Grip (The Slip Trilogy Book 2) (17 page)

He requests that they guard the topmost floor.

She wears her hoverskates and he carries a hoverboard under his arm.

When it’s pitch black and everyone’s sleeping, they ease silently into the night sky and away from the abandoned building. She knows the smart thing to do would be to run, to get as far away from the big cities and the Pop Con Hunters and anyone else she might hurt.

Instead, they head directly toward Saint Louis and redemption.

~~~

When night falls, it's like a club beating Benson to a violent, unwanted sleep.

He awakes from time to time, in fits and starts, trying to remember his dreams. Was Luce in them? he wonders. But he can’t remember, and, to his utter dismay, he can’t remember her face either. Is this what it’s like to lose someone? he wonders. Forgetting everything about them you never thought you’d forget in a million years?

If so, he never wants to lose someone again.

Finally, he gives up on sleep, moving away from Check and Rod and Gonzo, who are breathing heavily nearby. He checks that Geoffrey’s still there, too, and he is, looking even younger in sleep than he does when awake. Janice—his mother—is curled up like a backwards S. There’s something in her hands, clutched tightly. His old Zoran watch, he realizes. She really loves that thing.

The entire building is asleep, except for the guards perched on the windowsills. He wonders where Harrison and Destiny are. He assumes they’re together as they’ve been inseparable since the gunshot incident back at the camp. As they fled the woods, his brother and Destiny stayed together, whispering to each other the whole way. They seemed close in a way he’s only ever been with Luce.

Which means Harrison should understand why…
what happened
…left him so broken. He should understand that he can’t just “get over” Luce and that she’s not just “some chick.” A renewed burst of hot anger seeps through his veins. He takes a deep breath, trying not to think about Harrison or their argument. Trying to move on.

His mind restless, his feet seem to have a mind of their own. To his surprise, he finds himself in the temporary medical corner. There are a handful of beds, which are really desks with blankets on them. All the patients are sleeping. Except, wait…

Not all of them.

One is sitting up, staring at the wall, back to him. A woman, he guesses, judging by the long dark hair. Minda, the guardswoman who saved Harrison and Destiny—later saved by the same pair during Pop Con’s raid. Last he’d heard, she hadn’t woken up and her status was precarious.

Clearly, she’s awake now.

“Are you okay?” Benson asks.

He sees her body tense, but she doesn’t flinch, or even turn around. “My head feels like it’s swimming through quicksand,” she says. “Oh, and I can’t see out of one of my eyes. Other than that, I’m perfectly fine.”

“You almost died. Do you want me to get the doctor?”

“Where’s my pack?” she asks, ignoring the question.

Benson grabs a bag off the floor at the foot of the table. Hands it to her.

She grabs it roughly, rummaging through it. Pulls out a portable holo-screen. “No,” she says, staring at its shattered face. And again, “No.”

“You’re alive,” Benson says, “and you’re worried about your stupid holo?”

“It’s not just a stupid holo,” Minda says, “I need it to—” She stops and shakes her head, placing the broken holo back in the bag. “Never mind. You’re right, it doesn’t matter. Now tell me what happened.”

“How much do you remember?”

“I remember the alarms and getting trapped in the bunker and an explosion. Then there was smoke, so much smoke. I tried to tuck my mouth into my shirt but I’d already taken a deep breath of the stuff.”

“Gas,” Benson says. “Lethal.”

“Then how?”

How am I here? How am I alive? How did I get out of the gas-filled room?
Benson hears all three questions in her ambiguous inquiry.

“Destiny and Harrison saved you,” Benson says.

Finally, she turns, one eye open, one closed. She nods, as if it’s the exact answer she expected. “Those two are good ones.”

“They are,” Benson says, silently wishing he knew either of them well enough to really make that judgment. For all he knows, Minda might have had more conversations with them than he has. And his last one with Harrison makes him wish he’d never met his brother in the first place.

“But Harrison hates your father,” Minda says. “I worry he always will.”

Strangely, Benson feels simultaneously defensive of both his brother and father. “Harrison didn’t get to see our father the way I did. And my father saved my life more times than I can count.” In that moment, Benson realizes that blood is like a thick rope, tying him to his family. As much as he wants to hate Harrison for what he said before, he can’t. Just like he couldn’t hate his father, even if he should’ve.

“I didn’t mean it in a bad way,” Minda says. “I was just wondering whether you think Harrison will ever forgive him.”

“Oh,” Benson says, surprised by the turn in the conversation. “I—I don’t know.”
I don’t know anything about my brother.
“I hope so. One day.”

“I hope so, too,” Minda says. “One day he’s going to find out about my past, and I’m going to need his forgiveness, too.”

“What do you mean?” She’s a Lifer. A strong, independent woman. She seems exactly like the type of person Harrison would gravitate toward.

“I used to work for Pop Con,” she says.

Benson sucks in a breath, picturing her wearing a gasmask and shooting lasers at his head. He shivers at the frightening thought.

“I know,” she says. “I feel the same way when I think about the old me.”

“What were you?”

“A Hunter,” she says.

“How did you…” Benson lets the question trail away, not wanting to offend her.

“Gain the trust of the Lifers?” she says, reading his mind. “It wasn’t easy, not that I can blame them.”

Benson digests it all. “What changed for you?” Benson asks. After he asks it, he realizes how important the question is to him. How vitally important. Because he needs to know what makes people change their thinking.

She shakes her head. “I was always so confident in my beliefs. Everything was black and white. There are laws and you follow them. The laws are for the good of everyone. Anyone not obeying the laws threatens our society. I studied population control. As soon as I graduated, I applied for a job at the Department of Population Control. I was
ecstatic
when I got it. I was doing something good. I was help—”

“You were killing innocent babies,” Benson says coldly.

Her face goes stone cold. She nods. “I did horrible things. Not just a few times. Many times. I didn’t go through with it the first few missions. I stayed back, let the others do the dirty work. I was reprimanded, suspended, almost lost my job. But then I forced myself to disconnect my emotions from the job. They weren’t babies anymore, they were UnBees. They had no souls. They were abominations that never should’ve been brought into the world. I imagined them with claws and beady eyes and blood-dripping fangs. And I was the ONLY one who could stop them.” Her lip is trembling and her face screwed up and her eyes burning with intensity.

Benson sees the Hunter she once was.

The expression fades and the Minda he met a week ago returns. “Then I got pregnant, accidentally,” she says.

Benson’s stomach turns. “You were married?”

“Boyfriend,” she says. “We took precautions, but nothing is foolproof.”

“What happened?”

“Although we didn’t realize it before, we wanted a baby together. So we applied for a Death Match. We didn’t tell anyone I was pregnant, not even my parents or his. And we waited. As the months went by, it got harder and harder to hide the bump. We hadn’t committed a crime yet, but my boyfriend was already talking about finding a doctor who would deliver the baby illegally if the birth authorization didn’t come through in time.”

“Where’s your child?” Benson asks, a bolt of fear striking his heart.

She continues on, as if she didn’t hear the question. “We argued. I said we couldn’t do it—we couldn’t have an unauthorized baby. He said the laws were wrong, unfair, that we had every right to have and raise a child as everyone else. Every day at work, I felt like the other Hunters were constantly staring at my stomach. I waited another few weeks and then turned myself in.”

“But you hadn’t committed a crime,” Benson argues. “There was nothing to turn yourself in for.”

She shifts in her seat. “We hadn’t announced the pregnancy, hadn’t made plans to terminate it if the birth authorization didn’t make it in time. We were contemplating an illegal birth.”

“They kicked you out of Pop Con?” he asks.
And killed the baby?
he doesn’t ask.

“Noo,” she says, drawing the word out. “They gave me a medal. Called me a patriot.”

She pauses, but Benson can see she’s not done, that there’s more, something dark and deep. The reason why Harrison would hate her. He waits patiently.

“They killed my boyfriend.”

Benson freezes, his blood running cold.

“Unknown to me, he’d already contacted a black market doctor. They had proof. Records. They said his crimes were unforgivable. Sentenced him to death and killed him.” Although her eyes fill with tears, they’re like dark pools of fury.

“I’m sorry,” Benson says. “I’m so sorry.”

“I loved him,” Minda says. “Both of them. They aborted my baby before I could carry him to full term. They killed my little Rajesh, named after my boyfriend. He was beautiful, perfect. I know he would’ve had his father’s big eyes. His big ears, too. I still picture him with my nose and chin. They kept me locked in a facility until after the procedure. They knew I would run, even as they poured accolades on my head. I played along. Tricked them. I knew they’d kill me, too, so I didn’t fight back, accepting the compliments gracefully. I made them think I was okay with it. I let my unborn son go silently into the night so I could keep on living.”

“You had no other choice,” Benson says.

“There’s always another choice,” Minda says. “I know that now. That’s why I’m a Lifer. That’s why I’m fighting for change.”

Benson looks away. He’s never been sure he agrees with the Lifers’ methods—the bombings and destruction—but he can no longer deny their spirit. They’re trying to help give people like him a better life. They were even harboring dozens of wanted fugitives. Maybe he’s been too hard on Jarrod.

“Minda?” a voice says from behind, pulling his thoughts back to reality. Simon approaches in the dim lighting. “You’re awake.” Benson can hear the relief in the large man’s tone. Clearly he cares about Minda’s well-being.

“I’m okay, Simon. I’m glad you are, too.”

Benson rises to leave, to let the friends speak privately, but Minda stops him. “Thanks for checking on me, Benson Kelly.”

“Sure,” he says.

“Do me a favor?”

“Yeah?”

“Don’t tell Harrison what I told you. I need to do it in my own time.” Simon gives Benson a strange look, but doesn’t ask what she means.

“No problem,” Benson says. Suddenly all he wants to do is talk to Harrison, even if his brother has nothing nice to say. Now’s not the time to hold grudges against family.

