The eagles brood, p.9
I AM BROKEN (I AM MAN Book 3), page 9
With a gasp, the princess pulled the eye from her pocket and slapped it into his hand. Zaust examined it for a moment, then he leaned over to insert the piece into X5’s socket.
“This is no different from a heart transplant. It may seem scary to force a unit’s Core to shut down, but it won’t kill him if we work quickly,” the Balpur said calmly.
With a click, he finished securing the eye in place and then retrieved his screwdriver again. Clora watched through blurry vision, lifting her helmet so she could wipe away the fresh tears pouring down her cheeks.
“Dear God,” she whispered.
“Mmhmm,” Zaust said, sitting back. “Pray to your Triune God, princess.”
“Is it done?” she asked.
He nodded. “Now we signal the base to turn off the EMP gate. He won’t be able to connect to any of his systems with the gates on.”
Clora nodded and stood to face the shelter. She waved her hands over her head in a specific rhythm, trying to remember the routine Pearl had taught her. It was their own form of morse code, specific hand movements meant everything was alright, others symbolized danger. The waving she performed now was a signal to shut down the gates and stand by for assistance if necessary.
After she finished the wave routine, Clora stood back and stared at the safehouse. She hadn’t been too confident performing the moves, but she knew she’d gotten them right. Still, the EMP gate hadn’t been shut down. She glanced down at Zaust, then at X5. His eyes were still dark, his Core no longer glowing.
Fear set in, sending a burning wave of worry rushing up her spine. Clora turned to wave her arms again, but as soon as she pivoted, she heard the shutdown mechanism initiate as the metal pole beside her hummed and then clicked off.
Silence took over the grassy field. Clora hadn’t realized how much white noise the gates had given off until they were shut down. Her ears rang as she knelt beside Zaust again and peered down at her Guardian. The Balpur was checking him for injuries, his small hands roamed his frame in quick movements, checking screws, plugs, wiring, even using his tools to poke and prod some of his inner organic parts.
“How is he doing?” Clora asked.
Zaust clicked his tongue. “He’s in worse shape than I thought.”
“What does that mean?”
“His ankle is busted, he’s lost all connection to his audio systems, torn tendons, a jammed soft cannon—”
“Nothing lethal, right?”
He shook his head. “No. He’ll definitely live, but I’ll have to work on him for a day or two.”
Clora let go of a held breath. “That’s good, though. He can be saved.”
Zaust laughed and then rapped a knuckle against X5’s Core. It was glowing brighter now—glowing blue—not that horrible red color she’d seen when he’d turned rogue. And his eyes had color in them now. Clora leaned over to peer into them. They were blue as well.
“He’s already been saved,” Zaust said. He held up a hand for a high-five. “You did well, princess.”
She swallowed her sob. “I didn’t do anything.”
“You held on to the eye he gave you. You figured out its true purpose. And you came out here to help. You put your life at risk being here. I’m sure he will appreciate that.”
Clora allowed herself to smile. Maybe Zaust was right. X5’s message about his eye had been vague at best. Knowing him and his paranoia, he’d probably left it unclear on purpose—afraid that his systems might get compromised and his memories stolen. Whoever had access to his memories only had to roll them back and find the exchange. They would have been able to establish firewalls and prevent the eye’s data from overthrowing the violent virus if they had known about it. But X5 had been clever in making it seem like the item had only been a souvenir.
And Clora had been even cleverer figuring out its true purpose.
She felt flattered that X5 would leave her with something so important, and shocked that he’d trusted her to figure out how to use it. Clora had put herself in danger for X5 many times before—challenging a destroyer to break him out of prison, escaping the palace and defying her brother, making dangerous deals with Zaust, unaware that she was being used. But she’d done all that without thinking—in the spur of the moment, a kneejerk reaction. But with this eye … had X5 trusted that she would be willing to do it again? Did he know how much he meant to her? Did she mean much to him?
