“Malcolm, fancy seeing you here,” Marcy said when Malcolm entered the kitchen.
“I got your request for time off.” Malcolm leaned against the counter and grabbed a chocolate-chip cookie off a tray with dozens of them.
“You didn’t have to come all the way down here for that.” Marcy finished wiping down one of the counters and joined him.
“I could do with stretching my legs.” He took a bite of the soft cookie. The sugar satisfied something inside him he hadn’t even been aware of. “Of course, you can take off as much time as you need. I hope nothing’s wrong.”
“Oh, everything’s fine. I just got a message that a friend of mine is a little overwhelmed right now and could use my help. She just had a baby. I know it’s a horrible time for me to be away.”
“I’m sure we’ll manage.” Although Malcolm didn’t know how. “Jess will still be here, after all.”
“Yes, and you have Tony as well. I feel bad about kicking him out of here earlier.”
Malcolm finished his cookie and debated taking another one. He decided against it. “What’d he do this time?” Tony doted over everyone under normal circumstances. With the current state of affairs, it wouldn’t surprise Malcolm in the least for Tony to have found his way to the kitchen after annoying everyone else in the house.
“He took an inventory of every last item in this kitchen to make sure everything that we need has been ordered. Which was fine. I have plenty of work to do around the house, so I was happy to leave him to it. But then I return, and he’s taken over all my counter space to make enough cookies to feed the entire compound.”
“They are tasty.”
“Yes, please, take some. Take a dozen.”
For the first time in quite a while, he felt a smile lift his lips. “That doesn’t sound so bad.”
“I know. When I say it out loud it sounds ridiculous to get upset with him, and I know I should be more understanding, but his constant hovering was driving me crazy. I’m more than happy to talk if he wants to sit and have a cup of tea or something, but I have a houseful of people to feed. I need my counters.”
That sounded exactly like the man Malcolm and the rest of them loved. Tony desperately needed someone to take care of. Perhaps Malcolm should get him a pet of some kind, something that wouldn’t tire of his attention. “I understand. Where did he go? I could go keep him company.”
“The garden.”
“Of course.” The flowers and plants were the only things that didn’t mind Tony’s constant care. “Enjoy your time off. If you want, you can go ahead and leave now. Between Tony and Jess, I doubt we’ll starve.”
“Thank you. I’ll go let Jess know. She can handle lunch, but Tony’s fussing could be put to good use for dinner.”
“I’ll let him know.”
It didn’t take long for Malcolm to find Tony. He knelt in front of a flower bed against the back wall of the house. Malcolm grabbed one of the patio chairs as he passed and seated himself in it next to Tony. “Mind if I join you?”
“Not at all. Do you mind if I finish here?”
“Go ahead. I wouldn’t want to interrupt. I just came from the kitchen where I had the most delicious cookie.”
The left side of Tony’s mouth quirked upward in a smirk. “I might have gotten a little carried away.”
“You’ll have your chance to dote on all of us tonight. Marcy is taking some time off, and Jess could use your help for dinner.”
“Is everything all right with Marcy?” Tony looked up from his work.
“Yes, she’s just tired of having to jockey for position in her own kitchen.”
“Ha. As long as she’s all right and I have her approval, I’m happy to help. I’ve learned my lesson. She’s more protective of her territory than she appears.”
“I take it you retreated to the kitchen because the others weren’t letting you take care of them properly. How is everyone doing?”
Tony always knew the temperature of everyone in the house. He cared too much not to. “As well as can be expected. Stu’s taken to not talking if he can help it. Can’t really say I’m surprised. Nick’s like elastic. He’s bouncing back to his old self, or at least pretending to, but I’ve heard him crying in his room at night when he thinks we’re all asleep. He and Stu spend most nights together. They’ve both enjoyed all the time you’ve been spending with them. I think they just wish it were under better circumstances. Rufus has taken to spending most of his time alone. We’ve tried to get him to open up and spend some time with us, but he doesn’t appear to have any interest in life. I sit with him plenty, but he’s not in a place to accept comfort right now. I’m keeping an eye on him, though.”
“I don’t know what I can do for them. Syrus and Carson have seen enough loss in their lives that they can cope. I have no idea how to help Rufus. He always belonged to Kaleana. She understood him in a way I never will. You should have seen how they bonded right from the start.”
“There’s nothing you can do, Malcolm, unless you can speed up time. You need to stop worrying about all of us and take care of yourself. You need to be with Will.”
“No, he’s busy working, and I’m useless right now. We talk at night. If I don’t leave him to his work, this place will fall apart. I don’t know how he manages it all.”
“You ran Panacea when you were his age.”
“Yes, but I hadn’t spent the rest of my life being treated like I was subhuman. Besides, I had Kaleana’s help and it was much smaller then.”
“Will’s made of tougher stuff than I think you realize.”
Tony was right. Will continually amazed Malcolm. The way he handled everything in the wake of Kaleana’s death only added to the amazement.
“He is, but he’s also singlehandedly trying to take down the system.”
“Let him.” Steel entered Tony’s voice that Malcolm hadn’t ever heard before. “Isn’t that what we all want?”
