The Travels of Scout Shannon Books 1-3

Chapter 26

26

“Are you going to cut me free?” Scout asked, indicating the knife with her chin.

Clementine shook her head sadly.

“No witnesses?”

Clementine nodded.

“You want this to be a fair fight.”

She shrugged one shoulder.

“But like your friend said, this can’t ever be a fair fight. You have advantages I don’t. So what is it?”

Clementine stepped closer, putting a hand on each arm of the chair and leaning in until her nose all but brushed Scout’s. Her eyes stared into Scout’s, demanding that she understand.

“I see,” Scout said slowly. “You don’t want a fair fight, but you do want a fight. Not death by poison or lack of air or invisible darts. You want me to fight with everything I have. Fight and fail.”

Clementine grinned again, delighted that Scout understood her so well. Scout flinched as Clementine stepped back and tossed the knife into the air, but it came down gently onto Scout’s lap.

Clementine brushed her fingertips over Scout’s cheek as she ran past her. Then she was gone.

Scout looked at the knife on her lap. How long would Clementine wait for her to cut herself free before she came back to finish the job? She’d rather not find out.

It took more tries than Scout could count to get the knife balanced on her knees and then bring her knees up to where she could grasp the handle in her teeth. She had to give up on more than one attempt when the knife started to slide away from her; if it fell to the floor, she truly was lost.

She was exhausted in mind and body, bleeding profusely from each wrist and ankle, thickheaded still from the lack of oxygen not far enough in the past.

But she was still lucky. And once she had the knife in her teeth, cutting the bond from her wrist was surprisingly easy. Either that or her injured wrist was too numb to register pain as she sawed at the cord. After the first hand was free, the others quickly followed.

Clementine must have run back to the hangar, but Scout didn’t follow. Instead she fell to her knees beside her dogs, gathering Shadow up into her arms. He was cold already, and all the tears she hadn’t shed since Warrior had died flooded out of her in a deluge. Clementine could come back and stab her from behind at any moment and she wouldn’t know, wouldn’t hear, wouldn’t care. Shadow was all she had left of her family from before, and now he too was gone. She had nothing.

It wasn’t a whimper, really, just a soft sort of complaining breath. Still hugging Shadow tight to her chest, she reached down to put a hand on Girl’s chest. She was cold too, so very cold, but under Scout’s palm, a heart was still sporadically beating.

“Girl,” Scout said, giving the dog a shake, but she didn’t wake. She tried again, louder and with more shaking, but still the dog slept on.

Perhaps there was something in the medical supplies to bring her out of it? Some sort of adrenaline?

Or perhaps she just needed to sleep it off?

Scout looked down at Shadow still in her arms. She didn’t want to leave him just lying on the floor, but she wasn’t strong enough to lift both at once. She carried him first past the demolished communications room, through the barracks into Viola’s rooms. She set him gently at the foot of the bed, pulling some of the comforters around him like a nest. He always liked to sleep under covers, even on the warmest of nights.

Scout went back and gathered the much heavier Girl up into her arms. Girl did whimper this time, but she still didn’t wake. Scout brought her to the bed and put her inside a nest of covers as well. Viola’s room felt warmer than the rest of the station. Perhaps the air was purer here as well. Perhaps it would be enough.

Tubbins lifted his head to look at Girl, but if he held any animosity toward the animal who had crushed his pelvis, he seemed to have let it go now that she too seemed in danger of death. Scout scratched his ears and listened to the loud rumble of his purr.

Then she went out to the hangar to find Clementine.

If she had been traveling through the ceilings before, she wasn’t now. She had left a very clear path through the dust, even occasionally swiping a hand over a dusty tarp to leave a sloppy sort of arrow pointing the way.

She had the gun. Scout didn’t know if she would use it, but she had it. Scout had Ottilie’s knife as well as her own not-much-larger utility knife.

She also had her slingshot. Scout drew that out of her back pocket, taking a round stone from her side pocket and setting it in the cup. She kept it in her hands, not yet drawn back. It wasn’t remotely as reassuring as a gun.

Then again, Scout had never seen that gun fire. She doubted it was defective, but she’d lay even odds that no one but Warrior could fire the thing. That seemed to be the way the bulk of her equipment functioned.

Did Clementine also have the lens? Could she fire with just one, like Scout had read the tablet with just one?

Scout bit her lip but kept following the trail of footprints. In the end, it didn’t matter whether the answers were yes or no. Either way, she’d get maybe one good shot with her sling, and only if she was very, very lucky.

She wasn’t surprised that Clementine had turned to watch for her approach, or that she was waiting for her under the open hatch Scout and Ottilie had found. Scout was certain now that this was how Beatrice and Felicity had entered. How they knew to come here, how Clementine had summoned them when she had never been left alone, would have to remain a mystery so long as Clementine remained silent.

Clementine had the gun in her hand but was spinning it through her fingers, fast and nimble. Scout didn’t waste what would likely be her only chance. She drew back and fired on Clementine, fishing out another stone before even looking up to see if she had hit.

Clementine’s mouth was an almost comical gaping O as she wrung her hand and watched the spinning gun disappear into the darkness under a tumbling down stack of crates.

