Magnus! No!
Instantly, the men stopped screaming.
An awful silence ensued, broken only by low groans and the sound of pained wheezing. The men rocked on the floor, clutching their heads, curled into fetal positions. The leader, the one who’d been afflicted first, crawled slowly to his knees and sat back on his haunches. He touched his face, shook his head as if to clear his vision.
“Today’s your lucky day, Scav. Any other time and I would’ve ended your sorry life without a second thought,” said a low voice, a growl from the semidarkness that wasn’t attached to anything visible. Wherever Magnus was, he must’ve been close to the leader, because the man cowered at the sound of his voice.
“Please!” he entreated in a ragged whisper. “We were just looking for food!”
His hands flew to his head again. He began, shrilly, to scream.
It was over as quickly as it had started. The man fell forward onto his hands, gasping for breath.
“I don’t like liars. You should know that up front. I also don’t like repeating myself, so I’m only going to say this once: Leave, and never come near here again. Next time, I won’t be so forgiving.”
Then it seemed all the men were released from the grip of agony that held them. One by one, they staggered to their feet, grunting and groaning, wiping blood from their faces, their eyes wild and disoriented. The leader found his helmet and stumbled down the tunnel toward the others, and one by one the rest retrieved their headgear. They fell into the elevator, collapsing to the floor.
The door closed. The elevator creaked to life. Then there was only an empty tunnel festooned with bloodstains, and a tall, smooth-edged hole in one wall.
Something glinted oddly in the dim light. A sly glimmer began to coalesce into a solid form. Then Magnus appeared, looking up into the camera, his face as cold as stone. He looked a long, long time, and Lu knew he knew she was watching, and waiting for her to pronounce judgment against him.
When she remained silent, still stunned by what she’d seen, his voice, broken and raw, spoke into her head.
Not so beautiful now, am I?
He turned on his heel and strode away.
TWENTY-FIVE
For a person who’d grown up in a society where the elderly were murdered with a lethal dose of chemicals, then incinerated and disposed of along with the trash, Lu found Cherokee burial customs exotic, foreign, and hauntingly beautiful.
First, Nola washed Grandfather’s body with water and boiled willow root. Then she anointed him with lavender oil to cleanse his body of impurities. She sang a lament on her knees beside his bed, while James performed purification rituals for the house. They then gathered all Grandfather’s belongings, wrapped his body in a shroud, and sang more lamentations until the day had passed and darkness again overtook the sky.
Then they went outside, dug a hole, and buried him in the yard with his head facing west. His clothing, favorite books, jewelry, old photographs, and wedding ring were buried with him.
During all of it Lu fought back tears. Her own father had escaped the injection of SleepSoft-9 and the CineratorTM, but in the end he’d burned anyway. There was no grave for her to visit when they reached New Vienna. No evidence existed that he’d ever been alive at all. There was only a place in her heart that would forever remain empty, and her memory of him, the gentle, faithful man who’d raised a foundling child and paid the ultimate price for his kindness.
Though she’d been surrounded by death almost her entire life, Lu felt that her father’s and Nola’s grandfather’s deaths were connected, as their dying advice to her was connected, as she herself was connected to something larger and unseen. The weight of her destiny loomed heavy, and if she was being honest with herself, she wasn’t sure she was capable of rising to the occasion.
This rescue plan she’d concocted wasn’t exactly foolproof. What if she failed?
Magnus spoke quietly from behind her. “It’s time.”
Lu had been staring at the computer screens, lost in thought, her eyes focused on the image of the mound of freshly dug dirt in the yard, but now she turned and looked at him. His eyes held that cold, remote look again, which told her in no uncertain terms that this morning’s interlude in the bedroom hadn’t been the breakthrough she’d hoped it was.
Her heart sank. Fool.
She was a fool to think she could change a man so damaged. She was a fool to believe there could be anything good or happy in her future. She was a fool to believe in the power of love.
There was no love in this world. There was only death, and darkness.
“I’m ready,” she answered, her voice empty. She turned back to the screens.
