Space Invaders (41 page)

“Don’t fuck with me,” I said instead, protesting against his verbal jab. “You may not think so, but this is a big deal. Neither of our countries is going to be taking tomorrow lightly.”

“It’s only a bullet,” Armise said before he buried his head under the pillow. The industrial light was probably strong enough to seep through the edges of the thin pillow he tried to wrap around his head. It gave me a perverse sense of satisfaction that if I wasn’t going to sleep, I could make sure he didn’t either.

I continued, pressing the point. “A real one. Shot in public. For the first time—”

“In two hundred years. I got it.” He lifted the pillow off his head and glared at me. “Go to sleep.”

Now he was awake as I was. I grinned. “Do you want to be the one to shoot it?”

It was a pointless question. I knew who was going to shoot that bullet, and it wasn’t going to be Armise. But it was a subject neither one of us had dared to speak about, and I couldn’t stop myself from toying with him a bit.

He shrugged. “It doesn’t matter either way. It won’t be me.” His voice was muffled by the cotton comforter he stuffed under his chin despite the warm air. Much like his personality, Armise’s internal temperature was permanently set to cold.

I was surprised by his answer and had to force myself not to tense in response. Armise wasn’t one to forgo a challenge. So either he knew more than he was telling me or I’d been too careless. That Armise was one of the only people in the world who could hear what I never said out loud, possibly the only person, was a reality I’d fought against since the DCR standoff. The thought that he could see through my words at this pivotal moment stilled me. I took a breath and waited, but he didn’t say anymore. “Or me,” I added, my voice taking on the military precision of practised deceit, years in the making.

Armise grunted and readjusted his pillow.

His lack of a response unnerved me. Now I was even more sure that I needed him to leave. “If we’re discovered, even with the treaty, we’ll be branded as traitors.”

That excuse hadn’t worked before, for either of us, and yet it was the only consideration that should have ever mattered. As usual, Armise wasn’t buying it. “Then shut the fuck up so they can’t hear us.”

I poked at the dip between his shoulder blades, dragging my finger down the indentation of his spine, and then pinched his ass. With any other man the motion might have been playful, but with Armise the gesture was designed to elicit frustration. “I don’t want you to stay.”

My head snapped up as there was a rending sound from outside, as if the sky itself was being torn open. But no rain fell. It rarely did anymore.

Armise tried to swat me, but I moved just out of his reach. He sat up and wiped at his eyes. He looked more tired than I expected, but his intent to get what he wanted was now crystal fucking clear on his face as he scrunched up his brow and pointed at me. “Fuck you. I’m comfortable.” He pointed out the window. “There is no way I’m going out in that. And the States get much better accommodations. I’m not going back to that Singapore rat hole.”

“Leave,” I ordered.

Of course that made Armise grip the blanket even tighter, unwilling to cede any territory to me. “No.”

He nearly crushed me as he moved over me and switched off the blinding white light as another deluge of lightning crashed to the ground.

He forced my head down into the pillow, kissing my forehead as he moved back to his side of the bed. The kiss was more frustrated than loving, but anything more affectionate from Armise would be unnatural. And then his body eased against my side, and he draped an arm over my shoulder, pulling me into his chest in an embrace I would have considered protective if I didn’t know him better.

All thought slipped away too easily under his touch. That should have been enough of an indication that I‘d long ago descended into domains that should have remained untouchable. Personal connections of any kind were taboo in our job. They left us—the cogs of the unending war machine—too vulnerable. The man next to me was my nemesis, through all definitions of the word, and a serious breach of duty that I’d been ignoring for years now. Too many years.

I couldn’t afford to get this close to him. Even on the eve of my death. And yet I didn’t move.

The wind whipped up again, ruffling the curtains and rushing through the room. Then it abruptly withdrew, settling the canvas against the frame with a decisive
thwap
. The pops and crashes of lightning faded, receded into the distance.

The worst of the storm had now passed.

But there would be another one. Soon. Of that I could be certain.

