Titan Base (11 page)

THE KIDS FROM THE GRIZZLIES SOCCER TEAM
froze. They’d been trained to obey Coach Norman.

Not Ethan.

He’d seen the man for what he really was. Coach Norman had tried to interrogate and torture Ethan and inject him with chemicals that would accelerate the puberty process.

Coach Norman was the enemy.

Ethan ran up the basement stairs and slammed the dead bolt on the door. He raced back down to secure the windows, but Madison had already done it.

“Eight adults on this side of the house,” she reported,
peering through an unpainted pinhole in the window. “
Not
the Neighborhood Watch either. They’re in riot armor, carrying shields and batons.”

Emma cast about, looking for weapons. She found a bag of golf clubs, pulled out a driver, and experimentally hefted it. “They must’ve seen us if they’re dressed for a fight.”

“I don’t think so,” Ethan whispered. “If they saw
us
, they’d be here in Ch’zar I.C.E.s.”

The Resisters shared a glance. They’d outwitted the Ch’zar too many times to expect anything but a lethal response … unless the enemy was going easy because of the other kids here.

“They’ve come for us,” Bobby whispered. The fear on his face hardened into determination and pride. “We stopped a bus full of ‘sick’ kids a few days ago. After what you just told us, Ethan, I guess that was the right thing to do. I think we made enough of a difference for them to take us seriously.”

Coach Norman’s voice boomed once more over the loudspeaker:
“Kids, you broke a few rules, but you just got some bad information. There are a lot of rumors being spread out there. No one is going to blame you. Come out now and there’ll be no marks on your permanent record.”

Most of the Santa Blanca kids flinched at that last comment and took tentative steps toward the stairs.

Bobby hissed at them, “Are you guys crazy?”

They looked confused and ashamed.

In a way they
were
crazy. They’d been told for the last ten years that getting into high school was the one thing they had to do. Good grades, extracurricular activities, brushing your teeth—obeying. It’s what every parent was supposed to teach their kids. But it was part of the Ch’zar plan.

“The only permanent record you guys are going to have is joining the Ch’zar as mindless drones. Snap out of it!” Madison said.

“Bobby?”
A woman’s worried voice came over the loudspeaker next.
“It’s Mom, Bobby. We’re not going to blame you, honey. Just come out. It’ll be okay.”

Bobby crumpled in slow motion like he’d been punched in the gut. He shook his head. “Ethan,” he whispered. “I can’t. That’s my mom. She can’t be …”

Ethan moved to Bobby and held him up. “It’s
not
your mom,” he said. “At least not the mom you think she is.” He held Bobby’s gaze.

Bobby wavered, looking at Ethan, and then he glanced at the windows.

Ethan felt sorry for him. It was too much for
anyone
to believe. How could a person not love their mom and dad? Ethan hadn’t been able to swallow the story about the Ch’zar and their mind control—even
after
he’d seen the I.C.E.s up close and personal. He’d wanted it all to be just a bad dream.

“George!”
a man’s voice shouted over the loudspeaker.
“Get out right now! Stop all this nonsense!”

George was the defensive lead for the Grizzlies. He was a big kid.

He jumped up at the sound of his dad’s angry voice as if he’d been slapped in the face. He moved toward the door. “Sorry, guys,” he said. “I just don’t believe my dad is controlled by some bug.”

In a heartbeat, Madison got ahead of him and held up her hand. “Don’t,” she told him.

“Step aside, little girl,” George snorted.

That was the wrong thing to say to Madison.

She jabbed him in the solar plexus twice and followed up with a punch to the nose.

George staggered back, tears streaming from his eyes. “Hey!”

“I could’ve
broken
your nose, buddy,” Madison said with a cruel smile, “along with a few ribs. Care to try your luck again on this ‘little girl’?”

“Sara …?”
A woman’s voice hiccuped with sobs over the loudspeaker.
“Please, baby, we’re here to help you. You’re sick.”

Sara clutched at her stomach as she listened to her mom.

Overhead, floorboards creaked and Ethan heard soft footfalls. He grabbed Bobby’s arm. “Is there another way out of this place?”

The situation was explosive. James and George looked like they wanted to bolt for the basement door and give up. The Resisters looked ready for a fight (adults in riot gear notwithstanding). And the rest of his old team—Sara, Leo, and Bobby—looked like they didn’t trust anyone at this point, not even themselves.

“Is there a way out?” Ethan said again, shaking Bobby.

“Yeah,” Bobby said, snapping out of his trance. “There’s a side door, but it’s locked with a padlock on the outside.” He glanced in the corner, shaking his head. “There’s a storm grate … but that just leads to the sewer.”

“Sewer tunnels,” Emma said, like someone might say, “Thanks for the wonderful birthday gift!”

For a girl who prided herself on her appearance, making sure her makeup was just right, that her braid was neat and tight, Emma showed no hesitation in prying open the sewer grate with her golf club. She couldn’t
help but wrinkle her freckled nose at the scent wafting up, though.

“It’s good,” she said with a cough. “Stinky, but big enough to get through. There’s even a ladder.”

The doorknob on the basement door jiggled.

Then everything happened at once.

George and James made a break for the door, tromping up the stairs.

Ethan guessed they were unable to handle the truth, unwilling to believe their parents didn’t love them.

“You idiots! Don’t!” Bobby screamed, and started after them.

Sara and Leo looked too scared to make a move.

