Psion Beta (22 page)

Great. That leaves four to me.

A well-aimed shot knocked his leg loose from the wall, and he was forced to launch himself from his perch. He tried to deactivate the remaining member of Kobe’s team while still in the air, but couldn’t, and so he landed behind him.

Parley’s voice came over the com: “We took out one of Marie’s—aurgh!”

“
What happened?” Sammy screamed, louder than he meant, still aiming a blast at the head of the person he just realized was Brickert.

“
We just lost Parley,” Al answered.

“
Jeffie, we need you now,” Sammy cried.

“
I’m trying to find you guys, but I’m a little turned around!” she shrieked. Her voice was shrill and desperate, more so than he could ever remember hearing it.

“
Please hurry,” Sammy answered.

He and Brickert were locked in a battle that needed to end quickly. All of Marie’s team had left to gang up on Al.

“
I need help here real bad, Sammy,” Al said. “There are five of them on me!”

“
I’ll be right there,” Sammy said in a cool voice, then to Brickert he added, “Sorry, buddy.” He performed a dazzling array of acrobatic blasts and jumps, leaving Brickert completely turned around.

“
That’s not right!” his roommate cried out in frustration.

In a neat flip off the right wall, Sammy gracefully soared over Brickert’s head and laid a hand on his roommate’s helmet. A gentle blast deactivated Brickert. Then Sammy landed in the intersection.

He looked up to see Al moving in a flurry of defensive blasts and foot attacks, letting go of his hold on the wall just long enough to blast and regain his footing. As bizarre as Al’s movements were, Sammy was impressed he’d had managed to stay up so long. Two of Al’s enemies turned on Sammy as soon as he appeared in the intersection. Sammy parried and evaded their blasts, sending out his own from the ground and from the air in mid-jump.

Two more of Marie’s stopped attacking Al to help take out Sammy. Desperately, Sammy launched into an all-out barrage of attacks, figuring his defensive maneuvers were now worthless against four. Just as Al picked off the one who had stayed to attack him, Sammy hit Marie in the helmet, but the cost was a shot to his own helmet from Cala. As Sammy arched backward from the blast, slowly falling through the air, his eyes caught hold of something just as the helmet covered his face.

Help had arrived for Al, and she was beautiful.

For about five or ten minutes, Sammy could not tell for sure, he lay in darkness hoping that his team had managed to pull out the win. He found out the answer as soon as his helmet lifted. Al pulled Sammy up to his feet, smiling broadly. Natalia ran up and hugged him, screaming, “You did it! On your first try! We won! We won!”

“
Yes!” Sammy shouted, pumping his fist into the air. “I knew we could do it.”

The turning point of the Game was Jeffie; she had wall-blasted unseen, high above the competition, just as the others had done. Between her sharp-shooting skills and Al’s near invincibility, they deactivated the last three on Marie’s team. A come-from-behind victory winning three straight games. Sammy thanked the members of his team for their outstanding performances. Jeffie merely blushed and stared at the floor when he complimented her shooting ability.

“
I’m serious,” he told her. “Without you, we never would have won. Al can only handle about two by himself.”

“
Pardon me?” Al interrupted with a grin. “I can handle at least three.” He patted Sammy hard on the back. “You were real good, Jeffie. And you, Sammy.”

“
See?” Sammy pointed to Al to emphasize his point.

“
Thanks,” was all Jeffie said, still looking at anything but him.

Just then Marie tapped him on the back, and he turned to face her. “You little punk,” she teased. “Good work. Don’t give Albert all the credit. You had a great plan—it worked really well.”

“
I’ll remember that,” Sammy answered. “Good game.”

He turned again to face Jeffie, but she had already left with Al, and instead he saw Kobe walking swiftly past him. When their eyes met, Kobe grunted something that sounded like “Gh—game,” without breaking stride.

The seven Games had lasted over five hours.

“
Can you believe it’s not even eight o’clock in the morning?” Brickert griped on their way downstairs to change. It was obvious he was still a little sore about losing to the team on the brink of a shutout.

“
Sorry about taking you out like that in the last Game, Brick.”

Brickert waved it off. “It was too impressive to make me mad. I think I stopped blasting just so I could watch you. I’ve never seen Al move the way you did.”

“
Whatever,” Sammy retorted, but his face turned hot in embarrassment. For him, Al would always be the standard to look to. The rankings didn’t mean a thing. Al was just the best.

