Temper (19 page)

“Of?”

She stands and walks to the small painting I noticed before. I wonder if it is something she brought with her or if it was a part of the room and she took a liking to it. She adjusts it, though it was already straight. When she looks at me again I can see the weariness in her despite the distance separating us. “Knowing doesn’t always help.”

“Tell me.”

“You have a tumor. The Company serum kept it in check.”

Growth? “Like cancer?”

She nods.

“I don’t believe you.” I hope she doesn’t hear the squeak of fear in my rising voice. “If what you’re saying is true, then through whatever they gave us on the ship the Company has found a way to cure cancer.”

She hesitates and then nods again.

My breath is heavy in my lungs, sticking to the walls of my chest. The ache in my head blurs my vision and stings my eyes. “No. You’re wrong.”

“This is a lot to take in. I think we should probably—”

“Stop talking down to me. I’m no child.” I grip the edge of the table so hard I can’t feel my fingers. “You’re wrong with your fancy theory and your backyard training. You know nothing.”

“Sam—”

“No.” I still can’t feel my fingers. That’s normal isn’t it? It’s not some result of the thing growing in my head. Is it? Rubbing my palms, I try to get some perspective. I’m thinking like she’s right, but she can’t be. There’s nothing growing in my head.

Across the table, Charley watches me in silence. Pitying silence.

I’ll wipe the pity from her face. “If they’ve cured cancer, why was that how most of the people died on board the ship?”

She blinks and straightens.

“That fails your precious little theory, doesn’t it?”

Her brows gather and the pen in her hand twirls around and around. “Cancer is a complicated beast.”

“Sounds like you’re making excuses to me.”

She stands, paces the small room. “There is little use for the elderly on board a ship.” She makes another turn as she thinks aloud. “It would be easy enough to switch the serum protecting the patient to a placebo, then nature would take its course. It would require careful food distribution, assuming that’s the vehicle to have the serum enter the system but it wouldn’t be difficult under the tight regulations of shipboard life.”

“This isn’t some interesting problem you’ve been given. You’re talking about people’s lives, effectively killing off a generation if they’re lucky to live to old age. My grandparents, their parents.” My voice cracks. “People who read their grandsons bird books because they said there was more magic in the peregrine falcon than any fairy tale.”

“I didn’t think.”

“No, you’re thinking too much. As though you have some proof but you don’t, not really. You are making this up as you go along.”

“Aren’t we all?” Her smile is so sad, it’s worse than if she’d yelled.

I slump back into the chair. “What makes you so sure?”

“We were able to take an image of your brain.”

“When?”

Her gaze drops to the pen. “When you were unconscious.”

“Yesterday?”

I don’t need her confirmation. It had to have been yesterday. Since then they must have compared the tests they ran when I was Blank to their latest scan. She’s sure because she’s seen the growth and the effect on it being off the ship.

I should see it. My mouth opens. And I know that if I ask, she’ll show me the results of the scan. But if she shows me and it’s there …

I swallow fear. I’ve faced worse than this. “Show me.”

“Are you sure? This is a lot to take in.”

“Please.” The request comes out strangled. I focus on breathing. In and out. Repeat. Count backwards from one hundred in twos. Breathe some more. Anything to keep ahold of the shred of control I have left.

None of this is Charley’s fault.

But if she hadn’t gone poking about in my brain without my permission I’d be happily ignorant right now.

She places a folder on the table in front of me. I rest my hand on it, stilling the shaking and look up at her. “Being careful and keeping your distance, I notice.”

She brushes back hair where not a strand is out of place. “This is a sensitive issue.”

“And I’m one of the loose cannons.”

“I’m not afraid of you, Samuai.”

I laugh. She’s saying one thing but the brittle line of her shoulders and the way she keeps looking to the door, hoping for backup, says another. And it’s not her words that are right. Knowing she didn’t put this in my head isn’t helping keep down the anger rising inside me against her. “You should be.”

I think she holds the edge of the table to stop from backing away at the venom in my voice. “This thing in your head doesn’t have to define you,” she says soothingly. “If Asher is successful on her Company raid, we’ll have the serum; therefore, the ability to reduce the tumor in a matter of days.”

