Rachel Caine - Terminated

Speaking of that . . . Bryn hated to do it, but she grabbed her backpack, unzipped it, and took out one of the tubes of lukewarm hamburger meat. “We’d better power up,” she said to Riley, who nodded. Riley sliced open the tube with a knife, and took a handful of the raw beef. Bryn made a face and plunged her own fingers in; it felt . . . gross. But the smell hit her in a wave, and woke an insane tsunami of red-hot hunger that made her jaw ache, and suddenly, she was shoveling the slippery meat into her mouth and chewing, and the taste was like ambrosia and honey, like the best and rightest food in the world.

She ate four handfuls of it, then forced herself to stop. Riley took an extra. There wasn’t much left in the tube.

Bryn wiped her mouth and sat back, and caught Joe staring at them. The expression on his face wiped out to impartiality, but there was no doubt that he’d found what he’d just seen disturbing, at the very least.

“Sorry,” she said, and swallowed the taste of iron and meat. “Better to go in full strength.”

“Copy that,” he said, and put the truck in gear without another word.

The elation the meat brought with it was unsettling. Despite that, Bryn felt sad and disoriented, and realized that it wasn’t so much for herself—she’d given up hope that she’d come out of this in any way normal—but for the world around her that had no idea it was on the verge of change. Because change it would; it wouldn’t have a choice. Whatever happened, even if they miraculously stopped the Fountain Group dead in its tracks, word about Returné would begin to creep out. People would seek it out of desperation and pain and anguish. And someone, somewhere would meet that need.

It would turn clinging to life into a drug-addicted plague.

She blinked as Joe steered the truck to a stop, and looked around. “We’re here,” he said, and nodded ahead. “See that building? That’s the address. Call me crazy, but it doesn’t exactly look like the high-dollar establishment I was expecting from these guys.”

It was a clinic. A free clinic, one of those charity operations that served the down and out and disenfranchised. Bryn felt a sudden sweep of chill, as she thought about the sick, old people who’d been used so cruelly at their supposedly safe memory care unit by the Fountain Group. “They like to pick off the weak,” she said. “Use them. This is a place they might find attractive.”

“Or maybe it’s a person we’re looking for,” Riley said, leaning forward. “Call Pansy.”

Bryn dialed the burner phone, and it rang three times before Pansy picked up, sounding breathless. “If you’re calling to offer me low rates on my credit card, it’s not a good time,” she said.

“It’s me,” Bryn said. “Everything all right?”

“That all depends on your definitions,” Pansy said. “Manny’s come out of his bunker, so that’s good. Your sister is bored out of her skull, which is bad. Liam is making amazing meals out of our food stores, and did you know he could cook? I think we might keep him. Oh, and we’re completely surrounded, and Jane’s people are trying to dig us out.”

Bryn took in a sharp breath and looked at Joe. “Are you going to be all right?”

“Sure. Nothing we can’t handle,” Pansy said. “Not if you can do your job and get this thing resolved within the next week, anyway. That’s about how long it’ll take them to break in, we think. What do you need?”

“We’ve reached the address you sent us to. What are we looking for?”

“All I was able to get was a last name: Ziegler. He, or she, was specifically named in Fountain Group comm that we decrypted. But I don’t know what role this person plays, only that he seems highly involved.” There was a shout on Pansy’s end of the phone, and her sunny tone grew brisk. “Okay, Manny’s calling, gotta run. Good luck, Bryn.”

“You too,” she said, but Pansy was already gone. Bryn shook her head, folded the phone, and relayed the information to her two remaining allies.

“Well,” Riley said, “I’m the logical choice to go collect intel. My new look fits in.”

She was right; the punk esthetic she’d put on would probably blend better than either Joe or Bryn could. “Keep your phone on,” Joe said. “We’ll be fifteen seconds away.”

Riley nodded, concealed the handgun under her shirt at the back of her pants, and bailed out of the van. She walked the short block, hands in the pockets of her jacket and head down, with slow, wandering steps.

If Bryn hadn’t known who she was, she’d have missed her altogether. “She’s good,” she said.

“Surprised?”

“A little.”

“By the time she reaches the door, she’ll already have a backstory worked out for her character, and she’ll have some specific medical problem that fits in with what they normally see.”

“But she won’t be sick.”

“Doesn’t matter. A lot of people coming into these places aren’t, they just want drugs. It’s pretty much foolproof,” Joe said. Just then, Bryn’s phone rang, and she put it on the console between them and pressed the speaker button. “Riley, you’re on, we’re here.”

Riley must have been holding the phone to ear while standing at some sort of reception desk, because she said, “Hold on,” and then, “Yeah, I need to see a doc. My back hurts real bad.”

The receptionist sounded muffled and world-weary, but clear enough. “Fill in these forms here. Have you been before?”

“Yeah, I saw Doc—um, Ziegler, maybe?”

“Dr. Ziegler’s here,” the receptionist said. “Take a seat. We’ll call you.”

Riley’s clothes rustled, and then she said in a low voice, “I’m on the list. Will redial when they call me back.”

“Riley, no, don’t hang up—” But it was too late, and Bryn was talking to a dial tone. “Dammit.”

“She’s trying to save on battery power,” Joe said. “It’s a clinic. Could be an hour before she sees anybody but homeless dudes and crying kids.”

“It could be seconds before they drag her off, if Ziegler was a hot name,” Bryn said. “Right?”

“Not arguing that, but we have to let this play out. It ain’t Riley’s first prom.”

“Maybe not, but this is the Fountain Group, and they’re not playing, Joe.”

He thought about it for a second, then sighed and nodded. “Okay, you win. Check that first aid kit there for bandages.”

“Uh—okay?” She opened the kit built into the wheel well and pulled out a roll of gauze. “This?”

“Yep, that’ll do. Spool some off and get ready.”

“For what?”

“This,” he said, and pulled out his combat knife from a wrist sheath. Before she could ask what he was about to do, he sliced a cut in his forehead, above the eyebrow. It was about half an inch long, but the blood immediately sheeted out down his face in a shiny red stream, pooling around his eyes, snaking down his chin and pattering in thick drops on his shirt. It kept coming, a steady red rain, and she was mesmerized by it. Glad I ate, she thought, because the smell of the blood tantalized.

“Old fighter trick,” he said. “You can give me the gauze now.”

She blinked, flinched, and handed it over with guilty haste. He pressed it to his forehead and said, “How do I look?”

“Gruesome,” she said.

“Excellent. I’m just going to lurk. This cut’ll seal itself in about thirty minutes; all I need is a couple of butterfly bandages and a cleanup, but it gives me an excuse to sit and watch Riley.”

“Be careful,” she said.

“My phone will be on,” he said. “You hear me say the word wife , get your ass in there, because something will be on fire. Probably me.”