They waited in a janitor’s closet while a patrol went past, three normal men moving with what they probably thought was cautious silence. Cal’s free hand turned into a fist, longing thoughts of smashing the door open and taking on all of them, then just charging forward until he found her, danced through his aching skull. The effort almost made him sweat, the close confines of the closet full of the thick scent of two agents, one a haze of stress and fury, the other’s smell of calm determination beginning to fray a little.
It was a relief to get out into the halls again. It felt like forever, the ringing silence where Trinity’s muffled screams used to be. In reality, it wasn’t very long before they heard another sharp sound, one that stopped Reese cold and jerked Cal’s head up.
A gunshot.
Reese jolted forward, but Cal was already running. He plunged around a corner, the throat of a long fluorescent-lit hallway opening up in front of him, and there was a set of sealed double doors at the end, the light overhead flashing red. Biohazard! Containment! Cal hit them at full speed, glass shattering and the lock snapping, and a wave of sickness and death rolled out to envelop him. His shoulder crunched with pain, even agent-strong bones rebelling, and he found himself outside a containment tent, shadows moving inside the billowing opaque plastic. A faint whiff of gunfire, the iron-copper tang of blood and burned metal of agonizing pain, he ripped the plastic aside and stumbled into the operating theater.
For a moment what he saw made no sense. A vaguely familiar blond man with a bloody face, his fatigues covered in vomit and his patches proclaiming him a major even though he was too young. Thin trickles of blood slid down from his nose and eyes, and his cheeks were aglow with fever. The gun was steady, though, and it was pointed straight at Reese, the blond’s bleeding eyes widening as he swayed sideways, hitting a huge control console with his hip.
Thick cables ran from the console to an operating table, and crouched on the table, in a torn, tattered hospital onesie, was Trinity, gaunt and feral-eyed, bleeding from several places, several metal arms attached to the table’s base looming over and around her like petals. A deadly flower, and the marks on her matched the pattern.
Restraints were thrown free—she’d been strapped down, and those things had been jabbing at her. Electricity crackled, more sparks fountaining, and the burning insulation smell wasn’t just gunfire. It was just short of an electrical fire in here.
The fury inside Cal mounted another notch.
She had just finished gathering herself, sinking on her haunches, and the bullet intended for her had hit the base of the table instead, sparks fountaining from the jagged hole. A layer of burning insulation was added to the simmering stew, and Cal almost gagged.
“Who the—” The blond choked on another spray of vomit. Whatever he had, it was bad. He swayed again, and Cal realized where he’d seen him—the police station in Felicitas, running the grids looking for Trinity. So he’d been military, and part of Division, too.
“Cal!” Trinity blurted, and he had time to think that she actually sounded pretty happy to see him, all things considered, before the blond man pulled the trigger.
A padded hammer struck Cal right in the gut. He folded over, his stupid body not realizing he’d been shot until he tried to straighten and the pain began, breaking every barrier the virus gave him. He staggered, his own gun rising, and the blond had turned his attention from Cal back to the honey-haired, gaunt, impossibly beautiful woman on the table, who was uncoiling to leap. Not at him, but toward Cal, to put herself between him and the danger.
God, she’s amazing. Training was still with him, even though his head was very light and he suspected the virus couldn’t heal a gutshot. I don’t deserve her. Something was chewing at his stomach, its fangs sinking in, but his own gun finished its steady movement, and a great calm stillness fell over Cal.
So this is where it ends. Make it count, soldier.
He squeezed the trigger.
The blond’s head evaporated, and Trinity let out a short garbled scream. She launched herself, colliding with Cal a bare second after the gun spoke, and they went down in a tangle of blood, foulness and huge clawing agony. He heard his own voice screaming as well, a hoarse cry as the pain swallowed him whole, and the last thing he heard was her repeating his name raggedly while she clasped his body in her slim, iron-hard, trembling arms.
