by Keary Taylor
I looked the other way, my cheek brushing the top of Avian’s recently shaven head. His head rested right next to my shoulder, my left hand held loosely in his. As I brushed against him, his head jerked up. The whites of his eyes were red, his entire face tired looking. He looked like he hadn’t slept for a while.
“Hey,” he said, a small smile forming on his lips. He squeezed my hand tighter. “How do you feel?”
“Tired,” I said as I raised my hand to rub my eyes. It was encumbered by all the tubes that were sticking out of my hand. I ripped them out in one quick move. Avian gave a small chuckle and shook his head as he stepped around the bed and pulled something out of a drawer. Raising my arm, he wiped the drops of blood that were forming there and placed a small bandage over it.
“How long have I been out?” I asked as I rubbed my eyes. The room came into sharper focus.
“About twelve hours,” Avian said quietly as he sat on the edge of my bed and took my hand in his again. His eyes were serious as he looked into mine. “Dr. Beeson came to talk with me when he heard you were here. He said he’d given you some really shocking news that probably caused this. He said it was personal.”
I gave a nod, my eyes falling away from his again.
“Are you going to be okay?”
I let out a sigh and shook my head. “I don’t know. I still don’t know what to think about it all. This is…” I couldn’t think of the word that described what this was.
“You know you can always talk to me if you need, right?” he said quietly.
My eyes met his again. “Always,” I said softly as I raised my other hand and held it against his rough cheek. “Have you slept at all since?”
He gave a chuckle and I dropped my hand back to the bed. “I fell asleep about twenty minutes ago. Other than that I couldn’t really. You really had me worried.”
“Sorry,” I said, trying to smile back. “Have they left?”
Avian nodded. “West and Tuck went with their team last night. They should be back before dawn if everything goes smooth.”
I nodded my head that I heard him. Grabbing the rail with my other hand, I pulled myself forward with Avian’s reluctant assistance. As I swung my legs over the edge of the bed I realized I was wearing a loose fitting gown of some sort.
“You changed my clothes?” I asked as I narrowed my eyes at him.
“Your other ones got a little… wet,” he said uncomfortably as his eyes dropped away from my face.
“Oh. That’s incredibly embarrassing,” I said as I couldn’t look at Avian either.
Avian chuckled, putting his hand under my chin to make me look at him. “Don’t worry about it. I’m just glad you’re feeling better. At least you seem to be.”
“I feel fine,” I said as I stood. As I did I felt a draft come in from behind me. My stomach jumped to my throat as I looked to see where it was coming from. “Uh, where is the rest of this thing?”
Avian laughed out loud, something he rarely did. I suddenly wished he would do it more often. It did amazing things to his face- and my chest. “It’s a hospital gown. They’re made to… easily access everything.”
“Nothing back or down there needs to be easily accessed,” I said as I pulled the openings closed, shifting there uncomfortably.
Avian opened a cupboard and grabbed another gown and handed it to me. I pulled it on backwards, only feeling slightly more comfortable. “I think they washed your clothes and put them back in your room,” he said as his eyes settled on mine again.
I nodded, looking around for my pack. I found it sitting on the counter by the door.
“I didn’t think you’d be happy if they took that,” Avian said as he grabbed it and handed it over to me. “I hid it from them so they wouldn’t try and sterilize it as well.”
“Thanks,” I said, forming a small smile as I pulled it on. I felt myself relax just a bit.
“You’re welcome,” he said, his lips still in a slight smile as his eyes fixed on me. I felt all those strange emotions building up inside of me again.
“I need to do something today, tonight, whatever it is right now. I can’t tell with no windows open in this place.”
“We’ll talk to Royce, I’m sure there’s something you could help with.”
“I need to get out,” I clarified as I walked to the door and opened it. “The air tastes weird in here. Everyone else has already breathed it. I need to get outside.”
Avian asked me a million questions as we walked down the hall, trying to assess my physical health. He held his fingers to my neck for a while, timing my pulse to the watch on his wrist. His eyes studied me as we left the elevator and I started back toward my room.
“I’m not going to be able to talk you into resting anymore, am I?” he asked as he leaned against the door frame of my room.
“You would be correct,” I said as I gave him a smile and closed the door.
I found my clothes clean and folded on the counter in my room. It felt like a relief to pull them on. I could think of nothing more uncomfortable to wear than a hospital gown. Someone must have wanted to torture patients. I cinched my pack tight to my back and Avian followed me to the main floor to search out Royce.
Ten minutes later I was outside in the dark night, walking the streets with a man who had not spoken one word to me. That was just fine with me. I was just glad to be outside.
It was unnerving, seeing all the eyes and faces inside the buildings. I expected them to burst through the glass at any moment and tackle us to the ground.
It was a relief to be outside but it wasn’t the same as being back home, or even being in the desert. I still felt so small, so closed in. Buildings rose all around us, closing us in. I felt like they were blinding me.
