted in his approach, the mask falling and then morphing into something else. President Tan looked back at me.

Fine. I crossed the space between us and slapped him hard across the face.

The cacophony of laser guns whirring to life drowned out Alan's and Si's shouts of warning. Tan looked at me as if he didn't know me. A taut moment stretched between us. Like fine silk it threatened to tear.

Then he clenched his teeth, the pink on his cheek where my palm had landed whitening, and said, "Stand down."

The Cardinals obeyed the order, reminding me who’d I’d actually struck. I darted eyes over his security detail, noting their compliance was ingrained in them, but their fingers still rested on the triggers of their guns.

The room was now a powder keg waiting to explode.

"Well?" I said with as much venom as I could muster. Every Elite instinct in me roared for self-control. For model behaviour. I quashed it all, held firmly to my resolve, and took a step forward.

Tan stood his ground. The Cardinals froze. Alan and Simon had stopped breathing.

Deep inside I felt dead, but my body told me it was alive. My heart still beating.

"You know something," I accused. "You knew something at Parliament House. You wanted Trent's help. Under the radar, you said. So what you know, you don't want to get out."

Tan remained mute.

"Take a look!" I shouted, my arm flinging out to indicate the newsfeeds on the vid-screens. So much carnage. So much heartache. So much death.

I refused to think on that last further.

"This is the Wánměi you've inherited," I said, my voice cold and hard. "This is your
Free
Wánměi. How safe are we? Who pulls the strings? What are you hiding, Lee?"

He let a slow breath of air out and ran a hand through already dishevelled hair. His face didn't exactly soften, but something flashed behind his eyes. A memory? An emotion?

He sat down heavily in a swivel chair, his eyes on the ground for a moment. I glanced at Alan, who was watching the Cardinals, but he felt my attention and turned his head to look at my face. An eyebrow rose slowly, but other than that, he remained silent.

Alan had learned more than just operational skills from Trent in those practice sessions, it seemed. He'd learned when to let someone else hold the reins.

"A boat was found out on the coast near Hillsborough," Tan suddenly said, drawing everyone’s attention. "Attempts had been made to hide it.”

The implications were limitless. My breath shook when I exhaled.

"It was not ours," I guessed. Tan shook his head. "When?"

"How long it had been there is anyone's guess. It was well camouflaged. But a routine border check located it two weeks ago."

"How can you be sure it's not been there a while?" Simon asked.

"We had high tides just before Shiloh was deactivated," Tan advised. "The boat had been stored below the storm's watermark. It showed no signs of being caught in the tidal surge."

I sat down on a chair beside Simon. "So, we're not alone."

Alan snorted, but it wasn't his usual effort. More like a release of tightly held emotions; uncontrolled.

"How big was this boat?" Si asked.

Tan turned his chair to face our tech-guru and replied in a steady voice, devoid of any feeling, "Big enough to carry two dozen people."

"That's a lot of people," Alan remarked.

"Not really," Tan started.

Alan's snort this time was everything I'd come to know.

"There's been times," he said, "when the rebel army has consisted of less than a dozen people, and trust me, even with that number a lot of hell can be unleashed."

No one said anything in reply for a while and then I turned to Simon and said, "What do you know?"

My words were chosen with care. If he wanted to show Alan and I something privately, he'd be able to answer with a flippant reply now. But he didn't. He turned toward his closest vid-screen, and brought up images clearly pulled from street-cams. Some of them showed the devastation from the Sky Tower collapse in high definition colour. Every cut, bruise, mark visible. Even the varying colours of blood.

I swallowed thickly, searching without thought for Trent. If Si had footage of the crash zone like this, then...

"I think I've found an answer to who was on that boat," Simon said, interrupting my hopeful prayers.

I felt Alan move closer behind me, and heard the creak of Tan's chair.

"Recognise anyone, Lena?" Si asked, freezing the video coverage on a scene which seemed so familiar. And so unfair.

Bodies lay crumpled beneath large blocks of broken concrete. Metal twisted and cleaved limbs in two. Dust mixed with blood mixed with body parts. Tears ran in rivulets down stricken cheeks. Flames from out of control fires made the shadows of those figures scrambling over the wreckage elongate. Turning them into monsters and not saviours.

Making the masks they wore grotesque and not fashion-statement pretty.

"The Masked," I said, my eyes skipping over the carnage and landing on each would-be rescuers' face.

"Look closer," Simon instructed, and I actually leaned in farther, as if that would help me find what he wanted me to see.

He started the video moving again, slowly, frame by frame. It seemed worse somehow. Not only viewing this horrific day again, but being forced to watch it in deliberate detail. The lives lost. The role of saviour handed to an enemy.

For what were these Masked if not our enemy?

They had Trent.

I sucked in a sharp breath of air right when the video stopped moving. A lone masked figure stood out on top of a pile of debris; dirt, dust and blood coating his black clothes, sticking into his short, model-appropriate black hair.

The video moved forward again, under the precise command of Simon. I held my breath, even as Alan let out a growling sound; frustrated no doubt at Si's showmanship. I was sure he was about to complain, verbally and most profoundly, but just then the masked figure reached up to remove his mask and wipe away the sweat and grime that had accumulated under it.

"It's hard to identify them when the mask is on," Si said, turning to look at me.

I couldn't meet his eyes, my gaze locked on once familiar ones.

"He'd been there all along and you didn't see him," Si pointed out, maybe as an explanation for the cruel way he'd made us suffer to get to this point. "That's why they wear them," he added, turning back to look at the frozen vid-screen. "So their families and friends don't get a fright."

"Holy shit," Alan said, turning now to look down at me. I felt Tan do the same.

I reached forward and stroked a finger over the person on the vid-screen, a plethora of emotions swirling for attention inside my head. Around my heart.

"Hello, Citizen Augustine," I said, my voice cracking. The still figure of my former concierge did not reply.

I hadn't expected him to. Ever.

He'd been one of our wiped.