Page 49 of Silver Elite
It’s time.
The Jubilee starts soon, and I have less than an hour to execute my mission. With my pack in the passenger seat, I drive my borrowed vehicle across the base to the large, sprawling venue where the General hosts all his events. The capitalists and other Continent elites prefer the only hotel in the city grand enough to host large gatherings. The Elysian. They purchase permits to celebrate the most frivolous things—a daughter graduating from upper school. A son landing his first job assignment.
The General, of course, is not about these frills. His trusty Command base will do, even for celebrating such a monumental feather in the cap of his rule. According to Cross, he doesn’t care one lick about this Jubilee. The General believes all parties are self-indulgent, period, but hosts them for appearances’ sake. Tonight he’ll be giving a speech. There’ll be dancing. Refreshments. And then everyone will be dismissed in military fashion before midnight and ushered off the base.
Copper Block is overseeing transportation. Civilian vehicles will enter the base from the checkpoint near the venue. Searched and scanned, of course. I ran into Lieutenant Hirai in the mess hall earlier, and he told me he was responsible for strengthening the force field surrounding the venue. If any guests ignore the multiple warning signs and try to step foot beyond the designated area, they’re in for a nasty surprise in the form of electrocution.
“We really hope we don’t have a lot of dead civilians on our hands tonight,” he said ruefully, and I had to giggle.
“Do you have the package?” Adrienne asks.
“Yes.”
This will be the tricky part. I need to set the charges inside the caterers’ quarters. Not in the kitchen, but a large supply room two doors down. Adrienne projected the blueprints to me last night.
“There won’t be anyone in here?” I ask her, the same way I asked yesterday when I was told my objective.
“There shouldn’t be.”
Good. I’m assuming my role in the plan is to create another decoy. The explosives taking up residence in my bag are nowhere near enough to do much damage to the supply room, let alone the entire base. But I’m still on need-to-know footing, with no directive other than to plant these explosives.
Silver Elite comes with the kind of security perks that make the lower blocks jealous. My movements hardly ever get questioned, and if I do happen to get stopped, I scan my thumb, they see my unit, and there are no questions asked. Today, luckily, not a single soul noticesme.
The venue is chaotic. Catering trucks parked outside, soldiers with guns watching the staff unload items and scanning each one. I keep my head down and slip into the building, averting gazes in the hallway. I haven’t activated my jammer yet—it’ll draw too much attention if all the cameras in the building suddenly stop working—so I’m very aware of the blinking red lights in the ceiling following my every move. I enter the kitchen, and only then do I remove the jammer from my bag, activate it, and scurry back into the hall, invisible to the cameras.
In the supply room, I make quick work of the charges, setting them around the room. Every sound, every rustle of fabric, sets my nerves on edge. I want to hurry, to rush what I’m doing, but I can’t afford to be careless. Adrienne is counting on me.
I haven’t been asked to arm the explosives, only to position them at strategic points and connect them to the ignition system. I assume the detonation will be remote. After I stick the remaining silver pod on the wall inside a slatted wooden closet, I slide the now-empty backpack over my shoulder, the jammer peeking out of the side pocket.
I breathe a sigh of relief.
I did it.
Done.
Time to get the hell out of here.
Halfway to the door, I hear footsteps directly outside it. I freeze.
Keep walking, I implore whoever it is. Just keep walking.
The doorknob begins to turn.
Shit.
I shove the top of the jammer deeper into the pocket, out of sight, just as the door swings open and Jayde Valence appears in the doorway.
My heart stops.
We stare at each other for a moment, until her cool, crisp voice breaks the silence.
“What are you doing in here, soldier?”
“Oh, I was looking for the caterer. I think his name is Eman?” I gulp through my bone-dry mouth. “The kitchen crew said he might’ve ducked in here to grab some supplies.”
“The caterer.”
“Yes.”
Jayde closes the door behind her and steps deeper into the room, scanning her surroundings. My heart promptly starts beating again. Loud and persistent.
The charges I’ve set are invisible to the eye. Strategically placed. I should be fine so long as she doesn’t take a closer look. Particularly at the window. All she has to do is raise the blinds and she’ll find those two small silver pucks I affixed to the frame.
“But as you can see,” I finish lightly, “he’s not here. I guess I need to keep poking around.”
I take a step toward the door. She doesn’t move.
“Lieutenant Colonel?” I prompt.
She smiles. The bloodmark on her cheek appears even more menacing when paired with an expression of mirth.
“It is very rare,” she says, “that I misjudge people.”
“I’m sorry?”
“I saw you set the charges. The General will not be pleased.”
Panic sparks inside me. “I don’t know what—”
“My mind has never failed me,” Jayde interrupts. “Even in childhood. Every vision I’ve ever had has been confirmed with unerring accuracy. This evening’s vision…” Her lips tighten. “I recognized your face immediately. I interrogated you after Julian Ash’s execution.”
“You did. And you cleared me,” I remind her, squaring my shoulders. “Because I didn’t do anything wrong.”
