“They’re keeping records on more than the new arrivals,” Toby said when Rhys finished describing his discussion with Zach. “They’ve gone back and done retroactive interviews with everyone in the Clean Zone.”
Darius was beginning to wish he’d heeded Toby’s suggestion about getting away from Colorado Springs back when they’d been climbing the walls in the quarantine unit. Especially since it was pretty clear from the way Rhys was behaving that he was holding some things back.
Titus nodded. “There are thousands of files at the intake center, not hundreds. They have a few computers, but they don’t dare keep anything on them in case the plant goes off-line. They want their research somewhere that they can get to it whether there’s power or not.”
“Well, at least someone learned something from the plague.” Xolani scowled. “Even when there was still battery power, no one could break the security on the data solids scavenged from the Pentagon. The lack of records meant anyone researching Bane had to start from square one.” She drummed her fingers on her thigh. “Do any of the files have information about the blood tests Zach said he collected samples for?”
Toby and Titus both shook their heads. “All that’s there are the interview transcripts and forms the survivors filled out. Medical data is kept elsewhere.”
Darius rubbed his jaw and then nodded irritably. “Fine. Xolani, if you still think it’s worth trying to address the Science Committee, you can detach and remain here with Titus. But tomorrow morning I’m giving Schuyler and her people orders to gather provisions for the trip to Lewis-McChord.” He grimaced. “I know we’re all concerned about the missing people, especially if what Zach told Rhys about Littlewood is true, but when it comes down to it, that’s not our detail.”
“What?” Rhys’s voice climbed high with surprise. “We’re leaving?”
“We’re not Clean Zone citizens. They didn’t want us, remember? He can’t get his hands on Alpha unless he’s willing to try to grab one of us, and that’s too damn risky for him or he’d have already done it. So yeah, we’re leaving.” He scowled into the fire. “I’m not particularly comfortable bringing more survivors here to live under the GDM or be used in . . . whatever it is the government and the DPRP are up to, so there are other things we can do. Once we get to Lewis-McChord, we’ll confer with Luis about dispatching messengers to the other companies about finding someplace new to take the survivors we find, forming another settlement.”
“Whoa!” Xolani held up her hands. “Darius, if the Clean Zone population already feels like we’re a threat, establishing a settlement is going to look like a declaration of open hostility. You’re not doing things the way we want, so we’re going to stop supporting you. The ramifications are huge.”
He arched an eyebrow at her, keeping his hands flat on his thighs to prevent clenching them into fists. Using Rhys as bait . . . It was taking everything he had right now not to hunt down Zach Houtman and pound the shit out of the motherfucker. “So you think we should keep handing survivors over to them?”
Xolani looked like she wanted to argue about that, but she just grimaced and gave a jerky shake of her head. “No. Fuck.”
“Fine.” Darius pointed at Toby and Titus. “Keep digging in those records until we’re ready to go. We want to know everything they’re up to if we’re going to present this to the other companies. Xolani, keep talking like you’re trying to get through to the Science Committee. Don’t advertise that we’re prepping to leave. But we’re fucking out of here as soon as we’re ready to travel.”
They all nodded and got to their feet, except for Rhys, who stayed firmly planted on a log next to the fire.
“No.” They turned in unison to face him, and he raised his voice. “No. I’m not going. I’m going to do what Zach asked. I’m going to play bait.”
“The hell you are,” Darius growled, reaching down to pull him up by his arm. Rhys jerked away.
“No. And don’t you dare try to haul me away like some piece of baggage!” He narrowed his eyes at Darius’s grasping hand.
Appalled by the way he’d just attempted to manhandle Rhys, after he’d sworn to himself that he’d never again force anything on Rhys, Darius dropped it.
“People are being hurt, or killed,” Rhys went on. “If Zach is right about what Littlewood is doing to these boys who are missing . . .” Something tragic crossed Rhys’s face, and he swallowed hard. “We have to stop that. And what if Littlewood does find a way to get ahold of Alpha? It would be Jacob all over again. Worse, maybe. I’m not going to walk away.”
