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HOPE RENEWED
TIERNEY JONES
I am not sure if I’m flattered by Three’s fixation on me or humiliated by it. Certainly, I’m uncomfortable standing before my bosses while a naked man who looks like a titan ogles me, calls me ‘little one,’ and waves his penis around like a matador of old waving a red flag. I suppose that makes me the bull? It’s not an entirely unfair comparison, though. I barely recognize myself these days.
I never know what I’ll do from one moment to the next. In his presence, I’ve become unpredictable. At least to myself. It’s quite possible he’s moving me across the ring for his own purposes. He has a way of flipping things around on me, keeping me on edge, a constant barrage of confusion, sexuality, humor and aggression.
Baldwin, however, takes it all in stride. And unlike Caruthers, she doesn’t attempt to protect me.
She lets me decide. And for that, regardless of all her other atrocities, I respect this strange cold woman.
“Great.” I nod at Caruthers but he’s busy facing off with Three through the glass. “That’s settled.”
I stalk toward my box of novels, taking a couple away from some of the more curious of the lab techs, and carry it toward the head guard. His name is Officer Reyes, and if he has ever smiled in his life, it hasn’t been here in this lab.
He takes the box, his jaw clenching under his thickly grayed beard, the gun strap creaking and shifting on his black kevlar uniform.
“Please see that they’re distributed equally between the Sierras.”
His lips flatten into a hard line, but he takes them anyway.
“I’ll be back in an hour.” I cross to the hallway. Baldwin and Caruthers have evidently left, to have the afore-promised private discussion. I catch Schwitters’ eye where he talks with the lab techs about their current work. “Could I have a word, please?”
His brows raise and he flashes a smile. “I’ll come to your office in a minute.”
––––––––
When Schwitters comes in a moment later, he wiggles his brows at me. “Anal play, Ms. Jones? I didn’t take you for the type.”
I’m sitting at my desk, my elbows on its reflective surface, and I drop my head into my hands.
He slides easily into one of the chairs facing me.
I groan. “I honestly didn’t even think about how embarrassing that would be, having everyone know I’d read those. My great-grandmother gave them to my grandmother, who used to love those books. My mother loved them. Swann loved them. I love them. We never talked about the ... sexual part of it. It was always the love story.”
“Mmmmhmmm. The love story. I’m sure that was the best part.” He crosses his feet in front of him and eyes me shrewdly. “How is she?”
I lean back, an unexpectedly easy smile stretching across my face. “Thanks for asking, Curt. She knows who I am now.” It’s true. For the first time, in four years, I have someone to talk to, someone who hears me, who talks back, who understands. The financial burden may be mine alone, but at least she loved mom and dad too. “We talk almost like normal sometimes. I took her out shopping over the weekend.”
“That’s good.” He spreads his arms wide, then folds his hands behind his neck and glances at the time on the wall screen. “You’ve got me here. I have a call in sixteen-and-a-half minutes. But I’m yours till then. What can I do for you?”
I blow out a breath. “I want to know more about Romeos Eight and Seven.”
For a second, his face shutters. All the amusement and camaraderie from before slides away. It’s like I’m seeing the real him, and the thought randomly surfaces that it was him who gave me the nickname Tierney the Teary. Kids can be so cruel. “What about them?”
“What happened to Romeo-Seven? What’s wrong with him?”
He hums dismissively. “Some people break sooner than others. He’s always been one of the more emotional Sierras.”
“But Romeo-Three said something the first day I came here. He said, ‘You don’t deserve mercy. Not after Sev.’ As if something specific happened.”
He frowns. “I don’t think so. I don’t know. I think he just meant because Romeo-Seven is depressed. That whole ... wrist ... debacle.”
I make a Caruthers play and try silence to see if he’ll say something more. But it doesn’t work.
Schwitters just blinks back at me blandly, and after a while I start to feel stupid. So, I ask, “What happened with Romeo-Eight and Delilah?”
His eyes widen. He scratches the back of his neck, leaning forward like he’s trying to come up with the right words. “I joined this program three years ago. It was located at a base back then. This was all before my time, but the Sierras were performing at their highest levels. They were launching them constantly. To the Northlands. To Russo-Asia. They were obedient from everything I can understand from the feeds. The program was solid. To be honest, they seemed happy.
“Delilah worked at the base. She was a soldier. I don’t know how they met. But they fell in love, and they tried to follow protocol, but there were no protocols for the Sierras falling in love. A blind eye had been turned when they had relations with people, but this was different.” He smiles at that, slightly, and the same old surge of irritation I feel every time I think of them swells inside me. Since stopping the vitamin, I’m eternally on edge. Anger, long suppressed, keeps bubbling upward, making me itchy for a fight. I breathe through it.
