Fury: Book One of the Cure (Omnibus Edition)

by Charlotte McConaghy

  There is a girl sitting on the gurney, facing us but unable to see us. Her skin is covered in streaks of dirt and blood. Her eyes are completely red. Something about her expression chills me to the core.

  I clear my throat. “Who is she?”

  “We don’t know her name. We don’t know anything about her. But she says she’s killed people. Lots of people.”

  My heartbeat quickens and I am unable to look away from her.

  “I want you to take her on,” the chief tells me.

  “I have a full case load already.”

  The chief turns to me for the first time. “You don’t want to know what’s inside that head?”

  I glance at him, then look back to the girl. I open my mouth to deny it, but find that I can’t. I’ve a red-hot curiosity threading through me. I want to know who she is.

  I nod once. “All right. I’ll fix her.”

  Because that’s what I do. I’ve not yet met a patient I can’t fix. This girl will be no different.

  In the corner of my eye there are birds, a flock of them, wings fluttering across my mind and brushing against my skin. They carry a name with them, a name I hear with every beat of my dull heart.

  September 16th, 2065

  Luke

  As Anthony bleeds to death on the cold floor, I’m too agitated to feel anything about the life slipping from the room. It is unforgivable. But this is what I’ve done to myself.

  Josephine won’t stop crying; it is odd because tears are so rare for her. I know this but I feel rabid. I want to hurt something, inflict pain or just scream scream scream. I stand up and pace. I recognize the adrenalin flooding my body but I can’t control it or focus it. I’m moving too fast, way too fast and I can’t do anything about it. I think I might scream scream scream—

  “Luke!” Ben says sharply, and I realize he’s been trying to get my attention. “You need to run, lad. Get your body moving really hard.”

  “There’s no space in here!” I snarl, furious with the stupidity of his suggestion. Does he think I haven’t imagined pressing my body into the fastest sprint of my life? All I want is to run and run but there’s no room and I can’t breathe, Jesus, I can’t breathe—

  “Luke?” Josephine’s voice slices into my head. She is looking at me from the ground where she’s been slumped over Anthony’s body. Her bloodied face is streaked through with tear tracks. “What’s wrong with you? What did you do?”

  I bare my teeth—I know it’s weird, but I can’t stop myself. It makes her flinch in alarm.

  “He took the Zemetaphine,” Ben says flatly.

  “What?” Josi stands up slowly, horror struck. “What’s he talking about, Luke? You didn’t, did you? Of course you didn’t.”

  I don’t have to say anything—she sees it.

  “Oh my god,” she whispers. “This is … How could you?” Suddenly she’s furious. “How could you?”

  I snarl. “I did it for you!”

  “I would rather you’d died than go through what I have,” she whispers, making me cold.

  It’s too awful for words. I can’t speak. My teeth are grinding together. There’s too much strength in my body—it feels wrong. I’m a frenetic mess of energy and power and Josephine has just said the worst thing she’s ever said to me.

  Before either one of us can say more, a screen flashes on. It’s on the far wall of the observation deck; I noticed it earlier but thought it must not be functioning.

  Jean’s face flashes onto the television. Her voice inhabits the room. “Agent Townsend. We have you surrounded. You have two options. You can send the girl out so that she can be erased. Collingsworth, Harwood and yourself will be dealt with leniently. Or you can all stay in there and die before morning.”

  I want to kill her. I want to tear her limb from limb and make her beg for mercy. I pick up a stool and smash it into the screen. Sparks shower down into the room and Ben ducks his head quickly.

  When I turn around Josephine has gone. In her place is the monster. She lunges for me, a shriek of fury leaving her mouth. I duck my head and let myself plow into her as hard as I possibly can. We crash together in a brutal clash of limbs and bones and muscles. I have to get her into the other room, away from Ben. I throw a punch into her side and another to her chest—she feels neither, but they force her back a few steps. We tangle. She is so strong, but I have become more than I was, more than just a man. I make myself faster and tougher than I have ever been; I force her into the other room using every trick I have learned over the years, every piece of brute force and pure stubbornness. I will not let her harm the old man—I will find a way to cure her of this. Even now, when it should be too late, I don’t care—I am determination.