Emma took in the situation, glanced once at Ethan and Madison, and then went down the ladder into the sewer tunnels. Ethan knew she’d scout ahead and make sure it was safe.

Madison moved over the tunnel, hands raised, ready to cover their escape … or if necessary, to take on all comers in a fight for her life.

And Ethan? He wanted to save the lives of his
former
teammates and get out of here alive with his
current
teammates.

Madison darted over to him, grabbed his hand, and yanked him to the storm drain.

Meanwhile, the basement door burst inward. Adults in padded armor and boots, holding shields and batons, tried to push through and down the stairs, while George and James were trying to get out to meet their parents. It was complete chaos as the kids shoved past the adults and the adults went over the kids—and they all ended up in a heap at the bottom of the stairs.

Ethan looked at the storm drain. The cast-iron rectangle was just big enough to let him squeeze through. Oddly, there were ladder rungs descending into the darkness like Emma had said. Why would anyone put a ladder to the sewer in their basement?

He tested the first rung with his foot. It was solid.

He stepped down three more so he was half in and half out of the hole.

“Hurry,” Madison hissed. “I’ll be right behind you.”

Two adults in riot gear managed to get to their feet.

Bobby, Sara, and Leo seemed to wake up then. They tackled the adults from the side and dog-piled on top of them.

“Go!” Bobby shouted. “Now!”

Ethan started back up. He wasn’t abandoning anyone in a fight.

“I’ve got this,” Madison said. She placed her boot on his shoulder and pushed.

Ethan’s hands and feet slipped off the wet rungs. He fell through the air, scraping walls, and hit a concrete floor.

Overhead, there were shouts and screams, the crack of wood … or it might have been bone.

A beam of light cut through the darkness, momentarily dazzling Ethan, then moved to the side.

Emma held a flashlight, shining it back and forth, revealing a moss-covered tunnel five feet wide. Cables and pipes ran along the walls, and a water-filled channel cut through the center of the floor.

“These are more than sewer tunnels,” she whispered. She glanced up at the opening above.

Shadowy figures appeared and clambered down the ladder. First Bobby, followed in rapid succession by Leo and Sara.

“Where are the others?” Emma asked. “Where’s Madison?”

Bobby shook his head. “I … I don’t know.”

Ethan grabbed the rungs. He had to get Madison.

But then he saw someone jump into the hole.

He dodged aside.

Madison—sliding down with both hands and feet braced against the walls—landed in a crouch where he had been a moment ago.

There was a flash and boom from the basement that
left Ethan’s ears ringing. Boxes and shelves and crates crashed over the storm drain.

“Flash-bang grenade,” Madison explained. “They’ll be disoriented for a few minutes, so let’s make it count, Lieutenant.”

Ethan noticed that when she called him Lieutenant (not Ethan or Blackwood), he usually had some difficult command decision to make … like she used his rank to remind him of that.

He stared up at the dust and the sealed storm grate.

There was no way to go back and fight now.

There was only one way to save his former teammates—get the I.C.E. suits up and running.

“Let’s move out,” Ethan said, and ran into the dark.

   
12
   
THE BLOOD MUSIC

ETHAN WASN’T SURE HOW FAR THEY’D RUN. HE
was still thinking about the kids he’d left behind. Thinking, too, about how Angel was doing. Wondering if Felix and Paul and the others had found what they needed to get the I.C.E.s cleaned.

And in the back of his head, there was a nagging suspicion that there was
more
to worry about—especially how the Ch’zar had been able to blanket-jam the Seed Bank’s emergency broadcast bands.

Something felt
very
wrong about that.

“Hang on,” Madison said, and grabbed Ethan’s elbow. She flipped open her wristwatch/radiation counter to use
the built-in compass. “West is that way.” She pointed left. “That’s the direction of the hospital.”

Ethan checked his mental map of Santa Blanca. Madison was right.

“Hospital?” Bobby slumped against the wall and slid down to his knees. He looked exhausted and disoriented.

“We still have to get that medicine for our sick friend,” Ethan explained.

Bobby shook his head.

Ethan wasn’t sure if he was disagreeing about their priorities or if he was in denial about the entire world.

Emma knelt next to Bobby and set her hand on his shoulder. “It’s going to be okay.”

“How can you say that?” Leo asked. Leo was the goalkeeper on the Grizzlies and had wanted to be an architect when he went off to high school. He was always building model dams and bridges. “My mom and dad aren’t what I thought they were. This whole place …” Leo waved around in a hopeless, helpless gesture, unable to find the words.

“Is a lie?” Ethan offered.

“That’s exactly it,” Sara said. “And if
everything
is a lie, what does
anything
matter?”

“They’re losing it,” Madison whispered to Ethan.

Ethan had similarly “lost it” the first time he’d seen the
truth. Although that first time turned into an I.C.E.–enemy robot smashup, so it was either cope with the situation or get squished.

In some ways that had been a lot easier than this.

“Let’s take a minute to get our heads together,” Ethan said.

The Resisters dug through their packs and passed around canteens and protein bars.

As they munched in silence, Emma examined the walls in detail with her flashlight. She motioned for Ethan and pointed. Some pipes and cables had tendrils and side branches that looked like veins. Emma moved her flashlight aside and the organic parts glowed for a moment before fading.

“Bioluminescence,” she said. “Odds are that’s Ch’zar engineering.”

Ethan would never get used to the mix of bio- and mechanical technologies—even if he did admire his own wasp I.C.E. suit. It was still gross.