I laughed at that, I couldn't help it. "You don't like submarines, Wreg?"
"He hates them," Revik told me, kissing my face as he held me closer. "Don't you, brother?"
"With a passion," Wreg confirmed. "...A sinking dread. And that was an intended pun, by the way. A pun by way of a hint. A dire prognostication, if you will..."
"He got stuck in one that got torpedoed during WWI," Revik told me, still cradling me in his arms. I felt another flush of heat in his light, but he subdued it more quickly that time. "...Both of us did. He's been claustrophobic ever since."
"So have you," Wreg retorted.
"No." I shook my head. "He was claustrophobic before that."
"How is that better?" Wreg grumbled, now glaring at both of us.
Something about the way he said it made me laugh again.
The conversation lifted things a little, for that brief moment anyway. Until Revik glanced outside once more, pausing on something he saw. I didn't follow his eyes to know the specifics, but I felt that cold feeling return to the pit of my stomach. As if rousing himself, Revik shook his head before looking back at us, his voice more serious.
"I think Balidor's plan is sound," he said, matter-of-fact. "Despite what they tell the press, they must maintain at least one safe passage in and out of the city...for food, medical supplies, ammunition, potential evacuations and whatever else. They would not risk dropping the main grid for this. It would be too easy for the contaminant to get through."
Wreg nodded, turning this over in his mind. "And if there is a separate grid below?"
"Balidor seems to think there is one," Revik admitted. "He is following a lead he got from Chandre, to find a way through. I agree with him, for the record...and with you. It is too big of a flank to expose."
Wreg nodded, but his expression relaxed. "So Adhipan and Chandre think they have a way through?" He glanced up at Revik, his obsidian eyes reflecting firelight from the view through the windows. "What is it?"
"Chandre has someone on the inside," Revik said.
"SCARB?"
"I think maybe not," Revik said, glancing at me. "Secret Service, maybe. Or White House Construct Security."
I expected Wreg to press the issue, but he only grunted, glancing out the window again.
"I'm glad he is missing this," he said finally, watching a gang of what looked like teenagers run by, some pausing to swing bats and tire-irons at the Humvee, bringing nothing but a hollow thud into the background noise, dull enough to feel far away.
I didn't have to ask Wreg who he meant. Glancing down at Jon, whose arm curled snugly around Wreg's leg, I only sighed at how not-peaceful his face looked, even in sleep.
"Yeah," I said. "Me, too."
Watching Wreg look at Jon, I sighed again, internally that time.
Wreg caught my stare though, and returned it, his dark eyes wary, but also holding a thread of caution as he studied my face.
"I won't hurt him, ilya," he said, soft. Winking at me, as if to lighten the mood, he smiled. "...Not like you fear, anyway."
I nodded, sighing aloud that time.
"I know," I said.
He laughed. "No, you don't," he said. "You look at me like I might snap his neck any second. Or at the very least, beat him in a jealous rage..."
"Just see that you don't," I warned him.
Wreg rolled his eyes, clicking in irritation, but I saw the humor there, too. I was about to look away altogether when Revik jumped a little, as if startled, and stared directly at Wreg. Feeling a pulse of what might have been shock slide off his light, I glanced over, too.
"What?" I said.
Revik shook his head. A faint smile played around his narrow lips, even as he tugged me closer again, warming me with his light. I could tell he was glad I'd been distracted away from the view out the windows, so I shoved at his arm, wondering if he’d pulled my attention on purpose.
"What?" I said again.
Revik glanced at Wreg. "Can I tell her?"
"No," Wreg said at once. Looking between our faces, he saw my frown and returned it with one of his own. "I've told him," he said to Revik, his voice bordering on defensive. "...Let her ask him, if she needs to know every single thing so badly."
"Every single thing?" Revik clicked in amusement. "What did he say, anyway?"
"Nothing," Wreg said, looking out the opposite window. "He said nothing...I told him it was too soon, that we'd talk about it later."
