Judgement 8 (Subject Alpha #1) Page 18

  “Shit! What now?”

  Forcing myself to step forward without thinking I found myself on the third path, my feet moving quickly. Then it split again and I went with instinct and allowed it to direct me. The junctions were becoming more and more frequent, delaying my time and making me angry. My emotions were already hanging on by a thread, but it was too dangerous to yield to them yet, I needed to build them up for the end.

  I presumed each route to be different programs within the Judgement motherboard. That was how I looked at it, anyway. And I was searching for the default program, the primary driver. I smiled to myself. I was a virus. Reid had been right. I was the worm wriggling my way through the apple to find the core.

  Taking more involuntary selections, I eventually found myself in what seemed to be a huge white dome. I knew as soon as I beheld it that I had made it. I couldn’t help but allow the excitement to build in my gut. It rose above me like one of those bubble umbrellas, the clear but frosted plastic in this case a bright glowing mass of intricate veins of energy.

  In the centre was what appeared to be a tall fountain of twisting and swirling streaks, trails of electricity reaching from the ground up to the centre of the dome, each one branching off to create the structure. They were the elements and foundations to the Judgement nucleus. To put it in other words, this pulsing pillar of data was my creator, the very thing that had given this disease inside me sustenance and order. It was the very thing that fed information to my brain. Its power over me was incredible, I felt it inside me, flowing, demanding, controlling. It was my real mother.

  It seemed to spit at me as I made my way over to it. It didn’t want me there. It could read what I was going to do, almost like it was a physical entity. But it wasn’t. I was.

  The atmosphere around me darkened, the walls to the dome morphing into a deep hue of red, the anger it greeted me with warning me things were about to become much more intense.

  I stalled, I couldn’t help it. Anyone would when facing their death. Numerous second thoughts held me back. Shaking my head, I discouraged them, refused them access into my mind. The very thing I was going up against was feeding my mind with anxiety and fear. It was playing dirty.

  Yeah, well so could I.

  I laughed, tilting my head back as I spanned my arms to the side when it tried to defend itself and struck me with its energy, bolts of red and white lightning taking me to my knees before it.

  But what it didn’t seem to grasp was that I’d mastered it now. I had full control, I was in charge of myself and over time, I’d learnt to submit to it. That and the fact I had accepted death made me unstoppable.

  But still it fought me, spat at me, pushed me back with a barrage of tremors and explosive sparks, and still I soaked each one up. I took my enemy’s ammunition and loaded my own weapon with it. With what Janice was pushing into me and the Judgement hub trying to kill me, my whole essence was on overload, my body trembling violently, the walls to the dome shaking as I started to fight back.

  I felt the familiar lockdown of each organ, the rapid build-up of cement coating my veins and turning my blood to sludge to obstruct the voltage from reaching my brain.

  I vomited. I couldn’t help it. The agony forced every fibre of me to scream in torment. My brain struggled under the pressure, my concentration slipping with each second that passed, but I wasn’t ready, I needed more. I needed to be so crammed full of power that it didn’t stand a chance.

  I blinked, my concentration slipping when I heard Janice panicking. She knew what I was doing. I could hear her frantic ramblings, another shot of poison flooding my veins and driving me deeper into the danger zone.

  It was winning, forcing me back, and I let out a frustrated cry. Pushing myself harder I released an agonising scream, struggling to cope with the pain. It was too much. I could feel my bones splintering with the force, my organs starting to roast inside me.

  “Shit. No. NO!”

  I blinked when I spotted a blue glow in the air. It raced along one of the paths to the left of me. As it neared I felt its heat radiating around me, the soft sensation of calm and pleasure that came with it enthralling, its simple appearance immediately dulling the agony cursing me.

  “I’m here, little girl.”

  I released a sob. “I can’t do it, Reid. It’s winning. I can’t control it!”

  “Listen to me. We do this together.”

  “No. No I won’t let you. Lettie needs you now.”

