The Hatching: A Novel (The Hatching Series) by Boone Ezekiel

Author:Boone, Ezekiel [Boone, Ezekiel]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: Atria/Emily Bestler Books
Published: 2016-07-04T16:00:00+00:00

Metro Bhawan, Delhi, India

Dr. Basu was not pleased. She did not like Delhi. And Faiz was exhausting her. Normally she found him mostly amusing, but he’d spent the entire drive from Kanpur to Delhi—which should have taken six hours, but instead had taken thirteen—in a state of despair. She’d already been dreading the drive with him because she knew he would be texting or e-mailing Ines constantly, and when he wasn’t talking to Ines, Dr. Basu assumed he’d be talking about Ines. But literally five minutes into the trip, his Italian girlfriend had texted and informed him that she was now his Italian ex-girlfriend. Their relationship had moved too quickly, Ines wrote, and she was calling things off. Dr. Basu had a fleeting moment of relief—which made her feel immensely guilty—at the idea that she and Faiz could now talk about seismology instead of Ines, but of course, Faiz was distraught. Which was the lesser of those two evils, she thought, having to endure Faiz’s misery or his ecstasy? The longer the drive took, however, the angrier she became at Ines. She hadn’t even met this woman, but there was a part of her that wanted to fly to Italy just to give Ines a piece of her mind. How dare she break up with him by text? And worse, after an hour or so of Ines and Faiz texting back and forth, Ines dropped the bombshell: the real reason for the breakup was that she’d finally had a chance to read some of his work and she couldn’t be with a man if she didn’t “respect” his research. Saying she didn’t respect Faiz’s research was as good as saying she didn’t respect Dr. Basu’s research either.

Thirteen hours in that car, and most of that time spent reassuring Faiz that he was smart, which was true, and an excellent worker, which was mostly true, even if he occasionally—okay, often, well, always—made inappropriate comments, and that he deserved to be treated better. By the time they arrived, she had a throbbing headache. No surprise, then, that she was beyond annoyed that she could still not figure out what the hell was causing the odd seismic readings.

Faiz waved her over to where he was. He still looked miserable, but he was doing his best, holding his tablet and phone and talking with a man wearing a suit and tie. When she got closer, she saw that the man had a Delhi Metro Rail Corporation ID badge clipped to his jacket. He held up one hand.

“I’m sorry, but I’m not authorized to let you go any farther.”

Dr. Basu pointed to the man’s ID badge. “Are you not the supervisor?”

“I am, but—”

“There are no ‘buts’ to this. One of our sensors is below. We need to see it.”

The man shook his head. “Yes, your assistant already told me that.” Dr. Basu did not bother to correct the man about Faiz’s status. “And you had a man go down yesterday. It’s disruptive.”

Dr. Basu stared at him and didn’t say anything for a few seconds.

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