by RJ Plant
Easy, Felix. Don’t let your anger get the best of you. We still need information from him. I thought you’d be better than me at this.
“You’re going to kill thousands of innocent people instead of targeting Truepenny directly?”
Bernard smiled. “We’re going to do both. Or rather, you’ll infiltrate Truepenny and spread the virus as I see fit. I’ll worry about the inhabitants of certain noncompliant territories.”
“And the whole of GDI is behind this plan?”
Bernard shrugged, an almost coy movement. “I may have to clean my own house a bit before going after anyone else’s.”
“You’re insane,” I said.
Bernard’s face turned into something ugly and unrecognizable. It was only for an instant. I wondered if he was constantly hiding that part of himself.
Fecking sociopath, Conor said.
“I’m driven. There’s a difference,” Bernard said, trailing over the last of Conor’s words.
Bernard must not know that Brinly works with Truepenny. They’d know where the assault came from.
“What’s to keep the virus from spreading to unintended targets?” Rian asked.
“The vaccine, of course,” Bernard answered, then added to no one inside the room, “Take him.”
Fuck. Get down, Conor said.
I dropped—whether by choice or Conor’s will, I wasn’t sure—an instant before a bullet punched through the window.
The bullet, not meant for me, had grazed Rian’s face, a score of blood marking his cheek. He pushed himself off the floor and backed into the corner, away from the windows, his gun trained on Bernard.
The sound of boots marching up the stairs was disheartening. Brinly moved into the hall.
You’re running out of time, Felix! Get the information! Conor shouted. I could feel him pulling at me.
He was right. Even through the burning adrenaline, I could feel my body losing the battle to the virus.
I crawled to Bernard and leaned in close.
“Who else in GDI knows about this?” I demanded. “Who else is involved with Kazic?”
“You’ll find out soon enough,” he said.
He lashed out to grab my wrist. In a moment of weakness, I let him. I looked down at his hand, saw the effects of the virus starting to show on my skin, cracking and tearing around his grip. And I smiled.
Fuck. You eejit! Shake him off, Conor said.
Bernard froze, his eyes widening as his own skin started to show signs of the virus.
“How’s that vaccine working out for you?” I asked in a harsh whisper.
His hand slid from my wrist as gunfire rattled in the hallway. Bernard reached for me again, this time going for my neck. He stopped short, an agonized look flashing across his features a split second after signs of the virus marred his face. He let out a cry of frustration. That one noise was the most humanity I’d seen from this man.
Agents spilled into the room, Brinly a deadly wraith at their backs. In the chaos, Bernard disappeared.
Kaitlyn appeared, pistol in hand.
Where’s Bernard? Conor screamed in my head.
I looked around. Didn’t see him. My vision was getting blurry. My hearing getting a bit muffled.
He’s by the door. Hurry!
I caught a glimpse of Bernard as he pulled himself through the doorway. Or what I thought was him—he looked like he’d stepped out of a burn ward. As I stood to follow, a scream from the kitchen stopped me cold.
I looked up. Kaitlyn’s hands were covering her mouth, the gun forgotten as it fell to the floor.
With all the gunfire, I hadn’t registered one important shot.
I felt the sting now, struggled to stay standing. My legs gave out. I fell back onto the floor, leaned against something hard. The chair back. I looked down. Blood. It spread in a pool across the fabric of my shirt.
I looked over my shoulder. Looked down the barrel of a gun aimed at me. Looked at its owner.
“Shaina,” I said.
I felt Conor just under my skin, fighting for control. I pushed him back. I needed to know.
Stop fighting me, you eejit.
Shaina’s eyes were cold. Never seen them like that.
“Shaina,” I said again.
I choked. On blood, on air.
“I should have killed you sooner,” she said, heading for the door. I wasn’t sure if she was talking to me or Conor.
“You’re just going to let her leave?” Kaitlyn asked of someone I couldn’t see.
