by A. R. Wise
“Hush,” said Beatrice. She moved closer, and set her hand on my head. “You need to save your strength.”
“For what?” I asked. “What was that guy doing last…”
“Levon,” she said sharply and gripped my arm tightly for just a moment, like the reproach of a mother trying to keep her son from embarrassing her in public. “The doctors are only trying to help. You need to forget about them.” Her words were oddly insistent, as if she were trying to communicate something with me without having to explain in detail.
“What the fuck’s going on, Bea? I don’t want to play games.”
“But the pieces are in place,” she said as if we were enjoying each other’s company.
“I’m not one of your pieces.”
She wiped a bead of sweat from my brow and said, “Of course you are.” As much as I hated her, the touch of her skin against mine was a welcome relief from the cold, plastic touch of the doctors and nurses.
“Are you ever going to tell me why you’re the only one allowed to be in here without a suit on?” It was a question I’d asked in the past, but she’d never been willing to answer.
“Jerald wanted to test me. He thinks he’s very smart.” She chuckled as if we were old girlfriends sharing a laugh over brunch. “When we got here, I told him you’d been cured, but he was still taking precautions. They found traces of the disease still in you, which is why they hooked you up to this device.” She pointed at the tubes that hung down from the machine above. “This is the only way they’ve been able to kill the virus in someone that’s not immune, but the drawback is that the patient becomes dependent on it to survive. And there aren’t many of these left.” She stroked one of the tubes.
“So I’m cured?” I asked and then added a weak, “Hooray.”
“They keep finding inactive viruses in you, which is why they’re still pumping you full of these toxins. They’re hoping that if they can keep you alive, that they can find Reagan’s influence in you.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“Reagan’s the only reason anyone cares about you, Levon. It’s his influence on your immune system that they’re hoping to mimic. I’m just Jerald’s guinea pig. He decided to let me come in here to meet with you to see if my immune system was affected. That way he doesn’t have to risk the lives of any of his precious men.”
“Aren’t they worried you’ll get infected and carry the virus out of here?”
“Like I said, the only viruses they’ve found in you have been dead. The only concern they have is that you might have a negative influence on the doctors and nurses, and it’s important that they stay healthy. Allowing me to meet with you like this gives them the chance to test me endlessly as well.” She rolled up her sleeve to reveal several purple lesions where blood had been drawn from her. “But I’m not scared of you, Levon. We’re friends now, aren’t we?”
“Nope.” My mouth was so dry. I licked at my chapped lips and then asked for water.
“They’ve got fluids going into you,” said Beatrice as she traced her finger along one of the tubes that hung down beside me.
“Just get me some water.”
“I can’t,” she said, and was about to say more when I interrupted her.
“Come on, buddy, I just want some fucking water.”
She frowned, but relented. She went to the sink to get a washrag that she ran under the tap for a few moments. She squeezed out most of the water, but brought the washrag back over and held it out as if in offering.
My arms were either too weak or I was too drugged. “Can you put it on my lips?”
Beatrice did as I asked, and gently touched the cool rag to my lips. I savored the taste of the water that dripped into my mouth and said, “Thanks,” once I’d had enough.
“Things are changing around here, Levon,” said Beatrice as she returned the rag to the sink. “I don’t know how much longer I’m going to be able to protect you.”
“Protect me?” I asked with a snort of laughter. “You’re doing a bang-up job.”
“I am protecting you. In fact, I’m the only friend you’ve got in this place. The Electorate would just as soon burn us all in a purge; all except the Dawns, of course. The girl’s rooms are reinforced, and not connected to the purge system. Or perhaps Jerald will purge us all in his rage. I wouldn’t put it past him. You know, if it weren’t for me, Jerald would’ve tortured all the information he needed out of you, and when he was done, you would’ve begged him to kill you.”
I looked at the tubes sticking out of me and said, “You mean this isn’t torture? You coulda fooled me.”
“These are the only things keeping you alive.” She stood beside me and slid her fingers along one of the tubes that was pumping that mysterious concoction into me. “And I need you alive, at least for the time being.”
“Stop trying to play games with me,” I said. “I’m not in the mood.”
“It’s not a game when your life’s on the line.” Then her words took on a darker edge as she whispered, “And the lives of everyone you love.”
I grumbled and looked away. “I’m not going to…”
“Listen to me, Hero,” she said my nickname as if taunting me. “We’re coming to the end of this, and you’ve still got a job to do.”
“Fuck off.”
She pressed her hand against my wrist and squeezed, bringing memories of how my aunt used to do the same thing when she was angry with me. I recalled those blistering Georgia summers, when Mark and I would stay with our aunt because our mother couldn’t handle having us day in and day out. My brother and I weren’t used to discipline, because our mother’s version depended entirely upon her mood – or more specifically, how long it had been since her last hit.
Auntie Claire was as different from our mother as two siblings could be. She was strict and demanding, with little patience for two naughty hood rats like us. The first summer we spent with her was a tumultuous one, and I got myself whipped more than a few times. We learned fast that Auntie Claire wasn’t kidding with her threats. We damn well learned to treat her with respect.
