Blackout

GEORGIA: Thirty-one

We left the Agora shortly after sunset, when the cleanup crew declared the van road-serviceable and unlikely to infect and kill us all. Shaun took the wheel, since Becks wasn’t willing to let me drive. She said it was because I didn’t have a license; from the way she refused to meet my eyes while she was saying it, I suspected it was more an issue of her not quite trusting me yet. I couldn’t blame her. If I’d been in her position, and someone I’d already buried had come back… yeah. It was a miracle any of them trusted me at all. A miracle, or the kind of madness that was going to get us all killed.

With no real idea where we were going, and nothing I could do to help, I contented myself with pulling up the site archive on the local server and reading as we drove down the length of Washington State and into Oregon. This was a slower, more careful read than my earlier looting for information; I could take the time to really absorb what I was looking at, rather than just clicking the next report as quickly as possible. There was even a link to the site’s financials. I was somehow unsurprised to see that Shaun had maintained ownership of my files, and was using them to finance a large percentage of the site’s overhead. I was one of the higher-profile journalist deaths since the Rising. That made me fascinating, and made my previously unpublished op-ed pieces lucrative, even when they’d been written to parallel events that happened years before. That’s the human race. Always willing to slow down and look at the train wreck.

Becks kept watch from the passenger seat while Shaun drove. The route he chose involved a disturbing number of frontage roads and narrow trails that were basically glorified footpaths. He drove them like they were familiar, and after everything that he and the others had been through since I died, they probably were. I stopped reading and leaned back in my seat, closing my eyes for just a moment, missing the familiar ache I used to get whenever I forced myself to look at a brightly lit computer screen for too long. I never thought I’d miss having retinal KA, but now it was just one more thing about my life that I was never going to get back.

This was my fault. I was the one who pressured Shaun into agreeing to follow the Ryman campaign, and together we’d strong-armed Buffy into going along with us. If I’d just been willing to work my way up through the ranks the way everyone else did, taking it one step at a time instead of rocketing straight to the top—

Then someone else would have died in my place, and in Buffy’s place, and someone else’s brother would be the one making this drive. This was all going to happen eventually. The only thing that made us special was the thing that has distinguished one journalist from another since the first reporter found a way to distinguish gossip from the real headline story: We were the ones on the scene when everything went down. We weren’t better. We weren’t worse. We were just the ones standing in the blast radius.

Everything that happened from there was inevitable.

That didn’t absolve us of blame—there’s always blame when the wrong stories get told and the wrong secrets get out—but even if we weren’t innocent now, we were then. We really believed in what we were doing. It wasn’t our fault that we were wrong.

I drifted off reading Alaric’s analysis of the political situation after Ryman’s election—situation normal, all fucked up, with some interesting developments in the regulation of larger mammals and a few changes to the rules for determining hazard zones, but nothing earth-shaking—and woke to see the first rays of false dawn painting the edge of the sky in shades of pollution pink and caution tape gold. Becks was driving. Shaun was asleep in the passenger seat, his head lolling back and his mouth hanging slightly open. He looked exhausted.

Becks must have heard me stirring. She glanced at the rearview mirror, her reflected eyes meeting mine, and raised one eyebrow. That was all she needed to do; the message couldn’t have been easier to understand if she’d posted it on the front page of our news site.

I nodded. I understood, and I wasn’t going to hurt him. Not if I had any choice in the matter.

My mouth felt like the ass-end of a Tuesday morning. I cleared my throat and asked, “Where are we?”

“Oregon. We’re almost there.”

“There where?”

“Shady Cove.”

I paused, trying to convince myself I’d heard wrong. It didn’t work. Finally, I demanded, “What?”

Shaun didn’t flinch. Becks replied, “Shady Cove, Oregon. Our friend Dr. Abbey has a lab there. Right now, anyway. She’ll probably move it soon. Possibly after she demands that we let her dissect you.”

