And the way he said it, the way the very air changed around us with his words, made me freeze in place.
I turned to look back at him and found his face stark white. His eyes had reddened and moisture pooled in them.
“What?” I demanded, my tone unsure.
He held a hand over his mouth and squeezed his eyes closed for a moment. A tear streaked down his cheek.
“I have something important to do right now, so if you have something to say, you’d better say it quick.”
West finally opened his eyes, wide and disbelieving.
“Now, West!” I demanded, debating just running into the building to complete my task. We could talk later, if we lived through the day.
“You know all those stories I told you? About how we used to play together when we were kids? The notes I left you?” he asked in a shaky voice.
“Is this important right now, West?” I said, my tone dripping acid.
He nodded his head.
“Fine, yes.”
He paused for a moment. He took a deep, quivering breath. “None of them were true.”
“What do you mean?” I asked, my brow furrowing.
“It was your sister, Eve,” he said, more tears streaking down his cheeks. His eyes rose to the heavens and he shook his head. “It was your identical twin sister that I did all that stuff with. Not you.”
I tried to ask what? but the words stuck in my mouth like it had been filled with cotton. My thoughts swirled. I’d seen myself talking to me in those fractured memories and nightmares in Seattle. I’d been crazy, they’d broken my mind. This couldn’t be true.
“That tattoo on the back of your head?” he said, his voice shaking nearly beyond control now. “The roman numeral two? You were Eve Two. Your sister was Eve one.”
“No,” I said, shaking my head, my insides quickly going numb. “No. That can’t be…”
West nodded his head. “We hated each other as kids, Eve. Some people just don’t get along. You and I, we couldn’t stand to be around one another. It…it kind of explains a lot about us now.” His brow furrowed, as if reevaluating every moment we had spent together.
“You lied to me,” I said, my voice very controlled and very quiet. “Again? About something like this?”
Tears started leaking down West’s face again and he gave a slight shake of his head. “I thought you were her, Eve one. Because Eve Two was supposed to be dead. My father was supposed to dispose of her. Because she had been compromised. Because she killed over fifty people. Because Eve Two did this!” He pulled on the collar of his shirt, exposing the claw marks on his neck.
“That was supposed to be me?” I breathed, not believing a word he said.
West nodded, coming one step closer.
“I never said anything about the twin sister because she was supposed to be dead. You didn’t remember anything, and I thought that was for the best. What was the good of bringing up a sister who had tried to kill me and was supposed to be dead? I was going to let the past stay dead.”
I punched West in the face. Hard enough he collapsed to the ground.
“I can’t take any more of your secrets,” I said, my voice shaking with rage. “I hate you West Evans, and if we all live through this day, I never want to see you again.”
And I left him there on the ground. I slipped inside the building and let the door close behind me.
The interior of the building shifted with lines of black. My hands shook and my stomach rolled in an emotional hurricane.
There was coughing somewhere above me and a quick shh. I shut out my personal garbage and took the stairs two at a time.
I was catching a break for the first time in what felt like a very long time. I’d found them in the first building I tried.
Hushed voices came from behind a closed door. Slipping my handgun from my belt, I leaned against the door.
“Do you really think it will work?” a young voice whispered. “Do you really think it can kill them?”
“I don’t know baby,” a motherly voice said. “We can only hope so.”
I pushed the door open, my gun poised ahead of me.
Margaret stood by a large window, overlooking the fight below her.
“I should shoot you right now,” I said loudly. Every eye turned on me, including Margaret’s There were muffled screams and whimpers.
“Then why don’t you?” Margaret asked. There was just the faintest trace of fear in her eyes. But not enough. Not enough to classify her as human in my eyes any longer.
“Because I need to know how far that thing you planted in my head is going to reach.”
Margaret didn’t answer for a moment and I saw her gaze shift to those around her. I noticed then that they were mostly women, children, and elderly.
“Not here,” she said in a hiss and stepped toward me. She held her hands up when I didn’t lower the weapon and stopped. Her eyes slipped down to the little girl on the floor just to the side of me who was crying and had her face buried in her mother’s shoulder.
“Out in the hall,” I said, waving her out with the gun.
The two of us stepped outside the door and I closed it behind us. We walked halfway down the hall for privacy.
“Why?” I asked simply.
“Do you not remember what things were like in Seattle?” Margaret asked with narrowed eyes. “We had to leave or we were all going to get infected. The Underground has been totally compromised. And soon it is going to be the entire world and we will be eradicated.”
Margaret actually had no idea how true her words were. She had no way of knowing the sweeps the Hunters were conducting.
“Just so you know,” I said, my tone turning icy. “You’ve condemned us all to infection.”
“I don’t understand your pride with this Pulse thing. You have to use it!”
“We would be happy to,” I said, my teeth clenched so tight they might have broken if I were fully human. “If it hadn’t been damaged in the earthquake.”
Margaret paused, her expression paling. “What earthquake?”
“The one we had just a few days ago. The one that dropped a concrete pillar on the Pulse, making it unusable. And our head scientist, the one who developed it, the only one who can fix it, is sick.”
“I didn’t know,” she said. She was trying to pitch her voice to be non-caring, but she was failing.
“We’re all dead now, thanks to you,” I said. I grabbed her wrist and started pulling her down the stairs.
Maybe it was shock or guilt or some other unknown conscious that I didn’t know she possessed, but Margaret let me drag her out of the building without a fight.
Shots rang out and shouts rose into the air. There were three bodies lying in front of the hospital now. I couldn’t look at their faces just then to see if it had been any of ours that had fallen.
West was nowhere to be seen.
“Call your men off,” I growled in Margaret’s ear. “Or I swear I will kill you right here.” I pressed the barrel of my handgun into her ribs.
Margaret shifted uncomfortably, her arm going nowhere under my steel grip. She cleared her throat.
“Cease fire!” Margaret yelled, her voice startlingly loud and filled with authority. “Members of the Underground will assemble. Now!”
Instantly the shots died out and slowly the soldiers, New Eden and foreign alike, gathered before the hospital.
“You have a lot of explaining to do,” Royce growled, pointing a finger at Margaret. He approached her, fast. For a moment I was afraid he was going to plow her right over, but he stopped just an inch from her face, his finger pressed to her chest. He was covered in blood and grime.
Avian suddenly came jogging through the crowd, followed by Raj. I resisted the urge to rush at him and pull him into my arms. But now wasn’t the time.