The Bleeding Crowd (28 page)

“Sex,” Ben said. “Lots and lots of sex.”

She rolled her eyes.

“You just rolled your eyes, didn’t you?” He
studied her through the darkness.

“No,” she lied.

“Liar.”

“Takes one to know one.”

“Maybe.”

They didn’t speak for a long moment.

“We should be getting back,” she said. “It
has to be nearing morning.”

“Just a little longer,” Ben said. “Just a
couple more minutes.

* * * *

Jude watched the party going to town
disappear behind the hill before looking at Ben.

Ben waited a moment and then sighed.
“What?”

“Any reason you were in the forest this
morning?” Jude said.

Ben turned back to camp. “Stretch your
imagination.”

“You actually made up?”

Ben didn’t answer.

“And you’re just going to let her wander away
like that?”

“Like what?” Ben asked. “We all know what
we’re here to do.”

“Did you at least tell her you loved
her?”

Ben glared at him.

“Ben, seriously?” Jude stared at him.

“If she manages to get out of this alive,
Jude, it’ll be a miracle. There’s no chance in hell that I’m going
to. There was no need to say that.”

“You should have let her know.”

“We left it on a good note,” Ben said. “We
were smiling...I’d rather she remember me like that then to be
crying after all this.”

“What did you tell her then?”

“That we had a good chance of getting through
this.”

“So you left on a lie.” Jude sighed.

“She knew it was a lie,” he said. “There was
no pretense. If it makes you happier to focus on a lie...if you’re
facing death anyway, why make yourself miserable?”

“If she dies, you’ll never have any
closure.”

Ben shook his head. “I’ve lived my life
without closure.”

“What if it’s the opposite?”

Ben released a breath. “We reached a peace
treaty. Hopefully that’s enough closure for her.”

“You’ve never been an ‘enough’ kind of
guy.”

“Well, in this case it will have to do,” he
said. “I need to figure out a plan. If you’ll excuse me...”

“Yeah, I’d like to know what we’re going to
be doing.”

Ben just looked at him. “We?”

“You can’t do everything alone,” Jude
said.

“So you want to go on the suicide trek with
me?”

“If you’ve got to go down, might as well make
it a blaze of glory.”

“Or as shadows sneaking around at night
trying to get something done under the radar.”

“You need help,” Jude said. “Might as well
come from me.”

Ben actual managed a smile and clapped Jude
on the back.

Chapter Sixteen

Dahlia looked around Mia’s room. It didn’t
look much different than hers, making the whole charade just a
little harder. It had the same bed, the same dresser, they were
even placed along the same walls as hers had been with the control
pads near the window, bed, desk, and door. If the window across the
room had doubled as a door, it could have been her room. Though a
door would have been a little dangerous since Mia lived on the
third story. It appeared they didn’t have enough space for
one-story villas.

She sat on the bed, just like at home. A few
days had passed and she’d slept through most of that. Being a spy
puzzled her, but at least she had the chance to sedate herself.
Being slightly spacey would be less suspicious than being nervous
all the time. She didn’t know how Ben had done it.

More than likely she wasn’t going to see him
ever again. That thought hit her more deeply than the thought of
dying. Maybe because it was so much harder to imagine being dead.
Obviously she would be dead at some point, if not this week then
the next, or, if not then, the next month, or next year, or the
next ten years. It was all the future, all vaguely abstract. She
couldn’t imagine being dead. She could imagine being alone.

It had been surprisingly easy to get in and
around with Mia’s keycard. No one seemed to know who she was or
even really care. Mia probably knew what it felt like to be alone.
They should have tried to ask her to join them. They probably
didn’t even think of asking a straight woman. No, they were going
to rely on men and lesbians.

She sat for a long moment. They were counting
on her. If nothing else, she had to try. Try what, she wasn’t
exactly sure.

She moved to the desk, trying to figure out a
password that an extremely introverted legislator would use.
Actually, how someone so opposed to talking to other people was
placed as a legislator was a bit of a mystery to begin with.