* * *
This is going to take some thought. Reese eyed the wreckage. An almost-naked woman, a gutshot agent, a dead body with a major’s oak leaves on its sleeves and smoke beginning to waft from the tentacled nightmare of a hellish operating table. Trinity stared up at him, her dark eyes wide and her cheeks slick with salt water, and blinked twice.
“Here.” He holstered his gun, bending, and she made a short, sharp movement, pulling Cal’s limp, bloody body closer. “He’ll probably live, if we can get that bullet out. Do you know this place?”
She looked, for a few moments, as if she’d forgotten what English meant. Then she swallowed hard and nodded. Her lips moved, then firmed, and she finally spoke.
“Six.” A crack-pop of electricity under the word.
A cold finger touched his nape. It’d been a while since anyone called him that. “It’s Reese, ma’am. Let’s get him up.”
She examined him from top to toe. A while ago he might not have let her, just moved to grab Cal and get him somewhere they could fish the damn bullet out if it hadn’t gone through him. Since Holly, though, he’d become a little more patient.
Just a little.
Cal stirred a little. It looked as if it hurt. He was still trying to fight, even in his half-conscious daze. Trinity levered both of them upright, grimacing, and her doubtful acceptance of Reese was solidified when he stepped close, grabbing Cal’s arm and pulling it over his shoulder. “Let’s go.”
She nodded, let go of Cal’s deadweight and stepped away on unsteady legs. Reese was about to say something—but she simply bent over the major’s body, her quick fingers finding the gun and freeing more ammunition from his puke-splattered belt. She popped a fresh clip in, her fingers fumbling slightly, turned around and reapproached as a thin flame danced near the base of the table. She coughed to clear her throat and she was whiter than flour, as if she’d lost a lot of blood. Those dark eyes hooded, she took three steps and stumbled, righted herself, and Reese got the idea she’d keel over before they got to the end of the hallway outside.
She didn’t seem to notice she was only wearing shreds of thin blue-patterned cloth; flat straps of muscle stood out underneath her skin. Every ounce of extraneous fat was gone, her metabolism burning overtime to fuel virus-enhanced muscles and healing, but even so, she wasn’t as heavy as the male agents. He’d wondered why Holly hadn’t turned out agent-strong; it was looking as if Trinity hadn’t, either.
But she was plenty determined. Reese could respect that, even if he wasn’t entirely sure she was trustworthy.
“I...” She coughed, spat to clear her throat and stepped close to Cal again, taking his other arm and heaving grimly. “I know a way out.”
“We’ve got to get the bullet out. Unless—” He checked, as Cal began to surface, probably aware he was moving. “Well, goddammit. It went straight through him.” Too soon to tell if that was good or bad luck, though.
She simply put her head down and began hauling him for the door. Cal hung heavily between them, Trinity weaved, and Reese began to think they weren’t going to get out of this alive.
Because there were more shadows outside the rippling plastic, and they were probably armed.
“Halt!” someone yelled, and there was the popping zing of gunfire. Reese hit the floor, Cal going down, too, in an inglorious heap, but Trinity stood, her knees locked, and raised the gun. Did she want to die? Jesus.
“Get down!” Reese yelled, but she didn’t listen, aiming carefully through t
he plastic. Now Reese could see the holes blown in it, and black smoke began to puff up from the table in earnest.
More flashes of gunfire. Trinity cocked her head thoughtfully. A smear of blood on her cheek—where had that come from? Cal groaned, Reese rolled him onto his side so he wouldn’t choke on whatever came out of him, and it occurred to him again—they were going to die here.
At least Holly was safe. How long would she last without him, though?
“Friendly!” someone yelled outside, and Trinity stiffened.
It was a woman’s voice.
“Yo!” the new arrival yelled again, and Reese braced himself to shoot whoever came through the plastic sheets. “Hey—Agent Three, Alice Wharton, whoever you are, we’re on your side! Let’s get out of here, okay?”
Alice? Reese glanced at Trinity.
