by Devon Monk
“We’ll make it work,” Right Ned said softly.
Neds had a way of seeing things, visions when they touched a person, me included. Right Ned had never made me ashamed of what I was made of or what he’d seen of me when he’d touched me. Just the same, contact with the Harris brothers was a very rare thing. Which made his gesture all the more endearing.
I squeezed his fingers and let go of his hand. “Yes, we will,” I said. “Come hell or hinterlands.”
Traffic finally broke and we jogged to the other side of the street.
“Just make me a promise,” I said once we were on the sidewalk again.
“Another one?” Left Ned asked.
“Please.”
Right Ned peered over at me from beneath his hood. His eyes, blue as spring, were clouded with worry. “All right. What?”
“If things don’t go our way,” I said.
“They will,” he insisted.
“But if they don’t.” I waited to make sure he wouldn’t argue.
He nodded.
“If they don’t,” I continued, “I want you to take over leading House Brown.”
“Whoa,” Left Ned said as if all the air had been pushed out of his lungs.
“Are you listening to the nonsense that is coming out of your mouth, Matilda Case?” Right Ned asked.
“I am. And I am serious.” I took a chance and shot a look back the way we came. I couldn’t see Domek in the people there. Didn’t see an armed man wearing all black in the shadows. Was it possible he hadn’t found a way out of the tunnel yet? I thought he was the best of the best. We couldn’t be that hard to track.
“You’ve proved that you know how to stay below radar,” I said. “You know a lot of people who are willing to help others—”
“If by willing you mean ‘can be bribed,’” Left Ned said.
“—and I know you care about people being free. People like Sadie and Corb. People like me and my brother and Gloria. Please. Promise me you’ll take on the communication hub at the farm and try to keep House Brown safe from the other Houses.”
“I make it a point not to make deals with delusional people,” Right Ned said. “For one thing, we’re going to make it through this. You are going to make it through this. Brilliant brother has a plan, and all that.”
“Then make the promise,” I said. “Tell me you’ll take over House Brown if anything goes wrong. Since you know it’s all going to go fine, what do you have to lose?”
We were striding along a little faster. Abraham was a ways ahead of us and had picked up the pace a bit. Neds shifted his wide shoulders so both of him could look at me.
“Matilda,” Right Ned said. His eyes were sad. So were Left Ned’s. “Don’t make me promise that.”
“House Brown needs a man like you,” I said. “Both of you.”
“Fine,” Left Ned said, “I promise.” His voice was a little rough around what sounded suspiciously like emotions. “Now will you shut up about it?”
Right Ned just gave me a sad smile. “I promise.”
“Good,” I said. “I like knowing it will be in good hands.”
Abraham had stopped in a loading area in the shadow of a building. He had his arms crossed over his chest. We walked up to him.
“Welton Yellow?” Left Ned demanded in a low whisper. “For hell’s sake, how is that going to do any good? We already have one killer on our asses, in case you forgot.”
“What was your plan to get out of the city?” Abraham asked coolly.
I would have bought the stone-cold act Abraham was putting on if he wasn’t sweating so badly. His color had gone off too, or maybe it was just the coating of dust, but he looked greener around the edges, with dark, purple-bruised shadows, as if everything under his skin was leaking and bleeding.
“The old freight lines,” Right Ned said. “Substations. I know a guy. He can get us to Kansas. There’s a woman there who can get us within a couple miles of the farm.”
“Freight lines?” Quinten asked as he and Gloria closed in behind us.
“From back before the Restructure?” Gloria asked. “Those haven’t been in service for more than a hundred years.”
“They haven’t been in service for the Houses,” Right Ned said. “Not even for House Brown. But they work. Things get shipped. Private sorts of things.”
“Black market?” Abraham asked. “That’s all reported to House Silver.”
Neds made a so-so gesture with his hand. “People skim, people barter, people get what they want if they try hard enough. I got us passage.”
