Freya by Matthew Laurence

Author:Matthew Laurence
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Imprint

11

THE LONG HAUL

I hate waiting.

You see, I never thought about what to say to Nathan when I saw him again—stupidly, I just assumed I could spill it all, bring him up to speed with a whirlwind tale of skulduggery and adventure. What I’m holding on to is basically some of the best gossip I’ve ever had. The moment I rush to his side in Recovery, I so badly want to tell him everything. Then I remember where I am—remember there are cameras, microphones, suspicious staff—and realize I can’t tell him a damn thing. Fortunately, he’s still a little groggy, so he doesn’t ask too much. I shush him and tell him to rest for now.

I have to wait until we’re off-site and certain they haven’t bugged any of our things. It is killing me. The look in his eyes tells me he understands there’s definitely something going on, that I haven’t lost my mind while he was asleep, but to censor everything I say is completely at odds with my character.

I have to get out of here. I decide to skip dinner, which is, admittedly, another choice at odds with my character, but at this point it’s the lesser of two evils. I don’t even bother trying to navigate to the exits on my own, either—I flag down the first guard I see and have him escort Nathan and me off the property, flashing my permit and ID badge every chance I get. As we head out, I start to get an idea of their security systems and realize why it’s been relatively easy to go wherever I please inside the base; they have an outright ludicrous array of defenses, checkpoints, and armed personnel guarding the entrances.

X-ray machines, body imagers, and no less than three biometric scanners (hand, iris, and voice identification) form the frontline defense, but if someone manages to breach them—or trip an alarm—then the turret nests, guard stations, and pressurized bulkheads will probably make short work of any intruders. There’s also an off-key buzz in the back of my head, a distant thrum of hidden magic that tells me everything I’ve seen so far is probably just the technological half of Impulse Station’s defensive line. I have a hard time picturing an unauthorized god getting in here, let alone a mortal.

It takes us nearly five minutes just to leave once we reach these exits, guards checking us to confirm we’re not trying to smuggle anything off-site, but at long last, we step out into the waning Florida sunlight, free. I have to admit, I was worried they’d try to pull us back in at the last second. Since he’s an official “retainer” of mine, Nathan is supposed to have the same freedoms I’ve been granted, but I wasn’t about to trust Finemdi to keep their word. Now that we’re out, it looks like they were telling the truth. It’s early evening, the sky is still relatively bright, and only a handful of stars have begun to make an appearance.

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