Vin's Rules (Outer Settlement Agency) (8 page)

“What if we stayed another day?” She hated the notion as soon as the words crossed her lips. The longer they stayed, the more likely the chance of these idiots finding their means of transportation. Almost certainly, they would go out looking for it today. “Kill that. We have to get to our shuttle before they do.”

“Since you brought it up, we can’t just leave either. I’m not abandoning—”

“I know that. That’s the one thing I know for sure.  We need that shuttle, though. We get it, then we can use it to threaten the net. Together. Mike said that people are free to leave anytime they want. So, we leave. Just go get it.”

That cute eyebrow of his went to work again. “Time out. In your head, you see them letting us out that gate?”

“We’ll call them out on what they claim. That way if they say no, it exposes more of the lie. We need to chip away at the façade. If they say yes, we go.”

“Publicly. At lunch. Or whatever bell they call it. I’m in.”

Which also meant hanging around until then. It didn’t, however, have to be without purpose. Allie patted down her dress, removing the small vial of lotion given to her last night. With a casualness she sure as crap didn’t feel, she slathered some on her ridiculously exposed chest and turned toward the doctor’s office as she rubbed it in. “Wonder if Mike’s working?”

She glanced at Vin and instantly regretted the last two seconds. He pinched his nose and let out a huff of air. “That still stinks.”

She snapped the lid, but some of the cream splurted on her shoes. Vin’s “Awww, lovely” was mostly ignored as she tried to wipe the excess away. Still bent, she nodded to her primary objective. “We should talk to him. He wants out. You know he does. He can be our man on the inside.”

“Maybe, with a little help from Poppy.”

“Maybe is better than no. He might even let us slip into the doctor’s building.”

Turns out he couldn’t, because he wasn’t there. What they did find was a passed-out Tan reeking of last night’s liquor. His shirt was clean and unwrinkled—he hadn’t slept in it. By all appearances, he’d partied hard, dragged himself to work, and gave up the fight soon after.

Allie tiptoed past him with Vin fast on her heels.

Five steps led up to the front door. There, Vin jiggled the knob. “It’s locked.”

“No problem. Ert’zods have been popping locks for generations. Help me lift my dress. No jokes.”

“No problem.” Vin gathered the folds of her garment in his arms, then reached down to slip out the stiletto from her thigh holster and handed it over.

Her grandfather had run and still ran into people wanting to kill him on a regular basis. Locks, be they mechanical, electrical, or even rope, were meant to be conquered. “Your parents taught you how to play as a kid. My family taught me this.”

“I’ll applaud them later,” he said, looking behind them as the door creaked open.

The napping guard hadn’t stirred. All the same, rather than reholster her blade, she placed it in the pocket of her dress for the time being.

The building was dark, and her skin pebbled at the sudden change to chillier air. “Why is it so cold?”

“Do you hear that?”

She did. A scratching sound like dulled nails inching across steel, while the light from outside cast long, grotesque shadows. “Why do I feel like a kid hearing monsters under the bed?”

“I wouldn’t say under the bed. They’re right over there.”

His arm and pointed finger landed on her shoulder, and she followed the path to something that stopped her heart cold. Cages full of them.

Hairy.

Huge.

Gossamer-winged.

Scary-ass spiders.

They moved slowly at first, almost as if coming out of some sort of haze. But the closer she and Vin got to the cages, the more they rattled within them.

Vin rapped his knuckles against the top of a container. “They’re breeding them.”

“What did you tell me earlier? Only say what we know for sure? We know they have them. Maybe they’re studying them. There’s nothing to indicate breeding.”

“Because they’re too good for that?”

Well, no.

The monstrous things were the stuff of nightmares. Eight-legged with fur that looked as threatening as the saliva that dripped from their mouths. She’d never known spiders to snarl.

These did.

Then again, she’d never known spiders to fly.

They lurched towards her, pushing against their prison walls. Some of them had legs thin enough to get through the bars—twitching towards them, clawing the air.

“We need our omnitablets for this. No one will believe it. Nature didn’t do this. Nature is slow. Methodical. There’s nothing here requiring this evolutionary step. This was purposeful.”

