4: The Place of Fear
Hours after the confrontation in Mason's office, standing behind the scouts' stables in the grey light of pre-dawn, John was half-convinced he'd finally pushed the other man too far. He'd never been good at respecting the lines people drew around themselves, and Tom had been tetchy as hell since Weaver had dropped the bomb about Dr. Glass. It was as though he'd become a different person yet again, with all the stiff, commanding reserve of the professor turned President but the temper of the guy from out in the woods, minus the confidence and sly sense of humor that would have made either of those versions of Mason more tolerable. John hadn't seen much of it in person, but he'd heard plenty.
Getting caught up on business at The Nest hadn't taken long, but coming to terms with everything that had come to light in the previous week had taken a little longer. For one thing, if he really was – hell, he couldn't even think the words without wondering if he'd gone completely insane – there were decisions to be made, stories to be straightened out, and contingency plans to be altered, lest they backfire on him later. And for another ... he still wasn't even sure getting further involved would do Mason any good, never mind himself.
Which was proof positive, of course, that there was no going back for him: he'd never been known for putting anyone else first, except for his own long-lost brats, and sometimes – to his regret – not even them.
The fuckup with Hal taking Tom hostage had finally shaken him out of his fit of brooding; a clearer opportunity for the actual mole to get into places she might not otherwise access unnoticed could not have been imagined. Except by him, apparently; even Five-Oh had a one track mind on the subject, laser focused on the latest Mason drama. With everyone that was everyone either gawking at the spectacle or over at The Nest gossiping about it, he'd hastily nudged Weaver into kicking him publicly off the line, got Lyle to cover for him, then snuck down to the infirmary to take care of business. Sure enough, he'd found Lourdes there in all her eyebugged glory, face crawling with the things; there was a vent in the chapel she apparently used to sneak them in and out of Charleston. He'd seen one lift off her cheek, and shot at it automatically, lip curling in revulsion.
She'd nearly taken him out in turn with that Volm pistol she'd stolen. If Weaver's other spies hadn't got to the gun first and replaced it with a defective model, he'd have been so much fried Skitter-bait. Perfect example why he didn't usually commit the idiocy of volunteering; it seemed to turn off the part of his brain devoted to self-preservation. The bruise on his cheek from when she'd realized it didn't work made a nice souvenir, though; not to mention the incredulous reaction he'd got from Weaver and later Maggie when they'd heard the news.
After that, he'd known he'd have to man up and stop sulking. Time to call it what it was, if only to himself, and make the most of it. So what if it made him feel like the cat that'd finally caught the mouse, meowing for its human's attention? But when he'd finally tracked Mason down and realized what he was planning ... he'd taken it like a slap to the face, and let his mouth write checks he'd have a hard time cashing. Again.
Tom's silence had felt like a kick in the teeth as he'd walked out that door.
He sighed, listening to the murmur of voices as people started collecting in the street out front, and made a disgusted face at himself. Then he headed for the alley to circle around to the other side, and nearly ran into the rough planking of the side door as Weaver opened it to step out.
Weaver checked himself at the sight of John, blinking at him with tired, bloodshot eyes. "Oh. It's you."
John cleared his throat. "Cap," he nodded to him, hitching his pack on his shoulder, then jerked his head toward the side of the building. "Himself in there?"
"Yeah. He said you might come, but I didn't believe it," Weaver replied. He studied John again from head to toe, lingering on the heavy boots, the holster at his waist, the rifle slung over his shoulder with his pack, and the trophy necklace around his throat. "He also said you're the one convinced him to leave Matt behind."
"Little man's a good soldier, but he's a little young for a mission like this, don't you think?" John replied in a carefully matter-of-fact drawl.
"Call it what it is: a damn suicide mission," Weaver scowled, then shook his head. "Don't know what the hell's gotten into you lately, Pope, but I don't trust it. It should be me out there watching his back."
He sounded as irascible as ever, but John could see the wet shine in his eyes, and marveled again at what a year and a half could do to a pair of as stubborn cusses as he'd ever met. And he wasn't counting himself in that number. "Two years ago, you'd have laughed in my face if I'd told you you'd ever say that," he replied, dryly. "Think of it this way: it just took me a little longer than most to succumb to the Mason charm. I held out as long as I could, but it's like catching the plague. Once the symptoms start showing up, you're screwed."
Weaver's jaw worked, but he didn't curse John down; the shine in his eyes worsened for a moment, then he chuckled sourly and punched John in the arm. "Ain't that the truth," he said. "Go on, then. You bring him back in one piece this time, you hear? Then maybe we'll talk about letting bygones be bygones."
Bemused, he followed orders, and found Hal and Ben busy saddling the horses inside. There were five being prepped to go, nickering softly in their stalls; John wondered what they'd have done with the fifth if he hadn't showed. Maggie was sorting gear, and Tom was leaning against the front wall, cane clasped between his hands and exhaustion deepening the lines on his face. But there was a spark in his eyes that John hadn't seen since before Keystone, and when he caught sight of John he tipped his head in unspoken acknowledgement. Whatever he'd been up to since John had seen him last, he'd plainly struck some kind of peace with himself.
"Good. You're here," was all he said aloud.
"Think I could really let you go on a fishhead hunt without me?" John rallied in response. "You make pretty damn good bait, in case you haven't noticed."
"Of course," Tom smiled benevolently back, patting a pocket. "Even restocked my line this time."
Maggie snorted, and the boys exchanged a look; but Tom seemed amused, and that's what he'd been going for. "Brought something a little more useful myself," he smirked, thinking of the insurance he'd secured.
The others held their peace while they finished prepping; the awkwardness he'd been braced for seemed put on hold as he joined in. And when they led the horses out a few minutes later, John found that it wasn't only Mason-fans come to bid the small party farewell, either. A cluster of Berserkers and Nest regulars were there as well, with plenty of backslaps to go around, and Matt Mason's pointed scowl was next best thing to a hug.
Carpeing his Diem didn't usually pay out in those sorts of dividends, but John surely wasn't going to turn them down.
Then it was time. Out into the dark they went: down the black road to whatever destiny awaited.