“In Shady Cove.”

“Yes.”

“But there’s nothing in Shady Cove.” Shady Cove, Oregon, was on the list of cities abandoned after the Rising, when the economic cost of rebuilding was determined too great to balance out the benefits. We’d take it back someday, when the great march of progress demanded we leave the dead with no country of their own. Until then, Shady Cove would stand empty, just like Santa Cruz, California, and Truth or Consequences, New Mexico, and Warsaw, Indiana, and a hundred other towns and cities around the world.

“That’s why she has her lab there,” said Becks curtly, before leaning over and snapping the radio on. Further conversation was rendered moot by the sound of a pre-Rising pop star informing us, loudly and with enthusiasm, that she was a rock star.

Shaun jerked upright, eyes open, hand going to the pistol at his belt. “Wha—”

“Settle, Mason. We can’t all be as polite as the wakeup call at Maggie’s fancy-ass hotel,” said Becks, turning the radio down again now that its purpose had been achieved. “We’re almost there. I need you on watch.”

“Right.” Shaun ground the heels of his hands against his eyes, wiping the sleep away. This time he finished the process of drawing the pistol from his belt, flicking off the safety. Once he was done, he twisted in his seat, shooting his old, familiar, who-gives-a-fuck? grin in my direction. “Sleep well?”

“Like a rock,” I said. I almost said “like the dead,” but realized he might not take that well. Like it or not, Shaun was going to be a little sensitive about that sort of thing for a while. Possibly forever.

“Good, because the good Doc’s going to be real interested in talking to you.” Shaun twisted back around to face forward, watching the darkened forest roll by outside his window. “She’s a little hard to explain if you haven’t met her. Hell, nobody explained her to me.”

“I read the files.”

“There’s reading the files, and then there’s the reality of a mentally disturbed Canadian woman throwing a live octopus at your chest so you can tell her whether exposure to Kellis-Amberlee has changed its reflex speed. Which, in case you wondered, doesn’t happen. An octopus infected with Kellis-Amberlee is still fast, smart, and incredibly easy to piss off.” Shaun shuddered. “All those suckers…”

“Wait. Octopuses aren’t mammals.”

Becks smiled coolly at me in the rearview mirror. “And that’s why Dr. Abbey is difficult to explain to anyone who hasn’t met her.”

I sighed. “I’m not going to like this, am I?”

“Probably not,” said Becks, and turned off the narrow dirt road we’d been traveling down, onto another, narrower, dirtier road. This one seemed more like a deer trail with delusions of grandeur than an actual thoroughfare, and the van shuddered and jumped with every bump and pothole. Shaun whooped a little, causing Becks to shoot him a wide-eyed look. He grinned unrepentantly back. I got the feeling that there hadn’t been much whooping while I was away.

The dirt trail—I refused to dignify it with anything that sounded more maintained—emptied us onto a road that was just as decrepit, but had obviously been better, once upon a time. Chunks of broken pavement jutted up where the roots of the encroaching trees had managed to break through the surface. Becks swerved around them with practiced ease, and actually sped up, cruising through the dark like she’d driven this route a hundred times before. Judging by the calm way Shaun was watching the trees, she had.

The road ended at a large parking lot in front of a large, glass-fronted building that was probably originally some sort of government building or visitor’s center. “Forestry center,” said Shaun, before I could ask. “Welcome to Shady Cove.”

“… thanks.” I shifted in my seat, putting my laptop to the side. “Is someone going to come out and meet us?”

“No, but you should probably count on lots and lots of people with guns waiting for us inside.” Shaun shot me another manic grin. “Dr. Abbey knows how to greet visitors.”

“With terror and intimidation?” I asked.

“Something like that,” Becks agreed. She slowed down but kept driving, steering us into a covered parking garage attached to the back of the building. There were only a few vehicles already parked there, including—

I sat up straighter. “My bike!”