He hesitated a moment before moving away. He said a few words of condolence and thanks to James and Nola, accepted two canteens of water and small packages of wrapped food for their packs, then wished them both farewell.
“The bikes only hold a six-hour charge, so don’t take any detours on the way to your next stop,” cautioned Nola in a quiet voice. “All your stops on the way to the city should have chargers, but once you get to New Vienna, you’ll have to ditch the bikes altogether; they’re not registered. It’ll raise a flag.”
“Will you stay here?” Magnus asked. He left unsaid any words of caution about the Scavs, but his concern was implied in his tone.
James said, “My guess is we’re safe for a while, at least. They won’t be in any hurry to come back. We’ll be careful, don’t worry about us. Just . . .” He faltered, and Lu turned to find him looking at her. “You guys be careful, too.”
“We will. Thank you for everything, both of you.” Lu crossed and gave Nola a hard hug, then hugged James. When she withdrew, James squeezed her hand, then dropped it and went to the kitchen, busying himself with tidying up. Nola walked them to the door.
“There’s something you should have.” Nola handed Lu a small envelope with her name written on the outside in a masculine scrawl. Curious, Lu looked inside: There at the bottom glittered a gold chain with a pendant. She tipped the envelope and the necklace, cool and heavy, slid into the palm of her hand.
The pendant was in the shape of a dragon. Wings spread, tail curled, mouth open as if about to spew fire. It had tiny rubies for eyes, and it was the exact same dragon that Lu had tattooed on her stomach. She gasped.
Nola said, “Aside from his wedding ring, that was Grandfather’s favorite piece of jewelry. He was never without it. I found it inside the book on his nightstand, in that envelope with your name.” Nola paused, drawing a steadying breath. When she looked into Lu’s eyes, her own were moist. “There’s an inscription on the back. I looked it up. It’s Aristotle. Maybe it means something to you?”
With shaking hands, Lu turned over the pendant. In a whisper, she read aloud the words inscribed there.
“Hope is the dream of a waking man.”
The three of them stood there in silence, until Magnus finally spoke.
“She certainly is.”
Their eyes met. Without another word, he turned and opened the heavy steel door, and melted into the darkness of the tunnel.
“Lumina.” Nola’s voice was soft, filled with a hesitation that dragged Lu’s attention back from the fading sound of Magnus’s footsteps.
“Yes?”
“I just want to say . . . thank you.”
“For what?”
Nola swallowed, looking down at the necklace in Lu’s hands. She seemed to be fighting for words. “So many terrible things have happened to me in my life. I’ve . . . it’s never been easy for me. Even when I was a little girl.” She laughed a low, husky laugh, filled with dark humor. “Especially then. There were countless days when I would have gladly killed myself, if only I’d had the courage.” She hesitated, then glanced up. “But today I found something I lost long ago.”
Lu waited silently.
Nola said, “Hope.”
“I . . . I’m sorry. I don’t understand.”
“I never really believed in anything . . . after. You know. Life. But now . . . what you saw, with Grandfather . . .” Nola’s eyes misted, and she reached out and clasped Lu’s shoulder. “Grandfather used to tell me, ‘There is no death, only a change of worlds.’ I never believed that. Until today. Until you. And now I have a reason to keep pushing forward through this nightmare existence. I have the only thing a person really needs in order to survive: hope.”
Lu’s stomach roiled with nausea, her heartbeat skittered and tripped. She looked down at the necklace in her hand. “Please don’t put me on a pedestal; I’m no hero, Nola. I’m actually more of a dysfunctional mess. And I’m sorry to say this because you’ve been kind to me, and I don’t want to seem like an ungrateful jerk, but . . .” She met Nola’s eyes, and knew her own were bleak. “It might have only been a dream. His last dream. And not . . . what you think it is.”
“Maybe,” Nola admitted. “But maybe not. And that’s where the hope part comes in.” She wrapped her arms around Lu’s shoulders and hugged her, swift and tight. Then she pushed her away, all sentimentality replaced by that commanding side Lu had begun to think of as the General. “Off with you, then! And don’t forget what I said about the range on those bikes.”
