“In all of the chaos that was happening that day, I did not plan as carefully as I should have,” Dr. Evans continued. Regret echoed in his voice. He folded his hands and placed them in his lap. “I should have watched, I should have paid attention to what Dr. Beeson did to take away your memories. But there was no fixing that. The soldiers that took over the building were tearing things apart. So I took your sister to the back entrance and told her to go.”
“And did she run?” I asked.
He shook his head. “At this point, my son knew what I had done. There was a confrontation. And I had to worry about getting West out of that building. But I told her to run and I have no reason to believe she wouldn’t have.”
“We’ll look,” I said, glancing out the window. City areas started to fall behind us, dropping us into desert terrain. “I understand we might not be able to find her. We won’t lose focus on the bigger picture.”
West shifted in his seat and his change in demeanor grabbed my attention.
“What?” I said, turning my eyes on him.
“I understand that saving the world is more important,” West said, his voice unsure and uncomfortable. “But I searched for her for five years. I thought I’d found her, only to find out I’d found my nemesis. How could I possibly stop trying to find her?”
Our eyes locked on each other and the silence was heavy inside the vehicle for several long moments.
“West,” I said, my voice quiet. “Will you come back with us if we have to leave? If we can’t find her?”
He didn’t respond for a beat. “I don’t know,” he replied truthfully. “I don’t think I’ll know the answer to that until we get to that moment.”
There was chaos behind West’s expression. There was confusion and commitment and a million other things that I completely understood. That didn’t make them easy to accept. But West was his own person and this was his decision.
“Okay,” was my response.
“You do realize making the decision not to return with us is suicide,” Dr. Evans growled and the heat was instantly back in the air. “After everything I did to make sure you survived, you’re going to throw it away?”
“Your efforts to get me out of NovaTor were not completely unselfish,” West said back in a low voice. “I can make my own choices now.”
As the van grew quiet again, I closed my eyes and let out a slow breath.
My life was way too complicated.
There was suddenly a warm, comforting hand on my shoulder from behind and I breathed slightly easier. I placed my hand over Avian’s and pictured trees and mountains. I pictured scouting down unseen trails. I imagined overlooking a valley and knowing that was where I belonged.
I imagined my life a few months down the road, if there was such a thing.
“That was the last major city until we get to Vegas,” Bill said quietly as the last of the buildings fell away and we rolled out into the desert.
TEN
I kept waiting for something to go wrong. For something to happen.
But Avian was very good at keeping Morgan hidden. He was inconspicuous in checking her IV line, in monitoring her breathing and pulse. I dared imagine no one would discover she was back there until we got the entire way to NovaTor.
And out here in the desert, there wasn’t a trace of Bane, other than two demolished bodies we’d passed in the middle of the road. Nothing could have destroyed them like that except for another Bane. My army was out there somewhere.
So we had yet to have a need to fire even a single bullet. Much of the drive reminded me of our journey from old Eden. There was nothing to see for miles and miles except for dry clay and sand and rugged hills and small canyons.
But just as we passed a sign that read fifty miles to Las Vegas, the clouds started rolling in, threatening rain in the late January air.
Dr. Beeson had said once the sun was gone we would get about one hour of power before the batteries ran dry. We would die just outside the city.
“How long do we try and stay on the freeway?” Avian asked as the sky grew darker. “There are bound to be hordes of Bane in the city.”
“I still don’t see why we don’t just drive through the city,” Dr. Evans said, shaking his head. “We’ve all seen enough evidence to know that Eve Two can handle anything that might come at us.”
“It’s never a bad idea to err on the side of caution,” I said, cringing as we hit a large pothole. The road had grown rougher and rougher as we got further into the desert.
“My child,” Dr. Evans said, turning to face me. “When will you stop doubting your capabilities and accept that you are more than the rest of us?”
I just shook my head and looked away from him. We hit another hole in the road, making everything and everyone in the vehicle bounce violently to the left before being tossed back.
Morgan gave a whimpering cry.
My eyes grew wide and I instantly froze.
Bill and Dr. Evans gave no indication that they’d heard, but West whipped around in his seat, searching for the source of the noise.
Of course Morgan groaned in that moment.
“What was that?” West hissed, standing and leaning over his seat to gain a better view.
“Just our stuff getting shifted around,” Avian lied, his eyes darting to mine.
West didn’t miss that.
“I don’t think so,” he said, his voice hard. He started to move toward Morgan’s hidden form.
“Sit down, West,” I said, my voice hard. “It wasn’t anything.”
By now, Bill and Dr. Evans had started paying attention to what was going on.
“Then why are you two acting so weird?” West said, his voice growing louder and harder. “In fact, why have you both been acting weird this whole day? What’s back there?”
My eyes darted to Avian and we held each other’s gaze for a long moment. We had both known the moment was going to come when we’d have to tell the truth about what we were doing. But we had no way to know how everyone would react.
Especially Dr. Evans.
“I’m going to try and save the baby,” I said, my voice low.
“What baby?” West asked, his eyes growing dark.
By this point, Bill had stopped the solar tank and he and Dr. Evans were turned around looking at us.
“Morgan’s,” I replied simply.
There was a heavy moment before West pushed his way past Avian and leaned over the seat. He shifted the carefully placed bags. And then he saw her.
“No,” he said, shaking his head, never taking his eyes from her unconscious form. “You did not bring a dying, pregnant woman with us on a possibly suicidal mission.”
“What is going on?” Dr. Evans demanded. One of his mechanical hands curled into a steel fist.
I gave a hard swallow as I eyed his hands, knowing the unstoppable damage they could cause.
“Morgan is five and a half months pregnant,” Avian said when my words failed. “She was injured in the earthquake, and she isn’t going to pull through it. The baby is almost guaranteed to die with her.”
Everyone was silent as West turned and sank into the seat next to Avian.
“I was going to die once too,” I said, my voice even. “I came into this world too soon to a mother who was dying. You saved me, Dr. Evans.”
“That was a long time ago, my dear girl,” he said, his gaze falling away from mine.
“But you still have the formula for what saved me,” I said, not backing down even though, for one of the first times in my life, I was actually scared, in a way I couldn’t explain. “And we’re already heading back to where you kept that formula and all of the things you needed to create it.”
There was a general, quick intake of breath as everyone in the solar tank sorted out the plan Avian and I devised.