by Rebecca Rode
The second door swung open more easily. The warm wall of humidity and body odor and the shuffling, whirring, and humming of medical equipment nearly overwhelmed my senses. Only Millian’s lab was visible from here. The hospital section lay beyond the far wall, keeping our most critical patients hidden from intruders. Physician Redd would be back there now, in the sterile operating room. I still hadn’t received any word from him about the current patient’s prognosis. I crossed my fingers. Please let that be a good thing.
I straightened my shoulders before striding inside, a lesson I’d learned from watching Dad. He always took a second before entering a room as His Honorable Malachite Hawking. I never understood as a child, but I did now. Presence meant everything. It did far more than ensure we Hawkings held on to our power, as the Firebrands insisted. A leader’s presence meant assurance, comfort. It meant “I’ve got this, so you can stop worrying now.”
It meant all kinds of things that weren’t true for me. But like it or not, the presence was now mine to bear.
Millian stood in the corner, white coat and all, carrying her characteristic clipboard even though I knew there wouldn’t be anything written on it. Her version of presence, I supposed. Her dark-brown skin gleamed with perspiration under the hot lights. She wore her black hair piled atop her head in two buns secured with ribbons, a tiny ringlet escaping down the back of her neck. Only the hospital wing was conditioned for temperature, meaning Millian’s group suffered from this year’s early onset of humidity. We’d made plans to ensure our security and secrecy here, but nobody had expected ventilation to become our biggest challenge.
Millian turned and grinned, her white teeth brilliant under the sharp lights overhead. “There you are. I was beginning to think you had to swim back. How was the island? Any possibility there?”
I wanted to plop myself into the nearest chair, but I noted several faces turn in our direction. Instead, I sat carefully and hid a weary sigh. This wasn’t Neuromen, and we were no longer candidates competing for lab-assistant positions. Just weeks before, Millian had despised me. Now she was the friend I’d never allowed myself to have. She had this way of reading what I couldn’t say and teasing the truth out of me, and as infuriating as I sometimes found that particular trait, it reminded me so much of Mom it felt as if Millian and I had always known each other. Probably the whole scientist thing.
I wasn’t the only person who’d seen Millian’s potential. Within weeks, Millian had shot to the top of Neuromen’s former lab specialists, becoming something of a star in their circles. She had a way of seeing the big picture in an environment where scientists often got lost in details. She also had a way with people that I envied. If I hadn’t appointed her director, her coworkers would have.
Even now, I could see her hand in all of this—in the organized tables and well-trained shifts of scientists and technicians, screens full of carefully analyzed data, and calm sense of control. Yes, she understood the presence thing, but she also had the muscle to back it up.
There was no one else I trusted more to fix what Director Virgil had broken with his terrible implant update targeting his enemies. He’d already taken Mom from me. I wouldn’t let him have Dad too.
Millian lifted an impatient eyebrow, and I remembered she awaited an answer.
“The island was . . . an interesting option,” I said. “I’m sending teams to investigate, but I’m not sure we have the time or resources to secure it.”
She pressed her lips together. “I trust your judgment, but remember that the oddest locations can mean the most safety. We need to hide where your brother won’t find us. He’d never think to look there.”
“Probably not, but security is only half of it. Housing a thousand people is going to be tough. We need restroom facilities and beds and kitchens and security and communications and ventilation, not to mention food that’s easily stored but still nutritious and accessible.”
She whistled, long and slow. “It’s official. I got the easy job.”
My laugh came out in one tight burst. Only Millian would think saving hundreds of patients with brain scarring was easy. “Not in the least. I’m hearing good things about your accomplishments already. Only one member of your team has issued any complaints, but I think we both know why.”
Her face twisted in a wry grin, and she threw a sideways glance at one of her lab workers two tables over. The man hadn’t been happy to work under a new graduate’s supervision, but she’d quickly straightened him out. Though, even now, he kept his head down and shot glares in our direction.
