So she relaxed and drifted. Everything was going to be all right.
But there was one thought that kept resurging, spiraling insistently round and round her head like a bug that wouldn't flush down the drain.
What discoloration?
What discoloration had this man found, when she'd found none? Who was he, and why was he so familiar with her lab, and what had he found?
"Amo," she mumbled.
"I love you too, honey," Ravi whispered. "I'm not going anywhere."
She tried to give him a disapproving look. He just smiled more convincingly.
* * *
A time later she roused.
Ravi was sitting nearby, slumped and dozing in a chair. The ward's white lights had been dimmed and she could hear the generator chugging away, but the man was there still, strapped to the workbench with what looked like airplane seatbelts. There was a small airplane cushion under his head and a red blanket over his legs. The glass tube was gone from his throat, replaced by a large bandage, though she could still see the dark bruise spreading up his jawline and down his chest.
This was the cost. Everybody paid the cost in blood and pain and loss, and ultimately they paid with their lives, because that was the way of the world now. There was no use crying over it, any more than there was any use crying over three thousand dead. They were dead and more would follow.
Ravi shifted in his sleep. Ravi and the others, none of them knew what she and Amo had done. Perhaps they were weak. They still believed it was Salle Coram's doing, because what person could be so barbaric as to kill thousands of unarmed people?
The intruder's head turned.
Anna blinked and focused in. Was he awake?
His eyes opened. He looked right at her. He was.
A long moment passed. He opened his mouth but winced. He wouldn't be speaking any time soon, that was clear, so instead they stared at each other. There was so much to say, but Anna didn't know what ought to come first. Who he was, what he wanted, what he'd found, why he hadn't just asked to use her lab? None of them seemed to strike the right tone, so they just stared, and perhaps some kind of meaning transferred in that long gaze.
Anna carefully eased her hand out of Ravi's grip. She was still sore and headachy, but the strength was there. Now was the time to project it.
"What do you want?" she asked.
He just looked back at her. That was fine, he couldn't answer by speaking anyway. She eased her feet around, bundled now like Christmas presents in white gauze and surgical tape, until she was sitting upright and steady on the bench. The wheelchair wasn't nearby, but that was all right.
"Ravi," she said sharply. "Wake up."
Ravi jerked, his eyes opened, then he saw Anna sitting up. Worry darkened his handsome, tanned features, and possibly something else. Fear.
"Anna, you're not supposed to be up. Macy said. Lie down."
His worry she could handle. He loved her, he was concerned about her, that was fine. But his fear? That stung, and she stopped looking at him. These were two different modes, loving Anna or Anna the fighter, and she couldn't do them both at once.
"He's awake, Ravi," she said flatly, choosing the latter. "I need you to do something for me."
"Of course, what is it?" he asked. He was confused, that much was obvious. He hadn't expected this. He'd been sitting there all day probably, waiting for her to wake up so he could help her through this, but she didn't need that kind of help. What she needed was a soldier to do her bidding.
"Get a piece of paper and a pen."
She spoke without breaking eye contact with the man on the bench. It seemed that he read meaning in that. He saw Ravi move and he saw her give the order and he understood. He made his judgments. She wasn't going to show any weakness at all. She'd won here. She'd saved his life. She would end it in a second if he gave any sign of trouble, and in his eyes she saw that he knew that. But there was something else there too, something deeper, like the fear Ravi felt but stronger, perhaps even hate.
"Here," said Ravi, holding out a piece of bloodstained paper.
"Give it to him," she said, keeping the cold edge in her voice, as if she was talking to the man directly. It would hurt Ravi to use him this way, she knew that, but this was the way it had to be done. This was her squad and she was the leader. For too long they'd been complacent. They'd gotten soft waiting for the massacre to begin; three months of preparation and now this was real. "Put the pen in his hand, where he can use it."
Ravi did it. The man didn't break eye contact. Yes, she thought. Give it to me. You hate me? You fear me? You should.