“How do you even know about this?” I asked. “House Brown could have used those connections once or twice over the past few years.”
Quinten’s eyebrows shot up and he leaned back just a bit, maybe surprised that his little sister would be willing to deal dirty. Yeah, well, times had been hard and it had fallen on my shoulders to care for not only our farm and family, but also any of the House Brown people who had emergency needs.
And everyone has emergency needs.
“Like I said,” Right Ned repeated, “I know people. Not the kind of people you want to invite around for tea.”
“Unless your life depends on it?” Abraham asked.
“Pretty much. Folk who run this rail aren’t here to do you any favors. Money talks. Trade too, if you’ve got something worth trading. Like those medical supplies.” He nodded toward Quinten’s duffel.
“We’ll have plenty to trade,” Gloria said. “Were we supposed to meet someone?”
“We?” Quinten turned toward her. “Not you. You’re staying here.”
“No, I’m not,” she said.
“She can’t stay here,” I said. “They know she helped us. There was a killer in her shop. Who, by some miracle, hasn’t found us yet. Is that making anyone else jumpy?”
“Welton,” Abraham said. “He set up a few diversions for Domek. False leads and trackers.”
“You’ll be in more danger if you travel with us,” Quinten was saying to Gloria.
I turned to her. “Do you have anyplace where you can drop out of sight?”
She shook her head. “If all of you weren’t right here with me, I’d be calling out to your place, asking you if you knew someone in House Brown who would let me hide out with them.”
I nodded, turned back to my brother. “She stays with us until we can find her a safer place to be.”
He threw both his hands in the air, then spun away from her direct stare and paced two or three steps away and back. “This is a terrible, terrible choice,” he said.
“It’s my terrible choice to make,” she said.
“Where’s the entry to the freight line?” Abraham asked.
“Down a couple streets near the old library,” Right Ned said.
“There’s nothing near the old library,” Gloria said.
“There’s a hidden entry to the freight line.”
“I don’t like this,” Quinten said.
“None of us like it,” Gloria answered. “But all of us are doing it.”
“So, what are we waiting for?” I asked.
Abraham was still standing with his arms crossed over his chest. He uncrossed his arms and ran his right hand back through his hair. It was a very purposeful thing to do. A signal.
A loud pop echoed out down the street. Then another and another in quick succession. Six, a dozen.
I bolted into the shadows, searching the street. So did everyone else except Abraham. “Gunfire?” I asked.
Abraham hadn’t moved. “Power overload on old wires,” he said. “House Yellow really ought to have taken care of it years ago. Cameras, traffic control, and backup systems will be out for days. Streets are going to be a mess. Satellite feeds broken. Tracking anyone and anything will be impossible.”
He grinned and it was a wicked sight. “We’re as invisible as the head of House Technology can make us. Let’s go.”
“This way.” Gloria took the lead, since she knew the quic
kest way to the old library.
We jogged through the rising confusion that wasn’t quite chaos yet, but would be soon.
“This is it,” Gloria said.
Ahead of us was a building that must have once been made of brick but was mudded over with multiple layers of concrete, all of which had fallen off in clumps. The state of disrepair was echoed by busted windows and copious graffiti. It looked like a building-devouring blight had hit the thing and eaten it from the inside out.
A tall concrete barrier rolled off from our right, and separated us from the empty plaza in front of the old library.
The place seemed to be abandoned. No movement. Not even any sleeping transients.
That was weird.
“Are you sure?” Quinten asked.
“Yes,” Gloria said.
“Where’s your contact, Ned?” Quinten asked.
Neds stood just in front of me and to the side a bit. So I saw when he suddenly stiffened. “Shee-it,” Left Ned breathed.
Too late. Too late to run. Too late to hide.
Domek stepped out from behind a column of that dilapidated building and opened fire.
13
I’m afraid, but then, everyone is afraid lately. There are rumors of the plague returning.