  A roar leaves my mouth as she smashes my head into the ground, but I learned about pain a long time ago. It’s just a series of messages to the brain, easily shut off.

  “I’ve got it!” Ben shouts suddenly.

  Thank god, because I don’t think I can hold Josephine off for much longer. She has me down on the ground, twisting my arm the wrong way—it’s about to snap. I pull on it, jerking her forward. I manage to flip her over so that I’m on top, using all of my weight to hold her down. A shriek leaves her mouth, a ferocious animal sound.

  “Quick!” I scream at Ben. “Inject her!”

  Ben approaches but just as he’s bending forward, Josi gives a mighty scream and launches me off her. I feel myself moving through the air and I brace for the landing, twisting myself into a roll so that my back won’t take the force of the fall. I hit the side of the bed and feel my shoulder yank out of its socket. I send my mind away so I won’t feel the pain of it—a dislocated shoulder can be particularly painful. Still, even high as a kite and trained to deal with pain, I feel it. I feel the crunch of bone against bone as I push the joint back into its socket. I grunt, spots dancing in front of my eyes. I look for Josephine as I stumble to my feet.

  She approaches Ben, slowly like a predator. He is wielding the syringe like a weapon, but we all know she is too fast for him to have a chance at injecting it.

  “Josephine!” I shout, but she ignores me. I start running, hauling myself into a dive, hoping I’ll catch her before she lunges.

  I’m too slow. Her hands dart out, taking the old man by the neck and lifting him off the ground. There must be something primal in her that enjoys the play of it all, else she would have snapped his neck within a heartbeat. Instead she toys with him, letting him dangle.

  I plow into her, knocking her sideways, but as I do something sharp slices into my head, a blinding pain that brings me to the ground. I lie still, conscious only of the shallow air moving in and out of my lungs. My last thought before I slip away is, strangely, of Anthony’s birds. Ravens. An unkindness of ravens. They lift me up, up, until I can no longer see my Josephine, racked as she is by the virus. She has survived this virus for years and years, the same virus that has destroyed me in minutes.

  But then, I always knew she was stronger than me. I like that. Feathers are whispering against my skin, carrying me away.

  Josephine

  The first thing I’m aware of is a kind of heat unfurling from my elbow. It makes me think I must have it resting in a fire, so intense is the feeling. I look down, but there are no flames. Just floor. I must have cracked one of the bones in my elbow. Dazed, I look up to see that Luke is on the ground, having a seizure.

  His body is rigid and ghastly, jerking uncontrollably, and his eyes have rolled into the back of his head. A sound escapes me, a yelp of fear.

  “Don’t touch him,” Ben warns, and I whip my head around to see him slumped on the ground, holding his chest.

  “Ben, what happened? Are you all right? Is Luke …?”

  “He’s seizing. He’ll either come out of it or he’ll die.”

  A wave of dizziness nearly drops me to the ground.

  “I have the antidote,” Ben wheezes. His face is red.

  “Give it to Luke,” I order quickly, crawli
ng to his side to take the syringe.

  “If you don’t take it, Josephine, you’ll kill us all. Luke may yet survive without it.”

  “But he might not!” I exclaim hysterically. “I can’t take that chance!” I can’t and I won’t.

  “You’re not listening to me, dear. Take a deep breath and hear my words: you must take the antidote, or you will change and kill him. That’s all that matters right now. You must take it—quickly now, before you change again.”

  “Will you make more for him?”

  Ben nods faintly. “Of course, dear. Just take it.”

  I look at Luke, sick to my stomach at the sight of him jerking like that. He looks like he’s being electrocuted. The urge to give him the antidote is so strong that for a second I don’t think I’ll be able to fight it. I edge toward him.

  “Take it or Luke dies,” Ben says again, and it finally sinks in. He’s right. Of course he’s right. I can’t help Luke if I change again. I place the needle in my left arm, find the vein and push.

  It’s cold and painful, right away. I feel it move through my body, my whole body, creating a kind of deep freeze. When it reaches my head I black out.

