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“No. You’re the first.” Marlowe squeezed the top of Jericho’s shoulder. “You should be proud.”
But all Jericho wanted to do was to yell stop. I don’t want this; please don’t do this.
The nurse frowned as she took his pulse. “My goodness, his heart’s beating very fast.”
“We should get started. Not make him wait any longer,” Marlowe said.
Stop talking over me. I’m right here, Jericho thought.
Marlowe plunged the syringe into Jericho’s vein. The new serum wasn’t cold like the other stuff. It was warm. Uncomfortably so. It whirred through his veins like an invasion of bees skittering toward his heart. Everything around Jericho seemed a threat, as if the world were closing in, ready to take and take from him, reducing him to his most primitive emotions. Panic fluttered against his chest, beating to be let out. He moaned, muscles spasming. His fingers balled into fists, then spread out again, as if reaching for help.
“Easy, Jericho!” Marlowe’s voice.
And then, all at once, the scratching inside his veins gave way. The fear was gone. In its place was a feeling of sheer, unstoppable power. Take from him? From him? The Übermensch? A mocking laugh burbled up from deep inside Jericho. Well, he’d protect what was his—he’d hit first and hit hard! He wanted to win. No, he wanted to conquer. It was exciting and primal, this feeling. Jericho was reduced to his senses, and his senses were acute. He cou
ld hear a gull sipping water from the lake half a mile away. Could smell the antiseptic harsh and prickly in his nose. Could see every paintbrush stroke on the laboratory walls. He was the sweep of history and the arrow arcing toward an unseen future. His blood raced as if he were running through heavy trees, a kingly beast prowling its fiefdom, ready to pounce at anyone who dared challenge his authority.
Jericho inhaled deeply. His lungs seemed infinite. Evie. He’d caught the scent of her.
The restraints ripped in half as he broke through them. He could sense the nurse’s terror, vaguely heard Marlowe’s shouts as he pushed off from the table. But Evie was his only, all-encompassing thought. Carts crashed as Jericho pushed them out of the way. Glass tubes shattered on the floor. A doctor stood between Jericho and the elevator. Jericho thought about snapping his neck like a twig.
“Leave him alone!” Marlowe cautioned the others. “Let him go.”
Jericho spied the elevator key. Take, he thought. He shoved the key into the elevator and rode it up to Marlowe’s decorative library. The colors in the room were vividly bright to him. He was shirtless, but the cool air didn’t bother him. His body had never been more awake. The elevator was ascending. Arguing, panicked voices inside. Time to go. He was hunting. Hunting for Evie. He drew in another lungful of air.
She was in the rose garden.
Jericho threw open the door, the iron hinges bending slightly as he did, and then he bounded across Marlowe’s manicured lawn. Evie drew him, narrowed the world until she was the world. He saw her at the bottom of the long green slope, sitting in the gazebo, reading a book, surrounded by an explosion of flowering dogwood. She looked up. Smiled. He leaped a tall hedge with no trouble and strode toward her as if commanding an army. Her smile disappeared.
“Jericho?” she said.
He could hear her heartbeat quickening in alarm. But his blood was powerful. It spoke to him: I am the Übermensch, a god among men. The world belongs to me.
He wanted her.
“The time is now,” he said, and threw her over his shoulder, heading quickly to the woods on legs made even stronger by the serum coursing through him. Frightened and confused, she struggled against him. He held her tighter. They’d reached the clearing. He lay her down on the soft bed of pine needles, pinning her hands to the ground with his.
“Jericho! What are you doing?” Her voice was high-pitched. Terrified.
Some part of Jericho fought up from the depths. No, it said. What are you doing? Wrong. Not like this.
“Jericho! Please!”
He wanted her. Hadn’t she come to him last night? Hadn’t she kissed him and let him put his hands on her body? She wanted him. That was the only answer. He wanted her and he would have her. Like a hero. Like a conqueror. Conquerors did not ask. They took. He crushed his lips against hers. When she turned her face away, he forced it back and kissed her harder. She tried to shove him off. His hands pushed hers back against the grass, holding them down. He was on top of her. The victor. To the victor go the spoils. No. No. Not like this.
She fought. It infuriated and excited him. Her knee tried to come up and jab him in a sensitive spot. But he was bigger. Stronger. He ripped at her dress and she screamed. She slipped a hand free and slapped him hard. He liked it.
The report of a gun echoed in the forest. Jericho jolted as the tranquilizer dart pierced the back of his right thigh. He whirled around, angry. Ames held the gun. Jericho leaped up and lunged for it. Ames fired. Another dart caught Jericho in the side. Already, he could feel the drug entering his system, tripping along the veins and wires alike. Fight or flight. Hail, hail, the conquering hero. He staggered toward Marlowe. The third shot buckled Jericho’s knees, but he kept going. He had only one thought: Win. Win at all costs.
“Dammit, man, fire!” Marlowe instructed. Another dart and Jericho was now crawling, scraping up fistfuls of dirt in an effort to advance. “The world… belongs… to…” And then he was motionless, the scent of Evie’s perfume still inside him like a dream he needed to own.
Just before he lost consciousness, the serum began its retreat from his system, leaving him cold and confused, like an animal that had chased its prey and now stared up from the depths of a pit trap into which it’d fallen. He saw Evie’s horrified, tearstained face as Henry threw his coat over her and led her away.
“I’m sorry. So sorry,” he whispered, and blacked out.
In a gilded bathroom styled like an Egyptian palace, Sam sat on the marble floor beside Evie and held a cold washrag to her bruised lips. “When that son of a bitch wakes up, I’m gonna punch his lights out.”
“No, you’re not. That won’t solve anything.”
