Fuse (The Grid Series Book 2) by Nicholas Turner

Author:Nicholas Turner [Turner, Nicholas]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Nicholas Trieste
Published: 2021-04-01T22:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Acacia banged on the door to the Hub, praying that Gabriel would answer. She was completely out of breath. The meaty part of her fist where the pinky met her palm started to bruise, then bleed from the incessant banging. She felt the bones begin to grow stress fractures just above her wrist as tears streamed down her face for her old friend. His body still etched in her mind, sagging to the ground as his head disintegrated in a brilliance of light. “Gabriel, please fucking open the door. Babyle’s gone. They killed him. Those monster machines killed him.”

“What machines?” His voice crackled in the air.

“The ones I used to work for, the ones we studied. They have them out on the streets now. They did it, Gabriel. They finally did it. We’re fucked. They have the cyborgs up and running.” She waited for a reply. The door opened and Gabriel emerged.

“Where is everyone else?”

“I made Jeremiah take them. They knew his name. Everything we built and coded is gone. They got through it immediately. They knew his name, Gabe.” She looked at him, trying to guess what was going on in his head, but she came to no conclusions for the first time in a long time.

“Come in,” Gabriel moved back so Acacia could enter the Hub first. He waited, scanning the area to see if anyone had followed her, then tailed her down the stairs.

She went to the kitchen, pulled water from the sink, and filled a hard-plastic cup with it. She drank at least three to get her dry mouth to fix itself. Her hands trembled as she tried to find something to occupy her mind. Babyle’s death was the only thing that replayed over and over. He was there, then he wasn’t. He existed. Was a person. He was my friend. Now he’s only a memory.

She paced back and forth, trying to figure out anything that would help her besides drugs. Can’t become like Crow. Acacia looked up to Gabriel standing in the doorway and wondered how long he had been there. Staring. Processing the information being provided to him. A savant in his own right.

Say something, Gabe. Just say something! There was silence.

“Why won’t you talk?” Acacia asked him.

“I’m trying to feel something for the loss of my friend and partner, but I don’t. I feel numb. Closed off. That the walls of my world have gone up and I have not come to terms with the fact I will never see him again, or listen to a single reply.”

“But you know he’s gone.”

“I do.”

“You never made much sense to me, Gabe, but I’ve always known that about you. Through all of this. But now, I don’t know. You’re somewhere else entirely, someone who can’t function as a normal person functions.”

“I know, and I’d rather not function as a normal person, ambivalent to the world around them, working to survive while someone laughs in the ivory tower.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“I know what you meant; I was only stating my own reasoning.

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