Deception

by Teri Terry

  Freja’s emotions flood with apprehension, and then, like she realizes I can see it, she tamps it down and hides her feelings. There must be something I’ve missed. Did Freja and Kai have a big fight when I was gone last night?

  Everyone is focused on Kai. “I can’t stay here. I’ve got to leave.” He glances at Freja, but she doesn’t meet his gaze.

  Patrick looks at him. “Why?”

  “I have to find Shay. It might be hopeless, but I have to try. There’s no chance of finding her, or other survivors for that matter, if I stay here. I think we’ve proved that by now. There’s also no way of discovering what the government knows—or finding the doctor responsible.”

  Yes, at last! I’m happy—isn’t that what we agreed to do when we left London? It’s about time.

  And I think Patrick will argue with Kai, that he’ll try to convince him to stay, try to tell him how impossible finding Shay will be. But he stares back at Kai, then slowly nods. “You’re right. Our reach is too limited from here, and the same applies to the rest of us. We should all leave.”

  An instant silent bombardment of Patrick takes place—Amaya and Henry look excited; Zohra, scared; JJ, I don’t know. Freja is still carefully guarded. But like Patrick has done before, he shakes his head. “Out loud,” he says.

  “But where can we go?” Zohra says. She seems almost bewildered.

  “As a start we can go to my house. It’s on the outskirts of Matlock, far enough away from any neighbors for no one to notice you’re there if we’re careful. There’s enough room if you don’t mind roughing it a little—after camping out here, that shouldn’t be that much of a deal, I guess. At least there is hot water. And we need instant access to information we don’t have here. The zones are starting to break down; I don’t think anyone is going to knock on the door looking for survivors. Everyone is too worried about themselves, their own families, to bother with us.”

  “You don’t know that,” Zohra says.

  “No. I don’t know that. But why should we hide? We’ve done nothing wrong. If we’re committed to finding other survivors and bringing them together as a first step, then we need access to the internet; supplies, vehicles, roads. There’s only a tiny area we can search from here without these things.”

  “You said go to your house as a start,” JJ says. “What then?”

  “Cover the area we can from there, then move on. Maybe we should head to Scotland, to that group that contacted us a while ago? I don’t know. But one thing I do know is this: we’re not going to accomplish anything if we stay here, running from the problem like rats from a sinking ship.”

  “Should we take a vote?” Amaya says, eagerness shining all through her.

  “Wait,” Patrick says. “I think if any of us want to stay, they should stay and the rest go. We can send more supplies. This is too big to impose on anyone, okay? So vote for you—what you want to do for yourself.”

  We all nod.

  I’m surprised when everyone apart from Zohra votes to go. They want to leave this place, despite the fear: it’s almost like they were waiting for somebody to say it so they could agree.

  Then even Zohra changes her vote. She is still scared, but maybe the thought of actual hot water and a non-barbecue-related dinner is enough to convince her. Or maybe she can’t let Amaya and Henry go without her.

  “Kai, I’m guessing you were planning to go off on your own,” Patrick says. “You can, of course, still do that if you want to, but we might be able to help each other. Finding the government facility where survivors have been taken has got to be our next priority. If we can work out the right area to search, we can sense the presence of survivors in ways that you cannot.”

  Kai nods. “That makes sense. Count me in,” he says, but he looks troubled at the same time.

  They spend the day working out what to take, what to leave behind. This place will be left equipped as a refuge, a place to run to if needed.

  That evening three are to go in Patrick’s four-wheel drive; the other four will follow behind on the bikes. I expect Freja to go on one of them with Kai, but then Henry looks longingly at the bikes as we’re organizing ourselves, and Kai asks him if he wants a ride. JJ asks Freja to go double with him; she hesitates, then shrugs and says yes.

  We set out, Patrick in front, the bikes coming up behind with Kai and Henry bringing up the rear. They keep a wide distance between each, and I keep tabs on everyone as I go back and forth.

  I’m full of excitement at the freedom, roaring out of this place with all the ones who can see and hear me.

  We’re going to find more survivors, aren’t we? And Shay.

  And then we’ll find Dr. 1.

  I’ll wrap myself around him, and then we can all watch him die.

  CHAPTER 14

  KAI

  WE FIND ANOTHER GROUP ALMOST AT ONCE; or rather they find us. There are nine of them—all survivors. They’re spread out around a base in Chester.

  They’re also in touch with other individuals and a few groups dotted about here and there. We share knowledge: there is more talk of a government facility in England where survivors are taken, but no one has been able to find it.

  Groups have been destroyed in a few places too—either the government has swooped in and people vanish, or vigilante groups of survivor hunters find them. There is hushed talk of a group chased by a mob and burned to death. Would fire turn them into Callies? I ask, but none of the other survivors we meet have ever seen anyone else like her.

  And they’ve all begun to work on defense and attack—ways to protect themselves or rescue other survivors. But not with weapons, at least not the usual sort: with their minds.

  Freja is troubled at the thought of striking out, hurting anyone. She’s stayed remote since that night in the woods; I know she needs someone she trusts enough to talk to, like when she told me about her sister. I want to be that friend to her, but it feels like it is better to keep her at a distance and not get too close.