Scout drew back the next stone and fired. Clementine ducked and the stone bounced off her shoulder. She straightened, her eyes dark with fury. She raised her hands, gesturing towards herself with her fingers. Scout didn’t need a second invitation. She fired again and again. Clementine dodged the stones, never jumping for cover, preferring to simply twist her body out of the way each time. It was indescribably frustrating. Scout was a dead-eye shot with her sling, but that didn’t matter, not against inhuman speed.

The last stone. Scout pulled it back and fired without aiming, screaming her rage as she sent the last of her hope hurtling toward the girl who was so much more than a girl.

Perhaps it was the scream, but Clementine hesitated. Not long—perhaps a fraction of a second—but long enough. The stone struck her square between the eyes and she stumbled back behind a pile of crates.

Scout took deep breath after deep breath, letting her anger go so she could focus. She didn’t believe for a second that Clementine was down. She might be circling around her even now, keeping to the shadows that Scout’s eyes couldn’t penetrate or even crawling across the ceiling like a spider. Scout looked around and saw the gleam of metal in the dim light.

Someone had left a pry bar wedged between the slats of a crate, like they’d been in the middle of unpacking when they had just given up and walked away from all their belongings. Scout tucked the slingshot away and grasped the bar, putting a boot on the crate when she needed more leverage. At last the bar pulled free and she stumbled back.

She had a weapon. Unless Clementine found the gun, it was more than she had.

She started to raise it up as she walked closer to the light from the open hatch, but before she even had it halfway there, she was knocked to the ground. Clementine had circled around her—three-quarters of the way, at least—and the full weight of her knocking Scout to the ground was more than enough to drive every bit of air out of her body.

Scout wheezed painfully, unable to draw a full breath despite the stars in her vision. But she kept a tight hold on the pry bar.

Clementine climbed over her, one knee pressed tight to her side, the other coming down on the elbow of the arm with the pry bar. Scout whimpered as the bones in her elbow joint ground together. Clementine just smiled.

Her fingertips traced over Scout’s face, brushing back the loose strands of sweat-dampened hair, then cupped her flushed cheeks. It was almost gentle, but Scout wasn’t fooled. Not after what had happened to Felicity.

She heaved her entire body with all she had, but the girl was just too heavy. She couldn’t budge her. Not even the hands softly touching her face were dislodged. They slipped past her cheeks, almost stroking her earlobes before positioning themselves on her neck.

This was it. She was going to tighten up now, and then Scout would be gone. It would all be over, as fast as switching off a light.

Scout closed her eyes. She wasn’t afraid, not exactly, but she didn’t want that lunatic grin to be the last thing she saw in this world.

A scream split the air. Scout thought at first that she was the one screaming, but biting her lip didn’t cut off the sound.

She opened her eyes. Clementine was still straddling her, but now she was also showering her with blood. Or something like blood; even in the dim light Scout could see the color was wrong.

Something in the darkness had a hold of Clementine’s forearm. Scout saw bright white canines buried deeply in the flesh. Clementine screamed, sobbed, and struck at the thing. The thing pulled back, tearing a mouthful of Clementine’s flesh away with it.

And exposing Clementine’s shining metal interior.

The thing growled, then leapt again, this time striking higher and knocking Clementine off of Scout’s chest. Scout raised the bar and brought it down hard on Clementine’s blonde head. It clanged loudly and left a dent but didn’t stop Clementine’s struggle with the darkness.

“Girl?” Scout said. Her eyes couldn’t make sense of the whirl of motion in the half-light, but then the dog turned to look at her and she saw she was right. Girl had recovered, and had come to her rescue.

Clementine flung the dog off her and dragged herself with frightening speed across the floor. One arm hung useless against her chest, but the other was enough with her feet to propel her to the mountain of detritus under which the gun had disappeared.

“Girl!” Scout shouted, but too late. Clementine had the gun aimed at the dog. She rose slowly to her knees, then laboriously got to her feet without the use of either arm, her aim never wavering. Girl growled, every hair on her back standing on end in the most impressive threat display Scout had ever seen her do.

“Don’t shoot her,” Scout said, getting to her own feet with hands raised high. “Please. She’s not a witness. Just me. It’s not like she really hurt you. You have nanites too, right?”

Clementine never took her eyes off Girl. Her breath was coming in labored gasps, exertion and pain taking their toll. Scout was winded too. She lowered her hands, then slipped one behind her to palm Ottilie’s little knife.

She was only going to get one chance.

“Please, Clementine. It’s just a dog.”

For just a moment, the gun started to shake. Then it began to lower toward the ground.

But then she changed her mind, raising it again, finger starting to squeeze the trigger. Scout felt a rush of adrenaline, and for once she was the one moving with inhuman speed. She rushed to Clementine, seeing each motion as a separate frame of time. Step. Step. Grasp Clementine’s arm. Not the shooting one, the wounded one. Use the arm to pivot around her body.

Bury the knife up to the hilt in the place where she was fairly certain the girl didn’t have a kidney.

Clementine screamed again, then fell spasming to the floor. The gun went off and Girl yelped in alarm, but the shot was wild. In the distance, one of the mountains of junk underwent a minor avalanche of crates, tarps, and dust.

Then all was silent. Clementine was still. It was over.

Scout fell to her knees, then opened her arms for Girl to rush to her.

“Good dog,” she said, sobbing into the dog’s furry neck. She was wriggling, squirming excitement. A minute ago she’d been a hellhound intent on murder. Now she was just a puppy, albeit a badly trained one.

“Hey, Girl,” Scout said. “You need a name. And I think I know just the one.”