Tomorrow

by C. K. Kelly Martin

  “It’s true,” she confirms.

  I don’t want to believe it. But why did the man in the lab coat say those things about Isaac not having a vaccine? Why did Demian ask why I’d choose death? Neither of them explained themselves because they thought I already knew about the new virus.

  From the first moment I saw Minnow on the Lower East Side, my instincts told me he was hiding something. Now the knowledge writhes inside my veins like a poison.

  It all fits.

  When Luis said, “I wish there was another way out of this,” Isaac stopped him from elaborating on why he’d abruptly changed allegiances. He didn’t want me to hear anything that would stop me from helping the two of them. Then there was the horror, the fear, in this woman’s voice as she told me about the virus, and the questions I was asked about Minnow while I was in the FM helmet. He was the one they really wanted to know about. Him and his virus. Freya and I were just a subplot.

  So how much of what he told me actually happened? Did Doomsday cultists start a nuclear war in 2071? Did my mother save families by sending them back to 1993? Has humanity been racing around in circles in time, playing out the same fate over and over? Why would Isaac, who had always placed such importance on human lives, want to destroy so much of the population from 1986? And why would anyone want to help him do it? Has he been pushed into insanity by losses he witnessed during the Toxo outbreak?

  “What can Freya and I matter when faced with a virus of that magnitude?” I ask, unable to wrap my head around this new threat. It’s like the Toxo all over again. Too big for me to fight and win. All I can do is try to reason with this woman. Try to save Freya here and now, so we have some kind of chance as our intact selves.

  The woman is silent, the two of us picking up on the sound of footsteps from the hall. She swings her gun in the direction of the open door, her shoulders relaxing when the brown-eyed woman who questioned me earlier steps into the room with us, armed with a Beretta 9mm. The last time I saw her I would’ve done anything to help this woman. Now she’s an enemy again and she frowns as she commands, “Put Freya back on the bed, Garren. Now.”

  Everyone here knows my name and I have no idea who they are, just who they work for. Then it comes to me—since this is the woman who cross-examined me in the FM helmet, odds are she’s the director. I’d been expecting the same one we encountered in Toronto but he told Freya there were a handful on either side of the border.

  This director’s seen into my head. She knows I wasn’t working with Minnow when they kidnapped me. She must have assumed I’ve since sided up with him, virus idea and all. Or maybe whose side I’m on doesn’t count for anything. Maybe I’m just a loose end to her, same as I was to Minnow. Someone to betray for the greater good without a second thought.

  “Now,” the director repeats. She and Minnow are more alike than either of them would want to admit. Both so ready to issue orders and bury the truth under layers of secrecy.

  I hesitate before turning back to the bed, my wrist groaning under Freya’s weight.

  “I’ve got them,” the woman in the skirt assures her leader. “I can handle this. Where’s Monroe?”

  The director inclines her head. “That’s under control. We’ll leave them all for the feeders. Too much has happened here to go unnoticed for long. It’s time to abandon the site.”

  Feeders. Machines the size of rats that break down everything in their paths—metal, wood, biological matter—turning it all to ash. They’re even capable of devouring themselves, when instructed, and in this case the U.N.A. obviously doesn’t want to leave any evidence. For years members of the grounded movement insisted the U.N.A. government was using the banned technology in nefarious ways, to cover its tracks. It must be how they rid themselves of the submarines at the Lake Mackay end of the chute—the U.N.A. brought feeders back to the past with them. Builders—miniature construction robots—too, judging by the swiftness with which this hidden basement level would’ve had to have been created.

  I set Freya gently down on the bed and stare at our captors, my eyes white-hot with anger. Time and again they’ve fucked things up and expected us to pay for it. The flame inside me rages to wildfire and I swivel on my heels, on the verge of charging towards the director like a rabid dog. Lucky for me, more gunshots erupt upstairs before I can take a step. In that instant my moment of insanity passes, simmering down to a controllable loathing.

  “Take care of them,” the director instructs the other woman before darting out of the room.