She didn’t bother asking why. If what he said was true, and you didn’t have to be a science genius to see the sense in it, this had been done for one reason.

Power.

Scared people were gullible and controllable.

As she moved alongside the cages, she noticed that the things were in various stages of health. Some vibrant and strong, others slow and jerky.

One damn near dead, eaten from the inside, if the white, wiggling, fat maggots crawling out its flesh were any indication.

Vin said something, but even at this close distance, it was hard to hear with the clattering in the cages as growing numbers of the creatures livened up.

When she didn’t respond, Vin eased up next to her and nudged her shoulder. “I said, I don’t think they notice me.”

“You’re crazy. These things are going nuts trying to get at us.”

“Nope, just you. Look.” He waved his hand in front of one, and it jerked it his direction.

Temporarily.

But soon it was trained back on her. Each time she moved, spittle dripped from its engorged mandibles.  She leaned in and the thing went nuts—its legs clenching as if to grab her.

“Vin, I think—ow!”

He’d shoved her to the floor, placing himself between her and one of the escaped creatures. His chivalrous efforts were cute but ultimately unsuccessful.

Wings and stuff. Wings gave two craps about honorable men.

The things flew right over his head and onto hers, landing with its brushy hairs sweeping her nose and eyelids. She wanted to scream, wanted to yell, but that meant opening her mouth, and she’d lie down and die before one of those things scraped its furry legs on her tongue.

She didn’t give up though, rolling around and trying to wrestle herself free.

Somewhere along the way, the blade in her pocket twisted, jamming into her leg. This time, she couldn’t help but cry out.

Vin ripped the massive beast off, and she crab-crawled away, losing her shoe in the process.

The spider righted itself in an instant, rushing straight for Vin. Allie did what she could. She grabbed her shoe and threw it. It bounced off the creature’s back and ricocheted into a corner.

Scrambling to her knees, gritting her teeth against the pain, she prepped for an attack that didn’t come.

“Shit!” Vin dropped to his knees in front of her. “Is this knife in as deep as it looks?” At her jerky nod, he swore again. “We’ve gotta get it out of you.”

“But the spider?”

“Occupied.”

Though the room blurred through her tears, she found the spider in the corner, viciously attacking the shoe. “I don’t understand.”

“The lotion. Yeah, it’s on you, but you dropped some on your shoe too.” He pointed to the nearest set of cages. “It’s why these ones are still trying to attack you, but our friend back there isn’t.”

Her mind started to work it out—that Graham and his wife’s multiple layers of security were more sinister than anyone imagined. She couldn’t dwell on it too long though, the pain jagging above her knee zapped her of energy.

“We’ve gotta go, Allie. They’re going to know someone was here and trace it back to us. There’s no waiting anymore. We leave today.”

“I can’t run like this.”

“Then I’ll carry you.  On the count of three, I’ll pull it out.”

“Wait...”

“No time.”

No time to prepare.

No time to explain to him her thing about blood.

No time to do anything other than pass the heck out.

A
llie woke up with her head cradled in Vin’s lap. He sat with his back to the wall in their tiny room, looking toward the window. At her slight movement, he grinned. “Welcome back. Not a fan of blood, eh?”

“It’s a thing.” Kinda woozy, she didn’t move just yet, and he seemed in no real rush to let her.

“What about... you know... I mean...”

“If you’re meandering around the topic of women’s issues, that’s not a thing.”

“Right. You know, I was almost mad at you for not telling me.”

“Almost?”

He brushed back a lock of her hair and scratched his stubbly chin. “We’ve all got
things
. There’s a better than good chance of more blood before it’s over.  You can’t pass out again. I need you, Allie. We can’t do this without each other.”

He could. He could leave now, run for it, and expect to have some help in soon. One look up at him and she knew the thought hadn’t crossed his mind.

Her entire career was based on helping everyone within the Outer Settlement Agency be the best they could. Now would be no different. “You have to go. Now. It’ll be easier if we split up.”

