Clay's Ark (29 page)

Rane began firing again, and people did die. Keira saw one of them raise his head at the wrong time and get the top of

it blown off.

Terrified and repelled, Keira snatched up Jacob and fled. Doctor's daughter that she was, sick as she had been, she had

never seen anyone die before. She ran almost in panic, reached her father's bare room and looked around wildly.

"There!" The boy pointed to another door. The bathroom -no bigger than the closet she had been shut in, but it had a

window.

She ran into the bathroom, shut the door and locked it, then lifted the boy to the windowsill. He was over it and down

in an instant. She pulled herself up after him, no longer marveling at the return of her strength, no longer marveling at

anything. She had *o get out of the house, get back to Eli and safety. Her father was probably already safe, and Rane

soon would be.

She dropped to the ground and ran.

Keira ran through the rocks, hoping they would conceal and protect her as she circled around the house. She was

halfway around and already aware of the distinctive scent of Eli's people when she recognized another familiar scent.

The new scent confused her for a moment because of its clarity. She was so utterly certain it was her father's that for a

moment she thought she had actually seen him.

The wind favored her. It blew toward her from Eli's people and across the path of her father. She looked down the slope

through the rocks. Her nose told her this was the way her father had gone-away from the house and Eli's people, toward

the highway.

Of course.

Her enhanced sense of smell led her to spots of his blood, some of them still wet on the rocks. In one place near a

brown wedge of rock, blood had actually pooled-an alarming amount of blood. Before finding this, she had thought she

would go on to Eli and say nothing about her father. Jacob, running ahead and back to her like an eager puppy, might

notice the scent and he might not. If he spoke of it, she would have to admit what she knew, but perhaps by then her

father would have made good his escape. She would have let him escape, even knowing what that would mean to Eli

and his people. This was all she could do for her father. And in his way, he was not wrong. He was taking the long

view, trying to prevent a future epidemic. Eli and his people were trying to live from one day to the next, trying to raise

their strange children in peace, trying to control their deadly compulsion. Eventually, inevitably, they would fail. They

must have known it. If not for the blood, Keira would have deliberately permitted that failure to happen now.

But the blood was there, slowly drying in a natural depression in the rock. Her father had been hurt, needed help. Eli

had the medical bag, maybe even had it with him here to treat his own people. He should not be able to use it, but Keira

suspected he could-and her father might die before he could reach other help.

She turned aside to follow the blood trail. The next time Jacob raced back to her, approaching in utter silence, and

concealed except for his scent until the last instant, she stopped him.

"Come on," he said. "I'll take you to where Daddy is."

"You go," she said. "Tell him my father's hurt and I have to find him. Tell him to send someone after me with my

father's bag. Okay?"

"Yes."

"Good. Now go. And be careful."

The boy bounded away, leaping among the rocks as though they presented no obstacle at all. Her children would do

that someday. They would have four legs and be able to bound like cats, and they would be beautiful. Perhaps she was

already pregnant.

Somehow, when she found her father, when Eli helped him, he had to be convinced to stay and be quiet. He had to be!

Living day to day, free on the desert was better than being a quarantined guinea pig in some hospital or lab, better than

watching Jacob and Zera treated like little animals, better than perhaps being sterilized so that no more children like

them could be born. Better than vanishing.

She ran down the rocky slope with new speed and agility she hardly noticed. It seemed she could always see a place for

her feet, always find a handhold when one was necessary. She felt as secure as a mountain goat. Once she stopped to

examine the body of a red-bearded, balding man. He was not one of Eli's people, not one of Badger's. Most likely, he

was one of the new group Badger had called. He was newly dead of a broken neck. Her father's scent was especially

strong near him, and she realized her father had probably killed this man. It was even possible that this was the man

who had wounded her father-though she saw no gun. Perhaps her father had taken it. That would mean she had to be

careful. If he were wounded and armed, he might be panicky enough to shoot without waiting to see who he was

shooting at.

She continued down the slope with greater care. She did not have Eli's or Jacob's ability to move in complete silence,

but she moved as quietly as she could, missing the rock and sand she could have knocked loose, avoiding the dry plants

that would crackle underfoot, quieting her own panting.

She paused briefly to listen. The wind, now blowing toward her from her father, brought her the sound of his uneven

footsteps. He was limping slightly. His breathing, though, was even, not labored. She marveled for a moment that she

could actually hear his breathing over such a distance. The organism had given her a great deal. It must have given him

something too. How else could he survive being shot and losing so much blood? How else could he keep going? If only

something could be done to stop it from killing so many people while it helped others.