"Now tell me," she said. "What do you want?"
The pen moved. His hand shifted at the wrist, too drained to do more than that. Air whistled in and out of his bandaged throat. He wrote something, with Ravi's help. Ravi was a nurse, that was true. He was a nurturer.
"He's finished," Ravi said, lifting the paper to the light.
"What does it say?" Anna asked, still not breaking eye contact with the man.
"I can't," Ravi began, then paused and rotated the paper sideways. "I can't make it out. A lot of loops?"
"Here." She held out her hand. He dutifully put the paper in it, and she broke her gaze with the man to study it. It was all loops and squiggles, hard to make out, but the shape of it was there.
ONLY TO AMO
4. QUESTIONS
Anna stared. He stared back defiantly.
She'd broken his throat then saved him, and that was the mistake. Mercy was always the mistake, but it was done now, and he'd stuck a wedge into the crack that he would only pry further open.
He knew something. He wanted something. The ground had been well laid, and asking him questions would be weakness now, she knew that. To rage and flail would be just more displays of his power. She could threaten to kill him, but if she killed him she'd never find out what he really wanted.
What did he want?
It didn't make sense. She tracked the night backwards, trying to grasp her arms around it. She'd picked him up outside the hangar near the RVs, but why would he ever go there if what he wanted was here? They didn't keep cell samples out by the Cessna. He'd climbed the ladder up to peer into the cockpit, for what? There was certainly nothing for him in there.
A hollow feeling opened up beneath her. He'd played her for some agenda she didn't know, and that made her angry.
"Ravi, can you fetch my wheelchair?"
Ravi was watching her with wide eyes. He didn't get it, but that was fine.
"The wheelchair," she repeated.
He nodded and started moving. Anna waited for his back to be turned, and made her next move. Sliding off the edge of the bench, she let her feet take her weight.
Oh dear God, that hurt. It felt like icicles pushing deep into her heels and forcing the skin apart. She almost buckled and collapsed, but held on to the edge of the bench to support herself. How many stitches had they used to sew her up, and how many now would need to be replaced?
It was worth it for the look on the man's face. She released the workbench edge, as a hot rush of blood started to stain right through her puffy white sock bandages. Sweat broke out on her forehead, but still she advanced on the intruder.
He watched her come.
"You'll tell it to me," she said, low enough for only him to hear. She leaned in and rested her fingers on his cheek. "What you're doing here, what you want, and do you know why?"
He stared at her, while Ravi was off somewhere struggling with the chair's parking brake.
"Because you're nothing. You're a comma in history, a footnote. Nobody would have cared if you'd died here. You're living on my mercy now, and if you want that mercy to go on, you'll tell me everything you know."
His lip lifted in a faint snarl. Anna wanted to laugh. How things changed.
Then her legs buckled and she barely caught herself on the edge of the desk.
"Anna, what are you doing?" Ravi called.
He rushed ove
r with the wheelchair, took her arm and tried to guide her in, but she resisted. Just for another second, just a few more seconds of eye contact to fully sign, seal and deliver her message. Pain didn't matter. Loss and damage wouldn't stop her. At last the man on the bench looked away.
Anna wilted. She let Ravi fuss and guide her into the chair, then rush her out. They banged through the airlock door and out into the corridor with Ravi talking rapidly into his walkie.
She managed to hold it in until they were out of the quarantine zone and out onto the concourse. Then she leaned to the side and puked all over the marble-effect floor.
* * *
Macy sewed her up by Gate 17 while Peters, Jake, Feargal and Ravi gathered in. Apparently they'd been discussing the situation for hours on and off amongst themselves, looking in on both Anna and the man, but they'd come up with nothing. They'd contacted New LA but gotten nothing solid, as Amo was off on one of his walks.
"What did Lara say?" Anna asked, through the pain of Macy prodding and inspecting her feet.
"Lara said listen to you," Feargal said. "She's sent people out looking for Amo; they'll find him soon."
