Alerton walked over to the girl, a razor-sharp knife at the ready. Eryn clenched his fists hard enough to hurt, the girl’s eyes boring into his. They weren’t bluffing. They would hurt this kid without thinking about it, only it would now be him doing it to her. He tried to get up, but the guard pushed him down, and grabbed him by the hair at the back of his head, pulling on it so hard, he had to grit his teeth to keep from screaming.
“Don’t, sir. Please, don’t,” he whispered miserably, eyes on Alerton.
The man nodded, and he felt the guard let go of his hair and step away from him.
He knew what would happen next and he was okay with it, so long as they let that kid go.
They did, the guard escorting her out of the room. He stood up and slowly walked over to Alerton and put his hands out. The man tied the biters roughly around his wrists and without any warning, backhanded him across the face. He wasn’t expecting it, wasn’t ready, so he teetered to the side, barely catching himself. Alerton steadied him and then hit him again and again. He kept at it for a long time, wordlessly, his face impassive as he did it, and after a while, he couldn’t see his face anymore, his mind going blurry. He remembered not caring if he died then, remembered wanting to just die from the pain of it, but mostly, from feeling so bloody helpless.
His eyes flew open, and the brightness of the room surprised him. Everything around him was stark white, not at all like the dimly lit place he’d woken up in after what Alerton did to him that day.
He heard the door open and faced it, Riley blocking the small entrance and then walking towards him with a strange look on his face. He squeezed his eyes shut, not wanting to see him or talk to him, not wanting to see anybody. He felt the man sit on the edge of his bed, and turned his head away from him. Riley didn’t say a word for the longest time, but he could feel him watching him and it unnerved him.
“We found your journal, Eryn… I’m sorry,” Riley said, and he couldn’t keep it in anymore. It didn’t matter now.
He glared at him, angry, but Riley’s eyes were soft. Sad maybe, but soft, no anger in them.
“You should have let me die,” he snapped at him.
“I know,” Riley surprised him by saying. “I’ll help you do it if you still want to. If you ask me to. I just can’t do it while you are here, but I will when you are well enough to walk.”
He nodded and turned away from him.
“Are you in pain?”
He was, but it wasn’t the kind of pain Riley could help with, not until he could walk again. He shook his head.
“We went through everything we could think of, Stan and Loren did. We can’t disconnect it, by the looks of it. Stan wants to keep trying if you’ll let him.”
He knew that already, had known it for years. It didn’t matter. He just wished they had let him bloody die. “There is no point. I should have just done it years ago, when I first knew, should have found a way to do it”—he choked, feeling his eyes well up—“I’d like to be alone,” he squeezed out.
“Anything I can do?” Riley asked in a whisper, getting up.
“Get me something that’ll help me sleep better, something strong enough to where… to where I can’t dream.” He made himself look up at him.
Riley just nodded and left without another word, the door opening and closing softly behind him.
The bloody journal… the only thing he had that was still entirely his, that wasn’t a part of this bloody war, wasn’t a part of the weapon they made him into. He wished he had a better place to hide the thing, but there wasn’t one in his cell, and he didn’t think anyone would ever look under the damn cot in that little crack he found that he wedged it into. He only wrote in it at night when he knew the guards couldn’t watch him do it, and for the last few weeks, he didn’t even do that. Didn’t have anything he wanted to say.
Riley came back after a long while with the other one, the woman who looked like him, only she walked softly, not like Riley did. Everything about her was soft. It must have been her who put the needle into his arm earlier. She crouched by him, looking at him with the same eyes Riley had. He wanted to ask if she was his sister, but didn’t feel he had a right to.
“We don’t tend to use anything stronger than what I’m already giving you. It’s addictive, is what I’m saying, and it’ll be harder on you afterward. Unless you’re in a lot of pain, and you shouldn’t be, given your injuries, I’d rather not do anything that’ll make it harder for you to recover,” she said quickly.
