Zimmer’s tone turned sarcastic when he said, “Obviously that didn’t happen.”
Krista took a moment to search her memories, drifting into the scene where a whirl of activity happened all at once.
First there was Summer and her injured dog walking past her in the barn. Then the strain of Liz arriving unexpectedly and having to explain to her what happened to Edison.
A moment later, the scene changed again, this time with a focus on Liz’s emotional reaction and her flying past Krista on her way to Edison’s body. Then it showed the lab geeks showing up and her tasking them to help the security team escort the prisoners to the brig.
When the vision showed the detainees walking past her while they were under escort, she could see the faces of everyone involved, but there were only two that belonged to the prisoners—neither of which was the Scab Girl. “Shit! She wasn’t there.”
“What?” Zimmer asked.
Krista turned her eyes to the cell, looking through the bars at Horton. “I was so focused on Liz the whole time, I missed the fact that only these two assholes walked past me.”
Zimmer shook his head. “The girl was in the truck, right?”
“She had to be, Rod. Otherwise Summer would have said something. She was back there the whole time, with everyone else.”
Zimmer’s voice turned sharp. “Unless she helped the girl escape.”
“You’re reaching, Rod. Summer is a lot of things, but she would never do that.”
“But if she did that would be grounds for—”
“What’s going on?” a new voice asked from behind, interrupting Zimmer’s statement.
Krista turned to see Summer arriving in the doorway.
Summer stopped and put her hands on her hips. “Grounds for what?”
Krista didn’t want to answer the question. It would only lead to more questions and raise suspicions, tearing down what little trust Summer had in her. And Zimmer. She decided to redirect everyone’s focus, pointing at the cell. “Helena escaped.”
“What do you mean escaped?” Summer asked, not waiting for an answer before she turned to Wicks. “It was you, wasn’t it?”
“No, ma’am,” Wicks said, standing at attention with his chest full and shoulders back.
Summer looked at Krista. “I thought he was on suspension.”
“That ended this morning.”
“And you trust this guy?”
“Wicks said only two prisoners were delivered and I believe him,” Krista said, remembering a conversation she had with Edison years earlier.
She had tried to convince the Professor to install security cameras throughout the complex, but the old man denied the request. They would have come in handy today, had she only known and convinced him to spy on the community. Maybe Summer wouldn’t be as tough to convince. She was a rookie leader, after all.
Summer’s eyes lit up, as did the redness in her face. “There were three in the truck, Krista. I was there.”
“Yes, exactly,” Zimmer said. “You were there. Alone. With all three of them.”
“What the hell does that mean?” Summer asked, also shifting her eyes to Krista.
“He’s just pissed off like we all are. Don’t pay him any mind,” Krista answered, not wanting to add to Summer’s paranoia, as justified as it was.
Zimmer never should have said what he did, but there wasn’t time for any of this.
Krista gave Summer a head nod as more facts surfaced in her mind. “We did leave them alone for a minute or two.”
Summer paused, her eyes dropping to the floor. They darted left and right for a few beats before she brought them up to Krista. “—when I carried Sergeant Barkley to the stairs.”
“—and I was dealing with an emotional Liz, telling her about Stuart.”
Summer stepped to the bars of the cell, putting her hands on the metal as she addressed the bearded man with the injured leg. “You need to tell me right now, where the hell did she go?”
Horton shrugged. “How should I know? I was blindfolded, remember.”
“You have ears, don’t you? You must have heard something.”
“Not with Helena,” Horton said, looking as though he was proud. “Think about it for a moment. She’s been out in the Frozen World, alone, all this time and somehow, she’s survived. That should tell you everything you need to know about who you’re dealing with.”
Krista joined her boss, though she didn’t make contact with the bars, only peering at Lipton. “You’re apparently some kind of know-it-all. Why don’t you tell us what happened?”
“Yeah, right,” Lipton said with a twist of his mouth, motioning to Horton. “Like he said, that girl’s a ninja and we couldn’t see dick.”
A pause hung in the room until Lipton spoke again, this time laughing as the words left his mouth. “Looks like you geniuses were outsmarted by a scrawny little cannibal. Now that’s what I call funny. Scab Girclass="underline" one. Braintrust: zero.”
Zimmer grabbed Krista’s arm. “A Scab Girl? Are you kidding me?”
“No, I’m not kidding, unfortunately,” Krista replied, wishing she could deny it. She motioned at Horton and Lipton. “We found her out there with these two.”
“They tried to ambush us, but it didn’t work,” Summer said to Zimmer. “Lipton was holding the gun.”
Zimmer let go of Krista’s arm and angled his head back, apparently in shock. “Female Scabs?”
“Yeah, who knew?” Summer said.
“Not us, obviously,” Krista added.
“Just for the record,” Horton said. “That girl—she saved me. More than once after Frost left me out there to die. She’s not like the others.”
“Like they care,” Lipton snapped, rolling his eyes. “You just don’t get it, do you?”
“They need to know, because she’s not who they think she is.”
Lipton shook his head, looking annoyed, before turning his attention to Krista. “There’s something else you might find interesting. That little old Scab Girl has stretch marks around her midsection. Layers of them, by the looks of it.”
Zimmer threw up his hands, shooting a piercing look at Krista. “She was pregnant?”
Krista nodded but didn’t respond.
“That’s right, folks, they’re breeding,” Lipton said. “Just what the world needs, more ravenous meat-eaters.” He pointed to Wicks, standing at attention. “Other than Mr. No-Neck over there.”
“If there’s one Scab Girl, there’s probably more,” Zimmer said.
Lipton smirked, looking at Horton. “Well, what do you know? They actually get it. I didn’t think there were any brain cells still functioning in this place.”
“Speaking of which, where are we, exactly?” Horton said, his eyes gazing up at the ceiling as he surveyed the brig and its support structure.
“Obviously, we are somewhere deep underground,” Lipton said. “You can smell it in the air.”
“I know, but where? Don’t we have a right to know?”
Lipton smirked, looking amused. “Good luck with that argument. They’re never going to tell us shit. Or trust us.”
“That’s all thanks to you. I told you the ambush was a bad idea,” Horton snapped.
“Sure, you say that now. But I don’t remember you raising even a hint of a protest when we were out there freezing to death.”
Krista ignored the men, keeping her focus on Summer. “Helena knows our location, boss.”
Summer nodded, tucking a lip under. “We have to find her.”
“Before Fletcher does. If someone reports a Scab Girl running loose, he’ll send out search parties.”
“Or the rest of her kind follows her back here,” Zimmer said.
“You should take me with you. I can track her,” Horton said.
“Why should we believe you? You’d say anything at this point,” Krista said.