With a shaky breath, Clora pushed her thoughts aside and stood. She held out a hand to help Zaust up. “How long will this process take?”
Zaust shrugged. “Couple of hours. Enough time for me to start repairs.”
She nodded thoughtfully. “Grab his cloak, let’s drag him inside.”
Chapter Ten
X5 opened his eyes, shocked to be alive and in the present. He’d gotten so used to the bombardment of flashbacks, it felt strange to simply wake up. Something moved beside him, and he glanced to his right to find Clora curled up next to him. That was when he realized he was lying down—but not on a bed. Code was on display in the middle of a table.
Instead of jerking upright and running, he lay still for a few moments, trying to figure things out. He couldn’t be in danger, otherwise Clora wouldn’t be sleeping beside him. But the fact that he was on a table—he glanced around, taking note of the tools hanging overhead, stacks of supplies, crates, boxes, a radio in the corner, computer in the other corner. This room was a workshop.
“Welcome back,” said a raspy voice.
X5 turned to find Zaust hobbling into the room, a stack of papers in one hand, a half-eaten apple in the other. The fat, little Alien didn’t even look at him as he climbed into his chair and flicked on the radio. “You’ve been out for two days. Probably because you were running on emergency energy reserves.”
He blinked. Emergency energy reserves? But he’d gotten a short charge at the cabin in the woods, with Bastion and Clora—
Images of the rider crash popped into his head, accompanied by the horrible scene of Clora dropping him out the door and over the cliffside. S14 appeared in his memories, tied in with flickers of Bastion fighting him, then running away. He’d chased them down, all the way to the new headquarters—and then his memory went blank.
X5 reached up and rubbed his smooth forehead. “What happened?”
“You went rogue. A virus from that pretty-faced prince you shot.”
He moved to sit up, then remembered Clora sleeping beside him and stared awkwardly at her, unsure if he should wake her.
“She’s knocked out,” Zaust said, still munching on his fruit. “Been here since we dragged you in. Don’t know how she sleeps so comfortably on a metal table, but she wouldn’t leave you.”
Gingerly, X5 shifted and climbed off the table so he wouldn’t disturb her. He crossed the workshop to where Zaust sat at a short desk, listening to the radio and finishing his apple. “I went rogue.”
“Yep. Tried to kill everyone.”
A shiver brushed over his spine. “Did I … succeed?”
Zaust’s yellow eyes flicked up at him. “We’re still here.”
“How was I … turned back?”
“Clora had an eyeball you gave her—”
He nodded, finding and pulling up the memory of the exchange in his head. “It contained an encrypted file I made from a combination of Zero-four’s data and my own.”
“Whatever it was,” Zaust bit into the apple core and munched for a moment, “it worked.”
“Thank you.”
“Thank God. And then thank her.” He motioned to Clora still asleep on the table.
X5 let his gaze linger on her a moment longer before he turned back to Zaust. “Where’s Bastion? Or Pearl—did she make it out?”
“You’ll find everyone in the conference room. I uploaded a map of the base to your geo cache already.”
X5 turned away, taking off his cloak and laying it over Clora before he walked to the exit. “Thank you,” he said to Zaust again. “For the map, and the repairs.”
Code-X5 didn’t have many memories from his time being rogue, but he felt the soreness of the fighting he must have done. A medical report detailed the injuries he’d sustained, accompanied by reports of Zaust’s newest upgrades. Code still remembered being held hostage by the Balpur mechanic, but he had to admit he was good at his job. Each time X5 left his workshop, he walked out a better version of himself than he’d gone in.
He turned the corner to find the conference room open. He could hear voices arguing before he stepped inside, but the debate ceased when he crossed the threshold. Pearl sat at the head of the table with Annie standing guard in the corner. A few faces he didn’t recognize stared back at him, but he didn’t get the chance to react. Before he could utter a word, both Pearl and Annie had gasped and run over to him.
“You’re back!” Annie exclaimed, crossing the room at inhuman speed. She’d even beat Pearl across the room—and she’d only been three feet away.
