He rips the bag from my head, and I’m momentarily blinded by the dim light in the room. I squint at my perpetrator. When his face comes into view, and it’s one I recognize, I’m disoriented, confused.
“Ha ha—plot twist!” He throws up his hands, rocks back on his feet.
The guy from Wipeouts—Fletcher—the one who told Gideon and me to come here. Behind him, Murray paces in the corner, wearing worry on his face like a badge of honor.
“W-why did you bring me here? What do you want from me?”
He laughs, hand on his stomach. “What do I want from you, Peaches?” He examines my ring from Gideon, then slips it from my skinny finger—my last remaining, and dearest, possession. “We’ll start with this pretty thing, and move on from there. But how ’bout: What does everyone want from you?”
“I don’t know what you mean. Please give me my ring back, it’s . . . it’s all I have left . . .”
“Ah, no—don’t care. And a’course you don’t have a clue. Why would ya? Lotta things you don’t know about down here, Princess!”
He pulls something from his pocket—a syringe—and comes closer, leaning over me. “So, here’s the thing—I find that playing for both teams, in a way, means I play for no teams. And I don’t mean in the gay way, like you . . . But anyway, it frees up my options. And God knows we all need options these days, am I right?” He inspects the syringe, and its piss-yellow liquid glistens in the light. Behind him, the room is small, with a metal table nearby covered in blood splatters. Medical tools line the counters along the walls. This is not where I’m supposed to be.
“What is that?” I ask, shuddering.
He chuckles. “Aw, don’t be scared, Precious.” When he smoothes my hair back, Murray clenches his fists in the corner. “If what these guys think about you is true, then you have ab-so-lutely nothing to worry about.”
“I . . . I don’t know what you’re saying.”
He gives a dramatic sigh before standing to pace. “So, let me give you the lowdown. You’ll either die, or be a rag doll soon, so it doesn’t really matter what you know,” he mumbles. “In fact—” And he laughs, getting a kick out of himself like I remember. “Wanna know the truth? I loooove the sound of my own voice. That’s probably the only reason I’m saying a goddamned thing to you.” He gives my thigh a good slap, and I wince from the sting.
“So humor me. The contents of the syringe I hold in my hand is a little something we like to call Yes. The maximum—also known now as”—he laughs, juts forward—“lethal, dosage. But you may recognize it by its former, now less-used name: Mindset.”
The first time I heard that word, it came from Eileen’s mouth, the day before it was injected into her and Henry, and the rest of society as I knew it. I move away, but Fletcher pounces on me like a cat, squeezing my jaw, and holds the syringe inches from my neck. Murray paces faster now, shaking his head, balling his fists.
“Listen up, Cupcake,” Fletcher growls in my ear, “one wrong move, and you’ll be nothing but shreds.” He laughs again, throws a thumb over his shoulder. “Know where we are? In a lil’ secret spot . . . well, I like to call it the morgue. This is where they keep all the flesh eaters when they turn, baby! Building an army, keeping them off the streets for the greater good, who-the-fuck knows? But there’s some twisted folks around here. There’s hundreds, maybe thousands, of them!”
After an empty glare into my eyes, he releases my cheeks and turns to continue his slow pace, in contrast to Murray, who may spring to kill at any second.
“So, as I was saying,” Fletcher continues, “back in the day when Yes was first discovered, it was seen as kind of a Love Drug, of sorts. But they were nearsighted. After time, users became compliant, submissive . . . completely controllable. Over the years they tested various strains on the prison population, and eventually, they found one that had the effects they were looking for. They paid off the FDA, the CIA, the FBI, and God-only-knows who else—the President, probably—to approve a vaccine that would “cure” humanity of its violence, rendering them docile, peaceful. The makings of a perfect world.” He gets lost in himself, chuckling and mumbling things I can’t make out, and my head spins from the information. Not to mention—what does any of this have to do with me?
“I bet you’re wondering what this has to do with you, am I right?” Fletcher asks. “Well, I’ll tell you: be patient. Let me finish my story!” And he animates in a way that brings to mind the clown from IT.
