She was on her knees, sobbing into the gap in the gate, calling for her son. Pleading for an answer. But the intensity was waning. Three knew she would be useless in searching for another way. There was always another way. Knowing that had gotten him this far, and he hadn’t come this far to stop searching now. He could feel his eyes sliding over details, instincts screaming to slow down, go back. But Cass’s cries were interfering, dulling his focus.
“Cass,” he called her gently. She didn’t respond. “Cass, come on.”
He reached down to take her arm, thinking to help her to her feet, but the instant he made contact, she sprang up, screaming again, right in his face.
“He’s gone! You killed him!”
She flailed at him, weak, pathetic blows that he didn’t even bother defending himself against. Behind the chaos, the storm of a woman that raged in front of him, a hint of sound caught his attention, something he felt more than heard.
“Cass,” Three said, his voice calm, even.
“You sent him to die!”
“Cass,” he said it again, firm, urgent; a warning, if she’d been listening.
“He’s gone! My son is gone!”
He didn’t have time for this, or to explain, so he did what came naturally. He punched her in the sternum, a sharp, shallow blow that stole the breath from her body, and crumpled her to the ground. There. Quiet. Controlled. He put a hand on her neck to keep her in place while he scanned, strained. Every sense stretched outward, seeking to disprove what he’d thought he’d heard. Knowing in his gut that he had. Yes, there again… he’d heard it. The faint, distant but unmistakable call of the Weir. The very first of them were out. More would follow.
Cass had fallen into a silent, shuddering sort of sobbing, and Three took advantage of her stillness. He took his hand from her, scanned everything he could think of: the gate, the vent, the alleyways, the maglev line… In all that surrounded them, there had to be something to use, some place to hide. But his mind kept sliding back to the Vault. It wasn’t an option, but it refused to remove itself as one. He fought to forget it, to force his eyes to see everything else.
Under normal circumstances, he never would’ve let it happen. But the stress, the exhaustion, the pressure… whatever the reason, he let himself forget about the woman for a moment. A mistake. She hit him from the side, a blur of movement in the waning light, and drove the edge of her hand into his neck, just under the jaw. Three’s vision jolted; blacked out for an instant. As he fell to a knee, he felt the pistol sliding clear of its holster. Her words flashed through his dazed mind, her promise that if anything happened to Wren, she’d kill him herself.
She got two shots off before he managed to grab her wrist, and the third round tore a chunk from the upper corner of the Vault’s reinforced exterior. As the rolling echo from the blasts rumbled into the distance, Three wrenched the gun from her, and threw her back to the ground. For a long moment, he just stood there, staring, jaw clenched tight, temples throbbing, fighting back the urge to do her some violence. She stared right back, smoldering, defiant; he had no doubts about her will or ferocity. But there was something else… a vulnerability he hadn’t expected. Resignation to a familiar fear. Acceptance of what was about to come. And he knew in that instant that this woman was no stranger to abuse.
For the first time, something inside Three cracked. He felt it without understanding it. And there wasn’t time to analyze it now. But he knew something had changed, and whatever it was probably wasn’t good news for him. Wordlessly, he slid his pistol back into its holster, and went back to the job at hand, trying to forget for the moment that he’d just lost three of his four remaining shells in a flash of unchecked emotion. Not to mention the unwanted attention those gunshots would surely attract.
At first he’d thought she’d meant to kill him, but he saw now that wasn’t the case. Near the left-hand lower corner of the gate, just where the gap was, were two new holes, no more than three inches apart, still glowing orange-red where the thirty-kilojoule rounds had bored through. If only Cass had asked, Three could’ve told her that wouldn’t work, but he felt a twinge of relief as he realized he didn’t owe his life to lousy shooting.
Another squawk sounded from somewhere in the gathering gloom. A melancholy, almost lonely cry that resonated far too well with their current circumstances. Three ran a hand over his bristly head, cracked his neck. The wind was picking up, and the autumn air had the promise of a colder-than-usual winter on its breath. He flexed his fingers, worked out a tightness he hadn’t noticed until now.
“Come on, girl,” he finally said quietly, turning back to her and offering his hand. “We’ll figure this out.”
Cass had her legs drawn up, hugging her knees. She stared off back the way they’d come, refusing to look at him. Despondent.
“We need to go.”
Out this far, the Weir were scattered, harder to predict.
“Cass.”
She wouldn’t look at him, wouldn’t acknowledge him. But in a quiet voice, more to herself than to Three, she answered.
“I’m done.”
They were losing time they didn’t have.
“No you’re not.”
It was bad enough they were talking instead of moving. Cass was making it worse with long pauses between responses, as if the effort to speak was almost more than she could manage.
“Wren was all I had. No reason to go on if he’s gone.”
“And if he’s not?”
Still she hadn’t moved. Another uncanny howl echoed down the alleys, swirled in the chilling air. Three’s tone hardened.
“You’re his mother. If he was dead, you would know. He’s in there. And it won’t do him any good, waiting here to die. So come on.”
She didn’t look to him. But after a too long moment, she reached up, put her hand in his, let him help her to her feet. When he let go, her hand slid away with the barest hint of reluctance. Three told himself it was from her exhaustion.
“Where?” asked Cass.
Three put on his harness and slung the backpack over a shoulder, all the while scanning their surroundings a final time, searching for that other way. It was here. That voice inside was screaming that he’d seen it already, if he could just think. It was here. Just put it together.
No… not here. He’d passed it somewhere. Somewhere close. But what was it?
Finally, there was a spark of an idea, a floating scrap of conversation he’d overheard in some nearly forgotten place, some indeterminate time ago.
“Can you climb?”
Wren sat shoved hard into the cold corner of concrete and steel, desperately trying not to breathe. The scaly hand pressed over his mouth had a sour smell that made his stomach feel upside down and the hot breath on his face reeked of strong vapors that burned his eyes. In those last few terrifying moments, the chemlight had rolled away under some piece of machinery, leaving only the faintest glow pooling on the floor. All Wren knew of his captor was that it was human. He could at least feel that much.
Whoever it was shifted, placed its mouth right into Wren’s ear. Its breath tickled when it spoke.
“Quiet, little one,” it hissed. “Quiet, or we die.”
He wanted so badly to call out to Mama, to answer her calls, to let her know he was OK. But even if there hadn’t been a hand over his mouth, the fear in his throat would’ve stopped any sound he’d wanted to make. The thing was human, minimally. But it felt somehow… wrong. Being this close to It flooded Wren with an indecipherable sense, like hearing an argument in another language, unable to grasp the words but unmistakably getting the tone. Whatever was wrong with It, Wren felt simultaneously afraid of and sorry for It. It seemed wild, and lost.