Immunity Index Page 26

  With a gun pointed at her, she thought about how fast the police would come. They knew Neal was injured, if not dead—she hoped not dead. They’d slipped trackers into some of the boxes, and she wore a tracker clipped to her bra strap. But sometimes the police weren’t fast enough even in good times, and now it was all hell.

  The van raced off, heading north back into the city, speeding through the streets. She recognized the model she rode in, a low-end resale from AutoKar, its ID number still visible on the dashboard, its autopilot hacked. She’d serviced that model a lot when she was low-level staff. It wasn’t designed to careen in turns through empty intersections like an old-fashioned chase scene in a classic movie. It could handle only gentle, computer-controlled use. Turns like that could damage an axle. Oh, please, at least snap a tie rod.

  No one besides Berenike had even put on a seat belt. They must have hacked the automatic warning system. Worse, the man sitting next to her was talkative.

  “The Chinese pay you well, don’t they?”

  “I know jack shit about them.”

  “You were made by them.”

  “I was adopted. I know jack shit about that, too.”

  “What were you doing?”

  “I’m an assistant manager at an AutoKar, which was commandeered by the city, and me with it.”

  “I mean, for the Chinese.”

  “Jack shit. I don’t work for them.”

  “The White House says you do.”

  “The Prez said this was a common cold.”

  “That’s what everyone thought.”

  “Even yesterday everyone knew better. My father dropped dead of this at his kitchen table.”

  “My sister and her kids are sick and they’re not getting anything. In the city, sure, some people get everything. She’s out in the suburbs and doesn’t get shit.”

  Berenike understood exactly what she’d just heard and could have spent an hour explaining why it was wrong and racist and why she had mutinied. But why waste what might be her last breath on people who refused to understand?

  “Her insurance company acts like it never heard of her,” he said. “But some people get stuff for free.” It was clear who some people were.

  Again, she had an hour-long answer to that, with charts and graphs in multiple dimensions, leading to the conclusion that the system was victimizing the man’s sister the same way that it victimized everyone else, but it also made sure to keep everyone divided against one another instead of uniting against the victimizers. Some people were mutineers and others weren’t—but they all should be. Instead she said, “Where’re we headed?” She knew those streets perfectly, but it wouldn’t hurt if they thought she was ignorant.

  “We’re going to get the other clone and turn you both in.”

  The fourth one. “So tell me about her. I don’t know her.”

  “Sleeper cells?”

  “Jack shit, I told you. But if she’s my clone, I’m curious.”

  “Her position’s on the White House site, so we’re getting her. That’s all we know.”

  They turned, screeching onto Rawson Avenue, and Berenike heard a clunk. A U-joint? The U-joints tended to fail in this model. Please, break. Protect the fourth sister.

  The driver said, “I think we should have cuffed her.”

  “You got cuffs?”

  “No.”

  “Here.” The woman riding shotgun handed a pair back. The man grabbed her wrist, snapped on one cuff, and clipped the other one to the door handle. She knew how to disassemble that handle.

  The driver’s screen told him where to turn, and he didn’t seem to know for sure where he was. Berenike had studied lots of maps to locate stranded and broken-down vehicles, and she could have directed them precisely to any given address and maybe provided some of the neighborhood’s history. They had come back into the city to a once-modest neighborhood that had fallen onto hard times.

  The van stopped in front of one of the ubiquitous two-bedroom ranch homes with fake brickwork accents on its facade. A few of the bricks had fallen out. The trim needed paint. The lawn had been maintained, though, and there was a showy garden in the front yard with a trellis at the corner.

  “Let’s go.” The driver sounded melodramatic. He looked at Berenike. “You stay here.”

  Not like I have a choice.

  They exited silently, leaving the doors open. They spread out, two at the home’s front door, one at the rear. Did they plan to kick in the doors and bust inside? They were in for a surprise. In neighborhoods like this, most doors were made of steel and hung in steel frames to thwart burglars. One of the men reared back and kicked the door hard. He hopped away, holding his foot, wincing.

