The Hunt

14

Zane

THE SILENCE THAT FOLLOWED FORD the hybrid’s ultimatum (Ford hybrid—it was testimony to how frightening she was that I didn’t laugh at that) was the longest of my life. With Ariane’s back to me, I couldn’t see her expression—not that I always had a lot of luck reading her anyway. But the thoughtful quiet in the room gave me chills.

Ariane wasn’t seriously considering their “offer,” was she? She couldn’t be.

“This is bullshit,” I blurted, panic lighting the fuse on the words. “You want her to take all the risk.”

Ford turned her attention to me again, and once more I couldn’t help comparing her to Ariane. They were eerily similar, but Ford’s gaze lacked Ariane’s warmth and emotion. It was like staring into twin abysses. A whole lot of nothing. Ariane, as much as I knew she hated it, felt things deeply. With Ford, I wasn’t sure whether she was better at hiding her feelings or whether she just lacked them completely.

No, wait, that wasn’t true. She’d certainly demonstrated jealousy earlier. In some way she seemed to think of Ariane as an older sibling, one with whom she was forced to compete. I definitely recognized that emotion, even if she hadn’t shown it in a traditional manner. Ariane, an only child, both in her home and at the lab, hadn’t picked up on it.

So, maybe Ford was a broken toy, able to feel only the negative stuff. The bad things. That might make her even more effective as a soldier. Hate, fear, envy—those were pretty powerful motivators, weren’t they? Probably the source of most every war.

“We risk much simply by not reporting this contact to our creator,” Ford said, her expression flat, dead. “Would you rather we opted for that choice instead?”

So she’d moved on to threatening already? I stepped forward, fury and adrenaline pumping, prepared to move between Ariane and Ford, if necessary. I wasn’t stupid. Ford could stop me dead, literally, but it wasn’t right that she was taking advantage of Ariane being on her own. Someone had to call her on it.

“Your human is very valiant,” Ford said to Ariane, and somehow made it sound like an insult. “Is that an acceptable compromise? Being less than what you could be just to make him comfortable?” She sounded genuinely curious.

I couldn’t breathe for a second. It was like Ford had dug around in my head and found my worst fear, the very last thing I’d ever want Ariane to hear. And hell, who knows, maybe she had. “We are none of your business,” I snapped, trying to rally. But the heat burning in my face betrayed me, I knew.

“Zane,” Ariane said quietly, giving me a warning look in the mirror, one that said, Please shut the hell up before you make things worse.

That I could read just fine.

Whatever. I moved back into my corner, folding my arms over my chest. I hated this useless feeling, like a fist squeezing my heart. Ariane was on her own, and I couldn’t do anything to help.

“I will take your proposal under consideration,” Ariane said to her evil twin. “I will let you know what I decide.”

“We will be here,” Ford said without even a hint of humor twisting her mouth, as it would have if Ariane had said the same. But then again, maybe Ford didn’t recognize the irony of declaring that she’d be here after explaining in (albeit limited) detail why she couldn’t go anywhere.

Then the three of them turned to leave without so much as another word.

That was it? “You’ve got to be kidding me,” I muttered. But I clamped my mouth shut when I saw Ariane stiffen in response.

Carter, the last out of the room, paused at the doorway. He gave Ariane a small, pathetic smile and a little wave.

I rolled my eyes.

My God, it was practically the Oliver Twist “Please, sir, I want some more” moment. The only thing missing was the perfect single tear from one of those dark, creepy eyes. They were manipulating in every way possible: threats, bribery, and now an attempted tug at the heartstrings. Like I said. Bullshit.

But I kept quiet until the door closed after him.

“It’s a trap,” I said flatly as soon as it clicked shut. “Please tell me you see that.” Bastards. Ariane had risked everything to find them, and they wanted to use her in a win–win for themselves.

“Not here,” she said, her voice taut with tension.

I gaped at her. Was she pissed at me for speaking up?

She kept her gaze fixed on the door. Was she expecting them to come back? Or afraid they would? I wasn’t sure. When another moment or two passed without incident, she nodded seemingly to herself. “We need to go. Now,” she said.

That I wholeheartedly agreed with. “Finally.” I grabbed my tie off the chair.

