Duality (The Hitchhiker Strain) (18 page)

"You love that stuff."

"Well, today I love you more. And you needed to get out of there."

Belle takes another shuddering breath but doesn't argue.

Once we reach the office, Belle ignores the two chairs still sitting in the middle of the room and instead slides down against the closest wall to the door until she’s sitting in an undignified heap on the floor. Quietly, I sit down beside her and lean my head on her shoulder. We’ll talk if she wants to, but sitting here silently is fine by me too.

"Savannah..." Her voice is barely a whimper. "I... I can't. I don't
know. Pierce. He's just gone." Suddenly, she's close to gasping for breath.

"Shh." I reach over and grab one of her hands, squeezing it a little too hard within my own. "I know. I already miss him so much."

I’d been trying to show her that I understand what she’s feeling and that it’s totally okay. Instead, I opened the floodgates for both of us. Together we cry until I lose track of time, moving from big ugly sobs to small panic attacks. By the time Alex comes to find us, we’re both lost in our own thoughts, still leaning on each other for strength.

I see him hovering in the doorframe before he speaks. As soon as my glance meets his stare, he looks away. I can
’t tell if he’s embarrassed or simply doesn’t want our evident grief to lead him back into his own.

“
Paulson wants to talk to you. They’ve made a decision, and you aren’t going to like it.”

"So that's it then?" I ask, still not sure I believe it. "You're just going to stay here?"

"Well, not here specifically," Paulson counters, putting a hand on my shoulder as though that will somehow make me feel better. "We'll need to get back out of Militia territory. We don't want to get involved in any of the local politics. We just want to find somewhere we can survive."

"With what supplies? And what's from stopping this same thing from happening again and again? You've lost two homes
—three if you count your actual house—in less than a year. The Initiative can offer you safety! Security! A cure..." By the end of my rant, I run out of steam. I no longer believe I have any chance of convincing these people to listen to anything I have to say. It's pointless.

And privately, I
’m relieved. Before, I was so sure I could take on the Initiative and convince them to adopt nearly three hundred new people into their group—feed them, house them, give them everything they’d need to survive. I still think they’d be better off there than on their own, but I’m glad I don’t have to put up another fight today. It’s done.

"But we
'll have our freedom. And we're not turning you down on the cure completely. I'm not that bullheaded. I’m hoping you’ll be willing to take our injured back with you. Temporarily. Until they’re out of the woods."

That doesn't make me feel any better. I blin
k up at him slowly before shrugging his hand off my shoulder. "So you're going to take the free handout and go? That doesn't sound like you at all." I know it's a low blow, but I need to lash out at someone. Anyone.

"Of course not. We'll offer a trade. I'l
l send the people who were bitten yesterday back with you. I know you'll do everything you can to make sure they're taken care of, and assure this Initiative of yours that we're willing to do or give whatever it takes in order to keep our people alive.”

“
Fine.” And it is. It’s not good, but I won’t argue. If that’s what they need, that’s what I’ll do. He seems surprised that I’m not arguing more and the two of us stand there in silence until I start think I’m supposed to walk away in a huff or something. I sigh. “Whatever you need. I’ll see what I can do.”

"I'm sorry about Pierce." His eyes wander over to his daughter, who is sitting nearby but out of earshot. "I didn't even know they'd been seeing each other until last week. I kind of thought I'd get to ski
p over the secretive teenager phase with her. We're a team. I think maybe she needed something, someone, to call her own. It was probably inevitable anyways. It's not like hormones go away because no one is forcing you to go to high school anymore." I wanted to talk about anything but Pierce, but he keeps going, oblivious. "He's exactly the kind of kid I would have picked for her. He is... He was..."

“
Yeah. He was.”

“
Well. Maybe a fresh start will be good for her. Good for all of us, even.” He pauses, and I swear I see him wipe a tear from the corner of his eye. When Paulson starts to show cracks in his armor, you know it has been an impossible day. “And Savannah… Please tell Zack that he’s welcome to stay where he is or come back to us. He’s always welcome wherever we end up. And I hope it goes without saying that the same is true for you. Always.”

Chapter 23 – Chelsea

I think my eyes are starting to go numb. I've been sprawled out on this tiny uncomfortable bed for nearly two hours now and I should really
get something to eat…but I can't stop now. Doctor Nickleby was uncomfortable about my request to go in and see some of their other infected patients and I can't figure out why. It's not like interacting with them would somehow cause me to revert back to my old habits.

Her telling me to wait for a few days hurt me more than I thought it would. As teenagers went, I was a pretty lazy kid. I did the minimum I could get away with in school and never volunteered to do anything I didn
’t want to. Those things are probably still true about me. But now I have so much I need to make up for. I’ve wasted so much time already, and I’m running precariously low on karma.

