by Peter Clines
Stealth nodded. “Cesar and Lieutenant Gibbs each realized within four weeks and have helped keep her secret. Mayor Linhart contacted me seven weeks ago expressing his own worries. Gayle—”
“I believe you.” He leaned down and kissed her on the cheek. She turned her head and their lips met.
She looked up into his eyes. “How did Billie Carter respond to the requests?”
It took St. George a moment to find his footing in the conversation again. “Not bad, all things considered. She’d wanted more scavengers up there, so asking her to lose one so Gibbs could go didn’t exactly thrill her. But she gets it, too. She pulled the guy with the mohawk and the beads under his skin.”
“Benjamin Kim.”
“Yeah.”
“This arrangement bothers you?”
He shrugged and plucked a slice of hard-boiled egg from the salad. “It’s a little weird to have most of the Unbreakables heading up there. They’ve made the Big Wall a lot more secure.”
“I am sure Captain Freedom and I can manage for one week with three hundred and twenty-four regular guards.”
St. George pushed the egg into his mouth. “We have that many now?”
“Not counting the twenty-five now assigned to Eden, yes.”
“What if something bigger happens?”
Stealth tilted the salad bowl and split it between two plates. “There has been no sign of Legion since the destruction of Cairax Murrain.”
“Doesn’t mean he’s gone.”
“It does not,” she agreed, “but this absence has now been three times longer than any other. We know his abilities allowed his consciousness to travel as far as Yuma. Perhaps he has gone farther.”
“Maybe. It just feels weird that we haven’t seen anything from him. I mean, not a thing.”
“Your concern for our enemy is touching, even if it is unwarranted.” She gifted him with another tight smile and picked up the plates. “The glasses, please.”
“Of course.”
They walked to the table. He raised his glass. “Thanks for making dinner.”
She bowed her head. “It may be our last night together for several days. I knew you would want it to be memorable.”
He leaned in and kissed her again. “You know who surprised me with all this? Cesar.”
Her fork pinned a tomato to the plate. “In what way?”
He shrugged. “I figured he’d look at this as his big chance to go solo, that he wouldn’t want Danielle looking over his shoulder. But he looked really happy that they’re all going.”
Stealth raised her fork. “I believe his joy comes from the hope of another sexual encounter once they are somewhat isolated.”
“Really?” St. George swallowed a mouthful of water. “With who?”
“With Danielle, of course.”
“What?” He blinked. “Wait…another encounter?”
“There were at least two, but no more than four. Danielle has since ended the arrangement. I do not believe there was anything romantic between them, although I believe there was a risk of Cesar becoming infatuated with her had it continued.”
“Are you spying on them?”
Her eyebrows shifted as she stared at him. “I do not spy on anyone, George. I observe and deduct.”
“But you’re sure they’re sleeping together?”
She set her fork down. “One observation was during my night patrol of the Mount three months ago. I heard a cry and investigated.”
“And it was…Danielle?”
“It was Cesar. I believe that first encounter was brought on by her own frustrations with her condition and by three bottles of ale. I do not know what instigated the other encounters, but I would presume a degree of familiarity was a factor.”
St. George loaded his fork with salad. “Okay,” he said. He set the fork back down on his plate.
She looked at him. “I did not think this knowledge would bother you so much.”
He shook his head. “It’s not that. I mean, it’s a little that. She’s, what, ten or fifteen years older than him?”
“Thirteen. Only two years more than the difference between Gorgon and Banzai.”
“Fair enough,” he conceded. “But, no, I was wondering if this is such a good idea after all. I mean, do we want to risk any…complications up there.”
“There will be none,” Stealth said. She picked up her own fork. “There is also little chance of Barry learning about it.”
St. George coughed. The temperature in his mouth shot up and wilted a piece of lettuce on his tongue. He swallowed it anyway. “You know about that?”
“As I said, I observe and deduct.”
“Wow.”
She raised an eyebrow. “This surprises you?”
“No,” he said, “it’s not that.”
“Then what?”
“Have we become a couple that talks about their friends’ relationships over dinner?”
Her mouth formed another tight smile as she sipped a bit of water.
“Well,” he said, “in the interest of fairness, then, I guess I should throw my own grenade on the table. Something I’d like to bounce off you, anyway.”
“Please do.”
“I’ve been thinking about it, and when Barry and I head out to this boat-island, Madelyn should come with us.”
Stealth impaled two spinach leaves and a small piece of egg yolk. She looked at him as she raised the food to her mouth.
“I’ve got a couple of good reasons,” said St. George. “She barely ever gets out because people still don’t feel comfortable around her. She deserves a chance to be outside and feel like she’s contributing.”
The fork speared another leaf and a tomato wedge.
“It gives us a third set of eyes out there. And people tend to disregard her, either for her age or because, well, they’re not used to an ex who can think. So they might be a lot more honest around her without thinking about it.”
“The Corpse Girl is not an ex-human.”
“Everyone here knows that,” said St. George, “but no one out there does.”
