Stolen, page 3
“Yet she lives,” I said, still chewing, “and breathes, and kills, and fucks people up.” I didn't even raise my eyes.
Harry shook his head slowly. “You don't care that she'll put herself through hell and death to come here?” The curve of his spine was visible in a way it really shouldn't have been. “They're going to be waiting. They're going to be waiting with everything they have, Wade – and they know every card she can play. This is the brainpower of the world's oldest and nearly most populous civilization, and it's all being directed toward one end – killing her.”
“And yet she lives, and breathes, and kills, and fucks people up.” I was almost at the bottom of the bowl. Thank goddess.
“You really believe in her,” he said under his breath, and he put down the bowl again. “I start to see why she married your dumb, lugnut-eating ass.”
“I thought you figured that out the first time we had to shower together,” I said, finishing my rice bowl with all the gusto I could muster for a meal of undercooked rice and maggots.
He dissolved into laughter that turned into wheezing that transitioned into tears, all in the course of about thirty seconds. I put a hand on his shoulder and drew him sideways into a bro hug. He put his head against me, and I felt the salt drip through my papery jumpsuit.
“It'd be a lot smarter for her,” he said, sniffling, once he'd gotten himself reasonably under control, “to just leave us here.” He wiped his nose with his sleeve, and part of it tore off. “To do what she needs to do and forget about us. Because walking in here?” He looked out through the bars into the prison's indoor courtyard, where armed soldiers waited, watching, their faces masks of hatred and loathing, not a drop of the milk of human kindness visible anywhere. “It's death, Wade.”
“No,” I said, leaning in, whispering in his ear. “She is.” And I watched those soldiers – dozens, all metahuman, all armed to the teeth, milling around in their perfectly disciplined patrol patterns, as far from normal prison guards as Special Forces was from high school ROTC. “And she's going to bring it right here, to them, in a way they won't even see coming.” With a squeeze of his shoulder, I saw him cringe, and it wasn't from my touch, and it gave me a little pang. “Believe that.”
But I did have the slightest worry – a moment of unease – as he settled back, finally heeding my nagging and tucking into his rice n' maggots...that maybe the guy who could see the future had a better handle on what my dear wife was capable of than I did.
CHAPTER FIVE
Sienna
I sent Jian away. First I tried to get Alannah to go with him, but she told me to eff off and wouldn't budge, so Reed got Scott, and Scott led him away to the bunk room with its dozens of cots all lined up in rows while the rest of us sat in silence in the decaying conference room, waiting until he was far enough away to speak.
“Well,” Alannah said a few seconds later, because of course she was first to speak, “seems to me the Chinese really want you to get your snatch caught up in their penis flytrap.” When no one laughed, she added, “Because two of the guys she's slept with are there, get it?”
“Yes, we all got it,” Reed said with great irritation, “but the rest of us had the class not to say it, since they're under threat of constant death and likely being tortured.” He looked right at me. “It is a trap, though.”
I rolled my eyes. “Of course it's a trap, Admiral Ackbar. Why do you think I haven't gone there yet? Haven't Kool-Aid Manned my way through the walls, fried everyone in the place, brought it down around their ears and Taxi'd out while the place burned? Because it's an effing trap.” I blew air noiselessly between my lips. “It was a trap when the last spy in America handed it to me, and it's probably an even bigger trap now. Duh. No shit.”
“Well, I'm glad we're clear on all that,” Lethe said in that dry, matter-of-fact way she had. “So...how are we busting in?”
Reed looked like he was going to burst. “They're going to throw everything at us if we go in. Hell, they're going to throw shit at us we won't even see coming.”
“Probably they wouldn't bomb their own city, though,” Alannah said. “Probably.”
“I would not care to stake my life on it,” Odin rumbled, still standing at the window. Could he see through the layers of paper and plastic? I wondered. So much about his powers were still unclear to me. Gungnir was in his hand, and he leaned on it like a staff.