Sammy just wanted to sleep. The high of winning had worn off and a deep feeling of fatigue settled in. But Brickert refused to let him lie down, claiming Sammy might throw off his sleep cycle.

“
Then what am I supposed to do? Pass out standing around? Everyone else is going to bed.”

“
Let’s celebrate. Ice cream for breakfast.” Brickert had a maniacal look in his eye, but a bowl of ice cream sounded better than an argument about circadian rhythms. The cafeteria was almost empty. Jeffie sat by herself in one of the corners stirring something in front of her. She didn’t look up when they came in, and Sammy wondered if she was even awake.

“
You didn’t even win,” he reminded Brickert when they got to the Robochef, “how can you have ice cream?”

“
Well, let’s see. Your first victory as honcho . . . you’re my roommate . . . And do I really need an excuse to eat ice cream?”

They sat down at a table nearby, watching to see if Jeffie would notice them. Brickert leaned over to Sammy and hissed in his ear. “Has she talked to you at all, since—whenever?”

“
A little during the Games … when she had to.”

“
Not after?”

“
Not really, she just said ‘thanks.’”

“
Girls are so . . . nutty.”

“
I know.” Sammy smiled at Brickert’s use of the word he’d taught him.

It was a lazy Saturday, and Sammy struggled all day to stay awake. The few Betas who didn’t sleep sat around the rec room—some studying, some playing games. After the nerve-crunching intensity of the Arena, no one was up for VR gaming. In the late afternoon, Sammy and Brickert played doubles in pool with Kawai and Natalia. Sammy sometimes pretended not to see the exact geometry of the game so he and Natalia could lose a few times. Brickert inconspicuously rolled his eyes, but kept silent.

A rare event occurred that night: all of the Betas got together to watch movies. Cala and Asaki wanted to watch an
X-Men
film, but got vetoed.

“
Pick something realistic,” Kaden argued.

Martin and Li chose a boxing film,
Rocky IV
, about a fight between a Russian and an American boxer. Everyone booed when the American won. They followed it with a romantic film for the girls.

Near the beginning of the second film, Sammy got cold and ran downstairs to grab his red hoodie from his room. When he passed the girls’ dormitory, the door opened. He almost flattened whoever was coming out.

“
Watch out!” he cried in surprise, stopping just in front of Jeffie.

“
Sorry!” she said, blushing as badly as he had ever seen.

Neither of them moved. Sammy couldn’t go down the stairs until she closed the door, and she made no sign that she intended to. This went on for several uncomfortable seconds. Sammy stared at her, wondering what to say.

“
I was just—”

“
I didn’t mean to—” they said at the same time.

The second silence was worse. Sammy might have laughed had he not felt like the world’s biggest idiot. In a movie like the one playing upstairs, he could just say the perfect line and she’d fall into his arms for a passionate kiss. Or he could stand there, say nothing, and look like the dumb friend who always loses the girl.

Say something,
he urged himself.

“
Well,” he finally said, “sorry.” He nudged the door aside and went down the stairs. His ears and neck tingled with a white hot heat and a bead of sweat ran down his left armpit.
Great job, moron. Looks like you get to be the stupid sidekick
.

He had just eye-scanned the door to the boys’ dormitory when he heard, “Sammy, wait!” Jeffie came running down the stairs and stopped a meter away from him. Her face was definitely setting a record for redness.

“
Sammy, I’m sorry. I know—” She took a deep breath. “I know we’ve been through all this before, and I overreacted when I got mad at you for lying—but I didn’t realize you did it because you didn’t want us to feel stupid for being so far behind you in everything. And now I completely get why you did it. I know I should have said it earlier and not ignored you for so long, but I just didn’t know how to say anything after being so rude to you again—and it meant so much to me that you stood up for me after what that jerk-off Kobe did. And I felt even worse after all of that—and it was even harder to talk to you, but I’ve really wanted to all along.”

She paused to breathe again. “Does that make sense?”

Sammy tried to tread water, but Jeffie had flooded him in a deluge of words. For all of his brain capacity and listening to instructions at incredible speeds, nothing she said had registered in his mind . . . but she looked really
beautiful. And in the end, all that mattered to him was that she had chased him down the stairs and apologized. She had done that for him. His feet were glued to the floor, his mind oblivious to her question.

The thought occurred to him that he should also apologize.

“
I—I shouldn’t have lied to you,” he said. “I don’t have an excuse for it. I’m really, really sorry. I hate it when you’re mad at me. Do you forgive me?”

