Infected: Lesser Evils (31 page)

And Roan got on the FCC’s radar.

Roan beat the holy hell out of the two skinheads who had tried to kill Kim, a brief but brutal and surprising action caught on tape. (Were the skinheads members of the FCC? Quite possibly, but it wasn’t mentioned.) McFadden said this action proved Roan was demonic, not Human, and that all infecteds were children of Lucifer. The focus turned from Bolt as the butt buddy of Satan to Roan, and everyone seemed to like that a lot. They could find clips of him doing things that didn’t look particularly Human, and no matter that they were often poorly filmed and it was hard to say what was going on, you could still tell it was something weird, and it was Roan involved. His hair color was too unique; it was an instant giveaway. (Conversely, it made the fake video images easy to distinguish, because they could never get the hair color exactly right.)

Roan made things worse just by being himself. He was gay, confrontational, a vocal proponent of infected rights, and had come out as an atheist in that damn magazine article written about him. He was everything these people hated wrapped up in one shiny package. They couldn’t have hated him more if he came out for the subjugation of straight white men and the use of their children as living piñatas.

The problem here was, even if Roan had known, he wouldn’t have cared. He’d have egged on their hate, been deliberately provocative to piss them off, because that’s the type of asshole he was. He didn’t wait to be victimized, he’d run right out and confront his would-be harassers, get in their faces, make them increasingly uncomfortable, force them to make a move or leave. (The majority chose to leave, which was always the smartest move. You didn’t want to engage the crazy guy in a fight. The crazy guy had the built in advantage of being crazy.) He was one of the most aggressive gay guys she’d ever known, which wasn’t saying much, as she hadn’t known many. But even if he was a dyke, she’d have put him in the top five of aggressiveness.

That reminded her of the first time they’d met. Because they were both the only openly gay cops on the force at the time, they were of course introduced to each other, based on the assumption that all gay people knew and liked one another. To be honest, since Murphy wasn’t very politically active in gay causes (she supported them, but she didn’t have time between building her career and trying to have some semblance of a personal life) or in gay pride things, she had never associated much with gay men. Men and women generally mixed out of some desire for a relationship, so when you were a woman who preferred women—or a man who preferred men—why would you mix exactly? Again, political causes, parades, or rallies, but not much beyond that. Embarrassingly, she was kind of expecting a screaming queen type, someone who called everyone “girlfriend” and was obsessed with fashion, which Roan was the polar opposite of. (Poor bastard—even she had more fashion sense than Roan, and she wore flannel.) The thing that struck her immediately about him, beyond the odd hair color, was the light in his slightly too green eyes. There was an intensity there, the sign of a fierce intellect and even fiercer sense of humor (the most surprising thing about him was how damn funny he actually was), and… something else. She never knew what exactly, although now she was beginning to wonder if you could kind of see the cat in him. Back then she would have dismissed it as some silly, prejudiced thought wholly unworthy of her, but now she knew it wasn’t that simple at all. Roan and his virus weren’t as easily separated; she had yet to meet another infected who made her think of their cat side so much. You could kind of see the aspect of the lion in him even when he was in Human form, from the intense hunter’s scrutiny of his look to the flare of his nostrils as he unconsciously scoured the scents in the air, to the way he carried himself, to the way he was one of the quietest people she’d ever known when he wanted to be. (The dude could sneak up on you better than most, and she had no idea how he did that.) And when he was angry, he honestly seemed bigger—it was psychological or emotional or just some trick of perception, but when he was genuinely angry, he struck you as lethal, as a beast you were best to escape from as soon as possible. The weirdest thing was she never saw as much of the cat in him on the force; she saw it mostly once he had retired from regular police work.

Then again, most of his more flamboyant cat abilities had been coming out over the last few years. Since Paris died? If you did the math, pretty much. Did that mean something? Roan had once said Paris had kept him Human, and now she was wondering if that was actually true.

