Regeneration (The Incubation Trilogy Book 3)

by Laura Disilverio

  “We have to vacate this area, set up our perimeter at the lab proper,” I say. “Grab the weapons.” I pause. “And his boots.” I point to the IPFer whose feet seem only slightly larger than mine. I need real boots instead of the lab’s paper booties. “We’ll take Vik’s body. Leave the prisoners. They won’t be comfortable, but it can’t be helped.”

  I move to help lift Vik’s body, but his buddy waves me off and hefts him in a fireman’s carry. Face blood- and sweat-streaked and as expressionless as stone, he plods toward the lab, shoulders slightly bowed under his burden. Anjeta and I follow at a respectful distance. Dr. Ronan looks up as we enter, takes in the situation at a glance, and guides the Defier to one of the refrigeration units. I suspect Ronan keeps a supply of Wexl in there and wonder if he’ll offer the bereaved young man a nip. I consider forbidding it, but decide to leave well enough alone. By the end of the day, we might all be grateful for a dose of the intoxicant. If we’re still alive.

  On the thought, the lab’s inner doors, the ones opening into the dome, whoosh open, and Idris and Fiere stalk in, followed by a handful of Defiers, including Chrysto, but not Wyck. They spring into action, and in minutes there’s another large screen receiving transmissions from cameras around the compound, and squawks, voices, and other audio from a suite of communications equipment one of them fiddles with.

  “What’s happening?” I ask.

  Idris ignores me, but Fiere spares me a look. “The Prags’re gaining some ground. They’ve retaken the armory.”

  “Wyck?” Fear for my best friend sharpens my voice.

  “Alive.”

  Fiere isn’t wordy at the best of times, and in moments of crisis she’s downright monosyllabic. That’s okay: she’s given me the only word I need at the moment. Wyck’s okay. For now.

  Idris swings around, giving orders to several of the Defiers. When he’s done, he looks at me from eyes shadowed by dark brows. “They doubt our resolve. They think that a few losses will make us turn tail. They don’t understand that the Defiance will not stop until the Prags are gone, until there is equality and freedom in Amerada. Until—”

  His speech is interrupted by a painful squeal from the audio equipment, and then a man’s voice that booms loudly, “To the traitors who are occupying Kube 9.” Someone toggles the remote camera and the speaker’s face suddenly fills the screen. He’s removed his helmet, and prematurely gray hair lies matted on his bullet-shaped head. Gold eyes seem to connect to mine, the effect so jarring that I almost back up a step. They’re a lion’s eyes: fierce, stung with marigold and amber, predatory. His ears are sun-freckled, his lips thin. I know him. General Bledsoe. Commander of the IPF. I saw him at meetings when I was working in the Ministry for Science and Food Production. He congratulated me when I briefed the Prime Minister and her staff about finding a way to eradicate the locusts.

  The camera focus blurs and then resolves, zoomed out so we can see all of Bledsoe, soldiers arrayed behind him, and a transport ACV.

  “—cannot succeed,” Bledsoe is saying. “The full might of the Infrastructure Protection Force will crush you. It’s only a matter of time. However, if you surrender now, and turn over the IPF and Kube prisoners you’ve unlawfully detained, we will release the men we’ve captured and give you one hour to vacate the Kube before we move in. That’s a one-hour head start before we track you down and execute you like the rabid dogs you are.” An anticipatory grin slices his face.

  “They have prisoners?” I asked. I shouldn’t be so surprised. “Who?”

  As if he hears me, Bledsoe jerks his head and one of the anonymous, helmeted soldiers tugs open the transport’s door and four people file out. Two are wearing IPF uniforms, but I recognize them as Defiers, and one is a young teen I’ve never seen, dressed in a muddy tunic and torn leggings. I suspect he’s a Jacksonville citizen, caught up in the fighting by accident. Tear tracks show as clean streaks on his dirty face. The last one out of the transport makes me catch my breath. Alexander.

  Chapter Five

  A bruise blooms high on his cheek and this mouth is swollen and bloody. He’s barefoot. His boots are beside mine on the beach. He’s limping from the wound in his leg. He walks with one hand pressed to his abdomen, as if in pain, but straightens when the soldiers line him up beside the kid. He puts a comforting hand on the youth’s shoulder and stares straight into the camera. Of course he knows where it is. His lips move silently and I suspect he’s praying.

