Page 31 of The Black Rider
We were all naked in the shower, and he wanted to eat? Silly angel. Suddenly, it was like the bottom of my stomach dropped out, and I remembered all I had eaten was questionable jerky. My stomach let out this tremendous growl. Leif turned the water off in an instance.
“More on this later. Speedy needs to eat.”
Having to choose between two hot naked angels and eating was super unfair, but nothing about this was fair. Leif said to be continued, but we were on limited time. I’d never met Dice. I had no idea what he could and couldn’t do with a radio show. We had our own work to do here. I still needed to go through that flash drive to see if Doctor X found a way to infect the rest of the world, and Leif promised a vaccine to a good portion of the border wall.
We had shit to do, but for now, I needed to stuff my face because everyone was right. I’d withered down to practically nothing, and I needed to put more weight on if I would be smashing skulls with Smurfette.
Chapter 24
I
didn’t realize how truly exhausted I was until I woke up the next morning. I had a feeling I passed out in my pork, and Aeron and Leif had to carry me to bed. I didn’t wake up with food on me. I hope they didn’t have to wipe food off my face. I didn’t move until the sun was up the next morning.
We were back in our usual positions. I slept too late, and Aeron and Leif were going through flash drives. Breakfast was waiting like it always was, so I sat down and started eating.
“Anything good?”
“It was a brilliant idea to label these flash drives. I’ve been focusing on the research files. It’s pretty horrific. Just as bad as the original Rage Head mutation where they were kidnapping kids off the street and injecting them until they got the results they wanted. The soldiers guarding the place were finding survivors and promising them food if they took part in a vaccine trial. They kept doing it even as people were dying. They’d just toss them in the incinerator and find more,” Leif said.
“So, he did find a way to make things worse.”
I felt my stomach drop, and I lost my appetite. We still didn’t have a vaccine or a way to fix this. If I hadn’t lost my shit in Los Angeles, maybe we would have made it to San Quintin sooner. Perhaps it wouldn’t have made a difference, but I could have gotten us more time.
“I don’t think he did. Remember, Ariel. He had limited supplies of Patient Q’s blood. He couldn’t do anything with it until he figured out how to tweak your blood to get rid of the immunity. He was doing all kinds of things to your blood and injecting it into people. That’s what killed them. Your blood, by itself, is harmless. Mixed with dangerous chemicals or demon blood is what hurts people.”
“But you don’t know for sure.”
“I’m still going through the research, but if he had managed it, it would have been done by now. As I said, the first trials took several decades to get the Rage Mutation.”
“Then, don’t we need several decades to wipe them all out?”
Aeron just leaned back on the sofa and smirked.
“Doctor X needed several decades. Leif is not a fucked up mad scientist human. He probably has several theories, now that he’s looked at your blood.”
“I actually do, Speedy. When you’re done eating, I plan on testing a few. Did you want to go through the flash drive again, or did you want to go kill things with Aeron?”
“Ineedto go through that flash drive. Sorry, Aeron. We can kill things together later.”
“I totally get it, Speedy. If I were any good in that lab, I’d be in there with you. My specialty is death, not science.”
“I know. And we need to thin the Rage Head population as much as we can. I’m done eating. Let’s get to the lab.”
Leif and I walked side by side to the lab. I don’t know why. I suppose it’s because even if I couldn’t remember everything, I was just comfortable around him. I could feel that I knew him at one point, and I trusted him. The memories I could remember were all excellent. I slipped my hand into his and held it on the way to the lab.
Leif looked surprised, but he said nothing. He gave my hand a comforting squeeze as we walked in silence. That was one thing I liked about Leif. He talked a lot. He gave me a lot of information about myself that Aeron was too scared to. He joked all the time, but he also knew when to shut the fuck up and just have a moment of silence.
Going into his lab always set me on edge. It wasn’t just my history of getting experimented on, and at any time, he could want another blood sample. The answers to ending all this would happen in this lab, and we didn’t have decades for him to figure it out. The answers to what they did to me while I was in that coma were on the flash drive I was going through. I couldn’t take back the years that were stolen from me, but I could find out everything I could so I could fight back.
As soon as we set foot in the lab, Leif pulled me into a hug and squeezed me so tightly I could hardly breathe.
“I know this is hard on you. I’m sorry we didn’t find you sooner.”
“You were dealing with war, Leif. You did find me in the end.”
He sighed and rested his forehead on mine.
“We never wanted you to end up in one of his labs again. If it were up to me, I’d spare you from being in my lab. If you want to take the laptop back to my apartments, you might be more comfortable.”
