"Tell me," Ciari said slowly, struggling to wrap her thoughts around a concept she no longer understood, "why you need me."

Words flowed over her when Jael spoke, sound that told a story Ciari tried hard to feel connected to. Except that she didn't-couldn't.

In the end, when Jael finally left her alone, Ciari was certain of only three things. She was still a Cla.s.s III empath; that genetic fact could not be changed. She could still use her power, on others and on herself. She simply had no name for the emotions she could play with and no reason to care why, either about the people she would have to apply it to or the people she was required to lead and to protect.

TWENTY-TWO.

SEPTEMBER 2379.

TORONTO, CANADA.

The pain in her head reminded Threnody of when she peeled burned skin off her hands in the Arctic, how it came free one ragged piece at a time. The way Jael sought to flay her mind felt the exact same way.

The Cla.s.s III telepath had already stripped most of Threnody's mental s.h.i.+elds from her mind, her personal defenses broken down to their foundations. Now Jael contended with the safeguards Lucas had left in Threnody's mind, and for all that Jael was a skilled psi surgeon, breaking past a s.h.i.+eld erected by a Cla.s.s I telepath was practically impossible.

Coughing, Threnody spat out saliva mixed with blood, tasting the coppery tang of iron on her tongue. She kept her eyes closed. "Just ask me your questions," she rasped, the words coming out slow.

Strapped to a chair in an empty cell, Threnody's hands and feet were encased in rubber gloves that stretched to her elbows and rubber boots that hit her knees. Around her throat was a heavy metal neurocollar with tiny needles that cut into the skin of her throat and into her spine. The external device acted like a neurotracker, a precaution against her using the power she'd been born with. A dark bruise discolored the right side of her face from where her head had hit the wall when Keiko slammed her into it. Keiko's brutality had been unexpected, and Threnody wondered how badly things had frayed in the Strykers Syndicate since her defection.

"We aren't interested in your lies," Aidan said, voice flat and clinical.

Threnody forced her eyes open, blinking rapidly to clear her vision. She winced as the harsh light in the cell nearly blinded her. "They wouldn't be lies."

She hadn't set foot in the Strykers Syndicate since July, when she was a.s.signed a suicidal mission to track a target that couldn't be caught. The target turned out to be Lucas, and the mission had brought her full circle to the only home she'd ever known before she tasted freedom.

Threnody managed to smile at that delirious thought as she looked at Jael, the black woman swimming in her vision. "I want to speak with Ciari."

Pain. It ripped through her mind like one of Quinton's firestorms, burning her from the inside out. Threnody's head snapped back and she let out a strangled cry. She only had Lucas's singular s.h.i.+eld to hide behind and she wondered, distantly, if it would be enough. He didn't answer her. No psi link connected them, just the faint touch of his power.

"Aidan," Jael snapped out. "I already said that isn't going to work."

"Keiko said she wanted answers when she got back. Staying our hand isn't going to get those for her," Aidan said, sounding frustrated.

"I doubt Ciari wants Threnody dead, and the strength required to break through that last s.h.i.+eld would probably kill her."

"She isn't a telepath. How the h.e.l.l is she holding it up?"

Panting heavily, Threnody felt blood pool in her nose and had to let her head fall forward to let it drain out instead of back into her lungs. It dripped onto her thighs, soaking into the patched clothes she still wore.

"You didn't tag me for retrieval," Threnody coughed out, feeling blood slid down the back of her throat. "'S'okay, Lucas is better than Nathan."

The sudden quiet in her cell wasn't comforting. Nothing about her current position was comforting.

"What do you know about retrieval?" Jael said, the words sounding as if they were pulled out of her by force.

Threnody laughed, soft and low. It made her ribs hurt. Keiko hadn't pulled her power when she telekinetically hit her.

"Ask me your f.u.c.king questions." Threnody lifted her head, staring at the two Stryker officers who were still beholden to the whims of their human masters by way of the neurotrackers in their heads. "Or ask Ciari. Either way, get on with it."

Telepathy curled through her bruised mind once again, attempting to cut into the last defense she had against people she once trusted.

TWENTY-THREE.

SEPTEMBER 2379.

LONGYEARBYEN, NORWAY.

Keiko squinted through the lenses of her binoculars, glad for the shade the shuttle wing provided. Her gaze caught on the magnified metal wedge protruding from the mountainside and the road that wound its way up to their eventual destination. The visual was enough for a teleport, but they weren't ready to move yet.

