“Emil, wake up,” he said, working the zipper. “I hope you brought something useful in here.” He got the pack open and went through it like a raccoon through a garbage can, tipping its contents everywhere. There were clothes—Kit’s clothes—and bottles of water and all kinds of food and medicine and and a few unrecognizable objects, plus way more knives than Kit expected. Kit even found little hand warmer packets. “Oh my God, Emil, I’ve never been so happy to see anyone in my life.” Kit shook one until it heated up and then pressed it between his hands. He put on every piece of clothing he could find, which was difficult when his fingers were misbehaving, but worth every second spent on the effort.
Emil was still lying on the ground with his eyes closed. Kit shoved a protein bar into his own mouth then sat cross-legged next to Emil and pulled Emil into his lap so his head was pillowed on Kit’s thigh instead of lying on the cave floor. “You’re so heavy,” he complained, chewing. “And I can’t tell if I’m just really, really cold—well, I am, no doubt about that—but I think you might have a fever.”
Kit laid his hand against Emil’s forehead. Thank fuck, Emil’s eyes opened a moment later. They were glassy. “Kit.”
“Hi,” Kit said. “I have a lot of questions, like what the fuck did you do to yourself to get here and how did you even find me and why, but maybe we should leave this cave before that thing comes back to snack on us. Can you get up?”
Emil reached up and touched Kit’s face, his hand clumsy and imprecise, but warm.
It was sweet, and totally useless, and Kit rolled his eyes and huffed because he did not have time for whatever melty-gooey thing was happening near his heart. That beast could come back at any second. Death was still way, way too possible. “Emil,” he chastised. “You’ve totally misunderstood our dynamic. I’m the useless one. You take care of me, because I’m always in trouble, and you’re good at that kind of thing. You know, being authoritative and reassuring and unbearably gent—whatever, I mean, just—you know what the fuck you’re doing. I don’t. I have one skill in life and it’s not functioning right now.”
Emil didn’t seem to have heard any of that, but he did sit up in response to Kit pushing at his shoulders. He surveyed the cave, the explosion of his pack, and turned to Kit to ask, “Why are we on the ground?”
“Great question,” Kit said, maybe too brightly. It was a relief that Emil had said anything remotely coherent. “You fainted. After a pretty perfectly timed arrival-slash-rescue. Guess you were holding it together to save our lives and then once that thing was out of sight, you gave up the ghost.”
Now that Emil wasn’t leaning on him, Kit took this opportunity to repack everything. He managed to down a few more protein bars during the process.
“I went through the Nowhere,” Emil said. It was hard to tell if he was watching Kit. His gaze was unfocused. “I don’t feel good.”
“Believe it or not, I had guessed both of those things,” Kit said. He didn’t know how to be comforting, especially not when he was scared. What would it take for someone as tough as Emil to admit he didn’t feel good? What the hell had he done to himself to get here? Kit pushed the pack through the cave entrance, crawled out, then held his hand through the opening. Whatever was ailing Emil seemed to have broken his sarcasm detector, but he was able to take Kit’s hand and crawl through.
Kit stood up and shouldered the pack, which was heavy and almost as big as he was, and nearly dropped back to the ground on the spot. He still had all his complaints—cold, hunger, fatigue—but the prospect of survival had given him some energy. And Emil wasn’t in any shape to carry anything.
They set off in a random direction. The only thing that mattered was moving away from the monster. They’d find shelter somewhere else. Kit needed a few more hours of food and rest before he could contemplate making a run. And if Lange came after him again, he didn’t know what he’d do.
He and Emil weren’t setting any records, as slow as they were. But it was a lot more pleasant to walk through the snow in boots and warm clothes. If he weren’t half-dead and afraid of being full dead, Kit could almost imagine how a person could do this for fun. Almost.
Emil had unzipped his jacket and wasn’t even keeping his hands in his pockets. What did you even do with a person who had a fever? Kit stopped and rummaged through the pack. Water was probably a safe bet. And who knew if over-the-counter fever reducers would work on someone who’d just passed through the Nowhere, but they probably wouldn’t hurt. Kit put a couple pills in Emil’s palm. He accepted them, along with the water bottle.
