Youngbloods, page 2
I don’t know what to say.
Seanan was kidnapped by my father’s political enemies when he was seven years old. When our father wouldn’t pay their ransom—surrendering power—Seanan was given to the rebels to be raised.
Growing up among them, it makes sense that he would meet the most famous rebel of all.
Until that day in the hospital, I didn’t have a clue that X knew Tally Youngblood. But I suppose that’s how she’s stayed hidden for the last ten years: the silent loyalty of her friends.
‘I guess that’s why you’re helping me,’ I venture.
‘Who says I’m helping you?’ A shrug. ‘This is about your sister—she pretended to be a rebel when all she wanted was power. That’s bogus.’
‘That’s who she is,’ I say.
Tally gives me a cool smile. ‘And you’re her mirror image.’
‘Same genes,’ I say. ‘Different upbringing.’
She nods at this—everyone knows my story by now. How I was raised as a body double for Rafi, a bodyguard, sniper bait. Our father didn’t even give me a name.
And then Rafi stole the one I made for myself.
‘You never thought of taking your father’s place?’ Tally asks.
I again make the decision not to lie.
‘The free cities offered to put me in control. It was the only way they’d help us overthrow our father. But then Rafi found out they’d offered Shreve to me, and decided I was her enemy.’
‘So did your sister betray you?’ Tally asks. ‘Or did she outplay you?’
I hold her gaze. Maybe she thinks I’m just like Rafi, in love with fame and power, only not as clever.
I search for the truth inside me, trying not to get lost in the tangles of my own deceptions. All those years pretending to be my sister, I assumed that a life with no secrets would be simple.
Turns out living the truth can be just as tricky as lies.
‘There was a part of me that cared about ruling Shreve. But Rafi killed it when she murdered Col Palafox.’
Tally puts her hand on my shoulder, wearing an expression I haven’t seen from her before. I see where grief has worn itself into her perfect features.
In all these years of fighting, she must have lost people too.
Tally gestures at her own eyebrow, where a flash tattoo pulses, covering an old wound. ‘I’m glad you got rid of your scar. Didn’t need another one in the crew.’
‘That’s my new goal, Boss,’ I say. ‘Being one of a kind.’
Tally smiles. ‘As long as you’re not trying to be me.’
Before I can ask what she means, someone shouts from along the cliff—Shay, the crew’s second-in-command.
‘There’s something in the trees!’
3. CEREMONY
I focus my eyes on the forest below us.
Whatever’s down among the trees, it doesn’t give off much infrared—no pulsing engines or flickers of body heat. Millimeter-wave radar shows no reflections.
But something’s definitely out there, stirring a stretch of treetops against the grain of the breeze.
My new ears hear only the wind. How are they cutting down trees without making a sound?
‘Your father’s leftover arsenal,’ Tally says. ‘He had stealth tech, right?’
I want to implicate my sister, but it doesn’t quite make sense.
‘He was more into intimidation than sneaking.’
She steps onto her board. ‘Then I guess we take a closer look.’
‘Careful, Boss. The ground’s at least two hundred—’
‘Watch this,’ she says with a smile … and tips her board off the edge of the cliff.
The other Youngbloods slide away into the dark.
I have no choice but to follow. I shake my crash bracelets to make sure they’re awake, and jump.
A two-hundred-meter fall takes less than seven seconds, but my brain spins up fast, driven by the sudden acceleration of my heart.
Dropping hard on a board, you normally just hoverbounce—the lifting fans create an air cushion between you and the ground. But the cushion doesn’t form until those last ten meters.
By then I’ll be crashing through the trees, set tumbling by the branches, pine needles jamming my fans.
Was I supposed to bring a parachute?
The others aren’t even trying to slow down—they’re angling their boards forward, bending downward momentum into speed across the treetops.
I follow their lead, but we’re still dropping way too fast.
My eyes find Tally, falling two seconds ahead of the rest of them.