Behind her stood Terrence Finn, a Cla.s.s V psychometrist. He silently took the binoculars from Keiko when she pa.s.sed them to him. Born with a power that shared traits from both telepathy and empathy, Terrence could pull memories out of inanimate objects. He'd been on medical leave in Toronto after fighting in Buffalo, making it easy for Keiko to add him to the small team of Strykers a.s.signed this mission.

Only four of them had been ordered out: Keiko, Terrence, a telepath, and a pyrokinetic. They'd flown across the Arctic Ocean to this island on the World Court's orders. Erik had imparted to her the details of the mission and the location of the outpost in person, not trusting an uplink after the current political mess running through the media. Their contact here hadn't bothered to leave his shuttle, and Keiko had stopped trying to get orders out of Elion after the first try.

I wonder if Ciari knew about this place, Keiko thought as she surveyed the dead land that surrounded the abandoned airfield.

They couldn't access the Svalbard Global Seed and Gene Bank yet. Not until the World Court's appointed leader of this mission arrived on a government-charted shuttle. He landed less than an hour later.

We really need to stop meeting like this, Keiko, Nathan said as he stepped off the shuttle. Two Warhounds in the guise of human bodyguards and a quad followed him. Meters away, Elion was disembarking from his own shuttle, coming to join their small group.

Keiko realized right then just how little they knew about Nathan's political maneuverings. Or at least, how little she knew. Despite taking over as the Acting OIC, Keiko knew certain details were locked in Ciari's head that could be the difference between living and dying. Keiko wished she knew them. Lifting her chin, Keiko watched the group's approach in silence.

"Strykers," Nathan said when his group got within hearing range, "the World Court has seen fit to give me your contract."

You're enjoying this far too much, Nathan, Keiko said, shoving the words into the public area of her mind.

The expression on his face didn't change. No, I'm not.

"Sir," Keiko said, careful not to make the word grate.

"I was told there would be a psychometrist in this group," Nathan said, his eyes resting unerringly on Terrence. "Which one of you is it?"

Terrence took a step forward. "I am."

For Keiko, it was strange to face Nathan with people who knew nothing of his true ident.i.ty. Nathan lived a brilliant lie, Keiko had to admit. Brilliant and deadly. The Silence Law would dictate their actions here, with she as the psion and Nathan as nothing more than human. It would be a tricky dance.

"I've got a visual on the mountain," Keiko said, looking between Nathan and Elion. "Whenever you're ready, I can teleport us there."

"How many Strykers did you bring?" Elion said, sounding agitated.

"Four, myself included." Keiko tilted her head at the shuttle behind her. "Our telepath and pyrokinetic are monitoring the security grid. We've been waiting for your arrival before we proceeded up the mountain."

"We're here now," Nathan said. He turned his head to stare up at the mountainside. "Teleport us."

Keiko steadied her mind before wrapping her power around everyone. She teleported them up to the road that led to the seed bank's entrance. Elion and the quads stumbled a bit on their arrival; no one else did. People who were used to the quirks of a teleport-where the telekinetics always 'ported a few centimeters or more higher than the ground of their targeted location-didn't stumble.

"The ramp can support our weight," Elion said as quads moved to slide open the doors.

Lights came on, brightening the tunnel in sections. The group moved quickly down its length. When Keiko took her first steps into the long storage vault, all she saw was a mess of scattered boxes holding silver-foil packets and gla.s.s vials strewn across shelves and the floor. All she felt was quiet, fragile disbelief.

It was one thing to be told about a place such as this. Actually seeing it in person was almost painful. This place, this vast seed bank, was the whole reason why humanity had survived after the last bomb fell. Keiko knew of the launch; she hadn't known about this.

"We've lost half the inventory," Elion said. "We have everything that we need, just not in the amounts we expected."

"And the terraforming machines?" Nathan asked, dark blue eyes sweeping over the mess before them. He ignored the startled look the rest of the party gave him at that revelation.

Elion's voice was bitter. "A third of those are gone as well. Whoever was behind this didn't seem to care about taking everything, just enough of it."

"Or they simply didn't have the means or the time to finish the job." Nathan turned and headed for the hallway. "Show me the rest of the damage."

Elion led Nathan down the length of each of the three cold-storage vaults, reporting on their losses. Only when Nathan's inspection was complete did he speak again.

