Fragments (55 page)

It doesn’t matter,
she thought.
They can’t justify what they’re doing to those men in the basement. If these parents
knew that living, breathing people were suffering like that, would they be so glad
to see the cure? Would they even accept it?
She wanted to tell them, to tell them everything, but she felt frozen.

Vale finished prepping the shot and turned to the parents, shooing them from the room.
“Please,” he said softly, “we need a moment of privacy with your child.”

The mother’s eyes went wide in fear. “Will he be okay?”

“Don’t worry,” said Vale, “it will only be a moment.” They were reluctant to leave,
but they seemed to trust him, and with a bit more gentle urging and another quizzical
glance at Kira, they left the room. Vale locked the door behind them and turned with
the syringe—not toward the infant, but toward Kira, holding it out to her like a gift.
“I told you that I lead these people by giving them what they want,” he said. “Now
I’m doing the same for you. Take it.”

“I don’t want your cure,” said Kira.

“I’m not giving you the cure,” said Vale. “I’m giving you the choice—life or death.
That’s what you wanted, right? To decide for everyone what is right and what is wrong.
What is justifiable and what is irredeemable.” He offered her the syringe again, walking
toward her, holding it up like a grail. “Sometimes helping someone means hurting someone
else—we never like it, but we have to do it because the alternative would be worse.
I have destroyed ten lives to save two thousand: a better ratio, I think, than most
nations could ever hope for. We have no crime, no poverty, no suffering but theirs.
And mine,” he said, “and now yours.” He held out the syringe again. “If you think
you know better than I do how to weigh one life against another, if you feel like
you should decide who lives and who dies, then do it. Save this child or sentence
it to death.”

“This isn’t fair.”

“It isn’t fair when I have to do it either,” said Vale harshly. “It still has to be
done.”

Kira looked at the syringe, at the screaming baby, at the locked door with the parents
on the other side. “They’ll know,” said Kira. “They’ll know what I choose.”

“Of course,” said Vale. “Or are you suggesting that your choice will be different
depending on who knows about it? That’s not how morality works.”

“That’s not what I’m saying.”

“Then make your choice.”

Kira looked at the door again. “Why’d you send them out if they’re just going to find
out anyway?”

“So we could have this discussion without them screaming at you,” said Vale. “Make
your choice.”

“It’s not my place.”

“That didn’t bother you ten minutes ago when you told me what I had done was evil,”
said Vale. “You said that the Partials ought to be released. What’s changed?”

“You know what’s changed!” shouted Kira, pointing at the screaming baby.

“What’s changed is that your high-minded morality is suddenly faced with consequences,”
said Vale. “Every choice has them. We’re dealing with the very real threat of human
extinction, and that makes the choices worse and the consequences horrible. And sometimes
with the stakes this high a choice you would never make before, that you would never
consider in any other circumstance, becomes the only moral option. The only action
you can take and still live with yourself in the morning.” He pressed the syringe
into her hand. “You called me a tyrant. Now kill this child or become a tyrant yourself.”

Kira looked at the syringe in her hand; the salvation of the human race. But only
if she dared to use it. She’d killed Partials in battle—was this any different? Taking
one life to save another. To save a thousand others, or maybe ten thousand by the
time they were done. In some ways this was more merciful than death, for the Partials
were simply sleeping—

But no,
she told herself,
I can’t excuse this. I can’t justify it. If I give this child the cure, I will be
supporting the torture and imprisonment of Partials—of people. Of
my
people. I can’t pretend like that’s okay. If I do this, I have to face it for what
it is.

Is this what is left, at the end of everything? A choice?

She held the baby’s foot, pushed in the needle, and gave him the shot.

A
riel was surviving the Partial occupation the same way she survived everything: by
being alone. The conquering army had scared many of East Meadow’s residents into community
shelters, clustering together for strength, and stockpiling their food and water in
a single place. This had only made them easier to capture when the Partials started
raiding the city, swooping in to snatch victims and then carrying them off for experiments
or executions, it was impossible to tell which anymore. The groups’ sheer size and
noise made them easy to find and prey on, and really, no amount of untrained civilians
could fend off a Partial attack. With Marcus gone, Ariel stayed on her own, moving
from house to house, eating food left behind by others and always staying one step
ahead of the raiders. It had kept her hidden, and it had kept her safe.