As Beatrice gripped my wrist, squeezing tight enough to cause pain, I couldn’t help but smile. I was thinking about how Auntie Claire was probably yelling at Mark in heaven, chastising him for talking too loud or not wearing his Sunday best to church. Auntie was the only person in the world that Mark wouldn’t dare challenge, and I imagined him hanging his head and murmuring, “Yes ma’am.”
When I think of Mark in heaven, he’s not in a wheelchair. He’s tall, strong, and healthy, with a wide smile ready for me when I finally make it up there to see him.
Beatrice’s harsh whisper broke the spell, “Jerald is rounding up your friends as we speak. He found them, and he’s going to bring them here.”
I glared up at her. Was she lying? I had no idea. I didn’t trust her, but I also knew that Jerald had been desperate to find the Rollers. It was certainly possible that he had.
Apparently she could see that I was curious. “That’s right,” she said with a raised brow. “This is all about to end, Hero, and it’s not going to end well unless you do what I tell you.”
I waited for her to continue.
“If you want to save your friends, then I’m the only person that can help you do it. But we don’t have much time.”
The snake had my attention.
17 – Manipulations
Beatrice Dell
I left Levon to ponder what I’d told him about how his true enemy was just down the hall. I had to be careful what I said, because there was always a chance that Richard or Jerald was watching, but this was worth the risk. We were reaching our endgame.
My original hope had been to bring Levon into this facility with the Tempest Strain still burning in his blood, but masked by the vaccine he’d been given at the transfer facility. This would force them to purge the entire area. If that occurred, then the Dawns would be protected in their fortified rooms along with all of the infor
mation that The Electorate had stored in them.
That plan had fallen through when I discovered that Jerald and Richard had emptied the purge tanks and deactivated the system. Shortly after, they discovered the virus still in Levon, and hooked him up to the device that Covington had been experimenting with at the Nederland facility before Reagan’s attack. No one in The Electorate knew that Covington had survived or that they had salvaged one of the LiMM chairs. After Levon had been hooked up to the machine, I was forced to come up with a new plan.
Jerald’s decision to use me as a test subject to see if Levon’s immune system affected those around him had required me to spend a lot of time with the doctors. They were always testing me, and I took the opportunity to get to know them and their daily routines. This was how I learned about Covington’s dependence on them, and how he’d made certain they could always get to him by having them close by. Access to Richard’s floor was restricted, but not to his room, meaning that anyone down here could make their way to him at any point without having to worry about punching in a code or carrying a key.
I asked the doctors and nurses about their families, and learned which ones had spouses and children. When I discovered which of them had children here, I eagerly listened to stories about them, pretending to love kids. It didn’t take long to find my mark. Once I’d found the most sympathetic doctor, I plied him with promises of escape, if only he would work with me.
It was through this doctor, named Hank, that I was able to start crafting my scheme. He passed messages between The Electorate and me, using Covington’s own system that allowed only sporadic, late night transfers of wireless communication. We learned that The Electorate was debating different courses of action, and that Covington’s reappearance had given ammunition to the members that were calling for an end to the Dawn program. They wanted to erase all evidence of the eugenics experiments, and to ensure that our ancestors never knew of our involvement with the apocalypse.
I had to make them an offer that would delay any radical decisions. In order to placate them, and to save the Dawn program, I had to devise a way to kill as many people that knew the truth as possible. That meant Jerald and his Wolf Pack had to die, as well as Richard Covington. But The Electorate were also worried about the group of terrorists that had followed Reagan, not only because of their knowledge, but also because of the possibility that they were immune. The last thing The Electorate wanted was to have a band of survivors out here that knew the truth about us and had any chance of surviving The Noah Initiative.
I assured The Electorate that with Hank’s help, we could do as they asked. With The Electorate’s help, I acquired the drones that I then delivered to Jerald. If I could get him to track down Levon’s friends, then I hoped to get them here to die along with everyone else. Only the Dawns would survive a purge, along with anyone else that happened to find their way into the girls’ sealed environment prior to the blast.
Covington then surprised me by inviting me to take part in his negotiations with The Electorate. It turned out that he didn’t have the ability to perform his own transfer, meaning that he was dependent upon us. Of course, he didn’t want The Electorate to know everything, and neither did I. The best thing for me would be that it appeared to The Electorate that I had everything in control here. To my surprise, The Electorate offered Covington the chance to lock down the entire facility, causing most of the people here to starve. They said that if he did as they asked, that they could facilitate his transfer once they arrived, but that he would have to give them total control of this entire building.
Only a fool would agree to those terms, and Covington proved himself to be the idiot I always suspected. He was convinced that The Electorate wanted their Dawns safe, and wasn’t privy to the information I had about how many of them had been pushing to end the eugenics program all-together. Still though, I had to feign agreement. I didn’t want to risk disagreeing with Covington or The Electorate openly, which was why I had to work with Jerald.