Ariane pulled open the door, leaning out slightly to confirm that the hybrids were gone before waving me forward to follow her.

We wended our way back through the hallway, hustling past closed classroom doors toward the main entrance without actually running. It seemed to take longer this time, even though we knew where were going. But maybe that was because we were the only ones in the hall, our isolation a spotlight shining down on us.

With every second that ticked away, the tension in me wound tighter. My shoulders ached with it. I kept expecting that angry shout of “Hey!” and the sound of rushing of footsteps in pursuit.

But the main doors came into view, glowing white with the brighter light outside, without so much as a whisper behind us, and the tight knot in my stomach started to ease.

We still had to get past the office, though. At our school, the door would have been shut to preserve the precious air-conditioning for the administration, reducing our chances of getting caught to someone looking up and out the window at the right time. But here, where AC flowed freely and abundantly to the whole building (as it should if everyone was supposed to wear those stupid blazers all the time), the door stood open.

One more reason to hate this place.

Ariane took the lead, moving swiftly past the door, her shoulders straight and head held high, giving off no air of sneaking around or fear of getting caught. Which probably was the best bet for passing unnoticed.

But, unfortunately, with the placement of the office so near the front doors of the school, the only place we could be going was outside. So if anyone was paying even the least amount of attention…

“Hey!” A startled female voice called as soon as we passed.

I cringed. I knew we couldn’t get that lucky.

But Ariane only glanced over her shoulder and with a twitch of her hand, the office door slammed shut. A muffled thud sounded as someone slammed into it, expecting the door to give. Oops.

“We need to hurry. I don’t want them to panic,” Ariane said quietly.

In other words, she didn’t want to hold the door shut for so long they started to freak and called the cops or the fire department or something. And yet we needed to be gone before someone caught up with us.

She didn’t need to tell me twice. I broke into a run and pushed through the doors out onto the concrete driveway, breathing deeply of the fresh air and the smell of new asphalt. Ariane was a step behind me.

We cleared the covered drop-off area, passing through the weird pillar/statue guys, and headed into the parking lot. The sudden heat against my skin was a relief. I hadn’t realized until this exact second how unsure I’d been that we’d make it out.

The van was where we’d left it. Thank God. Not like I’d expected otherwise, but these days I’d learned not to take the normal function of the universe as I knew it for granted. There was always something, usually pretty messed up, going on just outside your realm of knowledge.

Just as I was berating Mark Tucker for not springing for automatic locks on the van to save us those precious extra seconds, Ari lifted her hand toward the van, and I heard the doors unlock. Guess a fancy key fob wasn’t necessary with Ariane around. That was handy. Especially with the security guard and a couple teacher types who’d just shoved through the front doors of the school after us.

I got in, slammed my door, and cranked the engine.

We peeled out of the parking space, leaving, I hoped, ugly tracks across several of the bright yellow lines. It wasn’t so much the school that I had a problem with but the privilege it represented—Ford and the others fit in here perfectly, making demands they had no right to make.

“In the future, if someone makes an offer that we don’t intend to participate in, can we agree not to announce that in front of them, when they can still call for backup?” Ariane asked tightly, her hand locked on the grab bar above her window as I jerked the wheel around, our tires squealing. “Their guards probably have direct contact with Laughlin, and I think we can agree that’s a complication we don’t need.”

Something tight in my chest eased. That’s what she was angry about. “Sure. Yeah. No problem.”

She nodded, her expression distant.

“So, what now? Where to?” I asked. Lacking any specific directions, I’d just started in the direction from which we’d come, back toward my mom’s house.

When Ariane didn’t respond, a tiny seed of doubt began to grow in my gut. She wouldn’t. She couldn’t. “I’ve been thinking about it,” I said, a little too loudly, as if that would stop her, blockade her thoughts and her words. “Chicago is a major news city. They’ve got what, at least two or three TV stations here. I know you didn’t want to go public alone, but you wouldn’t be. I mean, I would be there. And if we went to more than one, that might improve our odds.”

She was too quiet.

“What?” I asked with a growing sense of dread.

“I think it’s worth talking to Mara to confirm their story,” she said eventually. “Find out what she knows.”

Her words struck like a series of heavy blows. “I…You’re kidding. Please tell me you’re kidding.”