They kept to the main roads only long enough to meet up with the rebel skitters; surprise, surprise, the only help they ended up gaining from that source was word that Karen had set up an ambush. John could have predicted that; the last word she'd probably had from her spy was that Hal had taken his father hostage, which would have left her waiting either for her prize, or a news update to prompt her to redeploy.
The back roads were ... quieter. They also took longer to navigate, leaving a lot of time for idle conversation as they pitched camp for a nap or picked their way through the countryside of a gray, drizzly morning. John found himself riding in company with Tom about half the time, keeping the conversation fairly light in deference to the not-so-little pitchers' ears. At one point, they detoured through a discussion of the sparse amenities of Charleston's chickenwire jail to a debate about whether it would be better to keep Anthony on as the makeshift chief of police while he still held rank in the Berserkers, or whether Tom should draft orders to differentiate the armed forces between foreign and domestic again. That in turn led to a conversation about civilians carrying weapons, Tom's own mishmash of experience, and a quizzing match about military terminology.
Hilariously, Hal knew more than his dad on that subject, despite the fact that Tom had supposedly lived and breathed military history back at Boston U, and practically slept with a rifle in his hand even in safe quarters in Charleston. But John had them both beat. He'd learned most of what he knew around the watercooler, true; but around that particular watercooler, it had been next best thing to personal experience.
And some things, of course, he did have personal experience in. He would have called Farmer Pickett and his boys rank amateurs for the ambush they tried to spring on 'em a few days into the trip, except for the obvious clues that the clan of half-starved hill folk had been practicing for quite some time. Stringing a semi up to pull across the road on cue must have taken no small amount of work; would have burned another day off their trip to retrieve their supplies, if he hadn't been paying attention. As it was, they still lost an hour in wrangling while Tom tried to convince Pickett Senior to head for Charleston, and the man all but called Tom crazy in response. John couldn't blame the man for not wanting to draw the aliens' attention, but he also thought he was being an idiot to assume their isolation would protect them indefinitely. In the end, it wasn't up to him or Tom, though; Tom had to concede it was still a democracy, and therefore Pickett's decision to make.
Afterward, riding on up the road on the last approach to Mechanicsville, Maggie dropped back to the end of the line with him, striking up a private conversation for the first time since they'd left the city.
"This ... whatever it is you're doing ... it needs to stop," she hissed, pitching her voice low so as not to carry.
"And just what is it you think I'm doing, Margaret?" He gave her a tight smile, nothing for Mason Junior to spike his blood pressure over if he looked over his shoulder and saw them.
"Cozying up to them like this," she continued, irritably. "I don't know how you've managed to convince even Weaver that your intentions are suddenly wholesome, but Hal's not buying it, and you know I know better. When Tom figures out what you're up to ..."
"Come on, Mags. What about any of this gives you the idea I'm up to anything in particular?" he smirked. "I gotta say, I am never going to get tired of watching the Professor go red in the face when I introduce him as the 'no-shit President of the New United States', but I'd hardly call that 'cozying up to' the man."
Maggie narrowed her eyes, growing a little red in the face herself. "Joking with him. Talking politics. Pouring him the last cup of cowboy coffee. Even making up to his kids, for fuck's sake. You think I don't remember what flirting looks like on you?"
The smirk slid off John's face. "Because he's so much better than me? Is that it? Well, before you start slinging mud around, best remember you're no different, darlin'. You and me, we do what's best for ourselves. We survive. And if that happens to include me finally hitching my wagon to the Mason star? Well, there's plenty to go around. I promise not to poach yours; Scout's honor." He held up a mocking version of the familiar three-fingered gesture.
"You were never a Scout," she spat at him. "And I'm not just – hitching my wagon. Hal chose me. I told him everything, and he still wanted me. So no, I will not stand by and let you take advantage of his family."
"Whither he goest, thou wilt go, huh?" He raised his eyebrows at her. "Well, this may come as a surprise to you, Mags, but if you think slanging me to Mason Senior's going to win you any brownie points? You've forgotten just how dedicated I am to watching my own back."
That finally seemed to get through to her; her eyes widened a little, and she threw a sharp glance ahead where Tom and his sons were having a quiet conversation. "What did you tell him?"
"So sure you told Hal everything, are you? Or that he'll keep your secrets from his dad?" He grinned nastily at her. "Feel free to jump into that briar patch if you want to find out."
That did the trick; she zipped her lip, still looking angry but a little less liable to boil over at least, and rode back ahead to catch up to her man. Threats always worked so much better half left up to the recipient's imagination.
Maggie was never going to be easy around him; that ship had sailed a hell of a long time ago. And he knew it was entirely his fault. But he respected the steel in her, if not the bleeding heart under all her thorns, and they'd managed to establish a prickly détente since he'd won a place of his own in the Second Mass. She wouldn't buy pretty words about a change of heart; not from him. But if he could just keep her from rocking the boat, she'd eventually realize there was no percentage for him now in endangering the things she'd come to hold dear.
The others slowed as Maggie approached, then stopped; Tom held up a hand in a fist, and John pulled back on his reins as he caught up to them, dismounting to lead the horses to one side of the trail. "Something wrong?"
Ben pointed down to the road below, where their path would have rejoined the most direct paved route. "Mega-mechs. Two of them, and half a dozen Skitters," he said, grimly.
"Scouting in front of that bunch the rebels warned us about, I bet." Maggie made a frustrated noise. "They just keep circling around and cutting us off."
"Gee, it's like they know where we're going," John drawled. "I wonder how they guessed."
"We've managed to dodge them so far," Hal shook his head. "We can keep doing it; we'll just have to wait for them to pass, and find a way through."
"The Picketts won't be able to, though," Ben frowned. "It looks like they're headed straight for them."
Tom pursed his mouth, looking pained. "You're right. They won't have a chance."
John recognized that look from a certain cliff in the middle of a forest, and felt a swoop of foreboding in his gut. "You are not thinking of going back to warn them. Those people would have shot us over a handful of horses and a few days' worth of food!"
"You don't know that," Tom replied, shaking his head, giving him a piercing look. "As it is, they didn't. And if all we care about is our own family, then we're no better than them – wasn't that your argument, more or less, when you talked me out of resigning my job?"
Maggie gave John another sharp look at that, but the boys were still staring at their father, distressed.
