Tormented (38 page)

“He couldn’t hear her,” Zollers said.

“Because of the coma?” she asked.

“Because of the chloridamide,” I said. “I think, anyway. I took a big dose a couple days ago, before I was leaving.”

Ariadne stared at me, flummoxed. “Why?”

“Because they’re arguing,” I said tautly, ignoring the cause of the argument, keeping it to myself. “And I didn’t want to hear it on my drive.”

“I thought,” Reed said, finally breaking his silence, “chloridamide only worked for like … twelve hours at a time?”

“Whatever they gave her,” Zollers said, “I suspect it reacted in a synergistic manner with the chloridamide, magnifying the duration of some of its effects and dulling others. For example, normally they can’t control any part of her body when she’s taking the drug. In this case, Gavrikov was able to do a hell of a lot, even blind as he was.” His eyes settled on me. “I’m not sure I’d recommend taking chloridamide any more, since it would appear that there are people out there trying to poison you.”

“Any idea who those people are?” Ariadne asked him.

“I have no clue,” Zollers said, shaking his head. “If they were close by, I might be able to offer some insight, but no one here on the campus seems to mean actual harm to Sienna now that she’s settled down.”

“It was the Brain,” Reed said quietly. “Simmons. Anselmo.”

I processed that in an instant. Villains from the past, back to aggravate me. Then I blinked, thinking back to what Zollers had said a moment earlier. “But before I…cooled down,” I said, “someone here meant me harm?”

Reed exchanged a look with Zollers, then answered me. “Phillips ordered you shot when it looked like you were going to blow up.”

I blinked, absorbing that information. “Makes sense. I would have done the same.”

Reed blanched almost imperceptibly then looked at Ariadne and started to speak. He never got a word out, cut off by Zollers before he could even begin. “Ariadne,” Zollers said, “why don’t we go ahead and leave these two alone? I suspect they’ve got some talking to do.”

“What?” Ariadne’s eyes widened. “Someone should stay with her—”

“And I’m sure she’ll give us a shout if she needs anything,” Zollers said, gently putting an arm around Ariadne’s shoulder and steering her toward the door. “How have you been?”

“I—I’m … all right, I suppose,” Ariadne said as she disappeared around the corner with Zollers. He gave Reed a wink as he left us alone.

“Smooth operator, that one,” Reed said, stepping deeper into my trashed quarters. His hands hung at his sides, like he was having trouble deciding what to do with them.

“Knowing what people want to hear probably helps you know what to say to them,” I agreed. “Did you see Scott off all right?”

“He’s hanging around for the night,” Reed said, shrugging. “I got him into the quarters across the hall. He was pretty exhausted from moving all that water around. Same with Augustus, churning all that dirt.”

I felt my muscles tense. “Is he going to be all right?”

“Broken back,” Reed said, “but he’s recovering nicely. Isabella says he should be on his feet in a couple days. He pretty much passed out on his back after tonight, though, soggy bed and all.”

“What happened to him?” I asked. “That Cunningham guy I had to step over in the infirmary?”

“No,” Reed’s face got pinched. “No, Cunningham turned out all right. He helped save the day. It was Anselmo did the number on Augustus. On Cunningham, too, actually.”

“Anselmo Serafini? That prick?” I clenched my teeth. “I should have killed him in Italy.”

“Well, you got him this time,” he said. “Or, I guess I should say ‘we’ got him, since I ripped his lungs out before I tossed him on the funeral pyre that was you.”

I blinked, then looked down at the ash that was smeared along my neckline below the t-shirt I had appropriated from Perugini’s office. “Is this …?”

“A little overdone, but yes,” he said, nodding.

“Ewwwww!” I brushed at my chest, like I could get the smudge of black off my skin, pausing as I realized something else. “And he’s in my
hair!

Reed laughed. “Sorry. But hey … at least we’re rid of the version of him that talks back. All you need is a shower or twelve and you’ll be done with him for good.”

“Oh, you’re funny,” I said, still scrabbling to try and get the smudge off my cleavage. I finally gave up. “I hate that he’d actually love that he ended up here.”

“I wouldn’t worry about it,” Reed said, and I could tell he was setting up for a punch line, “it’s what he would have wanted. In a way, leaving him there kind of makes you a real metahumanitarian.”

