Death Wish (22 page)

Wish 29

I don’t remember anything after that.
No, wait. Yes I do.
I remember screaming.
Yeah.
Screaming.
And some crying.
Lots of crying.
I also remember thinking a single word over and over.
Why?
Then everything went black.

*

When I come to, I’m lying in a bed in a small, dimly lit concrete room. My head is throbbing, but when I try to lift my arm to touch my forehead I find that my wrists and ankles have been lashed to the metal frame of the bed. A jolt of fear runs through me. But before I can panic Robin is standing over me, looking relieved.
“Eliza! Oh thank
God
, you’re awake!” Her eyes glisten with unshed tears. “How are you feeling?”
“I…” I realize that I have no idea what’s going on, and look up at her through squinted eyes. “Robin, where am I? What’s going on?”
“You’re in Revolutionary headquarters,” she tells me, reaching forward to push a stray hair away from my forehead. “The doctors had to restrain you because you kept thrashing around. They couldn’t give you the sedative otherwise.”
“Sedative?” I groan, still confused. “Why would I need a se
—
”
Suddenly everything comes crashing back.
“
Harrison
!” I scream, wrenching forward and struggling against the ties. Robin jumps back, her expression switching from relief to fear. “Robin. Robin, where’s Harrison? Is he okay? He’s fine, right?
Robin, where is Harrison
?”
The unshed tears in her eyes escape, and she lets out a small whimper. “Oh, ‘Liza…He’s… Oh God… I’m so sorry, ‘Liza…” She chokes back a sob. “Harrison’s dead.”
As soon as that sob reaches my ears, my world comes crashing down.
I stop writhing and collapse against the bed. My head falls back on the pillow and I stare at the ceiling.
“‘Liza? E-Eliza, are you okay?” Robin whispers, her voice still thick with tears.
I barely register what she’s saying. I’m suddenly catatonic. I hear Robin say more, but the words don’t distinguish themselves. My limbs feel excruciatingly heavy and impossibly light all at once, and even though nothing is there I could swear a brick of lead is crushing my chest. My eyes are open but don’t perceive anything, until I notice a crack in the ceiling above me.
The crack starts as a thin, barely visible fracture, but as it continues its journey across the concrete it spreads out into multiple branches. Those branches become deeper and continue dividing until they must have spread too much, because there is a large hole in the ceiling where the spider webbing cracks end. From my viewpoint on the bed I can’t see what’s in the hole
—
it’s just a dark, empty void.
“Eliza… Please, can you talk to me?” Robin whispers, placing her hand over mine.
I snap.
“Don’t
touch
me!” I shriek, violently rattling the frame as I jolt my hand as far away from hers as it will go. She gasps and snatches her hand back, clutching it to her chest. More tears pour out of her wide, wet eyes.
“‘Liza, don’t
—
”
“
Shut up
!” I scream, every bit of rage I feel poisoning my words. “Why the
hell
are you crying? You didn’t know him! You stupid, idiotic
bitch
,
why are you crying
?
You didn’t know him
!”
She is openly sobbing now, her fists pressing up against her eyes. Her back is hunched, making it look like she’s collapsing on herself. This only enrages me more.
“
God
, you are so pathetic! Stop crying!” I try to move, but I am pinned to the bed and only succeed in rocking the bed. “And untie me!
Let me go, dammit
!”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” a deep voice shouts from the other side of the room.
I stop rocking and whip my head around to see who it is, my lips pulled back in a snarl. Robin immediately straightens, her shoulders shaking as she tries to hold back her crying. Chief Darian leans against the doorway, his arms crossed and one eyebrow raised.
“I’m pretty sure that if we undid those restraints, Miss Hayworth, you would do some serious damage to our dear Robin. And, as you both know, the damage would be permanent.”
I keep writhing, struggling against the cuffs, while he walks over to Robin at the foot of the bed. He puts a hand on her shoulder and whispers something to her. She nods and walks to the door. Before she leaves the room she pauses, turns to me, and mouths
I’m so sorry
.
As soon as she leaves I turn back to Darian, my fists balled up in anger. He just stands there and stares at me, letting the moments pass in silence. After a minute or so, I exhale a huge, shuddering breath and let my head fall back on the pillow. I can feel my eyes starting to burn, so I look back up at the crack in the ceiling. The hole is still there, still black and empty.
“Chief?” My voice is barely a whisper.
“Yes?” There is no trace of emotion in his response.
“Please,” I say, still keeping my gaze on the hole, “could you undo my restraints?”
“And why should I do that?” He moves over to me. I can see his flannel-clad torso in my peripheral.
“Because,” I whimper, my eyes beginning to fill with water, “I’m not going anywhere, and I won’t hurt anyone… I just
—
”
The first tear rolls down my cheek. “I just can’t be tied down right now.”
I love you forever, Eliza.
Harrison’s last words echo in my mind, and my entire body begins to tremble. The tears are coming faster now, and I can only get out the word
please
before I break.