"The psychometrist will begin with the main door," Nathan said.

Terrence led them back to the front entrance. The doors were still in their casings, but he wasn't going to work with those yet. Unsealing his left glove, Terrence pulled his hand free. He lost the warmth that the insulation provided, but he ignored the cold. Taking a deep breath, he raised his hand to the cold metal of the control panel and pressed his skin against it. He didn't hesitate, so none of the humans present knew that he feared using his power. The neurotracker in his brain denied him the right to protest, denied him the right to give in to the fear that all psychometrists experienced when using their power.

Terrence dropped his mental s.h.i.+elds, pulling memories out of cold metal. Memories that were both old and distant, too faint to catch completely, or s.h.i.+ning bright and sharp against the backdrop of the mental grid. Terrence's mind opened wide and swallowed the memories whole, instances, moments, that people unknowingly pressed into the physical world around them.

Tell Nathan he can go to h.e.l.l, Lucas Serca said into Terrence's mind, the clear message left behind days ago for them to find.

Telepathy that didn't come from the embedded memory slammed through Terrence's mind, meeting zero resistance since his s.h.i.+elds were down. The attack happened so quickly that Keiko didn't know Terrence was dead until he hit the ground. She stared at the Stryker in shock, forcing herself to not look at where Nathan stood.

"What happened?" Elion said, pointing at the dead Stryker. "What the h.e.l.l just happened?"

You didn't have to kill him, Keiko said, fury breaking up her thoughts as she dropped to her knees beside Terrence, fingers searching for a pulse that wasn't going to be there.

Nathan's gaze was unapologetic. I don't have time to deal with a broken Silence Law.

He didn't know a G.o.dd.a.m.n thing about the Silence Law. What did he see?

It's not your concern. Out loud, Nathan said, "Yes. Do explain what happened to the Stryker."

Keiko stared at the body beside her. Blood trickled out of Terrence's nose, dripping slowly to the ground.

"I don't know. I'm not a 'path-oriented psion," Keiko said, forcing her voice calm as she pushed herself back to her feet, brus.h.i.+ng dirt off her knees. "I'm guessing it must have been a mental trap."

"How is that even possible?" Elion said.

"Please, give me a few minutes to find out." She glanced over at Nathan. Was it Lucas that he saw?

Nathan's gaze didn't waver. Call your telepath, Keiko.

Keiko shook her head, as if she could shake his mental touch out of her mind. She opened herself up to the psi link someone else had st.i.tched into her mind. Eva.

Yes?

I'm bringing you up here. Terrence is dead. Whatever was left in the walls killed him.

Well, s.h.i.+t.

The Cla.s.s VI telepath gave Keiko a visual of the shuttle for the telekinetic to find her. Keiko reached for the Stryker over the distance between mountain and shuttle, teleporting the telepath to their position. Eva Collingsworth landed lightly on the road beyond the support ramp. She was a pet.i.te woman in her midtwenties; dark-haired, dark-eyed, with heavy scarring over the lower half of her face and throat. Her body didn't have the capability to accept biomodifications, and cellular regeneration had never worked for her. Eva had lost her voice when she was twelve. Telepathy was her only means of communication.

I'm not a psychometrist, Keiko, Eva said, eyes narrowing with emotion that showed nowhere else on her face. And Terrence is dead. What do you expect me to find?

Pretend you're trying to get something out of the hole in the mental grid, Keiko said. See if you can't possibly find out what killed him. Let me deal with the humans.

Eva inclined her head to the people in charge before closing her eyes.

"Eva is looking for answers," Keiko said, turning to face Elion and not Nathan. "Telepaths aren't psychometrists, sir. Whatever was left behind by whatever rogue psion who was here, I don't know if Eva will find it."

Elion glared at her. "We need answers, Stryker."

"We're trying to get that for you," Keiko said, sounding frustrated. "I don't know what killed Terrence, but if whatever it was is still embedded in these walls, then it's not safe."

"I don't care if you think it's not safe. You're not in charge. Your contract was handed over to us and you have an obligation to obey the World Court."

"I mean no disrespect, but the World Court hasn't issued a kill order for any Stryker here. Let us do the job you brought us here to do in order to keep you safe. Sir."

Elion opened his mouth to argue, or perhaps to threaten to activate the neurotracker in her head, but Nathan interrupted whatever tirade the other man was about to indulge in.

"Elion," Nathan said. "Let them do their job."