  “You need me, Elina. I’m here for you. I told you. You’re mine now. We do this together.”

  The air seemed to shimmer until Reid’s image appeared beside me, his beautiful handsome face looking at with me with awe. I couldn’t help but feel encouraged by his admiration for me. It was the first time in my life someone was proud of me and my emotions burst, the power of it making the core splutter when I suddenly released an overwhelming amount of power.

  Reid smiled at me and took my hand. “Now you’re ready, little girl. Let’s do this shit!”

  I puffed out a breath, nodded in return and closed my eyes, concentrating on the images Reid fed me.

  A choked sound resounded from me when I let him consume my mind.

  He stood before me, his hands framing my face as his eyes told me everything he needed to say. “Marry me. You own my heart, El. My soul is coupled with yours forever.”

  My head tipped back when his lips whispered over my throat, his fingers stroking down my arms until he linked them through my own and brought our joined hands to rest against his chest. I could feel the rampant rhythm of his heart. Each beat was mine, they belonged to me. Reid gave them to me willingly and I allowed them to flow through our fingers and into me. I could feel the throb of each one moving freely through me until they reached my heart and pulsed life into it when my own rhythm stopped.

  “Take me, Elina. Take what I’m giving you. My life is yours, baby. Use me.”

  Both our screams were loud and agonising in the air when we joined forces and fed the system with so much energy it parted in the middle and finally allowed me in.

  I saw it then, the tiny ball of power that fed so much destruction. Taking it in my hands I stared at what had taken and given so much.

  Lifting my eyes to Reid one last time, I watched as his own devastation rolled down his face. He knew it was the end. But he also knew there was no other way. I had to consume it to blow the circuit. We both instinctively felt it.

  He fell to his knees, his head shaking from side to side.

  “Don’t do this. We’ll find another way.”

  I fell in front of him, lowering the ball to the ground so I could feel him under my touch. His cries were loud and broken, more agonising than the pain riding our veins, yet whilst he begged me, he also accepted it. Because there was no other way.

  “Baby, please. I’ll do it. I’ll do it.” He snatched it up and tried to absorb it but it did nothing. He grew angry, screaming at it, his weeping growing more and more unbearable.

  He allowed me to take it back before I pulled him to me and held him tight.

  “I have to do this, Reid. You know I do. I’m the only one who has the initial software.”

  “I can’t lose you, Elina. Not you and Lettie. I won’t survive that.”

  Closing my eyes I allowed the tears freedom, they were too strong to fight and I was so tired. Exhaustion ruled me. It was time to end it all, and as much as I hated to leave Reid, I knew he would be just fine.

  “You gave me so much strength, Reid. I know you’ll get through this. Your heart will get you through this. And soon, when the pain of loss becomes bearable, you will understand why. And you will remember with a smile.”

  He shook his head, his eyes devouring every inch of my face, his pain making his screams silent and torturous.

  “Go,” I whispered. “Before they stop me.”

  He cried out, his hands clawing at me. “I can’t. It hurts too much.”

  “You have to. Do this one last
thing for me, please. Let me have my peace, Reid.”

  His wet lips crushed mine as he kissed me goodbye, his sobs climbing down my throat and settling in the expanse of my slowing heart. I felt him inside me, the serenity he fed me moving through me like a gentle heat, the pain ebbing with his love.

  “I love you,” he breathed as the ball started to soak into my flesh, the surge of immense power making my head fall back as my mouth opened and rapture made my soul float. “I love you so much, Elina. I’ll make sure to bring them all down. I’ll always be yours, little girl. Always.”

  I couldn’t answer him as he broke before me. I was engulfed by so much pleasure it was excruciating, the sustenance that had fed me for so long making me devour the whole of it until all I could feel was ecstasy, a magnitude of decadence and bliss.

  And then I let go, every single ounce of my energy bursting free and wiping out everything around me. I seemed to fracture from every angle, my body cracking open and releasing what had built inside me, the power short-circuiting the core until the dome crumbled and each and every element cut off, the lights evaporating around me one by one.

