Sand Red

47

I looked from the infected man to her closed expression, and it dawned on me. En's affected accent. I stumbled back from them. He had K1 Georgia. I swear to you I have never taken such pleasure in someone's demise. En would not be on Cerulone. In a fortnight, En would not be at all.

'We're going to kill him,' she said matter-of-factly. 'That's why he's all trussed up like that. He hid it from us,' she said, fury building in her throat. 'He was sick all this time and that scientist was keeping him alive.' My blood grew cold. 'Lars,' she supplemented, and I could hardly hear her anymore. 'My daughter is dying and it's because of him!'

En had turned to face me with fear in his eyes. 'You have to help me,' he said, all mock superiority gone from his voice. 'I fed and housed you for a month! You owe me.' He panted from the effort, and his face was red.

I stared at him, unable to comprehend what he was saying. Lars had kept this from me.

'What about you?' I asked the woman.

'My girl is sick,' she said stiffly.

'Are there others that aren't sick?'

'Just Laszlo. Six years old. His mother's got it. Just a matter of time.'

I thought fast. 'You won't come?'

She shook her head. 'I can't leave her.'

'I'll take Laszlo with me,' I said.

She merely nodded. 'Very well. Though you might have gotten it from Nikhil.' She gestured toward the man, still on the ground.

Laszlo was fetched, and he stood before me, his hands in fists, a fat purple bruise on his forehead. 'I don't want to go,' he said to his mother, his voice clear and high.

'Cerulone has sixteen oceans,' the large woman said, her voice breaking. 'They say it rains all the time.'

'But I want to live here with you.'

'I'm going to die, Laz. I explained this.'

'Then don't die!' he said despairingly. 'I don't know that man! You said don't go to strangers!'

She looked at me. 'He's my friend,' she said.

The boy looked at me mistrustingly.

'Do it for me, alright? We're made of the same water. I'll never really be gone.' She smoothed his mud hair.

'My Ma isn't gone,' I told the boy solemnly, like the two of us shared a secret. 'She died, too, but she's always with me. I feel her right there when I close my eyes at night. She even visits in my dreams.'

Laszlo looked at his mother with big green eyes. 'Will you visit in my dreams?'

'I will,' she said. Her voice quivered. 'I will.'

'Okay,' he said after a long pause. 'I'll go with him.'

Laszlo was loaded into the car, En screaming for me to take him, too.

I got into the driver's seat, and looked at En one last time. 'Rest easy,' I said, and we ground away, Laszlo waving his mother goodbye.

I had left En to die and I felt freed, and stupidly joyous. The wind tore and my hair and I laughed aloud at my fear of the giant hunk against the light, and I compared it to the broken man I had seen.

I was free.