Page 38 of The Bleeding Woods

My hand shakes so violently, the voice that comes through the speaker emerges jumbled. “Unexpected collateral.”

“You lied to me.”

“You let them die!”

I don’t even wait for a staticky click to snap the phone in half.

It unhinges like an oyster and sends metal, glass, and plastic splintering through the air.

Spiderwebs of wiring hang from each half, still sparking.

I’m still sparking too. After years of playing the boy next door, I’ve just about had it with patience, tolerance, and restraint.

If I make it to my personal time, I will do a lot more than cerebrate on what happened to my brother and my best friend.

I pick Clara up just as I had when we escaped the collapsing sector. She’s light as a feather in her human form. She’s eerily still, sedated in my arms.

Beautiful, but tired.

Always beautiful, and tired.

A hidden switch beneath the espresso cabinet of the coffee machine illuminates.

Flashing periwinkle light signals the availability of the electrical charge needed to enter headquarters.

I suck in a breath. It reminds me of the way Jade used to inhale her cigarettes.

I used to send her articles about lung cancer at ungodly hours of the night.

She’d send back a photo of her middle finger, and we’d move into lighter conversation about the last grown man she’d pummeled or the most horrible sitcom on television.

Too close, my superior had warned. You’re getting too close. I couldn’t help it, but I was getting too close. I really, truly was. Now I understand why it was such a colossal mistake. This hurts too much because I’ve gotten too close.

I can’t be grieving Grayson right now. I might not have to fit the Prince Charming archetype, but I most certainly have to be a soldier. I most certainly have to be Agent Grayson Warner. I’ve always had to be Agent Grayson Warner. I was born into this purpose. It’s the only reason I exist.

When I flip the switch, the entire dome is swallowed in waves of pale blue.

A beam rounds the floor like an underwater missile caught in a whirlpool.

Then a ghostly hiss sounds off, a puff of mist ejects from below, and the entire base of the structure drops out.

It descends into a tube of greenish glass, passing levels on levels of secrets hidden beneath the bedrock.

The EHKI spent more than a few million on this place.

It’s considered ground zero for all things JS-7R, the alpha and omega of undoing the damage caused by Project Undergrowth.

Folks in white lab coats scurry through the floors like hamsters starved of stimulation.

Agents of lower rank wear deep-green suits meant to blend in with the hellscape at the surface.

The ones on my oh-so-enviable level wear black-on-black tuxedos.

I didn’t earn my position. I’m special because of nepotism.

Clara and I fall deep into the bowels of the subterranean structure. Our destination is near the level that is close enough to the earth’s mantle to extract heat from it. When we arrive, the cylindrical tube of transport drops one of its sides to create a doorway and a ramp.

My mother and commanding officer—Dr. Hemlock to the EHKI, and Dr. Gwendolyn Warner to the world beyond—stands at the end of it.

“Good work,” she says.

A compliment? How rare and unexpected, considering the work she’s talking about got my brother—her son—massacred by an experimental eldritch monster. I ram past her without so much as a glance of acknowledgment. I don’t think my composure can take any more added pressure.

“Agent Warner.” Her thin heels sound like icicles on glass as she hurries behind me. “Grayson Oliver Warner.”

A pair of timid scientists arrive with a gurney for Clara.

I lower her onto it, making sure her head aligns with its pathetically flimsy pillow.

She likely wouldn’t have gotten one if it wasn’t sewn in.

As she is wheeled into the labyrinth of metal and misted glass, my heart aches in a manner my mother is sure to disapprove of.

I wasn’t supposed to care about her—the target.

My target. I’d gotten too close to Jade for comfort, and too close to Clara for sense.

Was any of it real?

My god, the way she . . . looked at me. I was once her reliable something more, then suddenly, I became her nothing at all. If I could have done things differently, I . . . If I could start it all over with her, I . . .

My mother jams her manicured nails into the tenderest spot on my shoulder. “Grayson,” she repeats herself.

“Specimen AV-7D secured, ma’am,” I reply, stoic as a soldier should be, perfect as the man she bred me to become.