“Yes,” X5 said awkwardly. Both women stood in front of him, afraid to offer an embrace. He was thankful. He didn’t want to hug them at all. Though, he did appreciate their concern and excitement.
“I’m glad you’re here,” Pearl said, taking a step back and using her professional voice. “We were just discussing counter measures against Prince Helios’s virus.”
“What do you mean?” he asked.
“The Vale has developed technology that can override Prince Dima’s virus.” Pearl returned to her place at the head of the table and motioned for Annie and X5 to do the same. Both Skel walked to the back of the room and took up guard in the corner. Annie pinged X5 while she pretended to listen to Pearl.
Welcome back.
I’m sorry I couldn’t help you and Pearl.
We managed to escape. Don’t worry about it.
He closed their server and focused on Pearl, listening to her lay out plans to raid a nearby Skel factory. “We need to move. At this point, the Vale is already ten steps ahead of us.”
“They are more than ten steps ahead,” X5 cut in. “While I was rogue, I was connected to the entire system of Skel Prince Helios has under his command. It was like we all suddenly shared one mind.” He paused, trying to find a way to relay the information to them without freaking everyone out. “There were thousands of us under his control.”
Gasps sucked all the air out the room. Even Annie jerked back, staring at Code’s profile in shock. “That can’t be true.”
“It is,” he insisted. “I was there, under his control. I could sense the minds of the other Skel in our server. I don’t know how he’s done it, but Prince Helios has acquired thousands of other units.”
“The only way to gain control of that many units would be to overthrow an entire factory,” Annie said.
“More than one factory, if its truly thousands,” Pearl added. She brushed her hair from her face and nodded at a woman with pale skin and white-blonde hair. She was seated to her far right, busy typing away on her datapad, her crystal blue eyes never left her screen as Pearl asked, “Lady Wren, is it possible to hack multiple factory security systems?”
“Of course,” Wren answered, still staring at her datapad. “The hard part is doing it in a way that doesn’t get you caught. Factory firewalls have a breach alert, it allows them to track signals from anyone who crosses into their systems.” She shrugged one shoulder. “Basically means they can find and arrest anyone stupid enough to try to hack them. That’s the deterrent.”
“But Prince Helios didn’t need to make sure he wouldn’t get caught,” X5 explained. “Because he planned on taking over the entire factory. Not just entering their systems.”
“So he hacked them without a problem and fed his virus to every Skel on their shelves,” Lady Wren finished.
“We could do the same.” Annie stepped forward. “Instead of attacking the factory, we could hack their systems and feed our virus into the Skel stored there.”
“Except they could still trace it back to us, and we can’t risk being caught. We’re not the prince—it matters if someone picks up our trail,” Wren said.
Annie bristled. “The Skel don’t have time for us to sit around anymore. We need to do something!”
For the first time since X5 entered the room, Lady Wren peeled her eyes from her datapad and glanced over at Annie. “Do you think we’re all gathered here for fun? We’re doing the best we can—especially considering our little side mission earlier.” She cast a very conspicuous look at X5.
“I’m sorry if my presence is an inconvenience—”
She cut him off. “Your presence is fine. It’s going rogue and sucking up half our power reserves that bugs me. We’ve been severely set back, and no one wants to admit or address that.”
Code blinked around the room, trying to read the muted expressions on everyone’s faces.
Pearl cleared her throat, maintaining her composure. “Lady Wren, Exfive and Annie are our top priorities. We would gladly surrender valuable resources to save them.”
“You’ve made that very clear recently.”
“I didn’t realize—” X5 began but Wren cut him off again, jerking to her feet so fast her chair fell over behind her.
“It doesn’t matter. We ran through half our reserves keeping those gates on. Meanwhile, Prince Helios acquired a Skel army, Kishra and Savai have teamed up to fight against the Vale, and we’re left to dry. We’ve lost our momentum. We’re in no condition to fight the Golden Prince at all.”
