Symbiont (Parasitology Book 2) (21 page)

I didn’t like that idea. I sank deeper, away from anything that could possibly resemble the physical world. The drums were beating too slowly, out of synch with themselves. That might have explained some of my fear and lassitude. I focused on them, encouraging them to beat faster, to return to normal. It
would be good for me, I was sure of that much, even if I wasn’t sure exactly why.

Bit by bit, the drums responded, and the hot warm dark returned to the equilibrium it was supposed to have. I curled into it, content, and forgot that I had ever wanted to leave. This was home. This was where I belonged.

Sherman shook my shoulder gently, snapping me out of my reverie. “Much as I hate to disrupt what’s proven to be a fascinating exercise in biometric control, I need you to wake up now,” he said. “We have reached our destination.”

“That means move, or we’ll move you,” added Ronnie.

I opened my eyes.

We were still in the van: that was good. It was rare for me to sink so deep that I could be moved without noticing it, but after the night—or nights, I didn’t know anymore—that I’d had, I couldn’t count on that. The drums were quiet, although if I focused, I could hear the distant beating of my heart, which seemed to have resumed its normal speed and rhythm. I felt better, although it was hard to say whether that was a function of my heartbeat, or just the fact that the van wasn’t moving anymore.

Kristoph was gone, leaving the entire front of the van empty, since Sherman was crouched in front of me with a thoughtful expression on his face, like he was assessing my value every time he looked at me. Ronnie was still in her seat, arms crossed over her budding breasts, eyes narrowed.

“What the fuck did she just do?” she demanded. Her attention flicked to me. “What the fuck did you just do?”

“I… what?” I moved to unfasten my belt with shaking hands. I hadn’t been told to, but I wanted to get out of this van as soon as possible. I didn’t mind small spaces, normally. This one was different. It felt oppressive and dangerous, like it could start moving again at any moment. “I didn’t do anything. I went down into the dark to avoid the drive. Where are we?”

“What Sal fails to understand is that for most of us, ah, ‘going down into the dark’ is a difficult feat.” Sherman waited until my belt was off before opening the door and offering me his hand. Through the opening, I could see what looked like an ordinary parking garage, all gray concrete and emptiness. “Come along, pet. You make yourself more precious by the hour, and I cannot wait to start learning all the tricks you have to teach me.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” I took his hand. It seemed like the safest thing to do. “I don’t know any tricks. I don’t even know how I go down into the dark. I just do, when I need to.”

“I’m telling you, rehome her.” Ronnie stepped out of the van after me, pausing long enough to slam the door. I blinked at her. She sneered. “We know she adapts quickly. Train a new one who doesn’t have all these stupid hang-ups.”

“Ah, yes, because what one should absolutely do on the eve of war is take one of the best available weapons, break it down for scrap, and wait six months to have a new model on line.” Sherman shook his head. “Honestly, Ronnie, if you were in charge of this battle, the humans would defeat us handily.”

“Maybe, but a lot of them would die first,” she said.

Sherman sighed. “Come along, Sal. It’s time to introduce you to the people who will be your new family.”

“I don’t want a new family,” I whispered.

His smile was benevolent and terrible. “It’s adorable how you keep thinking that what you want has any merit.”

I didn’t say anything. I just glared at him. He might have me at his mercy right now, but he wasn’t going to make me believe that I was going to be helpless forever.

We crossed the parking garage to a large steel door, which Sherman accessed with a swipe of a plastic card and a scan of his left index finger. He didn’t bother to conceal either of these security measures from me, which made me sure that they
couldn’t be broken, or at least couldn’t be broken easily. He would have made at least a little effort if he was worried about my getting away.

The door beeped, the locks disengaging with an audible click. Sherman smirked and pulled it open, letting go of my arm. “After you,” he said.

I was unarmed, effectively barefoot, and in an unidentified parking garage with no idea where I was. I went through the door…

… and emerged into a defunct shopping mall, obviously long since gutted and abandoned by its original owners, only to be rebuilt by the people who came to claim it as their own. There was a fountain directly in front of me, the water trickling merrily out of a sculpted concrete flower to cascade into the basin below. A few people were sitting on the fountain’s rim. One was eating a sandwich.