He couldn’t hear us, but I lowered my voice anyway. “Have you heard from Physician Redd yet?”
“No.” She glanced at the wall. “It usually doesn’t take this long.”
“Then I hope you have some good news for me,” I told her, eyeing the table she’d been working at. A human brain floated in a huge jar. My stomach nearly turned over. That hadn’t been there yesterday either.
She didn’t seem to notice my discomfort. “I do have good news, actually. Well, not news, per se, but a solid theory.”
I perked up. Millian had spent a couple of weeks looking over Virgil’s research and technology, gaining a basic understanding of how it interacted with the brain. But then she’d realized she wouldn’t get very far without an understanding of the brain as well, so she’d recruited Physician Redd’s help. Whenever the man wasn’t seeing to our most critical patients or visiting the less-affected ones across town, they sat at Millian’s desk and worked in hushed whispers. I tried to stamp down the hope that sprang up at her words. Even if Physician Redd’s operation went poorly, if we could figure out how to heal all the affected people without removing their implants—or even how to remove them without losing the patient altogether—it would be a huge victory.
Before Millian could respond, a woman with several braids pulled into a thick ponytail approached. She ducked her head as she arrived. “Sorry to interrupt your conversation, Your Honor, but the reaction I’m recording is time-sensitive. Director Comondor, could you please give a quick authorization?”
“Of course,” Millian said easily, swiping her finger across the clipboard in her hand. I leaned over to see a small screen come to life, full of data and numbers I couldn’t begin to understand. The woman muttered her thanks and returned to her station.
“What’s that?” I asked, gesturing to what I’d assumed to be an empty clipboard all this time.
“The master program. Stores all our data in one secure location, and it’s easy to transport or hide if we get raided.” She hit a few more buttons, then killed the screen. It turned white once more, its disguise nearly perfect. “I designed this the first day, and Kole helped me build it.”
Kole had done that? I always forgot that my boyfriend had worked in tech assembly before declaring for Neuromen. I just shook my head in wonder.
“Okay, here’s what we know about Virgil’s implant,” Millian said, her no-nonsense manner descending upon her once more. “First, the location is critical. It has to be placed precisely and connected to the visual and audio-circulatory centers of the brain to work.” She pointed at a section of the brain on her desk, looking completely unaffected by the fact that she’d displayed the human remains like a trophy. “Second, the material of the implant is incredibly important, otherwise the brain would be poisoned within weeks. Third, we know it works on a self-charging circuit that generates heat, but so far that heat hasn’t caused issues with the surrounding neurons. We don’t yet know why that is. We do know the damage to the implant site, which is the BA37 in the temporal cortex, has, so far, been found irreversible. We can’t heal those neurons from the outside, so we’ve been looking at ways to get the body to heal itself. Technically, that should happen while the patient is in the induced coma. Except it isn’t.”
I frowned. “That’s the problem? The brain won’t heal itself?”
“We’ve examined forty patients so far, all chosen at random. Their scans show no impro
vement whatsoever. It’s like the patient’s brain doesn’t know it’s broken, so it doesn’t set to work on those neurons.”
“So what does that mean exactly?
“It means something is wrong, and it can’t be natural.”
Nothing about implants was natural, but I didn’t argue the point. “So you think Virgil did something to the implants to prevent healing.”
“I think it’s blocking it, yes. Once we find it, those patients’ prognoses should immediately improve.”
“And if you don’t find it?”
Millian bit her lip.
Got it. “You’ll find it. I know you will.” I found my hands clenching and forced them to relax. She had to find the solution, or it would be Dad on that operating table soon enough.
“You can count on that,” Millian said easily. “I won’t rest until we have answers.”
By the look of the cot next to her desk, the blankets still folded in their original plastic packaging, she wasn’t lying. “You’re eating the meals I’ve sent over, right?”
