Rebellion by K. A. Riley

Author:K. A. Riley
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-05-28T16:00:00+00:00

15

“Brohn?”

With a groan, Brohn lifts his head. He looks across at me, then turns his attention to his blood-stained chest.

“You’re okay!” I squeal.

Brohn looks up at me again and forces a frail smile. “I’m alive. I think. But I wouldn’t call what I’m feeling ‘okay.’”

“But...you got, you know…shot.”

“Oh. That would explain the blood. And the pain.”

“It hurts?”

Brohn moans, “Uh-huh. A lot, now that you mention it.”

At the moment, I’m too immersed in a combination of laughing and crying to sympathize. “Forget that,” I yelp. “You’re alive!”

Brohn wriggles his fingers and then lifts his hands, turning them back and forth in front of his face like he’s inspecting them. “I’m alive. Not sure how.” He slips a hand under his shirt and skims his fingers across his chest. “Great,” he says. “I’m dented.”

“What?”

Brohn pulls up his shirt to reveal a cluster of shallow, red-rimmed pits in his muscular abs and pecs. “I’m dented. I’ve got dents in my chest. I feel like a golf ball.” He withdraws his hand and inspects his fingertips. “Blood. But I don’t think there are any actual wounds.”

“How is that—?”

“I think they healed. How long have I been out?” Brohn takes a good look around: at me, at the empty white room, at the transparent globe we’re floating in. “How long have we been in…this thing?”

“It’s some kind of grav-cell. They call it ‘the Marble.’ And we haven’t been in here long enough for you to heal from a dozen bullet wounds to the chest.”

“Did you…were you conscious this whole time?”

“No,” I admit. “But it doesn’t feel like it could be more than a couple of hours or so since Ekker cornered us in that alley. The blood on your shirt doesn’t even look like it’s all the way dry yet.”

“Then we have a mystery on our hands.”

“More than one.”

“What do you mean?”

“Ekker was in here.”

“The Patriot general who shot me?”

“That’s the one.”

Frowning, Brohn rubs a hand across his chest. “Remind me to have a chat with him about that sometime.”

“He’s going to take us somewhere. Do something to us. I’m not sure what. But it doesn’t sound like it’s for our own good.”

Brohn looks around. “We’re floating.”

“It’s some kind of gravitational cocoon.”

Brohn kicks his legs back and forth a little. “Neat,” he says, his amused grin dropping quickly into an irritated frown. “But kind of awful at the same time.”

Something occurs to me, and I share the memory with Brohn. “Render sent me a thought the other day,” I say. “Something about being ‘suspended in helplessness.’”

Brohn looks around at our floating bubble of a prison. “I’d say this counts.”

“He also said something about ‘rediscovering death.’”

“Hm. Not the most cheerful prophecy. Any guesses about what it means?”

“No. And I’m not exactly looking forward to figuring it out.”

“What about Krug?”

“Ekker says Krug doesn’t matter. He’s turning on him. Says he’s taking us away before Krug even gets here.”

“Great. So instead of being Krug’s slaves, we’re going to be this guy Ekker’s?”

“That sounds like his plan.”

“Then we need to get out of here.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.