“Hand-to-hand combat.” Once more he reached out, but this time he tweaked a strand of my hair instead of tapping my nose. Then he moved to brush the strand behind my ear. Before the action was complete, though, he stiffened. He dropped his arm to his side and cleared his throat. He backed two steps away. “This isn't a bad place to be. You might even come to love it.”
What had that been about? Why had he moved away? Unsure about everything, I gazed down at my feet. Dirt dusted my boots, and splashes of dried beer stained the tops. “I just, I don't know,” I admitted.
“Tell me what you don't know. I'll help you know.”
I wished I could, but my mind was suddenly blank. Dark. So many emotions coursed through me that I couldn't name them all.
“Do you have a home to go back to, Phoenix?” he asked, showing no mercy.
I bit my bottom lip. My mom had truly washed her hands of me; there would be no going back to her. She didn't even say good-bye. God, how that still cut. Even my dad, pathetic coward that he was, had said good-bye.
If I returned, she'd just send me to another camp. And the next one could be a thousand times worse than this.
Here, at least, I would learn to fight, to defend myself and my world. Can you kill? I'd told them I could; I knew I could if necessary. But I didn't think I was ready to do it. Not really. I shuddered to think of what that first death blow would be like. Still…“I'll stay,” I said, my tone almost inaudible. I'd stay. For now. If, later, I decided to leave, I'd leave and nothing they said or did would stop me.
Slowly Ryan grinned. “I'm glad.”
When he smiled at me like that, I was glad, too. I gulped, warm, tingling, suddenly needing to be touched. Kissed. I didn't understand my reaction to him, so I quickly changed the subject. “So, um, who were some of those people in there? Like the ballerina?”
“Ballerina?” He choked, his eyes nearly bugging out, and banged his chest with a fist. He cleared his throat. “You mean the dark-haired, violet-eyed babe?”
I nodded, not liking that he called the woman a babe.
His grin grew wider. “That's Mia Snow, the one who fought for you. Don't make her mad and don't let her hear you call her a ballerina. Something happened to her, I don't know what, that's eased some of the hate inside her, but she's still one of the most vicious, temperamental people I've ever met. She kills first and asks questions later.”
And they let the woman around kids? Fabulous.
“The brown-haired woman with the hazel eyes is Le'Ace,” Ryan said.
Ah, the perfect-looking one. The one with features so fine she could have walked straight from a priceless work of art.
“She's…I don't know if there's a word for what she is,” Ryan told me. “She was genetically altered and is stronger, smarter, faster than anyone you've ever seen. She is emotionless and will not disobey her commanders for any reason. If she's told to destroy someone, she destroys them. Age doesn't matter, gender doesn't matter. Background doesn't matter. They're simply dead.”
“Is she even human?”
“No one's brave enough to ask her,” he answered with a grin.
My eyes widened again. Dear Lord. It just got worse and worse. These were the people I was going to learn from? “What about the man who asked me all those questions? The one with silver hair and sunglasses?”
A dark blanket descended over Ryan's features, cutting off all sense of amusement. He appeared as emotionless as he claimed Le'Ace was. “That's Boss. He's been around a while and helped start A.I.R. He's in charge of everything and everyone here, and you do what he says, when he says it. No argument. The consequences for disobeying him are always harsh.”
“And the redhead with the sweet voice?”
“That's Siren.”
Perfect name, I thought. She had a bad personality, but I suspected her voice could convince people to do anything. “Is she human?”
“Yeah. Don't worry, though. You won't see much of her. She helps gather the new recruits and then disappears for a while. I don't know where.”
Before I could respond, the door opened. A young girl was ushered inside the room by Roses. She had the weirdest hair I'd ever seen, with orange-gold stripes and brown and white hunks. Her eyes were up-tilted and golden, the irises pointed on top and bottom. Her skin was a pretty amber.
Roses somehow seemed taller and more muscled than I remembered. “Phoenix, meet Kitten,” he said, “Kitten, meet Phoenix.”
Kitten's lips curled in a welcoming smile, and I returned the greeting, no longer feeling quite so alone. She wasn't the ginormous musclegirl I'd envisioned. She was actually delicate and serene looking, like the other Terans I'd seen.
How had this creature fought an Ell Rollis and won?
“Nice to see you,” she said.
“You, too.” Why had an alien been chosen for an alien-fighting camp? Seemed weird to me. Wouldn't that mean she'd have to kill her own kind?
“Now I know everyone's name but yours,” I said to Roses.
“I am Kadar.” He leveled a hard gaze on Ryan. “Let's go, boy. Your father wants you back in the room.”
His father?
I must have said the words aloud because Kadar said, “Boss. Top Brass, the big cheese.”
My mouth fell open, and I glanced questioningly at Ryan.
He wasn't looking at me but at Kadar—who was in the process of turning on his heel and striding away, completely unconcerned. Ryan followed after him without a word. The moment he left the room, the door closed with a quiet whoosh.
His dad was the man in charge. I didn't know what to think of that.
“What the hell was that Q and A about?” Kitten burst out the moment we were alone. “They asked me the freakiest questions ever. Ev-er. My sister told me they'd interview me, but she didn't mention an all-out interrogation. They knew about every mistake I'd ever made.”
“Me, too.” Thankfully she didn't ask what my mistakes were. I explained what Ryan had told me, and Kitten's eyes—those lovely cat eyes of hers—titled higher. She actually purred.
“How long do you think we'll have to stay in this room?” she asked, rubbing her hands together. “I'm ready for action.”
“I don't know.” Also I didn't know why Boss failed to explain any of this to us. Did he want us left in the dark? If so, why? I mean, if the man's goal was to heap as much stress on us as possible, he'd already succeeded.
“I wonder how many kids are here and how they'll react to me,” she said, the barest hint of vulnerability in her voice. “You know, 'cause I'm an Outer.”