Page 17 of Captured Immune (Secrets Trilogy #2)

17

TREY

Ruby leads the group with her fireballs flickering against the tunnel walls. I’ve got Pixie on my left and Katie on my right. Carlos and Dash are at my heels. I think I trust the men now—not enough to ask one of them to carry Arella, but I trust them enough to let them walk behind me without wondering if they’ll try something. Even if they do, the women will stop them. I’m sure of it.

“Is Pixie your real name?” I ask as our footsteps echo with each step. The silence was killing me.

“Nah. I go by Pixie here because my real name is Anna Jung. It’s kinda lame and plain for how badass I am, huh?”

“That’s not as lame as my real name,” Ruby says. “My family’s been calling me Ruby since I was born, and I’ve been going by it ever since. Barely anyone even knows what my real name is.”

“ I don’t even know what your real name is,” Pixie says. “And we’re besties.”

“Tell us,” Carlos says, grinning.

Ruby shakes her head with a chuckle. “Hell no.”

“Helga?” Pixie asks.

“Ew!”

“Olga?”

“No.”

“Gertrude,” I say because that name just sounds funny.

“Definitely not.”

“Bertha?”

“Okay, stop.” Ruby rolls her eyes. “It’s Agatha, after my great-grandmother.”

Pixie spits out a laugh. “Agatha? No fucking way.”

A baseball-size fireball appears in Ruby’s palm, and she holds it close to Pixie’s face. “If you ever call me that, I’ll burn you alive.”

Pixie throws her arms up in surrender, still laughing. “Noted.”

“What’s your real name?” Carlos asks Dash.

“Henry,” Dash says simply. “But everyone’s called me Dash since I was toddler.”

“And you, Katie?”

“My name is actually Katie,” she says. “Not short for Katherine either. It’s just Katie.”

“I take back what I said about you, girl,” Pixie says, keeping a steady pace at my side. “I called you weak earlier, but apparently, you’re not. That timid voice and submissive personality fooled me good.”

Katie lets out an adorable chuckle. “Where’s my Oscar?”

“That’s one hell of a mind power too,” I say, ignoring the burning ache in my arms. I don’t know how much longer I can carry Arella like this. “Now I know why you were so confident you could overpower me when I tried to leave.”

“I only said that to scare you. I can’t blow people up—just things.”

“I see. I guess if you could blow people up, you probably wouldn’t exist.”

Even before Zordinaries went into hiding, the zovernment controlled what powers remained in our genetic existence. Whenever a gift is classified as too dangerous or deadly, the zovernment puts it on the Extinction List. Then anyone with that power is sterilized to prevent others from being born with that gift.

There used to be people who could control minds, swap minds, and some even had a death touch. Now that those people haven’t reproduced for almost thirty generations, those powers don’t exist anymore.

“Deadly people slip through the cracks all the time,” Ruby says. “Especially if they’re a child of a Superior. My sister is living proof of that.”

“What do you mean?” I ask.

Ruby twists around and walks backward as she raises a brow at me. “Think about it. Once our powers come in around the age of one, our parents are required to register our gifts with the zovernment, right?”

“Right?” I say like a question because I don’t know where she’s going with this.

“My sister’s body power is one that skipped a few generations in our line, so there isn’t a record of this gift being in our genetics. She can make your blood literally boil until it kills you from the inside out. Do you really think my parents were going to register her as a blood-boiling killer? That’s instant extermination, my dude.”

“What? I thought the zovernment just sterilizes those babies.”

“Mm-hmm.” Ruby turns around to face the front. “That’s what the zovernment says they do because that’s what they want you to think . In reality, they just take those babies away and pop them into an incinerator.”

Katie slaps a hand over her heart. “Oh god.”

“Sorry for the visual, but that’s exactly what happens. It’s easier, faster, and it’s the most effective way of preventing that baby from ever being a danger to people in the future.”

Kill one to save the others. Seems like the zovernment has adopted that ideal too. Am I the only one who doesn’t think that’s okay? Isn’t there another way?

Ruby continues, “Now, let’s say you work for the zovernment and you know that’s where those babies end up. No zovernment official in their right mind would ever register their own child with a gift on the Extinction List, knowing it’s a death sentence for their baby, so people lie. They cover it up. They go into hiding. Whatever it takes to save their kid. According to the zovernment, my sister can look at any animal to hear its thoughts—you know, something completely harmless and not life-threatening at all, and most importantly, hard to prove.”

“Honestly,” Dash says from behind me, “if it was my kid, I’d do the same.”

“Me too,” Carlos says.

Me three. I’d kill a hundred people before I let anyone take my child away from me. I guess that doesn’t make me any better than the zovernment.

