Page 56 of Kingdom of Tomorrow
I did, and my jaw dropped. The ceiling was transparent. For the first time in my entire life, I peered up at a night sky, and the beauty stole my breath. Pinpricks of light glittered in a bed of black velvet. Stars I’d only ever read about in books or seen in pictures, unable to glimpse from my tiny bedroom window while pritis lights glowed from buildings around the city. The photos had failed to accurately portray the miracle of the in-person sight.
“It’s glorious,” I breathed.
“Yes.”
“Thisis a utopia.”
“Yes. Until you see past the veneer.”
My brow furrowed. What did that mean?
Commotion around us drew my attention to the rest of the room. Rounded walls covered in iridescent crystals. A dazzling golden floor. Pure luxury. “Walkers” recovering from travel.
Behind us, Juniper appeared from thin air, dropping to her knees. A fully recovered Roman rushed over to pull her up, and Cyrus released me at last. He said nothing else before stalking off to join a contingent of uniformed officers.
Titus arrived, appearing shell shocked, and I bounded over to assist him. He clung to me, as I’d clung to Cyrus.
I patted his back and offered the same words of comfort I’d been given. “You’re all right. You’re here. It’s over.”
He drew in a ragged breath, his tremors fading. “Thank you.”
“No problem.”
As more and more soldiers showed up, free space shrank. On-site medics hurried to examine those who vomited, passed out, or screamed.When Lark emerged, the last member of our team, Roman ordered us to huddle together.
“Welcome to the Annex. As the HP explained, we’ll be safe inside a heavily guarded facility as we do our ride-along with ground patrol today and tomorrow. I’d love to tell you we get to take a beat and regroup before we start, but one day we’ll be sent through a rift and straight into combat. This is how we prepare. For that reason, our shift kicks off in ten. We’re heading to dock 3, where we’ll be linked to a preassigned partner. Don’t speak again until you’re secured in a POD or in an off-duty sector.”
I didn’t understand the need for silence, but I chose to obey the rule.
Roman guided us through a building as massive as Fort Bala. Opulence abounded. Windowed walls revealed a sea of shadows with hints of flashing lights in the distance. Veins of gold ran through a polished white floor. High ceilings accommodated an array of statues featuring the same male, with the top half of a human and the bottom half of some sort of dinosaur. He was unlike any statue in Ourland. A hood covered his face, and a long tail curled in a counterclockwise circle. Precious gems glittered from top to bottom.
Did anyone offer historical tours?
We entered a large room filled with hundreds of soundproof cubicles. Each possessed a side table and a central dais with a fat metal bar protruding from its back end. In some of the cubicles, a soldier, appearing to mime, stood atop the pedestal, banded in place.
An older woman stood behind a counter. Roman approached her first, and she motioned to an ID pad. He pressed his palm flat. She typed something, swiped up a small metal card and a small box, and passed both to him. Off he went. When my turn arrived, she and I followed the same process.
I dragged my feet to an unoccupied POD. To whom was I to be linked?
Having memorized the steps I was to take, I entered, inserted the card into the proper slot on the console, and donned the required attire:a two-piece bodysuit meant to go over my clothing, plus a headband and gloves, all of which waited on the side table. The box contained a pair of contacts.
I secured everything, then took my place on the pedestal. A whirling sound preceded the emergence of rounded bars from the pole. Those bars circled my waist. Multicolored lights flashed over the glass walls, a picture forming. A spacious bedroom with a massive bed, buttery-soft-looking sheets, and a nightstand with a decanter of amber liquid.
“What the—” My body moved of its own accord, directed by the bodysuit. It felt as if someone pulled my puppet strings. I couldn’t stop and soon realized I was acting out the motions of putting a gun together.
“Hello, Pink.” The familiar voice brimmed with amusement, spilling through the room from speakers instead of the disks behind my ears. “You’re early.”
“Cyrus?”Oh no I did not.I walked in place, a tread rolling beneath my feet. “I obviously meantHigh Prince Dolion,” I said as I mimicked turning a knob. On the screen, a door opened. Because of the contacts, I saw the whole thing as if I were right there with him.
“Obviously.” He didn’t comment about my slip of the tongue any other way. Not giving me permission to use his name again but not issuing a rebuke, either, and I wasn’t sure what to think.
He paused at a full-length mirror, giving me a glimpse of his reflection.Oh my.He wore all black, with tactical gear anchored in place. A vest loaded with weapons and a belt heavy with even more. Two swords crisscrossed on his back, the handles rising over his broad shoulders.
“Unlike the other soldiers,” he said, “I’m not guarding pritis mines or fighting feeders. I’m on a special mission. There’s a plant growing in a field that occasionally produces a bundle of red berries. Most maddened ignore the fruit, but a rare few flock to it. On three separate occasions, a feeder has eaten them and recovered from the Madness within seconds.”
Talk about a major game changer. I must see this plant! “What happened to them after they healed?”
A prolonged silence only added fuel to my curiosity. Finally he said, “One made it through a nearby rift but two were killed by feeders.” He refocused the conversation. “We’ve never managed to obtain the berries for testing, but we hope to change that tonight. There’s a cluster in bloom, and I’m tasked with retrieval.”
