The Earth Dwellers

“What about you?” Lin asks. “You have the same problem.”

I take a deep breath, roll up my sleeve, and peel away the bandage.

“Yuck, what died in there?” Lin says, covering her mouth with the top of her shirt.

“What in God’s name?” Avery says.

I almost want to throw up, too. My arm’s a mess, the wound Tristan inflicted jagged and torn, filmed with black-red-brown dried blood, oozing with cream-colored scabbing, still moist. Beneath it is the small welt from the fresh chip injection I received on my first day.

“You want to help me, Lin? Dig out my chip.”

“You can’t be serious,” Avery says, still staring at my mangled skin.

“I’ll do it,” Lin says.

“Wait just a minute,” Avery says, “there has to be another way.”

“I’m listening,” I say. “If you know another way to trick the system, I’m all ears.”

He bites his lip, cringes, says, “I know someone who might be able to help. I could talk to him tomorrow.”

“I don’t have time for tomorrow,” I say. “I’ve got to do this tonight, keep things moving. The sooner I figure out whether killing Lecter is a possibility, the sooner I’ll be able to either end this or move on to the next option.”

“And what’s the next option, Adele?” Avery’s hands are in the air. “You going to smash through the Dome, destroy the city, throw grenades into the army barracks?”

“I’ll do what I have to do,” I say.

“Even if it means dying?” I’m surprised because the question comes from Lin, not Avery. She’s looking at me intently, watching for my reaction.

Meeting her gaze, I say, “Yes. Even if it means dying.”

Avery groans. “Don’t go filling her head with that suicidal nonsense.”

“It’s not suicide, Avery. My mother, my sister, my boyfriend, my best friend…they’re out there, counting on me to do this. They believe I can do this.”

“You’re one crazy girl, you know that?” Avery says, breaking the tension with a grim smile.

“So I’ve been told,” I say, quirking up the side of my lip. “Now will you let your niece dig out my chip?”

“No,” he says, and I’m about to protest, but then he adds, “I’ll do it.”

~~~

My arm hurts like hell, but at least the bleeding finally stopped. A thick bandage and a long-sleeved shirt hide any evidence of the ad hoc procedure. Avery had to use the tines of my fork to get the chip out, and the only thing that stopped me from screaming like a banshee was Lin stuffing a towel in my mouth.

Not my brightest moment.

But it’s done now, and we sca

Time to go.

“Be careful,” Avery says. “No u

“They’re all necessary at this point,” I say wryly.

“You know what I mean.”

I give him a quick hug, because it just feels right after everything they’re doing for me. Lin goes down with me, because the exit door won’t open without someone sca

When we reach the bottom, I give her a hug too. “Knock when you get back,” she says, but I get the feeling she’s just saying it to make us both feel better. It’s not likely that I’ll be coming back. “And kick some presidential ass.”

“I will,” I say. She scans her wrist on the door, which will raise some alarms, but then they’ll assume she just poked her head out for some fresh air the moment she scans it upstairs and gets into bed.

I slip out, a blind spot on Lecter’s radar; like a ghost, I’m invisible.

“There will be night patrols,” Avery told me before I left. “The city’s broken up into eight quadrants, each with a separate patrol pattern. You’ll have to make your way across three of these to reach your destination. Watch each patrol to get a feel for it, and then make your move.”

I didn’t ask him how he knows of all of this. I’ll just have to take his word for it.

The first patrol is in our quadrant, and I won’t have a chance to observe it because I’m already in the thick of it. My only chance is silent speed. My white clothes flash around me as I race down the street, and, not for the first time, I wish for a darker wardrobe.

Reaching the first cross street, I turn right. I’m halfway down the block when I hear voices and footsteps, just ahead, perhaps around the corner. I slam on the brakes, bolt across the street, duck into an alley. It’s full of shadows that grab me and pull me under, cloaking my presence.

Across the street, two Enforcers stroll by, carrying semi-automatic weapons and talking and laughing. They look completely relaxed. I’m guessing they usually get a pre-warning if someone’s out on the streets who shouldn’t be. Because they won’t get that warning, they’ll think it’s just another boring night on the job.

They pass and I slip behind them, sticking to the route that Avery and Lin mapped out for me. Two more blocks and then left, leaving the first quadrant. I look for a place to hide, to observe.

There are no nearby alleys, but there is a military truck, parked near the corner. It’s not safe enough to prowl behind it, so I dive to the ground, roll underneath, peer out.

Silence.

If the city is strange and sterile and somewhat frightening during the day, at night it’s downright spooky. Not a soul in sight. Utter silence. Dim lighting from lamp posts, sheening everything with a luminescent white glow.

Voices. Footsteps. The next patrol. Different than the last one. Four Enforcers, two on each side of the road, shining lights in alleyways and at the shadows as they pass. I’m lucky I didn’t try hiding from these ones. My only choice here is to avoid them completely. They’re coming right for me, but Avery promised they wouldn’t cross over into our quadrant, so I’m holding my breath and biting on my thumb and hoping he’s right…

They turn right at the intersection, away from me. I let out a silent breath.

There’s no time to waste. I roll out from hiding, scramble to my feet, and bolt across the road, ru

WHAM!

Something hits me; or rather, I hit it. Not a wall, because it gives way, groaning and collapsing in front of me as I stumble over it. A person. No, an Enforcer. Another patrol in the same quadrant? Avery must’ve forgotten to mention that.

But I’ve hit him from behind and landed on top of him, and though I’m shocked, I’m already recovering, raising my hands like a club, ready to bash his skull in…

When I see the blood.

It’s already pooling around us, escaping from somewhere in the front of his head, which he must’ve hit on the stone-block street when he fell. My head’s on a swivel, looking for his partner, who’s probably right behind me about to—

Nothing. We’re alone. Which really means that I’m alone, because I’m pretty sure this guy is dead.

Crap, crap, crap!

This was not part of the plan. I could try dragging him away to an alley somewhere, but I won’t have time to clean up the blood. Do I go back, find a way to break into Avery and Lin’s building, knock on their door, start over fresh in the morning? Or do I continue on, really turn this into a suicide mission, doing everything in my power to kill Lecter tonight?

I go on, grabbing only the dead guy’s gun, which thankfully clattered away in front of him, several feet out of range of the blood.

I leave the body, dashing into the night, being more careful, peeking around corners before turning them. The second quadrant disappears behind me and I don’t stop to observe the patrols in the third quadrant, because at any second someone might raise the alarm that there’s a dead Enforcer in the streets and a crazed, disgruntled, chipless citizen on the loose.

It might be luck, it might be fate, or it might just be that the entire patrol had to take a bathroom break, but whatever it is, I don’t see a single Enforcer in the third quadrant.