“Sleep, Merq,” Armise mumbled just before his head lolled to the side, nose buried in my sex-mussed brown hair, lips brushing the piercings lining the shell of my ear. He rapidly dropped into a deep sleep, his heartbeat and breath slowing until I knew there would be no moving him now.

I couldn’t fight the urge to close my eyes, to match my breathing to his. And I was flooded with a feeling that couldn’t be serenity. Because Peacemakers were never meant to know real peace.

Chapter Three

I dreamt of war. A war I fought in but never loaded or fired a real bullet. A war where hundreds of millions died but none felt the slice of metal into skin, the shattering of bone from the contact of copper and steel.

I dreamt of sound waves that crashed and killed. Of bullets that exploded internally, obliterating organs and leaving the body whole, unmarked, yet lifeless. This was the unnatural reality of sonic weapons. The unadulterated power of musical tone altered, harnessed and let loose to decimate.

I dreamt of the sonicbullet my grandfather, six generations removed, invented. The heritage I was named for.

I dreamt of Armise’s eyes on me. They were always there. Even when he wasn’t. Blue eyes that were nearly silver. A judgement upon who I was, who I’d become. I clawed at the stronger emotions settling inside me, sliding through my unconsciousness. He was my opponent. Of that I could be sure as much as I wanted to fight it. His gaze, unseen in my dreams but there nonetheless, haunted me.

My dreams were violent and bloodless. I knew from history that it hadn’t always been this way. That at one time war had meant torn limbs, a sea of red spilling from wounds. Two hundred years ago we’d removed the stain of bloodshed from our inevitable power struggles.

But carnage was carnage, death still final, regardless of the amount, or lack, of blood spilled.

When I woke up Armise was gone.

Which was good. It was much easier to remember he was my enemy when his hands weren’t wrapped around my cock.

The knock that had awakened me was simultaneous with Coach barrelling into my room. I started, sitting up in the rumpled sheets, even though I knew Armise was long gone.

“Ass out of bed,” Coach commanded in a crisp tone. It was impossible to miss that his jet-black hair, usually a tangle of curls, had been shorn to mere stubble. I noted the change, knew what the likely motivating factor was, but didn’t remark upon it. I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.

He wore the official practice uniform for the States—a deep red that brought my blood-free dreams and blood-drenched future back to the forefront. His gold-brown eyes studied me and then gave an arrogant dismissal of me when I didn’t jump at his words. He ignored me ignoring him and went to my dresser at the back of the room, sliding the window above it shut with a definitive clank.

“Breathing that shit will kill you, Grayson,” Coach said as he scrunched up his nose and flipped the air purifier on high.

Coach refused to call me by my first name and I refused to call him anything but Coach. It was an odd stalemate. Completely unnecessary as power plays went, but he and I had a personal history that dated way before my time as a Peacemaker. Perhaps it was our way of distancing each other or, more likely, an unsaid fuck-you every time we had to acknowledge the other’s existence. It didn’t matter either way. For all intents and purposes he owned my ass until I completed this mission.

He rummaged through my drawers, flinging clothes haphazardly around the room, studying and discarding item after item, leaving only a select few on the top of the dresser. I wasn’t nearly awake enough to care that he was frantically pawing through my meagre belongings. I scowled and slumped back onto the bed, pulling Armise’s pillow over my face. His scent—that mix of musky balms—clung to the fabric and I breathed it in, closing my eyes.

But Coach’s grating presence brought the reality of today screeching back to me.

“Nuh-uh. No going back to sleep,” Coach chided me, then added, “We have press waiting for you.”

I groaned. Coach had told me he would keep me from the media for as long as possible. I had other things to focus on today. “Press? What the fuck do they want with me? Send them to Jegs or Simion.”

“Neither Jegs nor Simion is a Peacemaker turned Olympian. Plus, they’re profiling the front-runners for who’s going to shoot the first bullet.”

I threw off my blanket, forgetting for a moment that I was naked underneath. “When did I become a front-runner?”

Coach threw me a pair of underwear, judiciously keeping his eyes from skimming any lower than my chin. “When the Committee found out there was more to your name.”