“You see, these assholes thought they could just cram all six doses into one and call it a day! The morons. Apparently, it doesn’t work that way, guys!” He yells to no one, then glares down at me again. “What the boys over at the Y know, is that it’s a very delicate process.” He sits on the edge of the bed and trails up my thigh, syringe in hand, and Murray charges.
“Murray, no!”
And he stops, retreats.
“Who the f—?” Fletcher squints into the dim room behind him before pivoting toward me again. “Oh, ha ha. Right, you’re a nutjob. Is your imaginary friend in here with us now?” he teases, spinning around in a circle. Murray crouches in a corner, takes his cigar out and puffs vigorously at his Zippo flame.
“How . . . do you know that?”
“Oh, we been watching you, Sweet Tits. Yeah . . . we’ve seen everything. And I do mean everything.” He grabs my left breast and squeezes. “You are one hot piece of ass, I will give you that. I almost feel bad about what I have to do. Almost.” He slaps his knee, then laughs out loud. “You know what’s funny as fuck? That you actually believed I came to your house and sold you cable. That was some funny shit! I almost couldn’t keep a straight face.”
“You . . . lied to me.”
“Everyone lies, sugar. An unfortunate truth of humanity—we’re all liars.”
“Please let me go.”
“No, see—you didn’t let me finish my story, so now you still have no clue what’s happening here. So shhhh . . . just go with it; hear me out. You’re something special, Princess.” He grips my thigh, then rubs between my legs. “You see, usually it takes six doses to achieve total compliance. But you—you had eleven. Eleven! Are you fucking kidding me? That’s unheard of. You may be a nutjob, but there’s something about you . . .”
Without warning, he jabs the needle into my bicep, depressing the plunger, I swing at him with my other hand, and he slaps me so hard my head whips to the side. Face and arm stinging from the burn, I give in to it, because there’s nothing left to do.
I’m so sorry I failed you, Missy. Gideon. Everyone.
“You know,” Fletcher says, removing the needle, “Mr. Deuce here wanted me to test you for resistance with another dose before handing you over to the boys at the Y, but you’ve already had fucking eleven—I mean, seriously? What the hell is one more gonna do? So, I said to myself, ‘Fletch? How could you benefit from these fucktards’ fucktardedness?’ And then it hit me—If this whore is immune, she’s worth her weight in gold. Do you realize no one has been immune? No. One. They wanna make counter-vaccines outta your blood, Sunshine. Can you imagine? Hooked up to machines all day, milked for your goods like a cow? Not to mention—” He crams his fingers into my vagina. “You get to be everyone’s little rag doll . . . But you like that, don’t you, Princess?” He leans into my ear. “Yesss, you do.”
He unzips his fly and climbs up onto the table, forcing my weak legs apart, then he pins them in place while he grabs a device from the table beside him, tiny erection bulging.
“Know what this is?” he asks. “It’s an electromagnetic device that activates the vaccine—which has been dormant until now. But with one little click of a button—” He touches it to my finger and there’s a charge, which calls to mind the incident with Eve’s parents and their television. “We’re off to the races!”
There’s the sensation of fireworks in my nerves, followed by a sudden rush of
nausea. My head spins, and I clutch my pounding skull.
“So how is it?” Fletcher asks, but his voice is far away, heckling like a hyena. “I admit I put a little extra in there—just in case!”
Murray’s sitting in the corner now, hands rested on his knees, letting his cigar burn down to its nub.
“That good, huh?” He gropes me, while stroking his cock. “You know what else is funny? These guys both think I’m working for them. Y doesn’t know I’m here—they’re actually sending someone out here to get you tomorrow—at which point you may already be dead. But, hey! The way I justify it is: I’m taking the necessary risks your boyfriend and his brother are too fucking ignorant to make. If you die—you die. Just another pussy; no big deal.” And he straddles my face, cramming his dick down my throat, making me gag.
“That’s a good girl, take it like a champ. Wow,” he says, with a thrust. “You’re really good at that.” He jabs it deep, and I gag, then puke over the side of the table.