"So you just dumped that on him, then wouldn't let him talk?" Revik chuckled. "Nice. Very smooth, my brother..."
"I had my reasons," Wreg retorted. "He thought my motives were..." He glanced again at me, as if remembering I was there. "...Suspect."
Revik snorted another laugh. "Yeah. I bet."
I frowned, once more looking between the two of them. "You're both a couple of jerks...you know that?"
Revik laughed again, kissing my cheek and tugging me back into his lap.
I'll tell you later, he told me softly in my mind.
"Like hell you will," Wreg said, glaring at him.
Revik only laughed again, sliding his fingers into my hair. "Jon thought Wreg was using him for sex," Revik said, even as Wreg smacked his arm sharply from the other side. "Wreg had to...reassure him...that wasn't the case..." Wreg hit him again, more of a punch that time than a slap, but Revik only chuckled more.
Shaking my head, I leaned my weight back against Revik's chest. "Never mind," I said, clicking in irritation. "I probably don't want to know."
"You really don't," Revik assured me.
That time, I smacked him.
More thumps on the outside of the vehicle doors jerked my attention back to reality. A gang of adults stood there, watching our convoy pass. Instead of being half-crazed and euphoric like the teenagers, these people emanated rage and desperation. I also couldn't help noticing that several of them held weapons with red smears and splatters on the ends, illuminated by the headlamps of passing cars.
Personally, I preferred the drugged-out teenagers.
The expressions of disbelief and fury on the adult faces tore at me; it was like I could see the realization sinking in that their world, their very reality, was collapsing in front of their eyes. All of those things they'd grown to count on were gone. Everything they’d worked for, and tried to be, gone. Whatever remained, whatever people and things they still loved, those would likely vanish in the next weeks or months, too. The worst part was, they were right. Their world was dying. There was no real way to pull it back, not anymore.
Intentionally or not, I'd been a part of that.
There was no way to give them back that sense of safety and permanence they craved. Nothing but pushes and memory fixes, which wouldn't change anything at all.
I tried anyway. What I could do was superficial at best, but I did it anyway, erasing their fears, however temporarily. Most just turned blank-faced once I had, their fear shifting to a deeper confusion, or maybe just a form of memory loss. I could still see that tension, though, like a background color in their light. It was as if on some level they could remember feeling terrified, just not the exact reasons why.
After awhile there were too many people to do even that.
As the crowds surged around the Humvee and Jorag did his best to navigate without hitting too many of them, Revik reminded me again that I needed save my light for when we reached New York. Somewhere in that, I gave in, and closed my eyes again.
We reached the gates of the military installation not long after.
2
ACQUISITIONS
OUTSIDE THOSE GATES, a near-riot raged.
I winced when guns went off, watching numbly as a crush of bodies pressed up against the cars, screaming and banging on the outside with everything from bricks to fists to lead pipes.
Revik wrapped an arm around my chest, pulling me deeper against him when a few people in the crowd discharged guns, too.
Most aimed at either the guards on the tower or the driver
's side of the car, in the hopes of stopping us, I guess, but the bullets did nothing but ricochet off the reinforced organic plates. I saw one of those bounced gunshots hit a woman in the throat. She hunched over, choking, then the crowd swallowed her up again. A group of armed attackers concentrated their fire at the tower and a rain of gunfire came from the guards stationed on top, cutting through the crowd.
It was hard to get angry at the soldiers, either; they were as wide-eyed and freaked out as the civilians.
Even so, I found myself looking away as more bodies fell.
I tried to tell myself it was a mercy, that most of these people were already contaminated or sick. My throat hurt, though. I could practically taste the blood, seeing it darkening clothes and faces and dots of it splattering the outside windows from stray bullets. The smoke from the fires seemed to penetrate through the Humvee’s airtight shields, enough to dry out my mouth, make my eyes water.
I hated that I couldn’t do anything. I hated that I could only sit there, watching it happen. It went against everything in me, even as I knew it was the only logical thing we could do.