  Idris started involuntarily when Alexander stepped out, but now he has himself under control. Only the pulse hammering in his neck betrays his tension. He cues his comm guy, and says, “Not a good trade, General. I have at least forty of your men, not counting the Kube staff.”

  His voice is level, unperturbed, slightly taunting even. Nothing in it reveals the turmoil he must feel. Alexander is his father. I don’t know if what I feel for Idris in this moment is admiration or hatred.

  “The Defiance has claimed this dome and Kube on behalf of the people of Amerada. Go back to Atlanta and tell the Prime Minister that Ameradans are no longer willing to have their destinies decided by a handful of tyrannical bureaucrats. We want equality of education and service for natural borns. We will prevail because we are in the right, and because Ameradans are with us. Leave the prisoners behind, unharmed, and withdraw. We’ll give you one hour before we hunt you down and put you out of your misery.” Idris’s tone is mocking as he flings the general’s words back at him.

  “Perhaps you need a demonstration of our intent,” General Bledsoe returns. He nods and two soldiers wheel something out from behind the transport. I recognize it. It’s the mesh cage Alexander and I assembled that morning to catch the locusts. We succeeded: the interior is a solid but shifting black of buzzing insects. The IPF must have stumbled across the cages on their march from the beach. I can’t imagine why they’ve bothered to bring them.

  Two soldiers grab one of the uniformed Defiers by the upper arms. He struggles, but they control him easily. Two more strip the uniform from him, cutting it away and yanking it off with a force that slews his body from side to side. Finally, he’s naked, his torso thin and white and achingly vulnerable. Slanting a look at the camera, Bledsoe approaches his prisoner and pulls a knife from a sheath on his thigh. There’s an indrawn breath behind me; we’re all rigid with tension, waiting for him to plunge the blade into our comrade, or slit his throat. Instead, his hand moves quickly, lightly, the blade flashing in the sunlight. He stands backs. Four thin lines of blood well on the Defier’s chest and abdomen. He looks puzzled. The blade flies up again, and the commander scores a bloody line across the Defier’s cheek.

  Fiere’s brow creases with confusion, and someone behind me mutters, “What kind of game is he playing?”

  My stomach plunges like I’ve stepped off a cliff. I know what he’s going to do. “No!” I call out as the soldiers march the naked Defier toward the locust cage. They can’t hear me with the microphone off on our end. The door opens a crack and a few locusts zip out. The Defier begins to struggle as he sees his fate. Idris gets it, too, muttering, “Damn you, damn you, damn you,” as the soldiers thrust the man into the cage and bolt it again.

  The locusts seem to still for a brief moment. And then it’s a feeding frenzy. Enflamed by the blood, they rip into the man. It’s like watching Keegan die all over again. I’m back in the MSFP lab, trapped with Keegan in the small room housing the locust cages. I can hear the loud hum of their wings in my head, and Keegan’s shrieks. I brush at my ear, convinced I feel the prickle of locust feet.

  As the first scream rips through us, Idris bites out, “Kill the audio.”

  The trapped man whirls and flings his arms at first, but then he sinks to his knees and the cloud of locusts follows him. The onscreen image trembles and I know the camera feed is being operated by an unsteady hand. Someone behind me retches and the sour stench of vomit fills the air. This is my fault. If I hadn’t put out the cages, the IPF wouldn’t have had locusts to u
se as executioners. The knowledge that they would have killed the prisoner some other way doesn’t comfort me. Nothing could be as bad as this.

  My eyes go to Alexander. He’s staring straight into the camera still, lips moving. He wears an expression of concentration, a line between his brows, skin taught around his eyes. It takes me a moment. He’s not praying. “Idris! Alexander.” I point to the screen. “He’s trying to tell us something.”

  All of us inch closer to the screen, trying to read his lips.

  “‘Sun. The first word’s ‘sun,’“ Chrysto says.

  “‘Do what—’“ someone says.

  “—hate to—” another voice offers.

  “‘You!’“ Jereth is excited about deciphering a word.

  “‘Sun, do what you hate to—”

  He’s saying “son.” He’s talking to Idris. My nose prickles with the tears I’m holding back.