Stores extended in all directions, most still bearing the signs identifying what they had been before this place closed down. The shoe stores and shops selling scented candles were gone now, replaced by little swarms of people clustering around lab equipment. Unlike Dr. Cale’s makeshift bowling alley lab, which held to strict protocols, even if most of the technicians wore jeans under their lab coats, the people here could have just wandered in off the street and picked up a scalpel. I didn’t see a single lab coat or pair of scrubs, although some of the people were wearing gray bodysuits like the ones Sherman and Ronnie had on. As I stood there, trying to process the scene, a man walked by towing a pallet of caged chickens that clucked and fluffed their feathers at me. I blinked.

“Welcome, darling, to the revolution.” Sherman slipped his arm around my shoulders, holding me closer than I was comfortable with. “I’m sure you recognize this place.”

“No,” I said blankly. “I mean, should I? I don’t think I’ve ever been here before.”

Sherman glanced meaningfully over my head. I turned to see Ronnie standing on my other side. She rolled her eyes.

“Ugh, fine,” she said. “Your precious special snowflake is
so
sheltered that she’s not going to be a threat. I’m delighted to know that she can’t give us away. I’d be even more delighted if you’d let me cut her open.”

“I don’t want to be cut open,” I said hastily. “I’m not sure I get a vote in this, but I really think I should, since this is my life you’re talking about, and I don’t want to be cut open.” That didn’t seem like enough. I paused before adding, meekly, “So please don’t?”

“God, it’s like kicking a fucking puppy,” muttered Ronnie. She raised her voice as she said, “We’re not going to cut you open. Not right now, anyway. It’s not
allowed
, right, Sherman?”

“At last, you begin to learn,” said Sherman. “If you want any chance of a stable long-term integration with a host you’ll actually like, you’ll stop threatening Sal. Go get yourself cleaned up. You reek of dead human.”

“My favorite cologne,” said Ronnie, and swaggered away. She didn’t walk like a little girl: she walked like a grown man, all strutting and strength, and people got out of her way.

Sherman pulled his arm away from my shoulders as he transferred his hold back to my arm. “This way,” he said, starting to walk deeper into the mall. A few people cast curious glances our way, but most of them ignored us. They had their own business to attend to, and we were just so much background noise. That, or they had been with Sherman long enough to learn to stay out of his way. All my early experiences with him told me that I could trust him, that he was my friend and would protect me. He had been one of my handlers at SymboGen. He had been my
friend
.

And yet everything I’d experienced since my last visit to SymboGen told me he was the enemy, or close enough as to make no difference. It was his fault we’d lost Tansy. It was his
fault I was here. But whether he was friend or foe, the only option I had was to go with him. If he was going to protect me, he’d do a better job if he knew where I was. If he was planning to hurt me, maybe he’d be gentler if I seemed to be playing along.

“Have you been keeping up with your linguistics, pet?” he asked. “I know I haven’t taught you any new words the last few times we’ve seen each other. I’m sorry about that. I did so enjoy expanding your vocabulary.”

“Did you always know I was a tapeworm?” It wasn’t the question I’d been planning to ask, but once it was out in the open between us, I realized that there
were
no other questions. Anything else I might have wanted to know was dependent on how he answered me.

“Oh, Sal. My pretty, innocent little creature.” Sherman kept walking, and I kept walking with him. We passed more people, none of them familiar, and none of them paused to ask where we were going. “I knew someone like you was going to come along eventually—knew it in my bones, you could say.” He chuckled like this was somehow hysterical. Maybe it was, to him. Tapeworms don’t have bones. “Mother always told us we could only happen under proper laboratory conditions, but what she didn’t count on was that I was the closest she’d yet come to perfection. Tansy was… well, you’ve met Tansy; there was no way she was going to bite the hand that fed her. Adam was always a momma’s boy, too devoted to doing exactly as he was bid to question anything. Whereas I was the snake in her garden. I read all her files, and when I ran across something I didn’t understand, I learned. It’s amazing what people will tell you when they don’t yet realize that they need to be wary.

