Rebel: Recoil Trilogy

In a time of deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.

George Orwell

It is the first responsibility of every citizen to question authority.

Benjamin Franklin

October 31

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I never thought it would end like this, with him dead, a loved one dying, and me lying on my back, bleeding.

Yet, looking back, it seems inevitable.

The moment I joined the rebels, perhaps even the moment I left home to train as a sniper in the war against the plague, I stepped onto the path that ultimately brought me to this place, and this moment.

My hair whips in the downdraft of the helicopter that banks overhead and peels away. The sickening iron taste of blood fills my mouth.

I’m so sore, so tired, so tempted to slip into the beckoning darkness. But the desperate voice above me begs me to hold on.

Sirens grow louder, closer. I shudder from the scorching pain, feel my heart pump more blood out of me with each beat.

There’s a loud bang, and another voice — harsh and hostile — yells impossible commands.

And I can’t protect anyone, not the ones I love, not even myself.

Part One

Chapter 1

Stepping Out

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October 4

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The world outside is crazy.

Mutant rats infest the streets and parks, infecting people with the plague. Terrorist cells plan more attacks on our nation. The government continues to crack down on opposition to its repressive measures: monitoring protests, unearthing dissident activity, hunting rebels, detaining insurgents — all in the name of protecting the people.

For Quinn and me, the world is an especially dangerous place.

We stand together, holding hands. Neither of us moves. Both of us want to prolong this last moment of calm before the storm that waits outside Tallulah’s Inner City Teen Shelter.

He squeezes my hand, and I look up at him, allowing myself to be distracted by his piratical good looks — the mahogany hair, the slate-gray eyes and olive skin, the slight cleft in his chin, and the silver hoop threaded through one eyebrow. A gentle smile curves his lips when he meets my gaze. I smile back and sigh.

It’s time to rescue my brother, Robin.

I slip my sniper’s rifle into my long duffel bag, sling a backpack over my shoulders, and open the door. Following Quinn, I step outside into the cool darkness of the evening.

That step feels huge, important, more like a momentous decision than a simple stride. I’m crossing a threshold from safety to danger, from the known to the uncertain. I’m moving from running away to running to, from escaping to confronting.

But Quinn holds my hand and tugs me forward, and I remind myself that with my hand in his, I can face anything.

As we set off down the sidewalk, I zip up my gray hoodie against the chill October wind that blows dried leaves against our legs and buffets trash against the run-down apartment blocks. Heavy clouds are gathering in the sky above, crowding out the stars.

The road ahead is dimly lit by the yellow glow of a streetlight, and deserted apart from two figures huddled beside a pile of bags in the shadow of a dilapidated old bus shelter a little way down the block. One of them is skinny, dressed entirely in black with chunky boots, and has her head shaven on one side — Evyan. I’m not surprised she’s one of the rebels who has chosen to splinter off from the main group, because she’s always had her eyes on the Quinn O’Riley prize. Wherever he goes, she’ll follow.

The male figure next to her must be Mark, because wherever Evyan goes, Mark follows. But as we draw closer to the pair, I see that this man is older — mid to late forties — and has glasses and a straggly goatee beard. It’s not Mark, it’s Neil. That is a surprise.

Neil, supposed computer genius and serious bunny-hugger, has no allegiance to any person, as far as I know. Maybe the rebel group, under the leadership of ambitious Zonia and bitter, vengeful Connor, was too bloodthirsty for his liking. Or perhaps Quinn promised to protect rats and cats and coyotes — that would have won Neil’s loyalty.

When we reach the odd couple, Evyan looks me up and down with that special contemptuous sneer she always reserves for me and says, Your hair looked better the way it was before.

The way my hair was before was long and blond with fading blue streaks. The way it is now is short, spiky, and chestnut brown with cherry-red tips.

Where’s Mark? I ask her.

There’s a short pause before Quinn says, We weren’t sure of his commitment, at the same time as Evyan says, He was out of camp.

I look from Quinn to Evyan with raised eyebrows.

He was out of camp, Evyan repeats, when we had to bug out. We had no choice but to leave him behind.

Ha! She ditched him. No doubt she still has hopes for Quinn and herself. I’d better watch my back.

You look very different, Neil says.

That was the point. I’d had to make sure I looked nothing like the image being circulated of me on the Southern Sector’s Most Wanted lists.

I approve of these. Neil points to the temporary tattoos I applied to the backs of my hands — the dove of peace on my left, and the balanced yin-yang circle on the right. Can we hope that the changes in your appearance have been matched by an internal metamorphosis of your character?

Sorry, Neil. My energies are as violent as ever.

And that’s probably a good thing — we won’t get far trying to rescue Robin and fight our enemies with Zen and positive affirmations.

So this is it? I say, gesturing to our small circle of misfits. This is all of us?