“Ugh, awful,” I said, shaking my head. I let the humor pass, watched my brother’s smile fade. “I thought you didn’t believe in killing our criminals.”

He opened his mouth and let it hang like that for a moment before answering. “I … well …”

“I’m sorry,” I said, waving him off, “I shouldn’t have brought that up.”

“No, it’s fine,” he said. “I wanted to say—”

“I had kind of a revelation while I was under—” I started.

We both paused in that awkward way, like neither of us wanted to step on the other’s line. “You go first,” I said.

“No, you,” he said.

“All right,” I said, swallowing my pride. “You were right. I kill too quick. It’s become a sort of … first resort for me, since London. It’s a bad habit to be in—”

“I was talking out my ass, Sienna,” he said, shaking his head. “I was the one who was wrong. I’ve never seen you kill someone who didn’t have it coming.” He paused, thinking it over for a beat. “You know, since M-Squad. Or Omega’s Primus. And even some of those are kindasorta arguable—”

I blinked in surprise. Where the hell was this coming from? “Uh, no. They really weren’t. That was … it was a hint of me at my least controllable.”

He pulled back, looked like he’d been slapped a little. “I was just … I think I’ve been too hard on you.”

“Maybe I haven’t been hard
enough
on me,” I countered. “You once told me I was a sheepdog here to protect humanity. That I wasn’t a mad dog in danger of breaking my chain. But something happened since that day to convince you otherwise, and looking back on what’s happened in the last year or so, I’ve killed a lot of people—”

“I’m not going to explain those away one by one,” Reed said, shaking his head, “but I think if you went through your head and really examined them, every last one of them was trying to kill you. Every last one of them had ill intent toward you or another person. Every one of them was conducting their own little war against Sienna Nealon or someone else. You didn’t go kill nannies and babysitters on the street, Sienna. These people knew they were in a fight with you. And that’s the last place anyone ought to be if they want to live. By now, that’s just understood.”

“Tell that to the paparazzi,” I muttered, and I knew he caught it. “You’ve got something else on your mind.”

He didn’t argue, but he looked tentative. “I know that to you, I always seemed like the guy who had his shit together. Even when I was a kid, and Dad … left me for the last time … I was like a block of stone, holding it all in. I didn’t let him see how desperate I was underneath it all, how much I was barely treading water, how much I wanted to break down. For the last few months … I’ve been doing the exact same thing to you. Letting you think I was just some impervious wall that didn’t care at all about you, that ignored you. The truth was … I was just trying to … I don’t know. Harden my heart. Hold you at arm's length because I disagreed with you, with what you were doing. But all the while, I’ve been isolating you, and that was … just damned cruel.” His face crumpled. “Sienna, I’m sorry. You’re the only family I’ve got left, and I’m sorry I let my pigheadedness get in the way of thinking it through sooner and telling you how much you mean to me … sis.”

I blinked tears out of my eyes for the umpteenth time in the last few days. Seriously, this was going into the Sienna Book of World Records. I don’t do the crying thing very much, after all. “You want a hug?” I asked, trying to keep a stiff upper lip.

He grinned. “Hell, no. You’ve got some Anselmo on you, after all.”

I laughed, and he hugged me tight.

And when it did it, it felt just like my dad.

Just like
our
dad.

He broke after a minute with a laugh. “You hungry?”

“I am so starving,” I said, and my stomach rumbled. “Apparently I haven’t eaten in the last couple days, and if I don’t ingest some fat soon, the tabloids are going to start reporting on my shocking weight loss plan that has my complete lack of friends worried about my health. On the plus side, maybe the internet will stop saying my ass is fat.”

“The internet is stupid,” Reed said, shaking his head. He put a hand around my shoulders and started steering me toward the door. “And I think you know, after tonight, that you’ve still got friends … though it seems like you might have tried your hardest to push a few of them away.”

I am death
, the voice whispered in my head.

“I didn’t want anyone to get hurt,” I said. I glanced back and saw Dog wagging his tail. “Stay,” I told him, and he parked it right inside the threshold. “Good Dog.”