Two hours after I had been allowed to join the others on patrol, the sound of the tanks echoed off the buildings around us. I followed them to the back of the hospital where they parked. Two armed guards jumped out of the top hatches first and one by one, my family members started climbing out of the tanks. All fifteen of them were there. West climbed out last, joining me as we watched the others go in through a back door to the hospital.
“Are you feeling okay now?” West said as he walked with me around the perimeter of the building again.
“Better,” I replied simply. It was the truth, if only a little bit. I vowed to myself I wasn’t going to go into shock again. “What did the others say when you arrived?”
“They were surprised, that’s for sure,” West said with a chuckle. “Tess and Van were really freaked out. She actually ran when she saw us. But we told them what we’d found. It didn’t take too much convincing to get them to come with us. I think they all liked the idea of running water and toilets.”
“They are certainly nice, in their own way.” It took everything I had in me not to run.
“I can’t wait till everyone gets here,” West said as he stared at the stars above us. “It will be nice to have everyone back together again.”
I just gave a nod. I didn’t like awkward moments. How was one supposed to remedy it?
“Time to get inside, you two,” one of the scouts said as we rounded to the front of the hospital. “It’s almost dawn.”
Neither of us said anything as we walked through the front sliding glass doors. As the last of the scouts came inside, the steel doors closed over the glass ones and we were once again caged in. Before I had to face West anymore, I ducked away, escaping into my room.
THIRTY-FOUR
The next day I rambled around the halls, half checking on the members of our group, half just aimlessly wandering as I felt lost in my thoughts.
With the revelation of the fact that there was a very good chance West was my brother it seemed like my choice should have been made very obvious now. If West really was my brother obviously I couldn’t pick him. I wouldn’t want to pick him. And even if the paternity test came back negative, would I ever look at West the same? Could I ever kiss him again without th
inking about it all?
It should have been so easy to finally choose Avian. I had wanted to pick and now my other possibility had been essentially taken out. But it all seemed so unfair. This was too abrupt. There were too many other things going on. It felt impossible to seriously consider my emotional feelings, anything romantic or involving love.
I still wasn’t ready to decide if anything I was feeling was love.
It was difficult to adjust to the schedule they kept at the hospital. We slept during the middle of the day, woke around eight at night, had breakfast, and once it was dark outside the scouts went out on patrol. Lunch was served in the middle of the night and dinner was served a an hour after dawn. It felt so off, but only if you paid attention to the actual times. Night and day looked pretty much the same in the hospital considering the windows were only open when it was pitch dark outside.
I sat eating my breakfast alone when Royce and a few of his other men approached me. I could tell from the looks on their faces that they had business on their minds.
“Do you have a few minutes to talk, Eve?” he asked. I could see a strange look of excitement on their faces.
“I was planning on going out on patrol but I think I have a few minutes before they’re ready to leave,” I said as I stood. They followed me to the counter where I returned my tray and we headed for the elevators. “What’s this about?”
“I have one last thing to show you,” he said, excitement in his tone.
We exited on the blue floor, the lights glowing bright as ever. I followed them down the hall, to the very end. A thick black door was closed, heavier and stronger looking than all the other ones. Royce punched a few numbers into the keypad attached to the handle. It beeped twice and I heard it unlock before he pushed it open.
Almost immediately inside the door was a set of stairs. All three of the men glanced back at me before starting up them, making me feel a little uneasy.
Even if they were planning to take me to some secluded area of the hospital and try and attack me, I was pretty sure I could take all of them if I had to.
My eyes grew wide as we got to the top of the stairs. They opened onto the very top floor of the hospital, one big room. There were no walls or ceiling, just windows. It was almost as if we had just walked out onto the roof of the building.
Dominating the center of the room was a ring. A fifteen foot ring, balanced on five steel legs about four feet off the floor. Inside the ring were more rings, gears, mechanical devices I didn’t even have names for. But I knew what it was. I’d already seen a smaller version of it.
“It’s a CDU,” I breathed as I took it in.
A small smile crossed Royce’s face as he looked at me and nodded. “Yes it is.”
“It’s massive,” I said as I started to circle it.
“It’s taken us a long time to build it,” Royce said as he crossed his arms over his chest. “We not sure exactly how far the blast will reach but we are certain it will at least clear the city.”
“Why haven’t you used it yet?” I asked as I ran my hand along the smooth metal surface. I immediately withdrew my hand, remembering what it would do when it was live. It would kill me immediately.
“It’s not quite finished,” he answered. “It still needs a power source.”
I nodded as I stopped, coming back around the gigantic ring. “I suppose you can’t just plug it into any normal outlet.”
“The amount of power this thing requires is astronomical,” Royce said, his eyes fixed on me. “Even directing all the power that runs to the hospital wouldn’t be enough to charge this thing and set it off. We need to tap directly into the power plant that is three blocks from here.”
“Then why haven’t you done it yet?” I asked, my brow knitting together.
He looked at me for a moment before he replied. “Because it is crawling with Fallen. Even at night.”
It took me a moment to understand what he was saying. The Fallen flocked to places with power. It made sense that a power plant would be saturated with hundreds of Fallen.