~~~

After leaving Minda and Simon to talk, Benson asks a few of the guards if they’ve seen his brother. The third one he speaks to says, “He went to the top floor with that worthless Slip who got everyone killed.”

Somehow he’s not surprised that Harrison and Destiny are still together. He starts for the stairs, but a voice stops him. “Benson?” his mother says, somewhere in the dark.

He makes for her voice. He finds her propped up on one elbow, right where he left her. “You need to sleep, Mother,” he says.

“Your brother is very sorry,” she says.

“Harrison?” he says, as if he has more than one brother.

“He wants golden sunrises and rainbows for the both of us,” she says, her eyes lighting up. “No, that didn’t make sense.” She taps her fingers on her skull. “Harrison wants straight arrows and umbrellas on rainy days. For you. For me. That’s better. Much better.”

Benson thought the first analogy made more sense, but he doesn’t comment. Instead, he asks, “Why is Harrison sorry?”

She scratches her head. “He didn’t say.”

“Wait. Wait just a minute.” Benson needs a moment of quiet. Something isn’t right. Well, something other than the fact that he’s travelling with a band of government fugitives. Something else, specific to his brother.

Harrison went with Destiny to the sixth floor.

“Umbrellas on a rainy day,” Janice muses softly.

He’s very sorry for something.

“Straight arrows, pointing at my heart,” she says.

We have to kill Benson’s dud. His old Death Match has to die so he can live.

“Oh no,” Benson breathes.