If we could locate Levon’s friends, then that would add another bargaining chip to play with. Covington had told The Electorate that he needed time to prepare, and had ordered that rations be delivered to the Dawn’s level, robbing the families above of their food and water. Jerald complied, and lied to his men about the reason, but I knew that his faith in Richard had been shattered. Jerald distrusted The Electorate, as did I, although I had to be careful about confirming his suspicions. It was a dangerous game, but I was determined to win.
Jerald and one of his doctors usually escorted me to Levon’s room during my meetings, but this time a member of his Wolf Pack had taken his place. The soldier was tall and thin, with specks of ginger whiskers on his square chin. He didn’t say a word, and I’d barely been able to get him to tell me his name when he first arrived this morning at the room where the other captured members of The Electorate and I were being held.
“Gabe,” I said to him as if his name tasted foul on my tongue. “Come along.”
He walked beside me as we crossed the hall that led to Covington’s chamber. I glanced down that way and saw the two guards that were posted to protect the elusive mastermind behind the rebellion that had crippled The Electorate. Next we passed the area where the doctors and nurses were stationed. Covington made sure to keep them close, since his survival depended on them.
This level of the facility was a secret to most of the people that worked and lived here. The only reason that Levon was down here instead of upstairs where the other prisoners were kept was because of his illness. The doctors were only able to keep him alive with equipment that had formerly been a backup for Covington. The elaborate system had been designed to extend the lives of test subjects that our scientists were infecting with various strains of the disease that had caused the apocalypse. Covington had sustained his injuries while luring Charles Reagan to one of those testing sites, and the only reason he’d survived was because the medical team there had hooked him up to what was known as a Libera Memento Mori, which the scientists referred to as LiMM chairs. Someone had told me once what that phrase stood for in Latin, but my memory fails me. It had something to do with being liberated from the fear of death.
“I need to go to the bathroom,” I said as we neared the last restroom before we reached the elevator.
Gabe didn’t respond other than to slow his pace and nod in the direction of the ladies’ room. It was as if I were being shepherded through the building by an android, devoid of personality; another automaton in a dusty cuckoo clock.
He followed me to the door and I glared at him as I paused while holding the handle. “You’re not planning on following me in, are you?”
“No,” he stated flatly, not offering me any of the respect that military men like him used to give graciously to everyone they encountered.
I went into the bathroom and to the second stall from the wall. I tapped on the divider twice as I sat, and then paused before tapping twice again.
A man answered from the next stall in a hushed, phlegmy whisper, “There was a problem.”
When would the day come when someone could just get a simple task accomplished without there being some complication or another? My frustration seeped into my words when I asked, “What happened?”
My co-conspirator coughed a few times before lowering his hand beneath the divider so that I could see the wound on his palm. “I got cut.”
There was a minor slice on the inside of his hand, but it was clearly infected. The edges had turned purple, and a boil was swelling there.
“Christ,” I muttered as the implications spun in my head.
“It’s spreading so fast,” said the doctor, his voice trembling. “I don’t know how much longer before…” A cough halted him.
“You have the blood though, right?” I asked, trying desperately to figure out how to handle this unfortunate development. Timing was an important part of my plan, and this threatened everything. I needed Jerald to find Levon’s friends before a
n outbreak happened here.
“Yes, but I…” Again, his cough silenced him.
“What?” I asked, getting more restless each second.
“You have to swear to me.” His words were hampered by his escalating illness. “You have to protect Debra and my kids. You have to swear.”
“I told you, already, Hank. Your family will be fine. That’s the whole reason we’re doing this.”
“Swear to me.”
“I swear,” I said to placate him. “Now who can you trust to take the blood?”
“I’m not sure.”
I’d put too much faith in Hank, and now I was paying the price for it. My plan was stretched so thin, depending on too many things to go my way. I’d asked Hank to retrieve some of Levon’s blood as a failsafe. I knew that there was an active virus sitting in those blood bags from when Levon had first been brought here. While Jerald and Richard thought that the cure had destroyed the disease in him, I knew that it hadn’t worked initially. Unfortunately, the LiMM chair had then eradicated the disease in Levon, leaving me with only a small sample of the actual disease left. Hank had been using these samples to re-infect Levon, which then kept the doctors uncertain if the LiMM chair was working, necessitating that Levon be kept on Covington’s floor. However, now that we were reaching the end, I no longer wanted Levon to be poisoned. I knew that he would die within days if detached from the LiMM chair, but I wanted him to gain back some strength so that his final act could be killing the man responsible for so much of his misery, and thus ending a major threat to The Electorate. With the virus gone from his blood, the doctors would stop injecting him with the chemicals that attacked the strain, and that would give Levon back some of his strength. However, it would also mean that the doctors would lose interest in doing tests on Levon, figuring that he was just like all the other experiments that had failed in the past. While Levon could survive while hooked up to the LiMM, just like Covington, there would be no need to keep him alive once the doctors lost interest. With Hank out of the equation, Levon would be living on borrowed time now.