"We're with you, Dad," Ben said.
"But what about Anne and Lexie?" Hal put in. "We've already burned a lot of time. Maybe too much."
"Then we'll just have to do both," Tom decided. "Ride on to Mechanicsville. Scout it out for me; you've got sharper eyes and ears anyway. Get an idea of what we'll need to do to break in and find them. And by the time you're done with that, I should be back; it'll only take me a couple of hours to retrace our path."
"Us," John corrected him, rolling his eyes hard. More Mason nobility. Well; he'd known what he was signing on for. "It'll only take us a couple of hours."
"This isn't a job that requires two people," Tom shook his head.
"Unless they get there before you do. You gonna bet your life on that, with Karen desperate to get you in her hot little hands?" John tugged at the reins again, leading his horse to face back the way they'd come. "I know which way I'd hedge my bets."
Maggie glanced between them, then gave a terse sigh. "If you're determined to do this, then go. The three of us will be fine; it'll make it easier for us to slip through the lines, anyway. But we're not going to wait in Mechanicsville longer than a day. If you don't show up, we're coming for you."
"I'd expect no less," Tom nodded to Maggie, then his sons. "Boys, be careful."
They replied with a jumbled chorus of "You too, Dad," and "Good luck." Then Tom was turning to him, expectant look written all over his face.
"If you're coming, then let's go, Pope," he said, mounting up again, the grim image of an Old West Marshal.
John replied by swinging back into his saddle, and letting the dust struck up from his horse's hooves speak for him.
There'd been more riding after that, he was pretty sure; an empty house lit up as though they'd just missed its residents, and the stomping, humming noises of mega-mechs. But none of it stuck in his mind in any kind of coherent way; between the adrenaline and the stun shot and the look on Tom's face just before he went down, John recalled only jumbled fragments out of sequence. He had no idea if there'd been any sign of the Picketts' fate, or if they'd managed to fall into Karen's trap for no good reason.
The next memory whole enough for him to piece together was the sound of someone screaming: a hoarse, anguished noise ringing through his head while a strange, pulsing light shone through his eyelids. Somewhere in there, he got the impression there'd been a pain stick; maybe even several. His chest hurt like he'd been sat on by an elephant, then hung up to tenderize a little while the torturer was busy elsewhere.
The architecture, when he pried his eyes open to see just how screwed he was, was typical Espheni industrial drag: all scrap metal salvage of various sizes and angles. He was penned in some kind of narrow lattice-walled cell, heated warmly enough that he would have been sweating in his layered shirts and jacket even without the add-on effects of stun shock and torture. The pain didn't mean much to him, though, once he had a chance to orient himself; he'd had worse. But the fucking noise, all hisses and skittering and humming; now that the screams had died down again, it was making the hair on the back of his neck stand up. Plus, there were cables all over him: snaking through the narrow space, tangling his legs, pinning his arms, dangling in his face...
John thrashed, panic abruptly overloading all the pain signals going to his brain. The cables were narrower and less slimy than the harnesses, but nothing he wanted anywhere near him in a structure built by a culture that dealt heavily in biotech. No fucking wonder Tom had woken up swinging when he'd thrown that snake in his face, if he'd experienced anything like that. Hadn't he said he'd been in one of their ships for days?
The screaming started up again, somewhere nearby, as if summoned by the thought; not near enough for a look, but maybe one room over. When he twisted far enough to press an eye to one of the gaps in the lattice of metal penning him in, John could just see the lizardy scalp of a Skitter at the edge of his field of view. Beyond it echoed the voice of someone in more than physical pain – and it was unmistakably familiar. Tom.
Oldest trick in the book for catching someone with a hero complex: give him someone to save. The idiot had stuck his neck out, and even with John watching his back, Karen had obliged. Damn. He'd called it, hadn't he?
The screams tapered off into half-crazed laughter, and John thrashed harder, working his fingers to find purchase on the cables pinning his arms to his sides. Maybe they were doomed, but hell if he was going to go out like a rabbit in a noose. John Pope had never been anyone's prey, and never would be; and Mason deserved more than to go down like that, either. He'd brought that little something along just in case, and from what he could tell the bastards hadn't even searched beyond the external pockets of his clothes.
...Or should that be bitch? Was little blonde Karen a prude? Maybe that was why she had such a hard-on for Hal. If he'd had his betting board in front of him, John would've put serious money down on Hal being the 'one who got away'. Almost made him feel sorry for her. But not quite: collaborators deserved everything they got.
He managed to get one arm freed up enough to move, then worked his hand into the waistband of his jeans where he'd tucked the special holster. Shooting through clothes would be no barrier, not with this gun, but he'd only get to pop one or two shots off before Karen realized she'd picked up an unexpected thorn in her paw. He'd have to be real careful what he aimed at. Preferably her, and not himself or the Professor.
The laughter died down after a minute, and then the overlord herself spoke up. "You find this funny?" Karen said, in the same creepily serene voice the spiked kids always seemed to default to when they hooked up to their Skitter pals. There was something just wrong about alien enslavement tech designed to give its victims a happy buzz whenever it was in use.
"I do," Tom replied, sounding desperate and rough by comparison, panting just from the effort it took to talk. "'Cause you must be so scared, Karen. How's that feel? To be scared?"
The balls on that man. In the old alien invasion movies it seemed like it was always the grunt soldier who went down swinging, the politician who wept like a baby, the sexy woman who stood in for vulnerable humanity, and the egotistic scientist who ended up saving the day; who would have ever predicted that a history professor from Cambridge would be the one who actually embodied the human struggle for the fate of the planet? And not do a half-bad job at it, either, from what John was hearing.
"You will tell me what I want to know," Karen intoned, a little stress finally disturbing the equilibrium of her voice ... and for a long few seconds, the sound of Tom's breathing was interrupted by choking sounds.
John gritted his teeth, carefully easing the Volm-modified pistol further out of its holster. He'd confiscated Lourdes' busted one after she'd clobbered him with it, then carefully swapped it out for a working one later; even Weaver probably didn't know it was missing from the armory. They'd never have let him take it out of the city if they did, but he was damn glad he had it, now. Sounded like he'd woken up just in time.
