Melancholy: Episode 3

by Charlotte McConaghy

  Will disconnects us and I sag in trembling relief. “Holy shit,” I gasp.

  “You nailed it,” Eric assures me.

  I look to Luke, who gives a single nod of approval.

  “Okay,” I stand. “Time for us to tackle our own clinics. Will, keep intercepting any calls to the Bloods. Don’t let Shay or his men connect with anyone but you. You know the drill.” The longer we can keep Shay in the dark and withhold information from the Bloods, the better. They’ll get a whiff of the commotion at some point soon, though, so we need to be quick.

  “Good luck!” Will calls, then gets back to doing four million things at once. He’s a genius. Pace is still busy on the phone, so she just gives us a distracted wave. Eric bends over and kisses her tummy, which I find adorable and can’t help grinning over.

  Our first clinic is close. Eric drives, while Luke and I check our weapons and gear. We look impressively like Bloods after having broken into one of their armories to kit ourselves out. The clinic is still open this early in the evening, but foot traffic has dwindled and the staff inside are getting everything ready for the morning’s rush of injections.

  If Luke was normal right now, this would be the easiest thing in the world. No one knows better how to act like a Blood than an actual Blood. Obviously. But since he’s all jerky and angry, he can’t waltz into the clinic and charm the pants off everyone within earshot like he would have. And since Eric is the nicest guy on the planet and is incapable of being anything but sweet as pie, the acting falls to me.

  I lead the team inside and straight to the front desk. I move with as much grace as I can muster, and an arrogant tilt to my shoulders. I catch sight of a security guard and motion for him to join us with a cool flick of my wrist.

  The thing is, I know exactly what a Blood is like. I lived with one for a year. Now I just have to channel what I saw in him but never recognized. And since we have no form of official identification, we have to make the notion of us being anything but Bloods seem preposterous.

  “Evening,” I greet the secretary at the desk. “Could you notify Dr Mahatmi to make his way here immediately, please.”

  The woman blinks, then grabs her phone to make the call.

  “What’s going on?” the security guard asks me.

  I raise my hand in a gesture for him to be patient. I do it coolly, calmly. I am mostly expressionless, except for the flicker of disdain I allow to pass through my gaze as I turn away from him. Out of the corner of my eye I see him blush and take a minute step backwards.

  He needs to fear us. They all do.

  We stand patiently as the head of the clinic makes his way downstairs. When he arrives, Dr Mahatmi looks flustered and very tired. He is slim, with a thick white beard. I don’t shake his hand when he offers it; I leave mine clasped loosely behind my back. He appraises all three of us and settles on me. “Are we still going ahead?” he asks. “You said the last load would be here by now – ”

  “We’re with the emergency services explosives squad,” I inform him. “Alarms have been set off at several clinics and due to a widespread security threat you are required to start your evacuation protocol immediately.”

  He stares at me. The secretary covers her mouth in fear.

  “Our last orders were to leave six guards within sight of the product at all times,” the security guard tells me. Which means upstairs is probably crawling with security. “And to keep everything locked down,” he adds.

  I meet his eyes and repeat, very clearly, “Immediately. Or those six guards, and everyone else in this building, might well be blown to pieces before you can blink those big brown eyes of yours.”

  The guard swallows and Mahatmi rushes to the front desk to set off a loud tone throughout the clinic. People begin to move, mostly staff.

  I step toward the security guard. I try to make myself bigger than him, even though he towers over me. I’ve seen Luke do it a thousand times. The bone-deep knowledge that he could destroy you – it’s that certainty that makes you big even if you are small. “Are you in charge of security?” I ask the man, allowing my eyes to skim him up and down briefly.

  He clears his throat. “Yes.”

  “Have you run an evacuation procedure before?”

  “Once.”

  “Good. Record time for an evacuation of a building this size is three minutes. I expect you to do it in half that.”

  He jerks into action, running with sudden speed to a stairwell and screeching into his radio.