All I could convince her to give me was a stack of DVD footage of the other post-infection residents of
the Initiative facility. She gave me a random stack that had been sitting unused on her desk, but these discs alone could take me weeks to go through. I've seen shots of the doctors interacting with and running tests on their patients—everything from shape recognition to pain stimulus, which was incredibly unsettling to watch, to hours of the recovering patients’ time spent alone when they thought no one was watching them.

I should probably take a break soon. There
’s only so much watching people sit and stare at a wall that I can do before I’ll probably stop really paying attention. I thought there would be more to go on here, like maybe there would be some behavior or pattern I would recognize and be able to hone in on. Some small thing that you’d have to have experienced to really understand. So far, there's nothing. But for today, at least, they've run out of tests to put me through, so I have some time to look through everything they've given me.

After two hours, I've barely scratched the surface. I don'
t want to admit it, but I'm starting to understand why they've been hesitant to increase their efforts in distributing the half-developed cure. So far their results haven't been that encouraging, and it looks like they're spread pretty thin. There are patient files with one or two pieces of footage and others with hours and hours of men and women sitting alone in a room. Unless there's something on these same people on a different file, it looks like they were injected with Veritas and then essentially left to their own devices, only getting food, water, and brief interactions every day.

They
’ve been waiting for someone like me—someone who would respond to treatment right away—and in a lot of cases haven’t bothered to really try and bring their patients back to the world of the living. I suspect it’s because they already know that it’s pointless.

Someone knocks on my door three times from the other side. "Come in!" I shout, not sure how thick the walls are
here until I hear the soft beeping of the entry code being inputted before my door unlocks.

Two seconds later, Zack enters. As soon as he steps through the door, he takes up half of my floor space, his large size being no match for the tiny room I've been
given.

"Ahh! Sweet freedom!”
He pauses, looking around my room. His light brown hair is sticking up slightly in the front like he’s been running his hands through it all day, but he looks a lot less stressed than I feel. “This is what they upgraded you to? Ouch. Well, I’ve got half an hour before I have to get back to work, so you should feel honored that I’m willing to spend it in this box of a room. What are you up to?" He leans over to get a peek at the laptop screen in front of me. I sit up and scoot over toward my pillow to give him enough room to sit down with me, gently pushing the computer so it will sit between us.

"Going over all the footage the doctor gave me." I use the touchpad to click back to the main menu, opening up the next patient file. "
There's a lot of the same, and I'm already half convinced that I'm wasting my time."

"Quitter. You've just started," Zack says. "Anything interesting you see could end up being crazy helpful for everyone here. Don
’t rush it. You don’t have to come up with all the answers today."

I roll my eyes, turning my head away as though to scratch my nose so that Zack won't see. It's not him I'm annoyed at, and I'm not ready for another argument.

Zack starts to chat about some of the errands people had him running today and I half-listen, nodding along while I pull up another video file, the first one listed for Patient 201-R, an older Asian man. The first clip is hard to watch. The man is strapped down to a gurney, essentially identical to the one I was forced onto, and a doctor I don't recognize is hovering over him, needle in hand. I hit mute and turn away. I know what's going to happen next and don't need to see the replay.

"So I told him about what you were doing here and how you thought maybe you could help," Zack
says, talking over my discomfort. His eyes never seem to leave my face. He's probably trying hard not to look down at the screen too. I wonder how many people he's heard scream through the agony of Veritas. I wonder how many people he's watched die.

Not a
s many as I have.

I skip ahead to the next clip. Neither of us needs to watch this. Zack jumps into a story about his friends back in his hometown and I can hear the smile in his voice so I t
urn back to watch him talk, flicking my gaze back to the screen every few minutes. This clip is showing the dark-haired man going through a series of tests with a team of doctors. I can't tell what they are with the sound still turned off, but the man's reactions catch my interest.

"One second," I interrupt Zack. "Look
at this."

"What?" Zack watches the screen with me, looking confused. "Do you know him?"

Now I do roll my eyes at him. "No. That's like asking some random guy from England if he knows your friend Tom from London. There isn't a club newsletter or anything." I rewind the clip and watch it again. This man isn't acting like the others. He's not acting like I did either, but I've watched enough of these clips already to have an idea of what the norm is. Instead of going through the motions as though he's still infected, 201-R seems nervous. He's doing everything he can to withdraw from any contact with his doctors.

I spare a glance for Zack, but I can tell he doesn't see what I see. This man is behaving more like prey than a conditioned predator.

It takes me a few tries to find the type of clip I'm looking for, but eventually I manage to pull up footage of the man alone in his cell. He's pacing, anxious and cornered. I know the feeling. Nothing happens for a few minutes, and I'm not even sure what I'm looking for. I'll know it when I see it. Some small hint at awareness is all it will take to confirm my theories. Thankfully, Zack stays quiet as though sensing my need to concentrate.

There! I rewind again and pause the clip. "You see it now?" I ask Zack. He shakes hi
s head. "He's looking right at the camera."

"So? He wants to get the hell out of there. He
’s probably searched the entire cell a thousand times over by this point, trying to find a way out."

