Cyn ran her tongue over her teeth, and one of them pricked the underside. Dentists were probably nonexistent. Could she even get cavities? She was nervous and wished she had a glass of water to wash away the odd taste in her mouth. Would they want her to speak next? Most of the Worshippers attended, to hear about a new way to fight the Ghoul Lords: her. It was odd to be the focus.
She smiled grimly.Better than going nowhere, as Willow had said.
This morning… make that this evening, had begun oddly, with her waking in bed with Vargr and Rutger—and that part was good. But also, and she wrinkled her nose at the memory, also with her picking a bug leg or two off the pillow near her face.Yuck.
The video Locke was projecting stopped when Mo left the door of Big Daddy.
She raised her head at the commotion at the rear of the meeting. Someone new had arrived, and people were slowly stirring, letting them through. She drummed her fingers on the butt of her new gun. Her big, new, gold-embossed gun. Made her feel so badass. Which would likely be needed, that attitude, if they went to find Big Daddy.
That vehicle was a long, long way away from here. She hissed in frustration. “Fuck it. Why can’t anything ever be easy?”
“A pity the viewpoint is so low,” said Locke from where he kneeled, unplugging the cable from Little Mo. “We can’t see shit, except the wheels, legs, and doorframe of that Big Daddy vehicle.”
“Meh.” She shrugged. “It is what it is. Mo is short and ground-hugging.”
Mo waved his front limbs as if in agreement. The more she saw of him, had it/him hanging around, the more she found him cute. Considering Mo was all metal and a programmed AI… She must be going crazy.
Cyn raised a finger to make a point when something appeared at the corner of her eye. Her mind’s eye too. Which was when she recognized the craziness in the air. The pink Lure threads were thick and thickening more by the second. Her heart clenched. She’d never seen it like this before. Not at night.
Dread crinkled through her bones, up through her chest, invaded her mind, then something sloughed away.Bing.
Worry. Worry had gone bye-byes. The world was good and fine and dandy.
She nodded as the doctor advanced with a serene smile on his face. She knew him, didn’t she?
“Dr. Nietz,” people were muttering.
“The doctor! Let him through.”
“Why itisFrank,” Maura said, her eyes wide.
Cyn’s vision glitched, snagged, blurred, like a camera malfunctioning.
Something was wrong here.
Practice makes perfect. You know. You know what’s wrong.
“I have to take Cyn away with me,” announced the doctor, loudly, and his voice sounded somoist.
This is wrong.
“Come with me, dear.” Half his words seemed to be in her head and not spoken aloud.
This is very wrong.
Again, everything did a hop and a skip, and she saw the Lure threads thick and swirling, swarming about, wriggling into heads, into eyes, mouths, even into hers.
The doctor is what’s wrong. He has the Lure.
Spitting, she backed from the offered hand, wrenching at the threads and flinging them away from her, only to find the drop-off of the Parklands at her back. Go further and she’d fall into that trench. Only yesterday, they’d sat here.
“Come,” the doctor beckoned, his smile widening, widening.
He jarred again, blurred, and refocused as this grotesque, decaying zombie figure. Wounds at the neck spilled liquids, flesh flaked and dropped to the floor. The exposed white parts steamed as if they burned.
Cyn stared, making sense of this.
That smile wasn’t so happy anymore. He struggled. He hurt. He burned. The pain seared her as she followed it into his head.
