Deadlocked 8

by A. R. Wise

  Beatrice Dell

  Jerald was in a huff, but he was locked in the hall outside of Richard’s room until I closed the door behind us. Whether he liked it or not, he had to wait for me to let him through. I lingered, and savored his petulance as he turned and asked, “Coming?” His lips were thin and pale as he scowled.

  I stepped through the portal, and it spun closed behind me just before the decontamination commenced, locking us in together for just a moment. I took the opportunity to get closer to him. Despite how much pleasure I got from his anger, there was no sense turning him into a bitter enemy. I set my hand on his shoulder, and felt his tense muscle. He wasn’t a young man by any stretch, but he was still in admirable shape. His shoulder wasn’t bony like the men I’d grown accustomed to on the isle. Instead, my palm cupped a hump of muscle there, and I stroked my thumb on it.

  Once the jets ceased, and the exit opened for us, I tightened my hold to keep him from charging off. “Jerald, stay a moment.”

  “I don’t have anything to say to you.”

  “Of course you do,” I said with a light tone. “I’m certain there are a thousand curses you’d like to hurl my way. And I appreciate you holding your tongue. I’m well aware of how capable and intelligent you are, and the last thing I want is for you to hate me.”

  He spun on his heel to face me, and then locked his stature, reminding me of an automaton in an exquisite German cuckoo clock that adorned my father’s study a lifetime ago. His square jaw, bristled with whiskers, was taut as he clenched his teeth, daring not to say what he wanted to. His breath went in and out of his nose quick and loud and his barrel chest puffed and deflated with the grandiosity of an opera singer.

  “You’re asking me to kill my men,” he said without giving in to his desire to yell.

  I quickly corrected him, “No, I most certainly am not. The Electorate is asking that of you, not me.”

  “You’re in The Electorate, Beatrice.”

  “Was in. Was. That’s an important distinction. I’m on your side now.”

  He gave a wry grin and shook his head. “Not on my side. Not by a long shot.”

  “Listen to me, Jerald, I’m down here with you now, and my life is in your hands. That puts me squarely in your corner, my friend, whether you like it or not. I’m here fighting for my life, and in turn for yours as well.”

  “I’m not going to just let my men die.”

  “Then work with me and let’s help prevent that from happening,” I said as we stood outside of the entrance to Richard’s room. “I have resources that can help you here.”

  “What the hell do you have that I could possibly need?”

  “The Electorate hasn’t trusted you for years, Jerald. You must’ve known that. Do you really think they would’ve entrusted the Dawn program to you without a failsafe or two in place? Like the anti-air missiles, for instance, or the purge system here.”

  “They didn’t know that General Covington still had access to their system,” said Jerald, his chest puffed with assurance. “We disabled the purge system a long time ago, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

  The Electorate had equipped this facility with a system that could purge all floors except for where the Dawns lived. In the event that an outbreak occurred, the majority of the hidden base was to be burned, and a team selected by The Electorate would be sent out to take over the management of the Dawn program, hopefully preventing any lapse. Richard was aware of these precautionary measures, and understood that they would be used to wipe out the base upon The Electorate’s realization that a rebellion was in the works. He promptly had the system shut down.

  “I’m not talking about the purge, I’m talking about a way to help you find Levon’s friends, these High Rollers I believe they call themselves.”

  He crossed his arms, but I had his attention.

  “I’m talking about drones, stationed not far from here, ready to scour the land in search of your hidden friends.”

  He squinted as he pondered my offer. “Drones? Why would The Electorate have drones out here?”

  “They were supposed to ship them here after I came for my transfer. When we discovered that two Dawns had managed to escape, we realized how porous the security here had become. The drones are equipped to search for the Dawns, but we could still use their cameras to look for other signs of life out there.”

  “Why didn’t anyone from The Electorate offer that to us already?” asked Jerald, helping me to see how he didn’t fathom the situation in the least.

