Chapter 2: Pulling Skeletons
You'll never live this life that I live
I'll never live the life that wakes me in the night
You'll never hear the message I give
You'll say it looks as though I might give up this fight…
He let the front door slam behind him, and regarded Mary impassively as she came down the stairs and glanced over at the noise.
"Where's Buddy?"
She looked startled, by both his abrupt tone and his changed demeanor. "In the kitchen," she said hesitantly. "Adam, is something wrong?"
He didn't answer. As he walked into the other room, he heard her follow quickly. Buddy sat at the table, and as the pair entered the room, he peered up at them from his paper. Returning his coffee mug to the tabletop, he looked first at Adam, then his wife, then back to the other man. "What's up, Adam?" he asked slowly.
Adam pulled down the collar of his shirt, and brushed aside the longish blond hair that covered the back of his neck, exposing the black marks to both sets of eyes trained upon him. "What is this?" he demanded.
"Oh Adam, we told you about that before," Mary's soothing voice responded shortly, "It's just a—"
"No," he interrupted, before she could go on. His gray eyes hardened as he took in the lined, slightly rounded face, the one that he had come to trust unquestioningly over the past three and a half months. "Don't tell me it's just a tattoo. You know as well as I do that it's not just a tattoo." There was almost a menacing undertone to his words, one that surprised him almost as much as it surprised Mary and Buddy. And it demanded answers; it demanded the truth.
"I was at the bar just now," he explained, forcing a calmness he didn't truly feel. "I saw the news." The pair before him exchanged glances, confirming his suspicions that they did indeed know something they weren't telling him.
Still, they weren't quite ready to give up the pretense. Buddy shrugged. "Is that what's got you riled up? What does a little T.V. have to do with some tattoo you got years ago?"
There were no televisions on the ranch—the service wasn't provided this far out from town. Back before the Pulse, it seemed it had been, but things had changed afterward and in the past decade or so, Buddy and his family had simply done without it. In fact, he knew very little, just that snippet of information he had caught on his way out.
"Because apparently I'm not the only one with this tattoo. In fact, there seems to be a whole group of people—transgenics—out there with barcodes tattooed on the backs of their necks. And the government is hunting them down."
That last bit didn't bother him as much as it should have. In fact, something told him he should be quite used to being hunted, being on the run and constantly looking over his shoulder. It was why he felt so uneasy staying in crowded rooms, why every stranger appeared a threat until they proved themselves otherwise.
"That—" Mary faltered, stumbling to explain it away. "That's in Seattle, not around here… and tattoos are common—who's to say yours has anything to do with all that?"
"You know I'm different," he said in a quiet voice. "I'm not normal."
Buddy stood from his seat. "Of course not. Of course you are." He walked toward Adam, placing a comforting hand on his shoulder. "Son, you've worked for me for three years. Those transgenics have only been out for a few months since that building burned down—you can't be one of them."
An image flashed in Adam's mind, an image of a dark forest and children running through the underbrush. Behind them loomed a large facility. That place—they had left it, they had escaped. There was no fire, no flames burning in the night sky. No, he hadn't left during the fire.
He pushed the thought away. "You say I've worked here for the past three years, but I only remember the past three months." Glancing, from Buddy to Mary, he questioned, "How do I know you're telling the truth?"
Buddy looked bewildered at his words. "Why would we lie?"
Why? He didn't know. That was what he was here to find out. He shook his head. "You know I'm different," he said quietly, "I'm not normal."
"Of course—" Mary began, but he interrupted.
"Of course, nothing," he said harshly. "I am not normal." He bit each word of slowly, emphatically. "I can hear and see things that I should be able to, not from that far away. I barely sleep, never more than three or four hours a night—and don't even tell me it's insomnia. If it was insomnia, then I would be tired. But I'm not, I rarely ever get tired, no matter how long or hard I work… and I'm strong, too strong. Someone my size, my weight, shouldn't be able to lift as much as I can." He paused and looked at them each in turn. "Is that enough, or should I go on?"
They looked… startled. What, did they think he simply wouldn't notice all those things? That he would close his eyes and blindly go about his life without the smallest amount of awareness of his own body and limitations—or seeming lack thereof?
"Is that what I am? Am I one of those transgenics?"
There was silence in the room. Then Buddy slouched back against the wall, a defeated look on his face. He glanced toward Mary, and began, "We didn't know ourselves at first. I mean, we were told you were—different—that you had certain special abilities. The abnormal strength, something about enhanced senses…" He looked toward Adam appealingly. "But we didn't know anything about transgenics until we heard about it on the news, like everybody else. Yeah, we made the connection right away, especially because of the barcode and all—but no one ever told us."