Who lowered her gun, slightly. Her hair hung in a darkened mop. She wore a faint, abstract look, and the terrible gashes and punctures all over her had begun to seal. Thin threads of blood trickled down her hips, and tremendous bruises flowered all over her scrawny body.
“Alice Wharton, social security number—” The new voice rattled off a list of numbers. “My name’s Fray, I’m here to help you, just don’t shoot me, okay?”
Trinity lowered her gun the rest of the way. She glanced down at Reese, and at Cal, who was moving feebly.
Take care of him, she mouthed and dived forward through the plastic sheets, rolling out of sight.
Reese swore internally. Popping clatters, more gunfire, a short female cry of pain.
He was about to shake himself loose of Cal’s unconscious weight and bellycrawl for the curtains when they twitched aside, and a dark-eyed, black-haired agent with linebacker shoulders glanced down at him. He had a 9mm but it wasn’t leveled, and behind him was a chestnut-haired girl, her green tea and healthy female scent almost agent-strong and complementary to Black Hair’s.
The young woman had Trinity’s arm over her shoulder, and she was grinning as if it was Christmas and New Year’s rolled into one. “God, it stinks in here,” she chirped. “I’m Fray, and this is Bay. He took care of the guys out there, but we’d better get going. I figure you’re on the right side, since you’re all beat up and everything, right?”
Trinity murmured something, her head hanging forward. She swayed, almost passing out.
Reese let out a long breath, watching Black Hair. The agent bent carefully, just out of strike range, and offered his hand.
“Truce?” he said in a flat, expressionless tone.
Reese decided they’d better get out of there before anyone else came along to join the circus, and took the proffered hand. “Help me get him up.”
* * *
“I saw they’d captured her—her name’s not really Alice, is it? She’s Omega. Wow.” Fray bounced in the passenger’s seat; Bay wouldn’t let her drive. The laundry van, full of bags of clean uniforms, shuddered and jounced as he piloted it across a stretch of desert. He was certainly handy to have around, that guy, even if he was creepy as all get-out. At least she could be sure he was on the right side now. “And you, you must be other guys from the program. Which ones are you?”
The dark-haired one—Reese—doused the blond guy’s nasty stomach wound with something that smelled like disinfectant and ripped a towel in half with one quick, efficient yank. “He’s losing a lot of blood. Trinity, hold this down—”
“Trinity,” Fray repeated. “Got it. Look, can I help or anything? That looks pretty bad.”
“What’s our heading?” Reese said over her.
“Southeast,” Bay replied, not turning from the road. “Should be a breach point there.”
“Are you sure?”
“I calculate it with some certainty, yes.”
“Great,” Reese muttered.
“It’s the way we got in, at least.” Fray unclicked her seat belt, despite Bay glancing at her. She struggled into the back, where the woman—Trinity—hovered, pale and swaying, almost naked and obviously in a deep state of shock. She kept staring at the blond man bleeding all over a pile of cloth laundry bags. “This guy’s magic with bolt cutters and copper wire, let me tell you. Honey, let’s find you some clothes.”
Trinity glanced at her, then down at herself as if she hadn’t realized she was naked. “Oh.” She swayed again, and the bruises and blood all over her would have made Fray lightheaded-sick if she hadn’t gulped, bit the inside of her cheek, and started digging in the bags to find something that wasn’t towels.
“I think I’ve got it figured out.” If Fray didn’t keep talking, she was going to throw up, too. It looked awful; the other woman had been through hell. “Trinity means you’re Three, right? You’re Omega. Your file—wow, it’s amazing. What they did to you was awful, and then—”
“My file?” That got her attention. She cast a glance over the sacks, pointed at one. “That one should have something. My file?”
“Oh yeah. It took some doing to get into. You know they wanted to breed you? You were the only one who survived the Prometheus process.”
“Induction,” Trinity said. She stopped, swaying even more than the rocking of the van called for, and might have keeled over if Fray hadn’t caught her arm. Her fingers sank in—the other woman was just skin and bones, her hips high arches stretching flawless, almost-translucent skin.
