First Shift: Legacy (Shift, #1)(44)

“Sir? We really need to keep moving—”

Troy ignored the doctor. He rubbed the glass shield, the cold inside leaching into his hand, the chill in the air creeping deep into the marrow of his bones. Troy’s gut tightened around a memory—

“Sir—”

A spiderweb of frost covered the glass. He wiped the frozen film of condensation away so he could see inside.

“We need to get this man installed—”

Sealed eyes lay inside that cold and dark place. Skin and air held a tint of blue. Blades of ice, like a snow queen’s mascara, clung to her lashes. It was a familiar face, but this was not his wife.

“Sir!”

The fist in his gut—that hand that clenched desperately around the nothingness—it stirred. It punched upward into his heart. Troy stumbled, hands slapping at the cold coffin for balance, bile rising in his throat with remembrance, his body searching for some medicine to dissolve.

He heard himself gag, felt his limbs twitch, his knees buckle. He hit the ground between two of the pods and shook violently, spit on his lips, strong memories wrestling with the last residue of weak drugs.

The two men in white barked at each other. Footsteps slapped frosted steel and faded toward the distant and heavy door. Shivers and inhuman gurgles hit his own ears and sounded faintly as though they came from him.

But who was he? What was he doing there? What were any of them doing?

The shakes subsided to a vibration, a bass chord thumbed hard and shivering home from some invisible state. Troy settled into this sonorous tremble, the cold floor distant somehow, his body growing numb as his mind became aware.

This was not Helen. His name was not Troy.

He almost had it as feet stomped his way in a hurry. The name was on his tongue as the needle bit his flesh.

Donny.

But that wasn’t right, either.

And then the darkness took him, the cold enveloping him like a hoary cocoon, tightening down around anything from his past that his mind deemed too awful to bear.

19


2052 ? Fulton County, Georgia

Some mash-up of music festival, family reunion, and state fair had descended on the southernmost corner of Fulton County. For the past two weeks, Donald had watched while colorful tents sprang up over a brand-new nuclear containment facility. Fifty state flags flew over fifty depressions in the earth. Stages had been erected, an endless parade of supplies flowing over the rolling hills, golf carts and four-wheelers forming convoys like ants marching back to their nests, their mandibles full of food, boxes, Tupperware containers, baskets of vegetables—some even pulled small enclosed trailers loaded with livestock.

The foodies were out in droves. Farmers’ markets had been staked out in winding corridors of tents and booths, chickens clucking and pigs snorting, children petting rabbits, dogs on leashes. Owners of the latter guided dozens of breeds through the crowds. Tails wagged happily, and wet noses sniffed the air.

On Georgia’s main stage, a local rock band performed a sound check. When they fell quiet to adjust levels, Donald could hear the twangs of bluegrass spilling over from the general direction of North Carolina’s delegation. In the opposite direction, someone was giving a speech on Florida’s stage while lines of ants moved supplies over the rise, and families spread blankets and picnicked on the banks of sweeping bowls. The hills, Donald saw, formed stadium seating, as if they’d been designed for the task.

What he couldn’t figure out was where they were putting all those supplies. The tents seemed to keep gobbling them up with no end in sight. The four-wheelers with their little boxed trailers had been rumbling up and down the slopes the entire two weeks he’d been there helping prep for the national convention.

A set of brakes squealed beside him as Mick rumbled to a stop, sitting atop one of the ubiquitous ATVs. He grinned at Donald like a guilty frat boy and goosed the throttle while still holding the brakes. The Honda lurched, tires growling against the dirt.

“Wanna go for a ride?” he yelled.

“Where to?” Donald screamed back. The rock band resumed its sound check, the Honda blatting as Mick worked the throttle.

“South Carolina,” Mick said, smiling. He scooted forward on the seat to make room.

“You got enough gas to make it there?” Donald held his friend’s shoulder and stepped on the second set of pegs, threw his leg over the seat.

“It’s just over that hill, you idiot.”

Donald resisted the urge to assure Mick he’d been joking. He held on to the metal rack behind him as Mick gave it gas and shifted through to third gear. His friend stuck to the dusty highway between the tents until they reached the grass, then angled toward the South Carolina delegation, the tops of the buildings of downtown Atlanta visible off to one side.

Mick turned his head as the Honda climbed the hill. “When is Helen getting here?” he yelled.

Donald leaned forward. He loved the feel of the cool October morning air as the ATV created a breeze. It reminded him of Savannah that time of year, the chill of a sunrise on the beach. He had just been thinking of Helen when Mick asked about her.

“Tomorrow,” he shouted. “She’s coming on a bus with the delegates from Savannah.”

They crested the hill, and Mick throttled back and steered along the ridgeline. They passed a loaded-down four-wheeler heading in the opposite direction. The network of ridges formed an interlocked maze of highways high above each containment facility’s sunken bowl.