Page 34

33

THE TRAIN

I stared out the window, letting my body relax into the rocking motion of the dining car as I looked out over the rolling French countryside and darkening blue skies.

Like earlier that day, on the famous avenue by the Arc de Triomphe, I wished I could be here for just about any other reason than the one that brought us here.

I’d come to this car less because I was hungry and more to get away from the circular conversations we’d been having while crammed into the train’s most expensive first class suite. We’d purchased a few smaller cabins on the train as well, but that one took up an entire car, and was the only one large enough to fit most of us.

We were on the train from Paris to Marseille.

We were once again following Dalejem to wherever he was taking Aura now.

We’d considered bringing the plane instead, but again, without knowing where Jem was going precisely, and being less than an hour behind, this seemed like the more practical approach.

Now I wished we had brought the plane.

Something about the train felt like it was giving me too much time to think.

“…I could almost see it with Rucker,” I muttered, continuing a conversation with Black that had been going on in that crowded car at the back of the train. “There are a hundred different motives that might justify killing Rucker, especially if Jem had somehow known about him trafficking seers. But Jem was outright hostile to Aura, and then he kidnapped her…”

Black frowned. “I don’t understand why you keep coming back to this. You don’t really think it was Jem making all these decisions now, do you? Doc, you were one of the ones who said from the beginning it couldn’t be Jem. You were more adamant than Nick…”

“I said I would follow the evidence,” I muttered.

I bit my lip, still staring out the window.

I didn’t add that following the evidence was usually his job, or Nick’s, funnily enough, but this time, I thought they were both wrong, because in different ways they were damned by Brick and vampire venom into seeing it a particular way. They each had been poisoned by Brick, in different but equally horrible ways.

I didn’t say that to Black, though.

Maybe I didn’t need to.

Slowly, I shook my head.

“It’s just not… something’s not right, Black.”

“It’s much more plausible if you think the implants could be capable of more than simply blocking a seer’s sight,” Black said. “If there’s an element of control there, that explains everything, doesn’t it?”

I’d heard this theory of his and Nick’s before, too. Their words sounded logical, reasonable, almost scientific.

So very logical, I thought. So very rational and scientific.

“I just don’t see any other explanation,” Black went on in that neutral voice. “Jem wouldn’t do this. We all know Jem wouldn’t do it, not without some kind of coercion. And we know it’s not vampire venom, not on its own. Again, you were the one to point that out, doc. And I don’t think you’d disagree that humans couldn’t have done this on their own, either.” Black’s shoulder rose in a shrug. “It had to be Brick, but it couldn’t be venom, not by itself… which is why Brick teamed up with Rucker’s company to use the implants.”

“I don’t disagree with your logic,” I said. “But, Black, you’re smart enough to make the evidence fit, and I don’t think it does fit.”

His lips tightened, but he kept his expression otherwise still. “Then what do you think fits, Miri? What are you trying to say?”

I frowned, biting the inside of my cheek.

What was I saying? I didn’t think Jem would do any of this, either. I’d said that from the beginning, like Black just said. Black and I were essentially agreeing, weren’t we?

No, a voice whispered in my mind. No, we’re not agreeing.

“Anyway,” Black went on, glancing down at the few bites of pastry left on his plate. “Jem and the girl seem to be getting along bizarrely well, all of a sudden. Looking at the two of them today, one would think they were working together. How do you explain that, doc, unless Brick is manipulating them somehow? And how else could he do that, apart from those implants?”

Black leaned closer, a faint smile on his lips. “Or are you now thinking Jem staged that whole thing back in San Francisco? Maybe Aura was in on it with him? Maybe they planned together how she’d sneak naked into Nick’s room?”

I turned to stare at him. There was more teasing than sarcasm in his voice, but I’m sure my stare got visibly icy, anyway.

“You know something’s not right here,” I said. “Nothing feels right about any of this. I know you feel it, too.”

Black’s expression slid back to careful neutrality, right before he looked away. His flecked, gold irises trained on the landscape as it moved swiftly past the window.

“I do,” he conceded, then added firmly, “But I agree with Nick.”

“So you think that explains all of it?” I asked. “Jem’s got a chip in his head? It’s as simple as that? Brick’s just controlling him, like some kind of robot?”