Just before she crashes into the forest canopy, she jumps up from her board. It unfolds beneath her, solar panels expanding in the starlight.
I expect the wind of her fall to tear the unfolded board to pieces, but Youngbloods use only the best tech. The solar panels form something halfway between a wing and a chute, catching the air. She settles back onto the huge contraption and takes control of it.
The others follow suit, the huffing sounds of unfurling boards like a flock of vast birds beating their wings.
I leap up into the rushing wind, giving the tongue click that tells my board to recharge. The panels unfold in an instant, the whole apparatus air-braking, rearing up beneath me. My feet slam hard onto the grippy surface.
For a split second, there’s only pain—that impact would’ve broken my old legs. But my ceramic bones and plastic ligaments hold, and the agony slides away like water.
A moment later, I’m surfing the tops of the trees, silent and fast, riding a kite the size of a swimming pool. And thinking …
Col would have loved this.
My board refolds itself under my feet, like a present neatly wrapped.
The disturbance in the treetops is only half a klick ahead of us now. A cut has formed in the forest canopy, as one needled crown after another is sucked down into the dark.
We sink into the treetops, out of sight. There’s no sign that the poachers have spotted us. Maybe they’re too busy killing trees to notice six giant butterflies made of glistening solar cells.
Shay takes over now. She’s in charge of the Youngbloods’ operations, talking more than Tally in tactical meetings.
Shay’s drill sessions are tough, as hard as anything I got growing up. But I like her more than my old tutors. Her criticisms sting but don’t bruise.
Turns out, she taught Tally herself how to ride.
Right now she’s all business. ‘Frey and X, take the far side. Hand signs only. Don’t let anyone get away. We don’t want to hurt them …’
But we will if we have to.
‘Got it, Shay,’ I respond.
X is already in motion, skirting the wounded area of forest. Following, I watch him slalom through the trees with new appreciation.
Before we joined the Youngbloods, I never thought of Boss X as a Special. But of course his lupine body is as complete a rebuild as mine. His strength and reflexes aren’t just wolflike; they’re superhuman.
Like Tally, he moves gracefully, without the inhuman skitter of too much surge. Maybe years of sleeping under the stars turn even Specials into something wild.
I still can’t hear the poachers, but from this distance, I can smell something—burned toast. Like they’re cutting the trees down with heat lances. But there’s still no glimpse of infrared.
We reach our spot. With a hand sign, I signal Shay that we’re ready.
Then we sink deeper into the trees.
X scents the air. ‘Nanos.’
Microscopic machines—that sounds like something from my father’s collection. I was expecting monstrous engines with steel jaws, not a cloud of synthetic termites, but ancient weapons take all forms.
A sound reaches us—voices, small and shivery in the wind.
‘Is that singing?’ I whisper.
X gives me the barest nod. We move forward.
Our hoverboards slip silently among the branches, pine needles brushing my arms.
My eyes start to sting. X was right—that’s the scent of nanos, a trillion molecule-size reactions cooking whatever’s around them.
We pass over a stack of felled tree trunks, hoverlifters attached. Their bases are shorn away smooth, no sign of the jagged edge of a blade. The branches and bark are stripped neatly bare.
X eases to a halt in front of me, and I glide up beside him. We’re at the edge of a clearing, peeking out. The singing comes from right in front of us.
A ring of figures stands around a tree, holding hands. I can’t see any faces—they’re dressed in sneak suits. But through their masks I can see their mouths are moving.
The song is full of gibberish words.
The figures seem oddly tiny to me. Maybe they’re Smalls, a wild clique who surgically reduce their size. But the whole point of being Small is to require fewer resources, to put less strain on the planet. Poaching doesn’t quite fit that strategy.
As we watch, the base of the tree begins to tremble, like water coming to a boil. The shiny-clean scent of pine billows over us.
The towering tree begins to tilt.
