Deception

by Teri Terry

“It’s not a trick. It’s part of being a survivor.”

  Her aura shifts; she’s pleased. She’s pleased I confirmed this?

  “All right, then,” she says, “let’s say you are a survivor. Now let’s get back to this boy you shot—”

  “I didn’t shoot anybody! A soldier from SAR shot at me, and Duncan pushed me out of the way and saved my life. The soldier shot Duncan.”

  “Really?” She doesn’t believe me. If she doesn’t believe that, how will she believe anything else?

  After everything I’ve been through, after having to leave Kai—I push that pain away too, to save it for later—could it come down to this? That they won’t believe me? I focus on Dr. Morgan; disbelief shimmers through her aura.

  And on top of everything else, I’m tired, hungry, and getting more and more angry with these word games. “Now you three are going to sit there and listen. Not another word, all right?” Tendrils of my anger whip out and find the part of their auras that allows their free will to speak, to form words, to stand up—to do anything, really—and I hold it fast. All they can do is listen.

  And I tell them everything. About SAR kidnapping Kai to try to trap me; about how I rescued him; about how we got away. That I came to Shetland to trace the cause of the epidemic. About the boat trip across to the island and the plague ship. About Dr. 1 and the research institute underground and what he was doing there with a particle accelerator: making and extracting quantum particles of some kind and using them as a biological weapon. He tested whatever he created on subjects and killed people. That it got out, and this is how the epidemic started. And then I tell them everywhere I’ve been and when, as the epidemic followed me across the country about a day behind. I leave out that Callie and Kai came here with me, but I tell them everything else.

  When I finally stop talking, I’m exhausted—both from reliving the tale and from the effort of influencing all three of them at once. I release them.

  “What did you do to us?” Dr. Morgan asks, her eyes round.

  “You wouldn’t listen. I made you listen.”

  There is fear on their faces, clear enough without even looking at their auras. They get up and almost run out a door on their side of the glass.

  At least they listened.

  Uneasy, I wrap my arms around myself. Maybe that display wasn’t such a good idea. Maybe I’d have been better off keeping the things I can do to myself. But I didn’t plan to do that. I was angry, and it just sort of happened.

  Too late to second-guess it now.

  Someone comes to the door just as I’m falling asleep in the chair. He’s in a full biohazard suit and goes through the double airlock into my small room.

  “Hi, Shay. I’m here to help you put on your suit.”

  “And then what?”

  “We’re flying you to England, to talk to some experts there about the Aberdeen flu.”

  The knots inside me loosen. Did they believe at least part of what I said?

  I get up, and he holds out the suit; I step into it. Again I have to fight the automatic urge to push it away, to stop his hands doing up the seals.

  “I’ll just adjust the ventilation,” he says, and does something to the top of the suit before snapping it closed over my head. I’m so distracted by not wanting to be closed up inside of this thing that by the time I notice the deception in his aura, it’s too late.

  There’s a funny taste and smell inside my suit. My head spins.

  “What…what have you…done?” I manage to whisper the words, but the world is lurching—I’m falling. Like he was expecting this, he’s there, ready, and I feel his hands through the suit catching me.

  Everything goes black.

  CHAPTER 3

  CALLIE

  THE NEXT MORNING Kai has Shay’s letter out again, but this time he uses it to copy the username and password to log on to a website. It’s JIT, the one set up by Shay’s best friend, Iona, who blogs about all kinds of weird stuff that she thinks may be news. Shay said that Iona wants to be a journalist and that JIT stands for journalist-in-training.

  At the top of the blog list is a draft post, the sort you can only see by logging in; it won’t be public on the internet. Its title is “Shay??”

  He clicks on it.

  Iona: Shay, answer me! Don’t do this—it’s too dangerous. And how can you be sure you’re a carrier? Shay?

  Jealousy surges through me. Shay said she was my friend, but she left without me; she left without even saying goodbye. But she told Iona everything, didn’t she?

  Kai sighs and clicks “edit.”

  Kai: Iona—this is Kai. It’s too late. She’s gone.

  He saves it. Waits a moment. Is Iona online? He hits “refresh,” and a new edit appears.

  Iona: No no no. Is she all right? How could you let her go?

  Kai: I didn’t let her do anything. She left when I was asleep. Left me a letter with the login for JIT. Told me not to follow her, to go back to mainland Scotland and spread the word about the cause of the epidemic.

  He hits “refresh” again. And again. Finally, a response.

  Iona: She makes sense. But…

  Kai: Maybe. I don’t care if it makes sense. It’s wrong.

  Iona: What are you going to do?

  Kai: I’m going to go to the air force base. I’ve thought all night, and I have to find out if she’s all right or I’ll go insane. I wanted to tell you so somebody knew, in case…well. You know.

  Iona: Okay, I understand. Get in touch when you can. Be careful.

  Kai washes quickly, dresses. Eats some crackers and canned fruit out of the cupboards. There’s not much left here; he’ll have to leave soon no matter what, as there will be nothing to eat.

  Yesterday’s sunshine is gone. Dark clouds scuttle across the sky, and it’s drizzling. As he walks across this untouched part of the island, then over the sand to the burned wasteland that is most of the rest of it, the rain comes down harder. He keeps walking.