“I asked her lab staff about biological interfaces and statistical probability. I asked her technicians about skeletal structures and backup functions and how often blood circulated through the brain. And I asked our mutual creator about the structure
of my soul. She was very glad to tell me as much as I wanted to know, because she didn’t think I’d have the background to understand what she was telling me. She even taught me—albeit accidentally—how one went about creating a false identity for someone, and what it would take to get on Steven Banks’s good side.” Sherman cast me a sly, sidelong look. “You see what I did for you, Sal? I twisted the world into knots so I could make it a pretty bow to tie in your hair. Your human lover never did anything half so nice.”

Bile rose in my throat as I realized that he meant what he was saying. Some of this—not all, thankfully, but enough to be disturbing—had been intended as a form of courtship, like he could convince me to love him if he just spent enough time working on the problem. “You’re not answering the question,” I said. “People keep doing that to me. I don’t like it.”

“I do appreciate that you’ve started growing a spine. It’ll make this much more of an equal partnership, and much less of a burden.” Sherman shook his head. “Yes, I knew. I recognized you for what you were when they first rolled you into SymboGen and I thought, this is it. This is what fate looks like. This is the way destiny presents itself. With a brunette on a stretcher, wetting herself and staring dispassionately at the ceiling. You were the Holy Grail, Sal. A natural chimera in the process of full neural integration, yet awake through the entire process. Most of us didn’t get to wake up until a full six months further along. I honestly feel that it hampered our ability to completely inhabit our bodies. The protocols for integration as practiced here are based largely on your experience. We have so much to thank you for.”

We had reached the far end of the mall while he was talking. A metal grill was half-lowered across the mouth of what had clearly been a department store, once upon a time. Sherman ducked to get under the grill, not letting go of my arm, and so I bent to follow him. The grill creaked down and locked onto the
floor as soon as we were through. Because that wasn’t disturbing or anything.

“You never told me.” My voice sounded small and betrayed, matching the slivers of ice that felt like they were piercing my heart. I knew Sherman was on the other side of this conflict. It didn’t matter. Part of me was always going to want him to be a good guy.

“What would I have said? ‘I’m sorry to be the one to tell you this, dear, but not only are you not actually Sally Mitchell, you’re not even a human being. You’re something new, and better, and everyone you have ever loved is going to view you as a monster.’ ” He let go of my arm and stepped away, turning to face me. “Everyone but me, that is. You have never been a monster in my eyes, Sal. You have never been anything short of perfect. I doubt that you ever could be. You feel it, don’t you? The way your heart slows down to beat along with mine.”

I paused. “But… you can do that to anyone, can’t you?” Sherman’s startled, guilty expression was all the answer I needed. “Ronnie asked if you’d kissed me, and then she called you an asshole. What is it, some sort of biofeedback loop? Can you do that to all chimera, or am I just in a lucky subset of the population?”

“Sal…” He started to reach out, like he was going to caress my cheek. I slapped his hand away. His expression hardened. “Yes, if that’s what you wanted to hear: yes, I can do that to any chimera, and to any of the charmingly named ‘sleepwalkers,’ if the need strikes me. It’s a matter of controlling the pheromones I’m giving off. They tell you what to do on a level you simply weren’t engineered to fight. I could teach you to do the same thing, but why would I put such a useful weapon in the hands of a
child
? Because don’t misunderstand me, Sal: you are a child in this fight. I am romantically interested in you despite my better judgment, but that isn’t going to buy you the sort of lazy disregard that you’re accustomed to. You are a child and you
are a weapon, and as we don’t let children play with weapons, I’ll be the one deciding how you are aimed and fired.”

I glared at him. “You can’t make me do anything.”

“Oh, but darling, as you’ve already seen, I can.” He smirked. “All I need to do is get skin-to-skin with you, and you’ll dance to any tune I play. Now make yourself comfortable: find something to wear, find a bed in housewares. I’ve got cameras on this whole place, and the front of the building is sealed off, so you’ll not be escaping. Aside from that, feel free to do as you like.”

“Where are you going?”

“Didn’t you hear me before?” This time when he smiled, he showed all of his teeth. I quailed away. “I’m going to go start a war.”