Terra (24 page)

I inspect the guardsmen quickly, and am immediately relieved to see that neither of them is Wolfe. I tense up again, however, when I notice the silver handguns strapped into holsters on their hips. Those aren’t part of the standard uniform.

I am standing but restrained; I couldn’t sit or lie down even if I tried. Cuffs are clamped around my wrists and ankles, and a large plate pins my chest to the wall, holding me upright. The only thing I can really move is my head, though the painful pulse over my left cheek doesn’t make that particularly easy, either.

As my eyes adjust to the brightness of this new room, my ears begin to prick. I hear labored breathing next to me. The sound is only feet away, and I wiggle my head to the left in order to determine their source.

“No.” The words escape my lips unbidden, a reflex.

Next to me, chained up in exactly the same way, his eyes closed and head drooping, is Adam.

Chapter 22

“Adam? Adam!” I try to keep my voice low, but make no attempt to hide my hysteria. His eyes flutter weakly as he turns his head in my direction. I exhale in relief. At least he’s conscious.

“Hey you,” he says feebly, attempting his lopsided grin. His lower lip is puffy and there’s a shadow over his right eye, like he’s been in a fight. I grimace as I recall my session with Wolfe, and realize I probably look much worse.

“Are you okay?” I ask, though I’m not sure why. The answer is pretty obvious.

“Oh, sure. You know me. I’m a trooper,” he says, but as he turns his head further toward me, he winces visibly.

I smile sadly. A small part of me is relieved to see him, but a much larger part is terrified.

“How… why… what…” My words come out in a jumble. Why is he here?
How
is he here? Is this part of their tactic to get me to talk? And if they took Adam to get to me, then…

“Where’s Mica?” I say suddenly. “Is he—”

“It’s okay,” Adam says, cutting me off. “Mica was gone when… when they came for me. They weren’t interested in him.”

“I’m sorry, Adam. I’m so, so sorry. This is all my fault,” I say.

He looks at me in confusion. “What are you talking about?”

“It’s me. I… I took that broken machine that you had, back in the…” I trail off before I let the word “biodome” slip out. I want to be able to explain everything to Adam, but considering what I went through to keep Wolfe from knowing about my jaunt into the ruins, there’s no way in hell I’m risking one of the guardsmen hearing me. I lower my voice to a whisper. “The converter. It looked exactly like the other machine I found and I just… I’m sorry. They flagged me the second I turned it in. And when I couldn’t answer their questions… It’s my fault you got dragged into this.”

I suck in a deep breath and wait for Adam’s reaction, preparing for the worst. To my utter shock, he meets my eyes with relief instead of anger.

“Terra,” he says soothingly. “This is not your fault. Sure, you probably should have let me know about the conversion unit, but… This isn’t about you.”

“What is it about then?”

Adam’s eyes are pained, but he doesn’t answer.

I press him. “When I was being… questioned,” my voice catches on the word, “my interrogator said something… something about a crash and…” The details of my processing are hazy. I try to regroup my thoughts. “The converter, was it… stolen or something? Is that why we’re here?”

“What exactly did they do to you?” he demands, ignoring my questions. His gaze lingers under my left eye, and I wonder what kind of bruise has already formed there.

“It’s nothing,” I say unconvincingly. I can’t maintain his gaze; the drug-induced visions are too fresh. Of course, I don’t know what I expect to hide from Adam. He knows anyway.

“Terra…” His voice is soft and heavy with compassion. No, not compassion. Pity.

Adam’s sympathy hits me hard in my chest and something inside me snaps. “What have we done?” I yell at the guardsmen. “Let us go!”

“Try to stay calm,” Adam says softly. The guardsmen scan us emotionlessly, then turn their backs to us.

I lower my voice back to a whisper. “Can you… can you do your thing?” I ask Adam. “FX your way out of these?” I wiggle my fingers as much as the cuffs will let me.

He looks at me warningly. “Shh,” he says, throwing his eyes towards the guards. His forehead creases in concentration, but after a few moments he shakes his head. “Can’t focus it like this. I need my hands.” His voice is barely louder than a breath.

“Why is this happening?” I whisper frantically, desperate for his assurance that everything is going to be okay, that this is all just some kind of misunderstanding.

Instead, he turns with a glare to the guardsman closest to us. “You’ll find out soon enough,” he says grimly.