  “Not ‘hate.’“ Idris speaks for the first time. “‘Have.’ He’s telling me to do what I have to do.” His voice is expressionless.”He’s my father.” There’s a break in the last word. To cover it up, Idris signals to the comm guy again.

  There’s a crackling sound, and then General Bledsoe stands in front of the camera, wiping a fleck of blood from his jaw. “I have three more prisoners,” he says, his intent plain, his gold eyes alight. “Give up now and—”

  Before he finishes speaking, Idris turns his head slightly and tells Chrysto. “Do it.”

  Fiere takes an involuntary step forward. Anguish twists her features. “But he’ll . . . Alexander . . .”

  “It’s what he wants. You know we have to.”

  Before I can puzzle out what they’re talking about, Fiere dips her head in acquiescence and Chrysto presses a button on the device he carries. There’s a five second pause when we all seem to stop breathing, and then an explosion rips through the air. The ground jolts and the cameras go dark. Secondary explosions growl and boom and pop.

  “What—?”

  “The armory,” Idris says.

  Filled with the IPF troops who have taken it over. I don’t know how many just died as a result of Chrysto’s brilliant booby trap. Ten? Twenty-five? More?

  Two of the cameras flicker back to life, and I see a crater where the armory was. The barracks’ rear wall is aflame. The armory is gone, vaporized. Chrysto, tall and lean, with blond hair tinged with red, looks somber. He takes no joy in this aspect of his work, I can tell. He has set the remote aside, and his slim, deft fingers pick at a hangnail on his thumb. I look away.

  Even through the lab’s air filters, we get a whiff of disintegration. It smells like dust and petroleum and tiny fossilized sea creatures blasted out of the ground. At least, that’s what I smell.

  Before we can dwell on the destruction, Bledsoe is back onscreen, his handsome face twisted, his eyes almost orange with rage. “You filthy, arrogant—” He stops and swallows hard. When he speaks again, he’s under control. He issues a command to one of his men.”Bring me the traitor Alexander Ford.”

  Two men drag Alexander forward. This close, I can see there’s blood in his beard. What I don’t see is even more important: fear. His face is calm. He knows his fate, and doesn’t fear it. My father. I slant a glance at Idris, hoping he sees it, too, the acceptance on Alexander’s face.

  General Bledsoe is talking. “—condemn the traitor Alexander Ford to death for his crimes against the sovereign nation of Amerada, including murder and insurrection.” He flicks the knife up and slices off the tip of Alexander’s ear. Alexander winces but doesn’t try to back away. Blood drips down his neck. He tries to say something, but the commander backhands him. “No last words for traitors!” He hooks the knife into the neck of Alexander’s jumpsuit and slices down. The fabric gives way and gapes open. We catch the glint of the blade as the general goes to work. When he steps away, fifteen or more bloody nicks weep on Alexander’s chest. Bledsoe leans in close to Alexander again, to score his cheek as he did with the Defier, and Alexander’s head snaps forward. He catches the general full in the face and the snap of breaking cartilage sounds clearly.

  Bledsoe bellows and cups his nose in one hand. Blood bubbles under his fingers and streams down his chin. His knife hand comes up. For a moment I think he’s going to sink the knife into Alexander, kill him right there, and I wonder if that’s what Alexander was aiming for. But the general controls himself at the last minute, lowers the knife to his side, and jerks his head toward the cage. Two soldiers march Alexander toward the carnivorous locusts.

  “For God’s sake, Idris. Black the screen. We can’t watch this,” Chrysto says.

  “I have to,” Idris says, at the same moment Fiere says, “We can’t desert him now.”

  We’re standing shoulder to shoulder the three of us, eyes glued to the screen. I reach for Fiere’s hand and our fingers twine together tightly as the soldiers shove Alexander into the second locust cage. The cage Alexander and I assembled and set out. In the bare seconds before the locusts descend, Alexander yells clearly, “I love you, my children. Keep on—”

  And then he can’t say anything more. He’s still and silent at first, but then he begins to writhe under the chomping of thousands of locust jaws, and a scream rips from him. Chrysto glances at Idris who gives no order. When another scream slashes into us, Chrysto knocks the comm guy aside and cuts the audio link. We watch Alexander die in silence.