*

The next few days blur together in a stream of tears, screams, more tears, and an all-consuming sense of emptiness. At least I assume they’re days, because I honestly haven’t bothered keeping track. Multiple people have come through my room to bring me food and check my cell growth rate, so I assume a decent amount of time has passed.
During a rare moment, when I was too exhausted to despair, Robin visited and told me what had happened in between my last mission and waking up in Revolutionary headquarters. She told me that, as I was clutching Harrison’s body, the Security branch had sent three of their strongest agents to take him away and subdue me.
She said I knocked them all out in about twenty seconds.
She explained that the fight had resulted in some internal bleeding, bruised ribs and a broken collarbone for me. My Chip already healed those with no problems, but Robin explained that Doctor Sloan wanted to make sure my cells were regenerating as they should be. Sloan doesn’t say anything when she comes into my room to check on me, but every time she leaves she places a gentle hand on my shoulder for a moment.
The warmth of that hand reminds me of Godmother Ashley’s touch so many years ago, and it makes me want to cry and scream at the same time.
The squad that the Revolutionaries sent to retrieve me before the Security Branch could send more agents found me surrounded by unconscious bodies, bleeding, and in a state of complete hysteria. When they tried to grab me I fought back with everything I had, and they eventually had to tie me up to prevent me from hurting anyone else. I fought tooth and nail to stay with Harrison but, because they had to get out of there quickly, they knocked me unconscious and strapped me to the hospital bed while I was still passed out. The next time I woke up was two days later when Robin told me I was in their underground headquarters.