Kit tugged on Emil’s hand to get him walking again.
“I guess being delirious with a fever is as close as someone like you ever gets to getting high,” Kit joked as they took off. He’d put on gloves that he’d found in the pack, but he could still feel how hot Emil’s hand was.
Emil laughed, and the sound lightened the weight hanging over Kit.
“Guess this isn’t a very good high, though. Not as much fun as those berries.” That made Emil laugh harder. Suspicion took hold of Kit.
“I was saving them for science,” Emil said, which Kit supposed was an explanation and an admission all at once.
“Somehow you coming here involved you eating those berries,” Kit surmised. Which one of his team members had Emil made out with? Kit didn’t want to care, but he couldn’t shut off his thoughts. What did Emil like, exactly? Other than Kit in convenient circumstances, that is. Was he only into guys? That would narrow the field. Dax didn’t seem like they were into anyone, anyway, and Chávez was probably a lesbian. If Emil was gay, he couldn’t possibly be into that woman who’d pushed Kit against a wall, which was comforting. Lenny seemed straight, as did Jake. How high had Emil been? He’d been competent enough to come through the Nowhere and save Kit’s life. Maybe he hadn’t made out with anyone. Trying to keep his voice neutral, Kit asked, “How was it?”
“Chávez hugged me and it was nice,” Emil said. Kit’s relief lasted a nanosecond, because then Emil said, “It’s not as much of a high as real.”
Now it was Kit’s turn to laugh. Carl Akins dealt real—also called “virt,” both short for virtual reality enhancement—and Kit preferred not to know if it was in the packages he delivered for Carl. It was wildly dangerous and addictive. Junkies ended up totally severed from reality. Seeing a few of them had been enough to scare Kit off trying the stuff. “Right, because you’ve done enough real to know.”
“Just two times,” Emil said agreeably.
“What the fuck,” Kit said. That didn’t fit with his idea of Emil at all. He pulled Emil’s hand up and rounded on him. “When? Do you know how dangerous that stuff is?”
“Not as dangerous as walking into the breach in Lange’s lab,” Emil said.
“Holy shit,” Kit said. That was how Emil had crossed into the Nowhere? “Stupid and brave, but mostly stupid.”
“But you’re not dead,” Emil pointed out, and for someone with a high-grade fever, he was making some pretty unassailable arguments.
“Right,” Kit said. He dropped Emil’s hand, which he’d been squeezing without intending to. The light had changed around them. It would be dark soon. “You must be feeling a little better. So now I need you to, you know, be Emil and look around here and tell me where we can find shelter.”
“There’s a tent,” Emil said.
“Is this some kind of fever delusion?” Kit said, scanning the forest for any sign of habitation.
“In the pack.”
“Oh.” Kit wasn’t at his sharpest, either. He thought back through everything he’d seen in the pack and realized that some of the unrecognizable items must be pieces of a tent. “Can you put it together?”
Emil nodded. Kit set the pack down. Emil searched through it and pulled out the tent. He didn’t seem to need or want help, so Kit took the opportunity to plop down beside the pack, not caring about the snow. He ate as much as he could and watched as Emil constructed a tent from almost nothing. Once
or twice, Emil had to pause to catch his breath or steady himself, but he seemed much better overall. And the tent impressed Kit a lot. There was even a sleeping bag. “I have never been excited about camping ever until right now,” Kit said.
Emil laughed. “Do you ever think about what it would be like if we’d met in different circumstances?”
“We wouldn’t have met,” Kit said with certainty. He didn’t talk to people he didn’t know, not unless they were offering him a lot of money.
“Even by chance? You wouldn’t have looked twice at me if we’d passed on the street?”
“Oh, I would have looked,” Kit said. But if he’d met Emil in other circumstances, he wouldn’t ever have had the courage to kiss him. “I would have enjoyed looking. But that’s it. I keep moving. I don’t introduce myself, especially not when someone is intimidatingly perfect.”
