She felt her anger building, and wanted to take it out on this man who represented everything she hated—lies, opacity, pointless bureaucracy, men with guns.
Men with guns killed my parents. And a man with a gun couldn’t save my brother.
Red gestured at the thing that used to be Adam on the floor.
“Still going to tell me that information is classified?”
“Where’s the lieutenant?” Sirois said.
He seemed unsteady on his feet, although Red didn’t know if that was because of his head wound or the blood around Adam or the smoke that he’d surely inhaled while staggering after her.
“I have no idea and I really don’t care because my brother is dead,” Red said. “And he’s dead because your lieutenant dragged him back here to look at a hole in the ground, and whatever was in that hole probably killed him.”
“I have to find the lieutenant,” Sirois said. “I need to find him now. Outside . . .”
“You do what you like,” Red said. “I’m leaving.”
Sooner or later Sirois was going to look for Regan behind the door that Adam guarded and when he did Red was not going to be present.
“You can’t leave,” Sirois said.
Red pulled the axe off her belt. She’d never used it on a person, or anything alive. She’d always wondered if she could. She was angry enough to use it now, because the man before her was not going to stop her.
“I am not going to your little quarantine camp,” Red said, and held the axe up. “I am going to my grandma’s house, and if you try to stop me I will slice off whatever I can reach and leave you here to bleed to death.”
Sirois shook his head. “No. I believe you. I believe you’ll do it, and I’m not trying to stop you so I can take you away. That’s not it. You can’t get out right now. That militia has got us pinned in here and they’re covering the road in both directions.”
Red blinked. “The militia? The fakey soldiers that Adam and I saw?”
The Locusts had returned for the rest of the goods in the store. That was the thing that had twanged her antennae earlier—when Adam said they didn’t have enough room in their trucks for the food in the back room. Of course, they would return with empty trucks. And when they returned they’d discovered the army, or whatever branch of the military Regan and Sirois were supposed to represent.
“Yes,” Sirois said. He ran his hand over his close-cropped hair. The wound on his head had clotted up, just as Red thought it would.
“Why would they do that?” Red asked, narrowing her eyes.
“Because they see us as the enemy,” Sirois said. “They’ve been getting bigger, collecting stragglers to their cause. They think the Cough came out of a government lab, that everything that’s happened is part of some massive conspiracy.”
“Is it?” Red asked.
“Of course not,” Sirois said.
“Just the part about parasites that explode out of humans and then become something that chews off my brother’s legs,” Red said. “And the part where you’re covering it up.”
“The point is that the Cough isn’t because of anything we did,” Sirois said.
“How do you know?”
“What?”
“How do you know?” Red repeated each word slowly, enunciating every consonant. “If the CDC brewed up something in their lab and it accidentally was let loose in the world, do you think they would tell you?”
Sirois frowned, opened his mouth, closed it again.
“Yeah, you’re thinking about it now,” Red said. “Fine, there’s no massive conspiracy but there are a load of conspiracy theorists with weapons trying to eliminate your whole battalion or patrol or whatever you are.”
“Platoon,” Sirois corrected absently. “And I need to find Regan, because he’s the CO and he’s needed right now.”
“I’m sorry to say that I think he’s been eaten up by whatever is behind this door,” Red said. “Adam told me not to open it, so I am not going to do that. If you insist on doing that so you can visually confirm the death of Lieutenant Regan then feel free, but give me a ten-minute head start first because getting eaten alive is not on my agenda for the day.”
Sirois’s eyes went from Adam to the door and back to Red.
“You’re telling me one of those things is behind that door?”
“One, twenty, who knows?” Red said. “All I know is that I was told not to open it and I am going to take my brother’s advice on that score.”
She was flippant now because it was the only defense she had, for the longer she stayed in that place with Adam’s body the more she felt she might just break down or crack up or start screaming to high heaven and never stop. There was no time now for grief, for curling into a little ball and crying all the water from her eyes.
Sirois stood there. Red saw him thinking, saw his eyes flicker as he turned over the possibilities.
“I’m going to take your brother’s advice, too,” Sirois said. “He seemed sensible, even if you don’t all the time.”
“You’re only saying that because he submitted to your tracker gun without an argument,” Red said. “So now what? You’re going to run outside to join the fray?”
“Yes,” Sirois said. “It’s my duty to do what I can, especially since the lieutenant is . . . missing.”
“And what is it that you think I should do?” Red asked. “Stay in here and cower like a good little woman until you suppress the insurgents?”
“I’d like you to use some degree of care and caution, yes,” Sirois said. “I feel responsible for you.”
“That’s a dumb thing to feel,” Red said. “It’s a free country, or at least it used to be. Go do whatever you think you need to do and don’t think about me again.”
“But your brother . . .”
“You don’t think Adam was the one doing the planning and decision making, do you?” Red laughed. The laugh had a hard, hysterical edge to it and she stopped right away. “I’m more cautious than Adam ever was. I promise you that.”
“Even you can’t think it’s a smart thing to try to escape with everything going on outside,” Sirois said.
“Sure it is. I can use the chaos to my advantage and slip away in a cloud of smoke.”
“And what will you do if you get caught by them? I don’t think they are the type that will be kind to a woman alone.”
“Do you think I don’t know what kind of men this world has wrought?” Red said. “Every woman knows. And those men existed before everything fell apart.”
She turned away from him then, because they were only going in circles and above all things she needed to get away from Adam’s corpse before her brain broke into a thousand pieces along with her heart.
“Where are you going?”
“I’m looking for another exit,” Red said.
She carefully stepped around Adam, looking without actually looking. There was nothing she needed to see again.
Sirois didn’t say anything. After a moment he followed her, catching up in a few strides.
Long legs, Red thought. Then she said, without breaking her stride, “What do you want now?”
She had to crane her neck up to see his face. Now that he was beside her the comical difference in their heights was much more apparent. He had a good foot and a half on her, maybe more.
“I’m going to see you safely away,” Sirois said grimly. “I feel responsible for you. I know you said it was dumb, and it’s pretty clear you’ve got brains and know-how or else you wouldn’t have gotten this far. But you’re right. It was our fault—mine and Regan’s—that your brother got killed. So I am at least going to help you get out of town.”