“No, sweetie. He asked me to see to it that he kept his promise to you. He would have been here to say goodbye, but our city is in a state of unrest and needs him. He’s going to be a wonderful leader.”
“He already is.”
President Layne smiled, and the warmth of it told me that West was going to be just fine in his city.
“You know that Justin and your council are corrupt, right?” I said.
She nodded. “I know. Fortunately for me, West already had a plan.”
“Cricket?” Dax had a hand on the door. He was more than ready to leave.
“President Layne, I have one last request.”
“Anything, dear.”
“Please don’t encourage West to find me again.”
I simply couldn’t bear it if he had to watch me die.
chapter forty-two
West
“Thank you for coming.” I stood at the front of a long conference table, the sleeves of my black shirt rolled to the elbows. The faces of each council member stared back at me with emotions ranging from curiosity to contempt. “We don’t have much time.”
“Westlin, what is this about?” the council member from the education sector asked.
“I called you here to—”
I was cut off by the sound of the door opening. Justin and three of his guards stood in the doorway. “Looks like I’m late.”
I smiled. “Actually, Justin, you’re right on time. We even saved you a seat beside Dr. Pooley. Your guards can wait outside.”
Justin turned and nodded to his guards, then walked to his seat, his narrowed gaze on me the entire time. He no longer wore protective gear—none of us did—as we were in a leadership room, far away from the medical sector.
“As I was saying, I called you all here today to talk about the condition of our city.” I gave Shiloh a quick nod, and she ducked out of the room as I continued. “Because I am short on time, I’m not going to tell you how I know the things I do, only that I have enough proof to support every claim that I will make from here on out—and I have shared that proof with key council members around the table.” A few of those members, who Mother was positive we could trust, nodded in support.
Shiloh appeared at the door. “Everyone is in place.” Mrs. Canary, Ryder’s mom, slipped into the room beside her.
“Wait just a minute,” Dr. Pooley stood. “She can’t be in here. She’s no longer a member of council.”
“Just what is going on?” Justin joined in. “Why are we allowing West to run any kind of meeting at all? Where is our president?”
Mr. Gatewood, the council member from the emergency sector, spoke up from his position on the other side of Dr. Pooley. “We’re letting him lead this meeting because I’ve already heard and seen enough of what he’s here to talk to us about to know that we need to hear him out.”
“And Mrs. Canary is here because I’ve asked her to rejoin the council,” I said.
“You don’t have the authority to do that,” Justin replied.
Shiloh moved to stand behind Justin. Her Taser was out, and Justin shifted uncomfortably.
“Justin, you no longer hold an office in this city. My mother has asked me to step in as her vice president. That gives me all the authority I need for now.”
Justin pushed away from the table; his chair slammed against the back wall. Shiloh smiled at the outburst while still holding her Taser, just waiting for a nod from me to take Justin to the ground.
“You can’t remove me from office.”
“No, but I can,” Mr. Gatewood said, “with a majority vote from the rest of the council. That vote was taken just before you arrived. You will sit down and hear what Vice President Layne has to say.”
After Justin had grudgingly retaken his seat, I leaned in toward the table. “I have assembled an entire team of staff, investigators, and my own guards to carry out the decisions we’re about to implement. And I assure you that my guards, along with my mother’s, far outnumber any guards who might resist us. I can also assure you that my mother is fully aware of everything I’m telling you.
“I know that members of this council infected my sister, along with at least eight other citizens of this city, with the Samael Strain. I know also that Dr. Pooley was partly responsible for this atrocity.
“Wait just a minute!” Dr. Pooley screamed. “You have no proof of that.”
I glanced over my shoulder at Councilwoman Canary. She stepped up to the table. “I assure you we have all the evidence we need. If you’d like to make a case for your life when this matter goes to trial, I would sit down and say nothing more.”
Guards moved to stand on either side of Dr. Pooley, convincing him to sit back down.
“I also know that Justin Rhodes and some members of this council approved the release of scouts into the outside—scouts who were deliberately infected with the Samael Strain.” I glanced around the table at each of the faces in an effort to determine which members had prior knowledge of these events. By the sincere look of shock on the faces of most council members, my guess was that the conspirators were limited to a handful.
“Since I don’t know exactly who was responsible, each of you will be investigated and questioned. Those of you who are proven to have taken part in the infection of another human being with Bad Sam will be tried for murder, and if you are found guilty, you will be punished to the full extent of the law.”
“Why are we listening to this boy?” Justin interjected. “He brought a girl in from the outside and allowed her to plant a bomb loaded with the Samael Strain within our city walls! A bomb, I’ll remind you, that is still there, waiting to infect every single one of our citizens with this deadly disease!”
“Our guests brought that bomb here strictly as insurance, to prevent us from holding them here against their will,” I said calmly. “They never intended to cause harm to any citizen of New Caelum. And that bomb has now been destroyed. Cricket and her friend exited through our city gates ten minutes ago, and immediately after, I witnessed, by video, the bomb being thrown into our incinerators.”