*

That evening, after Robin visited to explain everything that had happened, the Chief walks into the room to find me staring at my ceiling crack once again. I’ve looked at it so many times that I think I’m starting to make out faint patterns in the darkness. Or maybe that’s just wishful thinking.
“Hey, Hayworth. How are you feeling today?” He calls to me from the doorway.
I stare at the dark patch above me for a few more moments before turning my head to look at him.
“How am I feeling?” I let every bit of sarcasm I can muster color my words. “
Really
? I’m just
peachy
Chief. I mean, it’s not like the people I work for
completely
screwed up and caused me to kill Ha
r— To kill
Harri
—
”
I can’t even say his name out loud without sobbing, so I stop trying. I can feel my face starting to sting as more tears crawl in behind my eyes. I’ve cried so much since I’ve been here that I’m surprised that I haven’t turned to dust. I look back at the ceiling, close my eyes, and press my hands against my eyelids.
“
God
, what have I done…” I choke out, clenching every muscle in my body, staying rigid to keep myself from breaking.
I hear movement. When I open my eyes Darian is sitting in the chair next to my bed. He gently places his hand on my arm.
“Eliza, you can’t blame yourself
...
” he soothes. He stops for a moment, takes a breath. “
B
ecause what they did
wasn’t a screw up
.”
“Don’t...” I whisper.
I know that it couldn’t have been a mistake. The Security Branch would
never
mess up a Wish submission that badly, and there is no way Harrison would have submitted his own Death Wish
. But I have to convince myself that it was all a mistake, because the alternative is too horrifying to think about. I hope with everything I am that Darian won’t confirm what I already know deep in my heart to be true.
“They sent me on a Wish Fulfillment for
Harrison
.” My breath catches halfway through his name, and I have to clench my fists and dig my nails into the soft flesh of my palms to keep another cry from escaping. “It
—
it
had
to be a mistake.”
I swore I would protect him. That’s why I kept him out of all of this: so that I could keep him safe.
Sadness and pity flicker behind Darian’s eyes, and he squeezes my arm as if he can physically brace me for his next words.
“They sent you on that mission because they wanted him
dead
. And they knew you were the only person who could do it.”
I’m pretty sure that if I looked up right now, those cracks in the ceiling would have spread even further.
“No,” I insist in a quiet exhale. “No, that doesn’t make any sense. He
—
he was one of our best Godparents. Why would they want to
—
to kill him?”
He wasn’t involved at all. Why would they want an innocent dead?
“Because they figured out that it had to be a Godparent helping the Resistance, he was one of the people connected to Robin, and they have audio recordings of him openly questioning the Death Wish system.”
“So no, there’s nothing noble about inflating your sense of self-worth at the last moment, especially if it was all a setup.
I wish I didn’t have to complete Wishes like these—they’re so pointless and stupid.
”
That mission seems like a different lifetime, but I can immediately remember what he said. I had tried to put a positive spin on Mort Jefferson’s Wish, the man whose wife left him and who wanted to save a young woman from an evil pursuer, but Harrison said his death was pathetic and worthless. Something that we as Godparents are
not
supposed to say.
Those sentences were so meaningless. Just Harrison letting out some steam. They killed him for
that
? It doesn’t make sense to me. I feel like there’s something Darian isn’t telling me, but I’m so horrified by what I’ve done and what he’s revealed that I let that small suspicion go. Darian continues.
“They assumed it was him, Eliza. And the Godparents who question what they do are a danger to the entire structure of our society. They decided to have him killed, but they also knew he was one of the most talented members of the Fairy Godparent Division. So they sent you, his partner—whose skills were even greater than his—to take him out. But they knew you would never turn on your partner, so they created a fake Wish submission and had you fulfill it to ensure his death. I’m sorry.”
I can hear everything the Chief is saying, but there is a low, intense buzzing in my ears, like a swarm of wasps flying around inside my brain. I stare at him while he’s speaking, but slowly start to move my gaze downward. I stare at my hands, lying motionless in my lap, while his words wash over me.
“The Life Chips are the reason we are slowly killing our world. The Fairy Godparents turned you into a weapon to distribute slaughter disguised as a kindness. And the Security Branch manipulated you to such a twisted degree that they made you unknowingly murder your love and partner.”
I’m sure that the ceiling above me must be crumbling, turning the entire space into a black, empty void.
“Eliza, I have you ask you a question and I want you to seriously consider it before you answer. Will you dedicate yourself, fully, to changing this false utopia? Will you fight to bring back death and, in the process, ensure life?”
Darian leans forward and places one of his hands over my own.
“Eliza Hayworth, will you help us destroy the Life Chips and the Death Wish system?”
A rage I have never felt before, intense and white-hot, flows across my entire body. My hand clenches into a shaking fist under Darian’s palm, and I can hear my breathing turn harsh and heavy. Darian remove his hand from mine. It must have gotten too hot; I’m almost positive that my skin is on fire. My breathing increases in intensity and a strange red tint colors the edges of my vision. Every muscle in my body tightens
.
“Eliza?” I hear him say my name, but it sounds like I’m underwater.
I slowly look back at the leader of the Revolutionaries. His golden eyes widen, taken aback by the fury that is burning through my entire core. Through clenched teeth I spit out the only words playing over and over in my head.
“I am going to
destroy
them.”