  September 17th, 2065

  Josephine

  I can taste blood. My tongue dances over my cracked lips, finding traces of steel. I open my eyes and the light is so bright I have to close them again.

  “That’s it, dear,” Ben’s voice floats over to me. He sounds far away. “You’re all right now. You’ll be all right. It’s just taken your body some time to fight the Zemetaphine.”

  “Did it work?” I rasp, still unable to sit up. “Am I fixed?”

  “I don’t know, Josephine, but it definitely did something. You’ve been unconscious for a long time.”

  “How long?”

  “Hours. It’s around midnight, I think.”

  It takes me a moment for this to settle. Deepest joy takes root in my stomach, poking its head out and teasing me. “Wait,” I whisper, scarcely daring to believe. “I didn’t change again? When it got dark? I didn’t change?”

  “You didn’t.”

  I’m flooded with music. The Swan. It’s playing over and over in my head, so loudly that I start to laugh. Tears stream out of my eyes, because I know, I know, that I will never change again and there’s so much relief, so much joy that I am utterly weightless and floating through the sky.

  “Luke!” I call quickly, grinning like an idiot, wanting to share this with him. “Where’s Luke?”

  “He’s … I don’t think … I can’t hear him breathing anymore.”

  And just like that I’m a thousand miles under the ground, suffocated by the weight pressing down on my chest. I lurch up, ignoring the dizziness that this causes. Luke’s lying close by, very still. I remember now—he was having a seizure when I injected myself. I crawl over to him and listen for breathing. I can’t find a pulse either. “I should have given him the antidote!” I gasp in deepest horror. “I should have given him—”

  “Give him CPR,” Ben orders loudly.

  My head is a jumbled nightmare for ten long seconds. But then something happens. I close my eyes and I think a very simple thought.

  I am calm.

  I think it so loud and so bright and so strong that it comes true. I am calm. I will be calm until this is over, until Luke is awake again. No matter what happens until he wakes up, I am calm.

  I tilt his head back and blow a burst of air into his mouth, then I pump on his chest swiftly, firmly. I am weak now, weak and in a lot of pain, but I keep pumping, blowing, pumping, blowing.

  “Good girl,” Ben says faintly.

  I glance at him. “Why didn’t you do this? Why did you let him stop breathing?”

  “I’ve had a heart attack,” he says simply.

  “What?” I gasp, then remember that I am calm. “All right. It’s going to be fine. As soon as I’ve got Luke breathing again, I’ll come and help you. We can let the Bloods in and they’ll get you straight to hospital. You’ll be perfectly fine.”

  “If you let them in they’ll capture you and sentence you to death. Both of you.”

  I don’t say anything. I problem solve. While I pump and blow and pump and blow, I look around the room for another way out. There are no doors or windows, of course, but there is an air vent in the roof.

  Bingo. As soon as Luke wakes up he can help me get Ben out through that vent and find him some medical attention.

  “He’s been out for too long,” the old scientist tells me softly, but I don’t listen. “He’s gone, dear.”

  “No he’s not,” I say calmly. “He’s fine. He just needs a push. He needs to be reminded of why this world is so wonderful.”

  We forget, don’t we? We all forget. Amid Furies and Bloods and cures and drones, we all forget how beautiful life is, how hard we must fight to keep it. I need Luke to wake up so I can tell him this, so that I can tell him how we’ve been focused on all the wrong things, how we’ve thought only of the curse but not the blessings we have lived. I want to tell him that my life has been good because of him. That I have known wonder and bliss and excitement and joy because of him. That I have known grief and fury and loss and pain because of him. Who can say that they have given someone so many things? So much life?

  I start pumping even harder, climbing onto his body and putting every ounce of my strength behind my arms. Luke’s lips are tinged with blue as I duck my mouth to his, giving him all the air in my lungs. His skin is clammy, but I keep going. I keep going. I will never stop, not ever. Even if I have to keep pumping his chest for the rest of my life, I will do this gladly. I will never stop.

  “Stop, Josephine,” Ben says. “It’s over. It’s been too long.”