"So what's next? Pain stick?" Tom demanded hoarsely, after a long, worrying minute.
The sounds of pacing echoed from the same room as the voice; hopefully close enough to kill, before his breakout attempt ran aground. "I think we both know you're beyond manipulating through that kind of pain, Tom," she replied. "Though I suppose I could try it on the companion you brought along, again; perhaps it'll work better if you're not the one suffering? I knew you had a wandering eye, for all your talk when we first met about poor dead Rebecca being the love of your life, but I don't understand what you could possibly see in him."
And then she really got cruel, and brought up Anne and Lexie, and what might happen to an infant touched with a pain stick. John did his best to block out the ache and increased desperation in Tom's voice as he writhed further in his little prison. He'd finally got himself and his weapon mostly turned straight on to the cell door, ready to either shoot out the lock or nail whoever came into the larger room beyond. He'd go as far as he could, try to get to Tom, and if he did get caught, set the thing to overload. Whatever happened, going out in a flash of blue light would have to be better than anything the Espheni might have in mind.
He started to squeeze his finger on the trigger – then paused again as Karen's footsteps moved closer. He froze, holding his breath, as she walked past his cell followed by a Skitter ... and then Tom Mason, upright and looking a little less like hell warmed over than he sounded. Thank fuck.
"Things could have been different, Tom," Karen tsk'ed at him, for all the world like a disapproving mother. "We want you to know you only have yourself to blame."
A humming, crackling noise started up, and a heap of what had looked like metal scrap on the floor beyond John's cell shifted, opening like a box. It wasn't all that large; he'd ignored it as irrelevant before because it wasn't large enough to hide a mech. But whatever it held inside, Tom flinched back like he'd been struck.
"Anne. Lexie. You murdered them?"
"I'm sorry, Tom," she continued in that damnably reasonable tone. "You left me no choice."
Tom lost it then, lurching in Karen's direction. "I'm gonna kill you!" He screamed, trying to get to her. The Skitter that had been standing with him grabbed him around the waist, holding him back ... and John bared his teeth, knowing that if ever there was going to be a perfect moment to shoot, it had arrived.
He aimed carefully, then fired, flinching hard as the energy burst punched through the lock and the stomach of the evil blonde beyond.
"Not if I get her first!" he snarled triumphantly, firing again to try to clip the Skitter's legs for good measure. It wasn't easy; the first gunshot had definitely cored the lock, but the scrapwork door still wasn't giving way, and he was still wrapped in cabling, fouling his ability to quickly shift his aim.
The Skitter let go in a hurry, backing erratically away, and for a second John thought it would bolt. But then it jerked and scooted closer to the sprawled human overlord instead, one upper limb hovering uncertainly over its wounded master, making distressed-sounding chittering noises.
John thrashed again, finally freeing one of his arms, then lurched forward as the cell door abruptly released, sending him sprawling on the rough metal outside. He reached to catch himself, but lost his grip on the gun in doing so; it went clattering across the floor somewhere he couldn't see while he was kicking free of the last cables. Tom hit the floor at about the same time, released by the Skitter when it went to Karen; wild eyes met John's very briefly before Tom started dragging himself toward the boxlike structure Karen had opened.
John hissed through his teeth as he followed Tom's gaze. The bodies of Anne and a smaller form beside her were an expected but still nasty shock, webbed up in some kind of organic fabric, unmoving.
"She killed them," Tom moaned again, a tremor passing through his body. Then he snatched up the gun John had dropped, pointing it straight at Karen's head.
She tried one last time to influence him, blood trickling out of the corner of her mouth. "The defense grid goes operational in a matter of minutes, Tom. You can't stop it by killing me. It's hopeless. Why do you still fight?"
Tom curled his lip. "Why did you stop?" he snarled, then put an end to all further conversation.
The Skitter burst into shrieks at the shot, rearing back. But instead of charging either of them, it rushed out of the room, probably going for reinforcements. Almost as if in answer, the whole structure around them began to brighten and made a humming noise, like nothing they'd ever seen from Espheni tech before.
That could only mean one thing. "Professor. Tom. Tom!" John shouted, stumbling to his feet and shaking the man's shoulder. "Come on! We gotta get out of here before that six-legged bastard brings all his buddies down on us!"
Karen's blood was pooling thickly around Tom's knees; he stared down into it almost blankly, long enough that John started to seriously worry about his sanity. And when he finally rolled his head back and met John's eyes ... the worry grew legs and started walking.
"She killed them," Tom repeated, bleakly.
"And you killed her right back," John said, shaking him one more time. "But you still got three other kids waiting for you. Remember? Somehow, I don't think we're in Mechanicsville. So what do you think she left there waiting for Ben and Hal, huh? For Maggie? You really gonna lie down and die on them now?"
Tom huffed a breath, then tore his gaze away from Karen's cooling body long enough to throw another wild glance at the bodies of his daughter and her mother. "Anne and Lexie ..."
"Wouldn't want you to get yourself killed trying to rescue their corpses," John hissed at him. "Up, Mason! Get your ass in gear! We'll bring this place down later and write their names in the ruins if you want, but for that to happen we have to get out of here and make sure the Volm shut down the fucking grid!"
The sound of distant, roused Skitters echoed through the corridors; Tom swallowed hard, then finally made an effort to stand, free hand snagging at the wall to compensate for his still-weak ankle. "Grid – we are in Boston, then. Or New York. Or Chicago. Or Jacksonville ..." He trailed off on a half-chuckled gasp.
John rolled his eyes, setting his shoulder under Tom's one more time. He was still coming short of breath from the pain in his chest and his knees felt like they'd been stabbed with broken glass, but he was apparently still the most functional one of the pair of them, which had to be a serious strain on the fabric of reality.
He steered them toward the far archway of the room, the one the Skitter hadn't left through, and drew a deep breath as he caught a whiff of moving air: a chilly, salty, dust-heavy, industrial scent that meant out of doors and underscored Karen's choice of towers as a base. "Boston, definitely," he said, then dragged Mason around a couple more turns, where he spotted an unrailed balcony, maybe twenty or thirty feet above the nearest rooftop. From the view, it apparently opened out of the side of one of the legs of the tower they'd spent so many lives trying to blow up a little more than a year before.
