“Look at them,” he whispered, his heart drumming a tattoo against his ribs. “They don’t deserve this.”
She met his eyes and he searched her for a trace of pity, of hesitation, but found none. Nicholas isn’t the only psychopath on this island, Jim thought.
“They’re not kids,” she said softly. “Look at them. They’re mindless, soulless. They’re just things we made, machines of skin and bone perhaps, but their every thought is ignited by a mechanical code.”
The Vitros weren’t people to Strauss. They were merchandise. It made him ill.
“Dr. Michalski,” she said, without looking away from Jim. The doctor lifted his head. “Ready the chamber.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he mumbled, and he turned around and opened a panel on the wall, began to flip switches and punch buttons.
Jim shook his head, slowly at first, then harder. “No. No, you can’t do this.”
“I can,” she said, her voice calm. She backed away, reached for the door, hesitated one moment. “You should never have come here,” she said. “If you like, I can have them sedate you. It will make it easier.”
He tightened his arm around Lux and realized he was trembling. “No,” he whispered. He wouldn’t spend his last moments in a senseless fog. And he still wasn’t giving up. There has to be something, some way out . . .
She shrugged, and the mask of indifference slipped back over her features. She slammed the door shut.
Almost immediately, pale white gas began filtering from the vents above their heads. A small window in the door gave Jim a view of Strauss’s grim face before she turned away. You’ll kill us all but you don’t have the balls to watch.
The Vitros began to choke and cough. Only Mary, Wyatt, and Jay could possibly know what was happening, but they were so drugged Jim wasn’t sure they even knew their own names at the moment.
He crouched low and pulled Lux down with him. She was coming to slightly; he wished he’d asked for a sedative for her, but it was too late now. He hardly knew her, but she’d already become important to him. He’d never felt responsible for anyone in his life other than himself and he’d never wanted to be. Lux had come out of nowhere, a sudden, unexpected shadow. He’d never realized how much someone needing him would make him need them in return. That being important to someone else suddenly made them important to you.
She finally opened her eyes and mumbled his name.
“Keep low,” he whispered. “It’s okay.”
Her gaze settled on him and she smiled; she trusted him when he said it, believed him with an innocence that made him rage inwardly. It wasn’t fair. He could accept that his own stupidity and ill luck had landed him in this room, though he was far from content with it, but Lux didn’t deserve this and neither did her Vitro brothers and sisters.
The room was quickly filling with the toxic gas, and still it poured from the vents. Jim lay flat on his stomach and told Lux to do the same. He drew a deep breath and held it. Around him, body after body began to collapse. The sound of coughing and gasping roared in his ears; several of the Vitros were drooling and convulsing. He heard a thump behind him, and turned his head to see Mary lying on her side, twitching, her eyes rolling back in her head. Time dragged past. He could see now why Strauss had offered him a sedative; this was no quick, easy death. No, death took its time in this room. It hovered in the corners, lingering a while, a spectator looking on and biding its time, seeing how long it could dance just out of reach.
“Lux,” Jim croaked. He shook her. Her eyes were shut and he couldn’t tell if she was breathing. He rolled her over and pinched her nose, drawing once more on his lifeguard training as he placed his mouth over hers and breathed into her. The gas was making him lightheaded and a bit delirious. Instead of choking, he heard waves rushing up and down a beach. Instead of the groans he heard his lifeguard instructor Cate, who lounged lazily on a beach towel giving halfhearted instructions to her class of young, overeager male students. Like most of them, Jim had signed up for the class only because Cate was the hottest senior in high school and every underclassman, including himself, was crushing on her.
But no, it wasn’t Cate on the towel, spreading sunscreen on her legs. It was Sophie, and she was snapping at him to get up, to save someone—but who? Oh. It was Lux. She was drowning out in the surf, but Jim had been too mesmerized by Sophie’s sunscreen application to notice. He had to get to Lux in time. He floundered into the waves but they just pushed him back and pulled her further out. The water was too strong; it shoved him ashore and sucked Lux under.
“No!” he yelled, and he dove again and again only to land on the sand instead of in the water. “Lux!”
It was too late. She was gone.
He choked on the water; salt stung his eyes. This time when he dove, the water took him and dragged him down, down, down into darkness.
THIRTY TWO LUX
She had found him again. Peace flooded her, a calm that had nothing to do with Moira Crue’s needles. This peace began at her center, with Jim, and spread outward, intoxicating, warm, wonderful.
She had found him and all was well.
She was in his arms and he was looking down at her, saying “It’s okay,” and she believed him. All the anxiety, the panic, the chaos fell away and at last she could breathe.
Jim shifted, told her to lie down. He stretched out on his stomach and she did the same beside him. Now that he was here and she was still, she could look around. They were in a small room with lot of people, strange new faces. It was very noisy here and she didn’t understand why they couldn’t go back to the beach, where it was quiet and open and beautiful, but if this was where Jim wanted to be, she wanted to be there too.
She became aware of a hissing all around them; it came from the walls. It looked as if clouds were pouring into the room—pretty, but it made her cough. She laid her cheek on the cold, slick floor and locked gazes with Jim.
He was coughing too. That wasn’t good. She frowned, tried to say his name, but she only fell into a fit of coughs. Her throat burned; her eyes burned. What was happening? Why couldn’t she speak?
They were all coughing, all the people around her, the boys and girls. She reached toward Jim. He covered her hand with his and squeezed it tight. When she tried to breathe in, nothing happened. Her lungs were on fire. Her muscles spasmed painfully as she struggled for breath, but none came.
She fell into darkness and terror.
Something was horribly, horribly wrong but she didn’t know what it was. She had no name for it, no word, just a feeling, a terrible, sick, trembling feeling.
She felt Jim, heard him call her name and she tried to answer but there was no breath in her lungs. I am here, she wanted to say. Jim, I am here. Help me!
She was sinking; she could feel herself growing smaller, weaker. She fought against it but she was so lost in the darkness that she couldn’t find her way back.
Cold and dark and scared and lost and alone she screamed in her mind but no sound left her lips.
Then: air.
She felt her chest expand, felt her mind clear a little. She could breathe again.
She opened her eyes, barely opened them, saw Jim lying beside her, so very very still that her chest seized with terror and her mind screamed NO! She pressed a hand to his chest, over his heart. Check for a pulse, said her brain.
Was he dead?
Was he gone?
She crawled to him. Protect protect protect. She followed her instincts, followed the commands her brain fed to her: open his mouth, breathe into him, give him her air, make him live, protect protect protect.