I glance at the woman in my arms with my shirt still tied around her knife wound. The man who threw that knife at her is now lying either sedated or lifeless in a pool of his own blood, and I have no regrets. I’d do it again if it meant saving her, and I feel the same for the unborn child growing inside her belly. This baby isn’t mine, but it’s Arella’s. That means it’s a part of her, which means I’ll stop at nothing to make sure it’s safe too.

“Does anyone know of a good place I can take Arella once we get outta here?” I ask.

“Our ZIRDA base in New York might take you in,” Ruby says. “And I promise, our CEO is not an undercover Royal.”

“I dunno,” Pixie says. “The boss would need some convincing. You know how she is about bringing in outsiders.”

“But Trey’s not an outsider. He’s a fellow ZIRDA agent.”

“Who is related to Victor. She won’t trust him. She might think it’s a trick Victor came up with to get him into our base.”

Being associated with that monster by blood disgusts me. What would my dad say if he knew his older brother ended up joining the group of criminals who ended his life? Suddenly, it hits me: What if Victor’s the one behind the murder of my parents? His neck was slashed on the same night that my parents were blown to bits. What if that was just a cover-up to make it seem like he wasn’t involved?

The story Victor told me was that the Royals showed up at his house, demanding he take them to Shadow Ridge, and when he refused, they slashed his neck and left him for dead. If the Royals had really wanted him dead, wouldn’t they have slashed him enough to make sure he couldn’t survive?

“I can take you to ZIRDA Minnesota,” Katie says. “My CEO will take care of you two in a heartbeat.”

That sounds amazing. “How are we gonna get there?”

“Any way we can. Walk. Steal a car. Ride a bus. Stow away on a plane. Whatever it takes.”

The idea of having an entire ZIRDA base, a real one, protecting Arella makes my heart swell. With them, no Royal will be able to get within twenty steps of my girl.

Eventually, we arrive at a long set of narrow wooden stairs leading upward.

“This is the end of the tunnel,” Dash says. “It’s just up these stairs, then we come out of a tree. Let me go first again to make sure it’s all clear.” With a whoosh! and a slight gust of air, Dash disappears. At the top of the stairs, some moonlight shines through a small door. The rest of us climb the stairs in silence.

When Dash doesn’t come back right away, I stop and project my empath power upward. Like how Trackers can’t trace people who are underground, my empath powers can’t sense anyone above ground while I’m under it, so I get nothing.

Pixie pauses a few stairs ahead of me. “You okay?”

“Something’s not right.” My heart rate kicks up a notch. “It’s been at least ten seconds, and Dash isn’t back yet.”

“Roobs?”

“On it.” In an instant, Ruby runs up the stairs.

The rest of us stay where we are while she heads to the surface. Just as she exits the top, she screams. Then come the wails of a bunch of men.

“Help!” Ruby shouts. “I can’t fight them all myself!”

Without wasting a second, Pixie, Katie, and Carlos race up the stairs.

“Stay here!” Pixie shouts to me.

Stay here? And do what? Wait for them to either win or die before I can get Arella to safety? No fucking way. If they’re being attacked up there, they’re gonna need all the help they can get.

I scurry back down the steps and gently lay my unconscious Arella over the tunnel floor. My arms gain a tiny sense of relief from letting her go.

“I’ll be right back, baby. I promise.” Then I sprint up the stairs two at a time, shaking the ache out of my arms.

The second I step out of the hollowed tree, madness swarms my head. Shock, anger, and fear shoot at me from all around. Lightning balls whizz through the air. The forest catches on fire with each fireball that misses its human target. A rock ball the size of a basketball flies straight at my face. I duck just in time, and it hits the base of the tree behind me.

Everyone is screaming and shouting. It’s too dark, and there’s too much commotion for me to make out who is who. All I know is that there are more of them than there are of us.

A large man wails as he drops to his knees and covers his ears. Behind Pixie, another large man charges at her with his arm transformed into the shape of a machete.

“Pixie! Behind you!” I run to help her until I trip over something soft on the ground and fall on my face. When I turn to look back, I gasp.

At my feet, Dash’s lifeless body stares back at me. He’s bleeding out of a deep gash in his neck. They must have killed him the second he got up here. I guess that proves he really was on ZIRDA’s side.

“I’m sorry,” I whisper to him as I hoist myself onto my feet. Just as I do, a loud pop! pinches my eardrums. A slender man appears in front of me. It’s the Teleporter who brought me here.

He hurls a fist straight into my nose. I stumble backward as pain explodes up my face and something wet trickles into my mouth. Blood. Salty and metallic. I wipe at it with my hand, then launch my bloody fist back at him. He disappears with another pop! as I stumble forward, and my fist catches nothing but air.

P op! The man kicks me from behind. I face-plant into the ground, then turn and aim a fireball at him.