Until the Partials found her.

Ariel gasped for breath, struggling to keep going. She knew the city like the back
of her hand, but the Partials were faster than she was, their senses keener. She could
hear their feet pounding on the road behind her, heavy boots slamming down, one after
another, a relentless rhythm getting closer and closer with each gasping breath. She
dodged to the left through a gap in a fence, cutting right and then doubling back
to the left again, around another wooden fence. Her feet were quieter than theirs,
barely a whisper in the darkness, and she held her breath as she tiptoed through the
grass, her eyes straining in the dim light for any twig or branch or bottle she might
step on and give herself away. She heard one set of heavy footprints run past her,
crashing through the hole in the fence and thrashing wildly through the yard beyond.
The second pair followed, and she nodded.
Just one more. Just one more Partial fooled and I’m free.
She crept forward silently, almost to the end of the grass; there she would slip
down a stairway to a basement safe house she’d used a time or two before, and hide
there until the raiders gave up and left in search of easier prey. All she had to
do was make it to the stairs—

The third set of Partial footsteps stopped, nearly even with her on the far side of
the double fence. Ariel froze, not moving, not making a sound, not even breathing.
The Partial took a step in one direction and stopped. Back in the other direction,
and stopped.
What is he doing?
But even as she asked the question, she knew, somehow, what he was doing. He had
stopped because he had spotted something. And he knew where she had gone.

She heard a deep chuckle. “Oh, you’re good,” the Partial laughed, and vaulted the
fence directly toward her. Ariel cursed under her breath and sprinted again, all thoughts
of stealth gone in a flat-out race for survival. The Partial vaulted the second fence
and ran after her, just a few yards behind, almost close enough to stretch forward
and grab her by the neck. Ariel ran as fast as she could, her mind trying desperately
to figure out how he’d found her—she’d been quiet, she’d been hidden, she’d done everything
she’d learned to do, and yet it was like he’d known she was there, almost like a sixth
sense. Marcus had told her about their link, and the way it let them find one another,
but everything he’d said told her that it wouldn’t work on humans—that humans were
a blind spot in a sensory system they relied on too much. She’d used that to her advantage
before, and it had always worked. How had she given herself away?

The Partial was almost on her, his heavy breathing sounding so loud in her ears, she
thought for sure he must be only inches behind her, toying with her. She could smell
his sweat, and the sour stink of his breath in the air.
That’s it,
she thought,
it’s my scent. I’ve been running so hard, and hiding so long, I must stink. He didn’t
see me or hear me or feel me on the link, he smelled me, like a bloodhound.

But I’m not giving up.

She lowered her head, pushing herself into the hardest sprint of her life, when suddenly
her body went into a spasm and she sprawled forward on the ground, rolling end over
end as her muscles failed her, and her inertia carried her in a tumbling crash. Her
senses flickered and jumped; the world was upside down and backward. She struggled
to right herself, but her entire body throbbed in pain. It was like she’d been hit
full force with a baseball bat, but she couldn’t tell from where. Slowly her eyes
focused, and she saw the Partial standing over her with a shock stick; he clicked
it a few times, letting bright blue light arc back and forth between the contacts.

“You’re a fighter,” he said, dropping the stick back into a ring on his belt. He knelt
down and smiled, his teeth flashing white in the moonlight. “I might have to have
a little fun before I turn you in to the boss.” Ariel tried to move, but her limbs
still wouldn’t obey her. The Partial reached for her neck.