  “Three minutes?” Luke asks me.

  “He looks like he could use the exercise.” I am absurdly happy to see the edge of Luke’s mouth relax into a faint smile.

  I wait with Eric and Luke, holding our stances, until everyone is out of the building and security has done several sweeps to ensure that.

  “You are not permitted to enter the building, or allow anyone else to enter, until you have specific clearance from me. Do you understand?” I ask Mahatmi and the security guard, who are the last to evacuate.

  They nod.

  “You will remain at a distance of at least one hundred yards from the building at all times. We will now do our own sweep of the building and ascertain the existence of any explosive material. Do you understand?”

  They nod once more, looking pretty freaked.

  My team and I make our way swiftly upstairs.

  “You are scarily good at being a Blood,” Eric mutters.

  “I’m just glad they didn’t question why there aren’t a bunch of police and a whole host of emergency services people to set up perimeters,” I reply.

  “Too stupid to,” Eric shrugs.

  “Not stupid,” Luke grunts. “Scared.”

  Hurrying to the storerooms, we check the mountains of boxes to see thousands of vials of the drug. “Yep, this is it,” I breathe, holding one of them in my fingers and looking at the yellow-colored liquid. When the boys aren’t looking, I slip the vial into my left pocket.

  We set up the homemade bombs, which are wirelessly connected to Will’s command computer and will be triggered when each team has given the all-clear. We place more explosives in the loading bay, enough to ensure the whole building will come down. I do feel bad about destroying a place designed to help sick people, but seriously – don’t fry people’s brains and we won’t blow you up.

  Without exiting through the front where the staff waits for us, we head straight out the back and on to the second clinic on our roster. We’ll let Mahatmi and his people wait a safe distance away for us, and when the bomb blows they’ll think we were killed inside, removing any trail.

  The second clinic goes pretty much the same way, although the head security guard isn’t as nervous around me so I have to work harder to get him to back off on the questions. Soon it too has been evacuated and planted with bombs.

  On our way to the third and last clinic I check in with the other teams and find that their evacuations have all gone smoothly. Blue’s team has one more to get through, but the rest are finished. I instruct them to head home to the garage.

  As soon as we enter the last clinic, I know we’re going to have a serious problem. We left the largest until last, not wanting it rigged with explosives for too long before detonation because they’d be more likely to be discovered. And in this riskiest of all clinics, right here in the main reception, stand five Bloods. Real ones.

  I panic, my footsteps faltering. I can’t bullshit these guys. I won’t even get close.

  And that’s when Luke finally finds some measure of control over his poor body, and steps up to help me. He walks straight over to the Bloods. “Status?”

  They turn, this group of cold, detached young men, all sleek and dangerous like the cool touch of a gun or the soulless ruthlessness of a great white shark. They are terrifying, and they scare me more than the Furies. They are dead-eyed and still, and there was so much of this in Luke when I first met him – I just didn’t recognize it until this moment.

  “ID?” one asks. He
has red hair and freckles, and it occurs to me that he would have been an adorable child before he was emptied of his humanity. It’s a different curse, being a Blood, but a curse nonetheless.

  “Explosives squad sent from headquarters,” Luke replies flatly. “They haven’t updated you yet?”

  A headshake. Those calculating eyes trace Luke shrewdly.

  “Connect in,” Luke orders with blunt impatience.

  The red-haired guy, who is clearly ranking officer, touches his earpiece and radios in to headquarters, where I’m praying Will will intercept the call.

  “Update status for the Leeds clinic,” the Blood requests and then listens.

  I hold my breath.

  “Copy that.” He turns to Luke with a different expression, this one more curious than anything else. “Evacuation protocol.”

  Two of his Bloods move to alert the clinic.

  “We haven’t met,” he says, offering a hand to Luke. “Knox, Blue.”

  Luke shakes it, doing a good job of looking bored. Apparently the same intimidation techniques apply within the Bloods too.

  “Been on explosives long?”

