Enemies: The Girl in the Box, Book Seven (28 page)

I nodded at him then turned to find Kat staring at me wide-eyed. “What?” I asked her pointedly.

She shook her head, as though she wished I hadn’t caught her looking. After a moment or so of thought, she spoke. “I just … was amazed to hear you ask him if he was going to be okay with this since, like … two days ago you killed our leader and crashed through a window to get away from us.”

I glared at her. “Don’t forget that I broke your nose. Twice.”

She flinched. “Restraint?”

“You’ve just about seen the last of it,” I said. “Don’t push me.”

The van door slid open and Karthik waited outside. Breandan joined him a moment later, studying the parking structure with all the skepticism of a man walking into a jail cell. Kat carried Janus in her arms without help as we passed the glass box where the security guard had been reading the paper only yesterday and got in the elevator. She stopped at the floor below the main level, carrying Janus to their medical facility. I thought about going with them but decided it was pointless.

When the elevator dinged and opened on the top floor, I walked out onto a quiet cubicle farm. Only a dozen or so people were still here, and when I flashed a questioning look at Karthik, he shrugged. “We furloughed all the non-essential personnel yesterday on Janus’s order. Non-critical operations have been suspended.”

I led the way past Janus’s office without thinking about it, and burst through the doors of Rick’s old office without stopping. Breandan and Reed followed me, while Karthik peeled off and headed toward the other side of the floor. “Be with you in a moment,” he said, and I trusted he would. I walked through into the space that Rick had begun to convert into modernity, the last vestiges of the old world charm still there in the form of paneled wood and that robust cigar smell that lingered even now.

“So this is the seat of Omega,” Reed said, taking in the whole room with a sweep of his eyes. “It’s kind of how I always imagined it.”

“Actually, that was the seat of Omega’s power,” I said, pointing to the wreckage of the chair that still rested behind the desk. I looked over the edge to see smears of blood still there, and I hesitated before I stepped around to look closer. The smell of it was heavy, and I could almost taste it because of how much of it was dried on the floor. “Janitorial must have been furloughed, too,” I muttered to myself.

“What?” Reed asked.

“Nothing,” I said, not taking my eyes off the space where I’d last seen Rick, a bloodied mess of flesh and bone splattered all over the floor. I looked back to Reed. “So …”

He looked back at me then to Breandan, who watched us both uneasily. “So … what?”

“Well,” I said, “Janus wanted us to go to the cloister in Scotland, try and save them from this Hades-type.”

He stared at me with a blank look. “Sorry … is that a thought, a suggestion, an order?”

I frowned at him. “I’m not your boss, Reed. I can’t give you orders. I’m not in charge.”

Breandan looked from Reed to me. “Really? Then … who is, might I ask?” He looked down at the space behind the desk. “And is that blood?”

“Yeah,” I said. “Their last leader met a somewhat grisly end.”

“Ouch,” Breandan said. “Looks messy. When did that happen?”

“Oh, I don’t know. An hour before I ran into you in King’s Cross Station?”

He looked at me for a moment before it registered. “Oh! You! You killed him. I get it now.” He let his thumb and forefinger rest on his face. “You really are racking up quite the prodigious body count, aren’t you?”

I put my fingers over my eyes and rubbed my face, as though I could scrub away all signs of my identity, be someone else for a while. “It’s been a confusing few weeks.”

“This isn’t like you, Sienna,” Reed said quietly.

I looked at him through weary eyes. “I’m pretty sure it’s not all me.”

His eyes widened in slight alarm. “You mean …”

“Wolfe,” I said calmly. “He used to be able to take control of my body. Now it’s more subtle. He says, ‘Kill them!’ and I’m moving before he’s even done speaking.” I leaned to rest my backside on the desk. “The sad part is, I don’t even disagree with what I’ve done in some of these cases.” I turned my head to look at the bloodstains behind the desk. “Some of them seem to strain the moral compass, though.”

“Dear God,” Reed whispered. “You say it like it’s nothing. Like you just cracked an egg. ‘Oops, killed a whole bunch of people. Better luck next time.’”

“Honestly,” I said, and felt a tired that had seeped into my very bones, like the London rains, “given what’s going on right now, is anyone even going to notice the drop of blood I’ve put into the bucket?”