"I don't think so. Well, maybe. But I don't think that's what
’s happening here. He’s watching the camera. He's looking at you guys, at us. He's looking at the people who are holding him captive because he realizes we're here. Everyone else I've looked at so far can barely tell that they aren't out on the streets anymore looking for their next meal. They're acting like they still need to hunt in order to stay alive. This guy wants to be left alone."

"You're saying this guy is like you?"

"Maybe. Not quite. But he's not like the others either."

Zack looks suitably impressed
and pride swells within me. Though I’m half worried that I’m inventing this—seeing what I want to see—the other half of me can’t help but get excited. Even if this is barely relevant, it could be something, some clue they didn’t have yesterday. Now, I just have to do something about it.

Zack takes me as far as the medical wing before he has to get back to work transcribing notes for Doctor Silvers. He has at least another hour before he
’s done for the night, and I knew I wouldn’t be able to wait until tomorrow.

It
’s easier than I thought it would be to get the doctor to listen to me. Bringing the DVD footage to her office seals the deal within a matter of minutes. I’m not sure if she actually believes me that there’s something
different
about this one man, but she’s willing to indulge me, and that’s all I need.

But they refuse to leave me alone in the cell block even though I try again and again to explain that this man isn't being helped by constant attention. He needs space to breathe and reassurance that
we don't mean him any harm. Instead I'm accompanied by Gregor—my shadow—Doctor Nickleby, and her son—who I'm pretty sure is coming along because he happened to be in the right place at the right time and not because he'll actually have anything useful to offer. He introduces himself as Dooley and then proceeds to stare at me for the entire trip from his mom's office to the cell block on the other side of the building. I do my best not to return his looks and not to let him make me feel threatened. Instead, I feel naked—in the worst way possible.

I need to focus.

Unlike the section I was kept in, this cell block is packed. There must be at least forty people crammed in here like cattle, each with his or her own little prison no bigger than my bedroom.

The doctor finds the man we
’re looking for easily. He's sitting on the floor, staring at his fingers, and moving them one by one in front of his face. He looks both perplexed and mesmerized, and he doesn’t even seem to notice us at first.

Wanting a closer
look, I take a step toward the door of his cage. His demeanor changes immediately. At once, he’s on his feet and shuffling toward the farthest corner of his cell, tucking himself away beside the foot of his bed.

It
’s impossible not to see myself in this man. I did the same thing when I felt like
I
was in danger. Step one: get away from the threat. Step two: hide. Step three: panic because there’s nowhere else to go.

"Maybe this was a bad idea," I say, trying to keep my voice down. "Maybe he'd be better off
if you guys tried kind of what Zack did with me. Give him time to get used to someone’s presence, let him get comfortable." For now, for tonight, seeing him was enough for me. He’s barely done anything at all, but I’m more confident now in my unnamable diagnosis. Now we should leave him be, regroup, and come up with a plan that won’t do any more damage on his tired psyche.

The doctor doesn't even look up. She
’s too busy scribbling notes into the tiny pad she carries in her pocket. "Mmmhmm. Yes, maybe."

I ta
ke a few steps back, wanting to snap at the others when they don’t follow me lead. Gregor is still watching me from his usual position a few steps back, but the doctor and her son seem to have forgotten me completely.

"How did you guys miss this?" Dooley a
sks his mother.

"We don't have time to properly monitor everyone. And his reactions at the time seemed too fearful, too animalistic, and so much less engaged than most of the others. Even now, I
’m not sure how to utilize what it is we’re seeing. Though I have to admit, I do see the resemblance between his behavior and yours. It’s a good find, Chelsea. Very helpful.”

Then why can
’t she say that without her voice dripping with condescension?

"How long has he been here?" I ask. Together, the two of them final
ly turn around and look at me again.

"Four and a half months."

Wow. That's a long time to be left alone in a place like this, alone with horrible memories and fearing that you could die at any minute. Maybe he's too far gone now anyway, a victim of circumstance.

“
Well then. You can leave him alone for at least another night.”

It
’s another hour before I finally give up any hope of being included in the conversation and excuse myself to go get something to eat. Doctor Nickleby called in some of her colleagues and they huddled around the security display, whispering theories to each other in hushed tones as though 201-R might be able to hear them if they talked too loudly.

Zack looks up right as I enter the cafeteria, almost like he knew I was coming. As soo
n as I'm through the double doors, Gregor stops moving with me. Instead, he leans against the closest wall and pulls out a book. I guess he's not that worried about what I might do anymore, which has to be a good sign.

It's almost nine and I didn
’t expect anyone to still be here at all. All of a sudden, I'm nervous and I have no idea why. It's Zack. Offering an awkward wave, I turn toward the vending machines. They're restocked every day with sandwiches and other packaged food that has been made by volunteers within the last week.

I pick something at random, not even bothering to look at it when it's dispensed. I'm too busy worrying about what I can say to Zack when I go sit down. What do I tell him about today? When we split up, he was so excited for me, bu
t I have next to nothing to report.