  Only when it’s done does Idris disconnect the video, blacking the screens, cutting off whatever General Bledsoe is saying. He’s unnaturally still, chin tucked toward his chest, black hair falling around his face. We’re all watching him. When he looks up, he says, “Anjeta, Chrysto, bring every geneborn prisoner to the courtyard. No, bring that supervising proctor here.” When they don’t move instantaneously, he slams a fist onto the counter and roars, “Now! I will avenge my father’s death. We will all avenge our father’s death. You heard him—he called us his ‘children,’ all of us who fought for the same cause.”

  I think Alexander meant me and Idris, but now is not the time to tell Idris about our relationship. Chrysto and Anjeta are halfway to the door. It whooshes open and they’re gone.

  Dr. Ronan steps forward, his face gray from the strain of the day’s events, his tawny hair disheveled. Beside the twenty-something Idris, vibrant with grief and fury, Dr. Ronan seems dusty and old, smaller than I think of him. The alcohol tang of Wexl drifts from him, but he squares up to Idris. His hands are dug into his lab coat pockets and I wonder if that’s because they’re shaking. “There will be no killing in my laboratory. It is a space for discovery and science, a place where we find ways of improving the lives of Ameradans, not a place for killing them, no matter their offenses.”

  “It is not your lab, you old—” Idris begins furiously.

  I range myself beside Dr. Ronan. “What about the hearts and minds?” I remind Idris. “You’ll alienate the population if you kill noncombatants, if you kill indiscriminately.”

  His eyes burn with fury. “I am not going to kill indiscriminately. I am going to kill precisely every geneborn bastard on this earth, starting with the ones in this compound.”

  “There are two prisoners here,” Vik’s comrade says suddenly. “IPF. Geneborns. In the decon room.” He juts his jaw forward and I can see the revenge lust boiling in him.

  With a grunt of satisfaction, Idris swings around, unholstering his weapon, and the two of them stride down the hall toward the decon facility. The rest of us wait.

  Ka-pak, ka-pak. Two shots ring out almost simultaneously. Moments later, the men reappear. Idris sweeps past us and out the door. The rest of his staff follow him.

  I start to go after him, but Fiere puts a hand on my arm. Her face is pale with grief. “Let me.” I hesitate and she moves past me, picking up her pace to catch Idris.

  The lab is quiet when they’re all gone. I can’t sort out my emotions. Grief is uppermost, but there’s also anger and fear and despair. Before I can decide to sob or scream or p
ull myself into a tight ball and hide in a corner, Dr. Ronan says, “You—Jereth. Clean up that mess.” He points to the vomit pool. “When that’s done, the three of us will move the dead soldiers into the refrigeration unit with the other young man. Then, we will get back to work.” When Jereth stares blankly at him, Ronan makes a “get on with it” motion.

  By the end of the next day, Idris has carried out his executions, General Bledsoe has withdrawn his depleted forces (to the puzzlement of Idris and his staff), the wounded have been treated and the dead cremated. At Wyck’s suggestion, we buried Halla in the pine grove in the dome, beneath the tall trees with their soft purple needles, the shady place where the three of us planned our escape. She will rest well there. We cremated Alexander separately from the other dead. It seemed right. Idris has his ashes and says he will return them to the land of many lakes, wild rice, and solitude where Alexander raised him, just below what used to be the United States/Canadian border before the two countries merged. It’s where Alexander took Idris after leaving Emilia Alden and the capital. If I had been a little older, maybe that’s where I would have been raised, too, instead of here at the Kube. I try to imagine it, but can’t. It’s like trying to imagine a new color, an impossible task.

  The locust cages, left behind by the IPF as a grim reminder, like the bodies of hanged prisoners left to decay in iron cages in long ago England, have been retrieved and emptied, with the locusts funneled into new cages in the lab, and the remains of all four men removed. It sickens me to work with the locusts, knowing what they last fed on, but Idris has the compound on total lock-down so there’s no opportunity to trap more. Eradicating the locusts has to take precedence over my squeamishness, so I blank my mind and try to view them as impartially as any other subject. By observation, I note that at least sixty-five percent of this swarm is carnivorous. The urgency of my work is increasing as the locusts adapt to benefit from non-plant food sources.