If I’d had to pick a group to help me liberate my brother Robin from the clutches of PlayState and ASTA, it would have been trained fighters — big guys like Cameron and Bruce from my old sniper unit who knew how to handle themselves in a fight and shoot the pit out of a peach at forty paces. It would not have been a philosophizing pacifist and a girl who has always made it clear that she wished me, if not dead, then at least gone.

Even Quinn, whom I love and trust, wouldn’t be anyone’s first pick for a rescue mission team member. He’s madly intelligent, yes — great at extracting meaningful information and patterns from raw data — but he’s still more geek than guerilla.

This is all of us, Quinn confirms.

What do we do now? Maybe we could — I begin.

But Evyan cuts me off. "Quinn, what do you think we should do?"

Jinxy? Quinn asks.

I shrug — I don’t have any real plan. Until an hour ago, I’d been lying low at Tallulah’s, licking my wounds and hiding out from the government and rebel forces, both of whom have seriously unpleasant plans for me.

Okay then, Quinn continues, I think the best bet would be to get to Neil’s safe house, set ourselves up there, and plan our next step.

Cool. Which way, Neil? Evyan asks.

We follow Neil, heading up the street in a northerly direction. I wish we had a car and could move faster. Every minute that passes takes Robin closer to the moment he’ll be moved from PlayState’s headquarters to the detention center. What must it be like for my mom, stuck at home, unable to do anything to help either of her children? She’ll be freaking out, terrified that she’s about to lose another family member.

Feeling exposed and unsafe, I aim my flashlight into the shadows as we walk, alert for any movement or sound that might signal the approach of a curfew patrol or a plague-infected rat.

Safe house? I ask Quinn.

Neil has a house in the north zone’s outer sector.

It’s completely off the grid, and not registered in my name, Neil says. So there’s no way for the government to link it to me. No reason for them to search there.

And do the rebels know about it? I ask.

Government forces aren’t the only ones searching for me.

Neil shakes his head. They only know that I have one, but not where it is.

On the next corner is a long-abandoned convenience store. The security door of its entrance is still padlocked shut, but all the windows have been smashed and the shelves stripped bare. The wreck of an old van is parked outside, resting lopsidedly on the tireless rims of its wheels. This is exactly the sort of place where mutant rats might nest. And lurking inside the van could be an M&M — a plague-infected victim — or perhaps a government spook team set up to spy on the street.

Footsteps crunching loudly on the broken glass littering the sidewalk, Neil and Evyan march on, oblivious to any danger.

Chapter 2

Keeping an eye out

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Hold up there, guys, I say, taking my rifle out the bag.

Stepping around Evyan and Neil, I scan the gloomy interior of the store with my flashlight. Nothing. I take up position behind the van. Holding my rifle with the flashlight flush against its underside, I aim at the van’s rusty doors, on which someone has spray-painted graffiti: Only the rats are free.

Oh, for God’s sake, is all this really necessary? Evyan says.

I signal to Quinn. He opens one of the van doors and immediately steps back so that I can check the interior. Empty.

Clear, I say.

"Now can we go?" Evyan sets off without waiting for an answer.

We need to turn left here, Neil says.

Wait! I grab his arm before he can turn the corner. Let me check it’s safe first. Every time, okay? Every corner, every alley.

Evyan snorts and mutters something about me wanting to make myself feel useful. Keeping close to the storefront, I edge forward and crane my neck around the corner to search the street beyond. My eyes immediately lock onto a sudden movement about thirty yards ahead and to the right. It’s only a scrawny stray dog, sniffing around an old entrance to the decommissioned subway system.

I hold my hand up in a stop sign to keep the others back. We need to be extremely careful. Dogs can also be infected with the plague — any mammals can, that’s why the official policy is to destroy any and all stray animals. But I’ve always loved dogs, and I’m not about to shoot a healthy-looking specimen.

The dog walks over to a plumber’s truck parked in the street, lifts its leg against a tire, and then trots off. The street is silent and still again. I turn back to the other three.

Okay, it seems clear.

If we’re going to stop to check every street and shadow, we’ll never get anywhere. We should just get moving, Evyan says.

Much as it pains me to admit it, even to myself, she has a point. It might not be safe or clever to move down a dark street without checking for potential dangers, but neither is spending too much time outdoors. The wind is picking up too, and there’s the smell of rain in the air. Maybe it would be better to get to the safe house as quickly as we can.

Fine, I snap. Let’s go.

I’m still saying the last word when I catch a glimpse of blue light, floating about ten feet above the ground, moving up the street.

Get down! I shove the others back toward the van. It’s a securodrone. Get underneath — now!

We drop to the ground and slide under the old wreck, Quinn on one side of me and Evyan on the other. Neil manages to wedge himself under the lowest part of the chassis and starts trying to wrestle himself free of his backpack. I worry that his movements will shake the wreck, perhaps even bring it crashing down on us.