He pushes me down onto my back and pins me, dick in his hand. “But if you’re immune,” he whispers, licking my earlobe, “you’ll be an even better girl.”
He starts to stick his dick inside of me when something across the room on the wall moves. It shakes from side to side, erratically, until a cloth falls to the floor, as if it had done it on purpose. A camera appears, like the paparazzi ones in the Wet Room. The light beneath it blinks rapidly, then stops, blinks again, and in that moment, when I spot the syringe in Fletcher’s hand, his other by his side and with him distracted, I know it’s now or never.
I swipe the syringe from his hand and plant it deep in his neck.
Thirty-One
Fletcher flails around the room, gasping for breath, and Murray helps me from the bed.
“How do we get out?” I ask, sick and dizzy.
Across the room, the door slides open.
“Did you—?”
“Uh-uh.” Murray shakes his head. “But come on, this is our go.” With one arm supporting me, Murray helps me from the room. I’m dizzy as fuck at first and need all of his help, but after we exit the room and get into a stone corridor, I can stand a little better. But I’m naked, cold, sick, and I have no idea where I am.
“Bitch!” Fletcher gurgles behind us, still grappling with the assailant at his jugular, pants around his ankles.
“We gotta run now, Gracie,” Murray says. “You can do that, right?” He peers down at me, and I give him a nod. I’ll do it for Gideon. I’ll do it for Missy.
As Murray and I race along the dark corridor, my blood starts pumping enough to clear some of the haze, but only enough to notice torn, rotted hands reaching for me from the cells to my left.
“Shit!” I stumble to the right, against the wall, and Murray sticks to my left side, my support. My protection.
“Grace!” a voice calls from far ahead of us, where the dim lights disappear into black. I can’t tell for sure who it is, but it sounds like . . .
“It’s Jade,” I tell Murray. A wave of nausea as heavy as the Earth itself hits me, and I double-over, splattering the walls with puke as I try to run.
Behind us, Fletcher yells, and I think he’s chasing us.
“Faster, Grace,” Murray says, and he picks up his pace.
I give it everything inside of me, though my vision blurs, and there’s two of Jade when she gets to us, panting.
“Holy fuck, muchacha, what happened to you? Come on, we gotta move.” And she takes my other side.
Behind us in the corridor, there’s a procession of loud clacks that echo eerily through my haze.
“Fuck, it was right,” she says under her breath. “This way! We gotta hide!”
She drags me into a dark room and shuts the door. I panic for a moment, but find Murray behind me, to my relief.
“Oh my God oh my God oh my God,” Jade mutters, locking the door. “Holy fucking shit, this is no bueno.”
She helps me sit on the cold tile in the dark room, then she opens a cabinet, rummaging for something. The stench of death hangs in the air so strong, it makes me vomit again, all over my naked skin, and I shake violently.
“What’s . . . happening?” I ask her.
She races back to me, stripping from a white smock to wipe up my puke. “Shit is fucked. Shit is so fucked.” She slips a black T-shirt over my head, then yanks some black sweatpants up my legs, maneuvering them over my hips. “Someone opened the doors on all five floors of the Labs. Which means the test subjects . . . will escape. Part of the horde will be heading toward the Cross soon, so we gotta fucking move. We have to find a way out of here, girl.” She gives a frantic glance around the room, then her bottom lip quivers and she starts to cry. “I don’t wanna die here, Grace.”
Murray sits beside me, wraps an arm around my shoulder. “Hang on tight, girl.”
“Where are . . . we?” I ask Jade.
She wipes her eyes. “A storage room in sector five.”
“Sector . . . five? Test subjects?”
“Yeah, girl. I’m so sorry; I lied to you.” And she sobs harder.
On the other side of the wall, the shuffling of feet, gurgling, and snarling I hear every time I close my eyes is real, and it sounds like that asshole, Fletch, was right. There might be hundreds of them out there.
My stomach lurches again, and Murray helps me lean over to puke where it won’t spoil my fresh clothes. I’m surprised by the amount of bile. I’m definitely going to die here.