She gave Lu a gentle shove toward the door. Lu pocketed the necklace, nodding, and turned to leave, but Nola’s voice made her turn back one final time.
“Something else Grandfather used to say, Lumina.”
“What’s that?” Lu watched a smile hatch over Nola’s face.
“Those who have one foot in the canoe, and one foot in the boat, are going to fall into the water.”
Lu blinked at her, nonplussed. “I can honestly say I have no idea what that means.”
Nola’s smile grew wider. “It means a divided heart is destined for failure. So plant your ass in the canoe, let go of doubt, and paddle like a motherfucker. It’s the only way to get where you need to go.”
Then she pushed shut the door.
Three days of round-the-clock pampering and the best medical care available on the planet had not improved the Grand Minister’s mood one iota.
“Idiot! Schwachkopf! Kretén!” he screamed at the young nurse who’d come to change his bandages and apply fresh salve to his red, weeping skin.
The doctor standing calmly on the other side of the Grand Minister’s bed assumed his insults were hurled in three languages in order to make sure there was no doubt of his displeasure. As if his manner and tone weren’t enough.
“Please try to remain calm,” said Dr. Petrov in his practiced, soothing voice. He’d dealt with nearly every kind of human sickness in his long career, and considered himself a particular expert in diseases of the mind; it was obvious to him that the Grand Minister was a lunatic. Of the raving variety. But such a fact, stated aloud, would ensure the swift removal of his head—or something even more cherished—so Dr. Petrov only smiled his bland smile and kept the damning evaluation to himself.
“Calm!” shouted the Grand Minister. His face turned an interesting shade of plum. His lone blue eye bulged, threatening to pop from its hollow socket. “You expect me to remain calm when I’ve just found out you’ve been slathering me in goo made from THOSE DISGUSTING ANIMALS?”
Dr. Petrov adjusted his spectacles, trying to communicate with his eyes to the frightened nurse that she should ready another syringe of tranquilizer. They’d already used several on their patient since he’d awoken yesterday and had promptly started screaming.
“That goo, as you call it, has literally saved your skin, my dear Grand Minister. Had we not applied the Neoderma, you certainly would have died by now. You suffered third-degree burns over seventy percent of your body, charred skin, blistering, shock, and deep tissue damage, and the medication was necessary to—”
With surprising strength, the Grand Minister grabbed Dr. Petrov’s arm and yanked, pulling him down to the bed. The clipboard he’d been holding flew from his hands and fell with a clatter to the white tile floor, the papers attached to it fluttering like dry leaves in a breeze. He stared at the Grand Minister in wide-eyed shock.
“I would rather die than be defiled with that shit you call ‘medication,’” he snarled into Dr. Petrov’s face, spraying spittle. “Do you hear me, imbecile? I would. Rather. Die!”
Appalled, Dr. Petrov extricated himself from the unnaturally strong grip of the Grand Minister, and straightened, motioning to the nurse. He smoothed his hands over his hair, and down the front of his white coat. With as much dignity as he could muster after having been momentarily overpowered and practically assaulted by a one-eyed, one-armed, no-legged patient, he said, “While you are under my care it is my obligation to ensure you do not, in fact, die, Grand Minister . . . but once you’re released, you’re free to do as you wish. In the interim, we will continue the Neoderma therapy, and any other courses of treatment I deem necessary, including the CellRenu you’ve been receiving intravenously, which is helping to repair the damage to your lungs and air passages from inhaling smoke and superheated air.”
The Grand Minister fell silent, staring agog at the bag of clear liquid dangling from a metal hook beside his bed. The plastic tube that snaked down from it ended with a steel cannula embedded in a vein in the back of his hand. Dr. Petrov took the opportunity to snap his fingers, and the nurse darted forward, the syringe held ready in her pale, trembling hand.
“You’re injecting me with . . . them?” the Grand Minister whispered, his face a mask of horror. “You’re putting their poison in my blood?”
