Theo nodded. “Tiberius has been hunting me. He’s killing people, imprisoning innocents. He’s out of control.”

  “I know. Paul has nobody keeping him in check anymore. He’s free to impose his will however he wants. But then, of course, you’re not going to let him, are you, Theo?”

  “I’m trying, sir… Sam. My friends and I. We organized a group… we call ourselves rebels. We found weapons and they are going to attack this prison tonight.”

  “I know all about it, Theo. I’ve been watching you. You’ve never shirked your responsibilities nor shied away from the challenges placed before you.” Lucas wiped away a tear forming at the corner of one eye. “You make me very proud, Theo.”

  “Thank you, sir.” Theo said. He hesitated before saying, “I’m scared.”

  “You should be scared,” said Lucas. “You’re facing huge obstacles. But remember this, Theo, those emotions: fear, worry, care, they ground you and make you human. Paul has forgotten that. That’s why you’ll be a much better leader than him, when all this settles.”

  “I… I don’t have any plans to be the leader! I want to let the people decide.”

  Lucas slapped Theo gently on the back. “Precisely. They will choose you, Theo. I always knew they would. It’s what I was grooming you for all those months we met together.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “I told you my plan was always going to be to reinstate public elections. Now, I didn’t know if you’d be ready the first go-round, but eventually, you would be my natural successor, Theo. Someone with young ideas but a mature sense of purpose, grounded in compassion and true concern for all the people of this island.”

  Lucas stood up and began to walk toward the window.

  “But… Sam,” Theo began, “I’m just a kid. How can I fight a war?”

  Lucas turned to him, no sign of a smile on his face now. “You are no ‘kid,’” he said. “You are the finest young man I have ever had the pleasure to know. You may not be a military mind, but that’s okay. You’ve found a natural general in Kylee. Let her move the troops. You, my friend, are the rallying point. The symbol of hope for the people of Atlantic Island. This war is the people’s war. There is only one battle that you must fight alone.”

  “Tiberius,” Theo said. “But, Sam, he’s strong…like supernaturally strong. How can I hope to fight him?”

  “If your enemy is too strong, you don’t defeat him with strength. Paul may be strong and quick but he always sees things one way. Use your mind, Theo. Think outside the box. It won’t be easy, but I know that in the end you’ll be the one victorious.”

  Lucas was standing back by the window. Theo started to feel his mind slipping, as his body worked its way back to an awake state. “Wait,” he called. “Sam… will I ever see you again?”

  Lucas smiled. “I’ll be with you. And remember, there are always other worlds.”

  With that, Lucas vanished, and Theo felt his mind race back to the land of the living. He sat up on the mattress and looked around the room. The view through the window told him that the sun was just beginning to set.

  “Get your nap in?” asked Tony. “You were talkin’ something fierce for a while there. Must have been some crazy dreams.”

  “Must have been.” Theo scratched his head. Had it been a dream? It felt much more realistic than any dream he’d ever experienced. Still, it had the trappings of a dream. Already the memory was starting to fade, as memories of dreams always do.

  “Well,” said Jason, “I hope you got your sleep in. Countdown to war is almost over, baby.”

  Theo knew this was true, though he had a hunch that somewhere else on the island the war had already begun. This was only his part of the play, but he knew it was an important role and he would see it through.

  He stood up. “You guys know what you have to do?”

  “Of course,” said Wes. “Beat the hell out of the guard who delivers our dinner, get his weapon and his key. Lock him up. Join the fighting. Oh, and try not to pass out from panic. That about cover it?”

  “That should do it.” Theo was pleased. He could trust these guys to do what they had to do. He hoped the other prisoners would fight as hard. There were maybe ten rooms of political prisoners, according to what he’d gleaned in brief conversations in the cafeteria. The rest of the prisoners, maybe another hundred people, were in for a variety of other reasons. He hoped that those people could be trusted. He knew some of them were actually criminals and would have to go back to jail after the fighting was over, and now they would know how to create a riot in this prison.

  Well, Theo thought, that was a problem for another time, should he be so lucky as to survive what was coming. After that, the men didn’t speak. Instead, they watched the view out the window as the sun dipped lower in the sky. Theo knew they were all thinking the same thing. This could easily be the last sunset any of them would ever see. They waited, like nervous actors at an audition, waiting for the signal to go up on stage.

  Theo thought again of Kylee and the rebel army. Were they engaged in fighting at that very moment? Could she really lead a ragtag band of teenagers, senior citizens and housewives against the fearsome power of the Security Force? If anyone could do it, Theo thought, it was Kylee. From the time she had saved him on the boardwalk during the Event, she had never stopped impressing him with her confidence, her inherent survival skills and her quiet power. Theo had discovered to his surprise that he could lead and inspire people with rousing speeches. Kylee could do it just by her very presence.

  The sound of the first lock turning in the door broke his train of thought and snapped him to attention. This was it, then, do or die. Theo had made sure that along with the instructions that had passed around the cafeteria came one urgent warning: silence was key! If guards down the hall heard another guard being attacked, they would all rush one room instead of going to their own assigned rooms, as was the plan.