There were fake wanted posters for Roan on the FCC website, with simply “Wanted: Dead” on them, and the slogan “The only good cat is a dead cat.” There were hidden forums, links within links, where the FCC promised to financially support the family of the “martyr” who took out Roan. This was scary shit, and it was hard to believe that no one knew of this. This was a religious cult coming together in its hatred and focusing its attention on wanting Roan dead. They had his home address, business address, one of his cars (the GTO), places he was known to go (the Panic information seemed outdated). Someone had noticed he seemed to be hanging around with the Seattle Falcons a lot, and asked what the hell that was about, which was the only good question asked in the entire forum.

Murphy had wondered about that too, but finally figured it out tonight. They were all macho guys, and gay or not, Roan was the patron saint of macho guys. They probably enjoyed the macho camaraderie with each other, and the jock boys were kind of weird, which was just another thing they had in common. Grey, for instance. Wow—super intense. He could have been an MMA fighter, so why he was a hockey player was anyone’s guess, although she felt Roan should be glad he was hanging around, because Grey could probably take out a handful of attackers all by himself. The problem was, if you believed the FCC, there were hundreds.

One of the most troubling things had only just been discovered. One of these guys on the forum claimed to be a cop, one who had worked with Roan and found him skin-crawling and reprehensible. He played the victim card, claiming Roan, as a cop, only got his bravery medal and promotion while on the force for purely PC reasons and never deserved them. She absolutely loved the lazy-ass cops who always said someone got promoted due to affirmative action or political correctness, never acknowledging the fact that the minority in question actually just worked that much harder than you. And since Roan got his medal for saving a hostage and getting shot in the process, she wasn’t sure how he didn’t deserve it. He was sometimes so bullheaded he lost all common sense—like all men—but you could never question his bravery: he had brass balls the size of boulders. The cop also vowed to help set Roan up so he’d get “taken out” like the “devil” he was. Since his posting ID was Fagbasher42 (lovely), and the e-mail address he gave a phony one, it would be difficult to determine if he was a real cop or simply a grandiose liar, like many on the web actually were.

Now, the major problem. Roan was a hate target, a huge one. They couldn’t arrest everyone behind this, at least not right away, although she already knew the Feds were investigating the FCC for arms trafficking (supposedly they’d been selling and transporting dubious weapons across state lines, which was yet another comforting thing to know—heavily armed cults always came to good ends). With budget cuts there was no way they could keep a twenty-four-hour watch on his place, nor would it be practical. But she knew what Roan would say if she suggested he move: “No redneck assholes are chasing me out of my house.” Which she could understand, as she’d be much the same way, but it was self-destructive at best. He had a full fucking cult after him! But he was such a stubborn, macho asshole, he wouldn’t budge.

Murphy decided she’d tell Dylan. Either he could convince Roan to do the smart thing, or at least he could protect himself. While these idiots hadn’t discovered Roan had a civil partner, it was only a matter of time, and they’d come after him as well. Maybe even more so, because he’d be an easier target, and a good assumption with hatemongers was they were total fucking cowards.

Either Dylan would talk Roan into being sensible, or Roan would decide to be a suicidal asshole for both of them. At least it would be out of her hands either way.

O
NCE
again, Grey proved it was good to have a hockey goon for a friend.

Dylan was peripherally aware that there was a small riot going on in the lobby, but didn’t much care. There were a dozen cops out there, they could handle it, so he didn’t bother to pay any attention to it. But from what Dylan understood, while the cops were taking care of the troublemakers, one had actually snuck past and headed for the fire stairs. What the guy had missed, though, was that Grey had spotted him, and moved to intercept. When Grey grabbed the guy, he’d taken a swing at him, missed (of course he did—Grey probably saw it coming), and Grey threw a punch that apparently knocked the guy out the second it made contact, and sent three of his teeth flying down the hallway. This impressed many of the cops, but Grey just shrugged and said, “I’m a hockey player.” As if that explained how he could give a concussion and an urgent need for dental surgery to a two-hundred-and-fifty-pound man with one punch, but who knows, maybe it did. He really didn’t know hockey well enough to tell.