“We won’t have to fight.” Zaust stood in the doorway of the conference room, he’d appeared so suddenly the sight of him actually made X5 jump in surprise.
Pearl frowned. “Zaust, welcome.” She motioned him inside. “What are you talking about?”
He blinked once, his yellow eyes sweeping the room and landing on X5. “Prince Helios is dead.”
------X------
Nearly one hundred people gathered in the small conference room to crowd around Zaust’s radio. Apparently, the news had been all over the public channels and radio stations for days now, but the bunker had cut broadcasts to save power since the EMP gates needed so much of it. Zaust happened to catch part of a broadcast in his workshop and now the entire headquarters was in a ruckus.
Pearl clutched the handheld radio in her hands as she cranked the volume. She’d been the first to move after the little Balpur came in and announced the death of the Golden Prince. Everyone else, X5 included, had been too shocked to register the words. By the time he did understand what was said, Pearl had lunged for the radio, nearly knocking Zaust off his feet.
Now she stood on the table, her combat boots leaving prints on the white papers scattered about. She had the radio in her hands and her eyes glued to the speaker, as if her staring could make the broadcast any louder. The room was totally quiet, every mouth shut and every set of ears open. X5 turned up his audio sensors so he could listen while he initiated a search on the public servers for more information.
Crown Prince Helios au Valetia was pronounced dead this morning when officials from the Vale Republic confirmed the sky ship seen going down just beyond the oasis was indeed the prince’s ship.
The radio went fuzzy for a second, earning gasps and groans from the crowd, but Pearl frantically waved to hush them as it picked up the frequency again.
Details about what exactly caused the explosion are murky at best. The Vale has yet to explain the events that led to the prince’s ship being shot down, but rumors have surfaced from other sources to suggest it was the activity of Rebel forces.
X5 felt his chest tighten. They can’t be serious, he thought. Pearl agreed. She held the radio at arm’s length, like it was suddenly poisonous, and grimaced at it.
“They’re trying to pin this on the Rebellion?”
“Pin what on the Rebellion?”
Every eye in the room shifted to find Clora standing in the doorway, her eyes wide open, her dress wrinkled, her curly hair messed up and frizzy. She looked like she’d just woken up, but the laziness in her eyes had quickly been replaced by sudden fear and anxiety.
She took a step into the room, eyeing the crowd closely, trying to figure out what had gotten so many people fired up. “What’s going on?”
X5 stepped forward before anyone else could say anything. “Clora—”
“You’re awake!” she gasped.
He pushed through the mass to greet her, but instead of giving her a warm hug, he turned her toward the hallway and began escorting her out. “We should leave.”
“Why?”
“I’ve got video of the broadcast!” Wren announced. She waved her hand over her datapad and pulled up a holographic display of the news recording for everyone to see. A giant image of a woman with plain makeup and expressionless eyes appeared in the middle of the table, forcing Pearl to step down and return to her chair.
The crowd shifted so everyone could see the video. Clora turned too, but X5 grabbed her and shifted her away. She wriggled against him, angry that he was trying to stop her, but he covered her eyes with his hand and held her back against his chest.
“Don’t look,” he said calmly.
“What’s going on?”
He could hear her heart rate increasing as her anxiety swelled, but he didn’t have a choice. This shouldn’t be the way she found out about her brother. He would have told her himself later on, when it was just the two of them. Then she wouldn’t have to hear the grim details of his plane going down or getting shot out of the sky … and blown up. And she wouldn’t have to listen to the room erupt in a roar of cheers, celebrating the death of her dear older brother.
Clora clutched X5’s hand, trying to pry it away from her eyes, but he was stronger than her and held tight. The room swelled with excitement as Wren replayed the broadcast again, then the excitement turned to anger as the Rebels tried to decide if they should respond to the Vale trying to blame Helios’s death on them.
“We should take the credit,” one Rebel suggested. “Let everyone know we mean business!”
