“Where are we?” he asked.
“Quint Services Headquarters,” Kit said. “I guess you were unconscious for arrival and departure last time.”
“You didn’t have to bring me here,” Emil said, dazed. He didn’t want to take on Kristian Auer—or Quint himself—while still dealing with nausea from the Nowhere. Not to mention that given his preferences, he would have shaved, showered, and worn a suit. The winter coat he was wearing wasn’t suited for a professional meeting or Tennessee’s weather, and there was still otherworldly mud caked on his boots. “And you don’t have to stay for whatever’s next.”
“My bike is here,” Kit said, as if that justified everything.
“You could probably buy another bike for less trouble,” Emil said. “I hear smuggling is pretty lucrative, I bet you’re good for it.”
“Shut up,” Kit said, but there was no rancor in it.
“Being stupid and brave?” Emil asked. He’d wanted to protect Kit from the consequences of this, but now that Kit was here, gratitude overtook anger and concern. It was nice not to be alone.
“I’m here to make sure you’re not being too much of either,” Kit said. “You need a selfish person around to keep you reasonable.”
“You being here isn’t selfish.”
“Sure it is. I want you alive for my own purposes.”
That sounded suspiciously like a flirtation. “Oh?”
“Yeah. Don’t get too stupid in this meeting,” Kit said. “Let me negotiate.”
“Oh, you’re in charge now, is that it?”
“Yeah,” Kit said decisively. “I’ve been working for evil pieces of shit for years. I know how to fend for myself. You’re always thinking about other people. When we find that guy with his creep face and his helmet hair, he’s going to sell you some bullshit about how you should do what he wants for the good of your team and you’re gonna fall for it.”
“You have a pretty low opinion of my negotiating skills,” Emil observed.
Kit leveled a look at him, and Emil conceded the point from the force of his expression alone. Thinking back on it, Emil had never seen Kit back down from an argument. He’d done what Emil asked once, in the desert, but those had been unusual circumstances.
“Alright,” Emil said, although it was clear by then that his agreement wasn’t required, since Kit was already walking down the hall ahead of him. If Emil wasn’t dressed for this meeting, Kit looked especially outlandish. He was wearing the teal pants he’d left on Emil’s floor and a black winter coat, and the tail of his oversized red sweater was visible beneath it. His violet hair stuck out in all directions, stiff and dirty, serving to prove that Kit’s hair did indeed look bad sometimes, but Emil was attracted to him anyway. Kit marched down the hall, not caring about any of this, his boots leaving wet prints.
“Think about what you want,” Kit said over his shoulder.
“I don’t really know,” Emil said, which was true of so many things. “I want Heath and Winslow removed from any position of power, of course, but… I’d hate to lose the opportunity to go on missions.” I want you to come with me, he couldn’t open his mouth and say. Kit wouldn’t want that. Kit didn’t like joining things and working with people. He didn’t like going outside, either. If Emil had been looking at Kit’s resume when he’d been choosing his team, he would have tossed it aside.
And yet Kit’s abilities made him invaluable. And he was courageous and shrewd. He’d be an asset to the team.
And then there was the fact that Emil didn’t want to go anywhere without him. That wasn’t professional reasoning, though.
“Fine,” Kit said. “I can work with that.”
“Is there something you want from this?” Emil asked.
Kit kept his expression neutral. “I already told you. I’m here to make sure you don’t do anything too stupid. But I want to make sure those assholes get punished, too.”
That was a sensible, honest answer, and Emil had no right to feel disappointed in it. Kit had never indicated any desire to join his team. He’d been very careful not to suggest any sort of future for the two of them. It was best to change the subject. “Do you… know your way around?” Emil asked. As they’d walked down the hallway, they’d passed a few locked metal doors. Kit stopped in front of one marked “restricted.”
Kit pulled on its handle and set an alarm blaring. Then he waved at a corner of the ceiling where there was a camera that Emil hadn’t noticed. “They’re gonna come to us.”