—from the diary of E. N. D.
Chaos.
We dove for cover behind the concrete wall. The barrier was old and wouldn’t last long under the heavy artillery he was unloading.
Shit.
“Does he have anyone with him?” Quinten yelled over the gunfire.
“Does he need to?” Left Ned answered as bullets chipped holes through the top of the wall we were huddled behind. Concrete scattered over us in a rain of rocks and sand.
We couldn’t stay here. We couldn’t call for help. Even if there was someone out there who would help us without turning us in, Welton had shut down the city and all modes of communication.
There had to be a way out of this.
I unzipped my duffel and pulled out my revolver.
“You have a gun?” Quinten asked.
“No one ever searches the girl.” I squat-walked to the edge of the wall. “Knife? Mirror? Screen?”
Gloria dug through her duffel and handed me a palm-sized mirror. I pressed my back against the wall with the mirror aimed over my shoulder so I could get a line on Domek.
Another barrage of bullets rained down around us, lasting for at least a minute this time.
Holy hell, that was a lot of bullets.
But I’d gotten a look at him before I’d had to tuck back behind the barrier.
Domek stood out in the open of what had been the library’s plaza, like an idiot who underestimated that one of us would be armed, and two of us were galvanized.
“He has an automatic weapon,” I said.
“Old news,” Right Ned said.
“And he’s in the open,” I went on. “Nothing for cover.” I checked the chamber of my gun for bullets.
“Revolver’s not going to do you any good.” Left Ned said.
“If my aim’s clean, it only takes one bullet to end this.” I pulled up the mirror again to locate him. Then leaned out, took aim, fired.
But the wind shifted, my hand shook, and I was pretty sure I didn’t do anything more than make him aware that we were not going to go with him peacefully.
Not that he’d asked us to put our weapons down or go with him, peacefully or otherwise. Weren’t hired guns for the Houses supposed to tell us to come out with our hands in the air or something? Or had he skipped basic etiquette class in assassin school?
“Got any bombs left?” Left Ned asked Quinten.
Quinten nodded. “One.”
Abraham leaned forward a bit. “I’ll toss the bomb and draw his fire,” he said. “All the rest of you run into the building.”
“Like hell, you’ll draw his fire,” I said.
“If some of us are to survive, some of us will have to make sacrifices,” Abraham said.
Hadn’t we just gone over the no of this back at Gloria’s?
“All of us are going to survive,” I said. “None of us are going to make sacrifices.”
A hard hail of gunfire shattered the air overhead.
“Sonofabitch,” Left Ned said. “We need to move.”
“We need a plan,” Quinten said.
Then Domek decided to join the conversation. “Quinten Case,” he yelled. “Surrender yourself and the others will be unharmed.”
Quinten? We all stared at him.
I’d thought Domek was after Abraham, who was accused of murder. Who would have sent an assassin out looking for my brother?
Quinten’s back was pressed against the wall. Even through the tunnel dust, sweat, and concrete debris that covered him, he went pale. His clever blue eyes ticked over to me, wide with fear; then a decision narrowed them. I shook my head.
“No,” I said, “Whatever you just thought of? No. Nobody sacrifices themselves.”
“A distraction,” Quinten said. “You could run for the station.”
“Like he won’t shoot us in the back?” I said. “We do not trust people who are shooting at us. C’mon. That’s survival 101, Quinten.”
“He said he wants me,” he said.
“He’ll have to go through me to get to you,” I said. “If you walk out there, I will do mad, foolish things to save you. You know I will. And you know I can survive a hell of a lot of hits before I go down. Let’s not go willingly into that nightmare, okay?”
He shook his head. “Matilda . . .”
“No.”
“She ain’t budging,” Right Ned said. “So your surrender’s out. What else you got, Tilly?”
No support from satellite, phone, or any other connection. Local law was tied up with a million problems from the blown grid, so no cavalry to come riding to the rescue.