"Who?" he demanded relentlessly. "Who never told you?"
The older man sighed, rubbed a hand over his face. "A friend of a friend, I suppose you could say. Never really told me who or gave any details of your prior life; thought it was better if we didn't know, for some reason. I guess, knowing what I do now, I understand the need for secrecy."
Adam walked away from them, leaning against the sink, his palms spread out on the flat surface. He stared out the window, looking out into the darkness. And wasn't it strange how he could make out every tree, every shape and outline as easily as if it were day? It had always struck him as so, but not anymore. Not now that he knew what he was—even if he didn't know who.
"Why was I sent here?"
Mary answered, quietly, "For your protection. They—whoever arranged for this—thought you'd be safe here. We were supposed to keep you safe."
He glanced down from the window, but kept his back to them. "So all that about me working here for three years now… that was a lie." It wasn't a question, really, but Buddy answered anyway.
"The first time we met was in that hospital in Seattle three and a half months ago. Never before that."
Adam nodded. He had already suspected as much. "And the others? Do they know any of this?"
"No. Joe knows, of course, that you didn't work here before… he'd have to, since he's been working at the ranch for just over six years himself. He knows that we told you that to protect you"—there it was again, that word: protect; somehow, Adam had the feeling that he wasn't the one who needed protection… he was the one who provided it—"but he doesn't anything about why. And everyone else has no idea; they were all hired after you came here anyway. I think that's part of the reason why we were picked in the first place—because aside from Joe, all my other guys are seasonal workers. I hire them when I need extra help, and the rest of the time me, Mare, and Joe take care of the work. So no one else would know whether you'd worked here for three years or three months."
Three people—not much exposure.
Too much, the voice disagreed. Three too many.
He ignored it. Turning from the window, he faced them once more. "So this isn't me. I'm not 'Adam Thompson'."
The older man appeared slightly taken aback. He glanced toward his wife, who shared his look. "I guess, maybe not… that was the name we were given. I figured the last name was a fake—but Adam's probably still your real name," Buddy assured.
He thought about that, and shook his head. "No, no it's not." Though he couldn't explain how he knew that, he knew it was true.
"I called the number," Buddy said as they stood in the doorway, beneath the yellowish gleam of the porch light, "the one that they gave me for emergencies. It wasn't a direct line—a message service—so I left one. But there's no address or anything, so there's not much you can do until this person returns the call"
Adam shook his head. "No, I know where to go."
Buddy and Mary stared back, puzzled. "Where…?"
"Terminal City."
Their frowns deepened. Mary spoke, "Now Adam, it's far too dangerous there. How are you even going to get past the police and the army, who are guarding all the fences?"
"I'll figure out a way, Mare, don't worry." He gave her a reassuring smile. "Besides, I'm a big boy… with superpowers, apparently."
"And that's why you have to be careful," she replied. "You were fine here because they weren't looking for you, but in Seattle thing's are a lot different." She reached up and brushed down the hair hanging over the back of his neck. "Keep it covered up," she instructed as if he were a child going out into the snow and she was telling him to put on his gloves.
"Here," Buddy held out a set of keys, dropping them into Adam's outstretched hand. "Take care of my baby," he said with a half-grin.
"Your baby?" Mary cut in with mock scorn. "First Emerald, now the truck—and what does that make me?"
"The thorn in my side," he replied solemnly, but his face broke out into a smile as she swatted his arm.
"Don't worry," Adam told him. "I'm only going to take it into town. After that, I'm planning to switch vehicles anyway."
Mary raised an eyebrow at that. "By 'switching vehicles', are you saying that you're going to steal one?"
Adam opened his mouth to reply, but caught the look that Buddy shot him. It wasn't as if he felt guilty at the prospect, although he recognized it was something that one might—should—feel guilt for. It's necessary, something told him. You do what you have to; you don't have time for guilt. Instead he said nothing, and sent a backward glance over his shoulder, at the truck, indicating it was time for him to go. Mary gave him a hug, some more maternal advice, and Buddy clapped him on the back, told him to take care of himself. He gave them both a small smile.
"Hey, I'll probably be back soon," he said, even while the voice in his head told him that was a lie. "I still have to say goodbye to Joe, Eddie, and the others." They returned his smile, though they appeared somewhat skeptical.
Despite what he'd learned in the past few hours, he still felt regret at the thought of leaving them, and the life that he'd built here over the months. He wasn't angry for them lying to him, not really. Somehow, he knew that lies could be a necessary part of life sometimes, and he couldn't really fault them for wanting to protect him. Besides, they weren't the ones who put him here.