Shaun’s grin softened, becoming sadder and more sincere. “You didn’t think I’d leave it behind, did you?”

I didn’t answer him. I couldn’t speak around the lump in my throat. As soon as Becks parked the van I opened the door and climbed out, heading for my bike in what I hoped looked like a reasonably nonchalant manner. Not that it made a damn bit of difference either way. There was nothing—absolutely nothing, including the sudden appearance of a shambler from the shadows, which thankfully didn’t happen—that could have kept me away from my bike in that moment. I actually hugged the handlebars, I was so damn glad to see it.

Shaun and Becks followed, pausing long enough to get their duffel bags from the car. They stopped about eight feet away. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Becks elbow Shaun in the side, mouthing the words, “Ask her.”

He looked at her uncertainly before he cleared his throat and said, “Uh, George? Did you want to start the engine? Make sure I’ve been doing regular maintenance and all that good shit?”

“That depends.” I stopped hugging the handlebars, straightening as I turned to face them. “Do you actually want me to check the condition of the engine, or do you want me to run my fingerprints against the ones in the bike’s database?”

“The second one,” admitted Shaun.

“Right. Did you engage the biometrics when you locked the bike?” He nodded. I sighed. “Fine,” I said, and stuck out my right thumb, holding it up for both of them to see, before pressing it down on the pressure sensor at the center of the bike’s dash. A blue light promptly came on above the speedometer. I held my breath, and kept holding it until the light turned green before shutting off entirely. “Biometrics disengaged,” I announced. “Happy now?”

Shaun turned to Becks, grinning as he said, “Extremely. Told you she could do it.”

Becks nodded slowly. “Okay. You got one right. Come on. Dr. Abbey knows we’re here by now.” She started walking toward the nearest door, not waiting for the two of us.

I took a deep breath before heading over to join Shaun. Maybe he’d been sure that I could trigger the bike’s biometric lock, but I hadn’t been. Identical twins don’t have the same fingerprints. Why would clones?

Answer: because at least in my case, the clone was intended to pass for the original in every way possible, and that meant that if my fingerprints could be matched to my old body, they would be. I was just glad they’d taken the trouble with this body, given that it was never intended to see the outside of a lab.

Thinking about that too much made me feel nauseous. I shuddered and sped up a little, matching my steps to Shaun’s. Becks was already at the door, her palm pressed against a blood test panel. The light above it turned green, and she opened the door, stepping inside. She waved before slamming it in our faces. I moved into position next, slapping my hand down on the panel. The light cycled and the door unlocked, letting me inside.

“Be right there,” said Shaun.

I smiled at him and closed the door. “You know, for a black-ops virology lab, this place has pretty straightforward security,” I said, turning to face the room.

“No, we don’t,” said the short, curvy woman standing next to Becks. She was wearing a lab coat, blue jeans, and a bright orange T-shirt, all of which paled a bit when taken together with the hunting rifle she had pointed at my chest. “We just take slightly different steps to enforce it.”

I froze.

The door opened behind me. “Hey, Dr. Abbey,” said Shaun.

“Hello, Shaun,” said the woman. She had a faint Canadian accent. “Who’s your friend?”

“Oh, right, you never met George, did you?” Shaun closed the door and moved to stand next to me. “Georgia Mason, meet Dr. Shannon Abbey, mad scientist. Dr. Abbey, meet Georgia Mason, living dead girl.”

“He must be feeling better if he can make bad Rob Zombie jokes,” said Becks.

“Feeling better doesn’t mean sane, stable, or thinking clearly,” said Dr. Abbey. Her eyes swept across my face, assessing me. “What do you think your name is, girlie?”

“Georgia Mason,” I replied, relieved that she’d asked a question whose answer I already knew. “I’m a ninety-seven percent cognate to the original. Don’t quiz me on my fifth birthday party and I’ll be fine.”

She raised an eyebrow. “You sure you should be telling me that?”