Kaitlyn looked down at me. Studied my face. She knelt close, careful not to touch me, hands hovering. She looked at the bullet wound, looked at my hands, my neck, my face.
“Conor, I don’t think you can heal enough if the virus damage isn’t substantial,” she said. “You might be able to heal small wounds, but I think the virus speeds it up. I think … maybe.”
Even as I fought, Conor’s response forced its way through my lips: “How long?”
“Oh, shit. Shit. I don’t know. Could be five seconds, could be five minutes.”
“Say when,” Conor wheezed.
I pushed him, fought to use my own vocal cords.
“Rian,” I said.
“I’m here, Felix. What can I do?”
He’d said my name again. Must be bad.
“I’m sorry. I let him grab me,” I said. Coughed up a mouthful of blood. Tried to continue.
“I fucked up—” I started, cut off by Kaitlyn.
“Now!” she shouted.
I convulsed as I fought him.
I’ll always win against you.
28
5 November 2042, Dublin, United Irish Republic
Kaitlyn blazed into view, one hand on my forehead, the other clutching my left hand to her chest. My right hand was coated in blood.
“Bernard,” I said.
“I saw him leaving, but couldn’t get to him,” Brinly said. “A little preoccupied with …” She kicked the arm of an agent who was lying in the open doorway. “I got a good look at him, though, and it is not pretty.”
“Well … fuck,” I said. “So much for his vaccine.”
“So much for removing him,” Brinly said. “He looks like a real horror show, but he did walk out of here.”
“Fuck,” I said again. “And Shaina?”
“Rian went after her.”
“Not fast enough,” Kaitlyn spat.
“So Bernard got away, and we have zero of anything to show for our efforts,” I said. Then to Kaitlyn: “What do you think, doc? Will I live?”
She didn’t answer.
“Kaitlyn,” I said.
She snapped to attention at the sound of her name. I started pulling up my shirt, but it felt heavy. Kaitlyn smacked my hand away and lifted it for me, careful to only touch the clean spots. Her fingers trembled as they hovered above the wound.
“I don’t think you’ll be jumping any buildings anytime soon,” she said.
“I feel like shite,” I said, trying to sit up. “But if the accelerated healing isn’t just triggered by the virus, I should be good as new soon enough.”
“That’s a big if. We don’t know that for sure, do we?” she said, glaring at the bullet wound like she’d scare it away.
“I suppose we’ll be finding out,” I said. “I don’t think we can stay here though.”
“Do you think Shaina might come back to finish the job?” Brinly asked.
“I’m more worried about GDI at the moment.”
“I’ll bring the roller around,” Brinly said.
As I got a foot under myself to stand, Kaitlyn draped my arm across her shoulder to help. Once I was up, I realized how much it hurt to move, to breathe. I took a couple of shallow breaths and tried to lean a little on Kaitlyn, but the height difference made it difficult for her to support me. I was about to tell her as much, but she was crying, so.
I shuffled forward and let the wall support me as we walked down the hall to the stairs, then I put my arm around K
aitlyn once again. She walked with one hand on my back, the other on my collarbone. Which actually helped, from a balance standpoint. I trusted her to navigate the blood free zones since I couldn’t muster the energy to take stock.
Brinly was standing beside the roller when we walked out. She came over and took Kaitlyn’s place at my side, her taller frame offering more support. Between the three of us, I managed to climb into the back of the roller.
“Go to O’Cairn’s,” I said.
*****
5 November 2042, Dublin, United Irish Republic
“What are you looking for?” Kaitlyn asked.
“Sully lives here,” I said, stumbling around. “Must be a shower somewhere. Brinly, can you get the Raider?”
“What? Why?” Kaitlyn asked.
“We still have work to do,” I said. “We can rest through the night, but we leave for Boston first thing tomorrow morning.”
Brinly held my gaze. For a moment I thought she was going to tell me what a horrible idea that was. Then she nodded and left.