  I’m scared. What will they do to him when he gets there?

  What did they do to Shay?

  Maybe when I was searching the island for her, I couldn’t sense her because…because…I was too late. Maybe they shot her like that SAR lieutenant tried to do before.

  The air force base is miles away. By the time we get there, Kai is soaked. The base is quiet; there aren’t any people moving around like there were when I came here the day before to look for Shay.

  Kai walks up to the gate. That’s odd: there isn’t anyone on guard duty like there was yesterday either. Kai peers through, looks around, then opens the gate.

  He walks across the road to the first temporary building.

  He knocks, opens the door. “Hello?” he calls out. There’s no answer.

  It’s as if they’ve all left, or—

  I stop when it hits me.

  Yesterday I searched the whole base for Shay, didn’t I? There were people everywhere then, people I went up close to. I was so focused on trying to find Shay that I didn’t even think about what I was doing or what might happen to them.

  Kai continues on to another, larger building. When I follow, that is when I start to hear it: the pain.

  It is here.

  He hesitates, like he can hear it too. Then he goes in.

  This is where everyone is. There are the cries and the silences—the dying and the dead, and I’m full of horror. I did this. I’ve done it before, many times, many places, but that was before I had worked it out—before I knew that I was the carrier. That I was the one who made people suffer and die.

  Kai, horror in the set of his face, hesitates by the door. Some of the ill are with it enough to notice he is there, to turn and stare.

  “Leave,” one says in a weak voice. “Before you catch it.”

  Kai walks over to the man’s camp bed and kneels down.
<
br />   “I’m immune. I can’t catch it.”

  “Lucky you.”

  “Maybe you can help me, though. Someone I know—a girl, Shay McAllister—came here, and—”

  “That bitch,” the man says, and Kai recoils. “She did this to us. All of us. They put her in a suit, but it mustn’t have been soon enough to stop it spreading.” His face screws up with pain, then clears. He stares at me. “Who are you?”

  I’m Callie. Tell Kai I’m here!

  His eyes move from me to Kai and back again. “Callie says she’s here.”

  Kai is shocked. “You can see her?”

  It’s because you’re dying.

  “Yes. Callie says it’s because I’m dying. What a surprise.”

  “Where is Shay?” Kai says. “What have you done to her?”

  “Nothing. But if I’d only known, I would have shot her myself. They flew her off Shetland before this hit.”

  “Where did they take her?”

  “I don’t know—I heard it was to some secret air force base out of the quarantine zone. Wherever it is, they’re in trouble.”

  The whole time that he talks to Kai, he stares at me. “What are you?” he finally says, still staring.

  I stare back at him and move closer. He’s on the very edge of death now.

  Don’t talk about Shay like that. I’m your worst nightmare, not her. I spread the disease that is killing you.

  I see the understanding register in his eyes just as the blood starts to come out of them. And then he’s still. Dead. After what he said about Shay, I don’t even care.

  Kai looks around the room, shakes his head. Walks for the door, fast, as if he wants to run away from what he has seen and heard.

  “Come on, Callie,” he says. “There’s nothing we can do to help them now. At least we know Shay isn’t here anymore and we can leave Shetland.”

  Anywhere is good, so long as it is off this island. I hate being here. But if we leave, will what happened to me here always stick to me like filth, inside, wherever I go? Filth that spreads out and causes suffering all around me?

  “So, we have to go back over the sea,” Kai says. “Just like Shay told us to do.” He swears under his breath and starts striding out, putting distance between us and the dead and the dying.

  Kai pauses on the top of the hill, turns, and looks back. “Did they really catch that from her?” His face is pale.

  “Oh, Shay,” he murmurs under his breath. “What now?”

  CHAPTER 4

  SHAY

  THERE IS SOMETHING MORE than the nothing that came before it. Some awareness, some sense of my body, that I’m breathing deep and even, and I’m completely, deliciously relaxed. I push these sensations away; I don’t want them. I want to go back to floating in nothingness. In nothing, there is no pain, no loss, no decisions to make or actions to carry out. I want to stay there.

  There is a dim sound: a click.

  I swallow. My mouth is dry, tastes funny, and—

  Awareness floods back. Was I drugged? Where am I? I struggle to move, to open my eyes, but even my eyelids are heavy.

  Instead, I reach out to what is around me without using my ordinary senses.

  Nothing.

  Nothing? How can there be no life of any sort around me?

  Panic gives me the energy to open my eyes, to stir. I swallow again and cough.

  I’m in a small room on a narrow bed. There’s a toilet in the corner, a sink, a blanket over me. And that is it.

  There is nothing I can reach: no humans or animals or insects, not even a solitary spider.

  I struggle to sit up. My head is pounding, and I’m thirsty. There’s a plastic cup on the side of the sink. I reach out, turn on the tap, and fill it. My hands are a little shaky and water slops as I drink, leaving a cold trail down my front.

  I reach down to brush at the water I spilled on myself, and there is a further shock: I’m wearing some sort of shapeless gown, like from a hospital, and nothing else. Someone took off my clothes and put me in this while I was unconscious?