Amo. Why ask for Amo, if not to foster division in their ranks? He wasn't here. If he over-ruled Anna, it was already a victory. After Witzgenstein Anna had had enough of division.
"Do you think he's from another bunker?" Jake asked abruptly. "Perhaps they heard about our plan. Maybe he was trying to sabotage us?"
She turned to him. Ah, Jake. He was handsome and floppy-haired as ever, though the scar on the side of his head still peeked through. He had a tic in his right eye and sometimes he didn't finish sentences, but otherwise he was the same Jake he'd always been before the plane crash; thoughtful, smart and compassionate.
"He's not from a bunker," she said. "They're in the bunkers because they have to be, because they're not immune. No, this man's like us, a survivor."
"Hold still," Macy said sternly, and Anna winced as the needle went deeper into her foot than the local anesthetic covered. She held still. Probably Macy was stabbing a little harder than necessary, but then she was angry at having to redo all her work, for what she took only to be Anna's stubbornness. Whatever.
"I'm not certain of anything," Jake said. "If he was a survivor why would he act like this? Why wouldn't he just come up to us like everyone else does?"
"Some kind of con," Feargal suggested. "He has his own agenda."
"What kind of con? What's he trying to get?"
Feargal shrugged, then Anna gasped as Macy dug deeply again. Was she smirking? What a bitch.
"I don't know. We'll find out. Can you put me onto Lara?"
Jake nodded and knelt to rustle in a rucksack, producing the hefty satellite videophone he'd put together out of tech salvaged from the bunker. It looked like an old-style boom box, with a long aerial that stretched almost two yards in length. Jake angled it straight up, switched it on, played with some dials, then handed a slim tablet computer to Anna.
"Bluetooth," he said, "better than cables."
She took the tablet and swiped to on. This was just another way they relied upon the old world, piggybacking on infrastructure and programming from the past, but it worked, and that in itself was a kind of miracle. Unearthing the bunker had lit a fire underneath them all, and Jake had been at his most productive ever since. Bluetooth connectivity was something new in just the last few days.
"It's the VOIP button," Jake said awkwardly, trying to point at the icons on the screen even as she was swiping over to it.
"I know, I've used it before," she said. Macy stabbed her foot again and Anna cursed, then tapped the icon Jake had designed, a weird purple squid-like design that was supposed to be the T4, and a new screen opened up.
"No, not that one, Amo didn't like the logo."
"I'm not surprised," Feargal said.
Anna backed out and hunted for the new app. "Here," said Jake. "It's the white star, yes, on blue."
Anna sighed and pushed it. Amo was a stickler for branding. You'd think with the duties of mayorhood he'd stop micromanaging, but it seemed the brand image of the post-apocalypse was just too important for him to let go. He was an artist, after all.
The app opened up, a black field spread to fill the screen, and the phone rang.
They sat awkwardly while it rang. Macy hummed to herself happily and applied fresh bandages to Anna's feet. "I should padlock these together," she muttered quietly.
The screen came to life with Lara's face.
She looked worried, and her usually pretty, vital face had a gray tinge to it. Behind her was the back wall of the comms room, along with a glimpse of a rumpled single bed.
"Anna, thank heaven, it's wonderful to see you up," Lara said.
The signal was strong, better than Anna had seen it before. There was no fuzzing or jumped frames, and the audio was clear and crisp. It was a kind of miracle.
"I figured out some more satellite handshakes," Jake said softly. "We've got much better coverage these days."
"Lara," Anna said. "Tell me you've had some success finding Amo."
The pleasure in Lara's eyes faded a little, back toward the low level of dullness that had haunted them all since the bunker blew. "No. I thought he was off in the hills, we checked the Hollywood sign and the wisdom tree, some of his favorite haunts, but he wasn't there. It looks like a long one."
Anna gritted her teeth. This was Amo, now. He performed his duties as mayor admirably, with a steady influx of people coming in from Asia, but at times he'd started taking long, isolating walks through the city and hills, often leaving his walkie behind. Anna knew why, but she couldn't ever say.