“I wouldn't care to stake any of our lives on it,” Reed said. “China has showed shockingly little reticence to throw everything plus the kitchen sink plus a nuclear bomb at us thus far.”
“Nah,” Alannah drawled, “we were the ones who threw the nuclear bomb. Though they do now have almost the world's entire arsenal of 'em...which is concerning.”
“Nuclear worries aside for a sec, we can't leave these people behind, Reed,” Augustus chimed in. “At least part of this war we're in is going to come down to morale, and we ain't lost anybody in the core group so far. That's good. Because morale is already low enough since we're hiding in the weeds. But if we start leaving people behind without any hope? Consigning them to the worst possible treatment in prisons...you're going to watch all the hope go out of this cause real quick.”
“Yeah,” Jamal said. “You think things are bad now? You'll see defections if people believe we won't fight for them.”
“Okay,” I said, settling down in my chair. “I get it. I'm going to give it some thought, so...” I lifted my eyes. “...Leave me alone to think for a while?”
“Sure,” Augustus said, first to rise. He was followed by Jamal and Lethe, who gave me her opinion through the look she shot me on the way out. Hades, so silent in this meeting, followed her, as did Odin.
River remained, as did Reed. Alannah stared at each of them in turn. “'Alone' don't mean the same thing to y'all as it does to the rest of us, huh?”
“I don't see you moving,” Reed said, watching her with narrowed eyes.
Alannah shrugged and stood. “Maybe because I'm her assistant, so I try to be the last to leave. Y'know, do my check-in before I let her be. Make sure she doesn't need something, like a coffee, or dinner, or a naked Asian man delivered to her quarters for unspecified purposes.”
“She's still married, you dip,” Reed said.
“Hey, her husband's in prison, and you just know he's 'gay for the stay, straight for the gate,'” Alannah said. “Unless he's developed an affinity for that skinny chick with the big brain and no ass, and – just going by his previous conquests – he ain't down with the 'no ass' part of that.” She glanced at me, very significantly. “She can be faithful in vengeance, because she sure ain't been faithful with her lady parts.”
“I don't need anything, Alannah, you can go,” I said quietly.
“Whatever, I'm going to go review my memories of the day in my bunk,” Alannah said. “Don't disturb me, or you'll be disturbed in return.”
“I hate her so much,” River said once she was good and gone, still rolling the empty martini glass in her fingers.
“Because she reminds you of yourself?” I asked.
River raised her eyes, slitted, at me, then relaxed just a hair. “Yes. When I was younger and dumber and thought I knew everything about the world.” She stood, sighing, and walked out, still rolling the glass. No points for guessing where she was heading. (Hint: it was wherever the alcohol was. And there was always alcohol around. It was the one thing we had.)
That left me and Reed, and he didn't look like he was going anywhere. We sat at the opposing ends of the table, which was fitting, because it felt like we were in opposition more and more these days. Reed, the lone voice of sanity, of managing our way to sure defeat without taking any risks and me–
Well...me.
“We're going to lose,” Reed said softly.
“If things continue to move unchecked in their current direction? Yes.”
“If you want to arrest the momentum,” Reed said, “you're going to have to fight. China's willing to take losses. Massive losses. Mighty losses. Losses that would choke the average nation, to say nothing of this scrappy little collection of friends and family members you've assembled.” He didn't sound angry, he wasn't being pushy. In fact, he sounded...mournful. “Either we lose some people by starting to fight this like a war – carefully, calculatedly, on the ground of our choosing – or we're going to lose the whole war. And that means everything.”
“I'm not a general, Reed,” I said, standing up so quickly my chair just shattered under the force of my move, the pieces rolling and striking the wall behind me. “These people aren't soldiers. I won't let anyone die – and I am damned sure not leaving anyone behind.” My fist was clenched at my side; I didn't even remember doing it.