  “No one’s on explosives long,” Luke says.

  Knox grins, and there’s a savage edge to it. They are all ultra-aware of death, these men. Luke’s been training us to be able to kill them, but I realize now that we haven’t even come close to their level of ruthlessness. The difference between us and them is that they don’t care if they die – I can see it in every dart of their eyes, every empty twist of their lips.

  Luke’s fists start clenching and unclenching of their own accord. I don’t know if he’s noticed, but Knox sure has. The Blood’s eyes go to the unusual movement and then dart back up to Luke’s tight jaw. That gaze narrows.

  “You didn’t tell me your name,” Knox points out softly.

  “I didn’t,” Luke agrees.

  Come on, I urge the staff as they evacuate. This place is so much bigger than the others though, and there are so many more people to move. I can feel Eric fidgeting nervously beside me and give him a reassuring look. My heart is thumping painfully.

  “I asked you a question,” Knox says.

  “No, you didn’t.”

  The Blood smiles, but there’s zero humor in it. “Alright. I’ll specify the implied question for you. What is your name and rank, soldier? Or would you prefer me to contact headquarters to verify it?”

  Luke turns to look at Knox properly for the first time. I watch, my breath catching in my throat, as the coldest expression I have ever seen passes his eyes.

  “You’re going to feel very foolish,” Luke warns quietly, emotionlessly. “And you’re going to feel small. Better you just leave it, Agent Knox.”

  Knox hesitates for a fraction of a second, thrown by the words. “I’ll be the judge of that.”

  Luke murmurs, “Agent Luke Townsend, Gray.”

  I freeze in horror.

  And I watch as Knox looks ashen. All words are stolen from his white lips and he looks like he might either faint or vomit. “Forgive me,” he manages to blurt. “I had no idea … You … Why are you on explosives, sir?”

  “The rest of the world grew too boring for me,” Luke replies lazily.

  Knox flushes beet red and gives an awkward laugh. He is utterly awestruck, and opens his mouth to say something.

  “Stop speaking,” Luke orders him without so much as a glance, and Knox’s mouth snaps shut.

  My heart is pounding. It’s patently clear that Knox doesn’t know of Luke’s rogue status, but Jesus – pretty big gamble.

  The evacuation finishes at last. Luke orders Knox to form a perimeter outside and make sure everyone stays well behind it. He, Eric and I then make our way upstairs.

  “I think I just had a stroke,” Eric admits when we’re alone in the first storeroom.

  “You’re out of your mind!” I exclaim.

  Luke is busy setting up the explosives. “There’s no way in hell Jean will have informed anyone except other Grays about my status,” Luke says. “Disloyalty within the Bloods can’t exist.”

  “I thought there weren’t any other Grays,” I say.

  “Exactly.”

  I shake my head, nerves too fried to argue further. We’re fine, I tell myself. It worked.

  My radio crackles and Will’s urgent voice sounds. “Dual. There are too many calls coming through. I can’t field them all – the server’s about to crash.”

  “Calm down, Will,” I tell him. “Have the others all reported the okay to detonate?”

  “Yes.”

  “Great. We’re very close, we just need a few more minutes to get clear of the building.”

  “You don’t have a few minutes – Oh fuck.”

  “What?”

  No response.

  “Will!” I shout.

  “The Bloods know. They know the clinics have all been evacuated. They’re being dispatched as we speak.”

  Which means we have to blow the buildings now.

  The only way Will could rig the detonation wirelessly was to have all the bombs in all the clinics connected to the same detonator, meaning they all go together, or none of them do.

  We scramble to finish connecting the bombs and turning them on, then dart out of the room and back into the corridor.

  “We have to do the ground floor!” I shout, knowing that the whole clinic needs to go. No loose ends.

  “The Bloods in your building know!” Will shouts into the walkie. “They have orders to kill you on sight!”

  We draw our guns. My instinct is to split up – it would be quicker – but one of Luke’s rules reappears in my head. Never split from designated team members. The team exists to protect each other, or you wouldn’t bother having one in the first place.