“Having more information can only help us,” she said.

“Only if you intend to do something about it!”

She looked at me, her expression unreadable. “You do know this is what I was made for: deception, infiltration, recovery.”

I fought to keep a handle on my temper. “It’s a setup.” An elaborate one maybe, but a setup just the same.

“You can’t know that,” she said simply.

I gaped at her. “How can you—”

“If their goal was simply to eliminate me, there are much easier ways. They could have called their guards down on us. Or report us to Laughlin.”

“How do you know they didn’t?” I demanded.

“Because we got out of there without the guards chasing after us,” she said. “Plus, it’s only reasonable that Ford would want to test my motivations in some way. They don’t know whom to trust. I could have easily been sent to spy on them, setting them up to take—”

I shook my head, my jaw tight. “Okay, fine. Let’s say that you’re right. Maybe they’re telling the truth. Maybe she just wants to see if you can do it. Which I think is complete crap, but whatever. My point is, they’re using you. They’ve got nothing to lose. If it works, great. If not, then they have one less competitor. You’re the one taking all the risks. How is that fair?”

“Because I’m the one asking them for a favor,” she said. “Isn’t that how the system usually works?”

I gritted my teeth. I hated the way she could turn everything into a logical argument. Wasn’t there anything to be said for a gut feeling, any value on instinct? Mine was screaming that they were trouble. I didn’t trust them at all, let alone in a sketchy situation like the one they wanted Ariane to enter.

“Besides, they can’t help me unless I help them first,” she said.

“So she says,” I muttered.

“You think she’s lying about that?” Ariane asked, her eyebrows raised.

“Well, if not, why not help you more?” I threw my hands up. “Why not give you more details on how to get into the building or suggestions on how to get the pills or medicine or whatever?” They hadn’t even specified what form their precious Quorosene took, which was more than a little suspicious. Wasn’t it?

“And you’d trust that information?” she asked.

“Probably not,” I admitted reluctantly. “But—”

“Are you sure you’re not reacting to more than just their proposal?” she asked. But she wasn’t looking at me. She stared out the side window, as if fascinated by something out there or, perhaps, worried about something in here and not willing to face it. Or me.

“Like what?” I asked warily.

Ariane straightened the scarf around her neck in a long moment of silence. “They made you uncomfortable,” she said.

I should have been expecting this—the stuff my mom had said was probably wearing a track in Ariane’s brain—but it still made me angry. I pulled over into a gas station parking lot, cutting off a bread truck, whose driver apparently loved the sound of his horn, and turned to face her. “No. Absolutely not. You don’t get to do that.” I jabbed a finger in her direction. “I was uncomfortable because they threatened us, and because they want to put you in danger. It had nothing to do with their…heritage.”

But how much of one was indistinguishable from the other? Was it a little freaky that Ford had to talk through someone else? Yeah. But what I hated more was the cold way Ford had looked at Ariane as if she were a tool to be used, how she called me “human” like that was a synonym for dog shit, as if Ariane deserved better. So I guess the question really was, was Ford just a jerk or was she an alien jerk? Either way, no thanks.

“Besides, if anyone’s acting differently because of where they’re from, it’s you, not me,” I continued.

She whipped her head around to face me. “What?”

“It took me how long to even get you to talk to me, let alone trust me, but one conversation with them and their magical ‘silence,’ you’re ready to drink the Klingon Kool-Aid or whatever.” I wanted to scream in frustration. How could she not see this?

She stiffened. “That was a totally different situation.”

I snorted. “Yeah, one where you risked being caught, but at least that evil scientist wanted you alive.”

She didn’t say anything, but she seemed to retreat into herself, as if I’d lashed out at her physically.

I sighed. “I didn’t mean that. Nothing would ever make what Jacobs wanted okay. I’m sorry.” I put the van in park and waited for her to decide if she was ever going to talk to me again.

Several long moments passed before she spoke. “I am who I am because Dr. Jacobs put me out into the world,” Ariane said.

My mouth went dry. “Don’t tell me you’re grateful for what that asshole—”

“No,” she said, “just that I’ve been shaped by my experiences. It’s the same with them. They are behaving the only way they know how. If I hadn’t been raised by my father, taught to blend in with the humans, I might have been just like them.” Was there the tiniest hint of longing in her words or was that just my worried imagination? Were we, an entire planet of people, not enough to combat her loneliness? Was I not enough?