  Better for me; maybe not for Freja.

  Instead I focus on Shay—things like the sound of her voice, the way she instantly had my attention no matter how softly she spoke. The way she bit her lip when she was thinking about something. How her eyes held all of her and could flit between laughter and sadness and back again, taking me with her each step—to laugh with her, comfort her, then laugh again.

  As if remembering things like these will make Shay stay alive until we can find her.

  CHAPTER 15

  CALLIE

  KAI AND THE OTHERS ARE BACK FROM PATROLS. Leslie, a visitor from another group, stayed behind tonight. She’s some sort of computer geek and has been setting up access to the dark net for Patrick—the anonymous part of the internet where users are untraceable. She says we’ll be able to be in more direct contact with other groups and to search for things without worrying about being tracked online.

  Kai comes in and looks over her shoulder, JJ and Freja behind him. JJ and Freja seem to be together a lot lately—I don’t know why. I don’t like him, and I thought Freja didn’t either.

  “Is everything good to go?” Kai asks.

  “All set,” Leslie says.

  “Has there been any progress in finding the trap?” The trap is shorthand for the government place survivors are being held.

  She turns, sympathy in her eyes. She must know about Shay. “No, not yet. We’re still trying. It’s odd we haven’t sensed them anywhere.”

  Unsaid: Maybe that’s because they’re all dead.

  “Is there anything I can do? I wouldn’t be much use with computers, but if you run things past me, maybe there is something you’ve missed?”

  Leslie exchanges a glance with Patrick; they’re having a private, silent conversation.

  “We’ve been hacking into websites; for the air force, army, other armed forces, and government,” she says, a b
it begrudgingly, like she doesn’t like explaining things out loud. “Seeing if anything is mentioned. But nothing has come up. Some of their secrets are buried deep. We won’t give up, though.”

  “Could there be another way?” Kai says.

  “What do you mean?”

  “There are groups of survivor hunters I saw online a while back, like Vigil. They must be trying to find the same place we are, right? Maybe we should see what they know.”

  She shakes her head, dismissing the idea. “They can’t find it if we can’t.”

  Kai argues, but she’s not having it. She thinks we’re so smart that there is no way they could do something we can’t.

  Finally Leslie leaves, on her way to another group of survivors to sort out their tech.

  Kai’s face is a mixture of sad and angry. He sits with his head lowered, arms crossed. Freja takes one step toward him, hesitates, then reverses and goes out the front door.

  But Patrick’s eyes are thoughtful. “Kai, you might have a point. I’ll see if I can find anything.”

  JJ follows Freja out the door, and I follow him. Curious, I hang back and listen.

  What are you waiting for? JJ says.

  Freja ignores him, walks away.

  Kai’s in love with somebody else.

  Or he thinks he is.

  Is there a difference?

  Yes.

  Maybe there is when the somebody else is here, in front of you.

  Then you can see what is real, what isn’t. You can’t compete with an absence.

  What makes you think I want to?

  Freja holds JJ away with that, but I’m intrigued. Kai loves Shay, doesn’t he? But why does he? I don’t understand how these things work. She’s younger than him. She needs saving, or so he thinks. Freja is the same age, the same sort of degree of crazy. He is himself around her; she doesn’t want or need to be saved.

  But maybe Kai needs to save somebody, because he couldn’t save me.

  CHAPTER 16

  KAI

  SOMEONE IS SHAKING MY SHOULDER. It’s Freja. “Get up!” she says. My thoughts are blurred and thick from sleep.

  Lights are switching on; everyone is spilling toward the computer room. Freja is strained and there is excitement on everyone’s faces, and now I’m fully awake.

  “What is it? What’s happened?”

  Patrick answers. “You were right, Kai. I’ve been hacking survivor-hunting websites. The one you mentioned—Vigil—is making plans to attack a remote air force site in the North York Moors—I think we’ve found the trap. This must be it.”

  His hands move on the keyboard. I push my way into the crowded room to stand next to him. “I’m just patching into this new group network,” he says.

  There are pings of excitement from other groups when Patrick tells them what he’s learned. The location is pinpointed. Some want caution—it may not be what we think it is. Even if it is, are we ready to take on a facility like this? What happens if we run into Vigil on the way? Are we ready to deal with them?

  It’s agony watching this and not being part of what they’re saying—the decisions they’re making. At least for a change I can read it on the screen and not wonder what is being passed mind to mind.

  Finally, consensus is reached. Vigil is planning to attack. We don’t know when—they’re referring to dates in some sort of code—but it sounds imminent, so we can’t sit back and wait and plan and train. We’re going to go there, and we’re going to set out tonight.

  We’re the closest group. We’ll get there first and scout out what is happening, wait for the others to arrive so there are more of us—and then do what must be done.

  And we’re rushing to get ready, grabbing what we need. Even Zohra is coming; no one wants to be left behind. Everyone is scared but wants to go there and rescue these survivors if it can be done, and I know part of the reason is because of me, and Shay. I’m touched that they care.

