The Freeze (Barren Trilogy, Book 3) Read online

  In other hotels before the world ended, you could hear kids yelling, footsteps, maybe even dogs barking if it was pet-friendly. This had nothing.

  If we retreated to the Visitor Center, this was what our whole existence would be like. I had to remember that.

  “Dad?” I called, stepping down the hall. We were at room four-twenty nine.

  Then, four twenty-eight.

  I burst into a run.

  Sheri had pretty much confirmed he was alive.

  “Dad!” I shouted. He would be so shocked to see me.

  There was a bit of dying light coming in through the window at the end of the hall. It was just enough for me to see the door I stopped next to and the number on it.

  414.

  It was a number I hadn't dared dream about, but now it was here. There was no noise coming from inside.

  I took a breath and knocked.

  Exactly seven seconds later, it creaked open and the tall form of a man stood there. His face was long and tired and he had some beard, which was strange for him.

  “Laney?” Dad asked, obviously trying to keep his voice down. “Laney—they're looking for you.”

  “Huh?” I asked, but not before the door behind me came open with a loud squeak.

  “Freeze.”

  Alana screamed and I turned around to find a flashlight streaming into my face. I squinted and just behind it was a man and woman, both in sunglasses. They were the creepy X-files couple from the expensive restaurant and now they were here, cornering me against my father who was still alive and now, might not be in the next few minutes.

  They had found me and figured out where I was going. But before I had the chance to think of how, the man stepped forward, lifted a wallet, and let it fall open to reveal a very fancy, very intimidating badge with an eagle.

  “Agent Chalmers,” the man said. “My partner and I are from Operation Stardust and we'd like to talk to you.”

  Chapter Nine

  Sheri had let us walk right into a trap. I wondered what she had gotten out of the deal.

  “Um...why?” I managed. I turned back to Dad to see his pupils shrinking in the new light. He was dressed in a wrinkled work shirt and his blue dress pants. They had stains all over them like he'd been rummaging through food. Or garbage to grab some grub for Sheri. His new stubble cast little shadows on his face.

  “Laney, just do what they say,” Dad said. “They got here about an hour ago. Please, just do what they tell you. I thought I lost you and I don't want to do that for real.” He was overflowing with emotion, with both joy and sadness and everything in between. He opened the door and extended his arms like he wanted to hug me, but Chalmers cleared his throat. This was business.

  I had found my father alive and all these agents cared about was freaking business, whatever that was.

  I exchanged a look with Alana and Jerome. “You just want me, right?” I asked.

  “All of you. Inside,” Chalmers ordered. He closed his wallet badge and stuffed it back into his pocket, which had a pistol holstered right next to it. The woman had one, too. Chalmers had a face like stone and his sunglasses looked like pits into some void. I'd seen the void before. They looked like death itself.

  “Laney, please,” Dad said, sounding helpless. I hadn't heard him like this since he got the news that Mom definitely was not going to make it more than another few months. The result of this would not be good. This was somehow even more awful than not finding him here at all.

  I should have known. For one moment I'd let down my shield and now we were all going to pay.

  But I stepped into the hotel room.

  The sheets were off the bed like there had been a struggle. Dad had fought when the agents came to his door, probably pretending to be Sheri. They might have cuffed him and told him they were looking for me, that I was associated with a guy who had run over a major commander in the military. My mind spun but the numbness returned. I'd go on trial for being a terrorist or something. Some parts of the government were still running and it wasn't the good ones.

  Dad backed away to stand by the bed. “Laney—I can't believe you're alive. How did you do it?” He actually pinched himself. Dad thought he must be dreaming. All this time he had been grieving my loss, maybe even too scared to go and face it, until the agents came and told him they were hunting for me. Soon he would be mourning it all over again. “I thought you were dead. Laney, I would have come for you if I knew.” He sat on the bed and put his face in his arms.

  And he sobbed with guilt and shame. He had given up hope for me out of pure logic. I got that.