  The pain instantly ceased and Heaven greeted me.

  And finally, I smiled.

  THE SUDDEN RUSH IN my lungs made me gag against the pressure. Bile forced up my throat and I turned my head quickly, the torrent spilling from me onto the floor beside the bed I had been laid on. My head throbbed, my body still vibrating with both ecstasy and agony.

  The smell of smoke filled my nostrils as things popped and hissed around me. The lights were out when my eyes snapped open, numerous silhouettes regarding me from a distance.

  “Reid!” I heard his voice but my brain wouldn’t register him. Grief, pain, shock, devastation, heartache, desolation, they all flooded me were all I could feel.

  I shook my head frantically, gasping and retching simultaneously as my father’s face came into view and his thick hands cupped my head.

  “Reid!”

  I stared at him, my mouth opening and closing as strange whimpers climbed up my throat and burst free in a torrent of sobs.

  “What happened?” His face was full of anguish when he witnessed my despair, his eyes scanning my face as he tried to read me.

  “She’s . . .” I was so angry at him. This was his fault. All his doing.

  His eyes widened when I grabbed a fistful of his shirt and threw him clean across the room. He scurried to clamber up but I was on him in seconds. More things crackled around me, even the air sparked with my wrath. I sensed Logan, Jonah and Jayson trying to stop me but my energy was too hateful and powerful, preventing them from getting anywhere near me.

  “You said it was easy!” I yelled at my father. “You said she would be fine! You lied to me!”

  “I don’t understand,” he spluttered.

  Releasing the thin cotton of his shirt from one hand, I enclosed his throat with my fingers. “She’s dead. She’s dead. She’s dead. She’s dead!”

  His head shook from left to right, tears springing from his eyes as his lips turned blue and his fingers curled around mine in his endeavour to remain alive, but he was no match for the current of fury controlling me.

  “Please,” he choked out as his eyes started to droop. It felt good to watch the life drain from him minutes after I’d witnessed Elina’s do the same. I didn’t want to forever see her death in my mind on repeat, over and over and fucking over, torturing me until my own death was the only thing to grant relief. And now, hopefully, I would picture his instead.

  “You lied to me!” I curled my lip at him in disgust. “You lied just to find your own fucking success.”

  He shook his head, defending himself as he pleaded with his eyes.

  His body was heavy in my hold as he started to give in to death. The others were still trying to get near me, but I was so riled that my pores provided a shield around me when they emitted the excess electricity coursing through me. I could hear their frantic shouts but I didn’t care. Someone had to pay for what they had done to Elina. Even in her final moments she had been used. Manipulated in some sick game that had greedy people needing their own fucking victory.

  “Daddy.”

  I gasped when her sweet voice infiltrated my rage and echoed through my mind. She stood beside me, her hand on my arm as she looked up at me, her eyes wide but full of sorrow.

  I dropped him immediately, his body falling with a thud on the floor as his heavy gasps filled the sudden silence.

  “It’s not Grandpa’s fault, Daddy,” she said, out loud this time.

  I watched her tears tumble, a waterfall of grief falling from her eyes. I fell to the floor with the vision of her encroaching death. I could feel my soul split away from my insides to protect itself from the misery encompassing me. I couldn’t do this. I couldn’t witness both their deaths, the only two people who mattered to me. The only people I lived for.

  “Was . . . was she in pain?”

  I winced at her words, my heart splintering as a strangled whimper had her hugging me tightly against her tiny frail body.

  I made her look at me. “No, pumpkin,” I said, because if I’d witnessed anything it had been the pleasure rushing through my soul mate, her face so beautiful in her final moments. “I am so proud of her. She did it, baby.” I smiled around my cries, Lettie weeping hard but nodding and smiling with me. “She took them down. She was . . . she was amazing.”