  The door opened.

  Standing in it was a girl who looked like a snapshot of Berenike herself, maybe eleven years old, her hair uncombed. What had that girl hoped for by opening the door to strangers?

  The streetlights went out, but not the lights in the houses. The wannabe patriots pumped their fists. The electrical grid must have been partially attacked. Berenike tried not to feel anything. Her side had lost a skirmish, maybe a battle, and much, much more was about to be lost unless she could do something about it.

  They talked to the girl, who seemed upset. She must have hoped for help. An eleven-year-old, no matter how strong, needed help in bad times. Berenike had been in that situation herself. How could she help her now?

  The door handle looked like it was one piece, but she pried off a cap on the underside, revealing a clip. She had no tools, so she slipped a thumbnail under the clip and pulled. The nail tore and flesh yielded—a small price to pay. The clip snapped out, and she swung the handle free at one end. She slipped it off the cuff and reached into the front seat for her backpack.

  The man from the back door came running around to the front, and all three fake patriots were yelling at the girl. She began to cry and ran back into the house. The three followed. There was a lot of shouting inside.

  Berenike pulled out her phone. She pushed an emergency button for the police. Then she opened AutoKar. The company could disable any vehicle automatically. Even when a car was sold, it was never cleared from the database. She tapped in the ID number and killed the car. Then she tried to make a plan.

  The two men were backing out of the door, dragging the girl, followed by the woman, who fell to her knees and vomited.

  “I told you she’s dead,” the girl shouted with the righteous rage of a child who had told the truth and been disregarded. “Everyone’s dying.”

  The men looked around. Maybe, Berenike thought, when they tried to start the van, she could lunge for the girl, dash out, and then … do what? One of the men approached, dragging the girl. The other went to help the vomiting woman.

  “Stop it!” the girl screamed, twisting and fighting. The man jerked her arm, and she stumbled.

  Across the street, reflected off the side windows of a house, were faint red and blue flashing lights. No sirens. The blue and red lights went out. Cops?

  The man dragged the girl roughly. “Come on!” The woman was standing up, wiping her mouth.

  “I won’t go,” the girl said. “I didn’t do anything wrong. You can’t arrest me. I don’t even know who you’re talking about. I’m just a kid.”

  “Get in the car.”

  She tried to pull her arm free and snarled. “No! You can’t make me. Go ahead and shoot me. We’re all going to die anyway.”

  At that instant, an overwhelming love filled Berenike’s heart for that screaming, righteous, raging child. And she prepared to—Wait. Listen. Electronic cars made almost no noise, just the crunch of a dead leaf under a tire, a hiss of a brake that could blend into the rustle of the trees. In the dark, cars could appear out of thin air.

  As if on the count of three, searchlights flashed from the roofs of several police cars.

  “Everyone on the ground!” a loudspeaker blared.

  Berenike dove to the floor. Don’t hurt the girl. Through
the open door, she saw the girl drop to the ground. The woman pitched herself onto the grass.

  But one of the men raised his gun and shot at the police cars—as if the police cars weren’t armored. As if the police didn’t have self-guiding bullets that would seek the source of the gunshot. He jerked back and fell.

  The other man jumped into the van and touched a switch to start it. Nothing.

  On the floor, Berenike covered her head with her hands. The streetlights blinked on. She felt avenged.

  “You in the van,” the loudspeaker ordered. “Surrender. Come out with your hands up. Slowly.”

  Berenike held her breath. The man pounded on the steering wheel.

  “Dale,” the woman shouted, “give up.”

  “You’re a coward!” he answered.

  “They’ll kill you.”

  Berenike took another breath and held it.

  “We’re at war!” Dale said.

  She heard him stamp out of the car, and doors opened on the police cars. Footsteps hurried out.

  “Turn around,” the loudspeaker said, “spread your legs.”