“Yeah.” Logically, he remembered he had thought that way, but he couldn’t remember how it had felt. Only hollow weariness remained where that feeling had once been. If he had learned anything from this entire ordeal, it was that there was no use fighting the system. That battle had already been lost. Who was he kidding? It hadn’t been a battle any more than a kitten trying to fight a lion was.
He couldn’t tell Will, though. Will’s whole life was wrapped up in the movement. One of them had to believe. Malcolm couldn’t take that from him.
“You don’t sound so sure.” Tony tilted his head as if examining Malcolm more closely.
“Of course that’s what I want. I’m just not sure it’s feasible. I want to believe in Will. If anything, he needs this right now. But I also don’t want him wasting his life engaged in a futile battle.”
“Leave him to it. Especially now. Your doubts will pass too. You’ve worked too long for the movement.”
Malcolm wasn’t so sure. He couldn’t imagine ever believing that he could affect any real change, but he couldn’t stand idly by either. In truth, he was as angry as Will, only his anger was split between the Geneticists and himself for his impotency
“I’m liable to burn if I stay out here any longer. You want to go inside?” Malcolm’s skin had started to take on a pink shade.
“Sure. I’ll go find Rufus and peek in on Nick and Stu. They’ve been spending most of their time together, but I think they feel like we older ones betrayed them somehow, like we let them believe that their happiness was forever.”
“I did betray them. I promised that I’d keep them safe. How are they supposed to feel protected if I let Kaleana die?”
“I hope Will isn’t putting up with that kind of talk from you. I’m not putting up with it from Nick and Stu, and I won’t tolerate it from you.”
“So they do blame me.”
“No, they’re so full of anger and sadness that it’s pouring out in every direction. They’d blame Marcy if they spent enough time around her right now. They probably do and that�
��s why they’re avoiding her.” Tony reached out and grabbed Malcolm’s shoulder with his good hand. “They’re not just mourning Kaleana, they’re working through how to come to peace with the fact that the ideal world they thought they had entered has disappeared. If you want to help us all through this, don’t set us back by buying into this myth that you had anything to do with her death.”
The words rested on Malcolm but didn’t penetrate. Logically, he saw the sense in them, but they didn’t convince his heart. While Malcolm wished Will’s dedication could inspire him to continue fighting the system, he simply didn’t believe it was possible anymore. Every hope he had of ever changing things died with Kaleana. Even so, he needed to get back to work, to focus on something. All he had was anger.
Anger at the Geneticist who killed Kaleana.
Anger at the Alphas who had hurt his Zeds.
Anger at his father.
The hatred for his father burned deep in his gut. In one instant he hated his father for bringing Kaleana into his life, introducing her to him when it was he who would eventually lead to her death. If she had belonged to someone else, she’d still be alive. Just like Billy.
But how could he hate his father for introducing him to one of the best people in his life? He would have never survived Billy’s death the way he did if it hadn’t been for Kaleana.
He may not be able to fight the system, but he could fight the people within it. He could make them pay for their wrongs. Instead of seeking reforms that would never come to pass, he would seek revenge.
Not revenge. Justice.
“It might help if you let me get us all on a schedule again,” Tony said as he walked back inside with Malcolm. “The consistency and work is good. Routines are good. We’ve all kind of fallen apart, and I don’t know that it’s a good thing letting everyone loaf around with their gloomy thoughts. Mealtimes are the only thing we’ve kept up with. Now, more than ever, we need to be working.”
“Yes, I think you’re right. It’s time to get back to work.”
Chapter Seventeen
Will logged in to his messenger. Because of the time difference, mornings were the most likely time for him to hear from Oculus. Across the room, Malcolm sat working, but Will didn’t know on what. It didn’t seem to be work for the movement or Panacea. When Will had asked him last night, Malcolm had told him it was a personal project. At least it was something.
Life took on a familiar form. Nick and Stu had told Will they would start monitoring the darknet and the news. It seemed everyone had resumed work except for Rufus, who still spent much of his time alone. They were all worried about him. It had been a well-known secret that he and Kaleana slept together, but Will didn’t think any of them knew precisely how deep their bond went. In a house full of men, casual sex between each other wasn’t uncommon. Kaleana got hers too, and that’s all they had really thought about it. After seeing Rufus’s reaction to her death and running through memories of them together, sly looks and touches, the close friendship they had all observed between them, Will became convinced that they had a more romantic relationship than everyone had suspected and had kept it private to keep anything from becoming awkward. Will could relate. He and Malcolm had tried secrecy in the beginning of their relationship as well.
Oculus: Did you have the regular serum injection after the new collar was attached?
Oculus’s message served as a purposeful distraction.
Ajax: Yes. Looked and felt the same as usual.
Will went back to going through some intelligence from a drop. More information on population numbers and the classification of Zeds. He looked up an old report they had and pulled it up. There on the side was a notation to ask Kaleana about her memory of her time at the EZD before she was placed with her first family. He’d asked her and forgotten to delete the reminder. Any time his ache at her death dulled, some lapse would pick off any beginnings of a scab until the wound bled. Will thought he had known loss when the use of his leg was taken from him, but this was entirely different. A Zed spent his life never expecting to have anything of value, so there was no way to prepare for the moment when something precious was taken.