  I looked at him quizzically, wondering if he was simply feigning ignorance. “Because they want as many of you dead as possible, Jerald. They don’t want you to create a new vaccine.”

  He must’ve felt as helpless as a cow at an abattoir. “But…” He stammered as he reconsidered his position in the game being played around him. “They’re not immune. Right? The strain mutated. They’re hoping we can find a cure. That would be good for everyone.”

  “Would it?” I enjoyed prompting the oaf to think for himself. Watching his eyes squint as those rusty wheels ground away in that thick skull was the only entertainment I got in this drab prison-life I’d been subjected to.

  “Yeah, of course it would.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Goddamn it! If you’ve got something to say, then fucking say it. Stop playing games with me.”

  “The Noah Initiative had several goals, but none as important as cleaning the slate,” I said as I walked slowly down the hall. He followed like the docile pet he’d always been. Richard had tamed him and sent him out to nip at his foes, but a dog obeys the one tugging the leash. “They wanted to erase any knowledge about how the original apocalypse began. There was no greater threat to our future than how the innocent would react when they learned the truth about the plague. We had to erase that knowledge, and The Electorate is still planning to do it, whatever the cost.”

  “I knew it,” said Jerald, as proud as a man that had figured something out on his own, though he certainly hadn’t done anything of the sort. “They’re just waiting us out, hoping we all die down here. Right? But what about their precious Dawns? Aren’t they worried about them?”

  “Not as long as Richard has his secret hidden down here with us.”

  Jerald slowed his pace, and I turned to face him before explaining, “The Electorate already knows about the Dawn he’s hiding here.”

  “You told them?” he asked in anger.

  “Not me,” I said with a sharp laugh. “I don’t have contact with them except when I’m with you. No, Jerald, Richard’s told them everything.”

  Richard was desperate to free himself of the ravaged body he was stuck in. When Charles Reagan burned down the Nederland facility, he nearly murdered his old friend in the process, and Richard was closer to one of the walking dead outside than he was a human anymore, kept alive by his machines and daily purifications to accommodate his failing body.

  After fleeing the Nederland facility, Richard searched The Electorate’s database for the genetic code of one of our male Dawns. That was how he stumbled upon the information about Ben Watanabe, and he used that boy’s code to create a new Dawn in the hope that immunity triggers would be replicated. That Dawn, now nearing adulthood, was being stowed away somewhere inside of this building.

  Richard had hoped to perform a transfer at the facility where I’d been captured. Unfortunately, the bomb that Levon had set off inside had destroyed the equipment, making it impossible for Richard to achieve a transfer without turning for help to The Electorate. Any upper hand that Jerald thought he had here was being undermined by his superior’s desperate hope to survive. All of the grand posturing Richard Covington had exhibited when I first arrived had melted away as soon as the realization of his impending demise sunk in.

  Jerald’s expression soured and his ears burned red. For a second, I actually feared him. He exploded in sudden rage, and yelled a curse as he turned and punched the wall, leaving a crack in th
e stone and blood on his knuckle. I was so startled that I yelped and set my fingers over my lips before quickly composing myself. The worst way to deal with a person’s temper is to show weakness in the face of it.

  “Stop that,” I commanded and made certain my voice didn’t waver. I was reminded of my first meeting with Levon at the facility, when I’d annoyed him enough to cause the brute to start firing his pistol around. I wasn’t as used to dealing with men like these as I needed to be, and I had to remember how easy it could be to push them past their breaking points; as well as what danger there was in doing it. “Calm down.”

  “So you’re all just working together to…” He was yelling and I had to silence him.

  “Calm down,” I said as I reached out to grab his arm forcefully. I gripped his thick wrist like a mother might secure her rowdy child. “If you want to win this, then get a grip.”

  “Win?” he asked with his anger still apparent. “I’m just trying to fucking survive at this point.”