Joe, who had been sitting silently behind Rhys, laid a hand on Rhys’s shoulder with a look of approval. Damn. And there was Toby, stroking his chin thoughtfully.
“What was Zach’s extraction plan, once Littlewood took the bait? Did he even have one?” Xolani challenged.
Rhys broke off his staring contest with Darius to turn his attention to her. “I’m supposed to observe what is happening inside the research facility, see if I can get into their records, find out what they’re doing and who is involved. As far as getting me out, he said he has someone who could help me, someone named Nico.”
Toby frowned thoughtfully. “Who is that guy supposed to be? Why would Zach think he could help you?”
Rhys shrugged. “He didn’t explain much, just that this Nico had known Littlewood before the plague.” He took a deep breath and released it carefully. “Xolani . . . I know what you said about playing the martyr, and I’m not. At least, I don’t want to. But I keep thinking about what you also said the other day, about the GDM and that people in the Clean Zone might be preparing to go on the offensive against the Jugs. What if . . . what if it’s not just Littlewood who wants the Alpha strain? What if congress is sanctioning his operations?”
She groaned, falling back on her bedroll. “Oh hell.”
Titus grunted. “You trust ’im?”
“Zach?” Rhys pondered that one for a moment. “I . . . trust his intentions,” he said slowly. “I believe he’s a good guy who wants to help people. But without knowing who he’s working with, who he’s getting his information from . . .” He sighed, seeking Darius’s eyes. “I’m doing this, one way or the other. Whatever is happening here has to stop. But I’d feel a lot better knowing you’ve got your eyes on Zach and Nico. To keep them honest.”
Darius wanted to snarl at all of them for listening to Rhys. They were honestly considering letting Rhys do this. They followed Darius’s orders when it came to how to conduct patrols; it was a way of keeping operations orderly. But this was something else entirely. None of them had any official rank over the others now. If Rhys’s arguments swayed Xolani and Joe, the two people aside from Darius who were most invested in keeping Rhys safe, Darius was going to have to go along with this fucking plan.
Toby hummed. “I know you don’t want to hear it, Big D, but Little Brother’s right. He can handle this. We need to let him do it and have his back.”
Darius shook his head in adamant denial, but Rhys’s voice stopped him before he could speak.
“Would you let Toby do it? Or Gina? Or Jamie? Or any other member of Delta Company?” He looked up at Darius with a challenge in his eyes. “Did you mean it when you said I’m one of you?”
He unfurled his fists to realize his hands were shaking. He wanted to hit anyone who wanted to force him to accept this. God help him, even Rhys.
Darius saw the resolve in their eyes and swore, storming off into the trees.
It was hours before he’d cooled down enough to return to camp. Rhys was already in his bedroll, facing the fire. It was nearly Darius’s watch shift, so he took up position on the edge of their camp, refusing to look at anyone who was still awake and studying him, trying to gauge his mood.
“Darius?”
He turned at Rhys’s murmur. “Why ain’t you asleep, boy?”
Rhys scoffed. “With all this unresolved?”
“It’s resolved. Just because I don’t like it, don’t mean you’re not right.” He sighed and approached the spot where Rhys lay. “Just want to keep you safe.” He reached down to stroke the tousled hair back from Rhys’s face.
“I know you do.” Rhys’s hazel eyes glowed up at him, golden in the firelight. “Did you mean what you said, about a new Clean Zone?”
Darius shrugged. “Maybe. Xolani’s right. Could be a whole mess of trouble we don’t want.” He sighed, his thumb brushing Rhys’s palm. “Overthrowing the military government was one thing. They weren’t elected, they had no real right to be in authority, and honestly? We wanted revenge for what they had done to us. But it’s different now.”
“Why?”
“They were elected. Corrupt or not, we have no grounds to interfere with that. And if they decide to start a fight . . .” Darius suppressed a shudder. “Putting us up against civilians is a recipe for disaster. Someone will fire a gun at us, we’d be wounded, and then these thousands of people and everything they’ve built here are dead. All the work we’ve done for the last ten years would be gone.”