I hear a door slide open and the clack of high heels on the floor. A woman wearing a mint green blazer crosses the room to stand directly in front of us. Her auburn hair is slicked back into a tight bun.

She pulls her spectacles from the breast pocket of her blazer and frames them over her ice blue eyes.

Prime Morrigan Whitlock.

“Oh good, you’re both awake,” she says cheerfully. She turns to me. “Hello, Terra.”

I stare at her, unable to speak. What does one of the most important people in Korbyllis—the world, even—want with me? I have to hope that she’s somehow connected with Adam, that she’s been summoned by his research department or something, and is here to help. Unfortunately, the narrowing of her eyes as she appraises the two of us does nothing to support my desperate theory.

“Let’s try that again. I am Morrigan Whitlock, Prime of the Tribunal. Hello.”

“I know who you are,” I muster.

“Of course you do,” she says. “This is your first visit to the skyworld, I understand. Tell me, Terra, what do you think of it?”

“It’s not quite what I expected,” I say, more evenly this time.

Prime Whitlock laughs—a cold, high-pitched squeal. “Understandable. It is unfortunate that your first taste of Korbyllis had to be under these circumstances. I heard your processing with Inquisitor Wolfe did not go well.”

“That’s one way to put it.”

“He’s one of our most talented Inquisitors, you know. Most people crack within minutes. But not you. Which is why we had to put our secondary plan in motion. We initially went looking for your brother, of course,” she says, motioning towards Adam. “A bargaining chip, if you will.”

“What?” I respond instantly, my voice suddenly frantic. I turn my face to Adam. “You said they didn’t want him.”

“I’m sorry,” he says, staring at me apologetically. “I didn’t want you to worry. I thought it would be easier…”

“Oh, don’t be so dramatic, Terra. Your
man
was there to save the day.” Prime Whitlock purses her lips and turns her attention to Adam, looking him up and down. “The arresting guardsman said you offered yourself up in her brother’s stead almost immediately. Very noble. Especially in light of what I’m sure you knew would happen.”

My mouth falls open. Adam grits his teeth.

“Of course, we were looking for you all along.” She pauses for a moment, turning her gaze back to me and peering through her spectacles with feigned sympathy. “Which, sadly, makes everything this poor girl has gone through pretty much moot. Pity.”

“What is she talking about?” I ask Adam.

“Yes, why don’t you explain things to her?” says Prime Whitlock, smirking. “Though I have to say, with all your gallivanting across her settlement, all that time spent
bonding
, I’m a little surprised you haven’t taken the time to tell her already.”

“Why don’t you take those pseudo-intellectual glasses and go find yourself a different toy?” Adam glares at Whitlock with an expression so dark, he’s almost unrecognizable.

In an instant, her smooth smile is gone. She narrows her eyes. “I think that’s enough out of you.” She snaps her fingers and one of the guardsmen swoops down to wrap a black cloth around Adam’s mouth.

“Don’t—” I object, but there’s no point. Before I can finish my thought, the gag is in place. Adam grunts against it for a moment, biting down on the thick fabric, but quickly falls silent.

“We’ve been watching you very closely since that day at the Collection, Terra. We wanted to give you the benefit of the doubt, of course. We even rewarded you handsomely for your trouble. But you couldn’t let it be.”

“I didn’t know what it was. I was just curious,” I say desperately.

“Then, a few days later, you just… disappeared,” she continues. “Gone, all day. Nobody knew where, and nobody seemed to know when you’d be coming back. When you did finally return, you had this one in tow.” She jerks her head toward Adam. “We weren’t completely sure who he was at first, of course, so we had to keep our distance. Lucky for us, his sense of self-preservation seemed to be overtaken by his desire to find the rest of his team. The more he pranced about throughout your settlement, the surer we became of his identity. Then it was just a matter of getting a hold of him. Which is, of course, where you came in.”

Muffled shouts pour from Adam’s mouth. Prime Whitlock ignores him, raising her voice over his muted yells. “Really, we should be thanking you, Terra. We knew he’d be much too slippery to nab right off the bat, so we had to think of another way to reel him in. You and your brother were the obvious choices, but finding a reason to get to you was a bit problematic, too. You saved us a lot of trouble by being so delightfully predictable. When you turned in the second machine, you gave us just the excuse we needed to scoop you up for questioning. You just couldn’t resist, could you? Access to all that technology…”

“I. Don’t. Know. What. You. Are. Talking. About!” I scream, my frustration and confusion boiling over. “I don’t know what
technology
you’re talking about. I just found the machines. Two machines, that’s all.”