On our side of the clearing, two figures drop hands and take measured steps away from each other. The circle splits, opening into a U, and the song shifts to a higher key.
As if responding, the tree tips toward the gap and tumbles gently over, like a flagpole stuck into soft mud. Its full branches cushion the fall, a rain of knocked-loose needles ringing through the forest.
As the tree settles, the singers shift gracefully into a different song. They’re guiding the nanos with sound, but the singing isn’t just a control mechanism. Every step is measured, every gesture artful.
It feels more like a ceremony.
The shimmering nano haze climbs from the base of the fallen tree up the trunk and into the branches. It covers the whole pine, all of it glowing softly, like a decorated holiday tree.
The branches start to fall, a hundred invisible blades at work. Then the bark slides away, leaving the trunk bare, as pale and shiny in the starlight as a naked corpse.
My Special ears detect a creaking, the settling of the slow pulse of water inside the tree—a death rattle.
I’ve been mesmerized by a killing.
This beautiful ceremony is also a crime.
At that moment, the clearing explodes. Tally bursts from the trees at the far end, the lifting fans of her board spinning up. The carpet of pine needles whirls into an eye-stinging tornado.
My inner lids slam shut as Tally cries out, using a Special voice I haven’t heard before, full of anger and broken glass.
‘Take them! Take them all!’
4. TREE KILLERS
The figures scatter into the trees.
The six of us split up to chase them down.
It hardly seems fair. We’re Specials, soldiers forged in the crucible of war, expert hoverboarders, and they’re—
A lot faster than I thought they’d be.
They must have lifters on their feet. Each bounding step is huge, like astronauts in low g. They careen through the trees, staying below the thick upper branches that slap my face and hands.
I fly lower, my board skimming the forest carpet. I’ve lost track of X and the others, all my focus on one fleeing figure in front of me.
They’re even smaller than I thought—barely up to my shoulder.
I close in, matching my swerves to the zigzags of my quarry. My fingers reach out to grab the hood of their sneak suit.
The figure puts on a burst of speed, and the hood slips down.
She looks over her shoulder at me, eyes wide.
Is she … a littlie?
The girl flings something away into the trees. I’ll go back and get it later.
Right now, I’ll swoop closer until—
Whoom.
I’m off my board, spinning in midair, crashing to the ground. Tumbling through the leaves and pine needles until I come to a sprawled, ungainly halt.
A thousand thunderbolts shoot through me—bruised bones, pulled muscles, broken skin igniting. It takes an awful count of five for my nervous system to flush away the pain.
I lie there, skin abuzz with the healing nanos spilling from their reservoirs. My mind tries to clear away the shock.
What hit me?
Then I see it, strung between two trees—a dark line at the height of my knees. Exactly where the littlie threw something.
A smart plastic trip wire.
My legs are on fire, nanos working around my left knee. I try to move it, and fail.
Something swims into focus above me—a face.
The girl staring down at me looks about eleven years old.
‘Um, are you okay?’ she asks.
I start to answer, but an awful slithering feeling in my knee interrupts.
Something connects—the bones reconnecting. My left leg can move again.
I sit up. ‘Who are you?’
She stumbles backward, looking surprised that I can move at all.
‘Wait.’ I reach out, but the girl turns and bounds away. The hover lifters on her shoes blow pine needles in my face.
My hoverboard nudges me, an apologetic pet. I stand, still shaky, and step back on.
This time I climb higher, up to the clear air above the trees. I’m not going to risk catching one of those trip wires at neck level. My healing nanos might be able to weave bone, but I doubt they can put my head back on.
I fly in the direction the girl was headed, lying facedown on the board, peering into the trees below.
There—a glimmer of body heat.
The girl’s forgotten to pull her sneak suit hood back up. I zoom ahead, then bring my board to a banking halt in the treetops.
I cut power, falling straight down through the branches, bringing along a cascade of pine needles. At the last second, the fans spin up, and I roll off and land on both feet.