Dr. Petrov cared nothing for politics. He didn’t care about ideologies, either, except when it came to honoring his Hippocratic oath. And he had a secret thought, which he hardly even dared admit to himself, that the “disgusting animals” from which all the astonishing medicines of the last quarter century were made were far less disgusting than many of the people he knew. Like his assessment of the mental state of the Grand Minister, Dr. Petrov kept this dangerous opinion in the dark, quiet basement of his mind, where it would never see the red light of day.
“It’s not poison, sir. It’s medicine,” sniffed Dr. Petrov. He nodded to the nurse, and, with his help and after much flailing and cursing on the part of the Grand Minister, she succeeded in plunging the needle into the vein in the crook of his spindly arm. They watched as he struggled to keep his eyes open, and failed. His limbs grew lax, and he quickly drifted into a drugged sleep.
The doctor and his nurse shared a smile and the tenuous relief of two soldiers who’d just dodged a hail of bullets. There would be another volley as soon as the Grand Minister awoke again, but for now, thankfully, they could enjoy some needed, if short-lived, peace.
“Well.” Dr. Petrov straightened his glasses and smoothed his lab coat again. He was surprised to find his palms were sweaty. “Nothing like a little wrestling match to get the blood going, eh, nurse?”
She gave an exaggerated eye roll, exhaled a shaky breath, and chuckled. “I have to admit, Doctor, this one gives new meaning to the words pain in the ass.” She chuckled again, then clapped a hand over her mouth, realizing what she’d just said. And about whom.
“It’s all right,” said Dr. Petrov, keeping his voice low. “I couldn’t agree more. Just be careful you don’t let that slip again in front of anyone else.” He rounded the end of the bed, patted her shoulder, and watched with pleasure as a blush spread across her cheekbones.
“Yes, Doctor.”
“So,” he said, turning brisk. “What do we have up next?”
The nurse bent, retrieving his lost clipboard from the floor. He followed her from the room to the nurses’ station just outside and tried not to admire the alluring twitch in her hips as she walked; he was a married man, after all. His fidelity was less about adoration for his wife, of which he had littl
e, and more about pragmatism, of which he had a lot; the grass was never greener on the other side of the fence, he knew, only a different shade of green than the one on your own. And probably riddled with gopher holes you’d twist your ankle in, and thorny burrs that would cling to your socks. No sense disrupting your entire life to graze in new pastures when those same pastures would look downright dull once you’d been grazing in them a few months or years down the road.
Some men claimed variety was the spice of life, but Dr. Petrov knew that particular spice only led to diarrhea.
From the station counter, the nurse picked up the data pad with the rounds log and ran a finger down its list of contents, perusing with pursed lips. Something about her face was different, but Dr. Petrov couldn’t put a finger on it. Less makeup, perhaps? Her skin definitely had a glow he hadn’t noticed before.
“Four-ten fell out of bed again. Minor contusions, nothing pressing. Five-sixteen needed an additional two pints of B positive, and is stable. Five-thirty-one is complaining of chest pain, but his tests are all negative . . . oh, here’s one.” She brightened. “The patient in six-oh-two who came in last month is awake, and asking for a doctor—”
“Six-oh-two? Talking? Are you sure?” He was positive the nurse was mistaken; that particular patient had been involved in an accident at the waste treatment plant that had left him comatose, with zero brain activity. For him to be awake would be nothing short of a miracle. Dr. Petrov had seen too much in his time to believe in those.
“Yes,” said the nurse, looking up from the data pad. “Six-oh-two. He’s just finishing his supper now, I believe.”
“He’s eating?” Dr. Petrov was astonished.
The nurse shrugged. “Said he was starving. Asked for steak.”
Now Dr. Petrov was more than astonished, though he couldn’t think of the word that would properly convey the depths of his shock. Patients awakening after experiencing severe brain trauma were disoriented, mute, as weak as newborn lambs. And after a prolonged coma, they often couldn’t speak until months had passed and they’d relearned a variety of forgotten skills, including language. For this patient to be cognizant, hungry, and demanding a meal went beyond miracle territory and straight into . . .
Into Darkness (A Night Prowler Novel) Page 24