“Well,” Breandan said with excessive cheer, “it’s nice to know that my guardian angel is actually an avenging angel, ready to kill over the slightest offense.” He stiffened and held out his hands peacefully. “Which I am not trying to give. Please don’t be offended, oh murderous angel.”

I sighed. “It’s not like that.” I looked out the window. “At least I hope it’s not.”

Reed came to sit beside me. “What happened to the girl who struggled with the fact that she’d killed Wolfe and Gavrikov?”

I didn’t blink as I looked at the skyscrapers on the horizon, lit in anticipation of the coming night. “I think I left her in the box.”

“Bad news,” Karthik said, breaking the silence as he re-entered the room, shutting the old wood door behind him with a gentle click.

“Is there any other kind lately?” Reed asked.

“There’s the
Daily News
,” Breandan said. “No, wait, that’s bad too.”

“We have confirmation from our agents that the cloister in Connacht was wiped out,” Karthik said, reading from a piece of paper in his hand.

“But finally an Englishman who can pronounce it,” Breandan muttered.

“In point of fact, I’m from Mumbai originally,” Karthik gently corrected him.

“I was trying to be culturally sensitive. Inclusive and all that, you know.”

“Ah,” Karthik said. “So now the last bastion of metakind in the English isles is to be found in Scotland.” He read a thin readout. “Population is only thirty or so.” He pulled a piece of paper from underneath that one. “It looks as though the job is just about done over here.” His dark eyes were tinged with sorrow, and his voice was weighed down with it. “This is the last cloister in Europe. North and South America are all that remain after this. That and whatever stragglers aren’t cloistered that haven’t been swept up yet.”

“Dear God,” Reed said, letting his hands cover his eyes. “Scotland it is.”

“The helicopter will be ready in fifteen minutes,” Karthik said. “There is one thing we need to discuss first, though.”

“What?” I asked. “I mean, we know what we’re dealing with—a Hades-type. We know I’m the only one who stands a chance against it. And we know that—”

“We have no one to lead us,” Karthik said. “With the ministers and Bastet dead and Janus out of action, Omega’s line of command is officially finished.”

“What?” I looked at him in utter disbelief. “Your organization landed something like fifty metas on U.S. shores not two weeks ago when you went to destroy the Directorate. You can’t tell me that there aren’t any field commanders for those metas—”

“Most of them are dead,” Karthik said quietly. “The toll of Century’s efforts on our continental operations has been quite steep the last two weeks. When the crisis began, we had something on the order of a hundred metas on payroll. We did send fifty to deal with your Directorate, and with the exception of our American operatives, they all returned within a couple days. However, we’ve had major setbacks as our operations were destroyed in every European capital in the last two weeks. It was a blitzkrieg, nothing less. Every single field agent on the continent is now out of contact. The last—an office of five metas in Paris—went quiet this morning. Their last report indicated that the final major cloister in southern France had been destroyed in a blaze of fire.”

“So …” I said, “for next moves, I guess we can assume that Weissman’s intended return to London is going to include a visit to this location.”

Karthik gave me a slight nod. “That seems likely. We have about twenty-five metas here, not counting yourselves. Most are young, like Athena, the girl you brought in the other morning. Only a few of us have any offensive power or combat training.”

I rubbed my forehead. “Dammit,” I said. “Dammit.”

“What?” Reed asked, growing alarmed.

“When she gets worried, I prepare to panic, personally,” Breandan said.

“We can’t go to Scotland,” I said. “We have no idea what method of transport that Hades-type is using. He could be there already, in which case we’ll miss him and he’ll be back here before we can return.” I thumped my hand against the desk. “The only thing I know for sure at this point is that this is his last stop. He’ll kill everyone in this office before he can declare the job done and move on.”

“So you’re suggesting we write off that cloister in Scotland?” Reed asked, looking at me, dazed. “You’re suggesting we let those people die?”

“I’m not suggesting it, Reed.” I looked back at him tenderly. “I’m saying it flat out. They’re dead already. As much as I wish we could save them, even if we reach them in time, there’s no guarantee he’s going to be on his way there. He could be heading here right now.” I looked at the stripped-down office. “He’s coming here, guaranteed. He may hit Scotland now, he may hit it later, but he’s coming here, for sure, and nothing is going to stop him unless I’m here to do it.” I thumped my hand against the desk again, harder this time. “I can’t gamble with the lives of the people here on the chance of being able to save those folks in Scotland.”

