Page 67 of The Quiet
“We pay the price for our limits, regardless of if we know them or not. Most times, other people know more than we do. Trust me when I say that the fighting is good—maybe not for everyone, but for you it is.”
“That’s not fair,” Baker whispered and then she copied him just as he said the words, “Life’s not fair.”
“You’re learning,” Peter said, humor in his voice.
“I don’t like what you’re teaching me,” she replied.
“These weren’t lessons I enjoyed learning either,” he said in genuine relation to her. He spoke to her as if she were an adult. No one else ever had. His mixture of severity and kindness confused her.
It was much like the scene in the woods, burned in her mind from so long ago. It was the scene with the ROSE hunched over the dead Strike in the middle of a beautiful forest. The beauty and horror of the scene didn’t fit together. It didn’t make any sense.
Someone knocked on the door.
“In,” Peter said simply, and a familiar face entered. It was Perilous, dressed in black with vibrant, gold hair braided over her shoulder. She inspected Peter and Baker with ever-curious eyes as if she were watching a show. Playfully, she skipped once toward a nearby couch and lounged over the armrest into it, her athletic body stretching out like a cat.
“Congratulations,” Perilous said. “I heard the news.”
“Are there any new ones that have potential?” Peter asked and Perilous propped her head up on her hand with a raised brow.
“You can’t celebrate, can you? Shame.” She stood up and traversed the room, opening a cabinet before removing a green vial and shaking it at Peter. “Want some anger?” she asked.
He chuckled as if it were an inside joke.
“Something less...humorous. Is there any amazement?” Peter replied. “Mix it with shock, obsession, a powerful memory with a drop of heartbreak,” he said, and she nodded.
She sorted through the vials. “Memories. Traumatic or ecstatic?” she asked, sorting through the memories. “We’re almost out of obsession. I did just get a fresh batch of amazement though.”
“Ecstatic,” he said and then quieter, to Baker, “Obsession, trauma and heartbreak make for a painfully redundant drink.” With a mischievous smirk, he then added above a breath, “She has poor taste, doesn’t she, Baker?”
Baker couldn’t help but smile, because when Peter was in light spirits, she saw what she perceived to be his power. His charisma was painfully infectious, and though he was always kind to her, in these times she felt strangely cherished.
“You wound me,” Perilous said, flattening her hand over chest dramatically as she delivered the drink into his hand.
They started talking again about the creation of Strike. It was Baker’s least favorite topic.
Peter had at first described it as a delicate process that wasn’t always successful.
That hadn’t been alarming, but then, flatly, he’d divulged a gruesome sequence of events. Thankfully, she had understood little of it, but phrases like ‘organ chaining’, ‘rubbering of the spine’ and ‘artery peeling’ had been enough to stop her from asking questions for a few weeks.
The reason why the Strike in the Bleeding Grin were so dependent on Peter was not only because he was so powerful, but it was because he’d created them. Only Amiel was Peter’s equal in this, discovered by Peter in the deep caves of a mountain centuries ago in the North.
Amiel had destroyed entire armies of men when the first Strike had taken the North. Each powerful Strike had assembled colonies and established themselves as warlords as they battled over resources. Baker heard only bits and pieces of these secret histories, but it sounded much worse than what had happened here. Baker sometimes wondered if Peter was so invested in his people because his creator had died in those early wars.
“Easy,” Peter whispered and she realized she was furiously scrubbing his fingers. She corrected herself and took a deep breath, still refusing to look at him. Apparently, it was a sacred privilege to touch a Strike’s hands. Perilous had taught her this, and Baker could hear the reminder now as Perilous smirked in amusement from the couch
Peter had shown her nothing but kindness and patience, and yet he’d twisted a human being into something else. That was his goal, always, more Strike, and to him it was noble. In his mind, he was solving the problems of the human race.
Baker was surprised Peter hadn’t tried to turn her into one. Her hands slowed as she finished her work, the thought lingering. She’d never asked the question before.
Was he one day planning to make her a Strike?
He always talked about how he wished every human had such potential, and he would do everything he could to help them reach their potential.
She made the mistake of looking up as she dried his hands, only catching his eyes for a moment but knowing he’d seen her thought, a question that must have sounded to him like a blaring horn in his head.
He didn’t say anything, waiting like he often did when he saw such an emotional thought. His silence prompted Baker to look up again, only to find a smirk on his face, as if amused by her question. His eyes didn’t give her any answers.
Baker pulled the drying cloth over his hands as she withdrew it to her chest. Peter didn’t move.
