Evan sat there for some time, just staring at his hands, these destroyers that always worked to undo him. But who was the true culprit? Krow pulled the trigger – mutilated Ken. Nyla had blasted Krow, diverted the gun away from Vihn. Shwood had lured them into the trap to begin with. But Evan had been the fool to let it happen.

  Then Shwood’s words hung over him… “The Governor’s plan.” But what could Charlie Crain say that could be trusted? Whose hand was the true killer? Evan would figure it out, and he would let the monster loose.

  He’d kill his enemy.

  *****

  Evan brushed the matted hair from Blink’s face. Her eyelids quivered as she slept.

  Evan’s body was empty, drained of strength. He rested the back of his head against Addy’s metal hull. Sunbeams caressed its circular windows, inviting warmth, while the crew was spread out inside the hollowed machine.

  Twitch placed a hand on Evan’s shoulder. It was a drop in the dry barrel that was Evan’s suffering heart.

  Ken’s death replayed over and over. Explosion. Bullets. Blood. Water. Explosion, bullets, blood, water. Explosion, bullets, blood-water. Blood. Water. Blood. Dust.

  Evan hated them. Krow, Shwood, himself… How could this happen? How could he succeed and still fail? Then there was the fate of Alpha base. What destruction waited the crew?

  He hoped that his father was safe, and that he’d have the answers. What would he do when he learned that Shwood betrayed them? Or… was Evan still the fool to think his father wasn’t a part of this plot? If his father was a part of this, then what was the point of it all?

  Rowic’s voice echoed over the speakers, “I’m not getting any feedback from Alpha, but I don’t see any hostile signatures. What do you want us to do, Vihn?”

  Vihn pulled himself up by a hanging strap with his last arm. “Maybe it’s just radio silence so they don’t draw any attention from the Feds. Drop us off outside, we’ll take the lift down. Keep the ship prepped in case we need to make an escape.”

  “You got it.”

  The ship descended to the outskirts of the city.

  Twitch signed to Evan, pointing to himself and then Blink.

  “Yeah, that’s ok buddy. I’ll go with them.” Evan didn’t want to leave her side, but he owed Twitch time alone with his sister. Hopefully stepping outside would clear his head.

  The ramp lowered, allowing Evan and his team of Vihn and Rowic to continue forward, followed close by Cranston and Nyla. Daniel stayed with Blink and Twitch on the ship to keep it running while Rowic followed the ground team and ran scans from his tablet.

  Wrecks of Federation gunships and drones littered the earth. Lifeless bodies scattered the field; enforcer and rebel alike. The secret entrance was blown open, scorch marks spreading out across the rock.

  Rowic swiped his tablet. It displayed a three-dimensional model of the base, with five white silhouettes standing at the entrance in similar formation to Evan, Rowic, Vihn, Cranston, and Nyla. Another silhouette was shown to be deeper inside the facility, only one. One soul, out of everything this city had been.

  Evan whispered the revelation. “No one’s alive.” That emptiness inside of him grew, and he held on to this feeling as fuel for when his time came to face the orchestrator of this all, when his time came to pull the trigger.

  “Uh,” Rowic refreshed the program. “I don’t know, I’m getting weird interference.”

  Nyla muttered something Evan couldn’t understand, but the slack in her face said much about the dread she must have felt.

  Cranston asked, “What do you think, captain? Could be a trap.”

  “Only one way to know for sure.” Vihn continued forward through the cave entrance. The cave mouth was inlaid with chunks of rubble and a large pipe that trickled with water.

  Evan ignited a flashlight built into his wrist computer. The radiance burned against the darkness and dust – a ball of sinking hope.

  “The lift’s gone.” Vihn pointed to the empty shaft. “We’ll have to use the stairs.”

  Their feet clicked against grated metal steps as they descended. Something dark smeared different parts of the wall. The stains glistened a sickly orange red as wrist lights passed over.

  “Where’s the bodies?” Evan asked.

  There was a tinge of positivity in Vihn’s voice. “I don’t think there are any.” He pointed to a shell of enforcer armor; the blues darkened with splotches of red, which Evan could only assume was the result of an Afflicted melting someone alive.

  The stairs halted at a t-section; one path to the right, and one to the left.

  Evan, Vihn, and Rowic continued down the left path, while Nyla and Cranston decided to check the right.

  Vihn stepped onto a sidewalk, where a metal door stood alone amongst a concrete wall.

  “Here we go.” He punched a code into a small keypad and the door unlatched.

  Roaring water echoed over the hollow deafness of the facility. The team stepped through the door.

  They buckled at the horror before them.

  The great city of terraces glowed red from buttresses of fire that were spread throughout it. The river ran out in front of the team, bodies bobbing facedown its waters.

  Evan stumbled at the sight of the atrocity. His foot crunched on something as it stepped back. Underneath him was another corpse. He slipped his foot off instantly. The dead were scattered around the entire base, hanging from the terraces, sprawled over market tables, piled upon each other. A total massacre.