  The door opened slightly, just as expected, and several stacked trays of food were placed on the floor. The door slammed shut in a hurry. The locks turned again, sealing the four men in the room. Theo made eye contact with the other men and they moved swiftly to formation. Theo and Tony stood facing the door a few feet into the room, while Jason and Wes took positions on either side. Jason pressed the small button and waited for the guard to return.

  The locks turned until all were open. The door opened a crack. Just as planned, Wes grabbed the edge of the door and pulled it in, much faster than the guard had anticipated. The guard took a stumble step forward, and Jason grabbed the sleeve of the black uniform and tugged. Now the guard fell forward, and Theo and Tony were on him in a flash, pinning him to the ground.

  As Theo moved his knees onto the guard’s chest, Wes went for the man’s gun while Jason went for the keys. Tony pulled off the “death mask” and drove it down on the guard’s exposed head, just as the man was starting to scream for help. The guard went instantly unconscious.

  Tony shuddered. “I didn’t like having to do that.”

  Theo put his hand on Tony’s shoulder. “He’s still alive. Probably just going to have a really bad headache for a while. He gets a chance to decide which side he wants to be on. Now let’s get moving. This is just getting started.”

  Theo cautiously poked his head into the hallway. He didn’t see anybody, but several doors were open. It seemed the plan was working. “Okay,” he said. “Let’s go.”

  They exited the room. Theo looked back through the doorway. The others had moved the guard onto one of the mattresses. That, he thought, is what separates us from them. That is why we can win this.

  He said his goodbyes to the room, just another in a long line of places he had left behind. Wes closed the door and used the keys to turn the locks. “What happens to the guard?” asked Jason. He was pointing the stolen firearm down the hall, looking for signs of the Security Force.

  “He takes a night to think about his choices. Tomorrow someone will let him out.” Theo saw the others considering his comment. Someone would certainly be back at the prison by tomorrow. Which side that someone was on remained a matter to be determined.

  Just then, he saw other prisoners emerge from doors down the length of the reinforced concrete hall. Tired, shocked faces appeared and Theo waved them over to him. Within a few minutes he had added sixteen more men to his group. They carried a total of five weapons liberated from the Security Force guards. It would have to be enough for now.

  “The floor below us should have another twenty men,” he told the group. “We need to meet up with them. Then we work our way toward the exit. I have to believe there’s going to be resistance. Those of you with guns, you need to surround the rest of us.”

  Moving in formation, the prisoners travelled down the hall to the stairs at the end. “Be a lot faster to take the elevator, wouldn’t it?” asked one of the men.

  “It would split us up,” said Theo. “And if the guards catch on to what we are doing they will stop the elevators and then we’ve got serious problems. Let’s keep moving to the stairs.”

  They made the trip down the first flight of stairs in short order. The stairwell was quiet. Either the Security Force didn’t know about the escape attempt, or they were still organizing a response.

  On the fourth floor, they met a group of thirteen men, sitting on both sides of the hall. Several of the men had a disturbing amount of blood on their clothes, though none appeared to be injured.

  Theo ran to them. “What happened?” he asked, counting the unexpectedly small number as he moved.

  “The guards figured out the plan,” one man said quietly. “They came pouring into my room. We fought back but everything was so confusing. They killed everyone in that room but me.”

  “What’s your name?” Theo asked the man.

  “I’m Dave. Dave Michaels.”

  “Dave, where are the guards now?”

  Dave turned his palms up. They were covered in blood. “They’re dead. We killed them all.” Then, he burst into tears.

  Theo knew that the rest of the men in the room would be watching him, gauging his response to Dave’s emotional outburst. He knelt down. “Dave,” he said, “I want you to listen to me very carefully.” Dave looked up. “You all did what you had to do. I think we are all going to have blood on our hands before this is over. If you didn’t do this, if we don’t keep fighting back, we will all be dead. Every man in this hallway. Your families and friends. Do not think for a second that Tiberius will let what we’ve done here, or what the rebels are doing outside, go unpunished. We’ve made our move, and now we follow this path to wherever it ends.”

  Slowly the fourth floor prisoners got to their feet. “What do we do now?” asked Tony.

  “We go down to the ground floor and deal with whatever waits for us,” he said. And pray that Kylee is almost here, he thought.

  Theo instructed the men to be as silent as possible in the stairwell. As they reached the third floor landing, he heard something. He held up a hand to stop the line of men from descending. Theo listened. There… a footstep on the concrete step somewhere below. He pointed in the direction from which the sound originated, and was about to instruct one of the armed prisoners to take aim, when he heard a gun fire from up above. The bullet whizzed past and lodged in a step below.

  Theo heard marching from both above and below. The Security Force had boxed them in. He held out his hand to the man next to him and was handed one of the guns they had removed from the guards. Theo hesitated before speaking but realized there was nothing to lose. “They are coming from both directions,” he called. “I need backup, and I want guns at the top of the line. Now or never, people. Fight!”

  He leaned over and saw Security Force agents looking up at him. He fired a quick burst and ducked back as the Force returned fire. Theo was joined by several other men, who continued to exchange volleys with the guards below. He heard shots from above. He smelled gunpowder and could hear screams, some filled with pain, others with aggression.

