Light (25 page)

Now Caine met her gaze with an expression of disbelief and dawning horror. “That’s why she didn’t kill Sam; she just left him helpless. Why she didn’t kill me. So why did she kill Brianna?”

“I don’t know. Maybe she had no choice. Maybe she was confused. I don’t know.” Then, her mouth twisting into a bitter smile, she added, “It’s not like I really know her. She’s not . . . I know I gave birth to her, but . . .”

At last he looked at her and really seemed to see her. There had always been a guardedness between them, a layer of dishonesty, of show. Caine was not a person who could let himself be vulnerable.

To her surprise, Diana realized that was gone. For the first time, Caine wasn’t wearing a mask. For the first time, when she looked into his eyes she saw undisguised sadness.

He drew her to him. For once, maybe for the first time, it had nothing to do with either power or desire. They were two people at the end of the world. They were two losers waiting for their final defeat.

Diana went willingly to him. He put his arms around her and she refused to cry, refused because how would that make anything better? Their time was over: their chances had all been used up.

“We have to make sure Edilio really understands all this,” Diana said. “About Gaia . . . about the gaiaphage, and these powers. Edilio’s been shaken up. Maybe too much to really . . .”

She looked at him and saw his eyes shutting her out. His withdrawal wasn’t total, but it was undeniable.

“Diana, you want to make sure Edilio understands this? Do
you
understand it? Diana, if I’m dead and Sam’s dead and Dekka and Jack are dead, the gaiaphage isn’t very dangerous.” He made a disbelieving sound. “It will be ‘kill the moofs’ all over again. It’ll be that moron Zil and his Human Crew all over again.”

“So we do nothing? We wait until Gaia’s killed everyone but you? And then, at the end, she comes for you?”

“Maybe by then the barrier’s down,” Caine said.

“But maybe it’s not, and you and Sam are the last ones standing, surrounded by nothing but dead bodies.”

It was as if a cold wind had blown through the space between them. He was Caine again.

“Isn’t that the game we all play, Diana? We all try to stay alive. Even though in the end we all die.”

Diana turned away and only then realized that Astrid had been standing just a few feet away, quiet, listening.

Caine saw her, too. “What’s your advice, Astrid the Genius? When she comes, when that monster child of ours comes to kill us all, it will be Sam’s little laser show she does the most damage with. So what do you have to say, oh great fountain of morality?”

Diana stared at Astrid. Caine was right, and Astrid knew he was right. Of course, Diana thought, Astrid had seen the implications quicker than anyone. That’s why Astrid had tried to derail the big meeting in the mayor’s office.

Astrid, still manipulating, Diana thought bitterly. And yet, wasn’t she just defending the boy she loved? Was that so terrible?

A little kid came rushing up and pulled Astrid away.

“See?” Caine said, as though Astrid had proved his point. “When it gets down to it, when it gets down to the endgame, everyone just wants to buy another five minutes for themselves and their . . . and the people they care about.”

It was Sanjit’s little sister, Bowie, who had found Astrid and pulled her away. “Lana says you should come.”

“Why?” Astrid asked.

“Sam. Quinn just brought him to Clifftop. And he’s hurt.”

Astrid ran from the town plaza to Clifftop with her heart in her throat. She burst in, breathless and red in the face, and nearly stepped on one of the injured in the hallway.

Lana looked up as Astrid came tearing in and, before Astrid could speak, said, “He’ll live.”

But Lana was not with Sam: Sam was in a corner, on the floor, practically shoved underneath a coffee table. Quinn was with him.

“Hello, Astrid,” Quinn said.

She ignored him, knelt beside Sam, and took his face in both hands. “Sam. Sam!”

“He’s been out for a while,” Quinn said.

“What happened?”

“It seems he ran into Gaia outside of town. Broke him up pretty bad.”

Astrid twisted her head around and yelled at Lana, “Why aren’t you helping him?”

“Because he’s not going to die and this one is!” Lana snarled back.

“We need him!”

“You all needed Brianna, too. How did that work out for you?”

Astrid jumped to her feet and for a moment was so out of control she nearly swung at Lana. Lana did not flinch. Sanjit moved smoothly between them.

“Hey, hey, hey, come on. Come on.”

“You want to do something useful, Astrid, talk to your brother,” Lana said.

