The Prince's Trap Read online

  “Pollux and Hector, get out there and stand guard. We need to protect our own, and they may need the help when they get here. Echo, keep your eyes on Castor and Atalanta, tell us if they get in any more trouble. I’ll be at the controls so we can take off right when they get here.” Brock turned back toward the cockpit to complete his preflight procedure, but he stopped abruptly and turned, realizing he’d forgotten someone. “And Apollo, you just stay where you are,” he added snidely as he looked at Landon with laser focus. “We don’t need you getting in the way.”

  Landon’s jaw dropped and he stared at Brock with an expression of shock and infuriation. Get in the way? What’s that supposed to mean? he thought. His blood surged through his body as his blood pressure spiked. Get in the way? Landon ground his teeth and clutched the front of his armrest to restrain himself. After everything I’ve done, he still doesn’t think I belong here?

  If it weren’t for Cortland giving Landon an encouraging slap on the shoulder, Landon may have lost control and lashed out, but instead, he took a slow and steady breath and attempted to calm down. What else do I have to do to prove myself? he wondered. It was moments like this that made Landon remember why he disliked Brock.

  Landon caught a final glimpse of Cortland and Jeremiah as they headed down the ramp at the back of the Alpha Chariot. Peregrine looked to be in a meditative state; her eyes were closed as she breathed steadily, obviously keeping an “eye” on the missing Pantheon members. Brock continued to fiddle with the console in the cockpit.

  Torn between obeying orders and doing all he could to help the teammates he was responsible for trapping return safely, Landon found himself glancing down the ramp every few seconds to see if anything appeared amiss. Unfortunately, nothing could be seen but the morning sunlight as it shone on the steely ramp, and the vibrantly lit patch of grass at the bottom. The silence in which he resided was palpable, the anticipation torturous, and Landon just wanted them to get out of there.

  Then Peregrine called down to Cortland and Jeremiah. “They’re coming through,” she yelled to alert them.

  The faint sounds of rustling leaves and shifting branches could be heard from where Landon sat. Cortland was saying something, but Landon couldn’t make it out. It took every ounce of his willpower to stay put. Then the gunfire started.

  Landon envisioned the security officers breaking through the tree line, viciously attacking his teammates, and doing their best to stop the Pantheon’s departure by any means necessary. Bullets pinged and ricocheted off the sides of the Alpha Chariot, sounding like pebbles in a tin can as the noise echoed through the cabin.

  Once Landon heard the first yell, he couldn’t accept being a bystander any longer. He disengaged his harness and rushed out of his seat, scurrying down the ramp with as much speed as he could muster. The light of the morning sun blinded him momentarily, but once his eyes adjusted he saw Parker and Joshua approaching the aircraft. Joshua was injured; he limped badly, unable to put much weight on his left leg, and Parker was supporting him, shouldering his weight and determinedly dragging him along to the Alpha Chariot as quickly as possible.

  Twenty security guards inched into the clearing from the tree line with guns raised; additional forces emerging from the forest behind them swelled their ranks by the second. Cortland and Jeremiah worked desperately to inhibit them, employing their telekinetic abilities to lift and toss the guards back into the trees.

  Instinctively, Landon rushed toward Parker and Joshua to help them onto the tilt-rotor transport. It would all be over if they were on board. When he reached them, he found a security guard dangerously close to them with his gun pointed directly at Joshua’s back. With the flick of Landon’s wrist, the man flew backward as if a wrecking ball had hit him. For a moment, Landon wondered how he’d launched the man so far—he’d only tried to stop him, throw him off of his feet, but the security guard flew back at a breakneck speed and disappeared behind the thick brush with a violent thud.

  Landon went to Joshua’s right side and helped support him by pulling Joshua’s arm over his shoulders and gripping him on the side with his other arm. They rushed toward the ramp, but Joshua’s injury definitely slowed them down.

