Joshua McCune - Talker 25

I toss my jacket into a box and slump onto the bed beside Lorena. “Sorry.”

“Don’t be. You didn’t know.”

“That’s not what I’m sorry for.”

“I know.” She smiles. “We all have our moments.”

“Hurry it up, ladies,” Lester says from the doorway.

I’m pulling off my boots, extra slow because of the blisters on my hands, when Twenty-One starts bawling.

“Control your emotions, Twenty-One.” Lester shocks her, which only gets her crying harder.

“Leave her alone,” I say, hurrying over. “Twenty-One, what’s—”

She slaps me hard across the face with the brooch.

“You’re not a good one, no, no!” I stumble back, half in pain, half in shock. She hurls herself at me with a mournful wail, fists flying. I hug her tight, get punched in the nose, kneed in the thigh. Lester jolts her again and again.

“Leave her alone!” I say.

“You’re supposed to protect her!” Twenty-One cries, then goes limp in my arms.

“Give her here, Twenty-Five,” Lester says as I check her breathing. Alive.

Lorena steps between us. “Sergeant, we can take care of her. She gets like this sometimes. When she wakes up, she won’t even remember it.”

“Don’t make this harder than it has to be.”

Lorena settles her hand on his wrist. “There’s nothing we can do, Sergeant?”

I try to mimic her seductive smile. “Anything?”

Lester pushes Lorena’s arm away. His face hardens. “Twenty-Five, the girl.”

“Do what the sergeant wants, Melissa,” Lorena says.

I kiss Twenty-One’s forehead, whisper “Remember the island,” and give her up.

When they leave the barracks, I collapse onto my bed. A rerun of Kissing Dragons plays , followed by propaganda that shows a trio of Reds bombarding London. Evelyn finally returns and her girls go gaga over her new look.

“Don’t any of you people care?” I shout, rising to my feet. “She was one of us, and we just let them take her because she had a bad moment. We’ve all had our issues.”

“Yeah, like killing Claire?” someone says.

“Slut.”

“Hate me all you want, but she’s a child who needed our help,” I say. And I didn’t do anything either. Just handed her over like a sack of grain.

Lorena hugs me. I weep into her shoulder. “She’s not coming back, is she?”

“You won’t recognize her. . . . I still can’t figure out what set her off.”

I feel at the bruise on my face where she hit me with the dragon brooch. The silver dragon brooch. “You’re supposed to protect her,” I mumble, then let out a bitter laugh.

“What is it?” Lorena asks.

“It’s Baby.”

Thenext morning, I request a meeting with Colonel Hanks. Lester happily obliges.

“We had a deal,” I say when I enter the colonel’s office. But it’s not Colonel Hanks sitting behind the desk.

Major Alderson looks up from his tablet. “Can I help you, Twenty-Five?”

“Where’s Colonel Hanks?”

“On leave. While he is away, I am in charge.”

My heart sinks. “You can’t execute the Silver.”

“Found out about that, huh?” He shrugs. “The thing just wouldn’t die out there in that cage. Then this show of yours comes along and throws a big wrench into my ER. And when I met with Hector the other night, I learned that if things go right, he and his crew will be back for the long term, causing logjams and distracting my men. I needed a solution that would satisfy everybody.”

“I had a deal with Colonel Hanks.”

“I’m not Colonel Hanks. You don’t have a deal with me.”

“I won’t kill her,” I say. “And you can’t do the show without me.”

He nods with feigned concern. “That could be a panty twister.” He raises a finger, makes a phone call, puts it on speaker mode. “Hector, I’ve got Twenty-Five here with me, and she says she doesn’t want to do your show anymore. Is that a problem?”

Hector doesn’t miss a beat. “I’d prefer for Melissa to do it, of course, but if I do long shots and some CGI touchup, Evelyn will work fine.”

Evelyn. The grave of my hope. And I have nobody to blame for digging it but myself. “She can’t do the preexecution stuff,” I say, knowing I’m grasping at invisible straws.

“We can do those scenes when you’re in a better frame of mind,” Hector says.

“I’ll never be in a better frame of mind, asshole!”

My CENSIR jolts me. “Control yourself, Twenty-Five,” Major Alderson says. “Melissa will no longer participate in the show. Can Evelyn replace her for the other scenes, too?”

“I’ll need some time,” Hector says. “Is the Silver in place for this afternoon’s shoot?”

The major checks his tablet. “That’s an affirmative.”

“Let’s run that now. It’ll give me some wiggle room, particularly since my writers are still tweaking the front end.”

“Works for my schedule.” The major hangs up. “Well, looks like we’re all settled up here. Sergeant, please conduct Twenty-Five to the ER for the Silver’s execution. Need to remind her who’s in charge around here. Can’t have the inmates running the asylum, can we?”

Soldiers and scientists assemble around the slaughter slab. Excited murmurs follow Lester and me as we push our way toward the silver glow. I wish I had a gun with an endless supply of bullets. Bet their smiles wouldn’t be so broad if they had blood leaking from holes—

My CENSIR shocks me. “Control your emotions, Twenty-Five.”

When we get to the front and I see Baby surrounded by the lights and cameras, thoughts of retribution vanish. For a moment, maybe ten, my mind, my lungs, my heart seem to stop working. There’s so much fear in her eyes.

“Baby!” She brightens. “It’s gonna be okay. It’s gonna—” My CENSIR shocks me. “Be okay—” Another shock.

“Control your emotions, Twenty-Five.”

“I’m not doing anything wrong.”

My CENSIR shocks me.

Evelyn saunters to Baby’s side. She waves to the cheering crowd before turning her eager gaze on Twenty-Six, who seems fixated on the sword in his hands.

Baby deserves a better end than this.

“Hector!” I shout.

The director gets out from behind the camera. “If you cannot control her, Sergeant—”

“Let me do the execution,” I say.

“Evelyn will do fine.”

“Yeah, she’s a good kisser.” I snort. “But I don’t think that’s what you want right now.”

He glances toward Evelyn, then his eyes narrow on me. “Why? I was told this creature was your friend.”

“She is,” I say. “If you knew your friend was going to be executed, would you want somebody who hates her to do it? Or would you rather suck it up and do it yourself because you know you’d make it as painless as you could?”

“That would be scene appropriate.” Hector beckons a production assistant and a makeup artist. “Get her outfit. You, cover that welt on her cheek. Otherwise, keep it minimal.”

While I’m getting my face done, he waves for Evelyn. “Take five. Melissa’s gonna do the scene.”

“What?” Twenty-Six looks up from the sword, as if he just noticed I was here. “She’ll screw it up.”

Evelyn storms over. “She’s only doing this because she wants to say good-bye to her precious little Silver.”

“I don’t want to do it with her,” Twenty-Six says as Evelyn and I glare at each other. “She’s unreliable.”

“Just bring me the sword, Blackheart. I’ll do the rest.”

Goose bumps prickling every inch of my body, I change behind the wardrobe screen set up behind the slab.

Hector gives me an earpiece. “One miscue, and you’re off my set.”