“So what happened?”
He fiddles with his fingers. “Baldwin and their military commanders tried to end it. Eight and Delilah ran, along with the rest of them. They left the base, with a pair of helicopters in the middle of the night, left behind a trail of dead or unconscious bodies. That same night, their trackers were disabled. They went dark.”
“I didn’t even know that was possible. Disable a tracker?” I suppose a blocking code could work. I doubt you could turn it off, but maybe you could find a way to scramble any return signals. “This was four years ago?” Three found the timing interesting too, that day with the electrodes. Same time Mom died and Dad was Outlawed.
“Is that why my dad was Outlawed? Did he do it?”
Schwitters shifts in his suit. “I don’t know. His file is sealed to me. They were gone. Until one day, two years ago, Delilah contacted Baldwin about her son. He had Outlaw fever. She arranged for surrender in exchange for medical care.”
I don’t really even need him to finish the story. I can imagine it so perfectly. The poor woman, desperate for her child, sneaking away from her own husband. Why she’d reach out to Baldwin though, is a wild mystery. No one in their right mind would trust her. But fear does things to people, and Delilah was a woman with a sick child. What wouldn’t she do?
My heart clenches.
Outlaw fever isn’t usually a big deal. We learned about it in school. Most people experience nothing but the mildest of symptoms. But for a small percentage of the population, it can be deadly, particularly without medical care.
Schwitters’ voice is quiet as he continues the story. “They had them within two hours. After that ...” He shrugs. “They knew Romeo-Eight would contact them. So they just waited. And sure enough. He surrendered in exchange for Delilah and the boy’s freedom.”
My eyes burn. “And Baldwin agreed?”
“Of course, she agreed. Delilah was freed within the hour. A Killer got her within seconds of exiting the building. They were given advanced notice.”
I suck in a breath, almost afraid to ask. “And the boy?”
A tiny unamused smile lurks in the corners of his lips. “They needed him. One of the ways they were originally designed was to be highly adaptable. The second generation is more powerful than the first. It’s why we want them to fucking make us a new army of super-soldier babies. Russo-Asia’s cyborg program is still in its infancy. We have time.”
I resist the impulse to grimace. “And Octavius?”
“You mean Romeo-Eight.” He bites out the T in a clear reprimand. “They needed him too.”
I chew on the insides of my cheeks. “And the others?”
“They need each other. That’s why they all escaped together initially. I think they came here thinking they could get Romeo-Eight and escape. But so far, they’ve failed. Twice. I’m sure they’ll try again.”
If it was indeed a failure, which I’m doubting more and more.
“May I have access to those files?”
He stares at me for a long time. And finally, he nods and rises from his chair. “I’ll adjust the clearance as much as my own allows before my call.”
“Thank you, Curt.”
He winks, all sparkle again. “I want to read those books some time.”
––––––––
His name is Dane.
I stare at my screen a few moments later, after Schwitters has given me clearance.
His mother was Delilah Rose Walanski-Uko.
His father is Romeo-Eight, Octavius—or Oct for short.
The file contains no information on Dane’s current whereabouts, but there are several photographs. He was three when he had Outlaw Fever, when his mom died trying to save him, and when he was taken from his father. He’s five now. Skinny and tall. His mom had sandy-blond hair, blue eyes, a sharp nose. Octavius has deep-bronze skin, dark hair, even darker eyes, a hard, angular face.
Dane has a perfect combination of their features. Tan skin, rich brown hair, hazel eyes the exact shape of hers. He’s an adorable little boy.
There’s a clip, too. In it he plays a piano so solemnly it breaks my heart to watch, his tongue tucked into the right-hand corner of his lips, his little brows furrowed into a manful scowl.
Wherever he is, he’s well-dressed and clean, he has access to a piano and clearly tutelage in it, and in the background, behind the piano, a wall of windows overlooks a great blue expanse of water. The lake? Maybe.
Wherever he is, he is not underground.
It gives me hope.
The clearance doesn’t allow me to view the file from my personal screen, which isn’t unusual. Most of my work has to be done at my desk, where my retinal scanner grants or denies access.
So I use my personal screen’s recorder to copy the clip and the photos.
There is someone, I imagine, who will want to see them very badly.
––––––––
Octavius is kept three levels down from sub-level B.
His lab is much like the one the Sierras are kept in above, but his cell is larger. He is not dosed with stimulants. They’ve given him a pillow and a blanket.