  Vihn swore and popped open one of his last three plant vials. The flower inside twisted with tendrils that took the place of his missing arm.

  Rowic snatched up a rifle that lay on a corpse next to him.

  “They’re all dead,” Rowic gasped. “Every one of them.”

  “Shut up,” Vihn said. “We need to find Andrea.”

  There was only one light on the map that was not one of the Phoenix One members. It might have been Andrea. Though, Evan selfishly prayed it might be his father. Yet, it could have been anyone – a single soul lucky enough to be the last survivor of this carnage.

  The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

  Evan crept behind the two rebels across the field of death into a corridor that led to the upper terraces. Other halls branched off on either side, with more lifeless vessels slumped in their narrow spaces. The team traveled across a long flight of stairs to an open terminal room with consoles and wiring that webbed about it. At the center of this room was a round table with a walkway and circling rails. Ceiling lights flickered and sparked above.

  The team strode around the rafters toward a concrete wall where monitors hummed with fire.

  A hand shot up above the wall.

  Vihn halted them. Rowic pointed his rifle and flashlight at the hand. Further below it hung a bloodied dark face, unrecognizable as human. The team hurried around the wall. The hand belonged to a woman sprawled across the floor. She was so burnt and bloody and shadowed by the blackened room that Evan could hardly put together her features, except for her sagging eyes of night and day. Andrea. Not his father. Was he dead like the rest? He couldn’t accept that idea until he found his body. He looked around, steadying his thoughts until he could uncover what had happened.

  Next to her lay two figures. The first was a dreaded thing – a lifeless suit of purifier armor, motionless against a set of glowing terminals. The head of its pilot was charred black, with little streams of smoke drifting up from its skin. It… Evan hated being called it, but here was a true monster finally slain. If only it had been Krow, but the armor was missing the red stripes of that creature’s design. Still, it was enough to build the flames of Evan’s growing lust for vengeance.

  The second body was Jeck, scorched to a crisp.

  I’m sorry. You were right. I should have listened. I was the fool.

  Vihn passed the rifle off to Rowic and placed the tendrils of his plant arm over Andrea. They spread across her, glowing the same color as his eyes. Some of the wounds receded, and the rebel leader steadied her breathing.

  “Here,” she wheezed. Her hands gripped Vihn’s face, and his eyes flickered for a brief period. Then she fell unconscious.

  “I understand,” Vihn said as his eyes steadied. “We’re done here.” He lugged Andrea up and headed toward the exit.

  Rowic recorded a broadcast with his tablet. “Alpha has been compromised, stay clear. We have the Ark. Requesting sanctuary, please respond.” He turned to Vihn, “Where do we go now?”

  “We can’t stay here. The city ruins outside can give us cover for the night until we figure out what to do.”

  Evan didn’t progress. “We have to figure out what happened to my father. If he’s dead, I want to know.”

  Vihn and Rowic swapped a glance, before nodding to Evan.

  “Maybe we’ll find him in the main terrace,” Vihn suggested.

  Maybe… and hopefully not.

  The three of them made their way back through the city terraces, where one of the base’s great television screens flickered with distorted images of a Federation news report.

  Evan could not look away, though now he wished he was blind.

  A spokeswoman spoke with a smile that was stretched thin by cracks in the screen. She celebrated by saying, “The end of the terrorist organization, the Blood Red Army, was realized today thanks to purifier Jospeh Krow and the Governor of the East, Evangelos Hendricks. We have them both via video link to speak on the matter.”

  There they were. The murderer, and father, beside each other… smiling.

  It was true. His father… there was no more remorse left for Evan to feel, just pain, and fury. Evan stopped himself from processing any further. He was going to find them, he was going to let himself feel the emotions in him, he’d unpin the grenade in his chest and engulf them in flame.

  Daniel’s voice stuttered over their commlinks. “Uh, yo, guys?”

  “What is it, Daniel?” Vihn asked.

  “There’s something on the thingy?”

  “What?”

  “Crap, I see it.” Rowic flicked the tablet, showing a projection of the wider area outside of the base. Several large strobes were closing on their position. “Vihn, man, those are Fed interceptors. We’re not going to make it to Addy in time.”

  “Ad Astra.” Vihn handed Andrea over to Evan, who took on as much of her weight as he could. Vihn called over the comms, “Nyla, Cranston, get back to the ship. We’re making our way up.”

  “Yes, sir, already outside.”

  Up the stairs Evan, Vihn, and Rowic hurried with Andrea in their arms.

  “Uh… I think see them coming.” Daniel’s voice quivered.

  Vihn swore. “Alright, as soon as Nyla and Cranston are aboard, get out of here.”

  “What about you guys?”

  “We’ll figure it out.”

  “Where the heck do we go?”

  Rowic whispered, “the Feds might see them when they take off. Any base they go to would be in danger.”