Luckily, Jorag remained clear-headed.
He gave the tower guard the password via his headset and a secure channel. The password included a Barrier key, of course, along with multiple scans of our aleimi, since at this point all military bases treated pretty much everyone as a potential infection risk or a person of interest.
Surprisingly, to me anyway, we got through without a hitch.
Jorag even got a salute.
They put us through a series of five more gates, like the old-fashioned locks on the barge canals, each involving additional scans and passwords.
On the last two, we got blood-prick tests to ensure we weren’t carrying the virus, too. On each of those, an OBE field had to be disengaged to let us through. It made me think of a giant decontamination chamber, especially given the high dome that circled that part of the base.
It only occurred to me a few minutes later that, essentially, a decontamination chamber was what it had been. Instead of using actual walls to keep out the virus, which had ceased to be practical, they were utilizing distance from the contaminants, OBE fields, biological agent scanners, blood tests and guns.
"Will that work?" I muttered aloud.
"Balidor seems to think so," Revik said, feeling my thoughts. "He said they tested something similar at the hotel...which means they probably have something like that in place by now, too."
I grimaced, in spite of myself.
"You'll be thankful for it, once we get the humans inside," he reminded me softly.
I knew what he meant. He was talking about Jon, among others.
I nodded to show I understood, but his words didn't really help me let it go. The image of people flinging themselves against the hotel walls only to be fried to death by a fully-charged OBE was a hard one to chase out of my mind.
I knew he was right, though. I certainly didn't have a better solution.
Once we were on the other side of the last of those massive gates and past the second and more deadly of those OBE fields, our military escorts dwindled to none.
I felt myself exhale a held breath.
As I did, the military base grew visible before us, the view of the barracks lightening to a pale green through the infrared-equipped windshield of the Humvee. Being out of that crowd and away from the OBEs of the military gates brought an almost instant feeling of relief, like a huge pressure had just been lifted off my chest. Guilt accompanied that realization, of course, but not enough to wipe the feeling away entirely.
I could breathe again. I could even think, more or less.
I glanced at Revik, not bothering to voice my question aloud.
"No," he said, squeezing my fingers. “This used to be a private airstrip. They’ve converted a lot of places like this, putting F.O.B.s near all of the major cities.”
My forehead wrinkled. “F.O.B.?”
“Forward Operating Base,” Wreg grunted from his other side.
I nodded, watching Revik train his eyes out the window at the rows of tanks. I could feel his military-persona kicking in, bringing a different kind of interest in his light, enough that I could tell he'd been muting a lot of his reactions before, probably to avoid subjecting me to whatever was going on with him sexually. Now, even with the dark patches I could see in his aleimi from what happened at Casa de Shadow, Revik's aleimi felt sharper, and a fair bit brighter.
The aleimic equivalent of a dog pricking up its ears.
"Down, boy," I said, shaking his arm.
Glancing at me, he laughed, in surprise as much as anything.
"No more toys for you," I said with mock sternness. "If we have them, you and your band of ruffians will want to use them, and I'm voting on no more actual shooting wars for us for awhile. At least not until we get back to the hotel, okay?" When I saw Wreg looking out the opposite window, a similar glint in his eyes and light, I sighed a little. "...Make that down, boys. Seriously, if we have to shoot our way back into New York, I'm staying in the sub..."
Revik smiled a little, but his eyes didn't leave the window. Neither did Wreg's. Looking between the two of them, I could tell my words hadn't done jack-all.
"Isn't the armory at the hotel enough?" I protested.
"Can't hurt to have more," Revik said, eyeing a group of soldiers in full-body organic armor, probably with full camouflage capability, or so I felt from his light. “...Especially given what’s going on.”
"Always good to have options, princess," Wreg seconded, his eyes on what looked like some kind of portable flier gliding through the night sky like a mechanical bat. "...We could just look around some, couldn't we, Nenz?" he said to Revik, using his older name, the one I'd never gotten in the habit of using. "Take an informal inventory...assess any gaps?"