“Do you really think this is a good—”
The alarm cut off. When Emil turned around to see what Kit was looking at, Kristian Auer was behind him in an identical black suit, his lips pursed. “Mr. Singh,” he said. “Mr. Jackson. Follow me.”
The conference room was indistinguishable from the one where Emil had first seen Oswin Lewis Quint’s face on the wall display. Emil couldn’t tell if it was the same one. How many rooms were in this building? What did Quint Services do with all this space?
Auer didn’t turn the display on. He sat down on the other side of the table and gestured for them to take their seats. At least no one had handcuffed them yet.
“I assume there’s something you want to tell me,” Auer said.
It was better than Emil had expected to be treated.
“Dr. Heath and Dr. Winslow were conducting an illegal and unethical experiment in a secret room in Facility 17,” Kit said. “We discovered the experiment and stopped its progress.”
“I’m aware,” Auer said, and it wasn’t clear if he meant he was aware that they’d taken control of Facility 17 or if he was admitting knowledge of the experiment. “The kidnapping of Dr. Heath and Dr. Winslow will result in the termination of Mr. Singh’s entire team. Criminal charges will be brought against both of you.”
Emil had expected as much, but his stomach still dropped. “Don’t charge Kit—” he started, but Kit held a hand out under the table where it was only visible to Emil.
“Bullshit,” Kit said. “That’s not what you want.”
“Mr. Singh’s team is replaceable.”
“Not if you want to keep that facility and all the research in it a secret,” Kit said, “which I know you do. In fact, because you want Quint Services to continue to exist, you will remove Heath and Winslow from their positions, you will see them prosecuted by the justice system, and you will not punish anyone involved in uncovering their crimes. You will restore Mr. Singh to his position, you will grant him and his team a say in the hiring of all future personnel, and you will give them all a five-percent raise. You will offer both victims compensation for physical and psychological damage incurred. And you will pay me triple my fee for last week’s delivery.”
Emil tried to keep his expression from showing his thoughts, or rather, thought, singular: holy fuck, the balls on this kid. It was a gamble. How did Kit know someone higher up at Quint Services—maybe even Auer himself—hadn’t authorized Heath and Winslow’s experiment? Someone had built that secret room.
“And why would I do that?”
“We have proof,” Kit said. “Victims, witnesses, documents, physical evidence. If you don’t want it all over the media, you’ll do what I said.”
“Your demands conflict with your threat. If Heath and Winslow are prosecuted, this will all be out in the open,” Auer said.
“We both know Quint Services has ways around that,” Kit said. “You get them convicted of something else if you have to. Fraud. Plagiarism. Something that stops them from working again.”
Auer smiled and it was a horrifying sight. “Yes,” he said. “So you see why I’m not troubled by this threat of exposure.”
“Well,” Kit said. “That was my best offer. The other option is I dump you in the Arctic Ocean and shake this place up until Oswin Lewis Quint falls out, and then I’ll take it up with him.”
Auer stopped smiling.
“You know you couldn’t stop me,” Kit continued, a new edge in his voice. “Quint is right to be afr
aid. Every fearful thing people say about runners is true about me. I exist outside the law. I’m a criminal. I’m from Nowhere. I am loyal only to myself. I’m sure you’ve seen those bumper stickers and ads—the only thing that stops a runner is a bullet. You don’t have a gun.”
Emil struggled to keep his mouth closed. When Kit had offered to negotiate, he hadn’t expected it to involve threatening the lives of executives at a multi-billion-dollar corporation.
“An interesting proposal,” Auer said. “But I do have a gun.”
Emil shot out of his seat and shoved his way in front of Kit.
“Unnecessary, Mr. Singh. I was speaking figuratively. Your infamous associates, Ms. Njeim and Mr. Blackwood, were given an experimental treatment that should soon render them unable to access the Nowhere. One dose would do the same to you, Mr. Jackson.”
Shit. Travis had told him as much, and Emil had forgotten to tell Kit. Auer had failed to mention the antidote, though.