In fact, he mused, squinting at its base: maybe even the leg he'd personally tried to light the fuse on. Go figure.
"I think that's the first beautiful thing of theirs I've seen," Tom rasped at his side – head tipped backward, not down. Of course he was looking up. "Makes sense it's also the deadliest."
John cast one glance at the spiderweb of light building swiftly overhead – then turned back to the hallway behind them toward where they'd left Karen. More Skitters were filling the area, now; a couple with pain sticks lifted them and charged as they caught sight of John and Tom.
"Now this is a reversal, ain't it? Brace yourself," he said, snagging the Volm pistol back out of Tom's hand.
The Skitters rushed, and John fired, felling two in quick succession. Then he snagged up one of the bodies, pushed it at Tom, turned the unbalanced pair around, and shoved them toward the edge. He didn't bother to watch as Tom either went over or didn't; he was too busy dragging his own Skitter cushion to the brink.
Twenty, thirty feet; that was survivable, right? They'd fallen farther into that river. He heaved the body up in his arms, staring out over the wrecked city, and tasted bile in his throat. Then another rush of Skitters began, and Tom's voice rose from below, calling his name.
"Talk about trust falls," John muttered, well aware of the irony in having made his President go first. Then he took a deep breath, bared his teeth at the world, and stepped out into the open air.
Boston was even more of a deserted ruin two years after the apocalypse than it had been when they'd left it. No bodies in the streets; no fires burning anywhere. Debris lay thick on the ground, moldy and rotten from weather; most of the salvageable metal was gone, stripped to build the monstrosity they'd just escaped. John had very little idea where they were going, exerting himself to direct their forward progress only enough to dodge the statue-like mechs conserving fuel in stationary positions here and there around the city. He was more concerned about the professor's state of mind.
Because Tom wasn't talking. Not pausing for thought; not simmering in frustration; just – not talking. He clutched his jacket closed over his heart with the hand not wound into John's coat and simply stared, zombielike, in front of them. He had some purpose in the direction his feet were going, so there was some evidence he hadn't just retreated wholly into his head, but whatever was going on in there, he wasn't letting John in on it.
"Tom. Tom," he spoke up again, as they approached a residential street that seemed to make Tom's steps slow even further. "Asshole, talk to me. Tell me where we are."
Tom swallowed, glancing toward one particular house halfway down the block, some kind of muted blue color in the unlit night. "Home," he finally rasped. "I just ... have to see it."
That was where the idyllic prewar Mason family had lived? John took a glance around, and felt his lip curl at the utter ordinariness. He'd never have fit in there, not in a million years, not even if he hadn't ended up in prison. But he could see the stamp of it all over the Masonets Three, definitely.
"See what?" he prompted.
"Where Rebecca ... where she ..." Tom's breath hitched, and he shook his grip free of John's jacket to stagger toward the narrow front walk. It wound between once-pruned trees now liberally festooned with trash, like someone's drunken teepee party gone badly wrong, leading up to a narrow, covered porch.
Rebecca. Wasn't that the dead wife's name? "Tom. You know – you know it wasn't her back on that thing?" he said, cautiously. "That was Anne."
"And Lexie." Tom's breath hitched again. "Yeah. I know. But Karen ... she had this ..." He gestured vaguely toward his face, and his voice cracked as he continued. "I saw her again. Here. Rebecca. Made it feel like I'd never left."
Well, fuck. He wasn't just in fresh mourning for one dead ex, then. John was suddenly, viciously glad Karen hadn't tried whatever it was on him; if she'd made him see his kids again and then snatched them away, he'd have made her pray for death and not cared whether or not he and Tom got away with it. But how the hell was he supposed to dig Tom out of that hole? He needed his boys, not John.
Tom kept walking up toward the porch as he spoke, the foggy night air forming visible, ghostly eddies behind him. They might as well have been in another world, some grey veiled place between life and death; John shuddered, caught for half a second by the impulse to just leave the man to his shades and get the fuck out of there while the getting was still good, then cursed silently at himself. Whither thou goest, he thought sourly, remembering his words to Maggie, then picked up his feet again and followed after him.
The door stood half-open, waiting. Tom went in, drifting hollow-eyed through the house, and tucked a single sheet of paper from the silent fridge into his coat. The rooms were dirty, strewn with discarded clothes and other belongings, probably picked over at least twice between the initial evac and the first wave of looters afterward. Nonetheless, John could see the bones of a happy, healthy life in the picture hooks on the walls and the high quality, well-worn furniture. Mason may have lived soft in those years, but he'd lived, and he'd known what he had. More than John had ever managed.
They ended up in one of the upstairs bedrooms; John felt even more uncomfortable when he realized whose it had been. The silence was sepulchral, apart from the fluttering of a curtain in a half-open window. Tom stood there a long moment in the quiet, staring at the bed, then sat abruptly, face crumpling with anguish. He didn't bother to shield his face from John, or turn away; had probably even forgotten he was there.
If John had thought there was a raw honesty to Tom's face when he woke up in the infirmary, it was nothing to this. He felt scourged, inside more than out, as Tom sprawled backward on the bed, gasping through cries too deep to come to tears. People weren't meant to see each other that nakedly; it was an almost unbearable intimacy, leaving John torn between trying to offer whatever inadequate comfort he could or ducking out of the room to let the man suffer in peace.
Comfort ultimately won out. He was still human, whatever list of sins he had trailing behind him. And he had a gut feeling that if he walked away now, he might as well never have come on the trip at all. He sat down next to the man, near enough to reach out and grip his shoulder, and said his name very quietly. "Tom."
Tom wheezed like he'd just been struck, then curled suddenly into him, ragged breathing worsening into sobs. John found himself with half a lapful of Mason before he could do more than scoot awkwardly back toward the headboard to make room, and froze like he'd just been hit with another stun-shot.
"Rebecca," Tom said again, in the tones of someone whose soul had been thoroughly shattered, then shuddered, damp spots growing where his face pressed against John's shirt. The shaking went on for a while; John patted awkwardly at his shoulder until it stopped, not knowing what else to do. But the other man still refused to let go afterward, and John found himself unwilling to break the spell, either.