  Ten yards from the ramp, a sharp, debilitating pain exploded in his lower back. I’ve been shot! he realized in disbelief as the searing pain caused him to collapse, which in turn pulled Joshua and Parker to the ground. Parker stood up quickly, grabbed Joshua and continued towards the aircraft, but Landon lay on the ground unable to move or catch his breath.

  Time moved at a snail’s pace, creeping along second by second yet feeling like hours. The pain was unlike anything he’d ever felt. It was like someone had hit him full-force in the soft part of his back with a sledgehammer. Even with the pain, Landon heard Brock’s voice in his head saying, “You’ll get in the way.” Landon had disobeyed a direct order from his commanding officer by helping Parker and Joshua get to the transport, and now he was the one needing help. He tried to crawl toward the ramp, biting his lower lip as he fought through the pain, but his movement was labored and slow. At this pace, it was going to take him forever to reach the Alpha Chariot.

  Landon inched closer and closer to the large grey mass in front of him. The tears dredged up by pain blurred his vision. He couldn’t see Cortland or Jeremiah to call for help, but he knew they were preoccupied. The sounds of gunfire and the yells of surprise as security guards were telekinetically eliminated by Cortland and Jeremiah could still be heard all round him. Landon had to get back to the aircraft on his own, but then he felt someone grab him by the arm and side and hoist him to his feet.

  Before he realized it, he was up the ramp and released into his seat. The pain that surged through his body when his back made contact with his chair was almost as difficult to endure as his original injury, but he choked back the pain, wiped the water from his eyes and looked up to see who had rescued him. Brock looked down at him with a disgusted expression on his face before he quickly turned and made a beeline for the cockpit. Had Brock really saved him? How had he known Landon needed help?

  Landon then heard Cortland and Jeremiah rush up the ramp and push the button to close the door. The sound of bullets against the hull reverberated through the hollow cabin.

  “Door secured! Get us out of here Ares!” Cortland yelled up to Brock as he returned to his seat and engaged his harness.

  The nauseating sensation of takeoff briefly stole Landon’s attention away from the pain in his back. It gave him a moment to realize how much damage his attempt to sabotage the mission had caused: Cortland was coming down from the adrenaline rush of fighting off the security guards; Parker looked to be in a state of exhaustion after lugging Joshua from the building; and Peregrine sat back in her seat, trying to keep out of the way. Why didn’t I take her approach and just stay where I was supposed to? Jeremiah, however, was not strapped into his seat, instead attempting to stabilize his brother’s leg. Joshua grimaced terribly the whole time.

  Watching Jeremiah help his brother looked somewhat strange to Landon. The Crane twins were so identical that they were more like clones than twins, and seeing one help the other was like watching someone playing doctor with his reflection, especially when they were wearing their identical tactical uniforms. Everything about them was the same. They had the same speech patterns, the same mannerisms, and the same incorrigible personalities. Although short, they were the same height. They had the same pale skin. Their eyes were the same bright blue. Even their sandy brown hair was identical; it was buzzed to the same length.

  When the metallic pings of bullets against the hull diminished, Landon imagined they were finally free of Nitranos Industries and safely on their way home to the Gymnasium. He took a deep breath. The pressure the harness put on Landon’s torso alleviated the sting in his lower back, allowing his thoughts to clear the fog of pain. For a moment he felt a bit of relaxation,
but then he remembered: He still hadn’t figured out a way to destroy the atomizer, and it rested safely inside the cargo container near the cockpit.

  Landon stared at the box, wondering how he could destroy it. His prospects looked bleak; it was encased in a metal container at the front of aircraft, and Landon sat farthest from it in the back. There would be no opportunity for him to get the atomizer without someone noticing. As he focused on it more and more, he realized he could sense something—the atomizer. It fell within his tactometric sphere, and he could feel its presence through the metal. Unlike the Nitranos vault, the cargo box wasn’t coated in ichorium. And why would it be? It was in the Alpha Chariot, safely guarded by the loyal members of the Pantheon.

