by Eric Wood
It was painted on a wall of brick.
"That is, ah...somewhat discouraging," Sam said.
"We're like rats trapped in a maze, Sam," Abigail said, stepping away from the painted-on window. "Whether it's this Madame Ki, or this Roosevelt, or even your damned Colony leaders, it just feels like we're always at the mercy of someone else. I'm sick of it."
Sam moved to stand beside her. He nudged her shoulder with his own. "It's not so bad," he said. "Sure, Ki isn't exactly the most cuddly crime boss I've ever met, but at least we have a way to get what we came here for. Once we do that —"
"Once we do that, I'm sure Elena or one of her henchmen has orders to put bullets in our skulls," Abigail said.
"What I was going to say, is once we have that drive, we can work out some way to turn this whole messed-up situation around so that things are in our favor for once."
“We don’t even know that the drive is here.”
“Roach had the drive, and now Roosevelt has her. That means he has the drive as well. And if Roosevelt has the drive, he’ll probably be keeping it in the exact same spot as the information Ki wants us to steal. So we grab the drive while we do Ki’s job, and then we just don’t tell Ki about it. We take our payment and be on our way, and then we go from there.”
Abigail shook her head, exasperated. “That’s a lot of if’s and probably’s, Sam. What if the drive isn’t there? What if Roosevelt is trying to crack it when we go in, and it’s off in one of his computer labs? What if the Ravager lost the damn thing? What if—”
“That’s why we’re grabbing Roach while we’re there. And if she doesn’t have the drive, and if we can’t find the thing, then we’ll…I guess we’ll just figure out something else.
She rubbed her brow. “My god, we’re both going to die.”
He took her hand. “This will work, Abigail.”
"I just don’t see how. How do we even get out of this, at this point? We’re stuck between bad and worse. These people are all but screaming that they’ll betray us. How are we supposed to ‘turn this to our advantage?’"
By her tone, Sam could tell she didn't really think he had an answer. She was, of course, correct, but he didn't have to admit that. He just had to think. There had to be a solution, there always was. They'd been in worse situations before.
"Well," Sam began, thinking out loud, "we start by assuming that we can trust Madame Ki."
Abigail let out a short bark of disbelieving laughter.
"We trust," he pressed on, "that the plan she laid out for us is, more or less, one that she wants to see succeed. Now, do I think she told us everything? No, of course not. But that doesn't matter"
"You can't possibly be that naive, Sam."
"It doesn't matter, because we can still trust that Madame Ki is in no way trustworthy."
Abigail didn't respond, and Sam wondered if that statement had sounded more profound in his head.
He pressed on. "We can trust that we can predict how she will act, because how she acts will be exactly in her best interests. If we trust that, we can predict what she will do, and we can stay one step ahead of her. We can get what we need, and then we can get the hell out of here."
Abigail said nothing. She stood there staring at him, her arms crossed over her chest, still quite obviously irritated.
Despite everything that seemed to be stacking up against them, seeing her standing there angry somehow gave him a fresh bloom of courage and he smiled. "We're going to be fine," he said. "We've got each other."
"I still don't trust her," Abigail said, rolling her eyes and turning back toward the painted window. Sam wasn't sure, but he thought he caught the slightest ghost of a smile on her face.
He stepped up beside her and stared at the painted landscape. "Of course you don't," he said, nudging her shoulder again. "You don't trust anyone."
"Maybe not anyone," Abigail said, just when the silence between them was starting to become more than a bit uncomfortable. "But I trust you. I suppose. Even though you are often a fool."
"And I trust you," Sam said. "As long as we trust each other, we'll be just fine." And then, because it seemed like the right thing to do, and because he had the overwhelming urge to, he put his arm around her shoulder and pulled her close.
She leaned into him for a few moments, causing Sam's heart to jump up a few dozen beats per minute. Then, before he could figure out what he should do next, she stiffened and stood up straight, pulling away from him.
"We have a lot to figure out, and only seven days to do it. We need to get some rest. I will...I'll talk to you in the morning."