  “Dad,” I said. “You heard the news. I should be dead. You didn't know. I should have died with the whole rest of the state. I only lived because of a freak field trip that you and I both didn't know was way underground.” I lunged into his arms and then he cried into my shoulder. I kneeled there, his rock, while his guilt soaked into the shoulder of my shirt, salty and miserable.

  “I'm sorry,” he said. “I failed you.”

  The flashlight shifted behind me. It illuminated a mostly-empty bottle of whiskey next to the microwave along with open packets of junk food, used tissues, and a couple of pints of more alcohol. My head hurt just looking at it.

  Dad never drank. At least, not in front of me.

  “We need to begin,” Chalmers said.

  I wanted to tell him where to go while I held Dad and tried to squeeze the pieces back together. “I'm so glad you're alive,” he said. “I'm so proud of you. You're such a smart, tough girl.”

  “And I probably stink,” I said as we let go of each other.

  Dad sniffed. “You're no worse than me,” he said, flashing a real smile.

  “Or me,” Jerome said.

  Chalmers cleared his throat and Jerome went off on him. “Dude,” he said. “Can't you see that after weeks of traveling across deadly landscapes, storms, and other horrible crap no one should have to go through, that Laney needs some time with her dad before you ruin it?”

  I expected the agents to draw their guns, but Jerome kept both of his hands up. He moved to stand in front of me.

  “She does,” Alana said. Her eyes brimmed with tears. This was triggering her. I could only imagine what was going through her head right now.

  “I'm sorry,” Chalmers said. “We are just here on business. We have others to make proposals to tonight and there's a very bad storm coming. Please, sit anywhere that you can.”

  I sat on the bed next to Dad. I was glad he was here, even though he didn't look like he was in the shape to negotiate with goons.

  “Proposals?” I asked.

  “This is Agent Montoni,” Chalmers said, waving to his partner. She stood there like she was the guard ready to mop the floor with us on command.

  Alana and Jerome stepped off to the side as Chalmers and the woman stepped into the room. The woman closed the door behind her. I waited for them to reach for their guns but they remained still.

  The waiting was the worst. Always the worst.

  Chalmers cleared his throat. “I'd like to introduce ourselves. My partner and I are involved in Operation Stardust. Basically, it's a plan conceived by the government to ensure that mankind can survive an apocalyptic event such as this.”

  I had already heard about Operation Stardust from Dr. Marson, but if the guy was still alive by any chance, I had to protect him. He had told us it was a plan by the government to save the important people from starvation if that one giant star ever blew up and sent a ray of death at our world. Dr. Marson had agreed to be on the life and death panel—the panel that would decide who got to eat and who would be left to starve—in exchange for money. Of course, the guy didn't tink he'd ever have to do it, but he needed the cash to pay off his student loans. Maybe, if I was lucky, these two agents hadn't planned on it either and they still had a bit of civilization left in them.

  “Okay,” I said. I faced Dad, but he looked just as confused as I was. I wondered what the agents had told him wou
ld happen when I got here. They might have lied. “So what are these plans?”

  Chalmers set the flashlight down among Dad's used tissues and booze bottles and junk food wrappers. It formed a circle of light on the ceiling while the woman stepped back to stand near the door. We were trapped in here between her and the closed curtains.

  “What do you all know about natural selection?” Chalmers asked in a calm, almost scary tone.

  “It's evolution,” Alana said. She sounded small, like she could barely talk.

  “Yes,” Chalmers said. “It is part of evolution. In nature, all creatures are subject to dying. You all know this. Some are better at surviving longer than others, and making it long enough to reproduce. Basically, nature selects which creatures are going to survive, making the entire population stronger. Mankind has lived in a state outside of nature for a long time now. Now that a gamma ray burst has struck the planet, natural selection has become a part of our reality again.”

