The Alien Conspiracy by Cara J. Stevens

Author:Cara J. Stevens
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Skyhorse Publishing
Published: 2018-10-14T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER EIGHT:

JAX

We hit the ground in a tangled mess of arms and legs. By the time I stood up, Velasco was on the deck ushering Blaze, Zoe, and their goon squad out of the gym. They had been docked from the upcoming island overnight, which was fine by me, but I would have liked a few minutes to get in a few punches before Velasco broke it up. They were lucky he arrived when he did.

When the rest of the crew headed to dinner. I stayed back to punch stuff and cool down. I was glad they gave me my space, especially after my long, awkward speech about needing to talk more. They were probably talking about it as they walked to dinner. Or maybe they hadn’t even given it a second thought. Who could tell?

On their way out, I did ask Zane to bring me back a Chicago-style thick crust pizza with extra cheese and hot peppers. I needed some comfort food after everything I had been through lately. Too many fights outside of battle weren’t good for my reputation. And as Velasco warned me, if I wanted to clean up my act, I’d have to spend more time proving I was a team player and less time pretending I didn’t care about anything or anyone.

I got in a hot shower before the guys arrived with my pizza. Asha had stayed back to tag more doors. That girl made me laugh. The more people tried to take her down, the harder she worked to build herself back up and then go a step further than anyone expected. I had never met anyone like her. Or Jin or Zane for that matter. They were good people. It wasn’t easy to open myself up to anyone, but considering I had to be lumped in with three other people for a year, these weren’t a bad crew to be stuck with.

Asha met us in the avatar control room covered in paint, still giddy from her tagging adventure. Her positivity was contagious, and even I felt a smile coming on. “You know tagging up here isn’t like tagging on the island. On the island it disappears with the acid rain. Here in HQ, that stuff stays long enough to get you in trouble,” I warned her.

She just shrugged it off. “Whatever happens, it was still worth it.” She smiled as she climbed into her control pod and jacked in. The rest of us followed her lead.

On the Battle Bus, I looked around and noticed a positive shift in the mood. It might have been because we were all going on the overnight to explore instead of to fight it out. Maybe it was that Blaze and Zoe weren’t there and I was projecting my relief on every other face I saw. But maybe the others did feel the same way about those two squads as we did. I always assumed we were the only squad that they targeted, but they could have been acting the same miserable way to all the others as well.

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