Rhys gulped. “I think Zach was afraid of that, too. Can you promise me we’ll never be the first to attack the civilians? No matter what?”
“’Course we won’t. Why would you think that?”
“Just making sure. Zach really wants the civilians and Jugs to live together in peace.”
“Can’t blame him. Doubt it’ll ever happen, though. Best we can hope for is to just keep to ourselves.”
“Maybe . . . maybe if you set up a new Clean Zone, it won’t have to be that way.” Rhys’s eyes shone with a hopeful innocence that made Darius’s chest ache. “The survivors you rescue, they trust you, right? Not like the people who were already here right after the plague?”
“Maybe.” Darius stood, brushing off his fatigues. “I’ll have Schuyler detach some of her people to backtrack along the routes used by the other companies, leaving notices at the way stations to divert with the survivors they bring. We’ll tell them to converge in . . .” He rubbed his forehead, considering the cities they had cleared in the last decade of patrols. “Portland. Or maybe outside the city, down the valley around where we found you. Good farmland, lots of wildlife and surviving livestock, not too cold in the winters.”
Rhys blinked slowly. “You’ve been thinking about this for a while. I thought it was something you just came up with tonight, but it isn’t, is it?”
“Been considering it since we learned about the GDM. What we’d do if Xolani’s address didn’t work out. I thought a lot of our people would have trouble with bringing the civvies here if they were going to have to live under laws like that. Hadn’t decided anything until tonight, though.” He rubbed his chin. “Think Portland should work just fine. We’ll meet up with them there, give the survivors the opportunity to decide if they want to join the population at Colorado Springs, or set up a new settlement. It’s the best I can do until I talk to Luis and we approach the rest of the Jug companies. It’ll have to be enough.”
“A new settlement, huh? You’re serious about this?” Xolani appeared out of the trees, coming in from the edge of the old reservoir, while Darius took up his watch position on the outskirts of camp.
“If you got a better idea, I’m dyin’ to hear it. ’Cause right now I’m not sure about a damn thing. Seems the best of a lot of bad options.”
She shook her head, her mouth pressed in a grim line. “I’m fucked if I do. You weren’t wrong in what you told Rhys. We can’t play kingmaker with the Clean Zone leadership.”
Darius snorted. “So we just build a new city—hell, guess it would be a new nation, wouldn’t it?—when the old one doesn’t work out.”
Xolani shrugged. “Sure, why not? And sooner or later they’ll all go to war against one another and start developing weapons of mass destruction, and then it’ll be just like old times, albeit on a smaller scale. Ah, nostalgia!”
Darius stared at her before a reluctant grin tugged at his mouth. “Sometimes your sense of humor is just fuckin’ wrong.” After a moment, though, the amusement faded and he shook his head, sighing. “You were right. We’re getting old. Way too old to be dealing with this shit.”
“That hot young thing curled up on your bedroll over there doesn’t seem to think so.”
“Think we’d be trying as hard as we do if it weren’t for him?”
“I don’t know.” She looked up through the canopy at the moon. “We were getting pretty damn jaded. Or maybe we were just tired.”
“Is that what he has to look forward to?” Darius snapped a thin branch off the limb above his head and began peeling the bark from it. “We’re in our second decade of dealing with all this, never havin’ a place to really rest, always knowin’ there’s somewhere we have to move on to, still work ahead of us that we might not get done before we die.” He forced himself to speak the thought that had been haunting him since he’d learned of Rhys’s test results. “He’s not contagious. Not a danger to anyone. I keep thinkin’ maybe he’d be better off—”
“He isn’t asleep yet, and he can hear you just fine,” Rhys called out, drawing grumbles from the Jugs trying to sleep around him. “And he says, ‘Don’t even fucking think it.’”
Xolani dissolved into laughter, pressing a hand to her mouth to try to silence the chortles, and after a moment, Darius gave in too.
“Well, there you have it,” Xolani snickered, clapping him on the shoulder. “Now quit brooding. I swear you’re getting positively mopey in your old age.”