“You guess.”

She frowns.

“What if the serum stuff only stops it growing? If your theory is even correct, you have no basis to claim it will shrink the growth back to a size where I’m making rational decisions again, unaffected by the thing in my head.”

“We can hope.”

“It’s not enough.” I trace the smooth shape of the back of my skull, my fingers pressing as hard as I can stand. “I want it out.”

“I don’t think—”

“All of it. The growth, the nano-shit. All of it.” She’s shaking her head, but I don’t care. “You operated on my brain before, you can do it again.” As I speak, I stand, and I’m walking around the table. “I know it’s weird actually having permission before you do one of your little experiments, but this time I’ll hand you the blade myself. Cut it out. Now.”

She stands and backs away as I come toward her. “Calm down.”

The chair she was sitting on is between us. Correction, was between us. I’m glad it breaks when it hits the wall. “I’ve had enough of calm.”

“Samuai …”

My hand’s on her throat, and she’s not as heavy as I would have thought. I can hold her against the wall fine. The anger inside me burns brighter. This is what I should have done all along, the whole talking thing is overrated. “Cut it out.”

Her eyes are so big I think they might burst. “I would if I could, I swear.” Her breath is shaky, her hands grabbing at mine. “Please …”

Something about the word. It takes me back, to a boy I cared about like a brother. He begged for his life, too. I let go and stumble back to the seat. My head rests in my hands so much heavier than before. “I wouldn’t have hurt you.”

“I know,” she says.

I don’t examine the words too closely, in case I can tell they’re a lie. I stand on shaking legs, hardly daring to meet her gaze. Shame shouldn’t taste so familiar. “I have to go.”

Her hand reaches out toward me and then drops to her side. “I’m here for you if you need someone to talk to.”

If I didn’t know that she lied and schemed and put Kaih in prison for something she didn’t do, I’d almost believe the pain in Charley’s eyes is for me.

But I know better.

[Asher]

The medics arrive in moments and treat me right there in the middle of the hallway. Eyes closed, I listen as they bustle around me. I’m lying where I fell, still half in Davyd’s arms. Why doesn’t he put me on the floor? It must be a play for something. He’s probably trying to show his subordinates he has a caring side. With each breath I catch a hint of his scent. Funny, but I thought being Company now he’d smell different. The familiarity of it takes me back to the ship.

For a second I’m back in the training rooms giving everything to beat him after he dared me with the promise of a favor should I win. I needed to win to find out what happened to my brother and Samuai. I was no match for his strength and speed and experience but losing wasn’t an option. He cornered me at the top of the game space, smirking, so sure he’d won. But with nowhere left to run, I launched at him in a desperate lunge to take us both down. We fell. Arm in arm, bodies entwined, and landed hard. I remember neither of us moved for a moment.

This is the same, but impossibly different.

I couldn’t trust him then and I can’t now. But I can’t pretend it isn’t a little nice to have someone holding me. Even if it’s all a lie.

“Asher, we need you to breathe into this tube.” A stranger’s voice and then pain as plastic is shoved deep into my nose; a stream of oxygen follows. Their hands are cold and impersonal, angling my head up as they twist the tube, then a sucking sound echoing in my head. Another hand on the wrist without the bandage, feeling my pulse. “I think she’s stabilized.”

“Get a wheelchair.” The order comes from Davyd, and someone scurries to obey.

There’s the squeak of a wheel then he lifts me. There’s no pause or strain, but I’m lowered again so gently it brings a lump to my throat. I can’t take it after the violence of the interrogation. I hope my face shows nothing of the emotion swelling inside me.

“Take her back to her room.” Davyd barks the order. “I’ll catch up.”

“Yes, sir.” The medic’s voice tells me she’s young and female.

I think I feel the change in the air as Davyd walks away. It’s probably from the medics’ relief that one of their superiors have left. It isn’t because the world lacks a certain energy when he’s not around. Such a thing would make me more in tune with him than I could stand to be.