There was a knock on the door, and when Emil turned, the door was already open and Quint himself was leaning against the doorframe. With his blond hair, salesman’s smile, and tailored grey suit, he looked far more approachable than Auer. “Kristian is being overzealous,” Quint said. He sauntered into the room—Emil’s mind shot back to the predatory beast in the cave—and sat down in the chair next to Auer. He leaned back, taking up as much space as possible. “There’s no need to resort to threats. I’m sure we can come to an arrangement that suits all of us. You’re an impressive young man, Kit. I’d like to have you on my team.”
Quint leaned forward, offering a hand to Kit.
Kit didn’t move. He locked eyes with Quint until he retracted his hand.
“Understandable,” Quint said, still unsettlingly affable. “We’ve gotten off to a bad start and I’ve done nothing to make it up to you. I’m sure you’ve heard about my former views of runners, which I now know were offensive and misguided. I assure you I’ve changed.”
“Uh huh,” Kit said. Those two syllables captured Emil’s feelings exactly.
“Let me try again,” Quint said. “You probably know, based on my reputation, that I am a driven and competitive man. I want Quint Services to be the first to explore other realities. That, above all else, is my priority. You’re the first runner we know of to cross through the Nowhere into other realities. That makes you valuable to me.”
“So you’re willing to put aside your bigotry for potential profit,” Kit said. “That’s more like it.”
“That’s not how I would put it,” Quint said. The best way Emil could think of to describe him was glossy. He was attractive and friendly, almost impossibly so. Nothing about him seemed real. “As I said before, my former views were reprehensible and I do apologize for them. But I understand if you find it hard to trust me. You’re not wrong—I stand to gain financially from the explorations at Facility 17. If you can’t trust me, trust the money. Having you on my side is worth a lot to me. I know you work well with Emil and his team and I think you could do more with them in the future.”
“It hasn’t even been 72 hours since we got Laila and Aidan out of that cell, so you can cut the shit about how you’ve changed,” Kit said. “Tell me what you’re prepared to do to prove it.”
“I did encourage Dr. Heath and Dr. Winslow to create a drug that could disable runners, but I swear to you I knew nothing of their methods,” Quint said. “I am appalled and will do everything in my power to prosecute them. I’m prepared to fulfill all your demands—justice for Laila and Aidan, more transparency here at Quint Services, more independence for Emil’s team, and of course compensation. Additionally, if you’ll work with us, I can offer you a salary that I’m sure you’ll find more than satisfactory.”
Emil expected Kit to spit on the table. Instead, he said, “I have more demands.”
“Yes?”
“You fix Laila and Aidan,” Kit said. “And you stop research and production on whatever it is you gave them.”
“And Travis,” Emil said. He saw Kit restrain his surprise. Emil wasn’t sure Travis deserved a cure the way that Laila and Aidan did, since he’d been the one to abduct them, but he’d been mistreated by Quint Services himself. And he’d helped Emil. “Travis Alvey requires a cure, too.”
“Quint Services will devote every possible resource to restoring your friends to their former state,” Quint said. “But you understand why I can’t possibly agree to your second demand. Runners exist outside our legal system. We need a way to curtail the abilities of those who would abuse them.”
Kit was silent. Emil didn’t trust Quint for an instant, but he could see the man’s point. There were a few infamous instances of runners committing violent crimes. The drug represented a non-violent solution for bringing such criminals to justice—provided it was used ethically. Its development in secret, on innocents who hadn’t consented to the experiment, didn’t inspire much confidence. Emil didn’t know what to say.
“Quint Services will redirect all funding from that project into repairing the breach in the Nowhere at Facility 17, rescuing Solomon Lange, and restoring Laila Njeim and Aidan Blackwood to their former state,” Kit said. He swallowed. “And Travis Alvey, if he can be found. Until those things are accomplished, all research and production of that drug will remain on hold.”
“An excellent compromise,” Quint said smoothly. “Those will absolutely be our priorities. Is there anything else?”