I finally found Sully’s living quarters. His room was full of junk. Newspaper clippings lined the walls, headlines shouting out the top stories of every decade he’d lived through. Stuffed animals lined a windowsill and a shelf just below it, each one numbered.
Gifts from his daughter on her birthday instead of something for him on his.
A mattress on a metal frame took up a third of the room, the bed neatly made. A blue and pink handmade quilt was folded at the foot of the bed.
The walls were painted a medium-brown, which should have been depressing, but came across as homey and welcoming. There was a forest-green recliner in the corner to the left of the bed.
I walked to the back of the room and found what I was looking for, a stark bathroom, probably not as clean as it could be, but with all the amenities—a toilet and a shower. I turned on the shower as hot as it would go, then peeled off my bloody clothes and got in. I stayed there until the water had grown cold.
I stepped out and grabbed a folded towel from a shelf above the toilet. I inspected the bullet hole in the mirror. The skin puckered up, white and wrinkled and new.
I got as far as Sully’s bed and collapsed on it.
I let my eyes close, and they burned for the first few seconds. I opened one eye when I felt someone close by. Kaitlyn was leaning over me.
“That’s not creepy,” I said.
“Oh, haha,” she said. “I thought it was probably a good idea to check on you, given the whole getting-shot-in-the-chest thing.”
“Kaitlyn, it’s okay if you were trying to see me naked. Who could blame you?”
I pushed myself into a seated position.
She sat, facing me, her back to the empty space behind the bed, backside precariously close to the edge.
She held her knees against her chest and rocked a little.
“The best laid plans, eh?” she said, smiling just a little with her mouth.
“Often go horribly, violently awry? Next you’ll tell me I can’t have a pet because I’ve killed all the others.”
“You don’t know your own strength, is all,” she said, a strange look passing over her face. “Making that jump, opening the door on the roof.” She shook her head.
Killing guys with one blow.
“Crazy chimera strength or no, it didn’t get us the information we needed,” I said. “A waste of a good plan, that was.”
“I didn’t think good plans failed.”
“Waste of a perfectly mediocre plan.”
“So what now?” she asked.
“Get the fuck out of this place is what. We meet up with Sully, lie low, figure out our next step …”
“And you think helping Sully find his daughter will be a low-key kind of thing?”
“Did I say that was what we were going to do?” I asked. “In any case, going to Boston gets us away from GDI and Shaina.”
Kaitlyn nodded knowingly, then took a particularly lengthy rock back. I caught her arm. She rocked forward and kissed me. I didn’t oppose this but sat rather still all the same.
“A little help here,” she said, her lips brushing the words against my mine.
I pulled her into my lap and kissed her back this time.
I must have made a noise at the sharp pain from the movement, because Kaitlyn drew back.
“I can work around this,” I said, giving her a smile.
Kaitlyn looked a little torn. She chewed the inside of her bottom lip and looked from my wounded chest to my face. I grabbed her waist and twisted her so that she was under me. A surprised squeal escaped her. I leaned down to her and whispered:
“I can work around this, pretty little Kaitlyn.”
When I pushed myself back up, she smiled up at me. Then frowned again as a spot of blood dropped down to spread in a little splotchy circle on her shirt. I looked down at my chest and swore.
“This usually never happens,” I said.
I leaned a little to the side, propping on one arm.
And collapsed.
*****
6 November 2042, Dublin, United Irish Republic
I woke up on my back with a bandage across my chest. The room was empty. I got up and found that someone had placed a pile of clothes on my lap. My towel was still mostly wrapped around me.
I got dressed, then grabbed my holster and jacket from the floor and tossed them onto the bed. Not as much pain today, easier movement, and from the look of the bandage, less bleeding. I pulled on the holster and put the jacket on over it.
The girls were in the pub, Kaitlyn on a stool at the bar and Brinly, well, on the bar. Brinly uncrossed her legs and hopped behind the bar. She came back up with the duffel full of weapons and set it on the counter.
