“Wow, pretty rough, Georgia.”
I look down the hall to my left, irritation making my eye twitch. I can’t seem to catch a break.
“Can we talk?” Gage jerks his chin at my shadow. “Take a break, soldier. Fifteen minutes.”
“Yes, sir.”
“No.” I keep walking.
“Hey, come on.” Gage matches my stride easily. “I just want to talk. Please.”
“Oh, you want to talk to ‘Valen’s human whore’ now? Or is this the time when you drag me to the cells? Or, wait, maybe it’s execution time? Are we going with firing squad or gallows? Tell me now so I can dress for the occasion.”
“Georgia, stop.” Gage’s exasperated tone rankles. “You know I’d never let that happen.”
“I don’t know shit about you.” I turn down another hallway. A dead end. Dammit.
He stands a few paces behind me, and when I turn, he has the gall to give me a penitent look. “Listen, I’m sorry about what happened earlier. Inevercalled you Valen’s whore. The general was exaggerating about a lot of things, including the execution part.”
“Really?” I cross my arms over my stomach. “He didn’t strike me as the sort of man who overstates things.”
“What you said was true.” He steps closer, his voice quieter now, and I notice the bruises on his throat from Valen’s hold. “He’s out of his depth. He spent his life training to fight human militaries, not mythical creatures powerful enough to bring down an entire country, the whole world, really.”
“Tough shit, Gage. We’re all in uncharted waters. That doesn’t make genocide okay. Or experimentation on prisoners, for that matter.” I watch him for any reaction, but he gives nothing away. “What do you want, Gage?”
“I want you to be okay.”
I sigh. “No, that’s not it.”
“It is. Look, I regret every moment I failed to get you out of that prison. I’ll regret it for the rest of my life. I don’t want to make the same mistakes now that you’re here.”
“Then get rid of my guard, get the general off my ass, and let me do my work. We could be on the cusp of creating a vaccine.”
He puts his hands in his pockets. “I can’t do that. The guard stays, and the general is my superior.”
“Then you’re no good to me.” I take a wide path around him. “We’re done here.”
“I can still help you if you’ll let me.”
“I don’t need your sort of help, and you need to stay the hell away from me.” I head back the way I came.
“Because ofhim?” he asks, bitterness slicing through his tone. “He’s poisoned you against me, against your own kind.”
“Believe what you want.” I keep walking, leaving him behind. “I have work to do.”
15
It’s midnight before I trudge back to my room sans Evie. She left earlier to meet up with Astrid, so I walk alone, except for the new soldier assigned to follow me. I don’t even bother telling him off. It’s not like it does any good.
We managed to do a few test runs of viruses in my blood. Each time, the vampiric white blood cells immediately set out to destroy the invading entity before it even had a chance to replicate.
The problem is that once the virus was destroyed, the vampiric cells went after the other healthy white blood cells and replicated themselves until every white blood cell had the vampire symbiote attached. We have no idea what that truly means, what it would mean for the majority of the human population to have that living in their blood. What we need is an antigen, something to create the virus-killing response without the permanent addition of the symbiote.
I worked until my eyes were going bleary. Wyatt was already asleep at his desk. I shook him awake and sent him to bed.
Yawning, I get ready for bed then climb into my bottom bunk. Closing my eyes, I unravel my thoughts from antigens and proteins and think about Valen. “Where are you?” I ask silently.
I don’t hear an answer, but I do sense a heightened awareness, as if he’s looking right at me. And then I get a tinge of irritation, as if he’s pissed at someone else.