Someone knocked on the door, making Dahlia
jump. She took a deep breath and then moved over to the door,
pulling it open slowly.

A forty-something-year-old woman stood there.
“I thought you were supposed to get back yesterday.”

“Um, sorry, I got lost,” Dahlia said.

“Well, you’re needed in room 555.”

Dahlia nodded, waiting for the woman to move
away before grabbing the keycard off her desk. Either she was a
remarkable look-alike or Mia had been invisible.

She swiped the card into the elevator and it
took her straight to the fifth floor. Two rather large women barely
glanced at her as she passed them, and then opened the door to room
555 for her. It was large inside, and had to occupy what would
otherwise have been three or four regular rooms in the building. A
desk sat directly across from the door, forming the only obstacle
between the door and the windows which made up the entire far wall
from floor to ceiling with only a couple inches on each side to
make it possible to hang curtains. Dark curtains. Nothing like the
sets she was used to in the rooms.

The walls on either side of the desk were
made up almost entirely of books, paper books. More books than she
had ever seen in one place in paper form. She waited a beat. It
didn’t appear anyone was there or coming. The knot in her stomach
didn’t loosen any, but she moved to one of the shelves, picking up
one of the older looking books.

“Charles Dickens.”

A voice made Dahlia jump and almost drop the
book.

“Would have just made it Charlotte Dickens,
but most his stories are about boys anyway. If you want the
classics, I’d personally go with the Brontë sisters, but that’s
just my personal taste.”

Dahlia blinked and looked at the woman. She
was instantly recognizable, but hardly as impressive in person. If
she hadn’t been Patience, she wouldn’t have been any different than
any other woman on the street. She was shorter, maybe 160cm, with
dark blonde hair framing her face. Two hazel eyes studied Dahlia
with what almost looked like humor, the color becoming almost
orange around the pupil.

“I’ll assume you know who I am.”

Dahlia only hesitated a moment.
“Patience.”

“One of her.” The woman nodded.

“One?” Dahlia frowned. “There are more
of...you?”

“Well, I’m the thirty-year-old Patience,” the
woman answered. “Every thirty years they start a new one. So far
the DNA’s held up remarkably well.”

Dahlia paused. “You’re a clone?”

“Smart.” Patience smiled. “One every thirty
years. It’s how we stay young.”

She nodded, unsurprised. “Why are you telling
me this?”

“It’s why you’re here, isn’t it?”

Dahlia didn’t answer right away. “I work
here.”

Patience moved to the desk, bringing up a
picture. “I admit you look remarkably like Mia, but we aren’t
blind.”

Looking at the picture and then the one of
her that a security camera had taken, the computer started up a
program, and Dahlia saw dots forming on her face and the picture of
the other woman.

“Anyway, if we missed it, the computer
obviously knows there’s a difference. Your nose is thinner, your
eyes set wider...” Patience watched the computer work for a moment.
“I suppose it’s good to know security is pulling its weight around
here. Now, would you like to tell me who you are or would you
prefer me to guess?”

“Where’s the fun in being given all the
answer right up front?” Dahlia asked in a tight voice.

“True,” Patience said. “Should I ask your
friends then?”

“My friends are quite far away,” Dahlia
insisted.

“You didn’t come with the men then?”

She frowned, determined to give away nothing.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Come with me.” Patience motioned to the
doorway.

Dahlia hesitated, but had no other choice
than to follow.

Guards flanked the doorway, guns resting
against their shoulders. Patience motioned to another room. Dahlia
paused, but walked to it, feeling a hand push her inside followed
by a click of a lock behind her.

“Dahlia!” Jude stood.

She wrapped her arms around his neck as he
hugged her, looking at the door. Nobody seemed to be there. She
looked back at him, almost whispering. “How’d you get yourself
caught already?”

“Bad, bad luck.” Jude pulled back.

Ben moved toward them.

Dahlia looked at him and frowned. “Jude was
with you.”

Ben nodded.

They stood still for a long moment before she
crossed the room. He wrapped his arms around her waist, holding her
against him in silence.

Jude waited a respectful moment. “You made it
what? Three? Four days?”