"It weighs heavily on him," Lara said. That was close, but not even Lara knew the full truth. In history the winners branded the losers the villains, every time, and it was the same here. Amo had yet to immortalize the death of the Maine bunker in his comic book, and she had a feeling he wouldn't ever get round to it.
"Have they tried his office?"
Lara frowned. The satellite phone captured the expression perfectly, the squashing of her fine caffe latte features. She'd barely aged either; so few wrinkles. "I'd know if he was there, Anna."
"I mean the files. He's working his way through them, right? He'll have gone to the next in line."
Lara sighed. She didn't like the files, or that Amo spent so much time in there. "You're right. Crow goes in there sometimes. I'll ask him to take a look. In the meantime, the Council's prepared a list of questions we want you to ask him. There's a strategy here."
Anna nodded. She had her own strategy, but everything was in the interpretation. It wasn't so much the questions as the way they were asked.
"Send the file."
"Done. You should have it now."
Anna looked to Jake, who gave a thumbs up.
"Then we're all set here," Anna said. "I've got Ollie and Wanda trying to backtrack where he came from. We're on high alert. I'll go in and question him soon."
"Good. Godspeed, Anna."
"And to you."
She tapped the connection closed, then looked round at the others.
"I'm not asking those questions," she said.
For a moment Jake looked like he was going to comment, but instead held his tongue. Feargal nodded his approval. Peters barely seemed to be listening. Macy looked away, as if it was none of her business. Did they know what this meant, and what she intended?
Mercy was a mistake. She'd fallen foul of it earlier, when he'd been choking and so weak, but not now. Mercy was a liability, just like Maine, just like Witzgenstein, just like Julio.
But Ravi was looking at her with a soft pleading in his eyes. Ah, Ravi. Ravi who liked to plait her hair and kiss her neck and who sometimes mumbled the strangest things in his sleep. If he knew what she and Amo had done, if he really knew what she was planning to do now, would he look at her the same way?
She managed a smile.
"All right. Macy, can you check on him? Check he
's comfortable."
"I can," she replied sharply. She was different too, after Dr. Ozark died. She used to be such a nurturing type, always cooking and seeking to make other people happy, but so much loss had beaten that out of her.
"Then you go first. Feargal and Peters, you'll flank her. I'll be out here. Check him, feed him something if you can, and I'll follow afterward. Don't talk at all."
"Good cop, bad cop," said Feargal. "Done."
They left. Anna lay back and took a moment to breathe.
Outside the tall airport window, there was a jumbo jet; marked with the Virgin Atlantic insignia. That was just another bit of branding from the past. It leaned slightly to the side now, with one of its wheels more deflated than the other. The top slopes of the fuselage were scaled with gray dust, baked dry in the sun, while the underbelly dripped with green moss and lichen. At the tips the wings were starting to bow under their own weight, and all the windows had perished, fogged on the inside with condensation.
She took her breath, trying to find her calm center, but the jet didn't help. It was ten years since anyone had opened the hatch and depressurized the hull. Ten years of sitting there while the innards broiled in the sun and cooled in the winters; ten years in a can, just like Salle Coram and all those Mars colonists fated to die.
"I'm still here," Ravi said, by her side, pulling her back to the moment. She looked at him, then took his hand and gave it a little squeeze. That was all she could do right now, the most commitment she could make when she didn't know what they were up against.
Killing one person should be easy. After all of the other deaths they'd caused she should barely even notice it, but she did. She only had to look at Amo to see how deeply killing the bunker had broken him. It had hurt her too, with the dreams coming every night now. She never slept enough and could never outrun the weight.
You'd think so much death would numb you to killing, but in truth it made it worse. Every death added to the load. Eleven more bunkers lay ahead, with who knew how many thousands of people to die. She would do it, she knew that, but she was afraid of who she would be at the end.
The List (Zombie Ocean Book 5) Page 3