“No, you wouldn’t,” I said vehemently.

“Are you sure? Or is it more that you don’t want to think about that possibility?” she asked quietly. “I’m not human. Not the way you are.” She held up a hand, cutting off my protest preemptively. “I’m not saying that I trust them. Just that I see this differently than you do.”

My mouth worked, no words emerging at first. I was losing this argument, I could feel it—and her—slipping from my grasp, even as she sat right next to me. “I’ve never wanted you to be anything but who you are,” I said. Lame but true.

“How about now?” she asked, tilting her head at me.

Wait, so now she was positioning this choice as some kind of representative decision about her as a person? Like, if I cared about her, regardless of her genetic makeup, I’d let her do whatever she wanted? But if I thought going on Ford’s quest was stupid and reckless, then it was because she was too alien for me? No. No way. “That’s crap reasoning and you know it,” I said. “This is not about you. This is about them, and—”

“This is about all of us,” she said. “The three of them, me, whomever Emerson St. John has hidden away. We have to work together if we’re even going to have a chance to survive. They’ve made it that way.” Disgust colored her tone, and I knew then that she meant Jacobs, Laughlin, and the others. Humans.

“So, it’s the four of you against the world?” I asked, my jaw tight. No full-blooded humans allowed in that clubhouse, I guess.

“I didn’t say that,” she said a little too quickly.

“That’s exactly what you’re saying, just not in so many words.” My hands ached from gripping the steering wheel too hard.

“Zane,” she said. She touched my shoulder, her hand light, tentative. “I need to at least check into it. Please.”

I looked over at her, the glow of sunlight turning her white-blond hair into a halo around her head. It reminded me of that first night, on our way to the activities fair. We’d come so far, so fast. This girl had stood up for me when no one else would. Maybe this was my chance to do the same for her.

I blinked hard against the stinging in my eyes. “We’ll talk to my mom,” I said finally. “Find out what she knows.” I put the van in gear and pulled onto the road.

Ariane sagged with relief in her seat. “Thank you.”

I should have stopped then, just shut my mouth. I had one last card to play, and I should have held on to it until we found out what my mom had to say once she got home tonight. But I couldn’t.

“If you go through with this, I won’t be there,” I said conversationally, even as that sensation of jumping off the cliff spiraled through me. Whatever was between us would not be the same after this—it wasn’t an ultimatum, simply a statement of truth, but I knew she wouldn’t see it that way. “I’ll go to my mom’s with you tonight and then make my way back to Wingate. I don’t care if she tells you which cabinet their meds are in and draws you a freaking map.”

Her eyes went wide. “Are you…are you threatening me?” She didn’t sound angry, more hurt.

“I’m not trying to threaten or blackmail,” I said, hearing the deadness of my tone. “I can’t stop you from doing what you’re going to do. You know that.”

She flinched.

“But you have to understand I can’t sit by and watch you walk into one of those places.” I would be haunted for the rest of my life by the image of her in that tiny room, the monitors, the implements, the tests, the bright red blood splattered on the gleaming white floor. Granted, that time it had been Dr. Jacobs’s blood from the head wound that Ariane had inflicted in knocking him out. But I knew that was not the case for all the years previous. And how would I sleep at night imagining her in that room, or one just like it in Laughlin’s complex? Or worse, a room full of microscope slides, test tubes, and sample jars, all marked with her name. The only things left of her.

A tear escaped and slid down my cheek, and I wiped it away swiftly, hopefully before she noticed.

“It’s my choice,” she said. “Isn’t that the point of all of this? For me to have the freedom to make my own choices.” For the first time, she sounded frustrated. “As someone who claims to love me, I’d think you’d want that.”

I stiffened. She wasn’t pulling her punches anymore. “It’s your choice.” I forced a laugh. “And yet, weirdly enough, as someone who loves you, I don’t really want to watch you get yourself killed. Or worse. That’s my choice to make.”

She clamped her mouth shut at that, turning to stare out the side window.

And then, thank God, the conversation was apparently over. But somehow getting the last word wasn’t nearly as satisfying as it was reported to be.