Black didn’t react to my tone, not visibly, at least.

His expression remained calm, difficult to read.

“I think there’s something here we don’t understand yet,” he conceded with maddening reasonableness. “And, most likely, something important we don’t know.”

I aimed my eyes back out the window.

“I thought that’s more or less what I’ve been saying.”

“Maybe.” Black smiled at me, and stuck a piece of pastry in his mouth. He chewed. “But I think you also think I’m seeing vampires everywhere right now, because of PTSD.”

I looked at him, and didn’t drop my eyes.

“Maybe,” I admitted.

“And maybe you’re right,” Black conceded again. “But that doesn’t mean I’m not right about what I’m seeing, too.”

I quirked an eyebrow. “Just because you’re paranoid, that doesn’t mean they’re not out to get you?” I quoted at him, clicking softly.

“Maybe,” he smiled.

I knew Black had Alisha and her support staff back in San Francisco scan every figure who appeared on the station platform, both before and after Jem and Aura’s train left the Gare de Lyon station. There’d been no sign of Brick, or of any recognizable vampires; there’d been no one suspicious at all who boarded their train. I was tempted to point that out to Black, but we’d been around and around with this conversation for too long already.

He was right. There was something we didn’t know yet, something that would fill those gaps, explain all the things that didn’t make sense.

Maybe that’s where we needed to leave things for now.

Black watched me think from where he sat across the table from me, sipping a glass of very oaky red wine. He didn’t say anything, though I was reasonably certain he’d heard at least some of my thoughts.

“I don’t know where Brick is, doc,” Black said next. He let out a sigh, voice serious. “I’ve got Alisha checking the cameras. I’ve got our team on the buddy system, even you and me. No one’s out of sight, even for a minute. The infiltration team is keeping an even closer eye from the Barrier.”

I smiled at him faintly. “Seeing vampires everywhere?” I asked.

“Not so far, no. Which is the good news, doc.”

I nodded slowly, my eyes back on the passing landscape.

“And you know, this probably does all make sense,” Black pointed out. “Or it will, very soon. We just don’t know how it makes sense yet.”

“The missing piece.” I took a sip of my own wine. “Is that what you’re waiting for?”

“Something like that, yes.”

I stared out the window at a view of distant mountains, a vineyard spread out before us, edged by trees in bloom. Why was I so unwilling to let this go? It was like some part of me just couldn’t. It felt too important, somehow, like we were on the edge of something.

I didn’t look over when I began to speak.

“So, just so I have this straight… you and Nick’s theory is, Brick found out about Rucker’s implants and decided to take over that technology for himself?” I watched Black’s eyebrow arch, my voice neutral. “Brick decided to use Jem to obtain prototypes, and to help him take over Rucker Enterprises? Partly as a fuck you to Jem himself, of course, but maybe in the hopes of forcing Nick back into the fold?”

Black studied my face, his gold eyes a touch wary.

“More or less,” he said. “Yes, doc.”

“Maybe Charles was in business with Rucker already, and Brick found out,” I suggested. “Or do you think Rucker got access to seer tech some other way? Maybe from someone in Charles’ camp who was selling to the black market?”

At Black’s silence, I turned back to the window.

“And then, what?” I continued mildly. “Brick doesn’t just steal the implant… he venoms a Prometharis scientist to implant Jem, instead. Jem starts acting weird as fuck to Nick, leaves Nick in Santa Cruz, among other things. And again, instead of just venoming Rucker to sign everything over to him, or simply to run the company for him to disguise his involvement, Brick has Jem shoot Rucker. Is that it?”

When Black only looked at me, I frowned. “Then… what? Brick orders Jem to start hunting down anyone who knew about organic technology and trafficked seers?”

Black clicked softly under his breath.

He took another long swallow of the red wine.

He didn’t look annoyed, exactly, more like he didn’t want to do this anymore. The conversation had run its course, in his mind.

I considered letting it go, but again, I just couldn’t.

“So,” I continued. “Brick decides to move on to Frasier and Ungerman. But he doesn’t send Jem to kill them right away. No, he waits until you ask Jem to talk to Fraiser about something totally unrelated. Once you do, Jem offers to go to New York… presumably because Brick makes him, correct? And all of this is because… why? So Ben and Rory can’t tell anyone about Aura or the implants? So does Brick already know about Aura, then?”