He was exhausted, anyway; a long day's ride followed by some nice extended tenderizing by the Skitters, a leap of faith onto an all-too-sturdy rooftop, and a slog down Mason's memory lane had wiped him out. Besides, no one would know to look for them there, right? That made as good an excuse as any. He closed his eyes, just for a moment, feeling Tom's grief washing away at him like a second-hand storm.
They'd finally killed Karen, sure. But had it been worth the trade-off?
A month ago, John suspected, he would have known the answer to that without a second thought.
He jerked awake again without any clear awareness of ever having gone to sleep, Volm pistol in his hand swinging unerringly to cover the noise that had startled him. It wasn't a Skitter, though, or any other threat: just a cat, a sadly bedraggled example of a formerly pampered breed, blinking accusingly at him from the windowsill. The skies outside were still dark, the deep blackness that came after the moon had set and before the sun sent the first faint streaks of color up over the horizon.
"Shit," he muttered, then lowered the pistol again and leaned back.
His other hand had gone sort of cramped and half-numb while he was resting, and his back ached where he'd been propped up against the headboard for who knew how long. John tried to shift to get some feeling back in his fingers, then froze as he the rest of his surreal situation fully registered.
He'd fallen asleep sitting up in Tom Mason's matrimonial bed, with the man himself wrapped around him like a jungle vine. John had managed to keep his pistol arm free somehow, but the rest of him was trapped under encroaching Mason.
Worse: he could feel the dried tracks of tears on his own cheeks. He didn't like to think too often on the reasons behind his oft-stated all-consuming hatred for Skitters, his chief driving cause in the post-apocalyptic universe, but he'd been reminded all too often in recent weeks. He'd dreamed of his kids, and the father he hadn't been to them when it counted. All he could do for them now was kill as many of the invading bastards as he could.
Tom stirred in his lap, probably disturbed more by his voice than the cat, and then froze in the act of rubbing his cheek against John's stomach.
An unbidden smile tucked in the corners of John's mouth; bemused, he set the pistol on the pillow beside him and stroked his fingers over Tom's dirty hair. "Shhhh."
That went on for a minute or so as Tom relaxed again, just a fraction. Then he finally spoke, his voice calmer and more present than John had been expecting. "We have to leave."
"Yep. Give it a second, though; my back's all out of joint. Which reminds me – do you think you left any coffee in the cupboards when you bugged out of here? Might be a good time to try that chewing it dry trick."
Tom huffed a ghostly attempt at a laugh, then stirred again, turning far enough to brace his hands on the bed and lever himself upright. "Always practical."
"You know it," John said, shaking his formerly trapped hand as it started coming over all pins and needles.
Mason looked like a thousand miles of rough road, grime and blood streaked across his cheeks and bags under his eyes the whole Second Mass could have stowed their luggage in. But his eyes were clear; he hadn't gone totally bug nuts like all too many survivors when faced with one loss too many.
"You stole that weapon from the armory," he accused John next, in a conversational tone, watching as John sat up further to reholster the weapon.
"Mmm. Seemed the thing to do at the time," John shrugged. "And I'll take my lumps for it, if I have to. But I've never been easy about the way the Volm keep tabs on their tech; not too keen to play Prometheus, are they? I'd just as soon they gave us the tools to defend ourselves."
"I wasn't criticizing." Tom rubbed both hands over his face. "You and Dan are on the same page there. I weighed the risks as best I could, but ... I suppose we know what happens when I make decisions alone." One corner of his mouth turned up in a wry grimace. "We'll see what their alliance is really worth soon enough."
"When the grid comes down," John nodded, slowly. Then he reached out cautiously to lay a hand on Tom's shoulder. "Hey, man, you all right? I mean, for the trek back? You were a little ... out of it, when we got here."
Tom gave him a troubled look. "All right? No. But I have to be, don't I? If I break now, she's still won."
"You're allowed to be a little fucked up. I just wanted to say, you go throwin' yourself under the feet of any Skitters along the way, I'm gonna leave you to 'em. I'm not gonna miss the final assault, and that's a fact."
Tom snorted, glancing at the hand on his shoulder and then up to John's face. "No, you won't."
"Sure I will," John objected, snatching the hand back. "Or don't you remember the bridge over the Housatonic? That was me with my thumb on the button when Dan kept telling Jamil to hold, no matter how many mechs and Skitters were on your heels. Pretty sure your eldest's never forgiven me for nearly blowing you up that day."
"I didn't exactly disagree with you; or didn't you hear me yelling for Dan to hit it? You waited longer than I would've, as it was." Tom shrugged that off.
"Now that's a damn lie." John shook his head. "You never take a life when you can help it; and you give out second chances like they're goin' out of style. If you'd thought there was any chance Karen might come back to us, I'm sure you'd have shook her hand, too. One of these days that's going to bite you in the ass, Professor."
A wry expression crossed Tom's face. "Oh, I think it probably already has."
John cleared his throat, uncomfortable again. "Well, I did say if you gave me an inch, I'd take a mile."
Tom nodded, then glanced away and changed the subject. "You know, it wasn't so much being here that made that ... virtual reality thing Karen did ... so painful. She said it exploited my subconscious, so she could use embedded cues to get me to spill the Volm deployment plan without me being aware that's what she was doing. That meant that the world in there was all constructed from my prewar memories, but with all my hopes and friendships and attitudes about this world mixed in with them, too."
"And you were there, and you, and you ..." John quoted.
"Yep. Even you," Tom said, with a tired, faded smile.
"And just where the hell did I fit into your picket fence world?" he asked warily, not sure he wanted the answer.
"Why, as the philosophy professor across the hall, of course."
The statement hung in the air for a second; then John barked a surprised laugh. He remembered hurling that in Mason's face right after Keystone. "Good one, Professor."
"I'm not making it up!" he shook his head. "Though I'm fairly certain you still spent a lot of time in a bar; the first time I saw you in the hall you'd forgotten your keys, and Lyle had to bring them to you."
"Damn. Was I any good at it, at least?" He scrubbed at his face, brushing away hair that had stuck to his cheek in his sleep. He wasn't the most fastidious guy, but he really needed a shower, and soon.
