Page 90 of Rising

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Dim light seepedinto the basement from whatever was lighting up the street outside. It was late, hours had passed, but I couldn’t be sure of the time. They’d removed the bullet in both my and Seth’s legs and stopped the bleeding, stitching us up, but no other healing had been done.55515, I repeated to myself over and over. The focused pinched expression on Seth’s face told me he was doing the same. With the extent of his injuries, I wasn’t sure it would do much to relieve his pain.

I’d used it for years in The Before, The Monroe Institute had done research in the seventies or eighties on the human body’s pain perception gene, 55515. The idea was if you repeated those numbers and focused on the area of pain, then the pain would subside. It’d come out in some CIA document and I’d tried it, mostly for period pain or minor aches and bruises. I was shocked when I’d realized it had worked. It didn’t totally erase the pain, but it sure as hell made it subside enough to function.

So I’d taught each one of my soldiers the same. That and the fact that the human body can do anything for thirty seconds if you put your mind to it. Tell yourselfjust thirty more secondsenough and you can push through more than you think.

My leg throbbed. No pain medication and no access to Reina’s powers was going to be a major disadvantage on getting out of here, which is exactly what they’d intended. Sitting here around my friends, battered, bruised, and hopeless, there was nothing I wanted more in that moment than a bottle of liquor. It wouldn’t make everything better, but I’d at least forget for a bit.

I’d failed them. I’d trusted Alexiares and led them right into this trap. I should have sent him back to where he’d come the moment he arrived at The Compound, but I didn’t. My gut had told me to, but my family had led me to believe I was being harsh, emotional, and irrational. Denying someone a new home and possible happiness because I’d been void of it myself.

At that moment, I was angry with them too, then angry at myself for being angry with them. It’d been weeks since I’d thought about the bitter taste of homemade tequila burning the back of my throat. I’d had a purpose then, a goal.

Now I didn’t have one, and we’d likely all die because of my mistake. They’d be better off without me.

The door to the basement opened and light flooded in. Two guards came in, each with a bowl of food in their hands, sliding them towards us, smart enough to keep their distance. I peered into the bowl. It was too dark to see exactly what kind of meat it was, but whatever it was didn’t even look edible enough to feed Harley.I see why she wants the resources.

The guards turned to leave as Reina stopped them. “Wait,” she said, “you’re not going to untie our hands? How are we supposed to eat?”

“Not our problem,” one sneered. “Figure it out.”

“What about water?” I asked.

They said nothing as they left. There was only one way for us to eat. The water bowls they brought a few minutes later made it clear. Like dogs.

“Someone will be down in the morning,” the guard called out over his shoulder.

No one came until the afternoon. I hadn’t slept much and had been awake to see the sun brighten up the room and stay there for hours. The windows were thin, and I could hear crowds of people walk by in different waves. Morning shifts, mid-morning shifts, and lunch rush.

The guard from last night entered, eyeing me uneasily before he risked coming closer. I barked at him, grinning as he leaped back, tossing down a battered pink card with a small pencil.Lucky I can’t access my magic.

Will you be our valentine?

The card was littered with childish hearts and smiley faces.

Love Finley & Alexiares

It was signed, though the handwriting was certainly not his.

“What’s it say?” Moe asked, voiced raspy as she leaned over, her first words since we’d awoken.

I showed it to her, reading it out for Seth and Reina who had turned to see for themselves. A collectivenorang out, saying they too would rather die than work for her. A ping of guilt rolled in my stomach. They hadn’t known about Alexiares past, but I had. He hadn’t said Finley’s name, and I hadn’t put two and two together.

Finley was notorious for her cruelty in The Expanse. Gossip had spread across borders over the last few months of a ruthless woman who’d only recently come into power. She was greedy. Constantly finding loopholes in the treaty and using it to her advantage, seeing how much she could get away with. Pillaging unwalled areas, border towns and forcing them to become outposts of her settlement, trying to build her population. Where others were hesitant to react, still rebuilding and avoiding another war, Finley pushed for one, aiming to use it to gain more land, more power.

We’d discussed her over dinner one night when I’d first returned to my duties. Reina shared whatever gossip she’d picked up from the random person she’d decided to spend an hour chatting up that day. None of them wanted to work with her, but I wasn’t willing to sign their death certificates.

I knew my friends, I could sign our lives away at this moment, but that wouldn’t guarantee their cooperation once the chains were removed,ifthey were removed. No, I’d have to get them to agree, willing participants, which meant I had to be onboard.

My eyes scanned the room, searching each of their faces. I needed them to see that there was a way out. We could do this.

“Things … things are bad right now, and I know it seems like there isn’t a way out, but there is. Our fate has nothing to do with Finley, or Alexiares, or any of these shitheads. No, our fate is in our hands. When I look at you all, I see my family, people with willpower stronger than any motherfucker behind these walls. We’ll find a way out, but first we have to play their game.”

They nodded, slowly, accepting the truth in my words as I checked off the left box on the card.

* * *

When we were escortedfrom the basement, they removed our chains one by one, forcing us to swallow a pill. Reina had felt her magic recede deep inside her. While Seth had noticed his gifts had also been muted, Moe wouldn’t know until she tried to channel a vision, but I already knew what they’d done.

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