  “That’s what winning means in this game.” I loosened my grip. “And the more players you have on your side, the more likely you are to make it out alive. So let’s be friends, Jerald. Okay? I might be the only friend you’ve got anymore.”

  “With friends like these,” he said before chuckling and shaking his head as if in exhaustion. “I’m not letting my men and their families die. Sorry. I’m not going to do it.”

  “Then work with me. I can help you save them.”

  “How?” he asked, and I sensed the desperation in his voice. I knew that I had him.

  “We can use the drones to scout the area. Let’s find Levon’s friends and get them here. We need the child, but we’ll take what we can get. Any of them might’ve been influenced by exposure to Reagan. Let’s get them here, and then we’ll have a bargaining chip in our favor, which is something we’re sorely lacking. The Electorate wants to erase the history about the plague, but they’re not fool enough to send future generations blindly into a world where the disease is still running rampant, with no protection at all.”

  “But what about the Dawns?” asked Jerald. “Aren’t they worried about them?”

  “Some of them are, but not everyone. You haven’t been privy to the battles going on within The Electorate. You’ll have to trust me when I tell you that there are plenty of them that would happily wipe away the Dawn program for good and erase the eugenic legacy we built. I can’t let that happen. That’s how I define winning, Jerald. The same way that you care for your men, that’s how I care for the Dawns. I want to make sure they live through this, and I’m not confident anymore that Richard can carry us through to the end anymore.”

  “Fucking politics,” said Jerald. “I thought we buried that shit.”

  “That’ll never happen. Politics is a side effect of society, and anarchy’s a fool’s game.” I could see the weariness in his expression, and I didn’t want to lose him. “Jerald, help me help you. I can’t do this alone.”

  “What exactly do you need from me?” He still sounded tired and perturbed, and I knew that he hadn’t yet given in to working with me. Still, I had to sway him.

  “I need access to Richard’s tablet, or the computer that its information is transferred to. And I need you to return my tablet and bracelet.” They’d taken both from me when I arrived. My tablet had been damaged at the transfer facility, but not destroyed. They were sturdy machines, and Jerald had used mine to spy on the activity of The Electorate from the time that he’d captured me until Audrey Winchell was murdered. After that, The Electorate had ceased sending data to my computer.

  “No,” he said too quickly for my comfort. “It won’t do you any good anyways, everything’s encrypted now.”

  “But my tablet can get past the encryption, Jerald. And with the information that Richard had access to, which I’m certain you’ve copied somewhere in your system, we could get into The Electorate’s system again. Then we could deploy the drones, and…” I purposefully became lost for words, allowing him to suspect that we’d have more options than I dared share yet. “Jerald, we could win. I could save the Dawn program and you could save your men.” I sensed his uncertainty. “Let me prove myself to you, Jerald. Get me my tablet and access to the system, and you can monitor everything I do. You can keep my tablet except when we’re together, to make sure I’m not lying to you or trying to go behind your back.”

  I thought my former jabs at him might’ve made it impossible for us to get along now. He sulked, with a frown that seemed to fit his face better than a smile ever could, but then nodded and said, “I’ll see what I can do.”

  * * *

  It didn’t take long for Jerald to do as I’d asked. He brought me my tablet and the bracelet I needed to wear in order to activate the device. He allowed me to access the information that Richard had denied, but stood over my shoulder and monitored everything I did. We activated the drones and sent them out along a stretch of road that Jerald said was formerly used as a trade route, and had been the main thoroughfare between the settlements that had been recently extinguished. He thought this would be a good place to start looking for Levon’s missing friends.

  The drones were designed to locate escaped Dawns, and would be able to track them down with ease, but unfortunately they were incapable of distinguishing other humans from zombies, meaning that nearly every alert we received ended up being false. We spent a long time scanning pictures of zombie hordes that the drones had taken while flying above the devastated landscape. To his credit, Jerald didn’t get disillusioned. He was conscious of how useful the drones could prove for him as opposed to the satellite photos he’d been using until now.