Even as I speak, my mind is already decoyed in preparation for her penetration. It doesn’t come. She simply stands there, shaking her head in bewilderment.
“How?” she asks.
“How what?”
“How were you able to keep your mind controlled for so long? It’s extraordinary.”
“I honestly don’t know what you’re talking about.” I try to keep my voice steady despite the fear coursing through me.
“Don’t lie to me, soldier. I might have erred during your interrogation, but I’m not a fool.”
We stare at each other. My stomach is churning, twisting with anxiety. I throw out a desperate link to Cross, who responds immediately.
“What’s wrong?”
“I need you. Now. Jayde Valence just had a vision of me aiding the Uprising.”
“Where are you?”
I give him my location and say, “Hurry.”
My fingers tingle with the urge to reach for the gun on my hip. But nothing’s happened yet. She isn’t reaching for her own weapon, and I don’t want to reveal my hand too soon.
Even more telling is that no one else is rushing into this room. No footsteps thundering in the hallway. I suspect there’s nobody outside the door. The question is, why didn’t she bring any backup? How the hell did that vision of hers end if she felt this comfortable coming alone?
As I watch her, my nerves are stretched taut like a bowstring, ready to snap at the slightest provocation.
“Normally I would dispatch a squad to collect you, but I had to see for myself.” She shakes her head again. Astounded. “The vision was so preposterous. I cleared you. And yet here you are.”
Hubris, I realize.
That’s why she’s alone.
She was so confident in her mind-reading abilities that she couldn’t fathom how she could’ve possibly been bested by me. She had to investigate. And maybe there’s some embarrassment driving her actions, too. She’d been so colossally wrong about me; would she really want an audience while her shortcomings are being aired?
Or—I wryly acknowledge, as she gets her hand on her gun so fast I barely have time to blink—maybe she’s a highly trained lieutenant colonel who trusts in her ability to take care of herself in the field.
“I haven’t done anything wrong,” I protest as she points the gun at me. Its steel barrel is affixed with a silencer.
“Tell me how you did it. Who trained you? That kind of shielding requires extensive training. Years of it. Decades.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I just have a regular shield that I learned in lower school and then shored up in the Program.”
Her lips curl in a condescending sneer. “Fine, then. I’ll find out for myself.” She jerks the gun barrel toward my hip. “Unholster your weapon. Lay it on the floor and kick it toward me.”
It’s clear she’s not playing around, so I follow her instructions. When I squat to put the gun down, my other hand inches toward my boot.
“The knife, too. Kick it toward me.”
Shit.
She chuckles. “My visions are very detailed, soldier. I know every move you’re about to make.”
“Cross. Hurry, damn it.”
“Trying.”
I’m weaponless as I rise to my feet. Keeping her gun trained on me, Jayde’s emotionless eyes seek out my gaze. I feel it the moment she penetrates my mind, but I don’t react.
“Fascinating,” she murmurs. “You don’t feel the shock?”
“No, I feel it.” I’ve officially given up on denying the truth. At this point I’m only insulting her intelligence.
“You do?”
“Yes. I just ignore it.”
Amazement floods her expression. “We’ve performed tests on other Aberrants. Do you realize the shock you receive when another Aberrant infiltrates your mind is the equivalent of almost five hundred volts?” She starts to laugh. “You just ignore it.”
I shrug. It’s hard to focus with the itchy sensation crawling all over my body. She’s in my mind, and I’m having trouble keeping it decoyed while trying to come up with an escape plan at the same time.
Jayde is nodding with approval. “There you go. I hear you now.”
“Because I’m letting you.” My icy tone belies the thundering of my heart.
I need to find a way out of this.
“Cross, where are you?” I plead.
“Moving as fast as I can.”
“Move faster.”
“You’re communicating with someone,” she accuses. “Who is it?”
I decoy my mind before she can figure out it’s Cross. My gaze darts toward my discarded gun. It’s in the corner of the room, maybe three feet from Jayde. She’ll shoot me before I reach it.
“Yes,” she says, answering my thoughts. “I will.”
I could lunge at her. She’ll still fire at me, but if I can get her to lower the weapon, even a few inches, I’ll have a better shot of not taking a bullet to the chest.
At this point, there’s no harm in trying.
“And what are we trying?” Jayde’s tone is distracted. Her forehead has a deep groove in it as she concentrates on pillaging my thoughts.
I take advantage of that. The only time the shield of a Mod as powerful as her might show any weakness is when she’s using those powers. When all her concentration is directed elsewhere. Directed at me. I reach out with my mind, opening a path to hers. When I encounter her shield, I start pushing.
“Your veins…They don’t change.”
She’s still reading my mind. It makes me sick to have her poking around in there, but I continue to use it to my benefit. In fact, I help her out, bringing certain thoughts to the surface, making it easier for her.
“You’re working for the Uprising. Oh, you stupid, foolish girl.”