  We sprint through corridors and down the stairwell. We’ll never make it across the clinic and out the back without being spotted. I run through the blueprints of the building in my mind, making a swift decision.

  “This way,” I pant, veering into a service elevator. We take it down two floors, below ground-level, then emerge into the parking lot. Which isn’t a parking lot anymore. It’s a storage space.

  All three of us skid to a halt, eyes widening.

  “Oh my god,” Eric breathes.

  It is thousands and thousands of crates full of the sadness cures. The garage is enormous, spanning what must be the next few city blocks.

  “We would never have got it all,” I whisper.

  Luke grabs us and urgently shoves us behind a huge wall of crates, covering our mouths. The sound of several sets of feet passes by us and I catch sight of at least four Bloods, weapons raised. They sweep into the rows of crates and disappear.

  “This whole space will be crawling soon,” Luke whispers. “Teams will have already been stationed down here.”

  “We can’t let this much of the drug survive,” I say.

  Luke nods, too quickly. We bend our knees, lower our heads and start creeping our way through the rows of crates. Every few feet we stop and listen as more Bloods pass by on their patrols. Several times we have to duck around to the other side to keep from being spotted.

  We make it to where we can see the second stairwell, which will take us up and into a patient area. This will then lead us outside, but we are forced to pause as two Bloods emerge a few rows in front of us. Peering around the crate, we wait for them to move, but they don’t.

  One of them is speaking into his earpiece. “… is all clear.”

  We don’t have silencers on our guns, which means if we were to fire at them, the whole clinic would know exactly where we are. I turn to Luke to whisper something – I don’t even know what – but realize as I do so that he’s moved around the row to come at the Bloods from an angle.

  He moves forward silently, superhumanly fast, and snaps the first Blood’s neck. The man falls in a crumpled heap without a sound. Luke has already jabbed his fingers into the second man’s throat, stopping the shout of
alarm. Moving more carefully, he looks into the Blood’s eyes as he twists his neck sharply, and then both of them are dead and it wasn’t even hard, it was easy easy easy.

  As Luke motions to us, I swallow the churning horror in my gut.

  Up we go. Straight into another Blood, who dies with Luke’s dagger in his heart. Past the body. Down the hallway and into the cafeteria.

  “Freeze!” a voice booms from behind us.

  Half a dozen Bloods this time, all with guns raised.

  We dive beneath tables and start scrambling across the ground. Shots fire, a storm of them. The table above my head explodes as I skid along the cool linoleum floor. I manage to roll onto my back and fire up at the Blood towering over me. It takes him by surprise and my shot lands in his chest. I keep firing in utter panic, letting loose bullets and unable to release my finger.

  Abruptly my gun stops firing at all, and instead makes an empty clicking sound.

  Oh my god. I have just done the one thing I was warned not to do on multiple occasions. What a complete idiot. As I scramble for a new magazine cartridge, a Blood arrives and would have undoubtedly killed me if not for Eric’s shot taking him through the cheek. Blood sprays me but I have time only to keep moving, sliding awkwardly behind another table for cover and getting my gun reloaded.

  Luke and Eric have found their own tables and are firing around them, as quick and sharp as they can. Three of the Bloods are down, so the other three have stopped advancing, taking their own cover. We’re in a shootout, I realize. An actual gun battle. Jesus, my hands are shaking.

  Remembering Luke’s words, I will myself to calm down. Don’t ever do anything while you’re panicked.

  There’s only about twenty yards between us and the door, but there’s no more cover on the way.

  “I’ve got you,” Luke barks. “On my count, you both run.”

  Another breath, a shared glance with Eric, and then Luke shouts, “Go!” and we go. I hurl myself forward, certain that any one of the shots I can hear is going to collide with my body. But I keep moving, keeping running, until I have launched myself behind the door and out of the line of fire.

  Eric skids into me and I pull him to safety.