Tracer, page 8
“I see you’ve met Captain Janus. He’s going to escort us—”
“My friend needs immediate medical attention,” Trace interrupted, looking over at Brisby, who now stood sheepishly on the other side of Goldie, his face gaunt and pale. “He was stabbed by a vagrant right before we reached Apex. Anything else we need to do can wait.”
“Of . . . of course,” Trevor sputtered. “Captain, please escort Mr. Frost to the infirmary while I show Ms. Tracer to her room.”
“It’s just Trace,” she stated, then pushed past both of them and walked around the car. Brisby stared at her with huge eyes. She could see how terrified he was.
“Trace?” he said as she stepped close to him.
“It’s okay, Brizz, go with them. You need to get that wound looked at by a real doctor. I’ll meet up with you after and we’ll complete our mission and then get the hell out of here.”
“Okay,” Brisby answered after a moment.
Captain Janus appeared next to Frost and wrapped his meaty fingers roughly around the pyro-tech’s thin arm. Trace fought back an urge to protect Brisby, but that was ridiculous. They were here as allies. Janus might be an asshole, but he was just doing his job.
“Let’s go,” the captain said, pulling the smaller man away.
Frost looked back as he shuffled forward, and Trace forced a smile, hoping to reassure him. Even though she knew it wouldn’t work.
And then Brisby Frost was lost from sight.
FOURTEEN
Trace walked slightly behind Trevor, marveling at the sheer number of people passing them.
She was suddenly aware of how dirty and bloodied she was compared to everyone she saw. In fact, pretty much anyone from PH City would look unwashed compared to the citizens of Apex, with the notable exceptions of President Bell and Gunnar. The Apexers’ clothes were nicer, too, their hair styled in ways that Trace had never seen before. She also became painfully cognizant of the bruises on her face. She probably looked as deranged as the vagrant who had stabbed Brisby.
Bell had always bad-mouthed Apex, had made it sound like some kind of shithole, but the reality was very, very different. Trace didn’t know what to believe anymore.
The open-skied sidewalk they traversed was wide, larger than any public area Trace had ever seen, with kiosks every several hundred feet, selling food and wares. She noted that they were walking in a slightly upward, meandering circle, heading away from where they had left Goldie and toward the upper levels of the city.
“Impressive,” she grunted.
“Yes.” Trevor beamed. “We take great pride in our concourse!”
A group of children stared up at Trace, slack-jawed and wide-eyed, and then burst into laughter once they’d passed. She realized that a lot of people were staring.
“No one seems very worried that your oil is running ou—”
“And this is our dance hall!” Trevor nearly shouted, grabbing Trace’s arm and pulling her close while using his other hand to point at a nearby building.
“No one knows that our pyrolysis machine is broken,” he hissed into her ear. “And it is essential that they never find out. The last thing Chancellor Stewart wants is for people to panic, for a . . . a riot to break out.”
Trace pulled her arm away and kept walking. She had kept her voice purposefully low, but the foppish man’s outsized reaction confirmed they were trying to keep their situation very, very quiet. And that it was even worse than Stewart had let on to President Bell. Or Bell had let on to her.
“I don’t know . . .” she finally said. “I get the sense that your boy Janus wouldn’t mind cracking some skulls.”
Trevor gave her a shocked look, but Trace could sense the truth in his eyes. She smiled and took another look around. Everything really did seem so perfect, but she had been trained to see past the surface, and sure enough, she could see literal cracks in the walls’ foundations, could see some faces here and there that were gaunt from hunger. Not exactly a shithole, like Bell had said, but not perfect either.
She had to admit . . . Apex City threw off a pretty damn convincing sense of perfection, something that her boss never bothered to attempt, but Trace was more sure than ever that the two cities were more alike than Trevor, or anyone else here, would care to admit.
As if in response to her thoughts, a young girl, face streaked with dirt, came running up to Trace and pulled at her trench coat. “Can you spare any plastic?” the girl said, eyes light brown and huge.