“I trust all necessary procedures to ensure her captivity will be carried out by the proper departments. With your permission, I’d like to request a brief respite.

Then I’ll be ready for dispatch to the surface to carry out phase two of the mission. ”

She forces eye contact. There is not one ounce of remorse behind those prissy rectangular reading glasses. I try not to implode.

“I apologize for your involvement in this, Grayson. You must understand, these are desperate times. Desperate times call for unforgivable measures.”

My involvement in this? It’s incredible how she makes the sacrifice of an entire childhood sound so inconsequential.

This is your mission, Agent Grayson, she’d told me at twelve.

Keep an eye on Clara Lovecroft, but don’t get too close.

She is your target, but she is only a target, she’d said.

I was no older than Joey, yet my life had been orchestrated to instrumental perfection.

You’re strong enough, Grayson. You have to be. It’s your duty.

“Understood, ma’am,” I reply, a contraption, waking and walking in servitude.

“Originally, there was an extraction plan for Joey and Jade. Do you truly believe I would have sent my own son in there without one?”

“It’s not my place to analyze your choices, ma’am. My duty is to obey them. Right?”

She presses her lips into a thin line. The sepia matte lipstick she’s wearing keeps them from cracking.

I cannot help but envision her taking a trip to the powder room to freshen up her appearance before greeting her last-remaining child.

She was just as primped at Dad’s funeral, she’ll be just as primped at Joey’s, and if things go sideways, she’ll wear that same shade of taupe at mine.

“AV-7D will be taken care of appropriately. You will be contacted as soon as we are ready to proceed. Dismissed.”

I take a step toward the barracks, then . . . then something dangerous ignites at the center of my chest, and suddenly the world is all forbidden ire and ice-cold fire.

“Dad would be disgusted by you,” I seethe.

“Excuse me?” She whirls around, the brown line of her lips turning into a pair of cobra fangs.

“He never wanted this, and if he’d gotten custody of Joey and me, it never would have happened.

We weren’t toys for him to play with, we weren’t tools for him to build with, and we most definitely weren’t his tiny sleeper agents.

We were his children. For him, that’s all we had to be.

For him, that was enough. But you . . .” My voice quivers.

I’m losing control. “You’re different . . .”

“Watch your tone, Agent—”

“I’m not just an agent, Mom! I’m your son!

Joey was your son! Jade and Clara, they were someone’s daughters!

People aren’t meant to be puppets! They aren’t meant to be cogs in a clock, or means to your ends, or unexpected collateral!

My god, for a woman so intent on saving humanity, you’re pretty damn far from your own! ”

“That’s enough, Grayson!”

“That is enough! Enough lying, enough manipulating, and enough using! I’m done doing all of the dirty work you had the audacity to call duty!

The only reason I’m going back into that forest is to stand by Clara, because it’s my fault she’s here right now.

After that, I’m done. I’m done with this, and I’m done with you. ”

I take off for the barracks without looking back. A few nosy agents murmur over my outburst, and I’m more than happy about it. They should know their superior can bleed.

A few levels beneath the one Clara is being examined on, there are rows of bunk beds inside chambers made from steel with a teal finish.

The walls are gray, but the lights lining them cast spectral green shadows.

I can’t, for the life of me, fathom why the designers chose such a color scheme.

I’ve had enough green to last me ten lifetimes.

Were we ever— Did you ever— Clara’s voice whirls through my mind.

We were. Of course we were. Yes. Of course I did.

I wasn’t permitted to, but I did. It wasn’t safe or smart or sensible of me, but I did.

Despite it all, Clara, I wanted to be your safe place.

I wanted to save you from this life you’d been seized into.

You didn’t deserve it. All you’ve ever done is ponder the monster within, but what about the monsters without? What about monsters like my mother?

You’ve drawn blood, but it’s what you were designed to do. It’s what she designed you to do.

Are we monsters for becoming what we were born to be?

Are we monsters for becoming what we were trained to be?

No . . . humanity is a choice. JS-7R, Dr. Gwendolyn “Hemlock” Warner, and all the EHKI officials responsible for this mess made theirs.

Now, at last, it’s time for Clara and me to make our own.