I waited for Black’s answer.

When he still didn’t give me one, I wrung my hands together in my lap.

My voice sounded tight to my own ears.

“And how does Aura fit into all of this?” I asked. “Is she just an extra guinea pig for Brick to experiment on? Why would Brick need that, if he already has Jem?” I paused again. “Why not just take over Prometharis, now that Rucker is out of the way?”

Black leaned over the table. He laid a warm hand over both of mine. His voice deepened, even as it grew more gentle. “Hey, doc. I’m the first to admit… we don’t know a lot of this yet. We can’t know a lot of it yet. Not until we catch up with them.”

“But do you see how none of this makes sense, when you put Brick at the center of it?” I asked, my eyes darting between his. “Even the list of victims. Even in Paris, just now. This isn’t about the implants, not really. It’s about seer trafficking. It’s about Aura. Silver? Rory? Rucker? Ben? That’s the connection, Black. You said Ben was on those sex tapes you found in Rucker’s house. The ones with Aura. We can probably guess Rory was on them, too.”

I studied his face, looking for an understanding I couldn’t find in my own mind. I thought about Aura, about the recordings they’d found, and my jaw clenched.

“And again, why kill Rucker at all?” I asked Black. “Why not simply bite Rucker, and use him as cover? If Brick wanted control over Rucker’s companies, isn’t Rucker far more valuable to him alive?”

“I don’t know, doc,” Black repeated.

“But you have an opinion––” I began.

“I really don’t,” Black said.

I started to point out the ridiculousness of that claim, which might have turned this into a real argument, then bit my lip and forced myself to look away. I stared out the window, watching the clouds turn purple and pink as the sun set somewhere on the other side of the railcar.

“You always have an opinion,” I muttered under my breath.

Black grunted, not quite a laugh.

“Okay,” he said frankly. “Yes, doc, I do. So my opinion is, I think it’s impossible to know the answer to these things right now. And it’s impossible to know what motivates a vampire. Especially one like Brick, who we already know has multiple reasons to be completely fucking insane, and who hasn’t exactly spent the past one hundred years trying to work through his issues.”

That time, it was me who snorted a little.

Black didn’t laugh with me. He stared out the window instead.

As he did, his gaze grew increasingly inward.

A resolve grew visible in his eyes as I watched.

“You’re going to kill him, aren’t you?” I asked, blunt. “All this time, with the truce, you were waiting for him to cross the line. To break treaty. To come after Nick. You weren’t going to break it yourself, but now that he has––”

Black leaned towards me and kissed me on the mouth, silencing me.

When he leaned back in his chair, his gold eyes held a denser fire.

“You’re a little too perceptive, wife,” he murmured.

I thought about everything I’d said, everything he’d said.

I thought about Black’s sudden and inexplicable calm. I thought about how strange it was that he no longer seemed angry, or tense. I thought about the nightmares he’d been having for years now, ever since Brick first entered his life, the anger he carried with him after Louisiana, and after Brick kidnapped me out of my office on Fillmore.

I remembered the way his eyes looked when he first got out of that prison. That was something that would be burned into my memory and heart forever.

But it wasn’t even only those things. It was Black himself, time and again, even beyond everything with Charles. It was what mattered to him, in terms of keeping himself and his people safe, keeping this world safe from the darkest of dark forces.

It always came back to the people and creatures who used and enslaved others, just like he’d been enslaved on Old Earth.

Maybe Black was a bit like a vampire himself.

He could wait. He could be patient.

He could bide his time.

Whatever the truth of it, Black didn’t answer me in words, but I saw the answer clearly in his gold eyes. He was finished with the shadow Brick cast over his life.

He was finished with the lingering threat, a threat that would never go away, not as long as they both remained alive. He was sick of the nightmares, the feelings of being lost, the venom addiction he still occasionally struggled with, the false alliances and fake treaties he knew Brick would never honor, at least never in good faith and not for very long.

And now Brick had finally given him an opening.

Now Brick had finally given him an excuse.

Maybe I shouldn’t be at peace with that, but I was.

It still didn’t answer my questions about the rest of it, though.