  An unamplified woman’s voice called, “Berenike Woulfe? Are you there?” She pronounced her name in three syllables, ber-NYE-kee.

  “I’m in the van! On the floor!”

  “Don’t move. I’ll come and get you.”

  Soon a hand touched her arm and guided her out. How is the girl? As Berenike stood up, she looked for her. Two officers, dressed head to toe in armor, stood on either side of the child, who seemed stunned. Other officers were holding the woman, and some were inspecting the bleeding man on the ground.

  Berenike walked around the van toward the girl, who saw her and whose eyes got big. Her mouth dropped open.

  “I should talk to her,” Berenike told the officer. She had never wanted to talk to anyone so much in her life.

  “Um … yes, okay.”

  “Oh, and I disabled the van. I work for AutoKar, and I can do that. I can undo it anytime you want.”

  “Thanks.” The officer followed her closely as she approached the girl, whose eyes narrowed with uncertainty.

  Berenike stopped before she got close, afraid that she’d be frightening. She took a deep breath. One step at a time. “I’m your sister. It’s a long story.” The girl wasn’t going to want to hear that she was a clone. The AI counselor hadn’t covered this kind of problem, but she’d have to find a good way to tell her.

  The girl stared. “My mom.…” Her chin trembled.

  “Show me,” Berenike said, knowing what she’d find and hoping it would ease the girl’s troubles to share them. The girl led her and the officer through a shabby but clean living room to the attached garage. A woman lay there on the cement floor. She had died in the throes of a violent seizure. A lot like Papa.

  Berenike put a hand on the girl’s shoulder. “I can take care of you, if you want. You have two more sisters, too.” She’d do anything to keep that girl safe and well cared for.

  The officer seemed to be listening to something. She lifted her visor to show a grim, tired face.

  “Will we be safe here?” Berenike asked.

  “I can’t guarantee that,” the officer said. “We can’t guard you. We just don’t have any officers to spare.”

  “That van has some antivirals in it. They’re valuable.” Berenike thought a moment. She turned to the girl. “Do you want to come with me? I know a safe place. City Hall. I work there.” She called to the officer. “Can I take the van?”

  “Probably. I’ll check. It’s chaos out there. You said antivirals?”

  “I was delivering them for the city.”

  The officer lowered her visor and studied something for a minute. “That checks out. Let me talk to the girl, make sure she agrees.”

  The girl answered quickly. “Yes, it’s okay. I’ll go with her. I don’t have anyone else.”

  “Come and let’s talk privately,” the officer said.

  After what looked like a stern conversation, they returned.

  “Take good care of her.” The officer left, walking like someone who’d been on a too-long hike and hadn’t arrived yet.

  “Well,” Berenike said, “my name is Berenike Woulfe. And you?”

  “Lillian Montrose.”

  “First, I want you to know that you won’t get sick, at least not with this cold.”

  “How? Everybody gets sick.”

  “It’s a long story. A few people are naturally immune. Do you want to pack a few clothes and we’ll go? We can come back later, see to your mother, and…” She shrugged. She had no plan for what to do for more than a few steps ahead. Too many unsettled variables.

  “I’ll go, but only if it’s with you.”

  Berenike’s heart warmed to hear that. Trust wasn’t love, but it would do for now.

  The girl’s room was spare and clean, and she grabbed a bag and stuffed some clothes into it. As she did, Berenike talked, trying to make complex things simple.

  “You should know that we’re clones, like twins, but four of us, and in spite of what everyone says, it’s okay to be a clone. We’re really ordinary people. We weren’t made to be anything special. The one in Wausau is named Irene. The one in Madison is named Avril. We only found out about each other a couple of days ago. And then all this happened.”

  Lillian stared at her with narrowed eyes, lips twitching as if she were talking to herself. She said, “What’s going on?”

  “People are getting sick, some a little sick and some a lot sick. And everybody’s trying to figure it all out, and to change the way the government works. I wish I knew enough to answer your question fully.”