"A bit hit or miss. As usual, I suppose." The lines around Tom's eyes crinkled faintly at him. "When I went to you for advice about things feeling off, you tried to tell me to stop trying to find meaning in it all and blow my meticulously constructed little suburban prison to smithereens."
That surprised another chuckle out of him. "That does sound like me. And just who was Weaver, in this simulacrum of yours? The dean of your college?"
He wasn't idiotic enough to ask about Anne. If the wife had still been in the picture, the girlfriend's role in the scenario would have to have been problematic, to say the least. The last thing he wanted to do was remind Tom of that now, given ... everything else that had happened.
"No, that was Anthony. Dan was the homeless guy who kept showing up everywhere I went, wearing placards warning that the End was Nigh. I think he was meant to be the avatar of my conscience, warning me that something was wrong; a blond cop with Karen's face kept showing up to arrest him."
"The hell you say," John shook his head.
"That's what he'd say," Tom replied. Then he fell serious again, staring at John. "Thank you."
"For what?" John replied, surprised. "I'm just ... doing what I do."
Tom reached out abruptly, collaring a hand around John's neck, pulling him in until their foreheads bumped together. "Exactly. You're going to have to be patient with me, John. There's ... not a lot of me left to hold things together right now. But if you weren't here, if you weren't ... you, all I'd have to keep me going was hate."
John swallowed, feeling the warmth of Tom's forehead against his. "Uh, good; 'cause I think you're pretty well stuck with me now, regardless. By now, half of Charleston probably thinks I've been your secret weapon all along, so the usual hostility's not gonna get me much mileage anymore."
"My what?" Tom pulled back far enough to blink at him. "Oh, so that's what's up with Ben. I'm used to Matt drafting you into his little preteen rebellions, but Ben usually doesn't try to defend you."
John screwed up his face. "Yeah, I've might've been a little hard on the kid, before. The spikes still bother the hell out of me, but at least he puts 'em to good use. Didn't think he'd forgiven me, though, for how hostile I was after that first eyebug incident."
"Yeah, well. You did have reason to be," Tom said. The animation in his face faded again, and he stared out toward the still-dark window. "Just like a lot of people would have been suspicious of Lexie. And I couldn't have told them they weren't right to worry. Especially since I don't think Karen was responsible for her, after all."
"What do you mean? Karen was the one who took her – "
" – And also the one who killed her," Tom pointed out. "And just before we left Charleston, Dr. Kadar told me Lourdes had asked for tests on all the other recent newborns as well. I buy her wanting to coopt whatever was done to Lexie, but if she'd made the alterations in the first place, why bother to check the others?"
"Well, that ain't good. Because the alternative doesn't exactly inspire confidence." John replied, brows drawing together. "Why would the bubbleheads want to mess with your kid?"
"They're genetically engineered fighters; maybe they're trying to create an even better model?" Tom shrugged. "I don't know. But at least that option worries me less than the third alternative. Ben said the rebel Skitters think of Red Eye, the one who tagged me, almost as a god. What if he thought the same? I mean, we have no idea what his species was originally like, or any of the Skitters on Earth, before they were harnessed. Maybe he wanted to preserve part of his original species' DNA, or even create some kind of hybrid the Espheni can't control, and infected me with another nanomachine to test the concept while I was their prisoner."
"And why is that worse?" John wrinkled his nose. "Because if the Volm aren't what they say they are, taking the grid down basically equates to bending over and grabbing our ankles. Might be better to just let the radiation kill us."
"I suppose that would take care of my concerns about whether it'll affect any other children I might have," Tom replied dryly.
"Now there's a thought," John shuddered. Then he threw a glance toward the window, and realized with a start that the darkness was starting to fade, the blackest part of the night lightening toward morning at last. "Speaking of kids, though, we probably oughtta get moving. Mags and your boys have probably left Mechanicsville already; there's no telling how long Karen had us."
Tom nodded tiredly, then winced as he climbed to his feet. Jumping from the Skitter palace really hadn't done his healing ankle any good. He limped over to a closet, then rummaged in the back of it amid fallen dress shirts and other urbanite discards, and came out with one of those trendy hiking sticks with a compass worked into its top. "Maybe try the harbor? Without the horses, supplies, or easy access to a working vehicle, Charleston's probably at least three weeks from Boston on foot, and we don't have that kind of time if you were serious about joining the final assault."
"Of course you know how to sail a boat," John rolled his eyes, then got to his own feet, stretching until his spine crackled like Rice Krispies. "Anything else you need here before you go?"
Tom cast a last, lingering glance around the room, then sighed and shook his head, that faint smile back at the corners of his mouth. "She would have told me there was nothing here for me anymore; that I've taken everything worth living for away with me already."
"Mmm." A pang of something sharp and bittersweet went through John at that, and he ducked out of the room hurriedly to head for the stairs. Better make sure the street was still clear before the Professor limped his way out and made himself a target again.
The front door was still half-open, as they'd left it; and because Mason really was the king of chaos, John could hear a shuffling noise of some kind out in the yard. Maybe the cat he'd seen in the window, but maybe not. Nothing to risk getting shot over, anyway. He turned and laid a finger over his lips, casting a warning glance at Tom as he descended the stairs behind him, then edged just far enough around the door to get a look.
At first, it looked like nothing was moving apart from the fluttering debris in the trees ... but then John caught sight of a frozen form, tall and lean with youth, bending over to touch something on the weedy lawn.
"...Hal?" he rasped, calling to the young man in a harsh whisper.
"...Pope?" he replied in disbelief, straightening. "What the hell are you doing here? Hey, is Dad ...?"
"Is that ...?" Tom limped hurriedly around him and down the steps. "Hal!"
"Dad!" The eighteen-year-old threw his arms around his father, hugging him tight. "I'm so glad to see you! By the time we got to Mechanicsville we knew something had gone wrong; there was nothing there, and when Maggie went back to link up at the Picketts and see what you wanted to do, all she found was the horses."
"Yeah, Skitters were there for us, waiting."
"We figured; we saw a Beamer go over. But when we followed it, to see if maybe the outpost had been moved, we ran into a whole mess of rebel Skitters. Ben said they were running from the structure in Boston, that control had collapsed here, but that at least one of them had seen you with Karen before it happened."
