“Cassie!”
The call distracts her. “Coming.” She turns back to me. “We don’t have time to deal with you. I won’t hesitate to sedate you if it happens again.”
Point made, no need to be a bitch.I nod.
She strides off to deal with the real emergencies, which I clearly am not one of.
As the curtain falls back into place, I rub absently at my temple and pace back and forth.
I need to follow him. It’s a compulsion so strong, it obliterates every other consideration, every other need. They will throw the book at me for this, remove me from rotation, and likely send me for psychiatric evaluations, none of which I want.
Only, I don’t care about any of that.
He’s out there, somewhere, doing something so dangerous he likely won’t come back.
Nothing else matters.
Nothing else is real beyond I know that I love him, that I need him; that even after so short a time, and as impossible as it seems, he is the one, the only one.
What I’m thinking of doing is dangerous beyond measure.
And I’m going to do it anyway.
Zeb
The climb brings me out into a tunnel that carries air, water, and electricity the length of the substructure. It’s dark and probably hasn’t seen a human for centuries, but my enhanced vision and augmented physique allow me to make use of something lost and forgotten.
Their ship has landed. I may not be in communications anymore, but I know how this will go. Above ground, our sides will be engaged in battle. But the Uncorrupted are on the run.They’ll grab everything they can, everyone important, get them back to the base ship, and flee.
Jenda will be on that ship, and so will I.
When I emerge onto the surface, I’m met with the sounds of war. The buzz of automatic weapons. The whistle and the pound of explosives. I skirt around the edges. Getting myself dirty and bloody on the twisted, broken ground. Stumbling out of the shadows and merging with their soldiers as they board the Uncorrupted ship.
Inside, it’s the kind of organized chaos that makes it easy for me to slip through undetected.
But now that I’m in, I need to locate my target and fast—no point in hanging around if I don’t have to. Get in, get this done, and get back out again before they take off.
The corridors are narrow and dimly lit. The ship thrums and vibrates right down to my bones.
The passage of alphas—their alphas—triggers the change. My body morphs, rearranging molecules, warping something pure into something genetically abhorrent.
Fuck, I don’t want to spend too long in the form. I can already feel it twisting me up inside. The irony is not lost upon me. They called themselves ‘uncorrupted’, and yet this thing they’ve done with the Copper Virus is inherently wrong.
I slip into a side corridor looking for a good candidate. An officer rushing from a doorway on my right is just what I want. I walk past him as he rushes in the other direction, pivot, follow, and take him in a chokehold before dragging him back into the room.
The room is empty, just banks of monitors showing the status of the battle taking place.
My fingers are around his throat as I take him down onto the floor. He tries to bat my hands away, but with my enhanced genetics, he doesn’t have a chance. His face is turning red, andhis eyes are wide as he sees me changing… Changing into him…. It’s fucking excruciating changing this fast. The tissues of my face feel like they’re boiling.
But he’s of a comparable build. The cloning process doesn’t have to be perfect, just enough facial features to pass a cursory glance.
The last of his breath leaves him, and as his eyes roll back, the process is complete.
I’m breathing heavily and sweating as I heave myself up. Then I’m at the monitors, searching through the information.
There she is.
Got you, bitch.