  My skin is crawling. I feel sick. I wrap my arms around myself, but that isn’t enough. I grab the blanket and wrap that around me too.

  I have this creepy-crawly sensation like there is someone watching me, even though I can’t sense anyone there. My eyes hunt around, and every wall looks even, solid—the ceiling and floor too.

  That’s when I realize there are no windows or doors; at least, none that I can see. There must be: how else did I get in here?

  That weird feeling of being watched is still on my skin, as if eyes leave fingerprints I can feel. Could there be a hidden watcher?

  I swallow again.

  “Hello?” I say tentatively. My voice feels rusty, like I haven’t used it for a while.

  I try again, and this time it is stronger: “Hello? Is there anybody there?”

  My voice seems to echo off the bare walls, ceiling, and floor before bouncing back to my ears.

  No one answers. Can’t anyone hear me?

  Panic is rising up inside, waves that build and build, and I’m shaking. Where am I? I don’t want to be here.

  “Let me out of here! Let me out!”

  I say it loud, and louder again, until I’m screaming.

  CHAPTER 5

  CALLIE

  KAI’S HANDS ARE SHAKING as he types a message on JIT for Iona.

  Kai: Everyone I saw at the air force base had the flu or was already dead. They think they caught it from Shay. One of them told me she was flown off Shetland last night before they started getting sick.

  He hits “save” and has a long drink from a bottle of red wine that he found in the back of a cupboard.

  Iona: So…she was right? She’s definitely a carrier?

  Kai: It looks that way. Her reasoning before was sound too. I just didn’t want to believe it.

  Iona: Me neither. Any idea where they may have taken her?

  Kai: The one I spoke to said it was to a secret air force base outside the quarantine zone, but he didn’t know where it was. It could be anywhere.

  Iona: Okay. I’ll do some research, see if I can narrow that down a little. What are you going to do now?

  Kai has another drink from the bottle.

  Kai: Leave Shetland, like Shay said. I have to try to find her. And the doctor who is responsible for all of this.

  Iona: How will you get back here?

  Kai: The people on the boat that brought us said to return to the cave they hide in during the day and wait for a ride back. But that boat didn’t make it: they all died of the flu.

  Iona: I know. Shay told me.

  Kai: But I’m sure they said there’s more than one boat that goes there, so I’ll go and wait, see if one shows up. I don’t know what else to try.

  Iona: Okay. If that doesn’t work, let me know; I’ll see if I can find out anything about other ways off Shetland. But there’s just one problem.

  Kai: Only one?

  Iona: I was going to suggest destroying the laptop you are using, or throwing it in the sea—to make sure that if the owner returns, they can’t trace what you’ve done on it and track us down. But you can’t do that if you might need to use it again.

  Iona starts giving Kai detailed instructions for erasing history off the computer once they’re finished, and I drift away.

  My original excitement that Kai knew for sure I’m with him has faded. He still can’t hear me, and he seems to have forgotten to talk to me since we left the air force base, even though that guy told him I was there.

  I go outside. The sun is low in the sky, though it isn’t dark, not really. Shay said this far north in the summer, it doesn’t get dark—just dim. The summer dim, she called it.

  The rain has stopped—not that I care—and I stand on the cliff where I found Kai yesterday. I can’t feel
the wind, but I can see it is there in the fierce shaking of the long grass, the white froth of the angry sea below.

  On impulse I dive off the cliff, down, down, down…

  Then I stop and hang in midair, just where the waves break on the rocks. Spray flies all around me.

  In the thin light, I can see my hands if I hold them up: an outline of darkness. Water splashes through them as if they’re not there, and I can’t even feel it.

  I’m weighed down with not being able to touch, to feel. I drop lower and slide into the water. Rocks under the waves stretch out from the cliff, and they stop me from going down farther; the water doesn’t. It should be cold, but there is no feeling of that either.

  If I could dive off a cliff like Kai could and have everything just stop—would I?

  Darkness. Death. That’s all I am. I could stay here alone forever and who would care? Kai only knew I was here because Shay told him; if I left now, he wouldn’t even know the difference.

  Without Shay there to tell her, my mum didn’t know I was there either. I had to leave her to go with Kai. The loss is an ache that stretches on and on.

  And my father? I can’t even remember him. I know his name, from things Shay and Kai said—Dr. Alex Cross. He was Kai’s stepfather, and Kai hates him. Kai thinks he had something to do with what happened to me, though Shay and my mum didn’t seem to agree. But what does that matter if I don’t even remember anything about him?

  I have nothing.

  But there is one thing more that I am; something that I know will pull me away from this place and off the island. It still feels hot inside me even though the cold of this water and the warmth of the sun are things I can’t feel anymore.

  Hot, red, and strong:

  Anger.

  There is a distant crash up above.

  Kai?

  Panic has me blur back up to the top of the cliff and into the house. He stands there in the front room, red spreading on the light carpet, splashed across the wall, but he’s all right—it isn’t blood. It’s wine. Broken glass is scattered from one side of the room to the other. He must have thrown what was left of that bottle of wine against the wall with a lot of force to make as much mess as this.