“I’m sure that if you’re going to shoot me, you’ll do it regardless of what I say now, and if you’re going to study me, you’re not going to shoot me regardless of what I say now, so I may as well be honest with you.” I smiled despite the tension. “I like being honest.”

“You brought me a mouthy clone,” said Dr. Abbey, looking toward Shaun. “And here it’s not even my birthday.”

He shrugged. “I try to be thoughtful. How’s it hanging, Doc?”

“Well, let’s see. You went to get me mosquitoes. You didn’t bring me any mosquitoes. Instead, you bring me a clone of your dead sister. So I’d say it’s hanging pretty damn poorly right now.” Dr. Abbey sighed, lowering her rifle. “Thank God you’re not the only people I have to work with. Come on. There’s someone here that I want you to meet.”

She turned, starting to walk away. I followed, and got my first real look at her facility. I stopped, staring.

I’m not sure what I expected from an off-the-grid virology lab run by a woman with the fashion sense of a traffic cone. I certainly didn’t expect a fully equipped, if somewhat quixotically designed, research facility. Racks of medical equipment, computers, and lab animals were everywhere I looked. The place seemed slightly understaffed for its size, but that was probably a function of its underground nature—it wasn’t like they could advertise for staff on the local message boards. “Mad Scientist seeks Minions. Must be detail-oriented, well educated, and unconcerned by the idea of being charged with terrorism if caught.” Just no.

As she walked, Dr. Abbey asked, “How’s Maggie?”

“Gut-shot and cranky, but the doctors say she’ll live,” said Shaun. “Is there any news about Alisa?”

“You haven’t been looking at the non–world shattering news feeds recently, have you?” Dr. Abbey paused to hang her rifle from a hook on the wall and said, “Alisa Kwong was removed from the Ferry Pass Refugee Center two days ago when well-known Internet journalists Stacy and Michael Mason made an eloquent plea for custody of the tragically orphaned girl. They ran their reports from just outside the interdicted zone, making it impossible to shut them down without causing a massive Internet shitstorm. So the feds gave them the kid. Alisa’s been e-mailing Alaric constantly. He can’t tell her where we are, but being able to communicate with her without worrying about the mosquitoes getting into the facility where she’s being held is doing them both a world of good. We’ll worry about getting her back when it’s safe.”

Her words were clearly directed at Shaun, who nodded, a serious expression on his face. It was still a little weird, seeing him look so grave about something that wasn’t related to risking his neck or getting a good ratings share. His priorities had shifted while I was gone.

He shot me a look, a smile curving up one corner of his mouth. Well. Not all his priorities.

“This is impressive,” I said. “Did you set this all up yourself?”

“Golly-gee, Miss Clone, no! The government used to set up surprise scientific research facilities all over the country, just so they’d be around for people to stumble into when they were needed. If you break a few jars, you’ll probably find guns and bonus lives inside.” Dr. Abbey’s smile was closer to a snarl, leaving her teeth half bared. “We’re here for your amusement.”

I raised an eyebrow. “You could have just said ‘yes.’ ”

“And miss the opportunity to see what you’d do if I called you stupid?” Dr. Abbey’s smile faded. She grabbed a small testing unit off one of the shelves, lobbing it at me. I caught it. She nodded slightly, apparently taking a mental note of my reflexes. “Go ahead and get yourself another clean blood result while we’re all standing here. I want a portable sample.”

“Doesn’t Shaun get one?” I asked, concerned. The unit was heavier than I expected, with no visible lights on the top.

Dr. Abbey actually laughed. “You mean he didn’t tell you? The lucky boy’s immune.”

“Probably due to extended exposure to someone with a reservoir condition, which brings us back to you, Georgia.” The man who walked up behind her was clearly of Asian descent, even if his accent was pure Hawaiian. He was wearing knee-length khaki shorts and sandals, which wouldn’t do a damn thing to save him if we had to run. He had a round face, and a kind expression that put my teeth instantly on edge. I was quickly learning that no one who looked at me kindly was planning to do anything I’d enjoy. Call it the natural paranoia born of dying and coming back to life again.