Jeffie laughed and covered her mouth to stop herself. “Do you forgive me?” she asked, her eyes never breaking from his.

Sammy couldn’t pull his gaze away from her eyes. Everything negative he had thought or felt about her melted.
Please stop looking at me like that!
he wanted to scream. He wanted to kiss her. He wanted the nothing in the world but her closer to him.

Closer. Closer. Melting closer. Her breath filled the air around him. It was mint. Beyond that he smelled roses. She smelled like roses. He noticed a small freckle she had on her left cheek. He liked that, too. Then she made a tiny noise, clearing her throat. She looked at him expectantly.

He cleared his throat, too, and said, “Yeah, of course I forgive you. But do you think that, maybe, you could please just . . . talk to me next time you feel hurt by something I do?” Even as he said the words, they reminded him of something his father would tell him after Sammy had acted inappropriately.

Jeffie laughed again. The sound of it made Sammy feel stupid and wonderful and unsure. “Definitely,” she answered. “I can do that.” Her white teeth gleamed in her smile.

“
Thanks.”

“
Um—so what’s going on upstairs?” she asked. “And why did you come down here?”

“
We’re just watching some movies. I came down to get my hoodie.”

“
The red one? You always wear that one.”

“
Yeah. It’s my favorite. Be right back.”

“
Okay, I’ll wait,” she called after him as he disappeared through the door.

Sammy grabbed the hoodie from his closet and looked at himself in the mirror. His hair sucked but it could have been worse. He tried to remove the huge grin on his face before he re-emerged from the dormitory. When he returned to the rec hall with Jeffie behind him and sat down beside her on the floor, he had to suppress another laugh. Out of the corner of his eye Brickert was shaking his head, obviously very perplexed.

14.
Paradigms

Sammy had heard
about the phenomenon where best friends become worst enemies, and worst enemies turn into best friends, he had just never experienced it. Over the summer months, after he and Jeffie reconciled their differences for the second time, their friendship became forged with something different than anything he’d experienced with anyone else—even Brickert. It was palpable but still intangible.

Before the big fight, he and Jeffie had eaten together because they were scheduled to eat at the same time; they talked about the same Beta stuff because they had been recruited at the same time; they acted friendly more by association (and often because Kawai made them). Now he could see this friendship metamorphosing into something better—much better. As this transformation continued, his feelings for her blossomed.

He never dared to show how he felt. He had no experience whatsoever with girls or dating. Other than Brickert, he had no one to talk to about these new sensations. And Brickert only knew stuff from overhearing his sisters. Sammy worried that everything he felt was just in his head. What if Jeffie just wanted to be friends? The possibility of putting himself out there, telling her his feelings, and then being rejected mortified him. So he chose the safer path of doing everything he could—short of spending less time with her—to hide his true feelings.

In some ways, he suspected Jeffie must already know his heart. She knew what Kobe had recorded and shown in the sim room to piss Sammy off. She knew the way Sammy had reacted to it. But if she had any clue about his true feelings, she gave no sign. And that was fine by him.

Sammy was careful not to ignore Brickert. No one had been so true a friend to him through thick and thin. If anything, his newfound friendship with Jeffie brought the five friends closer as a group. They were almost always together in their spare time playing games in the rec hall or planning things for the weekends. But it was after everyone else had left for bed, long into the Friday or Saturday nights, when Jeffie and Sammy stayed up alone to chat, eating ice cream until they laughed uncontrollably from sugar rushes. And soon, even these things became part of Sammy’s routine.

“
Sammy, wake up,” Brickert said, shaking him urgently.

“
Uh-uh. Sunday,” Sammy murmured into his pillow. “Leff me ‘lone.”

“
You have to get up!” Brickert said more earnestly.

“
I’ll tell you about my night with Jeffie later. Need sleep now.”

“
Har har,” Brickert laughed sarcastically. Then he dropped the bomb: “Alphas are here.”

“
WHAT?!” Sammy said, jumping up. “Alphas?”

“
Yes. Alphas. Here.”

Sammy sat up straight so he could stretch his arms out without bumping the wall behind him. The stretch felt good. Even though he was still a little tired, he loved that sense of cheating time by staying up late and getting up a little too early the next morning. “Why are they here?”

“
Because Al’s Panel starts today.”

Sammy smacked his forehead. “Crappy crap. I forgot all about that. Did you actually see them—the Alphas?”

“
No, Commander Byron came into the cafeteria and called for Al.” Brickert snickered and kicked the bed. “I’ll tell you, I don’t know who looked more nervous.”