Eryn shut his eyes tightly, not wanting to see those soft eyes on him. “It’s all right. I’ll manage,” he whispered. “When do you think you’ll let me out of here?”
He felt her move and opened his eyes. She was whispering with Riley by the door and then she just left, shaking her head. He noticed a syringe in Riley’s hand, and that his hand was shaking.
Riley walked over to him and straddled the chair, set the syringe down on the small metal tray on the table where all the other stuff was and clasped his hands on his lap. He looked like he needed to say something to him, but didn’t know how to, his jaw working, eyes looking at anything but his face. He knew that look.
“Just say it, whatever it is,” he said sharply, staring at him.
“The rest of the Council… they can’t let it go, not until they know for sure what those things in you are and how they work, so you don’t have any choice about letting Stan do what he needs to do. I’m sorry.” Riley dropped his eyes for a flash, and then looked at him again, and he seemed sorry, the way his face was.
“What’s in the syringe?”
“The strongest anesthetic we have. It’ll knock you out, so you don’t have to be awake for any of it. It’s the best I could do.”
“I don’t want it,” he spat out through clenched teeth. “If they’re going to treat me like the lab rat I am, I want to be awake for it. I won’t go into shock or anything, I promise.” He knew it wasn’t this man’s fault, but he couldn’t help it, the anger flooding into him, anger at all of them.
Riley got up and paced around the room, back to him, hands clasping and unclasping nervously behind his back.
He watched him pace for a while and then closed his eyes, trying to calm himself. It would be easy to die now, easier than this. He never wanted to go through that again. He felt a strong hand wrap around the arm that didn’t have an IV in it after a while and opened his eyes. Riley was looking at him, and he knew, felt what he was going to do.
He tried to jerk his arm away, but couldn’t move it for the straps at his wrist. He forgot about the bloody straps.
Riley shook his head at him. “I can’t let you do it like this. I’m sorry, but I can’t,” he whispered, not letting go of his arm, the syringe in his free hand.
There wasn’t a thing he could do to fight him the way he was, and it hurt that he couldn’t. He looked at this strange man again, really looked at him, and he could see nothing but kindness in his face, kindness towards him, of all people. For the first time, he knew what Ams so loved about him, and he felt a small pang of jealousy at it. Not so much over Ams loving this man, but over how Riley was. And then shame over what he did to him and to her. He took a deep breath, knowing that he didn’t have a choice, wanting to just make it easier on this man now, if that’s all he could do. “Do what you need to do,” he exhaled, relaxing his arm, and closed his eyes.
This he felt, much more than a pinch, the needle poking useless holes in him. Riley couldn’t get it in the vein for the life of him. “Stop,” he said through the burning pain at his elbow.
Riley looked at him apologetically, but he wasn’t poking him anymore.
“Tie a belt or something around my upper arm. It’ll make it easier for you. You’ll need to pull it tight.”
Riley nodded and quickly wrapped a long strap around his arm.
He pumped his fist until his veins looked big enough to where even someone with shaky hands should be able to do it. “Take a deep breath or two and then
just drive the needle into the vein, far enough that you know it’s in there, but not so far that it comes out the other side, so go slowly. You’ll feel it when it’s right. When the needle is in, you’ll need to take the strap off. Squeeze the plunger…. It’s all right. Do it.”
He woke up with a blinding headache. Voices in the room, too many bloody voices. He lifted his head and regretted it immediately, groaning at the pain. He felt a cold towel on his head, the voices not as loud now, or maybe, not so many. He opened his eyes, blinking at the brightness and finally focusing on the face of the girl with Riley’s face. She smiled widely at him, not something he’d ever seen her do before.
“I’ll go get Riley for you. There is something you should know. You’re going to be all right. Those things -- you’re free of them, Eryn,” she said and ran out the door, soft-footed, silent. He didn’t know what she meant, wasn’t awake enough to process it. He tried, only his head hurt so badly, he gave up.
