The Gauntlet (The Cage 3)

Break some bones for me, boy!

Leon gritted his teeth. He couldn’t even fulfill Bonebreak’s dying request. What kind of a hero was he? He looked away, furious. The Axion shoved them into the recess room with the other prisoners. One entire wall had been torn away by the storm, and wind howled through the gap. The chill bit into his rain-soaked clothes, and he hugged his arms across his chest as they pushed him toward the wall, where the other prisoners sat in silence. Serassi, a bruise marring her face, her hair loose and messy, clutching her ribs. Willa, bleeding from multiple gashes. Redrage, wheezing through her shattered mask.

“Sit,” an Axion ordered. “You try anything, you get shot.”

He pushed Leon and Mali down next to Serassi.

Leon grumbled as he eyed the Axion guards. He couldn’t stop his teeth from chattering. Rage made his muscles feel extra tight. He flexed his fist, desperate for something to slam it into.

Then, a soft hand touched his shoulder.

“Thank you,” Mali said. “You did it. We know where Anya is.”

She gave a smile.

His heart leaped. He flexed his fist again, his tense muscles easing only slightly. “Lot of good it does us here,” he muttered. “Theta seems damn far off right now, with those guns pointed at us.”

“But she’s alive,” Mali said. Her hand tightened on his shoulder. Her eyes were so clear, so focused on him. Like she really saw him. A small pocket of warmth opened in his chest, and he stopped shivering quite as much. For the first time, he started to see what a future might look like for them, back on Earth. His family would lean on him hard to join up the smuggling operation, but with Mali’s support, he’d resist that life. He’d do something better. Maybe own a bar. A pawnshop. He looked down at his muscles, flexing them.

A cop?

Bloody hell, had he actually just considered that?

He sighed—it didn’t matter. They’d probably all die here anyway. The others looked terrible. Serassi winced as she leaned against the wall. He could tell from her eyes that she was uncloaked, and she hunched forward over her hurt ribs in a very humanlike way. So different from the stiff Chief Genetics Officer who had once told him to strip naked so she could perform tests on him.

In the central vestibule, the Axion were speaking among themselves. A pounding noise started, and he wrinkled up his face as he strained to see what was happening.

“They’re trying to break into the puzzle chambers,” Serassi explained. “It’s the strongest part of the structure, the only part the storm hasn’t completely torn apart yet.” For a second, a ripple of dark pleasure crossed her face as she nodded toward the wall monitor. “They’re worried. The last I saw before those monitors shorted out, Cora had made it to puzzle ten. She could be on puzzle eleven, or even puzzle twelve by now. They’re getting desperate enough to physically break into the modules and stop her. Her winning is the only thing that still threatens them. That’s why they haven’t killed us yet—bargaining chips, in case their plan fails.”

“Can they break in?” Mali asked.

“I don’t know,” Serassi said. She pointed to the Axion guards just beyond the doorway. One was speaking in emphatic words Leon couldn’t make out. “He’s updating his superior on battles beyond this planet. They’ve invaded Armstrong. They’ve taken over nearly ten percent of the galaxy, crippling the entire Intelligence Council system.”

“That means they’ve won,” Mali said flatly.

Serassi’s face returned to its tight, passive look. But then she glanced to the side. “Yes. Unless Cora and Cassian come through. If Cora wins, it will trigger the evolutionary jump for humans and Kindred. Not everyone will feel it right away, but we’re close enough that it’ll be almost instantaneous for us. You’ll feel it in your body: strength as if you could lift an entire shuttle. And in your minds. You’ll be able to read the thoughts of everyone in this room. If the evolutionary jump happens, it doesn’t matter that the Axion outnumber us. We’ll be strong enough to defeat them here.” She smiled. “And everywhere.”

Leon decided he liked Serassi infinitely more like this, with her hair messy and a smirk on her face, than with that mask of indifference. He exchanged a look with Mali, who was staring at her scarred fingers. He reached down and took her hand, squeezing tight.

“How will we know if Cora loses?” he asked.

The smile faded off Serassi’s face.

“We’ll know she’s lost,” she said, “if the Gauntlet ends and the Axion kill every one of us.”