The girl is soaring through air at me, flailing in an effort to redirect herself.
I take two steps to the right, and she collides with me, a tiny ball of fury. Wrapping myself around her, I hold on tight, pinning her arms to her sides. The lifters in her boots try to pick us both up, but I’m too heavy.
‘Let go!’ she screams.
‘I don’t want to hurt you,’ I say, leaving out the rest.
She’s so light in my arms—this isn’t some kind of camo surge. She really is a littlie.
Why are kids killing trees?
She stops struggling, a low growl slipping from her lips. ‘You’re going to get us all in trouble!’
‘No kidding. You can’t just kill trees.’
‘That’s not our fault. The supplies stopped coming!’
‘Supplies?’ I pull away a little. ‘How old are you, anyway?’
‘Almost twelve.’
‘It’s called eleven.’ I open up my comms to the rest of the Youngbloods. ‘I’ve got one, Shay-la. She’s a littlie!’
‘Same here,’ comes Astrix’s voice—she’s the Youngbloods’ tech specialist.
X reports that he’s managed to grab two of the child poachers. Croy wound up knocked off his board, thanks to a trip wire.
‘I got one too. Can’t be more than twelve,’ Shay says. ‘Boss?’
‘Still following the rest of them.’ Tally’s voice is distant in my ear, mixed with the wind of fast flight. ‘Stay put and guard your prisoners. I’ll let you know where the others wind up.’
‘You got it, Boss. And watch out—these little miscreants are dangerous. Youngbloods, meet back at the clearing. Shay-wa out.’
My comms go silent.
The girl in my arms has gone limp, except for the sobs shaking her small frame. I set her down, keeping hold of her arm.
My reactions are jumbled, the healing nanos still buzzing in my brain. I’m a Special now, my emotions too smooth to experience doubt or panic in the heat of action. But my battle frenzy is fading.
And the sight of a littlie in tears is shaming.
‘What’s your name?’ I ask.
‘Goose,’ she manages through the snuffles.
‘Okay, Goose. Take those lifter boots off. And stop crying—they don’t put eleven-year-olds in jail.’
‘Shows what you know.’
I stare at her. ‘Someone’s definitely in trouble for this, but not you. Someone made you do this, right?’
‘We had to do it. So we don’t wind up like our parents.’
A chill goes through me.
Goose swallows, fighting to say the next words.
‘Are you going to take us back to Shreve?’
5. CHILDREN OF TRAITORS
Shreve.
I don’t want to believe it. But the girl has the right accent, and the poaching started three months ago.
‘What happened to your parents?’ I ask gently.
Goose crumples a little. Her weight shifts from foot to foot.
‘I got us all in trouble. It was my birthday, when I turned nine. When I blew out the candles on my cake, I said my wish out loud!’
‘I don’t think that’s illegal, even in Shreve.’
‘Depends on the wish.’
A shiver goes through me—the ice of my father’s hand again.
Under his regime, the air in Shreve was full of surveillance dust. It saw everything you did, heard everything you whispered. Your whole life was recorded, saved, and judged.
‘What did you ask for?’
Goose hesitates. ‘To live in Seatac, where my mom grew up. She didn’t like Shreve anymore, since the man started talking.’
I can’t speak. Goose misinterprets my silence and thinks I need an explanation.
‘When I was little, the man started talking when you did something wrong. Lying, or littering, or getting facts wrong. He’d correct you.’
She’s talking about my father. Or rather, a facsimile of his voice, speaking for the AI that surveilled the citizens of Shreve. Enforcing the laws, but also the rules of dress and speech and custom.
‘Your mom didn’t like the man,’ I say.
‘She hated him.’ Goose starts to breathe harder. ‘We took walks when it rained, and she told me she wanted to go back to Seatac.’
A hard rain washed away surveillance dust. All of Shreve had a few hours of privacy, when it was safe to speak your innermost thoughts.