  Surrounded by two dead and bloodied bodies, an unconscious Freya on the bed next to me, and my discarded gun on the floor, I’ve run out of moves. If I go for my weapon this woman will pump as many bullets into me as she can. And if I manage to take her out in return, my actions will ultimately only leave Freya as helpless feeder food.

  “I was trying to help Freya,” the woman confesses, watching my eyes dart back and forth between her and my gun. “We were performing the procedure as slowly as possible so it wouldn’t damage her. There was every chance she would’ve been all right.”

  After everything we’ve been through this woman still expects me to absolve her; it’s unbelievable. “Every chance,” I repeat bitterly. “Even if it worked, Freya wouldn’t have been herself anymore. And none of this is her fault. You know that. You would’ve broken her for nothing, just because they told you to.”

  The woman blinks under the weight of my stare. “You know what’s at stake here. You know why we do what we do.”

  This is likely as much as she can possibly say without being wiped and I scowl. “And you know Isaac’s changed everything with his plans. So why are we still the enemy?” I don’t want billions of people to be killed by a virus any more than she does and my hope that the U.N.A. can succeed in preventing catastrophic climate change is probably as strong as hers is, but neither of those things makes our lives expendable. Freya and I have as much right to a future as anyone.

  “You’re not,” the woman admits, a hesitancy and rational alertness in her eyes that make me suspect she’s a scientist, not a security officer—someone accustomed to wiping and covering, probably, but not outright killing. Not on purpose, anyway. But she’ll either have to shoot me dead, drug me, or tie me down to get the feeders to devour me. That’s the thing about feeders; they won’t attack a moving target.

  Without warning the woman lets off a shot. It flies wide—well past Freya and me—embedding itself in the wall behind us. “Just take her and go,” she says breathlessly, squeezing the trigger a second time. “This is your chance.” The subsequent shot is wider than the first and, incredulous, I run for my gun, slide it down the back of my pants and scoop Freya into my arms. Staggering into the hall with her, Freya slips in my arms with every step, my damn wrist weak like a green branch.

  We’ll never make it this way. I stop and heave her over my shoulder, like a sack. Then I’m running for the stairs, running for our lives, my legs spinning like a windmill. Above me the hatch is open and I burst out of it with my gun in my good hand, at the ready. My heart’s exploding and my mind’s working at the speed of light. Look right. Look left. Aim your gun ahead. Run like you’ve never run before. Stay alive. Save Freya.

  I don’t know where they’ve gone—the director, Isaac, and whoever else is left—I just keep moving. Down the hallway and back through the living room, past the broken bodies of the elderly couple and another red-drenched form collapsed on the floor. A feeder’s already devoured the unidentified person’s head and is making quick work of the torso, incinerating as it goes. Bile shoots into my mouth at the sight.

  Then I’m out the back door and careening in the opposite direction from the barn. My eyes find only darkness but there has to be a country road here somewhere, the hope of passing traffic. Behind me, another shot punctuates the night. The sound makes me move faster still, Freya bumping up and down on my shoulder. Ahead, a parked van, Volkswagen Rabbit, and rickety-looking detached garage come into view. A garag
e marks the end of a dirt road, its beginning point far enough in the distance to render it invisible from here. But all roads lead somewhere, usually to other streets. Tempting as it is, following this one directly out to what’s bound to be a bigger road would make me an easier target when they come after me. I choose the long route instead, my breath growing short as I run into the long grass.

  Surrounded by silence, the noise from each of my steps is amplified. Suddenly I’m not alone. Someone else’s footfall is behind me, gaining on us. I turn to face them, holding my gun steady.

  “Garren,” Isaac says, relief sweeping into the air between us like all is forgiven. “You got her.”

  “And you got out.” His face is bathed in red, his clothes torn in countless places, and his pistol down at his side by his bleeding leg.

  “Did you get your hands on car keys?” Minnow coughs, his teeth looking like an animal’s amidst all the blood.

