MACHINE

13. A Sheep In Wolf's Clothing

The room was completely still for a moment, until Ezra grabbed hold of a gun which was lying on Rada's worktable. He raised the weapon until it was level with Kane's skull.

"Drop the gun." Ezra demanded, slowly approaching Kane. He set the pistol down gently on the ground and raised his hands above his head.

"Relax." Kane said calmly. "She was the traitor."

"Then why did you shoot her instead of bringing this up earlier and letting us talk to her? We could've decided as a group if she was guilty." Ezra said, his voice level but accusatory.

Jed had risen at the sound of a gunshot and was now standing among us. He said, "You have to know how suspicious that looks, Kane."

"I know." Kane said, his voice almost breaking. He looked genuinely sorrowful. "I just wanted to talk to her myself. I thought, maybe if it was just me she would confess. I knew her better than anyone. And if she was guilty... I wanted to kill her myself."

Ezra approached Kane cautiously, producing a pair of handcuffs he took from Rada from his pocket. He handcuffed Kane to a metal pipe sticking out of the wall.

"You're making a mistake. I have proof!" Kane claimed, clutching a wrinkled piece of paper in his hand. "This is from Botulinum. It's a letter saying to drop Jeremy off by the docks and they'll take him. She was in league with the enemy! It was my duty as her brother to put her out of her misery. She lost her way."

"Just because she was willing to give Jeremy up, doesn't mean she would rat out the rest of us. She might've been trying to protect us. We still don't know if she was the one who ratted us out at the rations station." Jed interjected.

"That's true." Muttered Ezra, regarding Kane with a suspicious eye.

"No, listen!" Kane said desperately. "She revealed where we were going to them last night. Just read the letter!" He pleaded.

Ezra took the piece of paper and scanned it quickly with his eyes. "There's no mention of a name here. You said you found it in her bag?"

"Yes, and when I told her about it she denied it. But I'm sure she was lying!" He said, the desperation he felt in needing to convince us was clear.

Ezra looked down at him with what looked like a mix of pity and fear. "I'm sorry Kane, but we can't trust you right now. You're staying chained up, only to be released if we decide you're no longer a suspect."

Kane held his head low, nodding several times somberly. "Yes. I understand."

Ezra walked away from Kane, groaning and clutching his face in his hands. "This is such a mess."

Jed put a hand on his shoulder, but Ezra shrugged it off. "Sorry, Jed. I just need time to think." He looked over at Eden's corpse with a mixture of misery and abhorrence. "Someone please clean that up..." He mumbled exasperatedly.

Jed did the honors.

The entire experience was frightening. I couldn't imagine someone killing their sibling with such ease and instantaneity.

I had two brothers growing up, and they angered me frequently, but I couldn't imagine killing them without any hesitation as Kane had. I hadn't seen them in years but I still loved them, and I knew Kane felt sad about killing Eden, it was obvious in his expression. But then why had he done it? He hadn't even bothered to wait until the others found out to discuss the issue, he just eliminated the threat before it could hurt them. Cold, alien, determination exuded from him. Although he seemed to care for these people, it was now obvious to me that nothing mattered to him more than the cause. He would likely shoot any one of us if they had betrayed the group like Eden did.