“I’m sure.” Prime Whitlock peers at me over the top of her glasses.

“Just tell us what you want,” I plead. “If this is about the quarantine violation, I swear, there’s nothing wrong with us. We didn’t contract anything or—”

Prime Whitlock’s eyebrows shoot up, her gaze darting from Adam to me. “My, my,” she says. “You really don’t know.”

“Know what?” I half scream, half sigh.

“Even after Wolfe couldn’t get you to talk, we still assumed you had to know
something
,” she says to herself. “The proximity of the landing site to the ruins… the converter… the quarantine breaches…”

“Know
what
?” I repeat, clenching my jaw.

Adam jerks against his restraints.

“Didn’t you ever wonder, Terra?” Her icy eyes are piercing as she paces in front of me. Clack, clack, clack. “How he knew so much, but still had so many questions? Why he was so interested in Genesis X-16? In
you
?”

“If I could get over it,” I spit, “you should certainly be able to.”

“I can’t really blame you,” she continues, ignoring my remark. “I suppose if you had bothered to finish your schooling, you might have picked up on it sooner.”

The insult is more cutting than it should be. “You don’t know anything about me.”

“Oh please. We know everything about you.” She reaches down to unhook a small computer tablet clipped to her belt, and begins reading aloud from it. “Terra Eryth Rhodon. Eighteen years old. Two living blood relatives. Resident of the Western Quadrant of Genesis X-16. Ceased schooling at fifteen. To take up scavenging, of all things,” she adds.

Disdain drips from her voice as she continues to pace. Clack, clack.

“Legal guardian of younger brother, Auron Mica Rhodon, age thirteen. Oh, would you look at that? Age fourteen, as of today. How sweet,” she says, looking at me with a sardonic smile. “You aren’t exactly a superior example of the groundworld education system, are you? Not that education down there amounts to much in general, but still. Your knowledge of Earth’s history is almost as antiquated as his,” she says, jerking her head in Adam’s direction. “Plus or minus a few centuries, I suppose.” She laughs appreciatively, as though she’s just heard a hilarious joke. Abruptly, she stops pacing, hooks her tablet back onto her belt, and plants herself directly in front of Adam.

She reaches out with long, manicured fingers and grabs his chin, forcibly turning his head from side to side. He stifles a moan as her fingers press into a bruise on his jawline.

“Get your hands off him,” I snarl, straining futilely against my bonds.

“Ooh, touchy.” She smirks as she releases his face. “All right, fine. If you haven’t figured it out by now… Allow me to be the bearer of bad news.”

Adam’s eyes widen pleadingly.

“Your boyfriend is not like you,” she says.

“I know that,” I reply slowly. “He’s one of you. Any idiot can tell that.”

Prime Whitlock laughs again; the screech rings in my ears and I know I’ll never be able to forget it. “What an apt choice of words. Oh, terrestrials. So entertaining. But no, my dear. What I meant to say is, he is not from here.”

I wrinkle my brow, confused.

“Not from Earth,” she clarifies.

“What?” I laugh derisively. “Are you saying he’s… an alien? Please don’t tell me our government is being led by some spacenut conspiracy theorist.”

“You’re smart to be skeptical. Surprisingly so. But it’s true. He and his crew crashed their—for lack of a better term—
spaceship
near the ruins of the District. I’m still not sure how we missed him during the extraction. We didn’t even know he existed until he told us himself. The others were all quite tight-lipped on the subject.”

“Others?”

“While the two of you have been playing house, we’ve been putting the rest of them to good use.” Her eyes narrow menacingly as she picks up her pacing again.

Adam attempts to lunge forward against his chest plate, screaming in his throat.

“It’s clear that whatever resources they used to learn about our culture are rather outdated. Aside from that, however, their technology really is quite astounding. We decoded his companions’ datapads, not without difficulty. Their plan was quite clever, really. They look just like us, after all. Barely even extraterrestrial. So they come down here armed with a basic understanding of human history, and hey, almost blend right in. Almost.”