  I need whatever help he can give me and I shake my head, bile burning my throat for the second time in minutes. Knowing what I know, I can’t let him leave here. But he has to believe I will, that I’ve convinced myself his virus was a lie.

  In another life, we were allies. In this one, I’m forced to be his assassin. The dread of what I have to do mingles with fury at how he’s betrayed me. Seneval’s trust in him was marrow-deep and my anger sharpens as I imagine her disappointment. How could the same person who inspired her turn to a path of such destruction?

  “We need to keep going,” I mutter, veering back to my original direction. I stumble as I go, willing Freya to wake up and run with me. If she can. If she can even do anything anymore. If we make it out of here I don’t know what to expect. I make an unspoken vow to the universe as I stagger onward: You can do whatever you want with me, as long as Freya comes out of this okay.

  Unencumbered, Minnow is faster, even with his injured leg. “Wait!” I call as he surges ahead of us.

  “Hurry up,” he yells back.

  A car engine revs from the general direction of the house. There can’t be many U.N.A. personnel left but they’re coming for us anyway. I run harder, tripping on an uneven piece of ground that sends Freya sliding off my shoulder. As I bend and turn to catch her, the pain from my wrist knocks me to my knees. A tear fights its way out my eyes as the Volkswagen slams to a halt behind me, its headlights illuminating Freya and me like stadium rock stars.

  “Get in!” a female voice yells. In my panic and exhaustion I can’t decipher the difference between a demand and a request. The woman opens the car door to show herself—the same woman who fired two gunshots past us so the director would believe her orders were being carried out. A bullet from Minnow’s pistol wings over her head, narrowly missing her. She ducks back inside, unharmed.

  No matter what this woman has done for me, I can’t trust her. Isaac, either. Both of them have saved me at least once and I can’t imagine what must’ve happened to Isaac—or the future—for him to believe setting a virus loose in 1986 is a sane plan, but I don’t have the luxury of waiting for an explanation.

  There are things you can’t stop, and things you can. I can’t allow him to set foot out of this field if it means he’ll kill billions of people.

  I drop Freya to the ground and swing to aim at Isaac. My finger squeezes the trigger and the bullet hits him square in the chest. A lucky shot. But for a second it seems to have no effect. Isaac’s face falls but his body remains stubbornly upright. Then his shirt erupts in blood and he topples to the ground like a wooden plank.

  Numbly, I haul Freya back over my shoulder and jog to the car, throwing myself into the backseat with her. As we peel into the field, gunfire crackles again. From behind us this time. Out the back window I see the director sprinting towards the car. A shot dings the back of the car but we’re farther away from her with every spin of the wheels.

  “Who’s left in the house?” I rasp, my vocal chords brittle.

  The woman shakes her head. “There were a lot of bodies. At least one of them was still breathing but he’d lost a lot of blood; I don’t know that he’ll make it.”

  At least two of them remaining, but maybe only one who could give chase. I set my gun down at my feet. As the car bumps onto the main road and races for safety, I lean back against the vinyl seat and inhale deeply, catching my breath before I bend over Freya. Resting her head in my lap, I kiss the end of her nose and caress her face. Her limbs look so thin and pale in the flimsy blue medical gown that all the oxygen is sucked from my lungs again. I have you, Freya. Now it’s time to come back to me.

  “It’s okay,” I murmur. “You’re okay. You’re okay.” My mind falls backwards in time as I say the words. Us in the Resniks’ kitchen, Freya leaning against the counter in only a T-shirt, reminding me who I was. “Because the night,” she told me as the world folded in on me. “You always like this.”

  I’ll remind her, too, if she needs me to. I’ll do whatever I have to. My lips brush her forehead. I unfurl her medical gown where it’s rolled up her thighs, forcing it to cover as much of her as possible. My hands rub warmth into both her arms and then each of her hands, trying to turn the ragdoll in the backseat with me back into the real Freya Kallas.

