by Jon McGoran
“Investigators?” I snapped. “We investigated already. We saw what they’re doing. We talked to people who escaped, who’ve been altered permanently and can’t breathe air anymore. Who are dying.” I could hear my voice rising, and I paused to get it back under control. “Look, we don’t know for sure who’s behind it, other than Charlesford, but we know what they’re doing down there, and where the yttrium eventually ends up. And the longer we spend talking about it or waiting for investigators, the more people are going to be…altered against their will. And the more people who will die.”
He nodded, hearing me, but I could tell somehow that I’d be disappointed by his response.
“I’ll contact my superior in Chimerica then, and see if we can activate agents Stateside.” He didn’t sound hopeful.
“You just had agents stateside. And you just said we are still the closest. Let’s go back the way we came with a few more people. That’s all it would take. There’s easily enough people in this camp.”
“No,” he said, his voice flat and final. Sly looked down and away. “It’s not our mission and I can’t risk exposing the camp, or violating the very uneasy peace we have with the Canadian government. Frankly, it was provocative enough bringing you in.”
“Well, we didn’t ask you to. I mean, thanks for getting us out of a tight spot, but we didn’t ask to be exfiltrated out of the country. If you’re going to take your time kicking everything upstairs while people are being murdered, then just take Claudia and me back where you got us and we’ll do it ourselves.”
I looked at Claudia and she nodded.
Martin looked at her, too, and said, “Do you want to go back?”
“Yes,” she said, folding her arms resolutely.
Martin nodded. “All right,” he told her. “We’ll have to wait until morning, in case anyone noticed you coming in, then Dara will take you back and make sure you get to your car okay.”
I was starting to get annoyed, and I didn’t try too hard to keep the tone out of my voice. “We can’t go until morning?”
Martin took a breath and let it out. “Actually, Claudia can’t go until morning. For the time being, you have to stay here.”
CHAPTER 38
For a moment I just looked at him, not quite believing what I’d just heard. Then my voice erupted in something close to a shriek: “WHAT?”
Martin didn’t look at me.
“Are you insane?” I said, stepping where he was looking. “You can’t keep me here against my will.”
“Those are our orders,” he said, his voice quiet and even. “And they’re for your own safety.”
Claudia looked stunned. Sly appeared confused and mortified. Clearly, he hadn’t known this was coming. Which was lucky for him, because I was livid. Roberta seemed to be wrestling with a smirk.
“This is bullshit,” I said. “Orders from who?”
“From my superiors.”
“You mean your secret council? And who are they, exactly?”
I could tell Martin wasn’t enjoying this. But I didn’t much care.
“Look,” he said. “All I can tell you is that it has been decided that it’s too dangerous for you in Pennsylvania right now, and you’re too important to the movement.”
“And what movement is that, exactly? What do you mean, too important?”
“Too important to risk letting Wells get his hands on you.”
That gave me a chill, but I didn’t stop to think about it. “Important how?”
He wriggled his shoulders in a movement that was halfway between a shrug and a squirm, or like maybe he just wanted to slip out of the conversation altogether. “As a symbol, I guess.”
“Because I was on a T-shirt, for God’s sake?” In that speech I made in Pitman, which was more of a diversion than anything else, I talked about equality and human decency and a bunch of other things that shouldn’t have been necessary to say. But then it went on the news, and struck a nerve. People made T-shirts with quotes from what I’d said, things I didn’t even remember saying because, while apparently it needed to be said, it was just the most basic, obvious right-and-wrong kind of stuff. Someone also made T-shirts with a picture of Rex and me kissing, and the words DOG MEETS GIRL. They at least used a cool font. But still, a couple of T-shirts didn’t add up to important. Not even close.
Martin looked away, and I got the distinct feeling that it was something more than that. But he squared his shoulders and took a deep breath. “Look, I’m sorry about any inconvenience. I’ve got my orders, and I intend to carry them out. This is all in your best interests, and in the best interests of chimeras everywhere. If you care about chimeras, if you care about people the way you say you do, you’ll support what we’re doing.”