Oculus: I’ve found something. I’ve been working on figuring out the serum from the data we received from your collar. I accessed the small amount of data we have from the other collar for comparison. When I turned on the transmitter, it sent over all the data from the sensor. Whatever was injected into the other Zed, it wasn’t the regular serum.
Will’s heart rate increased as he read the last line again.
Ajax: What was it?
Oculus: I don’t know.
It didn’t matter what Oculus said. They both knew what it was. Poison. The Geneticist had poisoned Kaleana. It was the only logical explanation. It hadn’t been a bungled collar attachment procedure.
Ajax: Send me what you have on the serum and what you have on the other substance.
Oculus: What are you going to do?
Ajax: The serum takes priority. Knowing exactly what poison killed her isn’t going to help anyone.
Oculus sent the isolated data for each liquid. They had an operative by the codename of Lyceum in the nation-state Europania who’d hopefully be able to shed light on what the serum was.
Oculus: I’m more interested in why.
Will hadn’t even thought about that. In his mind, the fact that they were Geneticists and she a Zed was reason enough.
Oculus: It had to be a test of some kind, to see his reaction. They might be on to us.
Ajax: If they were, Lazarus reacted well. He didn’t show any emotion other than anger at the Geneticist for messing it up.
Oculus: Has anything suspicious happened?
Ajax: No, but Lazarus did ask for her body to be returned. The request was denied.
Oculus: Shit. What would an Alpha want with a dead Zed?
Ajax: Let me see if I can find the request he sent.
Will searched through Malcolm’s messages. The last thing he wanted was to bring the subject up with Malcolm, not when he finally seemed immersed in something other than grief sitting at his desk. When he found the message requesting Kaleana’s body, he wished he hadn’t.
Bile surged up his throat, and he violently swallowed it down. The acrid taste lingered on his tongue, but he barely noticed. Nothing but the words in front of him could hold his attention. There, in sterile language, was a request for Kaleana’s body to be returned to Panacea in order to be used for medical testing. Except Kaleana’s name didn’t appear anywhere, only her registration number.
Ajax: There’s no need to worry. Lazarus’s request makes him appear like the worst of the worst.
Oculus: Good. I trust your judgment. Just be careful. We’re getting so close. How is Lazarus?
Will glanced at Malcolm. He appeared engrossed in his work, but Will had no idea what it was. Malcolm had only told him that he had his own project he’d be working on if Will could still manage without him. With Carson helping with Panacea again, Will knew he could manage the movement on his own for a little longer.
Ajax: Better, I think. It’s hit him hard.
Oculus: When is he going to be back at work?
Ajax: I don’t know. He seems to be taking an interest in it again. Maybe this news about the poison can help ease his guilt a little.
Oculus: I hope so, for his sake. We need him, Ajax. We can’t advance without him. I’ve done everything I can to prepare for the pilot program; we just need space now. I don’t have access to the resources I’d need to sort it out myself. See if he can at least help us solve this problem.
Ajax: I will.
Oculus: I’ve got to go. Good luck. Stay strong.
Will forwarded the data on the serum to the appropriate operative and tried not to get his hopes up for a quick response.
With nothing urgent remaining, Will considered how to tell Malcolm the news. On one hand, he couldn’t wait to show his lover definitive proof that there was nothing he could h
ave done, that it was a deliberate act by the Geneticists. On the other hand, he didn’t want to bring it up, not when Malcolm finally appeared to be making some progress.
“You ready for a break?” Will didn’t want to disrupt anything.
“Huh?” Malcolm didn’t move his eyes from the Glass Screen in front of him.
“Nothing. It can wait.” Will started to compose a message to an agent in Europania who had been working on a possible way to get a sample of the serum their Geneticists used. Having a comparison would prove beneficial.
“No, I’m sorry. What did you want to say?”
When Will looked up from his screen, he had Malcolm’s undivided attention. “I just spoke with Oculus, and there’s news. I was wondering if you wanted to go up to the loft for a break and to talk.”
“Of course.” Malcolm locked his workstation and led the way.
“What did Oculus have to say?” Malcolm sat against the wall and Will joined him.
“He’s isolated the serum. Even though the transmitter wasn’t turned on until later, the chip had the data stored, and we downloaded everything.”
“That’s good.” Malcolm had been obsessed with finding out what comprised the serum. Will had expected a bit more excitement, even given Malcolm’s usual reserved nature.
“Yeah. I’ve already sent it to Lyceum to see if we can get a better grasp of it. The thing is, Oculus was also able to retrieve data from Kaleana’s collar. She wasn’t given the serum, Malcolm. We don’t know what they gave her, but whatever it was, it killed her.”
“What?” No surprise lit Malcolm’s eyes, just ice. Will suppressed a shudder.
“There’s no reason for you to feel guilty. They killed her, and there’s nothing you could have done. It wasn’t a mistake or an accident that could have been avoided.” Will reached out for Malcolm’s face, but he pulled away before the touch could land. The fierce mask he used with the outside world slid firmly in place.
[In Distress 02.0] In Pain Page 12