For some reason, that made Emil frown. Kit had meant it as a compliment. But the frown passed as Emil examined his handiwork with the tent. He’d chosen a small, flat space among the trees. He unzipped the tent flap and crawled in. Kit handed him the pack and then made as if to follow.
“Kit,” Emil said. “We haven’t really… talked.”
“I almost died and you’re delirious. It’s not a great time.”
“I was out of it after crossing through the Nowhere, but I’m okay now,” Emil said. “Still feverish and tired, but compos mentis, I promise. I just wanted to make sure you knew that before I said this.” He took a breath. “I’m really sorry, Kit. I knew it was wrong to work for Quint and I did it anyway, because he offered me something I wanted. And you and your friends and who knows how many others got hurt in the process. I’m sorry. I’ll keep trying to make it right.”
“I know,” Kit said.
Emil’s eyes widened.
“I mean, apology accepted, or whatever I’m supposed to say,” Kit said, putting a hand on Emil’s before he got upset. He was still kneeling in the snow outside the tent, but saying this was more important than anything else, including moving inside where it might be warmer. “I figured you were sorry after you showed up here, having done whatever you did to yourself to survive jumping into that fucking skin-crawling breach. And…”
Emil said nothing into Kit’s silence. Fuck, this part of apologies was hard.
“It occurred to me that I maybe shouldn’t have been so pissed at you for working for someone evil,” Kit said. “Since, uh, I do it all the time.”
“Oh,” Emil said. Kit could tell he wanted to ask questions and was trying hard not to. Good. Kit’s career was a topic for another time.
“It’s sort of my whole reputation. I make deliveries and I take no interest in what or who they’re for. The money’s all I care about. Or it was. But when I learned about what Quint thinks about runners, it felt personal,” Kit explained.
“I get that. I really should have gotten it a lot sooner than I did,” Emil said, tripping over himself to get the words out.
“Shh,” Kit interrupted. “I’m trying to reveal some important shit about my life to you, like you wanted, and it’s not just to trick you into having sex with me. Although come to think of it, if that’s not the reason, I don’t really know why I want to tell you any of this awful stuff.”
“Do you want to come inside?” Emil asked, obviously biting back a smile. Kit crawled into the tent. “And for the record, I wouldn’t need to be tricked. But anyway. I’ll be quiet. Say what you want to say.”
Kit took his boots off and stuck his legs into the sleeping bag, which spread out over a pad that Emil must have inflated while Kit wasn’t paying attention. Kit took his time, and Emil watched him without saying anything. The sleeping bag was clearly meant for more than one person. Had Emil considered that when he’d packed? Kit didn’t care either way. He patted the space next to him.
“I’m guessing I can’t catch whatever it is you have.”
“I don’t think you can,” Emil agreed. “You sure you’re okay with this?”
“It’ll be warmer with you in here,” Kit said, which was pretty far off I have a lot of feelings about you and not all of them are sexual and I don’t know what to do about it, but it had only just then occurred to him that he and Emil might live through this. What would he say to Emil when he dropped him back at Facility 17—if that’s where he wanted to go? “Bye, thanks for repeatedly saving my life and also sucking my dick that one time”? Kit didn’t want to say that. Emil would be unhappy if Kit said, “Would you mind if I showed up in your bedroom sometimes?” Emil especially wouldn’t like it if Kit specified that he wanted to show up in Emil’s bed but never have any contact outside of that, so Kit wouldn’t be in too deep in case Emil changed his mind. But that was all Kit knew how to do. How did other people—normal people—have relationships? Did you just… make yourself vulnerable and hope the other person wouldn’t abandon you some day? Kit had spent his whole life armoring himself against that.
Emil slid in next to him, calming the torrent of thoughts in his brain. It felt so nice to settle his head on Emil’s chest that Kit almost forgot he’d promised to tell Emil something important.
Well, that ruined the mood. Might as well get on with it.
