30. Four Years Ago, Tristan
FOUR YEARS AGO, TRISTAN
“Ican’t be everywhere at once,” I snap, banging my fist on the rickety table strewn with maps.
Chess figurines representing our units rattle, some toppling over and rolling away from their positions.
“No one’s expecting you to,” Bob says.
“Really?” I march around the table, my footsteps echoing loudly throughout the high-ceilinged hall, the lacquered floor creaking underneath my weight.
“Then explain to me.” I round on him, irrational rage stretching the skin on my face.
“Why do all groups keep fucking up unless I’m there watching their every damn move? ”
“Because they have no military experience, Tristan,” she speaks, and the earth stops turning. “Besides, not all units. Krasnik’s group are holding their own down south. God knows how.”
I’ll tell you how, light of my existence.
“That’s because Krasnik is batshit crazy,” I mutter.
“I think it’s because he was in the army. Saw plenty of action from what I’ve heard.”
“The two are not mutually exclusive.” I cast a furtive smile in her direction.
What I really want to do is throw myself at her feet and beg her to marry me now that the man she never should have married is dead. But she doesn’t know me the way I know her. She doesn’t know yet that we’re destined to be together. But in time, she will.
“Tristan? Anything to add?” she nudges me, eyebrows raised.
“Yes.” I clear my throat, not meeting her gaze directly. “Krasnik may be managing to fend them off for now, and fucked if I know how, but he can’t be depended on. He’s too hot-headed and too much of a solo player. He ignores any and all instructions. One day soon, he’s going to snap.”
As if on cue, the hall double door flies open and in marches Attila—Krasnik’s second-in-command and as such, one of the few aware of my current location.
“He’s gone insane,” he announces breathlessly, and there’s no need for him to specify who he’s talking about.
“What has he done now?” I groan.
“You really need to come with me and see it.”
“Son of a bitch,” I mutter under my breath before turning back to the joy of my life to ask her, not meeting her eyes, “Would you like to come with me, Lena? I know you find Krasnik ... amusing.”
Just one more reason to hate the man.
Attila leads us into a run-down villa. Through an uneven-floor corridor with a badly frayed carpet, into the sunroom.
The smell hits us long before we reach it.
“Ugh, what the hell?” my love gasps, pinching her nose.
Blood. The air is so thick with it that just breathing tastes like eating a raw steak.
“What has he done ...” I gasp.
Post Rift Day, I thought I’d really seen it all. Still, apprehension ripples through me as I step through the door.
Inside, it’s way worse than in the corridor. The air is hot and solid, and it reeks of violence.
There’s a small pool in the centre of the sunroom. Its mosaic-tile edges smeared with crimson and filled to the brim with so much blood it looks more black than red.
“Oh my god.” She sways on her feet, but I’m so engrossed in what I’m seeing that I miss the opportunity to wrap a steadying arm around her shoulders.
Krasnik is crouching by the pool, carefully setting a thing onto the thick liquid surface before giving it a gentle push to make it float closer to other such things.
Foam floating devices with ... flesh and skin peels attached, arranged in such a way that they look like ...
“Lotuses!” Krasnik says with a manic smile and jumps to his feet.
He is young—early twenties—which makes him both impressive and scary. He’s as tall as me and boasts that casual nonchalance that never fails to irritate me: ruffled, overgrown hair, chiselled face, devilish grin, the clothes smeared with crimson flattering on his sculpted frame.
He’s athletic, his movements fast, but there’s an underlying predatory aggression to them. He’s like a ball of fire, intimidating without trying, sucking all the oxygen in the vicinity, commanding attention. He’s mesmerising.
Fuck I hate the guy.
Each time I see him, I could swear he’s high as a kite, if I didn’t know how hard it is to get drugs these days.
“What the fuck is this, Krasnik?” I demand, hating the unnerved edge in my voice.
“Well, it’s a ... uhhhmmm ...” He scratches his head theatrically—ever the fucking comedian. “It’s a tableau!”
“A tableau?” I repeat after him slowly.
“Yes!” he confirms triumphantly, beaming.
“Aron, honey, why did you make this ... tableau?” I could murder him for the simple fact that she calls him ‘honey’.
“I felt inspired,” he says plainly, shrugging before he explodes with laughter.
“You think this is funny?” I demand, aggression creeping up my neck in a heatwave. “You think it’s funny that you’re turning us into a fucking circus? Are we Reprobates now? How does this ... this ... monstrosity help our goals?”
“Yours? Not at all.” Like with the flick of a switch, all traces of humour are gone from his face, replaced by chilling solemnity. “But they’re doomed anyway. And it helps my goals.”
My heart rate skyrockets. “Your goals? And mine don’t matter since they’re doomed?” I repeat, struggling to breathe without screaming my head off.
“Aren’t they? The only reason we’re holding onto the Rifterland is that the Consuls aren’t that interested in it. For now.”
What he’s saying is essentially what I said earlier. But the way he says it—lightly, matter-of-factly—is like a slap in the face.
“So, you just give up. Is that it?”
“Never,” he assures me, fire flaring in his eyes. “I’d rather die. But I’m not dying just so that we can be barely a footnote in history. Resistance. Swiftly crushed. This shit”—He extends his arms towards the pool—“I do it often enough, people will talk about it. Soldiers will fear it.”
“You are not doing this again!” I finally snap, fury clawing up my throat. “You want this to be what we’re known for?”
“No. I want this to be what I am known for.”
“You’re out of your fucking mind, Krasnik!”
“Yes. And you’ll say that, loudly, anywhere you can. Krasnik, the rogue. Psychopathic and unpredictable. You will distance yourself from me just enough so you get none of the blame, but all the benefits.”
“Benefits?” I repeat after him, hissing. “Benefits?”
“Notoriety,” Krasnik elaborates. “I made one of the fuckers call for reinforcements before bleeding him dry. A whole platoon’s coming this way, and that bitch Riley is with them.” His handsome face stretches into a particularly nasty smile.
Fire roars through me with the next breath, and I lean forward, like I’m readying myself to lunge at him. “You demented son of a—” I start but snap my mouth shut the minute my queen opens hers.
“Tristan, please, let’s get out of here. I’m feeling sick.”
So am I, my love, if for different reasons.
The command-and-control hierarchy only exists between our groups in the loosest sense.
Such is the price of each group being an independent unit that operates on a need-to-know basis.
The only way to stop Krasnik from doing more of ...
whatever this is ... would be a head-on collision with him, and for now, he’s sadly a little too useful for that.
“Fine,” I growl. “But I want nothing to do wi—is there anything else?” I groan when I see him open his mouth to speak before I’m even finished talking.
“Yes. We’re now called Retrograde. My group,” he elaborates when I raise my eyebrows at him.
What fresh hell is this?
“Why?” I curl my lips.
“Retrograde means moving backwards or making things worse,” he explains, straightening to his full height, arms thrown wide.
“We want to move backwards. Return to a world not just before the Rift, but before the Continuum.” His voice detonates, controlled and forceful.
“And to do that, we are going to make things worse until we force them to make them better!”