Before Sam could figure out what was happening, she had turned and made her way into one of the bedrooms, closing the door behind her.
Sam watched all this in a sort of semi-frozen bewilderment. "Huh," he said, that single word seeming to sum up exactly how much he understood about Abigail in particular or girls in general. Despite everything that had happened today and since he had left the safety of the Black Hills Survivors Colony, nothing confused him quite as much as the strange girl with which he shared this fancy cage.
17
Seven Days Until Job — Rend
The man with the Scar watched, silent as always. Behind the glass. He would nod, and then the pain would come. Each day, it was the same.
Last night had been bad. They had dragged him out of his cell, where at least he had the extremely odd but not entirely unpleasant Roach for a companion, and they had brought him down into this bright white hell they called a lab. They had strapped him to a table, slapped a kind of muzzle over his mouth, and given him something that had made him sleepy and slow-witted. The pale bald man in the clean white coat had stuck him in the arm with needle after needle, sometimes injecting things into him, at other times pulling blood out of him. The short, younger one from the cells stood in the corner, bent over some sort of screen reading off data and trying to answer the questions that were barked over and over at him from the mustached man with the chest full of metal trophies.
After about the third injection he was certain he was on the edge of death. What had earlier been a dull pain in his bones and a weak case of nausea had become a sort of all-encompassing feeling of horror and sickness and wrongness that threatened at any moment to blot out his very being. He let out muffled scream after muffled scream, raging against his bonds, but whatever these people were looking for, they apparently weren't finding it. After the fourth injection, his memory mercifully failed him. He had no idea how long it went on like that, but they did eventually leave and let him sleep, alone and restrained in the dark.
This morning they had started — over the younger one's protests — trying a more direct route to accomplish their goals. This involved a lot of rough experimentation and a whole lot of pain. The time passed in a blur of agony and exhaustion, and it left Rend struggling to stay both conscious and sane.
A splash of water brought him back awake; he had apparently passed out. Rend strained against his restraints at first, then switched focus to calming himself and slowing his breath. At some point, the boy came over and began attaching small metal devices to Rend's shoulders, chest, and stomach.
As he reached across Rend's chest, he met his eyes and whispered quickly: "You have to give him what he wants. You have to do what you did before. Please, or this isn't going to stop."
Before Rend could think to respond — he wouldn't have been able to anyway, considering the heavy plastic muzzle strapped to his mouth — the young man was finished and returning to his screen and keyboard.
The scarred man, behind the glass, nodded. Then the shocks began.
Six Days Until Job — Sam
A thousand different smells, colors, and sounds enveloped Sam as he made his way through the central market. Voices in English, Spanish, and maybe half-a-dozen other languages argued over prices, shouted admonishment, and greeted old friends and new customers. Smells of sizzling meats and roasting spices came from all directions; sig
ns advertising smoked trout and dyed wool and countless other odd goods hung over stands and shops, hand painted in purple and red and blue, many of them misspelled in at least one place. It was the most amazing place Sam had ever experienced.
Just like yesterday, Elena had arrived first thing in the morning to lead him up to the surface and out into the city. Familiarizing him with the territory, as she had explained it. Not that it was her idea: Elena had made that quite clear on more than one occasion. Like everything else, this was on Ki's orders. Ki called the tune, and they danced to it.
"Which building?" Elena asked. It took a moment to realize it was Elena who had spoken, that the question was directed at him. Both of them were wearing head wraps and sunglasses, which wasn't an uncommon look out here in the market crowd. High winds would often kick up short but intense storms of gravel and sand, and the fumes of old refuse mingled with smoke from the coal plant to produce an ever-present, foul-smelling sooty fog over this part of town.
"It's...that one, right?" Sam said, pointing at what he was pretty sure was the tenement building they had entered yesterday.
She shook her head, scoffing, and shoved his pointing hand back to the side. "Don't point, idiot. You don't know who might be watching. And no, it's not that building. Are you even paying attention to me?"