  Landon shut his eyes and tried to block out the noises in the cabin, attempting to concentrate solely on his abilities and sense the device as clearly as he could. After Thought Reception, Tactometry was his worst area of training. He couldn’t get a clear picture of his surroundings unless he really concentrated and even then, the objects were generally fuzzy, not concrete and definable as they were supposed to be after extensive practice.

  Even so, Landon felt the atomizer. Initially, his perception of it was blurry. He could tell it was a little, hard sphere, like a glass paperweight. He knew, however, that there must be a number of components inside it that made the invention work, but he couldn’t discern them. What he could feel was the hollow space in the center of the invention, presumably the cavity where it stored the chemical substance to be dispersed.

  Being able to sense the device changed everything, but Landon had to think quickly. The flight back to the Gymnasium wasn’t very long, so his timeframe to do something narrowed with every passing second. After wracking his brain to come up with every possible option, he realized there was only one: He had to destroy it. But he needed to do it in a very specific way. If he managed to make it look like it destroyed itself, the team might very well conclude that it had some kind of self-destruct contraption build into it as a safeguard against theft. If he did it right, he would look completely innocent of any tampering.

  To help his alibi, Landon slumped down in his chair and rested his head against the side of the aircraft, hoping to give the impression that the intensity of the mission had exhausted him, and he was taking a quick power nap. Then, as inconspicuously as possible, he refocused his abilities and concentrated on the hollow center of the atomizer. He took his time, making sure he was ready and able to do what he planned before setting his plot in motion. He only had one chance, and if he did it wrong, it would be evident that someone had intentionally destroyed the atomizer.

  When he felt comfortable, Landon took a deep, nervous breath in through his nose and attempted to set off an explosion of telekinetic force inside the hollow area of the device. Hoping his abilities would do what he imagined, he concentrated on a point and thought of the air around that point being forced out with a massive amount of power. His shock when he heard a concussive sound emanate from the metal storage container was matched by the immediate reactions of everyone in the Alpha Chariot.

  Landon opened his eyes and jumped as if surprised. Cortland was first to disengage his harness and rush to the box. Landon watched as the metal top slid open, eagerly yet nervously awaiting Cortland’s reaction to what he discovered inside. The smoke trail that escaped from the container made Landon feel hopeful, but it wasn’t over yet.

  “The atomizer!” Cortland slouched, clearly dismayed, as he lifted a handful of debris out of the container. “It’s ruined.”

  “What do you mean ruined?” Brock asked forcefully from the cockpit.

  “Like I said,”—Cortland sounded annoyed. Landon was always amazed at how quickly people become agitated when a situation became the least bit tense—“it’s ruined. Nitranos must have installed some kind of anti-theft tech. I’m guessing it was proximity-based; we had to take it a certain distance from their lab to trigger the explosive.”

  Landon wore a contrived look of surprise, but in the back of his mind he allowed himself a heavy sigh of relief. It had worked; he had managed to complete what Celia had asked of him. The device was destroyed, and Cortland had said, without provocation, exactly what Landon had needed him to say.

  “It’s ruined?” Brock asked again in shock.

  “Yes, it’s ruined!” Cortland yelled back. “It’s beyond ruined,” Landon heard him add softly under his breath as he brushed off tiny dust particles of the atomizer on his thigh and returned to his seat.

  CHAPTER TWO

  A NEW ARRIVAL

  Brock lowered the Alpha Chariot through the retractable steel roof of the Olympic Tower and landed it safely on the hangar floor. The remainder of the flight back to the Gymnasium had been silent. Everyone wore expressions of disappointment or frustration, and no one wanted to talk to anyone.

  Once the hatch opened, the team disengaged their harnesses and proceeded down into the Stable, the top floor of the Olympic Tower and the Pantheon’s aircraft hangar, obviously ready to end the so-far depressing day. Landon stayed in his seat, hoping to avoid any unnecessary conversation.

  As he waited for the aircraft to empty, he watched Brock push a sequence of buttons on the front console, which caused the storage box containing the fragments of the atomizer to detach. A quick hiss broke through the silence as the undetectable latches disengaged the container.