She became aware of a low rumble behind her. Looking back, she saw a truck-a big private hauler-probably carrying

something illegal if it were daring to use a map-identified sewer. She dove for cover as the truck came over a rise.

Perhaps the driver was in his living quarters and would not see her or her father. Perhaps. But what driver would leave

his rig on automatic in a sewer? He would be at the wheel. And his truck would be armed and armored to fight off

gangs and the police.

The truck rumbled past her, not even slowing in spite of the fact that the rock she had crouched behind was not large

enough to conceal her completely. Unmoving as she was, perhaps the driver had seen her as just another lump of rock.

But up ahead, beyond the hill that now concealed her father, the truck slowed and stopped. Frightened, she walked

toward the truck, then ran toward it. People traveling legitimately did not stop to pick up strays, did not dare. Her father

had told her of a time when a person could stand with his thumb held in a certain position, and cars and trucks would

stop and offer rides. But Keira could not remember such a time. All her life, she had heard stories of strays being

decoys for car families and bike gangs. Real strays were people with car trouble and without working phones or people

thrown out of cars by friends who suddenly became less friendly. People who picked them up might be only

dangerously naive or they might be thieves, murderers, traffickers in prostitutes, or, most frighteningly, body-parts

dealers-though according to her father, involuntary transplant donors were more likely to come from certain of the

privately run, cesspool hospitals. But for a freelancer, strays were fair game.

Keira ran, not knowing what she would do when she reached her father and the hauler, not thinking about it. All she

could think was that her father might be shot with a tranquilizer gun and loaded onto a meat truck.

Suddenly, as she ran, there was an explosion, then several explosions. For a moment, she stopped, confused, and the

ground shook under her feet.

The ranch house. Eli had done what she had feared he would do: triggered his explosives, blown up the car people-even

the white-haired one who had been kind.

And Rane? Had she gotten out? Was that why Eli had decided to settle things? Or was it because Keira and her father

had escaped so easily? Eli almost certainly did not have enough people to surround the house and fight the new gang.

Were two escapees all he was willing to risk?

Black smoke and dust boiled up over the hills. Keira stared at it, frightened, wondering. Then she heard the hauler start

and saw it begin to pull away.

Again, she ran toward her father, pushing herself, fearing to find nothing where he had been. Instead, she found her

father half-crushed by the wheels of the truck. His legs, the whole lower half of him looked stuck to the broken

pavement with blood and ruined flesh. He could not possibly be alive with such massive injuries.

Her father groaned. Keira dropped down beside him, sickened, revolted. She could barely look at him, yet he was alive.

"God," he whispered. "My God!"

Weeping, Keira took his hand. It was wet with blood and she touched it carefully, but it was uninjured. Clutched in it

was a piece of blue cloth-a bloody sleeve, not his own.

"I did it," he moaned. "Oh Jesus, I did it."

"Daddy?" She wanted to put his head on her lap, but she was afraid she would hurt him more.

"Kerry, is that you?" He seemed to be looking right at her.

"It's me."

"I did it. Jesus!"

"Did what?" She could not think. She could hardly talk through her tears.

"He was looking for my wallet ... or something to steal. He hit me deliberately . . . had to swerve to hit me. Just wanted

to steal."

She shook her head in disbelief. She had never heard of haulers running people down to rob them. Car families were

more likely to do that. But in a sewer, anything could happen.

"I grabbed him," her father said. "I couldn't help it, couldn't control it. He smelled so ... I couldn't help it. God, I tore at

him like an animal."

So like the blue sleeve, the blood on his hand was not his.

He had spread the disease.

"Please," he pleaded. "Go after him. Stop him."

"Stop who?" Eli asked.

She had not heard him coming. Enhanced senses or not, she stood up, startled. Then she saw her father's bag in his

hand. She knew how utterly useless it would be and she broke down.

Crying, she permitted Eli to take her by the shoulders and move her aside. He knelt where she had been. When she was

able to see clearly again, she saw that he was holding her father's bloody hand. She felt that something happened

between them, a moment of nonverbal communication.

Then, with a long, slow sigh, her father closed his eyes. Eventually he opened them again widely. His chest ceased to

move with his breathing. His body was still. Eli reached up .and closed the eyes a final time.

Keira knelt beside her father, beside Eli. She looked at Eli, not able to speak to him, not wanting to hear him speak,

though she knew he would.

"He's dead," Eli said. "I'm sorry."

She knew. She had seen. She bent forward, crying, all but screaming in anguished protest. With her eyes closed, she

could not imagine her father dead. She did not know how to deal with such an unimaginable thing.