Outing me was supposed to be a last-ditch scenario. What had happened while I was asleep to change the plan? And why was Coach only telling me about it now?

“Who gave that intel up?” I questioned, infuriated that he hadn’t notified me about this earlier.

I could see it was a question he didn’t want to answer. “Does it matter?”

“Should it?” I immediately retorted.

“No,” he said and nearly broke the door off my closet as he swung it open. “We didn’t give up the infochip or Ying. You need to get up and moving.”

I pulled on my underwear and trudged to the en suite bathroom. It took me two minutes to make myself presentable, and the entire time all I could think about was my long-dead grandfather and the heritage my parents had reportedly died trying to save me from.

The same heritage that was now buying me attention and favours from the Olympic Committee, led by and stocked with Opposition members.

Time distorted the reality of history. Nobody knew that better than I did.

My grandfather’s invention, at one time lauded as the ultimate tool in the fight against cancer, had been bastardised into a weapon of mass destruction. The sonicbullet was nothing more than targeted sound waves. Sound waves that, when tuned to their highest possible frequency, were capable of deconstructing cells at the molecular level. My grandfather hadn’t lived to see his creation manipulated into genocidal proportions. His name was buried in confidential reports that were subsequently destroyed, but he was a folk hero nonetheless. The Opposition spoke of a man who had fought until his dying breath for the betterment of humanity. The passage of time had mythologised him.

Yet no one had ever known his real name. Until today.

Merq Grayson.

Only two men had ever been given that name.

My grandfather, six generations removed.

And me.

I would take full advantage of the favouritism the Opposition would show me because of this connection. It was another step in ensuring I was the only front-runner when decision time came.

Coach threw a pile of clothes at me. They weren’t the traditional uniform for the States or what I was supposed to be wearing in competition today, but he’d chosen colours that would reflect pride in my country, a style that would accentuate my size and a quality that hinted at my working-class roots. It was exactly the kind of quick calculation Coach was revered for.

“Anything else change while I was asleep?” I shot at him as I dressed.

Coach was unaffected by my anger. Very little got through to him anymore. I couldn’t help but wonder again what it was they’d done to break him so effectively. “Nothing,” he answered as he tossed my rumpled clothes into the closet and shut the door.

“Am I going to get any time on the range?”

“You don’t need it,” he said in a clipped tone. “Things are going to move fast now. Keep your head up. Smile plastered on like it’s permanent. Shoulders back. Don’t forget you’re a Peacemaker. Chosen to represent your country in the Olympics.”

I sneered. “Chosen to assassinate my president.”

Coach didn’t even flinch. “That, too. You ready?”

I nodded.

As soon as we walked out the door, Coach assumed his usual position since the DCR, flanking my right shoulder, and the press descended.

The press corps had a way of setting me off-kilter even with as much interaction as I’d had with them over the years. Their faces were shrouded, bodies covered from head to toe in a grey, clinging material that left them nearly indistinguishable from each other. Similarly, each had been implanted with a chip that gave them all a flat metallic voice identical in tone and pitch. It was impossible to know their gender. And the only indication of where they came from was a badge they each wore on their left shoulder emblazoned with the seal of their respective country.

From my childhood lessons, so many years ago now that I was surprised I remembered them at all, I knew that the media had adopted the stark uniforms decades ago to prove bias no longer held a place in reporting the news. But the effect of the faceless horde, closing in around me, always made me question what secrets they were hiding. Maybe it was just me projecting.

I continued to walk, forcing the group to move with me, but I kept my gait easy and slow, as if I was completely unaffected by their presence or the oncoming interrogation. The first tinny voice came from my left side. “Did you know you’re officially a front-runner for the inaugural shot today?”

I turned my lips up into a practised smile. “Coach just told me. I’m honoured to be considered.”

“You’re a Peacemaker for the States,” the genderless voice continued. “In fact, you fought as a sniper in the Borders War. Do you think you’re too controversial of a figure to take the first shot?”

I shook my head. “I’m proud to have served my country when they needed me. If the Committee has placed me as a front-runner then they obviously view my service with the same pride.”