“I used most of that time to sleep.” Dahlia
turned, but Ben didn’t release her. “Having a bed again was
beautiful.”

“So you didn’t accomplish anything?”

Dahlia didn’t answer, sliding away from Ben
to skirt the edges of the room.

“What are you doing?” He finally spoke.

“They probably have the place bugged,” she
said. “They caught me on a security camera. They have cameras
around to use at their disposal. Though, it’s not like we could do
anything about it if we found a bug. At least we’d know if it’s
just audio or if they can see us too.”

“Does it matter?” Jude asked.

“I supposed not in the long run.” Dahlia
pushed the curtains to look at the folds. “To me it does a
bit.”

Ben caught her by the hips, pulling her back
gently. “If they’re listening, they’re hoping that we tell them
where the others are. We don’t actually know where they are, so it
doesn’t especially matter. Personally, I’m happy that this is their
version of a holding cell.”

Dahlia nodded, looking around. It looked no
different than Mia’s room. Or her room. Or Cassandra’s room. It
contained a bed, a desk and chair, and a bed. “So we’re locked in
just another room. I take it the control pads are locked down.”

“What?” Ben frowned.

“That we can’t actually control anything.”
She moved to the one by the window. “It would be sort of stupid to
give us a way to contact everyone...”

The men just watched her.

“Yeah.” Dahlia sighed, tapping the pad. “We
can’t even turn the lights on and off.”

“Will you hold still for a second?” Ben took
her hand.

“Too much nervous energy.” She sat on the
bed, tapping her knee.

He followed, bending down to kiss her.

She froze for a second before returning his
kiss.

“Can we hold off on the romance?” Jude shook
his head.

The door opened again. The men studied the
woman in the door way. “Who...?”

“I told you Patience was the real Patience.”
Dahlia stood, standing slightly in front of Ben.

“She can’t—” Ben started.

“She’s a clone,” Dahlia explained.

“What?” Ben frowned.

“They cloned the original one,” Dahlia
said.

“Seriously?”

“Seriously.” Patience nodded. “You know,
without a huge military budget there was a lot of time to develop
plausible cloning before it was too late. So you three are
friends.”

“Not necessarily,” Dahlia said. “We could
have met three seconds before we went off on our own ways.”

Patience smiled. “You’re good, I admit.
Witty.”

“Too much so for her own good.” Ben sighed.
“The amusement factor will wear off soon, I promise.”

Dahlia stepped on his foot.

“Jesus fucking...”

Patience looked at the three of them and
motioned to Ben while still looking at Dahlia. “So I take it he’s
the one you’re here for.”

Dahlia just looked at her.

“I have the original Patience’s memory,”
Patience said. “Well, something like it at least. I remember
romance.”

“Then how did we all end up in camps?” Jude
frowned.

“A long, very complicated, series of events.”
Patience barely glanced at him.

“You were married.” Something clicked in
Dahlia’s head.

“Yes, I was.” Patience nodded.

“To a man.”

She nodded again.

“Seems like an odd political change.”

“Politics has changed quite a bit,” Patience
said. “Should I assume you’re revolutionaries?”

“I’m really not,” Dahlia said. “I ended up
here completely unwillingly through a series of my own long, very
complicated, train of events caused by many singular choices.”

Patience nodded with understanding. “Seems to
be the way things work out.”

Another redheaded woman walked through the
door. “Lisa says she’ll take over from here.”

Patience waved her away. “Let me finish.”

“Lisa said—”

“I’ll talk to Lisa then.” Patience
sighed.

“She’s in the office.”

Patience left without another word. The door
clicked shut. No one in the room spoke.

Dahlia finally sat in a chair. “She seems
nice enough.”

Ben looked at her.

“Don’t look at me like that,” she
snapped.

“Like what?” He crossed his arms.

“That’s your ‘I’m annoyed, but she really
doesn’t know any better’ face.”

“Didn’t know I had one of those,” he
said.

“Trust me, you do.”

He shook his head. “Well, in all honesty, you
don’t know any better.”