“Cafeteria’s shut down for the night,” Reed said as we hit the stairs. I wondered if he had an aversion to elevators, but I was letting him lead. “I know a breakfast place nearby that makes killer waffles.”

“Yesssss,” I said. “Waffles. I will eat all the waffles.”

“Maybe not all of them,” he teased. “Remember the internet, after all.”

“Those people can cram a waffle press up their asses, wide open, sideways,” I said as we rounded the bend in the staircase. “It is nice to see people back, though.”

“You mean Zollers?” he asked.

“And Scott,” I said. He gave me a look that I couldn’t decipher. “What?”

He shook his head. “Nothing. It does feel good to have them here again, doesn’t it? Makes it feel a little more like … home.”

Something tugged at the corner of my lips. “Home?” I turned the word over in my mouth. “Home. Hmm. Maybe I do belong here.”

He frowned. “What made you think you didn’t? Phillips?”

I tried to decide if I should tell him or not. “It was something that … my nightmares kept hitting me with, over and over. Playing on a conversation I had with Phillips when he suspended me—that maybe I didn’t belong here. That maybe … I didn’t belong anywhere. Because of who I am, you know. It was …” I shuddered. “I don’t know if I can explain it, but … it was really unsettling. Probably made feel worse than … maybe than I’ve ever felt.”

“This Phillips thing is going to come to a head,” Reed said after a long pause, just as we were reaching the exit into the dormitory lobby. “You may find that you don’t end up belonging here.” I stared out into the night beyond the glass-fronted lobby, the first strains of dawn lighting the horizon. “But you’ll find a place, I promise.”

I felt my guts rumble, from hunger and fear. “You think so?”

“You’ve faced death in so many forms and from so many scary people,” Reed said, blowing it off, “you’re telling me you’re scared to go job hunting? Or looking for a new place to live?” He kicked at the ground as we came out of the lobby, the squeak of the doors closing behind us.

“People hate me,” I said. “And you should know, because until now, it seemed like you understood how they felt.” He grimaced. “But seriously … where would I go? Where
could
I go that they’d want me?”

“Reality TV?” Reed asked, smirking. “Cable news? Politics? Hell, you’d fit right in with any of those.”

“Ass,” I muttered as we walked under a near-dark sky, his warmth keeping the autumn chill at bay. “Are we going to the garage?”

“Nah,” he said, “I left Baby parked outside the medical unit.” He pointed straight ahead, and I saw his new car up against a curb across the parking lot ahead of us.

“‘Baby’?” I asked, swiveling my head to look at him. “Really?”

He shrugged. “Your dog is named ‘Dog.’ Get off my back.”

I gave that a moment’s consideration. “Fair point,” I conceded.

We crossed the parking lot, the night air strangely refreshing. As I stepped onto the curb, I could see the dark hole in the ground next to the door to the infirmary. I stared into it for a moment, almost like I could see some evil waiting within.

Then again, I’d just proven I had one hell of an imagination these last few days.

“You all right?” Reed asked, hanging out with his driver’s door open, talking to me over the roof of his sporty little contraption. (I don’t know cars. But it was sporty.)

“I’ll be all right,” I said, his face reminding me again of Dad. I eased down into the seat and slammed the door behind me. The leather was damned comfy, I’d give him that.

“I sure hope so,” he said, shutting his door. He favored me with a smile that was warm, genuine, and reminded me again of our father. “I’d like you to be around for a good, long time.”

I thought about the words I’d said to the faux-Breandan just a few days—or maybe a lifetime—ago, about me either living nearly forever, or watching all the people I loved and cared about die before my very eyes. My breath hung in my throat for a moment, and then I forced a smile, forced myself to start breathing again. “I’d like that, too,” I said and meant it.

“Good,” Reed said, and nodded as he started to push the ignition button. “Glad we’re in agreement, since this is the first time in a while that we’ve—”

My brother’s last words were lost as his face disappeared into fire as the car exploded around us.

Cassidy watched on the monitor as the car flared into a burst of fire, a blinding beacon of light that set her monitor to near-white for a few seconds. The warm, salty water of the isolation tank lapped at her skin, and she allowed herself a little smile. “Gotcha,” she whispered, as she watched the flames through the camera’s lens, dancing soundlessly into the night.