The Girl Who Dared to Think (The Girl Who Dared #1)(9)

“Why would someone even be in here?” I asked, using a lash to tug myself up and over a particularly large pipe that had been built directly across the footpath.

Gerome pulled himself up over the same pipe without so much as a grunt.

“It makes sense,” he said. “Good place to hide. Not to mention, these pipes go into the Depths.”

I cocked my head at that. The Depths, as the council had taken to calling them, were a series of caverns and maintenance shafts at the base of the Tower. Supposedly they had become too irradiated to inhabit, but sometimes people would talk about undocs, the undocumented citizens of the Tower, hiding down there. It didn’t seem likely to me. If there were people down there, surely the council would have done something about them by now. Besides, there was nothing to live off of in the dark, under-powered floors that made up the Depths.

As I was contemplating the idea of someone actually trying to live down there, a figure emerged from behind a nearby pipe.

I froze, looking him up and down. He was taller than I’d imagined from the picture, and better built. Also, his hair was a little lighter, and he looked more rugged; a layer of stubble had grown along his jaw. All the same, this was our guy. I raised a hand, but found myself momentarily speechless as his intense brown eyes locked with mine.

As he shifted, his wrist came into view. His band glowed hot and red, like an angry burn.

“Gerome,” I finally blurted.

My mentor turned, and I could feel his eyes zoning in on the young man. Gerome wasted no time.

“Citizen Farmless,” he said, advancing, one hand unslinging the stun baton from his waist. “You are hereby placed under arrest by the order of the Knights. Should you fail to comply, you will be—”

Grey didn’t even wait. He turned with alarming speed and darted back the way he had come. Gerome cursed and broke into a run. I took off after him into the maze of pipes.

The guy was fast. He swung under and over pipes, his feet never missing a beat, never faltering for an instant as he sprinted ahead. Within moments he had a sizable lead. Growling, I thrust a hand forward and sent a lash spinning out. It collided with a pipe, and with a flex of my wrist I let it surge me forward at a breakneck pace.

I was almost near the fleeing man when I saw a familiar grayish tube just beyond him. An elevator.

That’s fine, I thought. The scanner would read his number. The elevator would hold him in place—like any other person with a ranking of one attempting to use them—and we could just grab him when it refused to move.

That was what I was telling myself as Grey stepped onto the platform and the blue lights erupted from the bottom, moments before it began to lift him upward. I nearly slammed into a pipe as I gaped, dumbfounded, at the machinery. It hadn’t even chirped out his ranking, and it always recited rankings if anyone lower than a nine was present on the platform.

Grey had the nerve to grin and actually waved at me as he disappeared behind the wall. I felt a burst of annoyance at the odd sense of pleasure his acknowledgement brought me.

Gerome entered the room just as I seized on that annoyance, racing up the ramp and onto the platform that slid out of the wall to support me. I didn’t break my movement as I flung the lash up, attaching it to the underside of his elevator and letting it haul me up as I dangled in the shaft. Below me, the blue lights of the computer flashed red in warning—indicating that someone (me) had broken protocol.

“Liana!” Gerome bellowed, as I disappeared into the shaft. “Get to C-9 and head him off! I’ll come around the other side.”

His voice carried after me as I pulled myself up toward the panel above, reeling in so fast the line seemed to whistle. I couldn’t stay under here for long—it was too dangerous.

The elevator began to slow and I waited until it had almost stopped before disconnecting my lash. I fell a few feet down, and flung out both lashes so they attached to either side of the shaft. The lashes fed out as I continued to fall, and at the last possible moment I reversed the feed and had them reel me back up—faster than was safe but I needed momentum. As I shot past the lash points, I disengaged them, angling my body up and through the now exposed doorway. I landed with a hard thud of my boots, a few feet behind Grey.

Grey froze and turned, his eyebrows jacking up into his hairline as he gazed at me in surprise. On impulse, I raised my hand and waved at him. He blinked, and then ran.

I felt a smile bloom on my lips as he sprinted, and flexed my shoulders, suddenly confident. This was what I had been made for. I felt my worries slipping away, my concerns staying far below with my supervisor as I lashed my way after him—through the pipes that crisscrossed the room, skimming surfaces as I shot lash after lash, in pursuit of Grey.

Because of his speed, and the pipes being so dense, I lost him behind a few, overshooting his location, too fast to stop. I swung back around, letting the swing of the last lash carry me back in a reverse trajectory and releasing it at just the right moment so I could land on an outcropping of pipes. I stared at the floor below, trying to find him.

The room was silent—only the occasional sound of water gurgling or steam escaping could be heard. My eyes scanned the piping he had disappeared behind. After a long moment, I lashed down to the catwalk below, looking for any sign of the man.

He hadn’t disappeared after all—but had come to a stop by a junction of pipes and was now hunched over one, rooting around like a farmer planting seeds and not a man being pursued by the Knights. I coughed as I unsheathed my stun baton, releasing a menacing hum of electricity.