“
What do you mean?”

“
The commander or Al. They both looked really nervous.”

“
Yeah. I’ll bet Byron gets like that every time a Beta goes through the Panel.”

“
Who cares? Let’s go already.” Brickert smacked him with his own pillow and threw back the sheets on Sammy’s bed. “He’s been gone for four hours. Should be finishing up soon.”

“
I swear,” Sammy groaned, climbing down from the top bunk, “sometimes I think you’re my mother.”

After speeding through a shower and throwing on the first jumpsuit he saw, Sammy headed upstairs with Brickert. Everyone had turned up in the cafeteria. Sammy grabbed food while Brickert sat down with the three girls. The low roar of conversations filled his ears while he waited in line at the Robochef. The same topic was being covered in the separate circles: Al’s Panel. Sammy got his bowl of steaming oatmeal and caught Jeffie’s eye on the way back to his seat. She smiled warmly at him. It made him giddy.

“
Hiya,” she said brightly as he took the seat next to her.

“
Hiya back,” he grumbled.

“
Sleep well?” she asked, grinning around the spoon handle protruding from her lips.

“
I got to bed kind of late, actually,” he informed her, though she already knew he’d been up until almost three. He had been with her. “Brickert wouldn’t let me sleep in.”

“
That’s because I made him go get your lazy butt up,” she said. “I knew you wouldn’t want to miss this.”

“
Did any of you see the Alphas this morning?” he asked the other girls.

“
Kawai did,” Natalia said.

“
Kind of,” Kawai corrected. “I caught a glimpse of someone in the hallway, the Alpha doctor, I think.”

“
The who?” Sammy asked, at the same time, blowing on his bite of oatmeal to cool it down. That was one thing about the Robochef, cooked food always came out piping hot.

“
The Alpha doctor,” Kawai repeated. “He gave us all health examinations us when we were recruited. Remember?”

Truthfully, Sammy did not remember ever being examined by a doctor. Either he had been unconscious for any of it, or they had just not done one on him.

“
You remember him, Sammy,” Jeffie said with a meaningful look. “He’s got a heavy Indian accent and came here when I got hurt. My leg . . .”

“
Oh, yeah. Him.”

“
How many Alphas are on the Panel?” Kawai asked.

“
Five,” Natalia answered. Sammy knew she’d pestered Al and Marie all about the Panel over the last few days so she could know more about it than the rest of them. “One Alpha for each of the five sections: combat, mental aptitude, leadership, psychological fitness, and mission functionality.” She listed them off like a roll call.

“
How do you know all this stuff?” Brickert asked.

“
I ask,” Natalia told him at once.

“
He’s doing the psycho fitness test today.” Jeffie smiled at Natalia as she said this because Natalia hated having her thunder stolen from her.

“
Yeah, but from what Al said, it’s cake,” Natalia said, refusing to be outdone. “The one he’s really worried about is the last. Leadership.”

“
Why?” Kawai asked

“
Because leadership is the main focus of the Panel, and it’s the last section,” Brickert told him. He shot Natalia a roguish wink when she scowled at him. Jeffie snickered into her glass of orange juice. Natalia was probably the only person Brickert had the nerve to stand up to.

“
Al and I talked about that one a couple days ago,” Brickert continued. “But it was really late, and I was tired. I think he said it means that Al has to go on a mission, right?”

“
Yes and no,” Natalia jumped in. Sammy grinned to suppress a laugh at her need to divulge information. “The leadership test measures how well Al can direct a mission. After he passes his first four sections of the Panel, an Alpha Commander will tell him what his mission will be. Then he chooses the other Betas who will go with him.”

“
You mean some of us are going to get to go on a real mission?” Kawai asked in utter disbelief. “Uh . . . isn’t that dangerous?”

“
Al’s mission won’t be dangerous,” Natalia answered, “and none of us will go. Al will only choose the older Betas. And the missions are always simple, non-confrontational stuff. They’re just to test Al on how well he can operate under real conditions in command of other Psions.”

“
But it’s still scary,” Kawai said. “Do you think Al’s nervous?”

“
No, he’s been on other missions before. So has Marie and a few others,” Brickert answered. “He still has a while to prepare for it, though. His mission isn’t for like three months.”

“
What happens if something goes wrong?” Her question was almost a demand. Sammy understood her fear, though. The missions didn’t sound all that safe to him, either. “Why doesn’t Byron go with them, just in case?”