“No, you’re not,” Murray says, reading my thoughts. He gives me a nudge, then points up at the ceiling in the back corner. There, in the aura of light shining from a single yellow bulb is an air duct with a metal covering.
“Jade . . .”
She pulls a handgun from her waistband and kneels in front of me, wiping her nose. “Yeah?”
I point to the vent, and she follows my gaze.
“No shit. Oh my God, girl, you are a fucking genius. That goes all the way to the Cross floor.” She jumps up and takes my arm, wrapping it around her shoulder to help me to my feet. “Either that, or the Lounge. But damn, momma, can you make it? You can barely walk, and that shit is a long way up.”
“No . . . choice.” I will myself to put one foot in front of the other, while Murray takes the lead. “Murray, you can’t . . .”
“If you can, I can. Besides, you need my help.” He stands beneath the vent, gazing up.
“Who you talking to, Grace?” Jade asks, alarmed. She moves a stack of plastic crates to directly under the vent, near Murray.
“No one.” I sway in place, steadying myself on a metal shelf piled with more crates. A flash of heat devours my body, and sweat pours from my neck, forehead, and back.
Jade climbs atop the precariously balanced crates, wobbling as she pries the metal covering off. And when a shrill alarm sounds, like the one I heard in the dressing room at Yvette’s, Jade almost topples off the crates, but catches herself by grabbing the lip of the hole. “Oh, dios mio. We have to get the fuck out of here!” She yells over the noise. She climbs down to assist me, and Murray takes her place, climbing up the stack of crates. His nimbleness surprises me, even though it shouldn’t. He shimmies up inside the vent, while Jade takes my arm and puts it over her shoulder.
“What the hell happened to you?” she mumbles. “I am not feeling good about this.”
“Fletcher . . .” But my ability to walk and talk at the same time has vanished.
“Who’s Fletcher? Never mind, girl, we gotta do this now. You can tell me everything later.”
“Where’s . . . Logan? And . . . Syd?”
“I don’t know, girl. I don’t know.” She cries again as she helps me up the side of the crates.
It takes everything I have inside of me just to make it to the top, and with Jade bracing the sides, I’m left to my own balancing devices. Missy’s face
, her fate if I don’t make it, propel me up the side, where Murray’s hand awaits just beyond the entrance of the vent.
“I’ll be right behind you, girl,” Jade says. “Thank God I put on my running shoes today, fuck. ’Cus I might have to push you all the way up.”
I take Murray’s strong hand with my right, and with my left, I grip the edge of the vent. With one deep breath, and a pleading with the powers that may be to help me, Murray guides me up inside the vent, and I use my bare feet to brace myself on the cold metal.
“Right behind you, girl,” Jade says from the top of the crates.
“Let me . . . go up . . . a little.”
It’s too dark to see Murray’s face. But he seems to float, using his strength to pull me as I use my feet to stick to the walls like a spider. “You can do this,” he says in a low voice that seems to come from my own mind, echoing off the metal walls.
“Okay, I’m in,” Jade says from beneath me. “Can you climb?”
“Y-yeah.”
And I do. I climb with my eyes closed, imagining everyone I love waiting for me at the top, wherever it leads. My body drips with sweat, shaking violently, but I manage to put one foot in front of the other. If I wasn’t so sick, I might have a panic attack, because this is too close to my nightmares of Riverbend, teetering somewhere over the great canyon of death. The only difference now is that I’m climbing up instead of down.
“You okay, girl?” Jade asks me, panting.
“No.”
“Just a little bit further, momma. We should reach the next floor soon, then maybe there will be a place to rest? I don’t know how these fucking things work, but . . .” She stops, having trouble talking and climbing. “That would make sense, right? They gotta like . . . I dunno, branch off or some shit? To each floor?”
“Yeah . . . maybe.”
Fighting a surge of nausea, because I don’t want to puke all over Jade—would I infect her?—I take in slow and steady breaths as best I can, until my left hand slips into empty space. “Here,” I say. “The . . . branch.”
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