S.W. Tanpepper's GAMELAND, Season One Omnibus (43 page)

“
I was supposed to get Micah's hack,” he admits. “I've been selling them to Arc.”

“
All
of them? Even the light saber fix Micah wrote for his avatar in
Zpocalypto
?”

He nods. “Yeah. I sold that one, too.”

I stare at him for a moment, then a bubble of laughter rises up inside of me. I try to stifle it. He smiles at me, confusion on his face.

“
But, okay, then why go back for Jake? What does that have to do with Arc? Or Kyle?”

“
Nothing. That's what I keep trying to tell you. That part was for you. And Jake too. A tiny, little bit for Jake. Mostly it was for you. And…okay, maybe a little bit for me. You really poured on the guilt back there. I mean, you were right: Jake didn't deserve us turning our backs on him. I didn't want to spend the rest of my life not being able to look at myself in the mirror and hating myself because I'd left him behind.”

“
You should've let us help.”

“
I figured it would be a simple rescue. Get in quick, get out quick. The fewer people involved, the better. Christ, I was wrong. And then, when those two guys from Arc found us, I was, like, cool. But I knew something was wrong, almost from the start. Sure enough, they betrayed me. They betrayed all of us.”

“
Why? What could they want with a bunch of kids?”

“
We're not just kids, Jess. We're hackers and gamers. And we're nobodies. Who'll miss us?”

“
We're not nobodies.”

He leans into me. The fatigue suddenly etched so deeply in his face that I'm afraid it'll never go away. I take his head in my hands and pull him close. He hesitates at first, his eyes studying mine, looking for something that I'm not sure he'll ever find in them. Maybe if he looks hard enough and deep enough he will. Maybe. I hope he keeps trying.

And then we kiss.

Oh God, I want so badly for this to be a dream. A nightmare fading into a harmless dream. I want to wake up from my life and just be with Kelly.

When he finally draws away again, his eyes are closed. “Marry me,” he whispers.

“
If we get out of this—”

“
If? Don't you mean when?” He smiles thinly, but it still manages to light up his face.

I smile back, even as a deep sense of foreboding falls over me. I'm not as certain as he is that we will succeed in getting out of this.

He sags against his seat until his head rests against the wall. In less than a minute, he's asleep, his body finally yielding to his exhaustion.

I wish I could sleep too, but I can't. The throbbing in my head is worse. My stomach roils unhappily. I stand up to stretch. With one last glance downward at Kelly, I step toward the back of the car.

Stephen looks over at me. “This isn't about Arc,” he quietly says. “It isn't even about you. It's much bigger than that.”

Jake gives him a quick shake of the head, a warning look in his eyes, silently telling him to shut up. But there's something else in Jake's face, too. Pain, I think. He looks like he's desperately trying not to cry out.

I go and stand in front of Stephen, blocking him from Jake's view. I don't need anyone to freak out like he did back there in the terminal. For a moment there I was sure he was going to lose it and murder someone. I can't let that happen. I may have blood on my hands, but the rest of them are innocent. I'll do what I can to make sure it stays that way.

The tram rocks slightly and my body responds sluggishly. My brain feels like it's sloshing around inside of my skull. My head pounds from the combination of tension and Kelly's kiss, from fatigue and hunger. I wait for the pressure and the nausea to pass, but they only intensify.

“
What do you mean bigger than Arc?” I mumble.

Stephen's face swims before me. He laughs again and his voice sounds low and warped in my ears.

What the hell is wrong with me?

Across the aisle, Jake suddenly bends over and pukes between his shoes. I turn, startled by the sound, but the scene sweeps past my view and keeps right on spinning; it doesn't stop. I catch a glimpse of Ashley slumped awkwardly in her seat. Tanya cries out, grabbing her head. She tries to stand, but crumples to the floor, writhing and making choking sounds. The scene spins and spins: Kelly, Jake, Micah, Ash, Tanya.

Kellyjakemicahashtanyakellyjake—

Stephen laughs and laughs.

And then, from some deep place inside of me, I suddenly know what's been eating at me. It was what Miss Novak had said about us not being able to leave. And then, earlier, in my room during the fight with Nurse Mabel, the words that so enraged me that I'd had to—

That I…

I…

You'll never escape
.

I had to kill her.

I had to.

Now I finally understand exactly what they'd meant: There's something about the new implants they put in us. They've done something to them so we can't leave.

I hear Stephen's voice cutting through the fog of pain: “Our failsafe.” He sounds so far away now, like he's been whisked away, flying over the hills and into the clouds. I can almost see and feel those same clouds between us as my knees give way. He comes and hovers over me, as if the floor has lost all its substance, smiling like a manic angel.

“
You didn't think we'd just let you go, did you?” he asks. “That's why we have contingencies such as these.”

He goes over to the cart and pulls out a pair of scissors and manages to cut himself free of his bindings. I watch helplessly from the floor, my muscles quivering like jelly, not responding to my commands.

Yet, somehow, with an effort that feels both torturous and not my own, I find myself incredibly lurching to my feet. I smack into a pole and grab it to keep from falling, but I slide down. I rise again, pushing, straining against the mighty grasp of gravity. I need to make it back to Reggie. I need to tell him to stop the tram. To turn it around. My mouth doesn't work. My lips are cardboard.

I bounce between the poles, off the seats. Two more steps and my brain registers that the engineer's compartment is empty. Reggie's not standing at the controls. His body lies limp on the floor of the compartment, half through the open doorway, rocking with the movement of the car.

I slip to my knees. They won't carry me any longer. Leaning back against the seat feels so good. I'm tempted to just lie down and sleep.

Stephen watches me with amusement in his eyes. I couldn't care less. I just want to sleep.

