The Immortality Virus (38 page)

There were at least thirty vehicles here, some military ground vehicles, others hover cars. She wove between them quickly but cautiously. Only one answering disruptor seemed to be coming from between these cars, and she positioned herself behind the shooter.

For a few seconds, she watched him, sandwiched between a gray troop transport and a green heavy artillery vehicle. Then she crept behind him and shoved her disruptor into his back.

“Don’t move!”

He froze and dropped his gun.

“Are you alone?” Grace asked.

“Yeah. You gonna kill me?”

“Only if I have to. Turn around.”

He did. He wore a familiar black uniform that nearly sent Grace’s mind reeling back to the farm. He also wore night vision goggles. “You’re one of Ethan’s men, aren’t you?”

“Yeah.”

“Where are the rest?”

“Dead or gone. I waited here in case more came out of the bloodbath. Got two friends inside, looking for injured men.”

“Only three of you stayed behind to take care of the rest?” Grace asked, temporarily forgetting her mission.

“That’s the trouble with mercenaries. We’re in it for the money.”

“So why are you here?” Grace asked.

He didn’t answer.

“Fine. I need a car.”

“Help yourself. We don’t need all of them anyway.”

“That’s it?” Grace asked.

“You’re trying to get an injured man off the field, aren’t you? I saw you up the way and shot at you before I saw the man down.”

“How do I start the vehicles?” Grace asked.

“Code–52491.”

Grace stood in indecision for a few seconds. Why was this man being so reasonable? Then she had another idea. “You know who I am, don’t you?”

He didn’t answer.

“And when I leave, you’ll report me to your supervisor, who has override control of all the hover vehicles.”

His lip twitched, but again he didn’t answer.

Grace switched her gun to stun. “Sorry about this.” She fired and he went down.

Their escape would have gone smoothly had it not been for one overwhelming problem–when they returned to get Sam and Jordan, Jordan was gone.

“Granddad!” Alex yelled. “We have to find him!”

He started to move, but Grace did not follow.

“Grace?”

“It’s over, Alex,” Grace said. “Jordan is a free man. We’d already decided to help him escape. Obviously, he didn’t want our help.”

“But people still want to find him. Some want to kill him.”

“Yeah, and they’ll have a harder time knowing where to look if they don’t have us to follow.”

Alex didn’t move right away. He turned his head in a slow circle from left to right, as if he could somehow find Jordan in the dark. “He’s old. He can’t have much of a head start...”

“Alex,” Grace said. He turned to look at her. “Let him go.”

Wordlessly, Alex picked up Sam and followed her to the car. Sam lifted his head, apparently experiencing a brief moment of consciousness. “Matt won’t be happy he’s gone.”

No, he wouldn’t be. She’d either have to kill Sam or leave the city. It wasn’t a choice, really.

They touched down on the roof of a hospital about half a mile from Grace’s apartment. The overwhelmed staff tried to turn him away, but Grace made them scan his ID chip, where she knew they’d find a substantial sum for emergency healthcare.

“Will he be all right?” Grace asked a nurse as she wheeled him away.

“I think so. Call tomorrow.”

But she wouldn’t call. By tomorrow she’d be gone and if she called, they might be able to trace it.

Alex, Meg, and Grace walked back to her apartment in silence. They all knew they would be packing to leave the city and they would have to lie low for a while. For Grace, it felt a little like dying. It was the end of something, and what would come next was almost as unknowable as what would come when she closed her eyes for good. In both cases, she could make guesses, but that was all.

She’d never felt this way before. Even when she had left the force, there had been Sam and her family. This time, Sam might as well be dead and she might never see her family again.

“Things didn’t work out like you thought, huh?” Meg said, finally breaking the silence.

“I really didn’t think I’d survive this one.” Grace suddenly remembered the desperate prayer she’d made while Ethan held her captive, challenging God to save her if he really existed. She wasn’t sure what to think about that at the moment, bruised and battered as she was, so she let it go, a problem for another time.

“But I thought I’d die a hero,” Grace said. “Instead, I have to run and I even took you two down with me.”

“I came willingly,” Alex said.

“Me too,” Meg said.

“No, you didn’t!” Grace stopped and faced Meg. “You didn’t want to leave the farm.”

“I don’t know what I wanted. It was safe and comfortable up there, but by getting involved with you in the first place, I think a part of me wanted more.”

They climbed the steps to Grace’s apartment. She felt a little better knowing she would be taking family–of a sort–with her. Meg would be like...well, not like a sister. Grace had a sister, and they weren’t very close. No, more like a best friend. As for Alex, she wasn’t sure what she wanted him to be or what he’d want her to be. Somehow, she didn’t think friendship would feel right.

“We’ve got to figure out what to do with Lissy,” Grace said as she unlocked her apartment. “We can’t leave her alone and–”

She never got to finish that sentence. They heard the baby crying before Grace opened the door, but it wasn’t until after that they saw the bloody corpse that had been a woman at one time.

Meg turned away. Grace held her nose and coughed, but could not tear her eyes from the sight. Someone had slit Lissy’s throat to the point they had nearly severed her neck. Her eyes stared at the ceiling, some remnant of shock still echoing there.

Finally, Grace tore her eyes away. It was hard to imagine anything else could affect her like this, but the howling baby lying in a bloody pool between his dead mother’s legs was too much. She felt like she was choking and when she rubbed her eyes, she felt moisture there.

“I’ll kill him,” Alex said. It came out like a croak. He turned and left the apartment.

“We don’t know for sure it was Roy,” Grace offered, weakly. It had to have been, though.