“How thoroughly practical of you,” Reed said coldly. “Looks like Old Man Winter has taught you well.”

“What did you say?” I let the chill creep into my voice.

“You heard me,” Reed said. “You just let the emotion bleed right out. ‘There’s no guarantee …’ As if there’s a guarantee of success if you stay here?” He jabbed a finger at me. “You realize Weissman and Madigan are out there still? Madigan knows her way around Omega HQ, she can show them how to get in without any difficulty. You’re writing off those people in Scotland—very coldly, I might add—calculating that the odds are better that you’ll be able to save the people here. I’m telling you that you might not be able to. It’s not just a Hades that’s going to be coming. Weissman has out-thought us at every juncture, and he’s gotta know he just put all his remaining enemies in one camp. That means he’s not worried about us. He’s not worried about you,” Reed amended. “He’s gonna finish Europe by rolling over us here and then we’re done. Say goodbye to the whole eastern hemisphere, because Century will own it when it comes to the meta world.”

“What do you want me to do?” I yelled at him. “I mean, seriously? I’m one person. I’m eighteen years old, Reed! Until two weeks ago, I was just a follower, riding along on the coattails of other people who were smarter and more organized than I was, okay? I have one thing in me, and that’s that I know how to fight. That’s all I have to bring to the table. So when I tell you that making our stand here is the smartest move because otherwise we’re going to lose the cloister in Scotland as well as get everyone in this place killed, you can take that as the word of an eighteen-year-old girl who’s both scared and more than a little pissed that she’s having to play janitor and protector to the remains of a group of people who have hounded her since day effing one, okay? This is a mess, all right, and it’s not mine, but somehow I seem to be the one that gets to mop it up. And I get to do it all less than two weeks after my first love was killed and while I’m trying to figure out if I’m pregnant with his baby!”

Reed staggered back like he’d been slapped. “You’re …” His face narrowed in horror and his voice went to a hushed whisper. “You’re pregnant? HOW?”

“The whole family needs remedial education in that, I suppose,” Breandan said to no one in particular.

“Dr. Sessions made a … suit …” I said. “For Zack. Before he …” I shut up, watching both Karthik and Breandan find immense interest in their shoelaces and the London skyline, respectively. “Anyway … I don’t want to be in charge of saving the world of metas, because we’re probably gonna fail.” I rubbed my hand over my face. “So, seriously. Who wants to be in charge? I’d vote for any of you.”

“Yeah, no,” Breandan said, “my vote’s for you.” He looked around sheepishly. “You know, if I get a vote. Not really sure what the Parliamentary procedures are here, being someone who rather drifted in and all.”

I brushed aside my hand and focused on Karthik. “This is your party, Karthik. Your house, your rules.”

Karthik shook his head. “I’m afraid that while I am a fairly good tactical leader of a squad, I lack the long-range vision and experience to run even the fragments that remain of Omega. I defer to your experience.”

“My experience?” I asked with amusement. “My experience is running a baby squad of metas for three months after I finished training.”

“You’re the most powerful of us,” Reed said in a strangled voice. I looked at him, and he looked back, giving me a shrug. “Probably the most experienced team leader, too, given that Karthik just deferred to you.”

“You were just bashing the hell out of my decision to make this our defense point a minute ago,” I said, trying to see if there was something behind his eyes that he was hiding, some sarcasm I wasn’t detecting.

“I was bashing the lack of emotion behind it,” he said calmly. “I didn’t question the logic of it, I just hate that you’ve had to come to a point where you see it as a game of probabilities instead of a battle for the lives of people.”

I felt my mouth dry out. “There are numbers behind the people.” I lowered my voice. “Two hundred and fifty-four.”

Breandan cocked his head. “Sorry, what?”

“It’s the number of people who died when Sienna first faced off against Wolfe,” Reed said, never taking his eyes off me. “I honestly kinda figured you’d forgotten.”

I shook my head slowly. “Never.”

Reed gave me a slow nod of understanding. “All right, then. What’s the play?”