“There will be no further research on subjects who don’t consent,” Kit said.
“Of course,” Quint said. “We’ll review the ethics of all ongoing research projects. I’ll even send you a list that you can discuss with Emil and his team. Full transparency.”
Emil had hardly said a word, and neither had Auer. He glanced at the other man, who sat ramrod straight in the chair next to Quint, expressionless. It was an effective routine, he had to admit. But Quint and Auer doubtless had experience bullying and cajoling people into what they wanted. Emil couldn’t tell what he wanted. He didn’t trust them at all, and yet he found himself tempted. It was just like before. He’d always had his hesitations about Quint Services, but he’d told himself he could do good from the inside. That whole time, he’d been living with Heath and Winslow while they committed atrocities in secret.
But maybe it would be different. This time, he’d know not to trust them. This time, he’d have Kit.
“You know how to get in touch,” Kit said to Quint, standing and moving so close to Emil that when Emil stood, there was no space between them. “Send me a contract.” Then he wrapped his arm around Emil’s waist and they disappeared.
They were only briefly in the Nowhere, and when they reappeared in the loading dock next to Kit’s bike, Kit moved quickly to roll it toward the garage door. The door rose as they approached, a silent sign that Auer and Quint were still watching them. Kit mounted the bike and gestured for Emil to join him, and it wasn’t until they were miles away that he relaxed—sagged was the better word—against Emil. That last jump, an impractical and aggressive show of power, had cost him. On their long ride back to Zin’s, Emil tried to suss out whether any of that had been worth it.
23
Flaws
Kit and Emil pulled into the alley behind Zinnia’s an hour and a half later.
Zin cried, of course. She gave him an extravagantly long hug and a monologue about how worried she’d been. Louann said “Hey, Kit,” smiled, and gave him what constituted an extravagantly long hug for her, which had nothing on Zin’s version, but still made him tear up. They loved him and he’d been such an asshole.
The bar was supposed to open in an hour, but as soon as Zin had hustled Kit and Emil from the back alley through the kitchen, Louann walked to the front, put up the closed sign and locked the door. The eccentric clientele of Zinnia’s wouldn’t be surprised to find their favorite dive unexpectedly shut, but they’d be loudly disgruntled about it next time they came in. Zin would tell them she had to close the bar on a whi
m sometimes because she was still a spoiled pop princess at heart and she had to let the world know somehow. They’d grumble. Secretly charmed, they’d all come back.
Kit knew all that because he’d lived here for ten years. He’d washed thousands of dishes and poured even more beers. He’d rolled his eyes at everyone who’d asked him for a specialty cocktail or a photo with Zin. More importantly, for the past decade, he’d eaten breakfast, lunch and dinner—and most of the meals in addition to that—in Zin and Louann’s kitchen in their apartment upstairs or in the bar itself. Because it was home. They were his family.
Zin and Louann made them sit in a booth in the bar. Then, because they were both angels, Zin called for pizza and Louann went to pick it up. That made Kit smile. Louann had never paid for delivery once in her life and she wasn’t about to start now.
While they waited, Emil sent a message to his team to say they’d made it back alive and he’d be in touch soon. They didn’t talk about anything else until Louann came back.
Kit let Emil tell the story. He was happy to have someone else do the talking so he could eat. Zin asked a lot of questions, and eventually she moved away from questions about Quint Services, the Nowhere, and other realities, and started asking Emil where he grew up, what his family was like, and what else he loved in life other than her discography.
It dawned on Kit that Emil was meeting his… parents. At their home. Over dinner.
They were on a date.
While Zin was asking Emil about what kind of plants she should grow on the roof, Kit made panicked eye contact with Louann and she gave him a knowing smile. In the past day, he’d nearly been eaten by an alien predator and had threatened the life of a Quint Services executive, but somehow this—sitting in the booth next to Emil and watching him chat with Zin—was the interaction that made his heart rate spike.
Edge of Nowhere Page 24