“China's at war with you whether you want to be or not,” he said, so softly, so reasonably. I wanted to be mad at him for speaking these painful truths...but I couldn't. “They–”
Rapidly thudding footsteps in the hallway were followed by the door being flung open, and Alannah bursting in followed by, a second later, Scott. Both were red in the face, breathless, but Alannah managed to speak first: “Sienna – you gotta come quick.”
And I knew, even before they got a word out, that something terrible had happened.
CHAPTER SIX
Wade
They came before Harry had finished fussing over his food, an even dozen soldiers and the hard-faced, cruel-grinning warden we'd taken to calling Captain China. Because we didn't know his real name. He marched in formation with his soldiers into the courtyard, a film crew following quietly behind and setting up unobtrusively in the corner, using – almost unbelievably – a camera phone as their tool. They fussed over lighting, steered soldiers into place, these civilians in military uniforms...
...And we watched them all, knowing that something terrible was about to happen before we got our first inkling of what it was.
“What do you figure?” Harry asked, leaning against the bars with me.
“They're filming something – and soon,” I said, watching as the warden issued orders. A tall man with a ramrod-straight bearing, a square jaw – the perfect Han son of this government. He peeled off a detachment of three armed soldiers, their standard-issue QBZ-191 automatic rifles on their shoulders. They marched crisply, in perfect formation, right to the center of the courtyard, where we were allowed to have yard time – briefly – some days.
“Ooh, I hope it's an HR video about sexual harassment in the workplace,” Harry cracked. “Maybe something with the late Troy McClure – Don't Grab That Ass, or Why'd You Grab That Ass?”
“What's going on?” Dr. Quenton Zollers murmured from the cell beside ours. I couldn't see him, but his voice was distinctive, and well known to us all by now.
“It's an execution, you idiots,” Cassidy Ellis said from the cell on the other side of us. “The camera phone, the armed trio of soldiers – they're going to kill one of us and leak it on the internet in order to draw in Sienna.” She made an impatient noise in the back of her throat. “How am I stupidified and still smarter than the rest of you?”
“It is just your burden in life, my dear,” Shin'ichi Akiyama said with his usual aplomb. God bless the Japanese stoicism on that man.
I looked at Harry, Harry looked at me; “I hope it's you,” we both said at exactly the same time, and with all the feeling we could muster...which was not much. “Eat your rice,” I said, and he chuckled. He wasn't going back to his rice now; it was the worst “last meal” any of us could imagine.
Captain China fussed around for a little longer setting things up, yelling at his subordinates, and then he unleashed the soldiers on us. It was a familiar feeling by now, watching squads of metahuman soldier/guards come at us. Zollers and Akiyama didn't put up a fight anymore. Neither did Harry.
I took a dozen good hits about the face and head, along with a few kicks to the back and sides when they came for me. Net result: I was bleeding pretty good when they cuffed my hands behind my back and dragged me out into the courtyard, lining us all up into a row on our knees.
Captain China bent down to peer at me, a smile on his thin little lips, black joy in his dark, soulless eyes. “Always the troublemaker, hmm, Mr. Wade?”
“If I could throw hands right now – or lift them,” Harry said from beside me, “I'd have fought back, too.” He sounded like he was about to pass out, and was breathing heavy in spite of not really doing much.
“I'm not much of a fighter,” Zollers said, his arms bent at an impossible angle, painfully, because apparently his guard was a sadist, “but I, too, would have liked to have been able to throw a punch or five today.”
The warden glanced at Cassidy, then Akiyama. “And you?” He grinned, so much malice behind his perfect teeth.
“I'm not much of a fighter, either,” Cassidy said. “I'd just drone strike you. From orbit. With a precision munition that has all the shell matter of a peeled grape. Aimed right at those peas you call nuts.” And she smiled, dark-eyed and malignant. “I could castrate you from continents away, and if I ever get out of here...I'm gonna do it.”