  “Our system’s set up to only allow data transfer at specific times,” said Jerald as he sat beside me and looked at another photo that a drone had sent us of a drove of zombies that were moving through a shattered town. “The time varied, but it was normally between dusk and dawn. Even when we got confirmation of the Rollers’ whereabouts they were usually on the move.”

  “Why only at night?” I asked, although I was hardly curious. I was just making small talk with him to pass the time. I already knew about the restrictions placed on outgoing messages here. That was how I was managing to get sporadic communication with The Electorate without Richard or Jerald knowing.

  “Used to be just once a week, back in the early days,” he said. “It was because some of the survivors were tooling around with devices that searched for Wi-Fi signals. All they needed was a cell phone and a battery. It was like we were a gold coin on a beach and they were old men with metal detectors.”

  I chuckled at the analogy. “A friend of mine used to do that, back before the plague,” I said as I ruminated on easier times. “He thought he’d get rich out there, waving that machine back and forth as families lounged on the beach. All he ever found was loose change that’d slipped out of someone’s shorts.”

  Jerald grunted, and I wasn’t sure if it was a pleasant response or a tepid one. He could be a difficult man to read. He wore a scowl as comfortably as most people might wear a hat.

  “What’s that,” said Jerald as he pointed down at one of the ten pictures that had scrolled up onto the screen of my tablet. “The structure there.”

  I enlarged the photo he was referring to. It was a decrepit water tower on the outskirts of a small town. The paint had long since chipped away, leaving it looking like a metal zeppelin left floating atop its hill, supported by a skeletal frame that looked too rusty to carry the weight. A catwalk ringed the fattest portion of the globe, and a person stood leaning against it, staring ruefully down at the silent and dead town below.

  “Well I’ll be,” I said as I inspected the speck of a human captured in the photo. “Doubt a dead man climbed up there to get a look at the town.”

  “Can you send the drone back there?” asked Jerald. “But make sure it’s out of sight.”

  “Sure, no problem.”

  “I’ll be a son of a bitch,” said Jerald
, exhibiting the first notes of excitement I’d seen from him since we began. “Have they been hiding in our backyard all this time?” He whistled, shook his head, and then pat me on the back. His heavy paw thumped against me, causing me to gasp as he continued on, “You might be worth a shit after all, Beatrice.”

  “Thanks,” I said with an uncertain tone.

  “Get me those coordinates,” said Jerald. “I’ll send some of my men out there to round up whoever that is.”

  “Can do,” I said as I jotted down the latitude and longitude displayed in the corner of the drone’s initial shot. “See, Jerald, we work well together after all.”

  His smile faded.

  I knew that he wasn’t fully on my side yet, but I’d made headway. People often compare politics to a game of chess, explaining that it was important to plan as far ahead as possible when you chose where to place your pieces. I despise that analogy, because in chess it’s not possible to corrupt your opponent’s pieces and make them turn on one another; in life, it most certainly is.

  10 – Well Done

  Cobra Dawn

  I participated in the routine mother asked of me. I did my exercises, took my pills, and didn’t argue with the Administrators about anything. I was as docile as I needed to be, despite how they continued to test me by using my old name.

  “Cobra Dawn, please stand on the grey footprints.”

  “Cobra Dawn, take your pills.”

  “Cobra Dawn, touch your toes.”

  Each time they said that name, it felt like someone was stabbing at me, and it was my job to accept the abuse. They were determined to beat me down; to kill Celeste once and for all and leave only Cobra behind.

  I would perform for them in whatever way they wanted, because I needed to earn back their trust. I wanted access to the other Dawns, in any form I could manage. I knew they’d never be willing to fold me back in with the other girls, but I thought my offer to meet with just one of the girls held weight. No matter how hard the Administrators tried to keep the girls from gossiping, it would always happen. I could only imagine the chatter Hailey’s and my disappearance had caused.