  Brock’s face held a grimace Landon thought would make orphans cry. He telekinetically raised the container off the floor and grabbed it out of the air as he stomped down the aisle to the ramp. Landon’s head went a bit foggy as his blood quickened; he was expecting a verbal reaming by his commanding officer, but Brock never said a word to him. He just gave Landon a menacing look before continuing on his way.

  • • • • •

  When Landon entered the men’s locker room in the Olympic Tower, he let out a noticeable huff of relief, thinking it was already cleared of the other team members. He had expected to find Brock, but he was nowhere to be seen. He must be giving Dr. Wells the box, Landon thought.

  Landon dragged his feet over to his locker, exhaustion and pain taking hold. He had no idea how he would manage to make it through an entire day of training after his mission, but such was the life of a Pantheon member.

  Landon disengaged the nano-zipper with a quick press of the button hidden in the cuff of his left sleeve. In a perfect line, a seam formed in the back of his suit and divided, providing an escape from the skintight uniform. As Landon leaned forward to pull his arms out of the sleeves, a jolt of pain from his back surged through his body like an electric current, forcing every muscle in his torso to constrict. The suddenness of the pain pulled Landon’s body forward, and before he could stop himself, his head collided with the door of the locker.

  Landon massaged his forehead with the heel of his hand to dissipate the sting. He reached behind with his right hand and gingerly moved it toward the source of the pain in his back. The second his fingers touched the skin, another jolt of pain rocketed through his body. Now more alert, he managed to restrain himself from convulsing forward and hitting his head again. The skin felt warm to the touch.

  “Wow!” Cortland’s voice echoed through the locker room, startling Landon, which forced another wave of pain to radiate from his lower back. When Landon managed to turn around, he saw Cortland standing at the far end of the aisle.

  Since joining the Pantheon, Cortland Cartwright had become Landon’s closest teammate, and as such, Landon had come to understand him a bit more. He’d learned Cortland was from California. He was the kid of some powerful industrialist family and had lived in a nice house on the Pacific coast near Malibu, spending the vast majority of his time before the Gymnasium on the water surfing or sailing. The minute Landon heard that, Cortland made sense—the dark tan, the shaggy hairstyle, the laid-back demeanor and the friendly, coolheade
d attitude—he was the epitome of the California surfer guy but without the annoying speech patterns. Landon figured Cortland got his confidence and outgoing personality from his family though. He had probably attended more than one black-tie gala or prestigious gallery opening in his life and had been taught how to mingle and make connections. It was no wonder to Landon why everyone liked him—he was just cool.

  “That bruise is gnarly,” Cortland continued as he moved closer, his facial expression almost excited as he stared at Landon’s massive hematoma. Scars and battle wounds were a thing of pride for most guys. “You’re one lucky guy, though. It may hurt like a bitch, but imagine if our uniforms weren’t bulletproof. You’d probably be dead.”

  I can’t believe I was shot! How many teenagers can say that? Landon thought as he warily removed his arms from his uniform and pulled the top away from his chest, letting it dangle freely at his hips.

  Landon walked over to the full-length mirror on the wall. When he looked at himself in the glass, he couldn’t believe what was staring back at him. He wondered if his mother would even recognize him if she saw him now. Even for Landon, there were days where he wasn’t even sure he recognized himself. He still had the same olive skin and stormy, grey eyes, but he’d grown a few inches since he’d arrived at the Gymnasium, and his rigorous training had turned his gaunt body into that of a toned athlete. And his thick, dark-brown hair was beginning to get unruly. He hadn’t had it cut in a few months, and it had now become long enough for the front to cover his eyes.

  He turned his back toward the mirror. Peering over his shoulder, he was dumbfounded by the sight of his injury. A massive area of his lower back was covered in an array of colors ranging from deep purple and blue to a swollen red spreading out like watercolor from a pale dime-sized circle of flesh in the center.