Shaun’s hand clamped down on my shoulder. “Dude,” he said, voice radiating suspicion, “who the fuck are you?”

The stranger’s smile didn’t waver. “I’m Dr. Joseph Shoji. You must be Shaun. You know, I don’t think this could have been engineered to go any better if we’d tried. I really had no idea how we were going to get the two of you into the same place, and then you go and manage to perform a rescue op—”

The rest of the word was cut off as Shaun let go of my shoulder, pushing me back a step, and lunged for Dr. Shoji. Becks and Dr. Abbey watched impassively as Shaun’s momentum drove the two men backward, stopping only when Dr. Shoji’s shoulders slammed into the nearest wall. I made a startled noise that was shamefully close to a squeak.

“You CDC asshole!” snarled Shaun.

“He’s not with the CDC,” said Dr. Abbey. Shaun didn’t seem to hear her.

“Bets on the crazy boy,” said Becks.

“Joey’s pretty mean when you get him riled,” countered Dr. Abbey.

I stared at them. “What are you two doing? Make them stop!”

“Sweetcheeks, there’s only ever been one person who could make that boy do anything he didn’t want to do, and she’s ashes in the wind.” Dr. Abbey’s gaze was assessing. “You’re close, but you’re not sure you’re good enough, are you? Now take that blood test.”

“You’re insane,” I said, and started to move toward Shaun and Dr. Shoji.

“Isn’t that what the ‘mad scientist’ after my name is meant to imply?” asked Dr. Abbey. Then she sighed. “Look. You can go along with what I’m asking, which isn’t much when you stop and think about it. Or you can try to intervene in Shaun’s attempt to throttle the life from my colleague—way not to fight back there, Joey—and I can have one of my interns shoot you where you stand. Pick one.”

Cheeks burning, I muttered, “I am getting damn sick of scientists,” and popped the lid off the testing unit. I slammed my thumb down on the panel inside, feeling the needles bite into my skin.

Dr. Abbey nodded. “Good. You can follow directions. That’s going to be important.” She placed two fingers in her mouth and whistled. On cue, an impossible terror came lumbering down the hall, jowls flapping, eyes glowing with menace.

I couldn’t help myself. I screamed. It was a high, piercing sound, and I was ashamed of it as soon as it left my throat. It had the unexpectedly positive effect of stopping the terror in its tracks. The huge black dog cocked its head, looking at me. Shaun also stopped trying to strangle Dr. Shoji, twisting around to regard me with alarm.

“George? What’s wrong?”

Mutely, I pointed to the dog.

“Oh.” Shaun blinked, releasing Dr. Shoji’s throat. The Hawaiian virologist took a hasty step away from him. “That’s just Joe. He won’t hurt you.”

“He will if I tell him to,” said Dr. Abbey, leaning over to pluck the test unit from my hand. She didn’t bother with a biohazard bag. She just snapped the lid closed and tucked the whole thing into the pocket of her lab coat. “Joe, guard.”

The dog sat, gaze remaining on me. Something in its posture told me it wouldn’t regard ripping my throat out as the high point of its day, but it would do it all the same if Dr. Abbey gave the order. The idea of moving seemed suddenly ludicrous, like it was the sort of thing only crazy people did.

“You’re a bit high-strung, aren’t you?” asked Dr. Shoji, rubbing his throat and giving Shaun a sidelong look. “Have you considered the benefits of marijuana? Or at least reducing your caffeine intake?”

“Don’t push it, Joey; he’s had a long day,” said Dr. Abbey.

“He just tried to strangle me.”

“Yes, but he failed, which means we’re still playing nice.”

“Don’t you touch my sister,” snarled Shaun, seeming to remember that Dr. Shoji was there.