He had been trying to listen, but it was hard to stay focused, considering all of the distractions surrounding them. And to be fair, Elena herself, with her insistence on walking directly ahead of him while wearing the same skintight pants as yesterday, wasn't exactly helping him concentrate. She might be terrifying and rude, but he couldn't deny that she was attractive, even if she was a few years older than him. Oh my god, Sam thought, do I have a type, is that what this is? He shook his head, trying to clear his thoughts. If either Elena or Abigail knew what he had been thinking just now...
He supposed he’d never had the most strongly developed sense of self-preservation.
"If you can't even remember where a simple safehouse is, Sam, then I don't know what to do with you. It's just going to be me and you walking into that place, don't forget. There is nothing I hate more than having to depend on someone else. But I guess we don't always get what we want, huh? I'm stuck with you, so I'm going to be damned sure you're ready for this. Because if you get me killed, I swear I will haunt your ass till the damned sun burns itself out."
"But wouldn't I also be dead, in that circumstance? I mean, I don't think ghosts can haunt other ghosts, can they?"
"Shut up, Sam," Elena said. "Now, let's go over the guard rotations in the northeast sector..."
Five Days Until Job — Abigail
It was her third day in a row down here in the tunnels. Today, however, things were different. Today, Madame Ki herself had accompanied them down into the depths.
Each day they had gone a bit further into the tunnels. Each day they had come through the hallway that connected her and Sam's hotel/safehouse/jail to what she had been told was known as the Shadow Market, and then down a vertical shaft to an older rock pathway with an inch of chilly water running along its floor. From there, they had entered the Old World Mines, a maze-like series of caverns and crawlspaces lit only by the flashlights and torches they had brought with them. Unlike the places closer to Madame Ki's base of operations and the Shadow Market, this place was perfectly dark and long abandoned by all but the most desperate.
And the Infected.
Abigail had been unsurprised to learn that Infected of any kind were utterly forbidden within the surface city. It wasn't exactly easy for a Howler or a Ravager to blend in, of course, but even clearly Uninfected people were often either quarantined or summarily executed for suspicion of being infected with the Horsemen Virus.
This was just another bit of news that had long since ceased to surprise her. No matter where you went, it was the most vulnerable portions of the population that tended to 'suspected' of infection at higher rates.
The Shadow Market apparently held small pockets of Infected — Ravagers, mostly, as Howlers and definitely Plague-Heads didn't mingle well with larger groups of people. The Ravagers down here were pitiful specimens compared to the ones Abigail was used to, scraping by either as injured beggars or cut-rate enforcers for the smaller undercity gangs.
The mines held a different variety of Infected: one with which Abigail had far more experience. There were countless unmapped tunnels down here, and a good deal of them led to the surface both inside and outside of the walls. Plague-Heads, Howlers, and the occasional Ravager found their way down here to lurk in the dark and survive on those foolish enough to stumble into their path.
Highmane led the way, raking the darkness ahead with a lamp mounted to the underside of his heavy machine gun. Hydra brought up the rear, walking backward and mirroring what his mute counterpart was doing. Between these two giants walked Abigail, and next to her, Madame Ki.
"Amazing," Ki said. "Darkness, like nothing I've ever seen. It's beautiful, in a frightening sort of way, don't you think?"
"I think it looks like a lot of black," Abigail said. "I have to say, I'm surprised you would come down here yourself, given how dangerous it's been made out to be."
Ki's face came in and out of the residual light from the giants' twin lamps. Even to Abigail's excellent night vision, it seemed as though Ki was only half there. Insubstantial, like a ghost.
"I've been down here before," Ki said. "More than once. Of course, never by myself. As you say, this is a dangerous place. Hydra and Highmane are very dangerous as well, though. But you, dear, are likely the most dangerous thing down here."
Abigail didn't respond, instead continuing to scan the edges of the dark, looking for signs of movement.
"I'm taking quite a chance on you, Abigail. You realize this, do you not?"