  Fifteen: 1986

  For a long time I don’t look up; I keep my eyes on Freya, watching her breathe in and out in the darkness. “You told me she would be all right,” I say to the woman.

  “The process was interrupted,” she replies stiffly. “It’s impossible to say what the results will be now.”

  I glance up at the back of the woman’s head. Her hair’s covering the damage Minnow did with his gun—her missing bit of ear at the tip—but the side of her neck is streaked with blood. “Take your best guess.”

  The woman straightens her shoulders against her seat. “We’ve never pulled anyone out in the middle before. Give her time.”

  “Why won’t she wake up? Is she in a coma?”

  “She’ll wake up,” the woman insists, but there’s no certainty in her tone. “She’s strong and healthy.”

  “She had a concussion.” Fighting with my lame wrist, I pull my sweatshirt over my head and drape it across Freya’s chest. Outside, the light’s turning a deep purple, night fading into morning. We must be breaking the speed limit; fields hurtle by us on either side, the woman making an abrupt left that seems to come out of nowhere. Soon we’re closing in on suburbs, the spaces between houses tightening and subdivisions coming into view.

  “I know,” the woman says, holding her head unnaturally still. “I warned them that would make it riskier.”

  My heart sinks. She either outright lied when she said there was every chance Freya would’ve been all right or was just trying to make herself feel better. In reality, right here with me Freya might be farther away than she’s been in fifteen months.

  “There was another boy awhile back,” the woman continues, voice wavering. “He had a benign brain tumour that resulted in some of his memories becoming unstable.” She skips over the details, leaving them to my imagination. “He reacted badly. His cognitive abilities and memory were profoundly affected. I couldn’t risk that again.”

  The other director warned Freya wipe and covers performed in the present would be more rudimentary, that they didn’t have all the necessary technology in place to complete them as smoothly as they would’ve in the U.NA. Nausea coils in my stomach, bounding upwards as I struggle to hold it down. “You shredded his brain.”

  “I couldn’t do it again,” the woman repeats. “I was being as careful as possible but when I saw you and knew there was a chance for her…”

  She took it. I’m surprised she can reveal as much as she has without triggering a wipe and I run my fingers along a strand of Freya’s red hair and say, “Are you telling me you think it was safer to stop in the middle of the procedure rather than trying to finish the job?”

  “In this case I think it might be, yes.”

  Then why won’t Freya open her eyes and look at me? “T
here must be something you can do for her.” I don’t mean to shout but the words come out loud and uneven. “You’re the expert.”

  “We shouldn’t force her to wake up,” the woman snaps. “I’m telling you, we have to wait.”

  An overwhelming urge to hurl the woman out of the car surges through my arms. I focus on Freya and force myself to fight it. “Where are we going?”

  “I don’t know.” The woman’s arms tremble around the steering wheel. She was completely unprepared to become an enemy of the U.N.A. today and seems in danger of unravelling.

  The car’s slowing to a crawl and I point my gaze out the window, at a sleepy suburban neighbourhood composed of large, attractive houses with two-car garages. Tidy hedges separate most of the properties.

  “I’m just trying to put some distance between us and them and stay out of sight,” the woman adds. “Where do you think we should go?”

  “I don’t even know where we are.”

  “Surrey.” Our eyes meet in the rearview mirror. Surrey’s only a stone’s throw from Vancouver. They didn’t take us far. Somewhere in Delta or a more rural area of Surrey itself, probably.

  “What would they expect us to do?” I ask.

  She should know the answer to that better than I do, but the woman replies, “I don’t know.” One of her hands dives into her hair, twisting it at the roots. “They’ll need reinforcements to looks for us.”

  Which gives us a window of opportunity, as most of their people seem to be stationed out East or south of the border. But first things first, driving around with a gun at my feet and a half-naked girl draped across my lap is a good way to get pulled over by the police. In the short term that might keep us from being taken again, but eventually the cops would give Freya back to her mother. Then the U.N.A. would have easy access to whatever’s left of her. And I would likely be sent to prison for kidnapping.