  He saw a Security Force body shoot past down the stairwell and he heard it slam into something down below. Theo knew he had to keep his group moving down to the ground floor. He leaned over again and fired, picking off one of the men below him. He walked down several stairs, registering in the walled-off recesses of his mind the fact that he had taken a life. He was a soldier now, no question about it.

  Each fired shot was deafening in the confined space of the stairwell. Theo’s ears were ringing. Still he worked his way down, avoiding shots and firing when he could. There was no way to properly survey the situation down below, but he believed there were only a few guards in each direction. The Security Force had surprised him, but he had a sense that they still underestimated what they were dealing with. Or, perhaps, there was more going on outside the prison.

  Passing the second floor, he picked up his pace and heard his men doing the same. The shooting above him had become less frequent. Either the attackers from the higher floors had been incapacitated or they had retreated. The Security Force at the bottom of the staircase had grown quiet as well. Theo didn’t dare lean over to look but he was convinced the Force agents were still lying in wait. This was going to be very difficult.

  He gestured and signaled assignments to the nine other weapon-wielding prisoners above and around him. Having the higher ground might be the only advantage they would get. With his men in position, Theo leaned over the rail. He saw flashes of motion below and ducked back without firing. From above him came a chorus of gunfire aimed at the ground. Then all was silent.

  Theo ran down the rest of the stairs, his gun at the ready in case there were more agents waiting or reloading. There was nobody left alive at the bottom. A pile of bodies awaited him at the base of the stairs. All but the one agent who had fallen from above were from the lower group that had tried to attack them.

  Theo knew how lucky they had been. He was preparing a congratulatory speech when he heard the clump of a body collapsing. He looked up at his men, seeing them clearly for the first time since the fighting began. The group in the middle, forced into hiding while the armed men protected them, looked worn, scared and frightened. Not at all battle-hardened warriors. Several of the prisoners at the top of the group were injured. Worst of all, Theo realized his count was coming up two men short.

  “What happened?” he called up.

  “We’ve got two down up here,” called one of the men. “They’re dead.”

  Chapter 30

  Kylee had seen plenty of gun battles on television and in the movies. She had read about them in books, preferring to read novels a shade more violent than those favored by her friends. None of that prepared her for the grisly reality of war.

  She fired her gun and heard those around her discharge bullets at the same time. The helmets, fearsome though they appeared, were more for technological superiority than defense against attacks that Tiberius had probably assumed would never come. They proved to be weak spots in the Security Force armor. Two of the three guards dropped instantly with a startling amount of force. The third guard was clipped in the armor protecting his shoulder. He stumbled forward and starting shouting, “We’re under attack! We’re under attack!”

  Joseph calmly picked off the screaming guard, silencing his cries. The damage was done. The other guards, alerted to the raid, rushed into action. Kylee heard her soldiers continuing the assault. She dropped to the sand and ran toward the advancing attackers. “Rebels!” she yelled. “Take this camp! No mercy!”

  The poor unfortunate people living in the beach camp screamed as they found themselves caught in the middle of two heavily armed groups. The campfires flickered and threw off light in random arcs, making it hard for Kylee to see what was going on. Damn that sniper! His delay had cost them the remaining daylight, and the Security Force could see in the dark.

  She saw people running every which way, and saw muzzle flashes to match the noisy bursts that destroyed the tranquility of the beach. She saw bodies fall and knew intuitively that they weren’t all Security Force. She knew she had been an idealistic fool to think her side would make it through unscathed, like some kind of arcade game. This was no shooting gallery. They were taking losses even as they pressed forward and gained an advantage.

  Kylee rushed a group of Security Force soldiers, their black suits barely visible in the dim firelight. She fired, taking down one of them, before the others turned toward her. She dove for cover behind a series of tents, seeing the sand tuft up where she had been half a second earlier. The Security Force was hesitant to shoot at the tents because of the civilians hiding there. This made the tents ideal hiding spots, negating the Force’s night vision advantage.

  She saw Joseph firing and knew from the lack of return fire that he had taken out his targets. She wondered who he really been in his old life before he was a man in his sixties vacationing at the Jersey Shore. Austrian military maybe? He had never let on, but kind, warm Joseph was a killing machine.

  The gunfire continued all around her as she slid down to the end of the clump of tents for a better view. How much of the Security Force was here? The camp had been much better guarded than she had anticipated. She saw several families hunkered down behind the tents. “Stay down,” she said. “We are putting an end to Tiberius tonight.” The people nodded. They were scared but they supported what she was doing. That was enough to reinforce her convictions.

  Kylee continued to fire any time she was sure she had Security Force agents in her sights. Shooting went on all around her, gradually diminishing. Was this going to be a total bloodbath, with one side wiping out the other? She regretted that she had yelled “no mercy” in the heat of the moment.

  “We surrender!” called out a voice.

  “Surrender! Surrender!” called several others. The guns stopped their thundering. Kylee stepped out from behind a tent. She saw four Security Force agents with their hands raised. They had dropped their weapons. She wondered if they had run out of ammo.