Trevor opened his mouth to rebuke the girl, but a glance from Trace shut him up. She knew it was probably hopeless, but she quickly patted her coat’s pockets. There was nothing there, just like she knew there wouldn’t be. She was about to apologize to the girl, who reminded Trace so much of her younger self, when she decided to try a little harder. She reached into one of the inside pockets of her coat, empty, then tried the other side, a last-ditch effort. To her surprise, her fingers wrapped around something. She smiled and withdrew the object, whatever it was.
A plastic fork. Cracked. Stained. But definitely worth some credits—if Frost was able to fix Apex City’s machine. Trace must have put it in there during one of her repo missions—she couldn’t even remember which one it had been. Which scars corresponded.
The girl’s eyes went even larger as Trace held the fork out. Trevor started to reach out, saying, “By law, you can’t—” but Trace slapped his hand away. There might be rules about this kind of thing in Apex, but she wasn’t bound by them.
“Can I . . . ?” the girl said, barely a whisper.
“Of course,” Trace said. “But keep it safe. Don’t let anyone take it from you.”
The girl nodded, her face hardening, a look Trace knew well from reflective surfaces in Puente Hills decades earlier, and then she sped off, the fork already hidden somewhere within her ripped and dirty clothing.
As she watched the girl disappear into the crowd, she noticed a man hidden in the shadows of a doorway. Even from this distance, even partially hidden from sight, it was impossible to miss his light-brown eyes. His messy hair. And an odd, mischievous smile.
“I’ll have to report this,” Trevor said, and Trace glanced at the man as he strode forward, back stiff and stringy hair flowing in his wake.
Trace glanced back at the doorway, but the man was gone.
“Good for you,” she said to Trevor’s receding back, following after him. And for the moment, she didn’t feel quite so tired anymore.
The living quarters were small but were cleaner and more brightly lit than her apartment back in PH City, and the bed was larger than any Tracer had ever seen before. She stood in the doorway and could feel Trevor hovering behind her, could feel his hot breath curling out against the back of her neck.
“This is perfect, thank you,” she said, turning around to face him.
“Once you’ve”—he waved a hand at her in a large circular motion—“washed up, please come back out into the hallway immediately. There will be a guard posted here, and she can bring you directly to the—”
“No,” she interrupted, attempting to stay calm but feeling the violence in her voice. “I need sleep. And then food. And Brisby needs just as much time, if not more. Your chancellor and your pyro-machine and whatever else will have to wait. I’m sure you have enough oil to survive a few more hours.”
“But I was told to—”
Trace took a single step backward and closed the door on his face. She could hear him still talking through the wood, but she didn’t care. Her body was shutting down.
She slowly removed the trench coat and threw it in a corner, then sat down on the bed. An inadvertent sigh escaped from her lips. The mattress was as soft as it looked. The softest thing she had ever felt. Tears formed in her eyes, but she fought them back. She hadn’t cried since the day Mackie died.
“You must be tired,” she murmured to herself.
Reaching down, she shakily untied and removed her combat boots and lay back onto the bed slowly, savoring every moment.
Trace stared at the ceiling. It was painted a peculiar shade of gray, and she felt herself falling into the color, being completely encompassed by its blandness, a feeling she welcomed, and her eyes closed and her entire world drifted into darkness.
FIFTEEN
six years earlier
I sat in my apartment, cleaning the SIG Pro.
It was possible I cleaned it far more than I needed to, but Mackie had told me to keep it in good condition, and I found that the methodical routine of the exercise calmed my nerves, particularly after missions—whether I had used the weapon or not.
I hadn’t needed to fire the weapon in several weeks, but I was starting to run low on bullets. Once I finished cleaning the gun, I would head down a few floors and see how the armory was looking, if the most recent scavenge mission into what used to be Los Angeles had bolstered their supplies at all. If not, perhaps I’d request to join the next one. Bell always said no, but perhaps it would be different this time now that I was finally in my twenties.