Lie still! I hiss.

But nobody needs the instruction this time — we can all see the flashing blue lights of the surveillance drone illuminating the asphalt and sidewalk. The beady eye of the camera under its pumpkin-sized body will be revolving as it hovers, taking in the images of the street and relaying them to an intel analysis unit somewhere. If we’re detected, a strident alarm will sound, and a patrol unit will descend on us within minutes. We cannot afford to be discovered.

My muscles are tense, my mouth dry, and something sharp presses painfully into my right hip. I turn my head to look at Quinn, who lies on his back beside me. His fingers inch across to grasp mine, and we lie like that, hardly daring to breathe, as the lights pulse brighter, closer, glinting off the piercings in Evyan’s ears and nose.

The drone must be level with the van now. Is it hovering beside us? If an intel agent, perhaps a cadet like the ones at ASTA, is monitoring its video feed in real time, they might direct it to descend and peer under the wreck. I would. But this one keeps moving, and soon the lights fade, then disappear.

We lie still for several more long minutes. Neil pants as if he’s run a mile, Quinn wipes a hand across his forehead, and I ease a bottle of water out of my pocket to take a sip. Evyan studiously avoids meeting my gaze, as if she expects me to say, I told you so.

No need, Evyan — I think we all understand the danger now.

Think it’s safe to move yet? Quinn asks.

I guess, I say, but I’ve no sooner eased out from under the van than I hear the sound of running feet.

I gather myself into a crouch and swing my rifle up at the approaching figure, but it’s just a kid — Carlos, the youngest kid housed at Tallulah’s. He stops dead in his tracks, staring bug-eyed at the weapon.

Kerry? He calls me by the name I used in the shelter.

I lay the rifle down on the sidewalk beside me and beckon him closer. What’s up, Carlos?

He edges forward slowly, wide eyes flicking from the rifle to me and back again. When he’s right in front of me, he fishes around in his underwear and brings out an envelope.

It’s a message, he whispers. From Miss Tallulah.

When I try to take the envelope, Carlos pulls it back. He holds out his other hand expectantly and smiles angelically at me. For Pete’s sake, the kid is incorrigible.

Does anyone have a cookie or some candy? I ask the others.

Neil hands over a roll of ImmunyChews. I break the roll of candies in two and drop one half into Carlos’s hand. He gives me the envelope, but his eyes are fixed on the rest of the candy.

Just wait, okay? I say, holding it up like a promised reward. We may need to send a message back with you.

Carlos nods once, then pops two of the candies into his mouth and starts chewing, staring at each of us in turn.

I hold the envelope gingerly by one corner — not sure how hygienic the inside of Carlos’s underwear might have been — and check both sides for a name, because I’m not sure if this was meant for me or Quinn. With an impatient curse, Evyan snatches it out of my grasp and hands it to Quinn, who tears it open and reads it quickly. His face tenses.

What? What is it? I ask.

It’s a message from Sofia.

Sofia Medina was one of Quinn’s fellow cadets in the intel unit back at ASTA. She helped me establish that our sniping unit was really executing plague victims, and she fed fake information into the intel system so that I could get a message to Quinn about where his captured brother, Connor, was being detained. I discovered this evening that she also passed the information to Quinn that Robin’s been captured and is being held at PlayState’s headquarters, where they’re grilling him about how he hacked into The Game.

Sofia says they’re moving Robin at dawn tomorrow, Quinn continues. She doesn’t know where to, but she does know it’s so he can be questioned further and given a lie-detector test.

I meet Quinn’s gaze. He looks worried, but my eyes, I know, must be wild with panic, because that’s what I’m feeling right now — crazy, stomach-churning panic.

Jinxy? Quinn says.

What’s up with you? Evyan demands.

I have to clear my throat before I can speak. I know where they’ll be taking him. To the place where they interrogated and tortured Connor.

To the place where they interrogated and tortured me.

Chapter 3

Outside the system

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Quinn, we need to get Robin tonight. Now! You said they’d tightened security at the detention center after your brother’s escape — it’ll be impossible to spring Robin once he’s inside there.

Yeah, but we don’t have a plan, Quinn says. We were going to discuss that tonight or tomorrow.

We’ll have to discuss it now. Let’s get off the street though, before another drone or patrol comes by.

I ensconce Carlos in the driver’s seat of the van and tell him we’re playing a game where he drives us all the way to Mexico, then I clamber into the back with the others. In the far corner, a soiled respirator mask and a single sock lie beside an old romantic novel, its pages fanned open like it once landed in water, the paper nibbled at the edges by rodents or roaches. Did someone once shelter here? Where are they now?

We need to get to PlayState as soon as possible, I say, sitting beside Quinn.

Do we even know where PlayState is located? Evyan asks.