He must have slept for a while because the room was silent when he woke up again, and it wasn’t as painfully bright as before. He heard breathing somewhere near him and turned his head to the side, opening his eyes, slowly, carefully now. Riley was asleep in the chair next to him, his head hanging down on his chest. Suddenly, the man sat up and smiled in that way the woman smiled at him earlier. He noted that his face looked tired as if he were sick or hadn’t slept in a while, dark circles under his eyes, and there was a bandage around his arm that wasn’t there before.
“Welcome back,” Riley rasped. “I’ll unstrap you if you promise not to beat the shit out of me.”
He nodded, thrilled at the prospect of being able to move more than just his head.
Riley took the straps off and surprised him by gently massaging his wrists. It didn’t seem new to him either, not like him trying to stick that needle into his vein. This was almost like an old habit. He closed his eyes and let him, feeling oddly calm about everything, the kind of calm he couldn’t remember feeling in years.
“You can try to sit up if you want. I’ll help you…. You’ve been out for almost a week, so I don’t think you’ll be up to walking on your own yet, but if you want to try, I’ll hold you up… whatever you want to do.”
He wanted to pee, more than anything. He didn’t know how he peed while lying here for a week, and he was too embarrassed to ask. “I need to pee, Riley,” he finally whispered, trying to hide his discomfort by not looking at him.
Riley ran out the door and in a flash came back in with the girl.
She told Riley to turn around as she leaned over his bed. “We had to put a catheter in you. You shouldn’t feel like you need to pee, is what I’m saying, but if you do, I need to get the catheter out. It shouldn’t hurt too much, but it will be uncomfortable.”
He nodded, mortified, realizing where that thing they put in him was. He squeezed his eyes shut, not wanting to watch this, and waited. He gasped when he felt her hands move the sheet that was covering him away from what he just now realized was his completely naked body, and he tried his best to block the rest of it. He just felt it, knew when it was done.
The girl pulled the sheet over him again, dropped a set of pajamas on his bed, and left the room without a word.
He quickly pulled the pants on, but then the room started spinning and he had to close his eyes to keep it from doing that again. He felt Riley’s hands on him, lifting him and he let him, and then let him walk him to the bathroom. He felt steady enough when he was just standing, so this he could do.
Riley backed out of the room, closing the door behind him.
He turned the water on at the sink afterward and washed his face, surprised at all the stubble on him. There was a toothbrush and a small tube of toothpaste on the side of the sink so he brushed his teeth, but he couldn’t find a razor, the two tiny drawers under the sink empty. He turned the water off and Riley came in then, looking him over, grinning.
“I couldn’t find a razor.” His hands wrapped tighter around the edge of the sink.
“I’ll shave you if you want me to,” Riley said softly.
“I’d like to shave myself if that’s all right.” He knew Riley heard the edge in his voice, the anger in it by how his face got.
“I can’t let you do that. Not yet. I’m sorry. I can get someone else to shave you though if you don’t trust me not to kill you.” He was grinning again.
He suddenly felt weak, too weak to stand or to fight this man over something as stupid as some stubble on his face. It didn’t matter. He didn’t have anybody who’d notice if he shaved or not. He shook his head, not looking at him, just trying to keep it together so he didn’t fall.
Riley must have sensed it, his hands gripping him hard, lifting him, and almost carrying him to where the bed was.
“I’m tired, Riley. You should go,” he said quietly, feeling the sadness take him again, only this was a new kind of sadness, a kind he didn’t know what to do with. The not having anybody who’d notice if he shaved or not kind, and he didn’t want to talk to this man about it, didn’t want to talk to anybody about it. He closed his eyes, hoping Riley would just assume he was asleep and leave him be.
“I know you didn’t ask, but I’m going to tell you anyway. We’re used to dealing with blood as a distribution method for neuros, but that’s all. In your case, what they did, and we don’t know how they did it or why it worked, but the neuros never left your blood cells. They didn’t just travel to the pathways, they were completely integrated. Anyway, Stan thought it was worth a try to go with the simplest solution, Occam's razor, as he put it, and the simplest solution was a blood transfusion, so that’s what we did. You and I are blood brothers. Imagine that,” Riley said quickly, and he could hear a smirk or a smile in his voice.