Fifteen minutes later, he was lost in thought as he drove down the deserted street to town, grasping at memories that seemed just barely out of reach. But not so lost that he didn't notice the vehicles when they passed him, black with tinted windows, like a grim convoy in the night. His heart sped up slightly, and he straightened even further in his seat. He didn't let himself relax until they were long out of sight, and even then he let the speedometer slide over a few more miles. Nothing so much that it would attract attention, but enough so it would cut the length of his trip by a few minutes.
But there was no reason to think that it had anything to do with him—why, of all nights, would they be coming for him now, just when he'd figured out what he was and decided to leave? It had to be a coincidence.
You can't afford to believe in coincidences.
It was a few minutes later that he noticed the truck behind him—black, tinted, just like the ones that had passed him—sending an alarm off inside his head. It was gaining on him, driving at perhaps twice the speed limit—even for nighttime joy riding that would have been a bit excessive.
Adam hit the gas and evaluated his situation. But he didn't have a chance to finish the thought though as he heard a loud explosion and a half-second later the entire truck shook as if experiencing a violent seizure. The steering wheel was clutched tight in his hands, but useless as the vehicle swerved erratically, spinning across the road and off the side. It was too late to change what was happening, so he did the only thing he could do—he strapped himself in and held on tight.
The truck flipped several times, the sound of metal grinding against metal and cement assaulting his ears, even as his body was jarred inside the mess, limbs ripping painfully in every direction. And it seemed to go on and on and on in a never-ending spiral.
When it did finally end, and he opened his eyes, he suspected that he might have blacked out, at least for a few seconds. His head pounded, his body ached, but he pushed that all aside, blinking rapidly through the settling dust, to reach for his seatbelt. It was jammed, and he yanked at until it tore loose. No smell of gas, so he didn't have to worry about explosions, but there was still the little issue of whoever had shot him off the road—and no doubt, they weren't about to leave it at that and walk away.
The vehicle had landed upside down, and when the seatbelt fell away, he flipped as he dropped to the ceiling. The door handle gave way fairly easily, and ignoring the pain screaming through his entire body, from head to foot, as he did so, he pulled himself free. He turned onto his back and glanced up, only to find himself staring down—or up, as from his perspective—the barrel of a gun.
At the other end of the deadly piece of metal was a man in a dark suit and tie, someone Adam was sure he'd never seen before. The man smiled, not the warm, open expression of Buddy, or the motherly smile of Mary, but something more slithery and sinister. It was not a pleasant expression.
"Well, well, well. If it isn't X5-599."
Inwardly, Adam frowned slightly at his words. Something rang familiar in them—X5… X-series, like from the news… And since there seemed to be a certain amount of recognition in the other man's eyes, as he slowly gathered himself to his knees, ignoring his body's protests, he asked, "Do I know you?"
The stranger paused, shrugged slightly with the shoulder of the arm that wasn't holding the gun. "Actually, no, we've never met," he drawled, maintaining a casual demeanor despite circumstances. "Although, I do know a fair amount about you." That didn't go over well with Adam. Maybe it was the maniacal gleam in the other man's eyes, or the fact that was point a gun at him, but something told him the stranger wasn't a fan. He continued, "But you're supposed to be dead."
Adam raised an eyebrow. Really? No one told me. "Sorry to disappoint."
The man smiled again, and the gesture was no less menacing when viewed right side up. "You know, oddly enough, you haven't. In fact, I've never been quite so happy to see a piece of transgenic trash before." He leaned forward slightly, lowering his voice conspiratorially, "You might even say you've made my day."
The words sent an invisible chill down his spine. Then the man made a slight gesture, and Adam realized what was coming the instant before he felt the pain in the back of his head, and everything went black.
White gave him a smile, that strange half-twist of his mouth that passed for one, conveying his pleasure. "That, Otto," he said, slapping the other man's shoulder as he stepped over the still figure on the ground, "is correct."
Another man stepped up to the pair. "Sir, what do we do about the vehicle?" All three men glanced over at the heap of metal at the side of the road. The events of the past several minutes had definitely taken their toll on it; it wouldn't be going anywhere anytime soon unless hooked up to the back of a tow truck.
"Nothing," White replied shortly. "Let the local sheriff clean it up—we got what we came for. Remember boys, we're not covert anymore."
Two figures stepped forward, to carry the unconscious man to an armored transport. They were all here now—the dark convoy that had trekked down to this nothing town upon receiving report of a 9-1-1 call giving the whereabouts of an X-series by the name of Adam Thompson.
"So, we're planning to keep 599 alive?" Otto asked after him.
White continued walking, his agent trailing after him. "Call him a bargaining chip, if you will," he replied, but speaking more to himself than to the other man. "452 took someone I care about, and now I have someone important to her. And, unlike her, I'm willing to kill to get what I want."