“
Well,” Brickert began, “there’s a team of Alphas standing by for mission recovery if something happens.”

“
No wonder why Byron’s so nervous,” Kawai said. “I’d be worried too if my students were on their first mission.”

Just then, Al came into the cafeteria followed by a woman who Sammy thought looked to be in her late thirties. She was not very tall and her short hair style fit her well. She smiled knowingly as the conversations died down upon their entrance. When Commander Byron appeared in the doorway (not looking worried at all, Sammy noted), the woman turned and greeted him. She shook Al’s hand with a genial smile and left with the commander in deep conversation. Al watched them go, then faced his fellow Betas.

“
How’d it go?” asked Marie, sitting closest to him.

“
Great,” Al said, but his big grin had already answered the question.

Marie shrieked and jumped into his arms. Sammy joined the rest of the Betas who preferred to just clap or cheer. He personally congratulated Al later.

The rest of the weekend flew by. Monday morning, Sammy suffered through an awful instruction lesson on engine mechanics. After bolting down a quick lunch, he literally ran upstairs for sims. He was grateful to see that Kaden had already left the room. Without letting another moment pass, he started up the sim.

Today, after several long weeks of weapons units, Sammy would start the unit he had been waiting so long for: Advanced Enemy Combat. He eagerly pressed the panel screen, and the familiar voice of Byron sounded behind him.

“
Congratulations on your completion of the Weaponry and Demolitions Training Unit. Thus far nearly all of the units you have completed have been standardized, requiring you to complete a specific task in order to advance to the next level of your training. You will no longer be following this format. All the necessary tools have been given to you to think for yourself and decide how to defeat enemies in combat. This will help you know how to accomplish assignments in a mission.

“
Today you will begin learning to fight the real enemies: Aegis and Thirteens. It is essential for you to understand the abilities of the enemy before you can continue into mission functionality. Thirteens rarely attack Psions one-on-one. They know they will lose. Therefore if you see one, you can reasonably deduce there are more nearby. NWG reports tell us that in the beginning of the Silent War there were two hundred thirty-seven Thirteens in maximum security. We have confirmed the deaths of forty nine since then. Still, they outnumber us almost four to one. Just as Psions often work alongside the Elite in our missions, Thirteens train operatives they call the Aegis, who are almost as deadly and cruel as Thirteens themselves.

“
You will start by learning to fight the Aegis, then Thirteens. The further you progress through these sims, the harder your training will become until our data reports that you have reached your maximum potential, your plateau. This information is important. It will tell you when you must fight, and when you must withdraw to save your life in real battle. Good luck.”

From countless previous experiences in combat training Sammy knew that as soon as Byron disappeared from view, the task at hand would appear, in this case: his enemy. He particularly remembered the disturbing session when his holographic enemy had appeared behind him and shot him with a splinter gun. He felt the splinters prick his skin, scaring him half to death; there was no pain, but still a shocking lesson that enemies can attack from any direction, at any time. Ever since then, without fail, he waited against a wall for Byron to disappear, watching the corners.

The lights dimmed slightly. A single Aegis materialized in a corner of the sim room. Sammy relished the feeling of adrenaline flooding his system—his breathing quickened, his reflexes sharpened, and his heart drummed a rock song in his chest. Still shrouded in darkness, the figure fired his weapon at Sammy. Sammy recognized the noise and identified the weapon immediately. Using a blast shield, he easily deflected the bullets. He continued to use the shield until he drew close enough to see the figure better. It was a man with strawberry blond hair and a heavily pitted face. His uniform was different than Sammy had seen Thirteens wear in the videos. Rather than the red and black of Thirteens, the Aegis wore a uniform of murky brown and green blotched together in such a way that it played tricks on Sammy’s eyes, making it difficult to focus on any one place.

Drawing upon skills already mastered in personal combat, Sammy continued warding off bullets, moving in closer to disarm his enemy with a blast. The Aegis was harder than any single enemy Sammy had fought so far, and there was one close call where a bullet passed close by his ear. But without any real difficulty, he disarmed the man. The Aegis’ weapon had a fingerprint scanner on the grip, making it useless to Sammy.

It took little effort to get himself into position to disable the Aegis. Using a jump-blast, he brought his foot down hard on the exposed neck. The crunch of the Aegis’ bone made his stomach lurch. As his enemy’s eyes closed and his body crumpled lifelessly to the ground, Sammy could only watch, knowing that he had just killed a person . . . and yet he had not killed anyone.