  “But we won’t die.”

  “We were designed not to catch this kind of cold. Some people never catch certain colds. We’re like that. It’s normal. I’m working with the city in the Health Department to help people. Because I can.”

  When they got to City Hall, she’d ask about Neal. Maybe it was just a minor wound that bled a lot.

  The girl stood thinking, her lips still twitching. Berenike waited. It was a lot to take in.

  “I’ll help too, then,” Lillian said.

  “It’s a deal.” Berenike held out her hand, and they shook, an old-fashioned formality reserved for the most solemn occasions.

  The police were still outside when they left. The female officer came with the keys to open Berenike’s handcuff. Berenike reauthorized the van, and she and Lillian got in. She set the controls for City Hall, then took out her phone.

  She’d need to tell Irene and Avril about the White House spy thing. Crazy countermutineers were everywhere, but Berenike had some good news, too.

  “Lillian, want to leave a message? You can say hello to your sisters.”

  CHAPTER

  10

  Irene woke up with a cramp in her shoulder from sleeping in an odd position because of the handcuffs. She instantly remembered where she was, not merely in jail but in the midst of a disaster.

  What time was it? She peered out the narrow window in the door. The open area had a half dozen round steel tables and benches, but no people. Obviously, everyone would be in lockdown. She had to pee and squirmed down her pants. She drank some water by contorting so she could put her mouth under the faucet. She was hungry but doubted breakfast would arrive anytime soon.

  She had little else to do besides worry, which she was getting good at. She tried to think about something else, anything else. Groundwater, for example. Where would be a good site for mass graves? Because there were going to be some, for people or for livestock, and they could contaminate the drinking water. The Wausau Ginseng Festival would be canceled, obviously. Sports events, too, maybe her favorite video shows—maybe forever, but not Finding the Line, she hoped.

  Within minutes, her attempt at not worrying collapsed in the flood of reality and the absence of a phone to distract her or inform her. Was Nimkii still alive? A target for frightened farmers? Were a long list of people safe, including
Avril and the second and maybe third sister?

  She tried to sleep again. Nope. She paced for a while. She sat on the cot, listened very carefully, and she might have heard voices in other cells or from upstairs.

  Her family, her friends, the whole world—the worry for them ached like blistering burns. Worry was circular and had no end, only repetition.

  The lock clicked. Outside stood a pair of deputies, both wearing face masks and gloves.

  “Irene Ruiz?” one asked, as if she could be someone else. “You’re free to go.”

  She jumped to her feet. “I am?”

  The deputy, a woman with brown hair pulled into a ponytail, shrugged. “The local federal prosecutors say so. I don’t know what’s going on. We’ll get you your stuff and send you home. Come on.”

  Irene took a few steps toward the door, toward freedom and the ongoing disaster they all had to cope with.

  “Wait, are you cuffed?” the woman said.

  “Yeah, the people who brought me here did that.”

  “Oh, the dead guys.”

  “Only one’s dead,” the other deputy said, a middle-aged man. “We still have the other one. She’s not going anywhere.” He turned to Irene. “Do you know which one of them had the key?”

  “The dead guy. His name was Ethan.”

  He looked at the woman for confirmation. She nodded. “Then the key is in the morgue. I’m not going there.”

  “Me neither.”

  Irene felt fresh despair.

  “Bolt cutter?” the man suggested.

  “Gonna have to be that,” the woman said. “I think I know where there’s one. Come on.”

  Upstairs, they entered a long room lined with empty desks that looked like they’d normally be busy, and they had her sit and wait while the woman walked away. A clock said 8:34 A.M.

  “How are things?” Irene asked the man, who’d sat down at a desk.

  He stared at a display on the desk for a while. It was flashing with what might have been a lot of updates. “Every kind of chaos you can think of. No one knows even who’s in charge.” He went back to staring at the screen.