Is this guilt on Baldwin’s part for her role in Delilah’s death? Admission of responsibility? Proof that somewhere under her cold austerity, she cares for these strange people she created?
When I enter his silent, empty lab, he’s on his back doing rapid sit-ups. His skin gleams with sweat under the lights. He must know I’m here. Fifty different senses probably announced my arrival before I even stepped foot inside, but he doesn’t look at me, doesn’t stop doing the intense exercise. Up. Down. Up. Down.
He’s so thin. Just muscle and tendon and bone.
I cross to the camera, a spherical red eye that sits in one corner of the room. I enter my override code and turn it off. All of the scientists in the lab are equipped with such a code. It gives us a chance to perform experiments that are better kept off record. The system fills in the analogue with obfuscated code, and, before a jury, it reads as a blip in the system.
He doesn’t look over at me when I stop in front of his glass.
“Octavius?”
No movement.
“Romeo-Eight?”
I clear my throat a few times. “My name is Ms. Jones—Tierney. I’d like to speak with you.”
Knocking on the glass makes me feel like a visitor at a zoo prodding a captive animal, but I try it anyway.
No response.
“Octavius.” I swallow. “I want to show you some pictures. Of your son. Of Dane. I have a clip, too. He’s okay, I think. I can show you.”
He freezes, his head pivoting at the neck to take me in, a thick black brow raised high. He’s lost so much weight since he came. The file says he used to be 235 lbs, which means he’d have looked like Three, but now he is down to 180 lbs, which on a 6'5" frame is terrifyingly gaunt. His ribs bulge, his cheekbones casting sharp shadows.
He stares at me like I’m worse than Baldwin or Schwitters or any of the lab techs.
He has to believe I’m taunting him. He rises predator-fast and crosses to the glass, snarling. He smacks it right over my face.
“Don’t you dare say his name.” His voice cracks and fades as he talks, as hoarse as if he’s screamed often recently, as raw as if he hasn’t spoken in months.
I hold my ground. “Would you like to see him?”
His jaw tightens, the hollows beneath his cheeks deepening.
I tap my screen and pull up the first image of the boy and hold it up.
He sucks in a breath, his whole body shaking, and leans against the glass, his face registering awe, sheer unbridled awe.
I don’t wait for him to ask. I didn’t come here to make him ask me for favors, and if he has to ask, that’s how it will feel to both of us. So instead, I call up the next image, let him look his fill.
His gaze roves over the screen, searching for cues. If I’d ever truly doubted that these Sierra soldiers had souls, this confirms it. Baldwin was either lying or misguided. They are capable of love. Deep and honest love.
A single glance my way, like he’s searching for a trick or a trap, and he leans in, his big hands splaying on the glass, his eyes jaw tightening.
When I queue up the piano clip, he looks back to me. “He’s good. He’s really good.”
“He is. That’s Chopin he’s playing. I looked it up. It’s a challenging piece for a trained experienced adult with big hands. Look how fast he’s moving.”
“He’s like me.” His shoulders start to jerk. “I don’t want him to be like me.”
I lower my eyes so he won’t have a witness to his grief. When it’s over, I play it again and then again.
“Would you like to see a picture of Delilah?”
His eyes find mine, bloodshot, and the look in them is one I hope I never have to see again. “Please.”
I call up the image, and his face crumples.
I give him the privacy of my eyes on the floor. “I looked up the file. The bullet entered from the back and cut right through her brain. She wouldn’t even have known it was coming. She wouldn’t have had time to be afraid, to feel pain.”
A long, shuddering breath fogs the glass, his shaking hand rises up to touch the air in front of her face, but I don’t look up to see his expression.
“And Dane ...” I struggle to find the right words. “I don’t know where he is. But he has windows, and a piano, and clean clothes. He looks well-fed. He’s alive, and he’s not in a cell underground. Someone cares enough to teach him piano.”
We’re silent for a long moment.
Because if I were him, I’d want to see them all again, I scroll through them a final time.
“Why?” he whispers.
“Why what?”
“Why are you showing me?”
“I don’t know.” Because it’s the one decent thing I can do right now. “Because if I were you, this is the only thing I’d want. I have a message from your siblings. Three says you shouldn’t give up hope.”
I look up at his eyes again, and his dark brows draw together.
“Okay.” I grin. “He actually said, ‘tell him not to give up hope.’”
“Thank you.”
I walk back to the camera. Just as I reach out to turn it back on, his voice stops me.
“Tell Three my hope has been renewed by Tierney Jones.”