  “No.” He doesn’t understand Luke. Doesn’t understand what kind of man Luke is. I remember back to that night, a thousand years ago, when we were standing in an abandoned building, right before we were attacked by Furies, and I thought a very simple thought: Luke Townsend is going to change the world someday. I know this in my gut, in my skin, my bones, my blood. “He’s stronger than anybody I’ve ever met,” I utter as I pump. “He’s too strong to die like this.” He will not die like this. Not after injecting himself with a drug he hates to save my life. That kind of courage deserves recognition—it deserves life.

  “He’s just a man. Nobody can be more than a man,” Ben says sadly.

  “A woman can. I can. I can make him wake up.” I hit Luke’s chest as hard as I can, knowing, somehow, that it will be enough. It has to be enough.

  Luke gives a mighty gasp, sucking air into his lungs and convulsing on the ground. A ragged breath leaves me and I slide off him, laughing in delirious exhaustion.

  “God almighty,” Ben whispers.

  Luke doesn’t regain consciousness, but he is breathing on his own now, a steady, strong rhythm. I scramble over to Ben. “We’re going out through the vent, okay? Can you stand?”

  Ben looks at me. There’s something so weary in his expression. “No, dear. I can’t move.”

  “Then I’ll carry you.”

  He shakes his head. “You’ll have to carry Luke.”

  “Luke will wake up any moment now.”

  “My guess is that Luke’s in a coma. That much air loss would have resulted in brain damage. There’s no telling when he’ll wake up, if ever.”

  I swallow. I can carry them both. I can—

  “You can’t, dear,” Ben says softly, reading my expression. “You can’t carry both of us.”

  I can’t carry them both. I am weak and small—I have made myself weak and small because I thought it would hinder the monster inside me. Now I see how much of a fool I have been. I should have been making myself strong—strong enough to fight her, to carry these two men I cannot leave.

  “Take him. Get as far away as you can. They won’t come after you until morning.”

  “What about you?”

  “I’ll be fine. In the morning when they break in they’ll ta
ke me to hospital. Now go, Josephine.” He puts one hand on my cheek, smiling. “You’re a medical marvel, child. You should have died years ago, so live every minute of your life like the miracle that it is.”

  I open my mouth to speak, but find that I can’t. Instead I nod, unable to manage more. Climbing to my feet, I drag the remains of the bed to the wall beneath the vent. It’s still not high enough, so I have to place a metal drawer on top. I’ll be able to climb up, but getting Luke up there is another problem altogether. He’s huge and probably weighs twice as much as me.

  Grabbing the leather straps from the gurney, I use them to tie him to my back, a bit like I’m giving him a piggyback. I step forward, testing the weight, and stagger to my knees under his bulk. “Shit,” I gasp. “He’s a lot heavier than he looks.”

  “Use your thighs,” Ben suggests rather unhelpfully. I haul Luke up onto the bed and then onto the drawer, which wobbles precariously. I’m sweating a steady stream by the time I get him up into the vent, and my limbs all feel like jelly. It’s no less than a miracle that I have managed to haul him up, but there’s something made of granite inside me—something that will not give, not ever. I will lift him into this vent, and I will carry him out of this hospital, and I will keep going forever if I have to. I have a body that has known the furthest reaches of human capability. I don’t need a drug—a virus—to be strong. I can do that on my own.

  I can’t help but sob in relief as I pull him into the vent. The fit is tight and it takes even more effort to drag him through the small space. Before I disappear entirely, I pause.

  “Goodbye, Ben. Thanks for everything.”

  “Goodbye, Josephine. Sorry for everything.”

  And that’s all I have time for.

  I can barely breathe by the time I find another vent opening. I look down but it’s not an area I recognize, so I keep moving, searching for a safe place to emerge. After the fifth unsafe vent, I peer down and realize that I’ve found my way to Anthony’s office. Groaning in relief, I pry the metal screws out and let the vent fall into the office. The next bit is going to be even trickier. I consider untying Luke and dropping him in first, but I don’t want him to accidentally land on his head and break his neck or something. Which means leaving him where he is and hoping that I don’t snap my neck.