"You need someone who can get through to the other side of these tunnels without causing a fuss and alerting Roosevelt. You don't have anyone else who can do it."
"True," Ki replied. "But it's more than that. Even coming down here with you is taking a risk. Frankly, even being in the same room with you is taking a risk. Highmane and Hydra are two of the most capable and deadly warriors I have ever met, but I believe if you wanted to, you could kill both of them — and me as well — with relatively little effort."
"Especially down here in the dark," Abigail said. She wasn't interested in setting anyone's mind at ease.
"There are other plans I could have pursued," Ki continued, "plans not involving you. Plans at least as likely as this one to succeed. Do you know why I chose to involve you, Abigail?"
"I'm sure you're going to tell me."
"Because, dear. I believe you are exactly what I have been waiting for. The answer to my...well, for lack of a better word, my prayers."
Four Days Until Job — Marcus
Lawbringer Roosevelt stood at the far edge of the roof, leaning on the railing, looking out over the city and the setting sun beyond. Marcus took a deep breath, gathered his courage, and walked over to him.
"General Lawbringer," Marcus said, trying and failing to keep his voice from cracking. "You called for me?"
"Yes, Marcus. Please, join me."
Marcus stepped up to the railing and looked over the darkening silhouettes of the Old World buildings that carved upward into the blood-red horizon. He watched as the lights of the city, the new lights, powered by Roosevelt's coal-fired generators — generators Marcus's father helped bring back online, and that Marcus now helped to maintain — blinked to life, one after another.
"It's beautiful, Marcus, isn't it?" Roosevelt said. The Lawbringer held a tumbler of golden liquid in his hands. Scotch whiskey, dug out of his Old World supply, Marcus guessed. Roosevelt never drank the stuff that came from Madame Ki's stills. "This city. Soon we will control it all, my boy. And then the real work will begin. We'll be able to truly make this country great again." He took a long, slow swallow of his drink, savoring it. "In a way, Marcus, I envy you. You're still young; perhaps y
ou will live long enough to enjoy the fruits of our hard labor in earnest. I, myself, am growing old. I may not see this project to its ultimate completion. But we all do what we can, don't we? We do our duty."
"Of course, sir," Marcus answered. It seemed like the right thing to say. Roosevelt had obviously been up here for a while and had drunk a good bit of his whiskey. He spent many of his evenings up here these days.
"We all do our duty, yes. Any progress to report on the subject?" Roosevelt said.
"Still nothing, sir. Doctor Allen seems to be at an impasse. For my part, I have all the readings I need for my analysis. Along with the blood we've taken, I think we will be able to unlock the, um...condition of the subject without any need for further tests."
Marcus wasn't lying, exactly. More testing was unlikely to tell them anything they didn't already know. The odd Howler — if that's even what he was — seemed unable to repeat the transformation they had witnessed in his cell. More than that, though, he didn't want to be a part of hurting the poor boy any further.
"Sir, it's the Company man, Cutter. Since he arrived..."
Marcus trailed off, unsure of what to say, of what he even could say. The Lawbringer's government had always been firm when it came to keeping order, but they had also kept toward a code. Now, he didn't know what to think. They’d never resorted to that sort of...well, torture was what it was called before, even with the worst of Ki's agents. Since they had hired the Company, he wasn't sure if the code meant anything anymore. The Company were supposed to work for them, weren't they? 'Independent Contractors,' as they were so fond of saying. Famous all over the Wilds as problem solvers. What problem were they solving here? Marcus didn't know. He didn't want to risk Roosevelt's fury by questioning him, but he needed to say something.
It was the nightmares. Marcus hadn't slept well since that first day, and he didn't look forward to what awaited him when he closed his eyes tonight.
If Roosevelt was angry, he didn't show it. Didn't acknowledge him at all, even, beyond a dismissive wave of a hand. "That's fine, do what you need to do. You are very smart, my boy, despite your tender age. I'm sure you'll solve this mystery. Just be certain you have everything you need from those two Infected soon. I'm not sure they'll be around for much longer."