He smacked Revik's chest with the back of his hand, pretty much right over my head.
"...What do you say?" he grinned. "A quick shopping trip?"
Revik fit the headset back over his ear and triggered it with his mind, giving me a faint smile when I rolled my eyes at both of them.
"In charge, my ass," I muttered.
His smile widened, right before he winked at me. He waited for the other end to pick up, then began talking almost at once.
"Hey, yeah...what's our ETD?" He nodded a little as the person on the other end, presumably Balidor, must have answered. "Good. So Wreg and I...we have time to do a little acquisitions scouting?"
There was a pause. He laughed at whatever the person on the other end said.
"We'll behave. I'll keep Wreg away from the seer quarters." Nodding at something else the person said, he glanced at me. "...Yeah. I'm going to try. I'm thinking the answer is probably no, though."
"You bet your ass," I said, refolding my arms. Revik was getting a little too good at charming everyone into getting what he wanted, even Balidor. He was definitely a lot better at it than I was, these days at least.
"Hardly," he mouthed at me, still listening to the person on the other end. He glanced down at me then, raising his eyebrows suggestively before covering the mic with his hand, leaning closer to my ear. "You know I do whatever you ask of me, wife..."
Wreg grunted a laugh.
I rolled my eyes, but snorted a half-laugh, too. "Gee. Thanks a lot for that, husband. And no, by the way. You don't."
Wreg laughed louder that time, shoving my arm good-naturedly.
Revik only smiled at me in answer, tugging my hair before he glanced at Wreg, who was already zipping up the front of his armored vest. I watched as he eased Jon out of his lap and onto the seat next to him a few seconds later. Revik started to climb over me to the door, his hand reaching for his headset. He pounded on the glass separating us from the driver's section, where Jorag sat next to Jax and Neela. Once the three of them looked back, Revik motioned with his hand for them to stop the car. Neela grinned at once, glancing at me long enough to roll her eyes. Clearly, she knew ex
actly what and who was behind this little detour.
The Humvee rolled to a stop, not far from a second line of tanks.
I watched the ones behind us drive around, saw white faces pressed to the glass, probably wondering what the heck we were doing.
"...We'll be there," Revik assured the person on the other end of his headset. "In and out, promise. No complications."
"Right," I muttered.
Laughing a little, Revik clicked off the headset even as he reached for the door handle, leaning over to give me a quick kiss before he hit through the four-key sequence to open the locks. The second he opened the door, I was hit with a sharp blast of cold air, shocking enough that I flinched back, shielding my face with a hand. Being inside the sealed space, I hadn’t realized just how freezing cold it was outside the Humvee’s shell.
I recovered enough from the shock of weather to give Wreg an irritated look, however, as he smacked me on the shoulder in the process of climbing over me after Revik.
"Don't you want to come?" the Chinese seer asked. "I'm sure I felt Nenz thinking about it. Besides, we might need more, shall we say...energetic backup. Right, Nenz?"
Revik glanced back at the two of us, looking first at Wreg, then at me. The wind blew his black hair sideways in a sharp gust, but his eyes remained intently on me, as if he were thinking about Wreg’s words. After a pause, however, he grinned, as if remembering something. He clicked over the sound of the wind as the grin widened, right before he smacked Wreg affectionately on the shoulder.
"Brilliant," he seconded. "She's coming." He crooked a finger at me, his gaze pointed above the smile. "I'd forgotten I don't have to ask. You gave me permission to teach you again, love. That means I get to order you around...in this area, at least."
"What?" I said. “No, it doesn’t.”
"You're coming, wife. You need the field training."
"Field training?" I snorted. "In what? Stealing?"
Wreg laughed. I glanced over the armored vests and pants both of them wore.
"Seriously?" I said. "This is how you're going to use your teaching authority, husband?"
Allie's War Season Three Page 81