“
We should be just about under the wall by now. Just about to the EM barrier. It won't hurt for much longer. I promise.”

“
Why?” I gasp.

“
We don't want our experiments getting out and infecting the rest of New York, now do we? Not yet, anyway.”

His laughter peals against my eardrums, pounds off the walls of my skull. He reaches into the medical bag and draws out a syringe filled with a shiny green substance.

“
What are you going to do with that?” I say, my words slurring. They're barely coherent, even to my own ears.

“
Not everyone is who you think they are,” he says. “Not your friends. Not your family. Not even me.” He laughs and pushes me aside with his foot. He sneers like I'm nothing but dirty laundry. It doesn't take him much effort to get past me.

“
Take me, for example,” his voice says.

I watch his lips, fascinated by the way they don't seem to sync with his words.

“
You undoubtedly thought I was some weak-kneed intern or something. I'm the prep nurse, not Miss Novak. I'm the one who developed the alpha protocol. And once I get you back, I'll be giving the injections to all of you.”

I slip to the floor once more and begin to melt into it. I just want so badly to sleep. I close my eyes, and darkness descends.

Suddenly, there's a snap inside my head and a white hot flash of pain. I scream in agony while Stephen laughs.

Then it's gone, blissfully gone. The pain flees from my head so completely that I'm left breathless. It leaves in its place an emptiness so immense that all I can do is plunge headlong into it.

 

“Citizens are advised to remain indoors,”
the recording blares from the government-required speaker on our wall. The same message for the past three hours, over and over again. “This is not a drill. Do not go outside. Do not answer your door unless you are instructed to do so by the military.”

Eric pulls me away from the window, snapping at me that I'm going to get us killed standing there like that.

“
I thought the outbreak was in Washington?” I say. “That's hundreds of miles away.”

“
How do you know that? I didn't see anything on Media.”

There's been nothing about the outbreak on the official Media Stream, no announcements, no coverage. But it's not hard to find the black streams. That's where the real information can be found, unadulterated by Government.

“
God,” I cry, rubbing my arm. “Why do you have to be so paranoid all the time?”

“
Jessie, be quiet!”

“
You be quiet,
Mister Scaredy Cat-I'm-afraid-of-a-zombie-wombie
.”

He holds his head in his hands and rocks, moaning like one of them.

“
Is it because of Dad you're such a freak?”

“
You shut up about Dad!” he screams, his face bright red.

“
Eric,” Mom says, “please. She's only nine. She's just a kid. She's scared.”

“
I'm not scared, Mom.”

“
You should be,” Eric says. “Now get away from the window.”

“
How long do we have to stay inside?”

“
As long as the police say we have to, honey,” Mom says. She reaches for her glass. Condensation still drips down the outside, though the ice is long gone. She lifts it to her lips and grimaces. She doesn't like the taste, and yet she still takes another drink. Sober for three months—the longest stretch yet. But rumors of a new outbreak have driven her back to the bottle.

“
When is Grandpa coming home?” I ask. “Won't he be arrested for being outside?”

“
Grandpa is safe. Don't worry. He's helping the police. He knows what to do.”

“
Damn well better know,” Eric mutters. “This is all his fault.”

“
Watch your language, young man.”

“
I'm twenty, Mom. I'm not a kid anymore.”

She gets up and leaves the room. We watch her slip away like a ghost through the walls.

“
You shouldn't say it's Grandpa's fault,” I tell Eric.

“
And you shouldn't always believe what you hear.”

“
He's family.”

“
So was Dad.”

 

The flash quickly fades,
and along with it, the memory of the scare eight years ago.

Actually, fade isn't the right word. The pain and memory don't slip away like sunlight leaking from the day. Everything just blinks right off, like a switch being flipped. Just like that, my head is clear and I'm slammed back into the tram.

I blink a couple times. Above my head, upside down from my perspective, Stephen strolls toward the engineer's compartment. He's going to stop the tram.

No. He's not. He pauses in front of Kelly, who's still on his seat, his head lolling to one side. Stephen raises his hands and I see that he's holding a syringe. He brings up to his eyes, taps it, removes the needle cap. He smiles as he bends down and reaches for Kelly's arm. Panic flairs up inside of me.

“
No!” I scream. I lunge to my feet, amazed that my body actually responds as well as it does. The lightheadedness is completely gone. My head still feels strange, but it's clear, my thoughts nimble, not heavy like before. Stephen's head jerks around, surprise on his face. “Kelly!” I shout.

He jerks upright in his seat, his eyes flicking from me to Stephen to the syringe. He doesn't hesitate. He kicks out and his foot catches Stephen's wrist. The syringe flips through the air, then clatters to the floor. It comes to rest beneath a seat. Stephen turns and punches Kelly in the face, then dives for the syringe.

“
Stop him!” I shout, stumbling against the rail as the car sways around a slight turn in the track. “Don't let him get that syringe!”

Kelly jumps up, but Stephen's too fast and too far ahead of him. He drops to his knees and reaches for the syringe as Kelly grabs his ankle to pull him away.

The car jerks again, throwing me to the floor. I land next to Tanya, who's still writhing and making grunting sounds. Bloody spittle froths from her lips. I hope it's nothing worse than a bit tongue. I pray it's not transmissible.

Jake's face rocks, his cheek smearing his vomit. He moans unconsciously. Ash is completely out. Her head jitters against the seat like a ragdoll's, her skin deathly pale.

Stop this thing! Something's wrong! Go back!

I propel myself forward, pushing past Jake's sprawled legs. The train judders and rolls.

Kelly and Stephen are tangled up between a pair of seats. Stephen's elbow rises and rockets down. I hear an impact and the explosion of Kelly's breath leaving his lungs. His arm reaches up and he gets a hand on Stephen's face and tries to push him off.