“I get that you feel you’ve got to say that, but—”

“I’ll buy you time. It means sneaking out, but I doubt they have much protection against that. You’ll find a soft exit. Take it.”

He sniffed and winked. “Got it out of your system yet?”

“I’m serious.”

“Me too. I caught some glances carrying you through town. I told them you were still tossed from last night. Your wound will hurt. Who knows what microbes they have out here. Without being able to get it cleaned, we gotta get you to the medikit on the shuttle.”

She sat up, whooshing out air at the shooting pain that met her.

“I’m going to hurt you, and you can’t let it show. You can’t limp. You can’t gasp, but we need to wrap it better. When we get to the shuttle, I’ll cauterize it, but I can’t offer you any of that right now.”

“They’ll see. Cameras.”

“We’re all out of options. It’s a chance, but I’m a gambler.”

Vin eased off the bed and lifted the many layers of her skirt. The color hid the blood, but any real inspection would show the darkened fabric on her side.

He took off her one remaining sandal and reached for her OSA shoes, abandoned on their first night here. “You’ll need to put these on. Better for running anyway.”

She closed her eyes, and he went to work. Stars burst behind cinched shut eyelids at the pain, but she could handle it. It took some screaming into her fist and biting against her knuckles, but she didn’t have the luxury of crying.

So she didn’t.

Instead she bit her lip, twisted against the sheets, and took it. The pain migrated throughout her entire body. Even the space between her eyes ached. “You have to stop. I can’t take anymore.”

“Shhh. I’m done. That’s it.” Vin dropped a dry kiss on her knee and pulled down her dress. “Try to get some sleep and dream of home.”

She rested with her head in his lap, but sleep was too far away. She thought about the world beyond this place and knew that her role in it was forever changed by this experience. How she talked to people. What categories she locked people into at just a glance. Two more lessons terribly learned: As long as you’re free, you’re a step ahead of the many people who aren’t. And just as important, one never knows what someone else has gone through. “You’re a hero.”

“I’m a security officer.”

“That too.”

“I’m hot.”

He interrupted her laughter by looking down with a wink. His open hand drew a circle in the air, pressing her on. He didn’t stop until she giggled out another, “That too.”

With a huff of contentment, he brushed back her hair. “I meant what I said. Try to get some rest.”

And this time she got a little.

Her eyes didn’t open again until the bell clanged for a meal. Vin rose first to poke his head out the door before closing it halfway. “It’s time. You ready for this?”

Another question with no choices.

Her walk down the hall was shaky but improving with each determined step. Vin’s hand on her back fueled her - a source of continued power. 

She’d half expected the room to quiet down at their arrival, but everyone went on with their lives, oblivious to the turmoil that held their lives in the balance.

Graham held court at the table in the back, but Mama’s bouffant wasn’t anywhere to be seen.

Side by side, they walked to Graham.

Clearly, he’d seen the determination in their faces. Graham’s smile dropped at their approach, but he didn’t wave his hangers-on away. Whatever was about to happen, he wanted an audience too.

“I’ll take a wild stab in the dark on this one. You two are ready to leave.”

Vin didn’t even pretend to smile. “Your unexpected hospitality has been a godsend.”

“But you’re done with us now?”

No good way to answer that. “No” was a boldfaced lie. They’d have to report
something.
“Yes” was just as dangerous. If, or rather when they came back, they certainly wouldn’t be alone.

Vin’s slithering response was downright political in its sidestepping of the question. “What you’ve done here veers to the extraordinary. Now, where can we find the cyclerover we came in on?”

Graham’s hands flipped up, grasping the air. “Damaged, I’m afraid. We are—were—in the process of repairing it for you, but well... rules are rules.”

Impossibly, Vin kept his cool. Mostly. The words and his jaw were just the teensiest bit clenched. “I make my own rules.”

“Ahh, but rules and regulations are necessary for cohesion, you see. Society is built on structure. Solidarity. So when one person wants to leave, they must do so immediately. We see the decision as unhealthy, and like any plague, we don’t want the infection spreading.”

Her eyes drifted to the window. It should have scared her that they were being sent out with nothing when well over half the day was gone. Graham meant to kill them.