Madelyn’s father, Emil Sorensen, had been the mind behind Project Krypton’s super-soldiers. But St. George and Stealth had learned he’d also treated his daughter with experimental nanotechnology to cure a childhood ailment. It had cured her disease and made her the picture of health. After she was killed and mutilated by exes, the nanotech had rebuilt a complete copy of her body. The reanimated corpse of a teenage girl.
Stealth set the fork down and picked up her glass. She sipped some water and looked at him over the rim. “It will be awkward to carry both Madelyn and whatever supplies you plan to take as a goodwill gesture.”
He shook his head. “I can just get a safety harness or something to clip her to my back, and that leaves my hands free.”
“You have never carried a large amount of weight while flying for a significant amount of time.”
“She’s not exactly heavy. She’s, what, maybe a hundred pounds?”
Stealth nodded once, picked her fork back up, and turned her attention back to her plate. She ate another two mouthfuls of salad in her efficient manner before she looked up at him again. She blinked twice, her eyelids sliding down and up across her pupils. “Are you awaiting some word of approval from me, George?”
“Kind of, yeah.”
“Your reasoning is sound. If you need approval from me, you have it.”
He smiled. “Really?”
“Of course.”
“I have to admit, I was a little worried about what you’d think since it’s such a last-minute idea.”
Stealth lifted her napkin and dabbed at her lips. She pushed her chair away from the table, stood up, and walked into the bedroom. She returned with a square of folded black material that looked like rubber. “Madelyn will need this.”
She held it out to him and he stood to take it. “What is it?”
“An insulated wet suit. There is a good chance your journey will
involve cold and possible immersion.”
St. George shook it out. It was a narrow shadow with white accent lines down the front that gave it a high-tech look. “Should I even ask when you got this?”
“I located it for her before I came to make dinner,” said Stealth. “It should fit perfectly.”
“WATCH IT,” GIBBS called out to the people in Mean Green. “If Dr. Morris sees you moving the components like that she’ll tear you a new one.”
Taylor and Hector de la Vega muttered something in the back of the truck. They lifted the exoskeleton’s leg again, gentler than before, and worked the padded blanket around the mechanical limb. Hector strapped it against the tool chest while Taylor hopped down onto the liftgate to help Cesar and Gus Hancock carry the other leg out of Danielle’s workshop.
St. George tilted his head at the two soldiers carrying the leg. “Why are you having them carry them out like that?”
Gibbs glanced at him. At his lapels. They’d been standing together for twenty minutes. Gibbs had managed to avoid eye contact the whole time. “Like what, sir?”
“All loose. Danielle has a bunch of custom cases and forms all lined with foam, doesn’t she?”
“She did,” said the lieutenant. “Once we started building the Mark Two, they were all useless. These components are all a little bigger, and they connect in different places. The old forms were too custom to hold them.”
“Ahhhh,” said St. George.
“She cut up one of them to make a new pillow, I think.”
“Sounds like her.”
Taylor and Hancock heaved the leg up onto the truck’s liftgate. It rang with the dull peal of metal on metal. Cesar’s face scrunched up. The two soldiers both smirked, then glanced over at Gibbs.
“Real funny,” he said.
“Sorry,” said Taylor. After a moment he added, “Sir.”
“Get it strapped down and I might forget to have First Sergeant Kennedy drive her foot up your ass.”
Taylor’s lip curled. He huffed in a breath.
“Unless you want me to drive my foot up your ass,” Gibbs said. He took a step forward. His steel toes scraped the pavement, and the mechanical ankle whisked as it adjusted. “Because her foot is going to hurt a lot less than mine, believe me.”
Taylor glared at the lieutenant. Then he turned away and lifted the exoskeleton leg up onto the truck bed. Hancock kept quiet and followed the other man’s lead.
The truck’s door opened and Mike Truman, another one of the Unbreakables, hopped out. “Big Red’s calling from the East Gate,” he said. “They want to know how much longer.”
St. George looked up at the sky. It was past noon, almost one. About six hours of daylight left, and the trip out to Eden could take five if too many exes clogged the road. “Maybe you should have Cerberus assembled and ready, just in case,” he said to Gibbs.
The lieutenant bit back a sigh and shook his head. “It’d take us over an hour to get it unloaded and assembled.”
“I could help.”
“I figured you would. That’s why I said an hour.” Gibbs glanced into the truck, where Hector levered another ratchet strap back and forth. “That’s the last piece. Just let us grab our bags and I think we’re ready to go.”
A few nods passed back and forth between the group. Cesar hopped off the back of the truck and dashed back into the workshop. Truman headed back to the cab. “Let me know when it’s all good to go,” he called up to Hector.
“Dr. Morris,” shouted Gibbs. “Train’s leaving, ma’am.”
Cesar came back with a safety-orange backpack slung over his shoulder. “She’s coming,” he said. He looked at Gibbs. “She just needed some last-minute stuff, y’know?”
Gibbs dipped his chin in understanding. St. George counted off four Mississippis and wondered if Danielle was going to need help stepping outside. Then he saw movement inside and relaxed.
“Sorry,” she called out as she shuffled forward. “Just locking up a few last things.” She stopped at the oversized doorway and set her duffel bag down. Her fingers flexed inside work gloves, she turned to the door, and then looked down at her bag again.