  Vihn chewed his lip, looking around at their surroundings.

  Evan tried to think of a plan, but his mind was a hive of wasps. Had it been some sort of A.I. trick? No, he’d been gullible too long, he couldn’t keep lying to himself. He just needed to know, why?

  Vihn rushed Evan and Rowic forward.

  “Sir,” Cranston said, “we won’t be heading back to the Ad Astra.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  Nyla came next, “The Feds are too fast.”

  “Ny and I are going to try and pull the interceptors off of the ship so it can get away.”

  Vihn cursed Cranston. “You idiots.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Daniel, get out of here, now. Thank you, Cranston. Thank you, Nyla.” Vihn had stopped running and set Andrea down with Evan.

  Evan scowled. “You’re going to let them get themselves killed?”

  “Goodbye, sir.”

  “Adios, Vinny.”

  Evan called over his comm, “Stop! You guys can’t-!”

  Vihn grabbed Evan by his shoulders and forced him against a wall. He stared Evan dead eyed, and Evan stared back with hate coursing through him.

  “Do you not blame yourself?” Vihn asked.

  “What?”

  Vihn tightened his grip. “This is on us both, kid. Don’t you get it?”

  Evan shrunk. He knew it was true.

  “We were idiots. We trusted people who never deserved it. We thought we could help everyone. We were na?ve, kid. Cranston, Nyla, Ken, Luna, Zachary – all their deaths are on us, and we’re never going to get them back.”

  It disarmed Evan to hear Vihn list those names… it was Evan’s list. Except for – “How can you throw Cranston and Nyla in there? They’re not dead, man, they’re right out there.”

  Vihn sighed. “Maybe not. But whatever happens, that’s war, kid. All we got to do is move on. There’s no changing things. Own up to it and move on, because a lot more people are going to die before this war is over.”

  It had fallen apart, every bit of the rebellion, every bit of Evan’s family. “What’s the point then, if people die no matter what we do?”

  “Revenge,” Vihn said. “When our friends and family are dead because the government murdered them, there’s no justice. When both sides of the country do nothing but repel each other, there’s no peace. One side will win this war, but only when the other one ceases to exist.”

  Evan stared at him in dismay. Was that the truth? Was revenge all he could salvage from this?

  Rowic sighed. “Ad Astra made it out, Cranston and Nyla were able to draw their attention – Crap...” He smacked his tablet.

  “What?” Vihn asked.

  “The Feds are running a trace; I had to disconnect the scanner. I won’t be able to see where anyone is anymore.”

  Vihn nodded. He turned to Evan. “Are you still with us, kid?”

  He wanted to give up, to let the trials wash him away. But he didn’t. He went to Andrea, grabbed her arm, and slung it over his shoulder. “Until there’s nothing left.”

  “Good.” Vihn took Andrea’s other arm. He led them out into the sunny air, where birds chirped, and wind whispered, oblivious to the horrors below them. There were no signs of the other rebels, Feds, or Ad Astra.

  Evan, Rowic, Andrea, and Vihn continued to the old Jeep that was hidden within brush and trees.

  “How have you been able to see?” Evan asked regarding Vihn’s white eyes.

  He blinked, flickering the light. “The blindness doesn’t set in until I stop using my powers. If I keep focusing on this arm of mine, I’m good. But as soon as I sever my connection with it, my vision will go with it too. Some loss of vitamin in me or something, I don’t know, I’m no scientist, kid. Set Andrea down on the Jeep bed.”

  Evan helped prop her back against a metal gas container. Her face was charcoaled and bloody, her hair scorched near clean off.

  Evan grabbed a canteen and dripped its waters over her lips, hoping she was able to drink some of it.

  Vihn unzipped her jacket. Her beige undershirt was matted with blood. As he lifted the shirt, the woman moaned. There was a deep gash in her side. Vihn popped open one of his flower vials and spilled its contents over the wound and placed his hand over it. The flower grew over the area and spread until it was wrapped around her belly. The plant emanated a mutual glow, and the gash receded until it was out of sight. Vihn took part of the plant and did the same thing to the burns and lacerations on her head. After about an hour, the wounds were mostly healed, and the glowing stopped.

  Andrea sighed in her unconscious state.

  Vihn’s plant arm shriveled up and fell from his shoulder like a wilted bouquet, while his eyes stayed in their white trance. He patted around his jacket. “Feels like I’m down to one last vial. She’ll need a lot more help than that.”

  “You think we should return to Luis and Nan, then?” Evan asked.

  “Maybe, but we have to move slowly. I don’t want to bring the Feds to them. We’ll take a different path that’ll lead us near some of the other rebel cells. Maybe there’s still survivors there who can help us.”

  Evan assisted Rowic in loading Andrea into the back seat and then sat next to her. This rabbit hole he’d been delving into had widened into an abyss, one of which he didn’t know if he’d ever claw his way out.

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