“Some of them.” She paused. “Hey, I don’t know if you’ve seen our lovely new art outside, but we’ve had some visitors lately. I think the neighborhood is on to us. Any way we can increase security around here? If the power gets cut, we won’t accomplish much at all.”
We’d chosen this warehouse—an old food-packaging plant—because it circumvented the city’s rolling blackouts. Constant electricity meant constant work, and that was exactly what we needed when every day was critical. But Millian was right—if somebody got curious and decided to do some damage, we’d be in serious trouble.
I added it to my already-too-long list. “We’re already stretched pretty thin, but I’ll see what I can do.”
“Thanks.” She’d already turned back to her work, half present. It was a state I remembered in Mom, and it made my throat hurt.
Standing up, I watched her for a second and then headed for the hospital door. Mom would have liked Millian. Kole, though . . . I wasn’t sure about, and, strangely enough, I didn’t care. Kole was the one thing in my life I’d truly chosen for myself. He wasn’t the rich, privileged boy my parents would have wanted, but I already knew plenty about boys like that. Kole didn’t care about my heiress status. If anything, it put distance between us—a distance I was perfectly willing to cross if it meant keeping us together. Kole was worth it. He would always be worth it.
The door opened just before I reached it, and Physician Redd stepped out. As my heart leaped into a gallop, I felt my stomach cramp just a bit. The exhaustion on his face told me all I needed to know.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
I didn’t know the patient, but that didn’t matter. What did matter was that someone had entrusted their family member to us and we’d failed them. Nausea joined the cramping in my stomach.
“Are we any closer?” I managed.
“I don’t know,” he murmured.
There was deep disappointment in the man’s tired eyes. His hair looked grayer and thinner than before all this began. What would he look like in a few more weeks, after more failed operations and more deaths? What would that do to all of us?
“Go home and rest,” I told him. “We’ll talk about it tomorrow.”
He dipped his head. “Thank you, Your Honor. Although . . . I didn’t come out to report on the procedure. There’s something else we need to discuss.” His frown sagged deeper.
More bad news? My heart practically sprinted now. “Is my dad okay?”
“He’s stable. Doing better than most of my patients. He should be able to remain with you in that safe house for a while yet. Actually, I want to talk to you about Kole Mason.”
My relief at Dad’s condition froze at the mention of Kole’s name. “The medics examined him last week. He’s doing fine.” I’d even seen him yesterday at his apartment, and he seemed perfectly normal—as normal as an overly paranoid and overprotective boyfriend could be, anyway. I wanted him to stay with us, but he insisted on keeping an apartment several miles away, muttering something about the Firebrands wanting his head—yet another reason this war needed to end. I couldn’t wait for us to settle down together like a real couple.
I tried to imagine us living like that, each going to our respective jobs every morning—me to the Copper Office and him to the tech assembly center like he’d always intended to do—and then eating dinner together at the Hawking family table at the end of the day. It was disturbingly hard to imagine.
Physician Redd cleared this throat. “The medics didn’t have his latest brain scan. I do.” He shoved a clipboard much like Millian’s into my hand and swiped the tech screen until it displayed a grayish mass. Several angry red messages appeared, the top one flashing in bold letters.
“Look right there,” he said, pointing at what had to be the back and center of Kole’s brain. I saw nothing but a dense cloud, but he didn’t wait for me to express my confusion. “The damage is far more extensive than in the others—not in intensity but in surface area.”
“You showed me that already,” I said. He’d shown me Kole’s results before he even gained consciousness the first time. “So it isn’t healing?”
“The others aren’t healing, but Kole’s condition is even more concerning. Somehow, and I don’t know how, the damage is getting worse.”
I stared at the image, my legs suddenly feeling a little tingly. It couldn’t be getting worse when Kole seemed perfectly normal. “How is that possible?”
“Environmental factors, perhaps. Or stress. This is something I’ve never seen before, to be honest.” He stepped aside to allow a medical assistant through the door, her arms wrapped around a bucket of supplies. She ducked her head respectfully as she passed me, her expression somber, the heavy scent of blood following her like death. I caught a glimpse of fabric and plastic and a bit of clothing in the bucket, all stained bright red.