Anyways, with Grey done showing off his amateur surgery skills, trouble dissipated quickly (yeah, no shit), and the cops hustled those arrested off to jail. (The guy Grey hit was admitted immediately to the emergency room. At least he didn’t have far to go.) There were already rumors of trouble brewing outside Divine Transformation, but again, that was for other people to worry about. As much as Dylan knew he should have, he didn’t care about all infecteds—he cared about one specific one.

Dee disappeared for several minutes, then he returned, coming over to him and whispering, “He’s out of surgery. Come on, I’ll sneak you to his room.”

Why did he have to sneak him in? He didn’t know, but he didn’t much care either. He got up and followed, feeling as bereft as he had felt for a long time. Not since Jason had died had he ever felt so bad. At least he wasn’t crying, though—he was too tired to cry.

In the elevator, Dylan slumped against the wall and studied the buttons, so he knew which floor Roan was on. He recalled that D’Andra’s friend Jayna was super into numerology, and wondered what she’d make of Roan being on the fifth floor.

There was a cop outside Roan’s room, a dumpy guy who had the look of the nameless partner always killed within the first ten minutes of an action film, and he recognized Dee. Dee introduced Dylan, pointing out he was Roan’s partner, and he should be allowed into his room without a hassle. As the cop and Dee discussed this, with the cop asking if the “docs” said it was okay for him to have visitors, Dylan slipped inside.

It was a hospital room, a place that stank of illness and disinfectant, but it seemed shadowy and almost medieval, mainly due to the bars on the window and the heavy, reinforced door that closed with a heavy, almost mausoleum-type finality. A special room for infected patients, in case they changed out of sequence or lied about their sequence, or came in in no shape to say. (Never mind that Roan was permanently out of viral sequence; they didn’t know that, and he probably wouldn’t want anyone to tell them.)

Roan laid corpselike on a narrow bed, so pale he almost blended in with the starched, cream-colored sheets. He had what seemed to be an octopus’s worth of tentacles attached to his arm, giving him blood and fluids and monitoring his vital signs. His heartbeat was a digital graph, reduced to bright blue numbers that probably meant something to someone, but nothing to him.

Dylan found a plastic chair tucked into the far corner and brought it to his bedside, wanting to say something, and yet afraid to crack the ice-like silence. He sat down in the uncomfortable, primary-colored chair, and held one of Roan’s hands within his. It was so cold it was almost shocking. Dylan still kissed his palm anyways, let the cold fingers rest against his cheek. “I don’t know how much more of this I can take,” he admitted, closing his eyes against the few tears that suddenly sprang up and leaked out. It was selfish of him, wasn’t it? He felt like he’d been beaten up and run over and dragged down three miles of bad road, but it was Roan in this hospital bed, not him. Still, it felt like it might as well have been, and feeling like this terrified him. He couldn’t leave Roan, but he didn’t know if he’d survive staying with him either.

Maybe that was the definition of love. He felt a cynic like Roan would appreciate that immensely.

Time to Pretend

R
OAN
felt an odd sensation, like warmth and pressure on his mouth (and a taste not unlike mint toothpaste), and opened his eyes to find Holden looking down at him. “Oh look, Sleeping Beauty’s awake. Or is that Sleeping Scary? Which do you prefer?”

Roan stared up at his slightly unsettling smiling face for a moment, trying to process what he thought he felt. “Did you kiss me?”

“What? Why would you think that?” His smirking face seemed to give nothing away.

“You bastard! Who cops a feel on an unconscious man?”

“Not me. I like my feelees conscious.” Holden sat in the plastic chair beside his bed, still smiling suspiciously, while Roan found himself wondering if he was just having an odd moment. He didn’t seem to dream like normal people—he dreamed in color, he could taste, smell, and feel, and sometimes his dreams were even more vivid than reality itself. It was possible Holden hadn’t done anything. Did he trust it? No, but he couldn’t prove it either. It didn’t seem to be worth arguing about, though; he was too tired, too cold, and his leg still hurt. He was aware he was on heavy-duty painkillers, but he didn’t feel them much. Either the downside of being an infected, or being an infected who popped painkillers like Skittles.

Roan rubbed his eyes, feeling groggy and frostbitten, and finally said, “Fine, whatever. Where’s Dylan?”