The medic pushes the chair along the hallways, back through the central space, and while I’m aware of us moving, I let myself relax into the act of being physically overwhelmed by what happened in the interrogation room.

It’s a rare luxury to rest my eyes by choice and retain consciousness, rather than fight a drug determined to pull me under.

I know when Davyd returns, not only because there’s a second set of steps, but the medic’s relaxed stroll becomes a purposeful stride, and the chair swerves a fraction each time she must turn to check to make sure she’s not doing something wrong. Or to simply check him out. Davyd isn’t exactly hard on the eyes.

So despite keeping my eyes closed, I’m not surprised when he speaks. “Thanks,” he says. “I’ll take the prisoner from here.”

The medic lingers. “Is that all you need me for, sir?”

That’s an invitation if I ever heard one. I bet she’s playing with her hair, touching his arm, making up an excuse to lean in close. Stupid, stupid girl. I’m tempted to sneak a peek at her, see if my guess is right, but I don’t think I’d be able to stop myself from gagging if I am.

“Nothing else … but thank you.”

I know that tone. He’ll be giving her a smile that says she’s impressed him, and he’ll be going out of his way to bump into her again real soon. I saw it on the ship. I saw it at camp. He can charm a stone wall when he wants to. Could he play this girl anymore? I almost, almost feel sorry for her. But then I remember she’s Company and therefore enemy, and I hope he breaks her heart.

She leaves and we’re alone. Apart from the other officers who go about their business.

He stops the chair, and I let my eyes drift open, as though I’m coming back to consciousness. We’re in the middle of the hallway, not far from the door to Rael and my room. I look behind. The tubes from my nose lead to a small tank attached to the back of the wheelchair.

“We have about thirty seconds before this will look suspicious.” As he speaks he’s studying the left wheel as though it’s jammed. His eyes dart my way. “What did you notice?”

“Before or after they tortured me?” There’s no one around and I can’t help the sarcasm.

His jaw tightens. “Stop feeling sorry for yourself and answer the question.”

Soft enough that no one could hear unless they had a microphone in the wall a foot away, I give him a brief rundown of the halls and the small room where I met the doctor and the second exit he and Maston left through and the security on the prison wing.

When I finish, he shakes his head in disappointment.

I’m sick of his games and his half-suggestions and implications that tell me nothing. “What was I supposed to pick up, oh brilliant one?”

His hand flies out but he doesn’t slap me. Instead, it rests on my mouth just below the tubes going to my nose. His skin is warm and clean and his touch is gentle. “Listen.”

I hate that focusing on anything other than his touch takes effort, but I listen. At first there’s only the distant movements of Company officers in the central area and indistinct thuds of others moving around the hallways beyond my sight. And then I hear it.

A faint hum.

I push his hands away. “We’re on a ship?” I blurt it out even as I know it’s not right. “I mean, something like the ship.” No wonder the past keeps tripping into the present. The faint throb of machines circulating air is the same as the noise I barely registered on the Pelican.

Amusement lightens his eyes. “Your guess is close. We’re underground.”

“But New City is made up of a series of white domes above ground. It’s a fancier version of our tent camp. Everyone knows that. Except theirs has running water and electricity.”

He nods. “That’s what Toby told me, too.”

My brain is scrambling. “He doesn’t know. The green robes don’t know about this facility.” Which means. “There must be two Company bases.”

“You’re right and wrong. Right now we’re below the tent city. They used the same tech from building the ship to create an environment that can be isolated from the city above. Right down to a farm level and exercise areas on lower levels.”

“But why?”

“Aliens.”

He says it as if it’s nothing, when he knows it could be everything. Growing up on what I thought was a ship sent to populate another planet because of an alien invasion, I accepted as fact that they were responsible for the catastrophic Upheaval. Discovering the ship and that our journey was a lie brought the rest into question.

I might not know the truth about the aliens, but I do know Davyd will do anything to bring his plans to fruition. Especially lie to me.

“You’re telling me to believe all of this is because they’re planning for an attack. You expect me to take this as proof aliens exist?”

“I expect nothing. Their belief makes regaining their army important. Our location means your chances of escape are negligible.”