Astrid recoiled.

“I know all about Nemesis,” Lana said. “I know what’s on the line. You asked me to reach out to the gaiaphage—well, let me tell you, Astrid, that touch goes both ways. It’s not pleasant, Astrid.” She was barely squeezing the words out through gritted teeth. “It’s not fun sliding up next to evil . . . hearing in your head the voice of a thing that tried to enslave you. To kill you. It hates me. It’s practically salivating at the idea of crushing me. Do you get that, Astrid the Genius?”

Astrid was taken aback by the venom in Lana’s voice, the pale fury on her face. Lana had aged in just the short time since Astrid had seen her last. Astrid knew she was seeing the face of some kind of suffering that she couldn’t really understand. But the fear, the fear on the face of this tough girl . . . that she understood.

“Lana, we can kill Gaia,” Astrid said.

“And Little Pete can kill the gaia
phage,
” Lana said. “Little Pete is the power: you know it, I know it. The gaiaphage is desperately afraid; that’s why it’s attacking. It’s afraid of Pete. It’s slaughtering people out of fear of Little Pete.”

“You know what Little Pete
needs
?” Astrid demanded. “Do you know what you’d be asking?”

Lana fell silent. She looked at the child she’d been touching. With her free hand she felt his neck, searching for a pulse. Then she laid her head on his chest, ear to his heart. Finally, she sat back. “I didn’t realize how damaged . . . I should have started sooner.”

It took Astrid a moment to realize what she had just seen. She stumbled back, stopped herself, met Lana’s haunted gaze.

“Yeah. That’s my life now,” Lana said. She raised a trembling finger to touch her own temple. “And now with
it
. With it back in my head. Extra fun.”

Lana stood up, nearly lost her balance, stretched to crack her back. “Well,
now
I have time for Sam. Plenty of time for Sam.” She accepted a glass of water from Peace and dropped down beside Sam.

“See those scissors?” Lana pointed to a pair of heavy shears on a table. “Bring them here and cut away his shirt. We have to start with his back.”

Astrid did as she was asked. She gasped seeing the bone protruding stark and white through Sam’s shoulder. But when they rolled him tenderly onto his side she saw the twisted jumble of his spine and almost lost hope.

“Yeah, that’s not good,” Lana said. “You’re going to have to help me. We need to straighten him out a bit, get the spine lined up. It goes a whole lot quicker if you at least get all the pieces back in place first. Where is Dahra? I could really use . . .” Then she remembered. “Two down, both hurt on lonely roads,” she said softly. “One dies. One lives, at least for now. The God you don’t believe in anymore rolls the dice.”

Sam groaned in his sleep when Astrid cut the last of the fabric away.

“She was a good person, Dahra,” Lana said. Her lip trembled. “She was a good person, that girl.” She looked around the room, at kids softly crying, moaning, asking for water. “Bunch of good dead people.” Then, shaking her head as if trying to throw something off, she yelled, “Sanjit! Send Peace to find some kind of a board. Like a shelf would do.”

Lana lit a cigarette, sucked in deep, and blew it out in Astrid’s direction. “You ever notice something, Astrid? No two moofs have the same power. There’s not two kids with super-speed, just one. Not two or three or five or ten with Sam’s laser thing, just him. One Jack, one Dekka.”

“Yes,” Astrid acknowledged cautiously.

“One healer.”

“Yeah, we all noticed that,” Astrid said, making no secret of the fact that she wished someone less volatile was that one healer.

“But this Gaia monstrosity seems to be able to heal itself, and to shoot light beams, and to do the whole telekinesis thing. Interesting, isn’t it? Kids have been telling me stories while I lay my little magic hands on them. Okay, now take Sam by the waist. Grab on, because this is going to be really bad.”

Astrid did as Lana directed.
Don’t start crying,
she told herself. But it hurt seeing the body she loved broken this way.

“You’re going to pull, see, so I can try to push the bones back into line. And you’re going to keep pulling until I tell you different. Got that?”

“I do,” Astrid said.

“Pull.”

Astrid pulled and Sam thrashed and Lana yelled at Astrid for loosening her grip so Astrid tightened her grip and pulled hard and Sam opened his eyes and yelled and flailed with his hands so Sanjit ran over and grabbed his hands, fast, because Sam’s hands could be very dangerous, and Quinn came around to help Astrid pull.