  It was eerie. This agent was echoing the exact thoughts that had spun through my head ever since we got to Colton and had time to reflect on all the death and cruelty the world had become. He was right. Life was just about survival now and nothing else. Nature didn't care about anyone's hopes or dreams.

  “I...I see what you're saying,” I managed. I couldn't see where this was going. Did he want us to understand why they were going to kill us?

  “That's good,” Chalmers said, flashing a smile at me. There was some kind of plot in those eyes. Some plan. I could see it in the dim light. “I'm glad we're on the same page. How about you?” He faced Jerome. “And you?” He looked to Alana almost like she was an afterthought.

  She nodded. Alana was going to her silent place again. I thought of Tony and Gina and the others who were scattering. My suggesting we split up had saved them. At least I had done something right.

  Chalmers backed away a bit to stand by the door. “We have a man named Norman Marson,” he continued. “He has told us a lot of interesting things about you, Laney, and you also, Jerome. It was how we were able to determine that you would come here.”

  I balked.

  Dr. Marson had ridden in a truck for hours with Tony and Mina. One of them must have told him about all of our plans to find our families.

  Then the military caught him again after our escape from the base and extracted some answers out of him. I could see Dr. Marson cracking under pressure. He had run over General McElroy. The government might have even used torture to get the answers they needed. It was no wonder the helicopter had almost found us at the farm.

  “Interesting things?” Dad asked. He sounded so weak and so tired. “What interesting things about my daughter do you mean?”

  Chalmers smiled again. There was something creepy about it. “Your daughter—and these other two teens—survived a radiation event that wiped out half of the country. They then escaped from certain death across desert, reached their hometown, and survived days of deadly dust storms. They made it through gunfire. A gang of men bent on torturing and killing them. Surely you can see where we are going with this.”

  I was beginning to realize that maybe we weren't going to die after all. My heart raced with anticipation, with a mixture of hope and dread. It was the strangest feeling.

  “Operation Stardust is here to make sure the strongest people are able to survive the mass starvation and possible new ice age.” He looked between all of us. “Our efforts are meant to focus on the fit, driving all resources towards them. We believe that Laney and Jerome, the ones who stole a truck full of food from one of the military bases and rammed the gate down to escape, qualify to be saved.”

  The room got a lot bigger and Chalmers was the only thing in it for a moment. These people were offering safety. Food, water, and shelter, the things I had no idea how to get after this. But then reality came back down and the room got a lot smaller than it had been before. The shadows were back.

  “So we can be saved,” I said. “What's the price?” They weren't going to help us for free and the thought of spending life in a gated military base while others starved turned my stomach. It did not make me want to eat.

  “Laney has a good question,” Jerome said.

  Chalmers glanced at his partner for a second and back to us. “Your services at times, of course,” he said. “Food gathering. Scouting for resources. Those skills will be very valuable in the months and years to come.”

  A horrible taste rose in my mouth.

  They wanted us to join the people who were stealing from the mouths of others, depriving them of a chance to live just because they weren't strong or important enough.

  “In return, you will be offered shelter, clean clothing, beds, and of course food and water,” Chalmers continued. “You will help begin a new society once conditions calm down and we will not allow David to come anywhere near you.”

  I looked to Dad. There was terror there in his eyes.

  He was scared of what I might be, what the apocalypse might have turned me into. I knew that horror all too well and I couldn't inflict it on him. I wasn't going to be one of the Davids. I knew what it was like to deal with them.

  “I can't,” I said. “I mean, I just wanted to find my dad. That's all I did all of that for.”

  Chalmers's features didn't move. I felt like I was looking at a statue and it was some kind of mental torture. “You wouldn't want your friends and family to starve, would you?” he asked, pacing again. He had this whole marketing thing worked out. “If they remain outside of our shelter, they will, or succumb to the cold conditions that are coming. And you certainly wouldn't want to see anything happen to your father, would you?”

  Dad wrapped his arm around me and cleared his throat. “Laney should not have to worry about me. It is my responsibility to look out for her.”

