Chris Morphew [The Phoenix Fi Fallout (epub)

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.But whatever else the fallout was doing to Peter, I guess he still had enough reason in him to feel threatened by the presence of a gun in the room.He roared, backing away, hands shaking like he didn’t know what to do with them.But he didn’t attack again.Reeve and Tank steered him through the door.I bent down to help Luke to his feet.‘Sorry,’ said Cathryn, back in the doorway.A tear streaked down the red mark on her face where Peter had hit her.‘I didn’t – He was so calm before.I thought if I just let him out for a little bit –’‘Get out,’ I snapped.She sniffed and disappeared, leaving Luke and me alone on the floor.Chapter 19THURSDAY, AUGUST 67 DAYS‘It’s about us, isn’t it?’ said Luke dully, hobbling sideways to get through a particularly narrow section of the passageway out to Bill’s excavation site.‘That’s why Peter’s going to do it.He comes after me because he wants me away from you.’I felt my fist tighten on the torch in my hand.‘That’s such –’ I growled in frustration.‘How does that even make sense? Even to Peter?’‘I think we left sense behind a long time ago,’ Luke said.‘I mean, even before all this fallout stuff started, he was pretty obsessed with keeping you to himself.’‘When have I ever given him any reason to think that I was –?’‘You haven’t.You didn’t need to.’ He kept his voice steady enough but I could hear how shaken up he was.We were down to our last week.Down to his last week.And, whether Luke’s dad had made it out or not, losing him again hadn’t exactly improved Luke’s outlook on life.I took a breath.‘There has to be more to it.Surely.You did not come all the way out here and go through all this crap just to get killed over some stupid thing about a girl!’‘Trust me, I’m totally open to suggestions on how to stop that from happening.’ He sighed.‘Hopefully Cathryn’s learnt her lesson about letting him out of his room, at least.’Tank had spent all last night apologising for letting Cathryn out of his sight.But the funny thing was that the apologies weren’t directed at Luke or me.They were directed at Reeve.As if Tank’s biggest regret in all of this was letting him down.The two of them had gone back to the surface this morning.Reeve wanted to see if he could use our newfound weapons supply to leverage some more support from security before we started planning our attack on the Shackleton Building.Not that there could be an attack on the Shackleton Building as long as that surveillance network was still online.Whatever we might have achieved by going to the armoury last night, it was worthless without a way to bring down the cameras.I lowered my torch as we got closer to the end of the passageway, listening for any sign of movement.According to our previous experience with the sedatives, Bill should still be unconscious on the ground, but there was every chance the usual rules didn’t apply.Everything was silent.I moved forward again, feeling for the auto-injector pen in my pocket loaded up with Kara’s last sedative cartridge.Just in case.I would’ve breathed slightly easier if it was Amy wielding the pen instead of me.But given she’d already taken a bullet for us in the last twenty-four hours, it seemed like a stretch to ask her back down here.Like Kara had said back at the armoury, Amy’s injuries were nothing too serious.Reeve had put his Co-operative security first-aid training to work, stitching and bandaging her up, and we were hoping the fallout would take care of the rest.Already, she was limping around on her own.Still, she’d gone straight back to bed after breakfast this morning and hadn’t gotten up again since.Soren, meanwhile, had made it back to the Complex about half an hour after us, still a bawling mess and covered in mud from head to toe.Apparently, he’d taken a wrong turn and run off into a ditch.Not surprising, given the mental state he was in.Mike had gone crazy with relief when Soren reappeared at the entrance, like he couldn’t imagine anything worse than not having a violent psycho to run his life.He’d been delivering food and drink to Soren’s room all day, and had got into another fight with Ms Hunter after she’d refused to give him Kara’s share of the rations as well.I stopped again at the end of the passageway and shone my torch cautiously around the corner.Bill was right where I’d left him, tied up on the floor with his arms and legs behind his back.‘Okay,’ said Luke, limping behind me, ‘what now?’‘I want to find out what he’s doing down here.’‘Didn’t you look already, when you knocked him out?’‘Yeah.I want to talk to him,’ I said.‘While he’s still tied up.It’s been twenty-four hours.The sedative should be wearing off by now.’I felt Luke’s hand tense on my shoulder.‘You really think him being tied up is going to make any difference?’‘Guess we’ll see,’ I said, walking out and crouching in front of Bill’s face.‘He broke out of a prison cell,’ said Luke, exasperated.‘You don’t remember that?’‘This is different.He needs us.’‘Didn’t stop him throwing a computer at your head.’I shone the torch into Bill’s face.He grunted, shrinking away from the light.‘Hey,’ I said gently.‘You awake, Bill?’Bill’s eyes snapped open.He rocked from side to side, trying to push himself off the ground, and I saw the anger flare up behind his eyes as he realised he was bound.‘THERE IS NO TIME!’ he shouted.‘NO TIME FOR THIS! I must – I must be released!’‘I’ll untie you,’ I said, getting up.‘I’ll let you go, but I want you to tell me –’‘No, no, no, NO!’ An invisible force pounded my stomach and I staggered backwards into Luke.‘I don’t need you! Not yet.You are an obstruction.’‘We should go,’ said Luke.‘What are you trying to do?’ I straightened, not ready to back off without an answer.‘What are you looking for down here?’‘Nngh!’ Bill groaned, his face screwed up in concentration.He rolled over onto his side, and I saw the ties begin to loosen all by themselves.‘I need to – Nngh! Timing is critical for the undertaking to be… to be…’‘What undertaking?’ I asked.‘Bill, please, does this have something to do with the Co-operative?’‘I don’t care about it!’ Bill spat.‘Not until – not until – no.All things in sequence.Your concern is premature.’‘Not until what? What are you looking for?’ The invisible hands shoved me again, harder this time.Luke’s injured ankle rolled under him and he collapsed.Bill dropped onto his stomach, face contorting again.All at once, the ropes came undone, slithering apart like they were alive.Bill stumbled to his feet, woozy from the sedatives [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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