A knock at the door pulled me out of my thoughts, and I checked the clock on the wall. Eleven o’clock at night. Who would be calling at this hour? I was almost done cleaning the gun anyway, so I reattached the slide, stood up, holstered the weapon, and headed toward the door.
As I swung it open, slightly annoyed with a surprise visitor—I was not a big fan of surprises—I was shocked to see Gunnar standing there. I couldn’t remember him ever visiting my apartment before, and I had never been to his, which was two floors lower. I had always assumed we lived in similar types of accommodations, but secretly wondered if that was true or not.
“Gunnar,” I said, keeping my voice flat. “What are you doing here?”
“President Bell called and told me to come get you,” he responded, mirroring my tone. “She wants to see us in the training room.”
I cocked an eyebrow at my adoptive brother, and I could tell by examining his face that he was just as confused as I was. Anyone else would think of his expression as a passive blank, but I’d been taught by Mackie how to read people, especially people I spent a significant amount of time with. Gunnar was almost as hard to read as President Bell, but I could see the subtle hints that something had him slightly on edge.
I nodded, then reached over and grabbed my trench coat off its hook. He turned and started walking to the elevator, and I hustled to catch up.
As Gunnar made his way down the long hallway, he slowed slightly and looked over at me. “She’s never called us in like this,” he said quietly.
I worked to mask my own surprise at his conversational tone. I wondered briefly if it was some kind of trick, but dismissed it. Gunnar had been trained in the exact same way I had, and he had nothing to gain by pretending to be congenial. Maybe he was letting his guard down, even slightly, because of the odd late-night request.
“Except that one time,” I said, surprised by my own response. It almost felt like a surrender, in some way, speaking to him like this. “That night in the pyrolysis bay.”
Gunnar sucked in a short breath and glanced over at me as the elevator came into view down the hallway. “I forgot all about that,” he murmured.
It had been years earlier, when I was eleven and Gunnar was twelve. Bell had woken us up in the middle of the night and brought us down to the floor where the pyrolysis machines were held. The essential machinery was run by a skeleton crew at night, the perfect time to explain to the president’s two wards how the technology worked.
I remembered being in awe of the process as the pyro-tech explained exactly how they turned the scavenged plastic back into oil, which would then power the entire city, including the machine itself. Gunnar and I had looked at each other in amazement. This was in those early days before Bell had really started pitting us against each other emotionally—creating a rift that went from competition to hatred.
I found myself missing those days, even though they’d been short-lived.
We reached the end of the hallway, and Gunnar pushed the button, both of us listening as the unseen elevator began rumbling in our direction. I tried to think of something to say, something casual or even friendly, but I felt like all those interpersonal instincts had been worn down into almost nothing after my years of training. Making small talk with my rival felt like a betrayal. But the words came out before I really had a chance to think them through.
“This elevator is terrible,” I said, the words and even the sound of my voice ringing false in my ears.
Gunnar flashed the slightest smile, odd and awkward, and I realized it might have been the first time I’d seen anything other than a scowl on his face.
“It really is,” he confirmed.
The elevator arrived, its doors squeaking open, and we stepped inside. Silence reasserted itself, and both of us went rigid again as we headed toward our destination.
Within minutes, we were approaching the door that led into the large training area, a space we had spent hours and hours and hours in but had never entered together. In fact, the last time I could remember being inside with Gunnar was the day Mackie had given me the SIG Pro three years earlier. I had always wondered if Bell ordered our training to be completely separate to widen the emotional distance between us. If so, it had certainly worked.
“After you,” Gunnar said, holding up his hand slightly. For a second, my instincts kicked in, and I thought this might be a trap. And then common sense reasserted itself. If Gunnar, or Bell for that matter, wanted me dead, there were far easier and less complicated ways to make that happen. No, it appeared that Gunnar was simply being polite.
First time for everything, I thought, taking hold of the knob and pushing the door open. Maybe things are finally mellowing between us.