“You gave me your blood?”
“Yes, you son of a bitch. We’re the same type and I was there, and since I’m one of them Zoriners, I never even had an implant, so I’m clean, as are you now. That means you can live your own life. You are a free man, Eryn. As far as the Council is concerned, you’ve paid your debts, and—” His voice trailed off, and suddenly he felt him sit on the edge of the bed, not talking anymore, breathing hard. He hoped it was too dark for him to see the tears running down his face.
“Shit, Eryn. Normally when people get news like this, they are all kinds of happy, you know. That’s normal. What you’re doing… what’s wrong?” There were no smiles in his voice now.
He felt his hand on his arm after a while and he forced himself to look at him. “I don’t know what to do with it; don’t know how to do that, the free thing. I don’t know what it means for me, is what I’m saying. Don’t know what it’s supposed to feel like,” he said, and he broke down crying in front of this man, crying like a little kid, unable to stop, or run or do anything but throw his arm over his eyes, grateful that he could do that much, at least. That Riley hadn’t put the straps back on his wrists.
Riley stood and turned away from him, and he was grateful for that too, for this bit of privacy.
His soft voice reached him after a while, the man still standing with his back to him. “Why didn’t you just tell us, any of us? They couldn’t have heard you from the cell, you knew that…. Why didn’t you just hand that damn journal to somebody here? It doesn’t make any bloody sense that you’d rather we execute you than that.”
“Because I would have rather you had. I didn’t want you to know. Didn’t want anyone to know,” he whispered. “It’s private, Riley. Let it go. Please, just let it go.”
Riley turned, looking at him as if he were insane, then sighed and shook his head, his voice strained when he spoke again, “I hated you more than I’ve ever hated anybody before. Maybe all but one other person in my whole life. I wanted to watch you hurt and suffer worse than anything for what you did to Ams. When we found your journal… I didn’t know what to do with it. Couldn’t sleep for days, hoping you’d make it, hoping you’d wake up if only for long enough for me to tell you how sorry
I was for everything, sorry for every bloody thing you’d been through. This place, the people here, they’re all right. What I’m saying is nobody here is going to pry or force you to do anything you don’t want to do. Not ever. You don’t owe anybody here anything. You can stay with us and help us finish this or you can leave and go anywhere you want to go that we can help you get to. Whatever you want.”
“I’ll help you finish it then,” he said quietly when he could speak calmly again. Riley just nodded in that way he had and let him be after that.
He knew he’d still likely dream about the kid, and the old man, and the bloody piano lessons and the rest of it, and he dreaded it, but for the first time in as long as he could remember, there was at least a chance that he’d make it, and it was more than he ever hoped for. More than he deserved.
14
Jasmine
Brody, September 29, 2244, Reston.
He tried talking to Riley for days after he read that damn journal, but he wouldn’t talk, not to him, not even to Ams. Wouldn’t sleep or eat either. It’s as if it were him they did this to, not that other man, the man Riley would have gladly put lots of bullet holes into not a month before if his boys didn’t interrupt him.
He read the thing, they all did, all but Ams, and it hurt like hell reading it, but none of them took it as hard as Riley, and he didn’t understand it. If nothing else, what they just learned gave them a real chance at finally ending it, for all of them. He went to see him every day at the med wing while he waited for that man to wake up, looking like he did when Ams left him, unshaven, his hair a mess, and not caring about any of it. He’d sit outside the room with his head in his hands and wouldn’t even look at him and he didn’t know how to help him, none of them seemed to. He’d sit silently with him for hours and then let him be, and he knew after a few days of this that the only damn thing that would make his friend okay again would be that boy waking up.
Alliance: The Complete Series (A Dystopian YA Box Set Books 1-5): Dystopian Sci Fi Thriller Page 87