41

Cora

THE SIX CASSIANS SEEMED to be spinning faster. Cora pressed a hand to her head, trying to stop the sensation that the room was moving. But it was moving, she realized—it was swaying back and forth, tossed around by the coming storm.

She was out of time.

She whirled toward the first Cassian, then the second, then the third. She let her mind clear of worries: about the storm and about the Axion just on the other side of those walls, waiting to kill her and everyone she loved. She ignored the throbbing pain in the back of her skull. She didn’t think about how, if she lost, the entire known universe was doomed.

She focused instead on her memories of Cassian. The paragon burst spread through her as a warm sensation. The first time she had ever seen him, in her dreams, when he had been so beautiful that she mistook him for an angel. And then the time in the snow when he had made stars appear in the night sky to comfort her. And she thought about their first kiss. Standing in the ocean, the warm salty waves lapping at their thighs, as he had pulled her into an embrace. I want to know what it feels like, he had told her. And electricity had sparked between them as their lips touched, shooting straight to her heart.

She pressed a hand to her chest, holding on to that feeling, multiplied by ten by the warmth of the paragon burst.

Knowing him, as he knew her.

Knowing him beyond appearance, beyond name or rank, knowing him more deeply than the stock algorithm ever would. Knowing him as deeply as she loved him.

Her head jerked toward the fourth Cassian.

He looked in every way identical to the others. His black suit showed no signs of dust or tears or battle; his left arm was extended, not revealing any kind of wound. The look on his face was just as masklike as the rest.

And yet there was something different about him.

Her heart beat extra hard. A warm shock of feeling. A spark.

She crossed the room, grabbed his outstretched hand, and pulled him into the center of the room. “You,” she said, staring into his eyes. “It’s you.”

The music stopped.

She was afraid it was the storm causing more interference, but then the other Cassians vanished, one by one. The chandelier overhead flickered and disappeared, followed by the ornate walls and the marble floor, until they were standing on a plain metal grid. Her dress faded into plain black clothes, and her hair fell loose around her face, once more tangled and dirty. His fine suit changed back to a torn uniform.

He suddenly clutched his left arm, crying out in pain.

“Cassian!” She caught him as he stumbled. She led him to the wall, which he leaned against for support. “Are you all right?”

“I couldn’t move,” he said, wincing in pain. “I had to do what the Gauntlet wanted me to do. I wasn’t in control of my own body.”

“It’s okay now,” she said. “I’m sorry I had to hurt your arm—I didn’t know how to tell you apart from the others.”

“How did you?” he asked.

She looked into his eyes. There had been a time when making eye contact with him had been nearly impossible. But now she felt a thrill at connecting with him on this level, of truly knowing him. “Remember when I told you that I wanted to know you as well as you know me?”

The corner of his mouth turned up. “You were lying. You were trying to trick me.”

“I guess it wasn’t entirely a lie,” she said. “It turns out I do know you already. Yo

ur heart. The stock algorithm can’t disguise that.”

She pulled back, resting a hand on either side of his face, looking into those eyes that weren’t so different from her own. He leaned in at the same time she did, and their lips met. She felt that familiar spark. Though they had touched often enough for her to be used to it, it still surprised her. She leaned closer, wanting to feel more of his warmth. He wrapped a hand around her back, holding her close.

“I love you, Cassian.”

A rumble overhead made them both look up.

A door opened in the ceiling.

Her heart started thumping anxiously as her fingers squeezed against his shoulders, wanting to hold on to this moment with him, this small moment of victory, of pure love.

Because there was only one puzzle left. And she knew it would be the hardest of all.

The ceiling was ten feet high, so Cassian made a stirrup with his hands for Cora to step into. “You climb up first,” he said. “I’ll be right behind you.”

She rested her hands on his shoulders to steady herself and then placed a bare foot into his palms. He lifted her easily, even with his hurt left arm, and she reached for the doorway, catching the edge, pulling herself up with her improved strength.

She flexed her sore fingers, looking back down through the doorway.

“Your turn,” she called.

He knelt down, preparing to jump—but the door slid shut.

42

Cora

SHE GASPED. “NO!” SHE slammed her hands on the metal floor. “Cassian!” She pounded her fists harder. She couldn’t do this alone. She needed his confidence in her. She needed—