“You shan't be,” Captain China said. Then he backhanded her for good measure, twice the size of tiny Cassidy, and her head snapped back, a stream of blood spraying out of her nose. I heard the crack from where I was being held, and I tried to break free, but got pounded to the ground instead.
Once they had me back on my knees – it took what felt like a couple minutes of solid beating before they felt comfortable doing so – the warden strolled over to Akiyama. “And you, xiao Riben guizi? Do you wish to see me dead?”
“I do,” I said around the blood oozing between my teeth. “I really...really...do...”
“Wade,” Akiyama said, so quiet, a still voice in this storm of rage and pain swirling around me...and I looked right at him. He shook his head once, wisdom and discretion in his eyes as he communicated to me with no more words: Stop.
But it always felt so good to mouth off...until the ass-beating started. Admittedly, that took some of the fun out of it.
“I am always struck by how defiant you are, Mr. Wade,” Captain China said, strolling back over to me. “You are trapped. You have no powers.” He poked me in the side, right where his goons had tenderized my ribs, and I jerked back from the pain. “You have no friends coming to save you. Your wife,” he chuckled, “she doesn't even remember you. She's been sleeping with other men for years. What does that make you – that American word...cucked?” He grinned, looking in my eyes. “She cucked you...with him.” And he pointed at Harry.
“That's just because I'm better looking,” Harry said, “and smarter. And probably wealthier. And drive a nicer car, when I can bother myself to steal one...and am better endowed...come from a better family...”
“You come from her family, you idiot,” I said, rolling my eyes. I'd long ago made my peace with having lost Sienna. Well...mostly. You don't ever really get over losing a girl like that. Especially for someone like me. “Kinda like this guy,” and I nodded at Captain China. “He married his own sister.”
“Wade, you fool,” Akiyama said softly under all the chaos. “Enough.”
The warden stared down at me with spiteful eyes, smiling. “Mr. Wade...I'm going to enjoy killing you.” Then he stood upright. “But not today.” With a snap of his fingers, he pointed–
And two soldiers dragged Akiyama forward from our line.
“NO!” I shouted through swelling lips and started to shove my way up, in spite of my injuries. Harry, beside me, tried too.
We were both dragged back down immediately, garroted in the mouth with gags. Soldiers behind us put their strong, metahuman hands on our shoulders and bound the gags tight. The hands on me were like iron vices, and I was so weak I'd have struggled to fight off a toddler. My shouts were impotent, ineffectual.
Cassidy and Zollers were quiet beside me, and Harry was only struggling a bit. I was the only one still trying – desperately – to get off my knees, though it was ineffectual.
“Shin'ichi Akiyama,” Captain China said, “you have been found guilty of crimes against humanity for altering time, and aiding and abetting the terrorist Sienna Nealon. In the name of peace and safety, this sentence is to be carried out immediately.” And with a sharp nod, he stood back.
“NO – NO – NOOOOO!” I was shouting through my gag–
But I was looking at the surreptitious camera in the corner with the dozen sound and tech guys behind it.
I wanted to stop what was happening, I truly did. I didn't know Akiyama before I'd come here, but I knew he didn't deserve this shit. No one did – or at least no one here did.
One soldier stepped up behind him, placing his QBZ-191 directly behind Akiyama's head. He'd developed some gray in the last few months.
He kept his head straight, but they put a black blindfold on him. The Chinese soldier drew down, finger tightened–
And the bastards blew Shin'ichi Akiyama's brains right out the front of his head.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Sienna
I watched Akiyama die and I felt myself die a little, too.
This was a man who'd helped me to defeat Century; who'd helped me set things right with my grandmother and great-grandmother, saving the world and universe in the process, who'd – perhaps a bit unwillingly – let me save Minneapolis from nigh-unstoppable destruction by allowing me to turn back the clock and keep trying until I succeeded in doing the impossible.
And he was dead. China had killed him to get to me.