“I never knew my biological family. I spent my childhood in a place called The Nashville Home for Wayward Youth,” Kit said, his voice flat. “They kicked me out when I was eleven after I came back from my third run through the Nowhere. You know the first couple of times, I didn’t even go anywhere? I just wanted so badly not to be where I was, lying in bed in the minutes before one of the caretakers would come in and make us get up for school—and suddenly I wasn’t there. When I wanted it, I could disappear into the darkness and come back a second later. Reality had an escape hatch. They didn’t catch me those first two times, slipping in and out of bed, but the third time, I vanished while I was getting scolded—for stealing from the kitchen, of course. For just a second, I showed up someone else’s kitchen. I have no idea where in the world it was or why I ended up there, but I remember the smell of chicken roasting in the oven. I thought I was dead or dreaming, and probably the woman in that kitchen thought the same. I panicked and went right back to where I had been, and they kicked me out three days later.”
“That’s terrible. I’m so sorry.”
“You know why they kicked me out?” Kit asked. He didn’t wait for an answer. “They said a few things about inappropriate behavior, but I overheard them whisper-arguing in the hall outside the kitchen, so I know the real reason.”
“Adults don’t like the idea of a kid with powers they can’t control,” Emil said.
“Yeah,” Kit said. “There’s that. But you know what I heard them saying? Runners are too expensive. We eat too much.”
“They didn’t want to feed you? That was it?”
“They talked about how they could take in three more kids—normal children, I remember that phrase clearly—for the same cost as keeping me,” Kit said. He was glad he didn’t have to look at Emil for this conversation. “I guess from a certain point of view, they were doing the right thing.”
“They shouldn’t have kicked you out! Is that even legal?”
“Laws don’t have much to do with my life,” Kit said, shrugging the shoulder that wasn’t pressed against Emil. “And they didn’t put me on the street. They found me an unofficial foster family, one that had contacted the Home looking to take in runners. Those were rare, like you pointed out—most people didn’t want kid runners. Most people thought I’d go wild and they’d have no way to punish me. It was always in the news back then, you know, runners being unstoppable super criminals. Laila hadn’t even robbed Franklin Station Bank at that point. They were worried all the same.”
“I gather the foster family wasn’t Zin.”
Ha. “No, the Shaws weren’t Zin. I don’t know how they’d convinced anyone that they wanted a foster child. I guess maybe the Home didn’t hold them to high standards. What they actually wanted was a free ticket to tr
avel anywhere in the world. They didn’t count on me, you know, being a person.”
“A child.”
Kit didn’t want to talk about this anymore, but he was in it now. After a moment of silence, he forged ahead. “I wanted them to like me. To love me, I guess. I thought maybe they could be my family.”
Emil squeezed him.
“At first, I did whatever they asked,” Kit said. “The Grand Canyon, Inland New York. But there were three of them—Bob, Becky, and their son Nick. Taking all of them somewhere in one day was impossible. I had to spread it out over two or three days, and they hated that. But I was sure they would love me if I did better, so I never said no. I pushed myself. They never fed me enough, so I learned how to steal. I never had the energy to jump myself out of sight in those days, so I had to get good at it. At some point, over the course of months, I started to understand that they weren’t ever going to love me or be my family. They just wanted to use me. I got scared then. What would happen if I said no? What would happen if my power failed me? I overheard them chatting about longer and longer jumps—Beijing, Johannesburg, the Amazon, Everest, the ruined coastal cities of the world—and I ran right then.”
“Good,” Emil said.
“I fantasized about dumping them somewhere far away—or maybe three separate destinations—and not going back for them,” Kit admitted. “But in the end, I just left. I wasn’t even twelve then. It had only been seven months.”
“I’m so sorry, Kit,” Emil said. “You must have met Zin soon after that.”
“You went to see her,” Kit said. He knew his wardrobe well enough to have figured that out.
“Yeah,” Emil said. “Sorry about that, too. Feels like an intrusion.”
Kit shrugged. “If it helped you save my life, I don’t mind. And I found Zin and Louann because I was hiding in the alley behind the bar one day—I’d just stolen a bunch of candy bars—when I saw Louann’s bike. I stopped to admire it, and Zin saw me and thought I looked hungry—she was right—and things just, you know, developed from there.”
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