We had one gun against a heavily armed, highly trained killer who was just playing with us.
“How far is it to the station entry?” I asked Neds.
“Should be right behind Killer Man there,” Right Ned said. “The actual entry to the station is inside the building.”
I tipped the mirror to get another look at the distance to the door. “Okay. Fifty yards. There’s another concrete half wall about ten yards from the door.”
“I’ll give you to the count of three,” Domek yelled into the relative silence. “Then you will all come out with your hands where I can see them.”
“Options?” I asked.
“Quinten throws the bomb,” Abraham said. “You and I take out Domek.”
“With one revolver?” I asked.
“With brute strength.”
Abraham was terribly wounded. Even so, we were both galvanized and frighteningly strong. “Rush him?” I asked.
He pointed to a rusted blue industrial Dumpster that stood on broken skids about half the distance between us and Domek. Concrete and scrap metal filled it. “I am in the mood to throw that at his head.”
“Shee-it,” Left Ned said. “Can you?”
The thing must weigh a couple thousand pounds. “Okay,” I said. “Let’s do it.”
“What?” Quinten said. “No.”
“Three . . .” Domek yelled.
“Yes.” I handed Quinten my gun. “Bullets won’t kill us unless he gets in a very lucky head shot, which isn’t likely after a bomb blast and us crushing him under a Dumpster. Give Neds the bomb.”
“Why Neds?” Quinten was talking, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t also moving. He quickly dug the glass vial out of his duffel and handed it to Neds.
“I know the arm he has on him, and, no offense, brother, but you haven’t been working the farm for three years. Ned,” I said, “chuck it and make it count. If he goes up in pieces, I’m not going to cry any tears.”
Right Ned took the corked glass vial from Quinten. “Do unto others, I always say. And that man is out to see us dead.”
“Two . . .”
“Wh
at happens after the bomb?” Gloria asked.
“You, Quinten, and Neds run for that building and get inside fast,” I said. “Use the half wall there for cover if you need to.”
“But what about you and Abraham?” she asked.
“We’ll be okay,” I said. “And we’ll be right behind you. Ready?”
“One!” Domek yelled. He didn’t even wait a second longer before he starting shooting again, blowing through chunks of concrete.
“Jee-zus!” Right Ned pulled a Glock out of his pocket.
“You had a gun?” Quinten yelled.
Neds leaned out and unloaded the clip, then cocked back and threw the bomb, whipping it full force.
A blast of white-hot fire shook the ground and buildings around us.
“Go, go, go!” I yelled, even though I couldn’t hear my own voice.
They bolted for the building. Abraham and I ran to the Dumpster.
But Domek recovered too quickly.
The bullets came fast and hard. One hit my thigh, another my arm.
I yelled and slammed up behind the Dumpster, breathing hard.
“For shit’s sake!” I said. “I think we made him mad.”
“You’re bleeding,” Abraham said.
I wiped the pain sweat out of my eyes, my hands shaking with adrenaline. “So are you.” I nodded to his gut, which was seeping red through his crappy secondhand clothes. “Ready?”
His eyes hardened and he nodded. “Lift. Throw. On three. One . . .”
I crouched, my hands under the edge of the metal. If the thing hadn’t been tilted on broken skids, there would have been no way to get leverage.
Use your legs, I said to myself. I exhaled, prepping mind and body for the lift. Just like a bale of hay. A really big, really heavy bale of hay.
“Two,” he said.
I inhaled.
“Three!”
We both stood, balancing the massive weight of the thing between us as we used our upward momentum to heave the Dumpster up and out.
It should have been impossible.
But, then, we were a little impossible ourselves.
Concrete and metal thundered across the plaza as the Dumpster tipped too far over in midair, scattering part of its load before it landed in a ground-pounding thump right on top of Domek. The stink of rust, oil, sour water, and garbage rained down around us as the impact shot debris into the air.
