The Gender Game 5 by Bella Forrest (uplifting novels .txt) 📕

adjacent tents, moving down the narrow gap between them. We had to move slower here. Stakes and ropes jutted out of the ground, and we had to step over them carefully so as not to trip—or shake the tents and give away our position. Owen made sure to check each row for guards as we darted across, and I covered the rear, glancing over my shoulder, looking for any sign of pursuit.

“Left again, for five tents, then right down another path like this one.”

We moved around the tents into the wider path, and were halfway down when suddenly Violet shouted, “DUCK!”

Without thinking, I grabbed Owen’s shoulder and pushed him roughly down as something whizzed by overhead, moving so fast my hair shifted from the breeze it stirred. Looking up toward where it had landed, I saw a shadowed blur skid to a stop and whirl. The figure was small—it had to be one of the boys. He was dressed head to toe in black, with a black mask obscuring his features. Except for his eyes, which stared blankly at me.

I was keyed in for the mission, my emotions compacted into a tiny place somewhere in the back of my mind, cut off from my actions. Still, I knew what I had to do.

I stood up slowly, raising my hands and letting my gun dangle from my fingers, one hand moving cautiously to my throat to turn off my subvocalizer. “Hey,” I said softly, trying to get the boy’s attention, my voice cracking as my vocal cords unfroze. “We’re not going to hurt you, buddy. I’m Viggo.”

The boy’s eyes stared at me. No, they stared through me, still vacant, devoid of anything resembling emotion. After a pause, he cocked his head, as if listening to something.

“Affirmative,” he replied, confirming my suspicions. He was receiving orders from somewhere.

So sudden was his movement that I had no time to react. One second he was staring at me, his eyes empty of anything resembling a personality—the next he was in motion. I had a moment to brace myself, preparing for impact, when suddenly the blur before me became an uncontrolled tumble. Owen’s hands pushed me hard, and I slid right as the boy flew between the two of us, hitting the ground and sliding into a tent. I heard the thump as he hit the ground inside, taking a set of stakes and poles with him, and as he whirled with a grunt, the tent collapsed around him.

“What just happened?” I growled at Owen, so shocked that I let my words slip out loud.

He gave me a chagrined look as I switched my subvocalizer back on. I threw my gun at him, he replied, glancing at the tent. I didn’t even have time to think—I think it tripped him.

I blinked once. I could explore how much luck we had expended with that one later. For now, we needed to get moving.

“Viggo, another one is drawing close,” Violet gasped through the earbud.

Owen was already a few steps ahead of me, a knife glinting in his hand, and I started to follow… then turned back, staring at the collapsed tent, the fabric billowing where the boy thrashed and rolled silently around. I wondered if he was upsetting bodies in that tent, too. I heard Owen hissing my name through the subvocalizer, but I ignored it, taking a tentative step back toward the tent.

“Viggo,” Violet’s voice said tightly.

I couldn’t leave the boy behind. Not only was it possible we might get important information from him… but more than that, I couldn’t let Desmond and Elena continue to use him like this.

“What are you doing, Viggo? You guys need to get out of there!”

Trust me, I replied to Violet’s anxious voice, working as fast as I could.

I reached forward and yanked at the tent, pulling at the collapsed material until I uncovered the boy tangled in a lumpy pile of canvas and bodies, grunting as he tried to shift the objects off him, his mask askew. Hesitating for only a heartbeat, I reached out with my left hand and snatched at his mask, keeping my gun trained on him just in case. The boy’s hands reached up from among the wreckage, and he grabbed my hand in a grip that felt too weak to be that of an enhanced human, but he was too late. The mask was off.

I froze, my heart stopping for a moment as I recognized Cody, one of the boys who had been in the first group I had trained. Once he had taken a swing at me, but I had taken him down to prove a point. As I looked at him, I felt deep anger rising up in my chest. Cody wasn’t some dead-eyed drone; he had been precocious and challenging. And he was only eleven. Elena was not only using genetically modified teenagers, but children in her disgusting war.

Cody didn’t even seem to register that I’d removed the mask. His eyes still vacant, he let go of my arm, panting with exertion as he pushed at a dead man who had flopped out over his legs. I took a chance and holstered my gun, then quickly plucked the earbud from his ear and slipped it into my pocket, wondering if it might be useful.

Immediately Cody’s movements stilled, and he gazed at me, his face blank, his mouth hanging slightly open. As gently as I could, I grabbed his shirt and then carefully leveled a blow at his jaw, wincing as it impacted. He immediately went limp. Feeling sick, I carefully dragged the unconscious boy out of the tent and into my arms, taking a few more of our precious moments to check his pulse. I hated having to hit him, but even little Cody was too dangerous to take with us while he was conscious—I had no idea what he would do awake, how deep his loyalty to Desmond truly ran.

I heard fidgeting behind me and was suddenly grateful he hadn’t