“Stop,” said a voice, and the Partial froze. His hand hovered inches from Ariel’s
face, motionless. “Stand up,” said the voice again, a woman’s voice, but Ariel couldn’t
see the speaker. There was something familiar about it, but she couldn’t place it.
The Partial stood, staring blankly forward. “Pull out your weapon.” The Partial obeyed.
“Shock yourself.” The Partial clicked the shock stick on, raising it toward his own
chest, but stopped a few inches away. His eyes seemed harder now, as if he was struggling,
and Ariel could see sweat pouring down his face. “Do it!” the voice commanded, and
the Partial’s defenses collapsed. He slammed the taser into his own chest, falling
instantly to the ground, his limbs flailing as his nervous system short-circuited.
Somehow his hand managed to keep the taser pressed to his chest, even as the rest
of his body twitched and jumped, until finally he lost all control and slumped into
unconsciousness. The taser fell inert to the ground.

It’s Dr. Morgan,
thought Ariel, still trying to move. She managed to get one arm under her, raising
her head slightly off the ground, but her vision swam and she struggled to stay up.
When Morgan was controlling Samm, that same thing happened—that was exactly how Marcus
and Xochi described it. Dr. Morgan’s here. She has come for me herself, like a vampire
in the night.
She got her other arm under her and lurched up, still woozy, her eyes wandering in
and out of focus. She turned and saw a figure in the darkness behind her, but her
leg throbbed and she couldn’t run. “Dr. Morgan,” she croaked, but her voice wouldn’t
obey, and the words were meaningless mush. The figured stepped into the moonlight.

It was an old woman, hunched and dark, not a vampire but a wild-haired witch.

“You,” said Ariel.

“Hello, child,” said Nandita. “Come, we must find your sisters. Our world is about
to end again.”

K
ira walked in silence through the dark subterranean hall, feeling the weight of the
empty syringe in her hand. It seemed heavier now than it ever had when it was full.

“I don’t know you how you do it,” said Kira.

“That much was obvious,” said Vale, “since you kept insisting that I couldn’t do it
at all. Now, I think, you have a glimpse of what it costs to be a leader.”

“That wasn’t right,” said Kira. “It wasn’t the right thing to do. But . . . it was
the only thing I could do.”

“Whatever helps you sleep tonight,” said Vale. He sighed, and his voice became distant,
pensive. “In twelve long years, every hour I haven’t spent tending the Partials and
harvesting the cure, I’ve spent trying to figure out how to do it without them. They
won’t last forever, but this colony needs to. These children will grow up and have
children of their own, and what will save them then? I can stockpile enough Ambrosia
for another generation, maybe two, but then what? Even a ‘cured’ human is still a
carrier—RM will be with us forever.”

“You have a year to figure it out,” said Kira. “Eighteen months at the most, before
every Partial dies and we lose them forever.”

“The expiration date,” said Vale, nodding. “It’s as tragic as the Failsafe.”

Only the Trust knows about the Failsafe. It’s time to confront him.
“You’re one of them, aren’t you?” asked Kira. “The scientists who made the Partials.
The Trust.”

Vale paused in midstep, casting her a glance. When he started walking again his voice
was different, though Kira couldn’t discern his mood—was he curious? Defensive? Had
she made him angry?

“You know a great deal about what I thought was secret,” said Vale.

“The Trust is why we’re here,” said Kira. “I . . .” She paused, not sure if she should
reveal everything. She decided to play it safe and keep everything as vague as she
could. “I knew a woman named Nandita Merchant. She told me to find the Trust, with
the implication that they’d have the answers we need to save both species. She disappeared
before I could ever ask her about it directly.”

“Nandita Merchant,” said Vale, and this time Kira had no problem reading his emotions—he
was struck with a deep sadness. “I’m afraid she’ll never be able to recover from what
she did with the Failsafe. She is as guilty as the rest of us.”

It was Kira’s turn to stop in surprise. “Wait,” she said. “The Trust did this? The
Failsafe was a virus, we learned that in Chicago, but you’re saying . . . you’re saying
that Nandita, that all of you, built it to target humans? On purpose?”

“I didn’t build it at all,” said Vale, still walking. “I built the Partial life cycle,
their growth and development, the way they accelerate to an ideal age and stay forever—until,
of course, they reach the expiration date. Sheer poetry, I assure you, one of the
most sophisticated bits of biotech in the entire project.”