  There was so much more there. He glanced at me out of the corner of his eye. I knew what it meant: save yourself. Dad was willing to die to let me go free from these goons. He was already putting his hand on his other leg, ready to stand. Chalmers seemed to make note of that because he moved his hand towards his pistol just a couple of inches.

  “Nobody try anything,” Jerome said. “It's okay.” His gaze darted around and he moved to stand on the other side of me.

  “Listen to him,” Chalmers said. “I highly recommend that you agree to come with us. No harm will come to any of you if you cooperate.”

  A memory of the soldiers shooting at the civilians on the other side of a fence rose in my mind, taking up everything. Nothing seemed real anymore. If I refused, Dad would get up and try to tackle Chalmers. He would die and the chances of me outrunning these people without getting shot were too low to risk. My refusal would kill Dad. I wasn't going to kill anyone else if I could help it.

  “Okay,” I said. “I'll come with you.”

  Chapter Ten

  After Jerome and Alana agreed, they led the four of us down through the hotel levels, past the dying emergency lanterns, and past the front desk where Sheri the Scary was still paging through a crossword. She avoided our gazes as the agents paraded us past. Chalmers led and the silent woman came up in the back.

  If we ran, they would shoot and it wouldn't necessarily be at me. Dad was expendable. They had even hinted that Alana was, too. Chalmers had only mentioned me and Jerome in his praises. We were the ones who had commandeered the truck, after all.

  These agents had everything they needed to manipulate us and they knew it. Jerome would never risk my father to get us out of here. For now, it was best to cooperate until we could find another way out. I wouldn't let myself become a David. There was no way.

  For the first time, I noticed two black cabs parked in front of the hotel. They had probably been there before and I just hadn't seen in my rush to get to Dad. Or I had seen and hadn't cared. I'd heard stories about drivers in the black cabs ripping people off somewhere on the Internet. There were two figures inside each car and they were all sitting in the front. One was a guy with
a long beard who watched as we drew closer. These agents had hired some help. People were desperate and ready to do anything to stay alive. They knew what their odds were. I wondered what they and Sheri had been promised.

  “Inside,” Chalmers said, opening the back door for me and Jerome. “Your father and your friend will ride in the other cab.”

  “He stays with me,” I demanded. Separating us was another tactic they were trying to use to control me.

  “It's in our best interests if your father rides in the other cab,” Chalmers said, lowering his voice to a dangerous level. “Your friend, too.”

  It was a David technique, all right, like the time he had me locked in the bathroom because he knew that tight spaces freaked me out.

  So I got into the cab. I tried to glance at Dad, but Jerome was climbing in and scooting over to sit with me. The cab smelled like tobacco and pine. The two guys sitting in the front oozed scamminess. Davids sure knew how to stick together.

  “Excellent,” Chalmers said, slipping into the car next to Jerome. The cab was crowded and squished. Chalmers kept his hand near his pistol and didn't glance back at the other car. I heard two other doors open and close. Alana and my father were inside the other vehicle with the scary woman.

  As if they had rehearsed this, the driver started the car and we merged into the traffic.

  It was full dark now and the city was very creepy without lights on inside most of the buildings. The cab took us closer to downtown, to where the skyscrapers stood tall and dark against the brownish sky. A fire was burning somewhere and the clouds were low, reflecting it.

  And Chalmers said nothing. Me and Jerome remained silent, too. We passed the entrance to a subway, where a few people were standing with lit cigarrettes. I wanted to scream for help but they were on the other side of glass and might not have cared anyway. People were all for themselves now.

  Dad sat in his room for hours, knowing there was nothing he could do about the trap. It had been torture for him.

  We stopped at a four way with burned-out traffic lights. It was taking forever to move. More people were out now that it was night and I caught a glimpse of some guys hauling a shopping cart heaped high with kids' cereals. Chalmers continued to look straight ahead and the glow of the fire reflected off his sunglasses. I felt like he was some demon come here to claim us.