Pop! My fireball hits a tree, setting it ablaze.

Pop! The Teleporter appears on top of me. He straddles me and punches my face. Then he does it again. And again. And again. He grabs my neck and chokes me as a punishing jolt of lightning races down my legs. I scream out in pain, clawing at his fingers digging into my throat.

This isn’t my end. It can’t be. Arella needs me.

I draw my arms back as some flames flicker between my fingertips, but I can’t gather enough strength to produce a fireball.

Suddenly, the lightning stops and the man groans in agony. His body convulses as he falls onto his side. I kick him away from me.

“Stop! Stop!” he shouts.

A hissing sound comes from behind me.

“St—” The guy vomits in his own mouth, then coughs as he chokes on it. Seconds later, his body goes still.

Ruby offers me a hand and helps me off the ground. “Grab the Ordinary and get outta here!”

“What about you guys?”

“We’ll hold them back! Just go!”

I don’t need to be told twice. I climb back into the hollowed tree and race down the steps. Arella is exactly where I left her, unmoved and unharmed. I heave her limp body into my still-aching arms, then sprint back up the stairs.

When I step out, the women and Carlos are guarding the entrance. Ruby has two men shaking on the ground, wailing like dying cats. Pixie has another three people on their knees, with their hands clasped against their ears. A few guys are swirling around in Carlos’s giant tornado. Katie is throwing ice balls at two women as a tree behind them glows red.

BOOM! The tree explodes. The women attacking Katie go flying through the air. When they land on the hard ground, the emotions of one of them leaves my head.

“Run!” Katie shouts. “We’ll cover you!”

Since I don’t know where in the forest I am, I don’t know which way to go. But anywhere is better than here, so I pick a direction and sprint.

I’m barely five steps away when Katie screams from behind me. “No! Carlos!”

Instinctively, I turn just as Carlos’s emotions disappear from my head. A giant tree root sticks out from the ground, piercing him right in the chest. Three people scream as Carlos’s tornado vanishes and they fall to the ground. It only takes them a second to get onto their feet. One of them punches Katie in the stomach as the other two run toward me.

I drop Arella’s feet to the ground to free a hand, then chuck fireballs at the men. Clumsily, I hug Arella’s upper body against mine, dragging her with me as I stumble backward and dodge the fireballs flying toward us.

“Arella!” I shout as I shake her. “Wake up! I need you!”

Her immunity would be so fucking helpful right now. Fighting people off is a hell of a lot harder without her invisible wall of protection.

The men are gaining on me. Another fireball rockets through the air and grazes my arm. The heat sears my skin before the fireball lands in the grass behind me, setting it on fire. The ground rumbles beneath my feet as two tree roots pop out of the ground. Their sharp ends fly straight toward my chest. I fall backward and land on my back just as the roots swipe the air where I was just standing. I lose my grip on Arella, who rolls away from me and lands on her side.

The Terra attacking me points his fingers at the ground again. The dirt rumbles beneath me until another tree root shoots out of the ground and circles my legs.

“No!” I shout as the roots drag me away from Arella.

In the corner of my eye, I see the Terra lift his hands into the air. His roots whip me upward, then slam me back onto the ground. Searing pain tears through my ribs. I clutch my side as I’m lifted into the air again, then my face crashes against the hard ground. More agony fires throughout my ribs. I cry out as the tree roots fling me toward the sky a third time. I’m bracing myself for the impact when suddenly, the roots stop. I dangle above a tree as the man below me cries out in pain.

“You little bitch!” Ruby says through hisses.

The tree roots around my legs glow red. They’re warm against my jeans until they slowly break apart and release me. I fall to the ground, landing face first—on my ribs again. The agony burns like hell.

“Sorry,” Katie says. “I didn’t know how else to get you down.”

I push onto my knees and clutch my side. I taste blood again, and it’s so hard to breathe.

“Get up, Trey!” Katie shouts as she tosses ice balls at someone behind me.

What the hell does she think I’m trying to do, have a tea party? “Give me a fucking second, will ya?”

“We don’t have seconds. You need to get her away from here.”

I’m barely back onto my feet when Pixie shouts, “No!” Then she puckers her lips and blows toward the large man hoisting Arella over his shoulder.

Katie and I race toward the man as he drops Arella onto the ground and clutches his ears. My girl limply rolls onto the ground.

With a grunt, Katie hurls her fist into the man’s face. Then she draws back and does it again. The petite woman sure hits hard. The man’s pain mirrors onto my own face, but it’s nothing compared to the agony in my torso.

“Go, Trey!” Katie shouts. “Get her outta here and hide!”

Aching, I pick up Arella off the ground and cradle her against my burning chest. Then I run.