Page 36
“Precisely, which is why I question where you’re going with this.”
“Because he spoke of those underdeveloped fetuses two months ago, after he lost his mind. They were attached to a woman who pleaded for the cure.”
The slightest flicker of intrigue dances across her face before it quickly disappears. “You just said he suffered hallucinations. How do you know he wasn’t manipulated into believing that.”
“I don’t. In fact, he doesn’t know if anything he saw was real. But what other choice do you have?”
“I find it convenient that you show up talking about women dying in childbirth. Babies kept in water.” Six steps from behind me, and I have to give the girl some credit for holding his stare. Particularly without the company of her Alpha companion, who, I’m guessing, is pacing somewhere outside this cave. “And now you’re talking about going back inside Calico to look for some fucking cure that a halfwit told you about two months ago.”
“I saw them, too, Six. The night I came for you. Albert led me past a unit in the hospital where women were suffering. Dying. Their babies kept in tanks. She isn’t lying about that.”
“You don’t have to believe me.” Chin tipped in defiance, she stares back at the two of us. “One way, or another, I’m getting inside that hospital. I don’t need your help.”
“You chase after a man you don’t even know is still alive,” Six says, prodding her frustration.
“And you’ll find yourself chasing after a cure you’re not even certain will work, the longer you wait. Neither of us has much time to dwell on the outcome.”
Something isn’t adding up for me, though, a piece of this is missing. “If the cure exists inside the hospital, why didn’t Ericsson retrieve it himself? Why did he dedicate so much of his life to the torment of so many subjects?”
“Enjoyment, for one. But also because it resides well below the surface, as I understand. Inside the early labs. Where the mutations are more violent than the ones that run free now.”
The gravity of risk presses down on my shoulders, and as if my nightmares are coming to life, I glance back at Six, remembering him fighting off the mutations in our bid for freedom.
“No. I won’t let him do this.”
“If it means saving you and the child, it’s already been decided, Wren. There’s nowhere I wouldn’t go to ensure you stay alive. Even there.”
“You’re chasing theories, Six! Nothing but hunches that could turn out to be vials of cyanide.”
“It’s a risk I’m willing to take. For you.” He rests his hand against my belly. “And the baby inside of you. My baby.”
“We don’t even know how to get inside. It’s sealed.” My arguments, as strong as they may be, are growing weaker to the resolve I can see spinning in his head.
“Kenny knows the computers inside and out,” she says. “He can find a way to get us inside.”
Of course she has answers for every argument. Why wouldn’t she, when she stands to gain so much from this endeavor?
“He can’t. He told me there’s no possibility of such a thing.”
“If I believed every time I was told the impossibilities, I wouldn’t be standing here now. Fate led me to you, Wren. We both stand to lose something impossible to fathom.”
I’d give anything to be alone right now, where I can work through the mishmash of thoughts inside my head, without the worry of having to school my expression. As much as I appreciate what she’s offering, I refuse to stand by and watch Six torn apart by ruthless beasts who’ve undoubtedly grown hungrier and more violent in the last two months. I’d sooner suffer the same fate as Mara to keep that from happening. Thankfully, regardless of her faith in fate and impossibilities, Kenny already assured me there was no getting inside, or out.
“We’ll start with Kenny,” I offer. “If he thinks there’s a remote chance of opening those doors, we’ll talk. If not, we put this mad idea behind us and deal with this pregnancy, regardless of the outcome.”
The girl nods, without saying another word, to her benefit, because there isn’t anything she can tell me right now to convince me this idea is worth it.
“I’ll get Kenny, and we’ll figure out where we go from there.” Six steps past me, and I reach out, grabbing his arm. “Promise me. That if he has even the slightest hesitation about this, you’ll abandon this idea.”
His scarred eye twitches as if I’ve slapped him in the face with insult. “I promise.” Skirting around the girl, he exits the cave, leaving the two of us.
“He would do anything for you,” she says.
“No matter how stupid the idea. Yes.”
“Valdys would, too.” The corner of her lips lifts with a slight smile. “He called my idea for escape foolish. But he did it, anyway.”
“And he’s the one locked inside the hospital?” As soon as the words tumble thoughtlessly from my mouth, I flinch and shake my head. “I’m sorry. Forget I said that.”
