Faye turned, smoke drifting from the barrel, and ran back to Fawkes and the others. Gasping, I raised my gun and fired after her, but between the rain and the motion of the ship, I couldn’t get a clear shot. Fawkes climbed onto the escape aircraft as Faye reached them, and I saw her grab the rail and climb in after him.
“Wachalowski!” a voice shouted from behind me. I turned and grabbed the hand that was waiting, and climbed in as the helicopter began to lift off. As it pulled away, I saw the other craft below rise quickly, then the rotors turned and it banked quickly in the other direction as another explosion shook the ship. By the time the smoke began to clear, we were far overhead and moving away. One of the soldiers heaved the door shut.
“Three minutes, people! Get us clear now!”
“Cal!”
I pushed my way in next to her as the helicopter bucked in the wind. Leaning over her body, I released the stop I put on her JZI systems. It saw her vitals had tanked, and sent a jolt of electricity to her heart.
Come on …
Energy was building in the musculature around her spine and neck. The JZI detected it, but couldn’t identify what it was. Her heart was still stopped. It sent another jolt.
Come on, Cal …
Emergency systems were feeding oxygen into her bloodstream and had begun a regular pulse to keep the heart beating artificially. That would work for only so long. I watched her face in the dark.
Cal, are you there?
The energy collecting at the base of her neck had me worried. I focused on it, looking through the muscle tissue. There was movement in there. Something was forming. As I watched, small nodes began to grow.
Huma. She’d been injected. She was already carrying the serum. The mechanisms inside had realized she was dead. The nodes began to branch out, connections forming between them.
I overrode her JZI and forced a payload of adrenaline into her bloodstream. There was a chance it would kill her outright, but she was out of time. Her heart seized. For a second her vitals pegged into the red, but through the stream of warning data I saw her heart catch; it beat on its own.
“Cal, wake up!”
The components had stopped forming. Her heart began to beat regularly. She opened her eyes.
“Cal!”
“Shit …you’re here,” she said.
“I’m here.” I went to touch her shoulder, but she bat-ted my hand away.
“What happened?”
“We’re off the ship. We’re going home.”
She grimaced as she sat up and looked back out toward the ocean. The ship began to fade in the rain and the dark, and all I could see was the faint flicker of a fire on the deck.
“This is MSST. We have secured the civilians and are on our way back. We need an EMT at the landing site.”
“Roger that, MSST.”
“Detonation in three …two …one …”
The timer was still displayed on my JZI. I watched it trickle down to zero.
The flash was so bright I had to close my eyes and turn away.
13
Eddish
Calliope Flax—Mercy Greaves Medical Center
My left hand tingled. It tingled all the time, and it was cold, like the blood was cut off. I woke up to it every day. I stared in the dark and listened to the whispering.
It was still dark. I was still in the med unit, and I was still on dope. Nico managed not to kill me getting the bomb out, but he left a hell of a hole.
When I was out, I dreamed I was back in Juba. My left arm was a stump, and I grabbed my hand off the floor and threw it. The mob went for it. They fought over it and ate it. The crunching sound was burned into my brain, but in the dream, all I heard was a hiss. It was like static. When I woke up, I could still hear it. It was like a sound from deep in my head. Quiet, but steady. It made me think of voices, all whispering.
I thought it was the drugs at first. It wasn’t the drugs.
What the fuck did you do to me, Buckster?
Someone knocked on the door. I figured it was the nurse on duty, but when the door cracked, it was Wachalowski’s ugly mug I saw. He had one arm in a sling and stitches over one eye. There was stubble on his face, and he looked older than usual.
“You’re awake,” he said.
“That your FBI training?” He smiled, even though I could see it hurt.
“Can I come in?”
“Knock yourself out.”
He came in and closed the door behind him. He pulled up a chair next to my bed and sat down.
“How are you feeling?”
“How do you think?”
The whole thing got messed up. It was supposed to be easy. It was cakewalk; he was an old man. I thought I’d get in good with the Feds. I thought I’d get in good with him.
“I’m sorry, Cal.”
“Sorry for what?”
“I should never have—”
“Oh, shut the hell up,” I said. “Is that why you’re here? Because you think this is your fault? Because you feel bad?”
“No.”
“Because I swear I will fucking pop you—”
“That’s not why I came. I wanted to see how you were.”
“What are you, my dad?” I didn’t really know what I was talking about, though. I never had a dad. He didn’t answer anyway. He just smiled again, and I thought he looked relieved. It hit me, then, how tired he looked.
“I’m just glad you’re still here.”
“Yeah,” I said. “I get it.”
He was quiet for a minute, and I added, “I like you too. Fucker.”
“Can I get you anything?”
“You can get me the hell out of here.”
“You’re going to be here a little while. Sorry.”
I shrugged.
“It beats being dead. Thanks for coming to get me.”
“You’re welcome.”
“So, is it over?”
“No.”
“It never is.”
I looked up at him, and watched the orange light flicker in his pupils. In my head, those voices whispered. It was like wind.
“I hear things,” I told him. “In my head. I don’t think it’s from the JZI.”
He made a cutting motion across his throat, shutting me up. His face got serious.
It’s not from the JZI.
Then what? What do you know?
Something happened back on the boat.
What?
We were about to get mobbed. The revivors were homing in on you, and I needed you out to make the cut. I stopped your heart.
You stopped my heart?
I was counting on the JZI to revive you. It did—
How long was I out?
Not long. Your heart began to beat again, obviously, but for a few minutes your vitals were flat.
Are you saying I was dead?
For a few minutes, yes.
“A few minutes?” I snapped. He made the cutting motion again. “No, don’t fucking shush me—”
Cal, be quiet. It was that or they’d have torn you apart. I didn’t know you’d been injected.
Injected. I remembered Buckster and the case. I remembered the needle they stuck in my neck.
Injected with what?
Fawkes got his hands on an experimental revivor prototype developed at Heinlein Industries. It’s introduced through the injection of a serum. Buckster and his followers were distributing it. You must have been injected with it before I got there.
So what are you saying? What does this mean?
It means you’re wired, Cal. When your heart stopped, it activated. Some kind of connection was formed to a revivor network.
I can’t be wired.
I’m sorry. You are. If you die now, you’ll come back.