Then he walked past us, his feet crunching the snow as he headed back toward the camp.
“And what exactly is it you’re doing? While people are being killed down in those mines?” I called after him. “Because it looks to me like a whole lot of nothing!”
He just kept walking, and I growled in frustration.
Sly came forward and put a hand on my arm. “Jimi, I’m sorry. I didn’t know this was going to happen.”
I nodded, then turned to him. “Did you know they were spying on me, too?”
He took a step backward. “They weren’t really spying, just…like he said, keeping an eye on you. For your own safety.”
I shook my head, letting out a grunt of frustration because I didn’t have the words.
“Hey, nonk.”
I turned and saw Roberta smirking at me.
“I heard about Pitman, and that’s great and everything,” she said. “But here’s what I wonder: Why is it you feel the need to be the savior who comes in and fixes everything?”
“I don’t…I’m not trying to fix everything.”
“Yeah, you are. You think we don’t know what we’re doing up here. You think you know what’s best with this OmniCare place, but you don’t know the bigger picture. How could you? You’re not even one of us. And you never will be.”
“I’m not trying to be a savior. I’m trying to help my friends, goddamn it,” I said, feeling a rush of emotion that I didn’t understand and couldn’t quite control. “And how do you know I’ll never get spliced? You don’t know me.”
A tear rolled down my cheek and I was furious at myself for it, and even more furious at Roberta for causing it and for seeing it.
Claudia put her hand on my back. “Jimi, it’s okay.”
I turned to Sly, pointing at Roberta. “What is her problem?”
Sly stepped up to Roberta. “Hey, hey,” he said, putting up his hands. “Lighten up, Roberta, all right? Don’t you think you’re laying it on a little thick?”
Roberta glared at him, and then at me, then she stomped back toward camp.
I took a deep breath and got myself under control. “I do not like her,” I said, wiping my eyes.
“Really?” Sly said in mock surprise. “Would never have guessed it.”
“Seriously though,” Claudia said, watching Roberta through the woods. “What’s her problem?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “She can be a little bit…well, like that sometimes….Most of the time.”
“Yeah,” I said, “well, if that’s a little, I’d hate to see a lot.”
A gust of wind howled through the trees, peppering us with tiny shards of ice. We hunched our shoulders against it and started walking back to camp.
“This is ridiculous,” I said. “I can’t believe I’m a prisoner here.”
Sly kept quiet. I know he didn’t agree with my being held there, but I got the impression he didn’t feel like he could speak out against it.
“Tomorrow, when I get back to civilization, do you want me to tell anyone you’re here?” Claudia asked. “Jerry? Your mom?”
“Pretty sure they don’t want you telling anyone this is here,” Sly said quietly.
I rolled my eyes and looked at him. “Oh, for God’s
sake. Another secret for the good of chimeras? That’s what they told us in Pitman.”
“I know, I know,” he said. “But this is different.”
I cocked an eyebrow at him.
“It is,” he insisted.
I paused to shake my head at him, and as he walked on, Claudia elbowed me and gave me a look that seemed to be full of some meaning I couldn’t grasp.
As we approached the camp, I got a better sense of the layout. At one end there were half a dozen quadcopters of various sizes and types, all under tarps. Thick power cables ran from under them into the woods, toward the wind turbines.
At the other end were the tents, mostly simple pup tents, but with a couple of bigger dome-types, and one elaborate frame tent that was larger than the others. They were all the same grayish-white color. Behind them was a row of composter toilets. Scattered among the tents were a handful of dark patches of bare ground, where the snow had melted within rough circles formed by thick logs. A few of the logs had chimeras sitting on them, and I realized there was a Hotblock dimly glowing at the center of each circle.