I sighed, reaching out to grab Shaun’s elbow. “He’s not one of the doctors from Portland. It’s okay.”

“I heard screaming—is everything okay out here?” Alaric emerged from one of the side rooms, showing an admirable lack of self-preservation—it takes a reporter, after all, to run toward the sound of screaming. Reporters and crazy people, they were the only ones who would be moving in a situation like this. So which one was I going to be?

“The dog startled me,” I said, turning to face him. I tried a smile. It felt foreign, like it wasn’t quite designed to fit my face. “Hey, Alaric. Long time no see.”

Alaric stopped dead, blood draining from his face. Then, with no more ceremony than that, his eyes rolled back in his head and he hit the floor in a heap. The five of us stared at him. Even Joe the giant fucking dog turned his head to study the prone blogger for a moment before returning to the serious business of staring at me.

“Dude really needs to toughen up,” said Shaun.

Becks sighed. “Or maybe we need to stop doing twelve impossible things every day. Are we all done waving our crazy flags around and proclaiming ourselves the Kings of Crazytown? Because I want to know what the new guy is doing here, and I want you to do whatever you need to do to prove that she”—she jerked a thumb toward me—“is close enough to legit that we can let Shaun keep her. I think he’ll cry if we don’t.”

Shaun glared at her. Becks ignored him.

“If I may?” Dr. Shoji looked from Shaun to Dr. Abbey, and finally to me. “As I was saying, I work with the Kauai Institute of Virology. I’ve been consulting with their Kellis-Amberlee research division for the past seven years, which is fairly impressive, considering they think I’m on loan from the CDC.”

I paused before saying slowly, “But you don’t work for the CDC, do you?”

“No. I believe you’ve already met some of my associates, Drs. Kimberley and Lake? They spoke very highly of you, even before they were sure you’d be able to make it out of the facility. They certainly thought you were the most promising subject—forgive me for using that word; it’s an ugly word, but it’s the only one I have—to arise from Project Shelley. We were all rooting for you from the start.” He was smiling again. It was such a kind smile. What was my life going to be like if I didn’t trust people who looked kind?

Probably a lot like it was before, when I didn’t trust anyone who wasn’t on my team. “You’re with the EIS.”

“What?” said Becks.

“What?” said Shaun.

“That was quicker than I expected,” said Dr. Abbey. She gestured toward Alaric, who was still lying on the hallway floor. “One of you, get him up. I don’t want an intern coming along and shooting him before he can wake up and tell them he’s not dead.”

“Giant dog,” I said.

She sighed. “Fine. Joe, down.” The dog abandoned its watchful position, lumbering back to its feet and trotting to stand next to Dr. Abbey, tail wagging wildly. She placed a hand atop its head. “Happy?”

“Not really, but I’m not seeing much of an alternative here.” I stepped closer to Shaun, still watching the dog warily. “Why is it here?”

“Joe is, like, a super-long story, and I’m a little more interested in the story that makes you meet Mr. Hawaii here and jump straight to him being with the EIS,” said Shaun. “Does that mean he’s working for the people who were holding you captive?”

“No,” said Dr. Shoji. “It means I’m working with the people who helped her escape, and it means I’m here to make sure you get her where she needs to be—where you both need to be. The man who funded most of Project Shelley needs you. This is what he was hoping for all along.”

“Who?” demanded Becks.

I didn’t need to ask. A quiet certainty was growing in the pit of my stomach. Maybe it had been since Dr. Shoji showed up, and I realized that everything—everything—was connected, whether we wanted it to be or not. There was no running away from the past. Alive or dead, it was going to catch up with us in the end.

Alaric groaned, starting to stir. I looked at Dr. Shoji and said calmly, “Rick. He paid to bring me back, didn’t he?”

“Yes,” said Dr. Shoji. “And now he needs your help.”

I sighed. “Right. Let’s peel Alaric off the floor and get him up to speed, guys. I think we’re heading for Washington D.C.”