“Yeah, that.” Fray dug in the bag—it held uniforms, and she began yanking handfuls of cloth out. “They had a whole projected pattern—harvesting eggs, in vitro, chowder to cashews. Was that Caldwell back there?”
A glimmer of suspicion in Trinity’s large dark eyes. She was beautiful, even if she’d been hitting the anorexia button a little too hard. “You knew him?”
“He had me working to track you. Nice trick with the SSN, by the way. I couldn’t figure it out until I thought about algorithms.”
“Yes.” Trinity’s eyes closed, her head dropped forward, and she jerked back into consciousness when Fray grabbed her, bracing them both against a pile of bags lashed down with nylon webbing. “Who are you?”
“I told you, I’m Fray.” She snapped open a uniform shirt—desert camo was such a weird fabric, she had to look up how they made it. “They had me looking for you until I figured out you weren’t the bad guy. The East Coast’s been trying to get hold of Caldwell for a while now. That was my first indication anything—”
“Control,” Trinity murmured. “Of course. Caldwell...infected himself.”
“He what?” Reese piped up. “Was that what was wrong with him?”
“Yes.” Trinity managed to button the shirt, reached for the pants—the only small pair Fray could find in the bag—and her knees folded. She went down hard, and Fray, unprepared, went down with her.
“Hold on,” Bay said from the front. “This could get slightly bumpy.”
The wounded guy screamed, a lonely, despairing sound, and Fray’s stomach revolved. There had been actual bullets. Bay had even punched a guy in the face. He moved like lightning, and the sound bones made as they broke was definitely uncool. He was a machine, and while he’d been pretty awesome so far, Fray kept hearing those crunches, her ears still ringing from all the gunshots, and she had made up her mind.
This was too deep for Alexandra Frasier, and she was getting out just as soon as possible.
For the meantime, though, she tried to arrange Trinity so she was comfortable next to the still-bleeding man. Reese, keeping his balance with a cat’s lithe grace, kept working, up to his elbows in blood. He had an assortment of medical tools and some disinfectant, and it looked as if he was doing pretty good so far.
Fray’s throat burned with bile. She kept telling herself not to throw up, not to throw up, not to throw up, and the laundry van barreled through the base fencing and into the desert night.
* * *
Trinity floated in comforting darkness, only half-aware of a soft, restful voice and warmth all around her. Someone held a cup to her lips; she drank greedily. Dense, calorie-rich, sweetened milk; her body seized the nutrition gratefully. The voice was familiar, but she couldn’t attach a name to its soft cadences.
“She’s going to be fine.” A woman’s voice, sweet and throaty, a comforting layer of musk and goldenness to her scent.
“Yeah.” Another woman, sounding very young, this one with a hint of brunette, caramel and green tea. “Look, it’s been fun and all, but I’ve got to jet.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah. Don’t... I mean, here. This is for her.” A sound of paper moving. “Reese told me she went in there to find out who she was. What they did to her...it’s just, you know. It’s awful.”
“People do awful things.”
“Tell me about it.”
Trinity stirred. Her entire body ached. She wanted, of all things, a milk shake. And other things—red meat, kale, Gatorade. The list of cravings was long and specific, her body informing her of various elements necessary for her continued survival.
I’m...alive.
For how long? Who else was here? Her eyes refused to open.
“So anyway,” the young woman said brightly, “I’m going to scram while the Terrible Two are out having fun. Can you, uh, tell Bay it’s been real? And to take care of himself?”
“Are you sure you want to go? Seems like he’s good protection.”
Trinity finally found names for the voices. One was Holly Candless. The younger one was the girl from the laundry truck, the gemina with the black-haired agent who reeked of induction and pain.
Fray. What an odd name.
“Oh no,” the new gemina said hurriedly. “If I stay away from him, I don’t need protection. Besides, I have to think about the best way of breaking the story.”
“You might want to consider—” Candless was endlessly patient, but a certain inflection told Trinity it was an uphill battle.