I looked away.
“What do we do about it, then?” I whispered. “Surgery? An induced coma? Bed rest?”
“Removing scar tissue this extensive would kill him. A coma could slow the progression, but it’s hard to know for sure. For now, I would watch him carefully. If he starts to act erratically or his speech becomes slurred, let me know right away.”
I nodded a little too quickly. “Okay.”
“I’m sorry,” he said again. He hesitated as if wanting to say something else, then shook his head and walked back through the door.
I stood frozen in place for a minute, struggling to control my quick breaths. So much for the composure thing. I must have looked like a disaster.
Virgil’s horrible “experiment” with the brain implants had nearly cost Kole his life. Physician Redd had recommended a coma at first, saying his brain needed rest, but Kole always refused. He wouldn’t consider it even now, no matter the evidence. Kole had always been stubborn about his independence. Even if a coma would help, how was I supposed to convince him to submit to a needle, sleep through the apocalypse, and wake up when it was all over?
There was no way he’d agree to that. Ever.
“Is something wrong, Miss Hawking?” Travers asked, and I realized he’d crossed the room to stand by my side and watch me fall apart. Several pairs of eyes watched from behind him. Technicians and scientists paused in their work, sensing the gravity of my conversation with the physician. Everyone in the lab had to know the stakes of today’s operation. Thanks to my demeanor, they would also know the outcome.
“Nothing’s wrong,” I lied, unable to hide the waver in my voice.
Presence.
Travers looked at me with concern, but he didn’t challenge my words. He watched as I straightened my shoulders once more, lifted my chin, and assumed the demeanor of a Hawking leader. Now I was a fake on the inside and the outside.
“Should we head home, then?” my driver asked gently.
I considered it for a moment. I could tell Kole I was too tired to meet tonight. He would understand. But that wou
ld mean another sleepless night, worrying and wishing I’d told him. It was his brain. He deserved to know, didn’t he?
That familiar clutch of nausea told a different story. It wasn’t benevolence that drove me to meet him now. It was pure and utter selfishness. I needed Kole. How had I allowed myself to care so deeply, so fast? Especially when everyone in my life had abandoned me in one form or another. I should have known I would lose him too.
I moved forward on shaky legs, feeling anger replace the fear. Good. Anger was good. Anger would help me function where grief would break me.
“Not home,” I said. “I need to speak with Kole.”
Three
Kole
Legacy’s transport pulled up just as I arrived home. I slipped into the shadows next to the apartment building’s porch before she could see me. I wanted to surprise her, but I also wanted to prevent any neighbors from seeing us together. For her protection, not mine. I’d much rather they came out and confronted me if they had a problem. People like that were much easier to deal with than the sneaky types.
Another bonus—the darkness also hid my face. I fingered my sore eye and winced at the swelling. The Firebrand I’d confronted today initially looked like Zenn, one of my best friends, and I’d been excited to see him before I remembered the truth. We weren’t on the same team anymore. If you considered politics, we weren’t on the same planet anymore.
But alas, it hadn’t been Zenn but a strange face with the same tattoo I wore. That guy would never wander the city alone again after today. A blessing and a curse. The smarter they got, the harder it became to get the information I needed. After two run-ins and narrow escapes, I still couldn’t confirm that the arsonists burning down the homes belonging to Legacy’s followers were indeed Firebrands, as I suspected.
Not that I needed proof. It had my Uncle Dane’s name written all over it.
Travers opened Legacy’s door, and she slipped out. She wore her long brown hair down over her shoulders in a tangled mess I longed to run my fingers through. As always, she strode toward me like a woman who knew her path, her form slender and athletic, a leader certain of her place in the world. But unlike always, there was a grim set to her mouth that stole the smile from my lips. The visit to the island hadn’t gone well, then.