I throw all my mental force against her shield. I slam into it as hard as I can. In my mind I imagine a crack form. Widen. Splinter at the sides. For some reason her shield looks gold now, but I go with it. I’ve found that fighting your own mind is a futile exercise. The gold shines brighter, flecks of it dancing through my head like dust motes. Long, thin fissures form across Jayde’s shield, spreading outward, like the surface of ice that’s about to break and—
I’m in.
Am I?
I don’t feel the pressure of her shield anymore trying to repel me. But she also doesn’t jerk in surprise. I didn’t get the feeling that she’d mastered the ability to ignore those five hundred volts. She seemed too stunned that it was even possible. Unless she was shocked because she believed she was the only one who could do it?
Setting my questions aside, I focus on pushing a command into her mind.
Lower your weapon.
“Stop straining yourself. You don’t need to try to read my thoughts,” Jayde assures me. “I’ll enlighten you myself. You’re fighting for the wrong team, Darlington. We’re not the villains here.”
That momentarily makes me lose my focus. I stare at her, incredulous. “You’ve murdered thousands of your own people.”
“They are not my people. Especially not the ones you’re working for. They’re unnatural. They’re corrupting minds.” Her gray eyes become oddly magnanimous. “If you surrender right now, I won’t kill you.”
I can’t stop a bark of laughter. “Uh-huh. I’m sure.”
“I won’t.” I glimpse a spark of excitement. “I want to study you. I want to work with you.”
My jaw falls open. “I would never work with you.”
Lower your weapon.
Jayde lowers the gun, just slightly. I don’t think she even realizes it. What I learned from my experience with the firing squad is that they couldn’t hear what I was saying. I was in their minds, but my commands weren’t translating into something they could consciously interpret. They didn’t hear me telling them to pull the trigger—they just knew that they should.
“I wish you would reconsider,” she tells me. “You’re extraordinary. I’ve never encountered someone with such a strong mind.”
“Yes, I’m sure this is a sincere offer and I’ll just skip into the Capitol, where you and I will work together happily, our offices side by side.”
“Of course not. You would be a prisoner. At first,” she emphasizes. “But I think once I teach you everything there is to know, once I show you the possibilities, you’ll understand why I’m working with the General.”
I want to command her to lower her weapon again, but her animated voice, her palpable enthusiasm, triggers a cold rush of unease. It roils in my gut. An eddy of fear. I could stomach being a prisoner. Getting thrown into the stockade again.
But I can’t stomach being her prisoner.
My mind flashes to that hospital full of fragmented Mods. The freezer of blood vials that makes me believe something horrific is happening there.
This woman wants to study me.
I refuse to let that happen.
“We could accomplish great things. Imagine the possibilities.”
“I will never work for or with you. You’re the reason my uncle is dead.”
“He’s the reason he’s dead.” Her expression clouds at the notion she’s not getting anywhere with me. “Your mind is the strongest I’ve ever encountered. I would hate to let that go to waste.”
Turn the gun on yourself.
She’s such a strong Mod that I expect her to smile and say, Nice try. But she doesn’t. She’s still in my head, though. Why isn’t she aware of what I’m trying to do? I wish I knew something about this ability of mine. Anything. Does it work on a different frequency?
Do I care right now as long as it’s working?
Turn the gun on yourself.
Jayde’s brow knits as her hand twitches, the gun trembling. I feel her losing her grip on my mind as she fights whatever impulse I’m feeding into hers. She tries to resist it, but my determination is stronger than hers. I’m not going to let this woman study me or sentence me to death. I refuse to face the squad. I refuse to leave Cross. I refuse.
Turn the gun on yourself.
“If you’re not going to work with me, then this is the end of the road for you.” She’s angry now. “But it really is a shame.”
Turn the gun on yourself.
She clicks the safety off, her exterior once again icy as she realizes I’m not going to “work” with her.
Frustration gathers inside me as my commands continue to go unobeyed. Why isn’t it working, damn it? I’m experiencing that same surge of energy I felt at the execution. My mind is alive with a kaleidoscope of gold dust. And I know she feels something. She thinks I’m reading her mind. She senses I’m doing something. So why isn’t—
“Try saying it out loud. I heard that helps sometimes.”
Uncle Jim’s voice rumbles through my head. Advice uttered a long time ago, during one of our many training sessions. He seemed so sure that vocalizing the commands could aid in inciting.
At this point, what do I have to lose?
“Raise your gun to your head,” I say, my voice coming out hoarse.
“What?”
Jayde starts to lift her arm, then stops. Frowning at me. At the gun.
“Raise it to your head and pull the trigger.”
The gun slices upward, turning.
Her eyes widen. “What are you doing?”
“Raise it to your head and pull the trigger.”
The barrel is now pointing straight at her own temple.
“ No, ” she growls. “What is this?”
“Pull the trigger.”
My voice doesn’t waver. I refuse to die at this woman’s hand.
“Pull the trigger,” I repeat.
Her face twists in agony as she struggles against my command. I feel her resistance crumbling like a sandcastle against the tide. Breaking apart.
“Pull the trigger, Jayde.”
With a sudden, sickening click, Jayde obeys.