"So you came to rescue us," Tom said, tightly emotional.
"Yeah. That was the plan," Hal nodded. "Might have known you'd rescue yourself; you walked out of Michigan and Keystone, why not Boston?"
"So if that was the plan – what brought you by this place?" John pointed out the obvious. "It's not exactly on the way to the tower."
Hal glanced at him, but addressed his answer to his father. "I wouldn't have thought to look here, except – you remember we had to leave Matt's new Ripstik behind in Acton? Or I guess you don't; you were with the Espheni then, too. But I thought, because he didn't get to come along, I'd pick up his old one while we were here. The others are waiting a few streets back.
"Which reminds me – Anne and Lexie!" Hal lit up at that; a painful thing to see, in comparison with Tom's grimace.
"Hal – about that, there's something you need to know ..."
Hal continued right over him, oblivious, breaking into a huge grin. "The Skitters had them! Something about them being in suspended animation, but that they'd wake soon without Karen keeping them plugged in. They wanted to hand them over to the rebel leader, but had we a little bit of an objection to that."
"Wait, wait," John objected sharply, automatically reaching out to grip Tom's shoulder; damn, now he was doing the grounding by touch thing, too. "Suspended animation? They're not dead?"
"Not even injured," Hal enthused. "Though Lexie's ... well, let's just say you're going to be surprised to see her."
Tom swallowed hard. "I thought – never mind what I thought. Take me to them. Now."
Hal obliged, grinning, tucking the toy he'd come to retrieve under his arm as he unshipped his rifle again and trotted slowly down the street away from the house.
"King of chaos," John muttered under his breath, feeling as if the universe had punched him in the nuts. He ought to have known something like that would happen. And that just made it worse: that he'd have been happier if Anne had stayed dead. Poetic justice, he supposed, for the way he'd carried on at the beginning, claiming that the end of the world was the best thing that'd ever happened to him.
True to Hal's word, five horses were waiting a couple of streets away, tethered in the lee of a half-collapsed building. Three people turned to look as Hal hurried toward them, one holding a much smaller figure. Maggie was in front; she smiled in relief as she saw Hal, then covered her mouth in a gasp as Tom limped into view.
"Tom! We thought you were at the tower!"
Ben ran to the Professor, wrapping relieved arms around him as Tom nodded back to Maggie. "And I thought you were supposed to take the boys back to Charleston."
"That means thank you, by the way," John said sourly. Then he nodded carefully at the third waiting figure. "You look a hell of a lot better than you did a couple hours ago."
Anne looked much paler than her usual tan complexion; she'd been staring at Tom, but refocused on him when he spoke. "I wish I could say the same, but I don't remember it," she replied, stiffly.
"Anne. You're alive," Tom finally greeted his woman, sounding more cautious than John had expected given how torn up he'd been. He reached out to touch her face, brushing long dark strands of hair away from her cheek, then pulled her in to touch foreheads like he'd done with John that morning.
"I am," she said, softly.
John couldn't watch that part; he looked down, focusing on the small form in her arms. It was squirming the way all babies did when they wanted loose – except she was too big to be two months old.
"Down. Down!" the little girl complained. Her voice was human at least; just like any ordinary toddler.
Tom pulled away from Anne at the sound, looking down. "Is this ...?" he asked, hesitantly.
"Lexie," Anne said, with a tense nod. Then she set the girl down, turning her towards Tom, obviously anticipating what the kid wanted. But it wasn't Tom the girl tackled; she ran straight around him to John, throwing her tiny little arms as far as they would go around his legs.
"Unca John!" Alexis said happily. "Up!"
John stared wide-eyed down at the kidlet, then glanced over at an equally startled-looking Tom. "Uh, slow down there, princess ..." he said, carefully holding his arms up and away from her.
But she just tugged on his jeans again, adding another insistent, "Up!"
Tentatively, when neither Mason nor Anne said anything, John caved and lifted her with reflexes last used when Tanya had been that size. Whatever she was, she was cute; a tiny, adorable, utterly eerie critter that resembled her mama much more than her papa, except in the intensity of her stare.
"You don't hafta worry," she said, utterly serious in her childish lisp, beaming widely as she patted at his cheeks. "It'll all be okay soon. I can't wait to meet your other daughter!"
John flinched hard at that, fighting to suppress the urge to drop her. Anne made an abortive move to grab her from his arms, looking alarmed; but Alexis just giggled, patting his cheeks again. Then she turned and leaned half out of his arms, making grabby little hands in Tom's direction. "Daddy! I missed you!"
Tom dropped his walking stick and caught her, looking as staggered as John felt. "I missed you, too, sweetheart. But how did you ...?" He glanced back at Anne, the smile dropping off his face in concern. "Where did you hear we might be going to Florida?"
"Florida? I don't understand," Anne shook her head.
Florida? John thought in echo. Then he abruptly remembered the muttered recitation of cities the night before, and drew a sharp breath.
"Jacksonville," he said, staring at Tom. There was a tower there, not fifty miles from where his ex lived. Was that the structure the Volm planned to hit?
Tom tipped his head in a nod of acknowledgement. "It's – one option. We've been calling it Project Orange."
"Then we are definitely not gonna miss the final assault," he said.
He didn't know if it was sane to hope that the creepy fruit of Mason's loins knew what she was talking about, when that should scare him shitless; or that Tom's mind had leapt from John's daughter to Florida without missing a beat; but – it would be the closest he'd been to Tanya and Brandon since the damn war started. Like hell he'd pass that up.
"Then we'd better get going," Maggie said. "Five horses, seven people, limited supplies; at least we won't have to duck Karen's defenses for a while."
"Anne can ride with me for a bit, if one of you boys'll carry Lexie? We'll swap again later."
"Sure. I'll take her, Dad," Ben said, holding his arms out for his little sister. Lexie smiled and went to him willingly, laying her head on his shoulder.
"And Pope ..." Tom finally looked away from his family again, focusing on him again with a strangely intent expression. "John ... remember what I said about patience, all right?"
John had heard someone say once that hope was stronger than loss. He'd laughed at the time, but ... hope was the only reason he was there, with the mole and the Espheni bitch to his credit.
Nowhere to go but up, then, huh?
-(4/5)-