“What about the computer virus set to take down our entire air purification system?” the council member from our technology sector asked.
“We appreciate your team’s hard work on that problem. But that virus has now been deactivated.” The virus, too, had been deactivated immediately after Cricket left the city, just as she had promised it would be.
Justin banged a fist on the table. “None of this changes the fact that Christina is a threat to our city.”
I faced Justin and kept my voice even. “Christina Black entered our city, unselfishly and heroically, to give us medical information that she felt would help us to develop a cure for the Samael Strain. She worked with our medical team to save my sister and to prevent others from suffering from the same horrible disease she once suffered from. But let me be clear on this point—you invited her here when you released Bad Sam on the world. You forced my mother to find her. And we rewarded Christina by treating her cruelly. This is not the kind of city I want to live in.
“Your lower sectors are in a state of uprising as we speak. The higher sectors will follow in the next few hours as word continues to spread of how you gunned down two of our scouts inside our walls and left the other scouts to die on the outside. Our citizens are demanding change. My team of supporters is already in place to calm the situation. Not by force, but with promises of the very change they seek.”
Shiloh smiled at me from across the table. She’d been preparing for this moment.
“What do you need from us?” the council member from the emergency personnel sector asked.
“I need all available guards who still support the president to be ready to contain the situation. There is no need for this to get out of control. I’m hopeful that words of truth and promise of change from President Layne and myself will calm the city and give us time to rectify the situation we find ourselves in.”
I nodded to
the various guards around the room. “Guards, you will take Mr. Rhodes and Dr. Pooley into custody, along with anyone else Mr. Gatewood orders.”
The door opened, and in walked Mother. Tears streamed down her face.
“Mother.” I took two quick steps to her. “What’s wrong? Is it Willow?”
She wiped her nose with a tissue, then looked up at me, laughing through a sob. “She’s improving. Her vitals are improving, West.”
“What? Are you sure?”
“She’s still very sick, and she has a long road. And Christina warned me that she could improve and still not make it, but—”
“She’s given us hope.” I pulled my mother into a tight hug. Hopefully, Ryder, Key, and Dylan had a chance as well. And since the disease hadn’t progressed as far in Dr. Hempel, or in the boy in the iso unit, they’d have an even a greater chance of surviving.
Mrs. Canary entered the room behind Mother. I hadn’t even seen her leave. “Ms. President, Mr. Vice President, the citizens of New Caelum have gathered in the atrium. They’re ready for you.”
~~~~~
My mother and I both spoke to the citizens of New Caelum that day. We told them the truth about the status of Bad Sam. We were careful not to make promises we couldn’t keep, but we promised them they would have a say and a choice in every huge decision made in the future, starting with whether we would reenter the outside.
Our holding rooms were now filled with people who had sympathized with Justin, who had refused to follow order. Not to mention Justin, Dr. Pooley, and the other council members against whom Mrs. Canary had provided evidence of corruption.
After our speeches were over, Mother and I walked the hallways together to visit Willow. But when we entered the isolation suite, we were met with quite a surprise. One of the nurses had Willow’s doctor in a headlock, and had pinned him face-down on the floor. She held a Taser to his neck.
“What’s the meaning of this?” Mother asked.
Shiloh, whom I had promoted as part of my main guard, rushed over and pulled the nurse off of the doctor.
The doctor stood and brushed himself off. “It’s nothing, Mrs. Layne. This is just a professional misunderstanding.”
“The hell it is,” the nurse cried.
“Let her go, Shiloh,” I ordered.
Shiloh released the nurse, who sucked in heavy breaths. “Mr. Layne, I listened to your and your mother’s speeches. And I must say… It’s about time.”
I shot Mother and Shiloh an uneasy look. “Tell us why you had this doctor in such an impressive headlock.”
“Because he’s a criminal.”
The doctor began to splutter, but Mother cut him off with a gesture. She faced the nurse. “Explain yourself.”
“I overheard the doctor speaking with Vice President Rhodes earlier this morning. At first I didn’t believe what I was hearing, so I waited for him to take a break, and then I suited up and searched the biohazard container in the decontamination chamber.”
Shiloh gasped. “Why would you do that?”
“I was very careful. I’m not new to this disease. I treated my entire family before I entered New Caelum.”
I waved my hand. “What were you looking for?”
“I overheard Mr. Rhodes and the doctor saying they’d given Miss Black a faulty hazmat suit before she entered your sister’s room. Mr. Rhodes sliced a hole in the back.”
I glared at the doctor and my pulse sped up, but I managed to keep myself in check. “Why would they do that? It increases the risk of exposing us all to the virus. Besides, Christina’s immune to the disease, so why would Justin go to so much trouble?”
“She’s not immune,” the nurse blurted out.
“What? Of course she is.”
“I was in the lab the day she met with Dr. Hempel. He had her blood samples from years ago, and from very recently. And he showed her how her antibodies were lessening in strength. She used to be immune; now she isn’t.”