“I’d have thought I lost this if I’d remembered I had it,” I said, walking over to the duffel.
“Feeling better?” Kaitlyn asked, sounding slightly more amused than I was comfortable with.
I narrowed my eyes at her. “I am. I feel pretty great, actually, thanks for the concern.”
“Good,” Brinly said with her hands on her hips. “It’s about time we were leaving.”
We followed Brinly out and I did my best to shut the pub door securely. Since I’d busted the door last night to get in, I kind of felt obligated to keep the vagrants out. When I was done, I trotted over to Kaitlyn.
“About last night,” I said.
“Don’t worry about it. It happens to the best of us,” she said with a laugh.
“I’d just been fecking shot,” I yelled after her, then mumbled, “Can’t catch a break, can I?”
Kaitlyn got into the front of the helicopter next to Brinly. I climbed into the back.
“I used Rian’s reserve to fuel up,” Brinly said once we were settled in.
“How did you manage to get away with that?” I asked.
“It helped that he wasn’t there,” Brinly said. She powered up the Raider and we were off.
29
6 November 2042, Atlantic Ocean Checkpoint/Fuel Station
We sat in an office aboard Truepenny’s fuel station, Olwen at the head of the long table. Brinly’s friend Jim was there too. There were a few others I didn’t recognize. One I did.
“What are we doing here?” Kaitlyn asked me, trying to keep her voice down.
I stood and said, “Kaitlyn Henderson, this is Olwen Edwards, cofounder of Truepenny. Truepenny has been financing and supplying resources to territories opposed to GDI. Or rather, what GDI is becoming under the guidance of Bernard.”
“Thank you, Mr. Quinn. I’ll take it from here,” Olwen said, coming to her feet.
I sat and leaned back in my chair.
“I believe further introductions may be necessary,” Olwen said. “This is James Reid—”
“Jim, please,” he said, standing up and shaking my hand, then Kaitlyn’s.
He looked relaxed in the coveralls I’d first seen him in.
“Ada Beckert.”
Maybe in her mid-thirties, Ada had short blonde hair and hazel eyes that looked almost green behind her glasses. She was about Kaitlyn’s height, more petite than curvy, and wore a black turtleneck. She dipped her head in a curt bow, a slight smile turning her lips up. Felix had met this one at the fit test that had kicked this whole nightmare off.
How many agents did Truepenny need in GDI?
“Mikhail Fyodorov.”
Mikhail was a large, dark-haired man with a pockmarked face and an intimidating physique. He may have been late forties, early fifties, but he was an impressive fella. His boots and the heavy material of his trousers screamed soldier, but his t-shirt—on which was written “No pen, no ink, no table, no room, no time, no quiet, no inclination”—was screaming something else. He smiled as he shook our hands with a firm grip.
“Gabriel Bloom.”
About the same age as Mikhail but slightly smaller, Gabriel was blond with dark eyes and a mouth set in an eternal frown. His bespoke suit rivaled any that Rian had ever worn, and he wore it well. Like Ada, he offered a nod instead of a handshake.
“And, of course, you both know Brinly Joyce,” Olwen said. “We make up the board of directors for Truepenny.”
“More complicated than a contractor,” I said to Brinly.
“Was it a lie?” she asked.
“We all have a busy schedule, Mr. Quinn,” Olwen cut back in. “Why not get started on telling us what happened with Bernard.”
With a heavy sigh I recounted the past few hours while everyone remained politely silent and gave me their full attention. A rather strange feeling.
“This throws a bit of a kink into our plans,” Olwen said, regarding Bernard’s escape.
“Maybe not,” I said. “Bernard will need time to recover. He isn’t likely to show up at GDI HQ right away.”
“He’s not likely to report to the board until he figures out what to do next either,” Brinly said. “He knows it’ll weaken his standing with them.”
“The way I see it, we could either track him down now and finish the job …” I started.
“Or …” Olwen prompted.