Lana pushed vertebrae back into place with a sickening wet crunch, then slid a wooden shelf beneath him and let Quinn and Sanjit work together to wrap strips of sheet around and around, locking Sam into place.

Sam quieted and lapsed again into unconsciousness.

“He may have internal injuries,” Lana said. “I can fix the back and the shoulder, maybe. We’ll see about anything else.”

“I should get back to Edilio, see if he needs . . .,” Astrid said and stood to leave.

“Yeah. You should go,” Lana agreed. “And then you better figure out which is worse, smart girl: That we give someone up as a living sacrifice to Little Pete. Or the other thing.”

Lana was smirking now, angry and challenging. Astrid didn’t want to ask, because she knew the answer. But she couldn’t not ask.

“What
other
thing, Lana?”

“The thing where we kill Sam, and Caine, too, if we can find him, to disarm the gaiaphage.”

Astrid stood stock-still.

Lana laughed her cynical laugh. “Yeah, you’re the genius, but that doesn’t make me an idiot.”

Astrid nodded. Her focus went to the big pair of shears, and beyond to the automatic pistol at Lana’s waist. She bit her lip hard and then said, “Sam?”

“I’m not going to hurt him,” Lana said. “That’s not what I do. Remember? I’m the Healer.”

“I WANT
MY
whip back.”

Drake’s head had melded perfectly well to Alex’s neck, although there was a definite red line, like . . . well, like surgery had been done and not quite healed.

Alex’s own head, now a fleshless, tongueless, and empty skull, lay in a ditch.

“Be glad you have a body at all,” Gaia snarled.

“I am glad,” Drake said, trying to sound obsequious. “But I can’t fight beside you like this.” He pointed with his remaining hand at the stump of his other arm. “It happened once before. It could happen again.”

Gaia seemed uncertain. It was a strange expression for the face of a goddess, Drake thought. But then Gaia herself was strange for what she was. He knew better than to take the beautiful, olive-skinned, blue-eyed face at face value. He knew he was still looking at the creature formerly represented by a seething carpet of green particles. But she was a beautiful girl now, almost his own age by all appearances.

As beautiful as Diana had been before starvation took its toll. As beautiful as Astrid and just as smug and arrogant.

It confused him. Because he instinctively wanted to hurt her. Fantasy images came to his mind and shocked him. She would kill him if she knew.

It was not a good idea to lust after a god. Even worse to imagine the whip coming down on her—

No,
he ordered himself.
Stop
. She was not Diana or Astrid. She was nothing like them. She was still it. She was still the Darkness. Still the evil that had welcomed him, given him a place, given him a purpose.

“I need my arm,” Drake said, willing to push on this point at least because without his whip hand he was weak. Without his whip hand, what weapon did he have? Without it he was just Drake, not Drake Whip Hand.

“Why do you want it so badly?” Gaia asked. “What would you use it for?”

“To fight beside you, defend you, protect . . . To . . .”

Her face was blank, but her eyes bored into him. “Tell me the truth.”

If he lied . . . she could destroy him right here, right now. How much did she guess? He had to answer. Truth or lie. “Diana first,” Drake hissed. “Astrid more slowly.”

Gaia shook her head. “Later. If.”

“If?”

“If you bring me the Healer,” Gaia said. “She is . . . She resists me. She looks for a way to deprive me . . .” Suddenly she seemed to think better of opening her thoughts to him. “Just bring her to me. Then you can do what you like.”

She put her hand on the stump of an arm. “I don’t know what will grow,” she said.

“It will come back,” Drake said. “It has to.”

Astrid stood at the top of the cliff that gave Clifftop its name.

There were boats out there, out in the dark ocean. She could see the lights going by.

When she craned her neck to the left she could see the glow coming from the camp, from the Carl’s Jr., the lights of the new hotels.

It was all so desperately, terribly near. How far to cheeseburgers and fries and cars that weren’t burned out and policemen to call when danger threatened?

Not a quarter of a mile.

Electricity and freedom from fear. Food and warmth. Her mother and father, cousins and aunts and family friends, and all of them saying,
So what was it like?
And
I bet you’re glad to be out of there
.

Were you afraid?

So afraid
.

I guess you saw some bad things?