Alex didn’t answer. A few seconds later, she heard a pounding on the neighbor’s door. Then, a disruptor fired and Alex kicked the door in.

“The baby,” Meg rushed forward to pick it up, bloodying herself in the process.

The umbilical cord was still attached. Simply because it gave her something to do, Grace went to the kitchen to grab a knife, then she grabbed some clean towels. She and Meg worked together to clean the infant and to permanently separate him from his mother.

“You’re crying,” Meg said.

Grace blinked back the tears, but they wouldn’t stay back. She let Meg take charge of the infant while she sat in the floor, balled up like the newborn.

“He’s not there,” Alex’s voice came from somewhere above her. “I searched, but his apartment is bare. I think he moved out.”

Somehow, Grace wasn’t surprised. “It’s not right. I just wanted to put an end to this kind of thing. No one will even care. The police will sweep this under the rug, and Roy will get away with it. I mean, why? Because she’s a blip? Are we really so afraid of aging and death?”

Alex sat down and put an arm around her. She leaned into him and let it all out–the pent up tears and emotions of the last few days, culminating in one final unstoppable tragedy. He didn’t say anything, even though his shirt was sopping wet. He just held her close and stroked her hair.

The baby stopped crying. The sudden silence made Grace jerk her head up, afraid the lack of crying meant he had died, but to her surprise, he was eating. Meg, with her shirt lifted, was cradling the baby at her breast. When she saw Grace’s look, she turned slightly pink. “I didn’t know what else to do. And I haven’t dried up yet...” She trailed off and fought back tears of her own. Grace did not interfere with her mourning, or with her decision to care for this baby.

“That’s what my grandfather never could understand,” Alex said. “He focused so much on the dying, that he forgot we don’t really die as long as we welcome new life.” He sounded like he had been uncertain for a while, but Grace didn’t question him while he spoke his thoughts aloud. “It’s not that we run out of hope when we die. There is hope so long as there is new life. That baby doesn’t have to turn into his father.”

The buzz of the doorbell nearly caused Grace to jump out of her skin. There’s no way anyone could have come after her already. She looked out the peephole to see, once again, Captain Flint. She opened the door to let him in.

“What happened here?” Flint asked as soon as he stepped in and saw Lissy. He wrinkled his nose.

“We think her husband killed her,” Grace said. “I don’t suppose it’s something you’d be willing to investigate?”

He stared at the body, then at the baby, seeming to put it all together in a matter of seconds. “If I can. We’re at war right now, and it’s not safe here for you.”

“I know that,” Grace said. “Did you come to arrest me or kill me?”

“Neither. I came to warn you to get out of town. Edgers made a deal with Stanton, and both men suspect you betrayed your contract.”

“Wait–Matt is wanted for murder and I last left him in the middle of a war zone. When did this happen?”

“Tonight,” Captain Flint said. “My team got him out of that cemetery and took him to Edgers.”

“Took him to...”

“I helped Edgers get into the city.”

“You what?” Grace couldn’t believe it.

“I’ve been on the force for two hundred years and I’m frankly sick of the way this city is run. I think Edgers can do it better, but either way it doesn’t look good for you here.”

“I’ll leave by morning,” Grace promised. “But please, try to do something about Lissy.”

Captain Flint nodded. “What about the baby? Does Lissy have next of kin? I can try to find someone...”

“No!” Meg half screamed from her place on the couch. “No, please! Not another one.”

“I don’t think she had very nice next of kin, to be honest,” Grace said. “And they might not even want the baby.”

“No problem. One less thing for me to deal with.” He paused and then looked Grace straight in the eyes. “If things had ever gone differently, I would have loved to get to know you better.”

His underlying meaning was clear, and Grace blushed.

“I just wanted you to know you do have a friend in this city.”

“Thank you,” Grace said.

He left without another word; Grace closed the door behind him, and then turned to run straight into Alex.

“It’ll be hard being on the run with an infant,” Alex pointed out.

“I know,” Grace said. “Do you have a problem with it? You can go your own way.”
Please say no.

“No,” Alex said. “I just wanted to make sure you knew. I’ve had babies. They’re not always...predictable.”

“Oh, well, neither is anything else.”

“That’s true.” Alex stared at her for a long time. Vaguely, in the background, Grace heard Meg thumping the baby’s back. The baby burped loudly.

“I’m not in love with Sam anymore.” Why had she said that?

“I thought you didn’t believe in love at all.” He was teasing her.

“Oh, well, yeah, I g–”

He didn’t let her finish. Alex leaned in for a kiss, and this time neither one of them turned away. His full, warm lips met hers and something like electricity seemed to move between them. Grace melted against him as the kiss drew deeper, more insistent, and more passionate.

The baby started to cry again. Grace broke off, feeling somewhat let down.

“Don’t worry,” Alex said with a grin, “There’s plenty of time to finish.”

Grace looked away, but she had a smile on her face.

The End

Christine Amsden has been writing science fiction and fantasy for as long as she can remember. She loves to write and it is her dream that others will be inspired by this love and by her stories. Speculative fiction is fun, magical, and imaginative but great speculative fiction is about real people defining themselves through extraordinary situations. Christine writes primarily about people and it is in this way that she strives to make science fiction and fantasy meaningful for everyone.

At the age of 16, Christine was diagnosed with Stargardt’s Disease, a condition that affects the retina and causes a loss of central vision. She is now legally blind, but has not let this slow her down or get in the way of her dreams.

Christine currently lives in the Kansas City area with her husband, Austin, who has been her biggest fan and the key to her success. They have two beautiful children, Drake and Celeste.

http://www.christineamsden.com/