  But some other part of me still hears an echo—the mixture of emotion that is Freja—happy and hopeful for me, sad for her.

  How am I able to see this?

  Maybe I’m more like them than I know.

  CHAPTER 17

  CALLIE

  PLANS ARE MADE AND UNMADE AND DISCUSSED, and all the while we’re rushing toward this place that Patrick thinks he has found. First racing up back roads in Patrick’s four-wheel drive and the bikes; now on foot, vehicles stashed out of sight.

  As we go they’ve been coordinating their minds, working out how best to deal with armed guards and locked doors. Can they really handle it?

  But that isn’t what worries them the most. Patrick found the location from posts on Vigil’s website: they are survivor hunters who think the best way to get rid of the epidemic is to burn anyone who might carry it. What if we don’t get there first?

  Now and then I race ahead of them, trying to sense survivors, or anyone at all, but everything is a blank. They’re following GPS coordinates, not something I can do on my own, so I go back and forth, keeping them close enough that I always know where they are.

  The sun is starting to come up, the sky streaked with red and gray, when once again I rush ahead.

  Then I wish I hadn’t. I wish I’d waited, so I wouldn’t find this alone.

  It is the smoke that gives it away—it is part of the gray in the sky, mixed with clouds that are heavier now, strangling the sunrise. The place is hidden in the landscape so well that even though there are parts of it that are outside—a small plain courtyard, some twisted and burned tables and chairs—without the smoke I don’t think I would have found it.

  And it is only the smoke that draws me to this place: there are no beating hearts, no intense splashes of heat or emotion that say survivors are here. Then I hunt and call out again and again, in case there are any like me that were made in the fire—but no one answers.

  I should race back and tell Patrick and the others, prepare them, but I can’t bring myself to do it.

  I’m a coward. I hide.

  No one lives in this place. Not any longer.

  They did, but now they’re gone.

  CHAPTER 18

  KAI

  FREJA AND THE OTHERS HAVE GONE QUIET, the excitement they had before dampened. What do they sense? Is something wrong that they’re not saying?

  Then I see smoke drifting into the sky.

  My head is light, my chest heavy, I can’t breathe…

  I have to move, now.

  I run. I can’t stop myself, no matter if they might still be here—the ones who did this—and it could be dangerous. I just don’t care.

  I hear my voice screaming her name—“Shay, Shay!”—I have no control over the sound.

  The smoke is rising from a dying fire, a pall of gray that stains the land before finding the sky. Patrick and the others try to hold me back with their minds, make me wait—stop me from going into danger—and to shield me, soothe me. But I easily push them out like Freja showed me before. Somehow, now, I finally get how to do it completely.

  But doing that slowed me down, and they’ve caught up with me now. Freja insists that I must wait. That Callie will go in and search—see if anyone is there, friend or foe. That she can be safe in the fire and smoke and I can’t. JJ and Patrick hold me back when I would rush in and not care if the smoke and fire had me. It isn’t their minds that can do this but their hands, their arms. Holding me fast.

  But Callie doesn’t find Shay, or anyone else for that matter.

  No one is left alive in this place. Callie says there is no one there like her either, but none of us understand why. Is there something different about her? Is she the only survivor to be changed—not just killed—by fire? Or maybe others changed form too, but they left before we arrived.

  Callie couldn’t find Shay, dead or alive. Does that mean Shay was never here? That she w
as here, but then she left?

  Or maybe she was so badly burned that nothing about her could be recognized anymore.

  We were so close; so nearly here before this happened—we could have stopped it if we’d gotten here sooner.

  The walls that protect me inside have crumbled now. There is nothing left to hide behind.

  Freja holds me as I cry.

  CHAPTER 19

  CALLIE

  THE SKIES OPEN: IS HEAVEN CRYING FOR SHAY?

  I’m in shock. I can’t seem to take any of this in. We were too late? And Kai—his whole body is shuddering, he’s struggling to control himself. Freja’s arms are wrapped around him and his around her as if that is all that can hold him upright.

  Rain thunders down even harder. “We’ve got to make camp, get out of this,” Patrick says. “Come on, Kai.” Patrick’s hand is on his shoulder.

  “Let me go. I need to go there and see for myself.”

  “Listen to me. The rain will help finish off the fire. We’ll tuck ourselves away in a safe corner and sleep, then come back and do a proper search tomorrow. See if we can work out what happened. All right?”

  “Kai, you don’t know Shay was here,” Freja says. “Remember that.”

  Kai nods and lets them lead him away.

  They pitch tents a mile or so away, hidden in a dip by some trees. Everyone is soaked to the skin and shivering by the time the tents are up. Food is passed around in silence, and it isn’t just that no one is talking out loud. Everyone is quiet inside too.

  Patrick contacts the other groups to tell them what we’ve found and to call them off from coming here. And he organizes watches, telling everyone not on watch to try to sleep.

  It rains for hours. Kai finally drifts off and is so still that I wonder if they made him sleep, if he let them. I stay with him, close. He doesn’t know I’m here, but that doesn’t matter. I need to be with him when he’s so upset.