  “She always was, Daddy.” She snuggled into my chest, releasing her grief in torturous cries that stabbed my heart and made it bleed with each one. “She was always so strong.” She lifted her eyes back to me. “I promise I’ll look after her when I get there.”

  I couldn’t seem to breathe. I had the honour of being loved by the two most remarkable girls. Their strength and courage told me that for them I needed to carry on, to come good on my promise to Elina and finish what she started.

  “I need you to hold on for me, baby.” She tilted her head slightly in question. “I have something I need to do. And I need you to be strong until I get back.”

  She understood what I was saying and she nodded. “I’ll be here.”

  Closing my eyes when her sweet scent calmed me, I held her tight before I lifted us both to our feet.

  “Where are you going?” Logan asked when I snatched up my phone and stuffed it into my back pocket.

  “To Judgement. To finish what Elina started. She only killed the system, I need to kill the source.”

  He smiled, surprisingly. “That’s more like it. Honour her, Reid. Don’t let her death be in vain.”

  I nodded. I wasn’t sure I would make it back, so my gaze roamed each person, etching their faces to memory, appreciating my family for what could be the last time.

  They all nodded when I pulled in a breath and turned away. They followed me through the hallways and into the entrance hall. Then they followed me outside and each went to their own cars. I frowned as Petra climbed into Logan’s car, and Jonah and Jayson walked over to Jayson’s car.

  “Where are you going?”

  They all turned to me with a frown. “To Judgement,” Jayson declared as if I was stupid.

  “What?”

  Jonah stared at me, confusion on his face. “We’re going with you.”

  “What? No.”

  He snorted, as did Logan and Jayson. Petra rolled her eyes and shook her head, winding down her window and sticking her head out. “We do this as a team, Reid. We finish it, for Elina. For Lettie. It’s time to raise some hell.”

  Logan grinned at her. “Fuck, baby. I like your vicious side.”

  She beamed at him, her eyes twinkling in delight. “Yeah, me too. We were created to fight, so let’s fight.”

  I couldn’t help but smile at their relationship. They were made for each other, and so in love. I was sure it couldn’t rival my love for Elina and my heart saddened at the thought but I peered at each of them, their support giving my heart a fresh beat, feeding my soul with a warmth that melt
ed a little of the ice that had formed around it.

  I turned to Lettie as she stood in the doorway with my father, his arm around her shoulders. “I promise I’ll be back. You hold on, baby.” She was so tired, so ready to give in, but I saw the promise in her eyes when she nodded.

  “Daddy!” she shouted when I walked over to Logan’s car. Turning back to her, her face crumbled a little but she swallowed it back. She struggled with what she needed to say but I stood and waited, giving her time. “Bring her back, Daddy. Bring her body home. I need to say goodbye.”

  I nodded, her little face blurring beneath my tears. “I will, I promise.”

  She nodded. “I love you.”

  I smiled, her words giving me strength. “And I love you, pumpkin. Until it hurts.” And it did hurt but it also brought me an overwhelming sense of contentment.

  Flicking my eyes to my father, he nodded. “I’ll take care of her.”

  Nodding my thanks, I slid into the car, resting my head back on the seat as I tried to hold on to my emotions. I’d need the full force of them to fight with.

  Looking up to the blackening sky, I blinked and tipped my head to study a strike of lightning burst through the sky. The clouds seemed to come to life as sparks and flashes erupted from them. Another bolt of lightning broke the darkness, and then another, until the whole night was lit with a tornado of blazing bolts, each one aimed in one direction. Judgment.

  “Fuck!” I cried out, making Logan jump and stall the car as I jolted up, my hands on the glass of the window as I grinned at each one, my heartbeat increasing with each fucking glorious strike.

  “What?” Logan gawped at me, then looked to the sky.

  “Oh my God,” Petra cried out with an excited laugh. “She made it. She only fucking did it!”

  Logan snapped his face her way, gawping at her this time. “Shit, you’re suddenly like a little minx.”

  “I know. I never knew swearing could be so . . . fulfilling.”