Hotblocks were kind of like chemlights, but generated more heat than light from the chemical reaction. People could sit around them and keep warm. It was like a campfire, but without the carbon emissions. Or much of the charm.
As we stepped into the clearing, Martin emerged from the frame tent. He spotted us and came directly over.
“What is it?” I said as he approached.
“I contacted our people Stateside. They said Rex has already been bailed out.”
I felt wobbly for a second, I was so relieved, but I tried not to show it.
“That’s great!” Sly said, clapping a hand on my shoulder.
“By whom?” I said, making sure he heard me say “whom.”
“Earth for Everyone, it appears. Anyway, I thought you’d want to know.”
“Any word on Doc Guzman?” Claudia asked.
“Still in jail, I’m afraid.” He turned to go.
“What about OmniCare?” I said. “Are they doing anything about that?”
He paused. “They said someone named Jerry had been in touch, and that they’ll look into it.” Then he went back to his tent.
“Thanks,” I said, not making much of an effort to be heard.
Any points Martin had gained for following up on things so quickly were nowhere near enough to make up for the fact that I was his prisoner.
CHAPTER 39
Sly showed Claudia and me to our tent on the edge of the clearing. “The tents are pretty warm, and there are a couple of sleeping bags inside. Dinner’s in a couple minutes, and I have to go help get it ready. You might want to warm up for a minute, but night comes early, so you might want to enjoy the daylight while it lasts.”
We thanked him and slipped inside, then zipped the flap closed behind us. It wasn’t too cold in there. And it gave us a chance to talk in private.
There were chemlights attached to each of the tent poles, and two rolled-up sleeping bags. Claudia tapped one of the chemlights and sat on one of the sleeping bags.
“So what do you think?” she said quietly, as I sat on the other sleeping bag facing her.
“I think it’s nuts that I can’t leave here. I mean, I’m all for doing what’s best for the team, but I don’t like being held here against my will.”
“No,” she said. “This is messed up.”
“I also don’t like the fact that while they’re holding me here—supposedly for my own safety—all those other people are stuck in those mines. And Doc is stuck in jail.”
“I know. At least Rex is out.”
“Yeah. That’s a relief.”
The dinner bell rang out, but neither of us moved for a second. Claudia looked up at me, her face serious but her eyes mischievous. “I can fly a quadcopter, you know,” she said.
“Really? Cool.” Somehow that didn’t surprise me.
She held my gaze, nodding very slowly. “Yeah, Jimi. It is cool. Especially if maybe you don’t feel like staying here until they let you go.”
I laughed, more out of shock than amusement. “You mean take one of their copters?”
“We’ll give it back.”
“But you’re leaving in the morning.”
Her eyes sparkled. “Only if I haven’t already left tonight.”
“You’re serious.”
“Unless you’d rather stay here until spring. Or whenever they say it’s safe. I’m sure your mom would love that.”
The idea was still sinking in when we were interrupted by Sly’s voice outside the tent. “Knock, knock. Didn’t you hear the bell? Dinner’s ready. And it goes quick around here.”
We slipped outside and Sly led us toward the closest of the log circles. The sky had grown darker during the few minutes we’d been in the tent, and the glow of the Hotblock was brighter in the gathering gloom. Steam billowed from a large pot suspended above it, and a dozen chimeras sat around it, eating stew from mugs.
We followed Sly to a space on one of the logs, and the chimeras on either side moved to make room for us without looking up.
Sly filled mugs for Claudia and me. The pot sounded close to empty when he filled a mug for himself.
He handed us each a spoon, and sat so he and Claudia were on either side of me.
“Not bad, right?” Sly said, elbowing me.
I nodded. It seemed to be some kind of lentil stew with carrots and celery. At home I would have picked out the celery, but I was hungry and I didn’t want to waste food, or come off as picky or spoiled. Plus, it actually wasn’t all that terrible.
“So, how long have you been here?” I asked Sly. Claudia leaned forward so she could see and hear him around me.