Yeah, I say. It’s virtually on the same grounds as ASTA. They’re probably the same organization.

Quinn said the security measures at ASTA were hectic. Is PlayState the same? she asks.

I nod, thinking of the high perimeter fence topped with razor-wire and electrified strands, the motion-detecting lights and surveillance cameras, and the guards at the massive main gate.

Soooo, how exactly are we going to get in?

There’s a long moment of silence as we look at each other and then at Quinn. But surprisingly, it’s Neil who speaks first.

What we need to do is to think like programmers, he says.

I don’t think computer code is going to help us with this, Neil. Quinn’s reply is much more patient and polite than the retort which hovers on the tip of my tongue.

No, but a logic flowchart will.

Neil snags a pencil and notepad from his backpack, turns to a fresh page and writes Rescue Mission at the top. He draws a diamond-shaped box, with an arrow marked NO coming out of the side and another labeled YES exiting from the lowest point.

Can we scale the fence somehow and gain access that way? Neil asks.

Yes. And no, says Quinn. I suppose it’s possible to short the electric fence, but we’d be seen for sure, and then there’d be a major shoot-out.

Up front, Carlos growls like the souped-up engine of a muscle car, and squeals as we take an imaginary corner at speed. While Neil draws another decision diamond below the YES arrow, I take a moment to scan the street through the windshield. Still deserted.

Do we have the manpower — excuse me, the human power — and the firepower to emerge victorious from such an encounter? Neil asks.

No, Quinn and I say together.

It’s a stupid question. Neil knows as well as I do that we have exactly one weapon between us, and that I’m the only one who knows how to use it. No one else here could hit the broad side of a barn with a shotgun.

Neil draws a little skull with X’d out eyes at the bottom of the YES arrow — that’s the end of that line of logic. He draws another diamond to the right of the NO arrow.

Could we enter from above — yes or no? he says, pushing up his glasses with a thumb.

No, I say. Unless you’ve got a helicopter at your safe house. And even then we’d be shot down.

Another NO arrow, another question box.

My foot jiggles. This is taking too long — we need to move faster.

Can PlayState be accessed from below? asks Neil.

What, like via a tunnel? Not that I know of, Quinn says.

Neil traces over the NO arrow. Then you’ve got to go through the door. Like the song says.

Dude, what song? Evyan’s words are clipped with irritation.

Neil sings a ditty. It’s so high, you can’t get over it. So low, you can’t get under it. So wide, you can’t get around it. You gotta go through the door!

We all stare at him like he’s nuts.

Didn’t any of you go to Sunday School? he asks in a wounded tone.

Evyan rolls her eyes, Quinn looks baffled, and I snap, Neil, if you’ve got an idea, please spit it out in plain English. And when he doesn’t immediately reply, I add, Now would be really good!

I know I’m being rude, but we haven’t got time to mess around. Carlos is also in a hurry — he shouts at imaginary M&Ms to get out of the way.

The logical conclusion is that you have to enter through the front gate, he says, as though this should be obvious to all of us.

That’s your grand plan? Ring the front door bell? Evyan asks.

They’d never let us in, Neil. Worse, they’d arrest the lot of us, I say.

That would be true, if the people at the gate were you.

Evyan curses violently.

I say, "Who else would they be?"

The more useful way of phrasing that question is: who would they let in?

Aah, says Quinn in a voice of dawning comprehension.

My irritation levels rise, because I’m still totally clueless.

The only people they let into the compound are those who they’re expecting, I say.

Neil draws another question-diamond.

I swear to God, I am done with those little shapes, snaps Evyan. For the first time ever, she and I are entirely in sync. I am ready to crumple up that piece of paper and shove it —

"Is there a way we can make them expect an arrival tonight?" Neil asks.

No, says Quinn, and his face has that earnest expression he always gets when he’s thinking hard. "We can’t. We can’t."

And suddenly, I get it.

We can’t because we’re outside the system, Quinn continues. But someone on the inside could, someone like —

Sofia! I finish for him.

She could plant a message in the security system that someone is expected? Neil checks.

Yeah, I say.

Easy, Quinn adds.

Then the next logical question is: who would they feasibly have to admit, in the middle of the night? Neil asks. Who would you need to be?

Some emergency service. Like a doctor, maybe! If someone was sick, they’d have to admit a doctor, I say, excited that there may be a way in after all.

My sister’s a doctor, Neil says, surprising me again. I’ve never thought about the lives of the rebels beyond their involvement in the resistance. "But she would not be keen to join a liberation mission, and besides, we live clear across town. If we had to wait for her to join us before we set off, we wouldn’t make it in time."

Okay, so who else might come to the gates? Quinn says.

Someone making a delivery? Evyan suggests.

Nah, I say. Not at night. Besides, ASTA get their deliveries mainly by drones. PlayState would be the same.

An official transport. A purification center disposal unit?