Page 378 of Immune

“Sounds about right.”

I pick it up and turn it in my hands. Faded fabric. Bent brim. The shape of an old instruction.

Hair hidden. Scent dead. Doors locked.

I put it on my head but not to hide. I place it there, over my loose bed hair, just because it is mine and I can. Maine sees that too and his face does something I don’t like.

“Don’t,” I warn.

He swallows. “I’m not doing anything.”

“Your face was doing a lot, actually.”

“My face has poor discipline. You know that,” he groans.

“Clearly runs in the family.”

That gets a real laugh from him.

Small.

Shaky.

Real.

By the time toast is gone and I’ve decided jam is proof humanity deserves at least one more chance, another knock hits the door. Sharper. More annoyed. Some might call it, oh I don’t know, medical, somehow.

I look at Ewan. “That knock has spooky bitch written all over it.”

He nods solemnly. “Ellis.”

Fletcher opens the door after I say, “Enter, Wall Ghoul.”

Ellis stands there with a medical bag in one hand and judgment wired through every line of her body. Mercer waits behind her with a clipboard held to his chest like a shield. Valeria stands at his side, carrying the sealed NOVAC case. Damn. Guess we’re having a whole-ass meeting then.

The whole room quiets the moment everyone catches sight of the case. I mean, there are ghosts in that case. Not see-through ones. Worse ones. Paper ones. Data ones.

Names turned into files.

Mercer looks past Fletcher to me. “May we come in?”

That stops me for half a breath, just because he asks. Because yesterday, men called me cargo and wanted to use mybody as an incubation to save humanity. Because today, a doctor with bloodshot eyes and a guilty conscience waits at a door.

I glance at my pack. Then at Maine. Then back to Mercer.

I nod and say, “Come in.”

Ellis enters first, because apparently permission still has a hierarchy when one person is carrying a medical bag and a bad attitude.

She scans me, the bed, the blankets, the four Alphas, Maine, then me again.

Her mouth flattens. “I am choosing not to ask.”

“That actually works for me. Look at that personal growth,” I mutter.

“I’m calling it self-defense.”

Mercer sets the clipboard down and Valeria places the NOVAC case on the table. I stare at it while my skin tries to vacate my bones. Kaito notices but he doesn’t touch me. He only shifts until his knee rests near mine. There if I want and not if I don’t.