“A little over a month.” He lowered his voice to a comical stage whisper to add, “But we’re not supposed to say.”
“Does Chimerica have anything to do with the H4H bombings?”
He scowled at me. “No! Of course not. Do you think I’d be here if they had anything to do with that?” He shook his head. “Like Martin says, ‘We’re doing our part to help make the world safe for chimeras, and for everyone.’ ”
I’d heard those exact same words before. I gave him a sidelong glance before asking, “Rex was here, wasn’t he?”
Sly smiled. “Like I said, we’re really not supposed to say.” Then he nodded.
The way Sly had been hurrying us—and from the sound of the pot when he served us—I figured the three of us would have been the last to eat. But several of the chimeras around us finished and left and a couple of others took their places.
Among the late arrivals was Roberta. She glared at me as she helped herself to stew, then sat on the other side of the Hotblock from me. I couldn’t see her in the darkness, but I could feel more heat from her stare than I could from the Hotblock.
The other late arrival was Dara, the pilot. She helped herself to a mug of stew, then came and stood directly in front of me, looking down her beak-like nose.
“Jimi Corcoran,” she said, as if that meant something on its own.
I sighed. I was almost finished eating, and all I wanted to do was slurp down the last of my stew and get back to the tent to talk to Claudia. I didn’t want another fight.
“Yes,” I said. “Dara, right?”
She nodded. “I was at Haven,” she said. “In Pitman.” Her face was hard to read, but her voice caught as she spoke. A couple of the other chimeras sitting around the Hotblock looked over at me. “A few of us were,” she continued. “We would have been hunted down if it weren’t for you and your friends.”
In the dim light from the Hotblock, her eyes glistened.
“I’m glad you got out,” I said, my throat constricting.
From the darkness, Roberta’s voice said, “She’s still a nonk.”
The look in Dara’s eyes hardened and she whipped her head around. “Why do you have to be such an idiot?”
Roberta shot to her feet and came halfway around the H
otblock. “Why do you have to be such a kiss-ass?”
Dara shook her head. “It’s asshole chimeras like you that make H4H’s work easy.”
Roberta came closer. “It’s an asshole chimera like me that’s going to break that stupid beak of yours.”
Sly got to his feet, not quite between them but dangerously close. “Hey, let’s calm down,” he said.
Claudia was suddenly standing behind the log, out of harm’s way. She put her hand on my shoulder and as Roberta turned on Sly, looming over him, Claudia’s hand tightened on my jacket, like she was about to yank me back.
“Shut up, Sly,” Roberta said with a snarl, “you little—”
She was cut off by a thunderous “ENOUGH!”
It was Martin, standing at the edge of the Hotspot, his chest heaving and his eyes flashing. “I won’t have this. I’m teaching you to fight so you can protect each other, not so you can brawl amongst yourselves.”
He glanced at me, and I wondered if he thought I was at least partially to blame. Maybe I was. Maybe everybody had gotten along fine before I got there. But the glares Roberta and Dara were throwing at each other didn’t seem like anything new.
“You’re taking watch tonight, both of you. Dara, first shift. Roberta, second. Any more of that from either of you and you’re out. If you can’t be civil, we’re better off without you.”
Roberta gave him a murderous look, but Martin simply stared back, as if daring her to test him. She turned and stomped off into the darkness.
Then he turned to me. “Jimi, can I have a word with you in my tent?”
He turned without waiting for a response and walked off.
I looked at Sly, then Claudia, and got shrugs from both of them.
Thanks, I thought, as I slurped down the last of my stew.
CHAPTER 40
Martin was sitting in a folding chair in front of a folding table, reading a piece of paper. He didn’t look up when I walked in, and it occurred to me that anytime I had ever been summoned—whether it was to the principal’s office or by some paramilitary chimera commander—they didn’t look up when I arrived. Maybe they really were that busy, but I always suspected it was some kind of lame tactic to assert that they had the upper hand. Either way, it was rude.