I stumbled backward, placing a hand against a wall to steady myself. “Does Christina know she was exposed?”
The nurse nodded. Her eyes pointed to the ground.
“Shiloh, get a truck ready for me.” Cricket knew she was no longer immune, and she knew she had been exposed. Why would she keep this from me?
“West.” Mother placed a hand on my arm. “You can’t leave now. Your future is running this city. You just gained their support. The city needs you.”
I turned to Mother. “My future is Christina Black, Mother. I let her go today because I made her a promise that I would.” I never would have let her go otherwise. “But this city I love so much—this city that needs me—it just gave her a death sentence. She sacrificed everything.”
chapter forty-three
Cricket
I watched Caine administer the treatment to his three patients. Like Willow, they were all very sick. Unlike Willow, they didn’t have seemingly infinite wires and tubes coming from all parts of their bodies. We simply didn’t have as many machines, or the power to run them.
Dressed in protective equipment, Nina sat by Dylan’s side.
Dax simply stared through the glass at his brother. They were twins, but Dylan looked nothing like Dax now as he lay there in a hospital bed, so much thinner than he had been only a week ago and bleeding from his ears.
The people I loved were here, taking care of each other. I would find comfort in that.
I wanted to hold Dax’s hand. To tell him that everything would be all right. But I couldn’t.
I couldn’t risk the touch.
And I didn’t want to lie to him. No matter what, I had never lied to Dax.
I walked into the main lab, where I had stored the vials I’d brought back from the city. I removed the remaining bloodstones from my necklace—leaving only the small tree of life— and then placed both the beads and my PulsePoint where Caine would find them. Then I grabbed the two vials I needed, needles and syringes, and tucked everything into my pack.
Next, after one last glance toward Dax, I slipped out through the back stairwell. He knew me better than anyone. He would understand that I was just doing what I had to do.
chapter forty-four
West
The evening sky was dark with stone-gray clouds that promised snow and possibly ice. I looked up at the old, run-down hospital and wished I had the power to turn back the clock on these past six years.
I wished a lot of things.
I took the steps of the hospital two at a time. The hallway where I had left my best friend and his girlfriend was quiet. I tracked Cricket’s PulsePoint to the lab, but I didn’t see her there. I turned and walked toward the hallway leading to the iso units. That’s where I locked eyes with someone familiar—Dax. But still no Cricket.
He immediately began looking around frantically. I was sure he was also searching for Cricket.
I walked closer, but he spoke first. “I don’t know where she went. I haven’t seen her in…” His voice trailed off as he searched his memory. The lack of hostility in his words actually surprised me.
“Did she… say anything to you?” My voice cracked involuntarily.
“Like what?” He cocked his head, narrowing his eyes. He must have seen something in my expression and in the way I was already backing away slowly toward the exit, because suddenly his shoulders slumped, and his expression was one of understanding. “You won’t find her. She runs when things get tough.”
He didn’t mean it as an insult to his friend. He and I both knew from experience.
But I’d find her. I had to.
“Cricket lives by two philosophies,” Dax continued. “She would never do anything to expose others to Bad Sam. And she promised herself a long time ago that she would never allow others to watch her suffer through a disease like that again. Not even you.”
chapter forty-five
Cricket
I somehow found the energy to put together a fire on the balcony of the estate. Sitting on top of a sl
eeping bag, I brought my knees in to my chest and rocked back and forth while watching a ribbon of smoke drift upward.
For six years, I had lived with the idea that I could face anything. After all, I had already faced the two most painful events I thought I could ever possibly face in my life: losing both parents and contracting a disease so awful that I prayed it would take my life. And though I didn’t believe a person ever quite got over those kinds of grief, I had learned to live with both. I didn’t think anything would ever trump it.
Until now.
“Why did he have to come find me?” I whispered. Unwelcome tears surfaced and spilled down my cheeks. My stomach tightened, and a lump formed in my throat so large that I couldn’t get in a breath. I hadn’t succumbed to my own tears in so long, I didn’t even remember what it felt like to truly cry.
I curled up inside the sleeping bag, wishing that I could get so small that I would disappear. My body shook as I turned my face toward the ground and let myself settle into the heartbreak. “I didn’t even get to tell you goodbye,” I whimpered into the blanket.
Hugging myself, I sobbed. It was a while before I surrendered to my exhaustion and slipped into another realm.
When I felt my body being lifted, I was sure I was dreaming. And I welcomed the fantasy world—a world that smelled of… West. Arms encircled me as I curled up against something large and warm. I managed to turn my head, but my eyes were heavy. I was so tired.
Fingers traced my hair along my forehead… and down my cheek. It wasn’t until I felt the touch reach the scars on my face that I realized I was not in a dream.
My eyes flew open. My body jerked, and I was hugged tighter. “Shhh. It’s me. It’s West,” he whispered close to my ear.
I stared up at hazel green eyes that glistened in the light of the fire. “West? What are you doing here?” I pushed against him, tried to break away from him, but he was strong and wouldn’t budge.
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