“You need me to go in,” I said as I put everything together. “I’m the only one that can’t be infected.”
He simply nodded, his eyes fixed on me.
I looked back at the Pulse, thinking of what it could mean if it really did work. This entire city, and all the ones around it, clear up past the forest we had hidden in for a short time, free of any Fallen. We could likely live the rest of our lives in peace.
“If I set this off, what’s to keep it from shorting me out and killing me?”
Royce adjusted his stance, pushing his hands in his pockets. “We’ve been working on proofing the entire hospital for the last two years. This room was added a while ago, completely sealed off from the rest of the building. The glass is all going to blow, but the rest of the hospital won’t be effected. You’ll be perfectly safe inside, along with all of our other electrical equipment.”
“And how do I get into the plant without being torn apart, limb from limb?” I asked as I stuffed my hands in my pockets as well.
“Heavily armed,” he said, a sly smile tugged on his face.
“No,” a voice suddenly said from behind us. Both Avian and West stepped into the room, looks of rage and fury on their faces. “You can’t send her right into a power plant. She’ll never make it out alive,” West said through clenched teeth.
“You can’t ask this of her,” Avian said, his eyes dark.
“Apparently Lex forgot to close the door behind us,” Royce said as he glared at one of the armed men behind him. The man just gave a shrug.
“You realize what this device will do for us? For humanity?” Royce asked, turning his eyes on Avian and West again. “We will never have to worry about the Fallen again. We can live like normal people again, start to rebuild.”
“But not at the cost of losing Eve,” Avian said, his hands forming fists.
“We will not be sending her in there naked. A tank will drive her as close as possible, our men will take out as many as they can without risking infection. She will be armed.”
“No,” West said, shaking his head. “It’s too great of a risk. There will be hundreds of them there, maybe even thousands.”
The three of them stood like that for a long moment, staring at each other with unrelenting eyes.
“I’ll do it,” I finally spoke. “When will everything be ready?”
“Tomorrow,” Royce said.
“No, Eve!” West hissed at the same time.
“You can’t do this!” Avian chimed in.
“Yes, I can and I will!” I nearly shouted back. “Neither of you are in charge of me. I’m the only one that can do this and I am going to do it. For all of us.”
“Wonderful,” Royce said as he clapped a hand on my back. “I’ll let them know and we will get things prepared for tomorrow night.”
Avian looked at me with cold eyes and I read a million words of shock, hurt, and betrayal in them. Without another word he turned and walked back down the stairs.
“You can’t do this Eve,” West said, closing the gap between us. He took my hands in his, his brown eyes staring into my blue gray ones. “You most likely won’t walk out of this. Don’t kill yourself to make life a little easier for us.”
“Maybe you’re underestimating me,” I said quietly, slipping my hands out of his. “I am doing this.”
Before he could say anything else, I stepped around him and walked down the stairs.
I hurried out to join the rest of the patrol group. It was then that I noticed how they kept a wide berth around an entire block. As I looked through the dark in that direction, I saw them, rows and rows of them, surrounding the complexities of the power plant.
As we patrolled that night, I thought of the dozens of ways I could die in twenty-four hours. I also thought of what the world would look and be like after the Pulse was set off.
I stood a good chance of not making it out of there alive, but I would do it a
million times over without thinking twice about it.
We finally stood a fighting chance.
As I walked back through the doors just before dawn, I was immediately greeted by Dr. Beeson. My stomach leapt into my throat.
“The test results just came in,” he said quietly, fidgeting with an envelope in his hands. “I haven’t looked at them yet. I wanted you to see them first.”
I swallowed hard, nodding. We started for the elevator, working our way through the crowded lobby.
“Eve,” West called as he crossed the room towards us. “I need to talk to you.”
“Not now,” I said as I held my hand up to him, shaking my head.
“But I need to talk to you,” he said, his step unfaltering.
“I said not now!” I bellowed as I stopped, my eyes fierce as I locked eyes with him.
My vision flickered. I was about to lose myself.
West’s eyes were large as he finally stopped in his tracks. I felt a hand close around my forearm and I was pulled toward the elevator.
Dozens of eyes watched me as the doors slid closed.
“It was happening, wasn’t it?” Dr. Beeson said quietly as we rose.
“Yes,” I replied simply.
We walked silently down the blue hall to his office and closed the door quietly behind us.
“West is a smart young man,” Dr. Beeson said as he leaned against his desk. “He has been up here most of the night with me, asking questions about the wireless system. I showed him how it works and I believe he understood everything I said. He got his grandfather and father’s brains.”
I nodded mindlessly as he handed me the envelope. I held it with shaking hands.
My stomach rolled as I tore the envelope. The edges of my vision started to turn black as I pulled the sheets of paper out.
The words seemed to move and shift around as I skimmed through the information that didn’t mean much to me.
But they froze near the middle of the page. At the only line that mattered.
DNA TEST RESULTS: NEGATIVE MATCH.
“Negative,” I breathed, my heart racing.