But those thoughts were wiped violently away as I took in the scene before me. I heard Gunnar gasp softly as he stepped into the room behind me.
Mackie was tied to a chair in the middle of the room, beaten raw, blood trickling from countless wounds on every visible spot on his body. His eyes were shut, and the floor beneath him was covered in plastic, where the liquid pooled in various abstract shapes. My hand instinctively went to my SIG Pro as I moved forward, unlatching the holster’s clasp as I scanned my surroundings. I assumed Gunnar was doing the same, but he was silent, just like me.
My rattled nerves settled slightly when I saw President Bell walking out of Mackie’s office, wiping her hands on a bloody rag.
“Ma’am . . . ?” I said, barely more than a whisper, my gaze moving back toward my mentor, whose eyes fluttered open at the sound of my voice. As he slowly focused on me, a sad smile crept onto his battered face.
“Hey, Trace,” he croaked.
“Shut the fuck up!” Bell screamed, striding forward, and I had to keep myself from flinching at the volume and the rage in the president’s voice. Gunnar stepped up and stood next to me, and the two of us watched as Bell backhanded Mackie, a fresh stream of blood shooting out of his mouth and landing on the plastic. He blinked against the pain and then made eye contact with me again, the smile diminished but still there.
I had no idea what to do, racked my brain, tried to figure out a next step.
“You two have any idea what this traitor was up to?” Bell growled, pacing behind the restrained man like a starved predator. When neither of us answered, the president shouted, “Do you?!”
“No, ma’am,” we both answered, monotone, unmoving.
Bell grabbed Mackie’s hair, pulled his head back so he was forced to look into her eyes. “This little shitbag was plotting to take me out. Take over. Can you believe that?! After all I’ve done for him.”
“You killed my wife,” Mackie said quietly, and I thought I saw a tear roll down the side of his face.
Wife.
I hadn’t known he’d been married, and I realized I had never bothered to ask the man anything about his own life. I silently berated myself, then shunted the guilt aside. I had to focus on the situation, figure out a way to make it right, to save Mackie’s life. There must have been some kind of mistake.
Bell let go of the man’s hair and laughed, a deeply incongruous sound in the echoey space. “Prove it,” she said calmly, as if she were making a casual request during an ordinary business transaction. Mackie spit blood but didn’t say anything else, kept his eyes on the floor. I glanced over at Gunnar, but his eyes were locked on the scene playing out in front of us. I had to give him credit: He had wiped all emotion off his face, and I had no idea if he was as unsettled as I was. I worked to do the same, breathed slowly, calmed my nerves.
Just like Mackie had taught me.
“That’s what I thought,” Bell said, circling her prisoner and moving toward me. “Shoot him, Trace.”
Mackie looked up, the smile gone now, his eyes widening slightly. He was clearly as surprised by the president’s words as I was.
“Ma’am?” I said, forcing the word out, forcing strength into my voice.
“You heard me,” Bell insisted. “Shoot. Him.”
I unholstered the SIG Pro with a trembling hand. Took aim at my mentor’s chest. A moment passed, the room silent except for Mackie’s labored breathing.
“He betrayed us!” Bell screamed. “He was going to kill me, and probably both of you, too. If I hadn’t been tipped off, I’d be dead right now. We all would. Do it, Tracer. That’s an order!”
I flinched at the yelling in my ear and began to pull the trigger, then paused, fighting against myself, my brain screaming unintelligibly, louder even than Bell’s voice.
“It’s okay, Trace,” Mackie said quietly, and now tears were flowing freely down his face. “It’s okay.”
There was what sounded like an explosion, and a hole erupted in his chest and blood exploded out, and Mackie fell back, the chair collapsing to the ground, his feet sticking into the air.
Shocked, confused, I looked over and saw smoke trailing from Gunnar’s P226 MK. His eyes were filled with water, and his mouth was open slightly, as if shocked at what his own hand had just done.
