Project Maigo(55)

The answer to that question, I now know, is: fuck yes.

I feel several things at once. My lungs and throat tear with wet coughs. Blinding jolts of pain explode from my ribs with each heave. The surface beneath my back is hard and uneven. Stairs, I think.

And then the rest of my full body pain returns. Screw childbirth, this must beat an afternoon in an iron maiden. But it’s not enough to knock me unconscious, which is both fortunate and unfortunate.

I hear breathing in the dark.

“Endo?”

“I am here.”

“The fuck did you do to me?”

“You drowned.”

The simple explanation is enough. I drowned. He performed CPR. Saved my life again. Damn him. Of course, I saved his, too. People are going to start thinking we’re pals. Feels like a few more of my ribs are broken. “Didn’t hold back, did you?”

I sit up with a grunt, clutching my ribs. The motion moves blood into my legs. The knife wound throbs. “You were pretty convincing. Up there on the roof.”

“There have been times when I would have liked nothing more than to kill you.” His honesty is disconcerting. If he changed his mind now, I’m not sure I could do much to stop him. “But,” he says. “you have been chosen for a purpose.”

He’s speaking about Nemesis. About my connection to her, which I understand a little bit better now. Not how it works, but why she would choose me.

I slide up against a cool, damp wall, pushing myself higher. “You have nice parents, Endo? A good childhood?”

He’s quiet for a moment. Then drops a bomb. “It’s your father.”

“The hell do you know about my father?”

“I know as much about you as you do about me,” he says.

“I know shit about you!” I shout.

“Then, yes,” he says. “I had a good childhood. And kind parents. They are still kind parents.”

“Asshole,” I say.

I hear him chuckle, and I have a strong urge to kick his face in, but I decide that will just end badly for me. “Where are we?”

“Underground,” he says, and I reconsider my boot-to-the-face idea. But then he adds, “Some kind of service tunnel. There’s a ladder here.”

I can’t see the ladder, but I can hear his voice. Turning toward him, I look up. A thin line of light shows the border of a square hatch. I struggle to my feet, leaning against the wall, and I pause to catch my breath. The air here still smells of ocean, but stings with the tinge of toxic chemicals. The burning in my throat and lungs might not be from more than drowning and being revived, though.

With a modicum of strength returned, I shuffle across the hallway like one of the undead, and catch myself on the wall, clinging to a ladder rung for support.

Endo stands next to me. “I know that we will never be...friends.”

I’m suddenly feeling awkward and uncomfortable, like when I was asked to the prom by Jenny Stillwater, my childhood-friend’s little sister. Not only was she four years younger than me, not only did I remember her in diapers, but she was my friend’s sister. It’s just not done. Of course, when I saw her again, three years later and all grown into herself, I wondered if turning her down was actually the best choice. But Endo isn’t about to grow anything feminine.

“I just want you to know…” he says, “you have earned my respect.”

“Just because Nemesis has—”

“Not because of how Nemesis—or Maigo—views you. Or even because of how you view her. But because you repeatedly put your life at risk to do what you believe is the right thing to do. Including returning for me.”

In the silence that follows, I realize that compliment time is over.

“Yeah, well, thank you, fuckface. Would you mind climbing the ladder now so we can find out who ordered that strike and kick their ass?”

“Gladly,” he says. He starts up the ladder, grunting with each rung ascended. As I follow, barely containing a scream with each step up, I realize that neither of us will be kicking asses anytime soon. There’s a clang of metal as he reaches the top and shoves. A flash of light reveals the brick tunnel around us. But then the hatch closes and Endo lets out a little growl. For a moment, I think we’re trapped down here, but Endo climbs another step, gets his shoulder under the door and shoves. Blessed sunlight pours into the tunnel. I expect Boston’s cool ocean air to follow, but I get a lungful of hot, foul smelling filth. I cough for a moment, while Endo exits.

When I reach the top, he bends to help me out. We’re not far from where we started, standing on a walkway in what used to be the Christopher Columbus Waterfront Park. It had been spared destruction a year ago, but it’s now a smoldering ruin. The grass is gone, replaced by ash, whisked away by the wind. Most of the trees were uprooted and either tipped over or flung away. Those that remain upright look like large incense burners, smoke twisting away from the tips of still burning branches. Anything that had been untouched by Nemesis has now been destroyed. Buildings. Wharfs. Boats.