The collar of her contact suit peeked out from under a threadbare flannel shirt, covered by a battered hoodie. Her Army Combat Uniform jacket rode on top of all of it. She was thin enough that it didn’t make her look too bulky, but her hunched-up shoulders didn’t help.
“I got the door, boss,” said Cesar. He hopped down, walked past her, and got the big door rolling on its track. She stood in the way for a few moments, then took a cautious step out into the sunlight.
St. George stepped forward. “You want a hand with that bag?”
They locked eyes. Her pupils were wide and her nostrils flared in and out with rapid breaths. He thought she was going to bolt. He could picture her pushing past Cesar and running back inside.
Then her eyes hardened. “I’m fine,” she said. “It’s just some clothes and my laptop.”
She stood there and her fingers flexed again. She bent down and grabbed the bag, then looked up at the sky. “Wow,” she said just a little too loud, “feels like ages since I got out.”
The big door closed behind her. Cesar took a few extra seconds with the chain and the padlock. Danielle took another deep breath, raised her foot, and took a step toward the truck. Then she took a second. And, after a brief pause, a third.
St. George bent and scooped up his own luggage, a bright red gym bag with a heavy shoulder strap. He straightened the pad at the top of the strap before he slung it over his shoulder. He made a point of not looking at Danielle while he did.
When he turned back, she was at the liftgate, all but gritting her teeth. It had taken her a minute to cover the five yards between the workshop and Mean Green. She met his eyes again and gave him a tiny nod.
Truman reached an arm out of the driver’s side window and banged on the door. “Come on,” he shouted. “I don’t want to be driving in the dark.”
Cesar walked past her and jumped back up into the truck. Gibbs stepped onto the liftgate with a clang of steel on steel as his foot hit. They both reached their hands down for her at the same time.
Danielle glared at them and hopped into the truck bed on her own. She stood there for a second, as if she were close to losing her balance. Then she adjusted her bag on her shoulder and turned to St. George. “You out of here?”
He nodded and tugged on the strap of his own bag. “I’m meeting Barry and Madelyn down at the southwest tower. We’re taking off from there.”
“Okay,” she said. She took another step into the back of the truck. Her shoulders relaxed a little more once the wooden sides were around her. “Have fun out there on Fantasy Island. Guess I’ll see you when you get back.”
“You will.” He pushed off the ground and rose up until he was looking down at the truck. “Cesar.”
The young man looked up. “Yeah?”
“Don’t get too comfortable. You’re getting one week with the armor. That’s it.”
The other people in the truck bed chuckled. Cesar’s face ran through a few expressions—confusion, sadness, understanding, excitement. “Yeah, we’ll see. You’re all going to be so impressed when you see how good I can—”
Danielle smacked him on the shoulder. “I’m standing right next to you, jackass.”
Taylor barked out a laugh.
Cesar’s face dropped again. “Sorry.”
Hector pushed a button, and the liftgate rose up with a whine of hydraulics. Gibbs moved to check the strapped-down components. Taylor and Gus stood in the front of the bed and looked over the cab as Mean Green rumbled into motion.
St. George gave Danielle a last wave and soared higher into the sky. He was a little over a hundred feet up when he saw the gleaming wraith hanging there. “Hey,” he said. “I thought we were meeting over at the tower.”
Zzzap turned his head from the departing truck. Oh, yeah, he said. I was just heading over that way and saw you.
Figured I’d wait for you.
“You didn’t want to say good-bye to Danielle?”
Nah. He spun in the air and darted south. St. George had to lunge after him to keep up. They were all ready to go and I didn’t want to delay them any more. Besides, it’s a week, right?
“Right. Maybe less, depending on when we get back.”
Yeah. Nothing’s going to happen. His head turned to the bag slung over St. George’s shoulder. Did you remember my stuff?
“Yeah, it’s all in here.”
Even the extra socks?
“I packed everything you put out.”
Just making sure. I don’t want to get halfway there and have to turn around. What about the snacks?
“I’ve got about two dozen of those oatmeal-fruit bars for you and three bags of jerky you can fight Maddy for.”
That stuff they make in the Corner?
“Yeah.”
The wraith shuddered. Y’know, it smells good but I’m always wondering what that stuff’s made of. Does it bother you they just call it “jerky”?
“Stealth says it’s not human. I try not to think about it past that.”
Oh, jeez, said Zzzap. I never even thought of that. I was just thinking rats or possums or something.
“I’m pretty sure it’s chicken.”
And you know what chicken jerky tastes like? Soylent jerky.
“Barry?”
Yeah?
“She’s going to be fine.”
What? Oh, yeah, I know.
“Eden’s got good fences, the main building’s practically a bunker, and with the scavengers there’s going to be almost forty guards. And Cesar’s going to be in Cerberus.” St. George regretted his choice of words as soon as they slipped from his mouth.
Yeah, I know, said the gleaming wraith. Just a little worried. It’s been years since we all split up this much.
“True.”
And last time we did, I ended up stuck in a reactor core.
“But they did give you bacon first.”
True. I guess it wasn’t all bad, when you put it like that.