Mira Grant - Deadline

“So this dude wanted to, what, go expose a bunch of kangaroos and watch to see what happened as they got bigger?”

“Essentially, yes.”

“What happened with him?”

“He got deported on charges of tax evasion and improper work permits.”

Silence stretched between us as I considered what he was saying—and what he wasn’t. Even George was quiet, letting me think. Finally, I asked, “What about the third guy?”

“His files are in my bag.” Mahir looked at me levelly as he sipped his tea. “He read the files. Three times. And then he called me, told me his conclusions and where he’d sent his data, hung up the phone, and shot himself. Really, I’m not certain he had the wrong idea.”

“What… what did he say?”

“He said that were we braver and less willing to bow to the easy path, we might have had India back a decade ago.” Mahir put his cup down and stood. “I’m tired, Shaun. Please show me where I can sleep. You can read what I’ve brought you, and we’ll discuss it later.”

“Come on.” I stood and started for the hallway. “You can use my room. It’s not huge, but it’s quiet, and the door latches, so you shouldn’t wake up with any surprise roommates.”

“That’s a relief,” he said, following me up the stairs. His presence, strange as it was, felt exactly right, like this was exactly what had to happen before we could finish whatever it was we’d started.

We were all refugees now. None of us would stop running until all of us did.

BOOK IV

Immunological Memory

It’s better to go out with a bang and a press release than with a whimper and a secret.

—GEORGIA MASON

Fuck this. Let’s just blow some shit up.

—SHAUN MASON

George and I never technically knew our birthdays. The doctors could estimate how old we were and make some educated guesses about our biological parents, but it really didn’t matter. We knew we were born sometime in 2017, toward the end of the Rising, when most of North America had been taken back from the infected, because the doctors said so. We knew she was older by about six weeks. Everything else was details, and details weren’t important. Not to me. What was important was that I had her, and she had me, and we had each other, and that meant we could face anything the world threw at us. Sometimes I was even arrogant enough to think the Rising happened so we could be together.

It’s as good an explanation as any.

As of today, no matter when my birthday really is, I’ve had a birthday without George. As of today, I’ve spent a year going to sleep and waking up in a world she isn’t in, a world that seems meaningless because she’s never going to make it mean anything ever again. I was always sort of afraid she’d turn suicidal when I died. I asked her once if she ever worried about me like that.

“You’re already suicidal, you asshole,” she said, and laughed. Only it turns out she was wrong, because losing her made me more careful about almost everything. I miss her every day. I miss her every minute . But if anything happens to me, she may never get the ending she deserves, and I refuse to be selfish enough to die before I’m finished taking care of the things she left behind.

Happy birthday, George. You made me better than I could ever have been without you, and you hurt me worse than I could ever have been hurt by anybody else. I love you. I miss you. And I’m starting to get the feeling that I’ll see you pretty soon, because I’m starting to feel like, maybe, things are coming to an end.

God, I miss you.

—From Adaptive Immunities , the blog of Shaun Mason, June 20, 2041

Anybody who messes with Shaun is messing with me. And of the two of us, I swear, I am the one you do not want to mess with. He’ll kill you. But I will make you sorry, and I will make you pay.

Trust me. I’m a journalist.

—From Postcards from the Wall , the unpublished files of Georgia Mason, originally posted June 20, 2041

Eighteen

Alaric, what’s your twenty?” Silence answered me. I bit back a snarl and tried again: “Alaric, where are you?” Getting mad at him for not knowing the weird mix of military and ham radio pidgin used by the Irwin community was pointless. That didn’t stop me from doing it.

This time he answered, his voice coming clear and easy through the phone: “I’m finishing up my edits while Becks does some final recon for her report.”

“Not an answer.” I raked a hand through my hair, watching Maggie try to guide Kelly through the steps required to mix pancake batter. Either Kelly was the worst cook in the world or Maggie was really shitty at giving instructions. It could have gone either way. “Where are you, exactly?”

“Down near Mount Shasta.” My silence must have told Alaric he needed to give me more information, because he added, “About an hour out. Why? Do you need us to stop at the store or something on our way back in?”

Back when Buffy was alive, we could trust our network against anyone on the planet, including the CIA. Our security isn’t that stellar anymore, but thanks to upgrades cobbled from Maggie’s house system, Becks’s jury-rigging skills, and Alaric’s computer know-how, we’re pretty stable. Stable enough for what I was about to say, anyway: “Mahir’s here.”

It was Alaric’s turn to go briefly silent. Finally, he said, “Mahir sent in a report?”

“No, dumb-ass, Mahir’s here . Mahir is asleep upstairs in the guest room I’ve been using. He showed up with pretty much the clothes on his back and a suitcase full of research, and he looks like hammered shit.”

Maggie looked over. “Is that Alaric? Tell him to stop by the House of Curries on his way home. I’m going to send in an order.”

“Got it. Alaric, Maggie says—”

“I heard her,” he said, managing to sound annoyed and astonished at the same time. “You’re serious, aren’t you? Mahir is actually here .”

“Yeah, that’s what I’ve been saying.” Alaric began swearing. I listened, impressed. I hadn’t realized he knew that much Cantonese. I let him go for a few minutes, then interjected, “You kiss your mother with that mouth?”

Play nice with my Newsies, or I swear I’m going to make you sorry, said George flatly.

“I am being nice.”

Luckily, Alaric was still swearing, finishing off an elaborate phrase that started in Cantonese and switched to English as he said, almost wonderingly, “—son of a chicken-fucking soy farmer and a diseased convention-center security guard. How did he get here? Is he all right? Are we going to need to move again?”

“I’d rather wait and explain everything to you and Becks at the same time. Right now, he’s exhausted but I’m pretty sure nobody’s been shooting at him—yet, anyway—and that’s something else I’d like us all talk about at once. So when can you be here?”

There was a clattering sound as Alaric shoved his keyboard away, knocking something to the van floor in the process. “Give me ten minutes to get Becks back here, and I’ll break a couple of dozen speed limits getting over to you.”