Departure(49)

I set out, my pace brisk but hopefully not rushed enough to raise suspicion. I don’t dare risk turning my head toward the labs, and I’m relieved to see Grayson following my lead.

The first lab passes. Then the second. Through my peripheral vision, I see flashes of what’s going on here. Autopsies. Human bodies laid out on metal tables, split open. Organs in pans around the room.

The third lab passes.

Fourth.

Fifth. Halfway to the doors.

At the seventh lab, the pattern changes. The body on the table isn’t human. It’s an ape. I can’t help but cut my eyes over. I can’t be sure, but I think the suited figure hunched over its body stops working and looks up. The eyes inside are human—I think.

We pass the eighth lab. Empty.

Behind us I hear the sweeping sound of a hinged glass door opening. Footsteps in the hall. I can’t tell if they’re moving toward us or away.

Ninth row of labs. Also empty.

I can see through the sliding glass doors ahead now. Rows of rolling tables hold domed plastic tents.

Just past the last two labs, Grayson reaches out and punches the round, unlabeled button beside the sliding doors. Neither of us look back as they open and we step out of the corridor, into an open space.

The tables are steel, each about eight feet long and three feet wide. There are three rows of seven, lined up neatly.

I move to the closest and peer inside the rounded, clear plastic chamber. A human body. I don’t recognize the person. I move to the next row. A woman, middle-aged. I know her. She was in the main section of the plane that sank in the lake. She was one of the first to jump and swim ashore. The last time I saw this woman, she was shivering on the bank in the dim moonlight, pleading with us to save her husband, who was still on the plane. The next chamber holds a black kid, around ten. I think I’ve seen him, but I’m not sure.

I scan the final row. Mike. Jillian. All still, eyes closed. What is this? Are they dead, or sedated?

To the left, a short passageway connects this tent to the next. More of the rolling tables with plastic domes over bodies crowd the connecting section. I bet the other tent’s filled with rolling tables.

On the far wall to my right a mechanical droning breaks the silence. A conveyor belt. It runs the length of the wall, from a dark tunnel along the backside of the labs to a small, windowless room in the corner. The belt jolts into motion, surging forward unevenly. Grayson and I wait, watching it. Slowly, a plastic-wrapped package emerges from the tunnel. A body. One they’re finished with.

I know what this complex is: a massive assembly line for some kind of experiment. An experiment—that’s why they brought us here. I’m sure of it now. And I know what we should do: get out. But I’m not leaving before I find out whether Harper’s here—and if she is, I’m not going anywhere without her.

The sliding doors behind us open, and Grayson and I freeze. I hope the suited figure will take the next body, wheel it back into the lab section . . .

It walks past the first row, still approaching us.

“I think we should have a talk.”

The voice from the suit’s speaker is human, and it booms inside the space.

I sidestep away from the table, into the aisle from the labs to the small room on the far side of the tent. Grayson mimics my movement awkwardly in his white suit, but neither of us turns. We march, probably a little too quickly, along the wide path parallel to the conveyor belt, overtaking the plastic-wrapped body.

“Hey!” the voice yells.

The sliding metal doors open as we approach, revealing a room that’s empty except for a large machine that runs the length of the right-hand wall: an incinerator is my guess. I bet there’s another at the opposite corner of the tent, serving the labs on that side.

One look at Grayson tells him what I want to do: set a trap.

He nods, draws his gun from the loose kangaroo pouch in the front of his suit, and steps diagonally back into the room’s blind spot, beside the door, where the machine meets the wall.

I draw my own gun, clasp it behind my back with my other hand, and stand my ground, trying to appear calm, as if I’m waiting patiently.

The doors slide open. The face is human. A middle-aged man. He doesn’t seem alarmed at the sight of me.

He takes one step inside. “Nicholas—”

Grayson brings the butt of his gun down on the man’s helmet, sending him to the floor. It doesn’t knock him out, however, and he pulls Grayson down with him. I bring my own gun out, waiting for an opening as they roll around on the floor, wondering . . .

Before the double doors can close, another figure rushes in, hands raised. I freeze, unable to look away from the eyes.

His gloved hands slowly reach for his helmet. He pauses, staring at me, waiting for the double doors to seal.

On the floor, Grayson and the man stop struggling, both looking up in shock. The man standing before us lifts the helmet off, and I’m staring at . . . me.

Down to the very last detail, he’s an exact replica of me.





28





If I had a quid for every time I’ve woken up sore, alone, and in the dark in the last five days . . . I close my eyes, hoping for a little more rest. Sleep comes quickly.





The second awakening’s much better. At least I can discern the pain’s focal point this go-round: my left shoulder.