Blackout

“What purpose would that be?” I asked warily.

“You have a certain reputation for honesty,” said the man from the CDC. “You will begin reporting the news as we present it, rather than reporting it as you see fit. By adding your voices to ours, we can hopefully control some of the more unpleasant rumors to have arisen since the events surrounding the most recent presidential election.”

It was my turn to stare at him. Finally, I said, “You want me to lie for you.”

“Oh, no,” said the man from the CDC. “You know, I’m disappointed. I really thought you’d be smarter. I suppose the cloning process wasn’t as reliable as we had hoped.”

“No,” said Shaun. He pulled his arm free of my hand. “You’re already out of the game as far they’re concerned. You said it yourself. The George I got was supposed to be the brainwashed agreeable one who thought they had the best damn ideas ever.”

“Then why?” I asked.

President Ryman sighed. “Shaun, I’m sorry.”

“No, you’re not.” Shaun glanced at me. The look on his face was enough to make me wish I’d never come back from the dead. “They brought you back so they’d have something they could use to make me do what they told me to do. They brought you back for leverage, so they could make me lie for them. You always told the truth, George. But I made people believe it.”

“Oh.” My voice was barely a whisper. It hurt to even force myself to speak that loudly. “Well, then it’s over. We won’t do it.”

“Again, I thought you’d be smarter.”

I turned to the man from the CDC. He was shaking his head, and holding what looked like a fountain pen in his hand. Shaun went rigid, barely seeming to breathe.

“You’ll do what we tell you to do. If you choose not to, well. We’ll have to find ourselves some replacement reporters, because you are all going to die.”

Because we chose to tell the truth

(The cool of age, the rage of youth)

And stand against the lies of old

(The whispers soft, the tales untold)

We find ourselves the walking dead

(The loves unkept, the words unsaid)

And in the crypt of all we’ve known

(The broken blade, the breaking stone)

We know that we were in the right

(The coming dawn, the ending night).

So here is when we stop the lies.

The time is come. We have to Rise.

—From Dandelion Mine, the blog of Magdalene Grace Garcia, August 7, 2041.

The problem with people who have power is that they start thinking more about what it takes to keep that power than they do about what’s right or wrong or just plain a bad idea. Here’s a tip for you: If you’re ever in a position to be making calls on right and wrong that can impact an entire nation, run your decisions past a six-year- old. If they look at you in horror and tell you you’re getting coal in your stocking for the rest of your life, you should probably reconsider your course of action. Unless you want to be remembered as a monster, in which case, knock yourself out.

—From Charming Not Sincere, the blog of Rebecca Atherton, August 7, 2041.

SHAUN: Thirty-six

The pen in the doctor’s hand—so much like the one Dr. Wynne used to kill Kelly in the Memphis CDC, what felt like the better part of a lifetime ago—was enough to make me go cold. I was immune to Kellis-Amberlee. None of the others could say the same. Especially not George, who made me immune, but didn’t confer the same immunity on her own clone.

Do you think you could survive losing me again? asked her voice, sweet and low and somehow poisonous. She’d never taken that tone with me before. But why shouldn’t she turn on me? I was replacing her, and doing my best to shove her away.

What kind of world were we living in, where the people we trusted to keep us healthy were the ones keeping us sick, and a man couldn’t even depend on his own insanity?

I raised my hands defensively and said, “There’s no reason for us to do anything crazy. Let’s just settle down, okay?” Out of the corner of my eye I could see Becks restraining Alaric, keeping him from moving toward the now- deadly doctor. He wasn’t with us in Memphis. We’d told him what happened, but he didn’t really understand.

“It’s a pen,” said George.

It took me a second to realize that it was the live George who was speaking, not the increasingly malicious voice inside my head. I glanced her way, giving a quick, tight shake of my head. “We’re all going to stay calm,” I said, hoping she’d decide to listen. “Okay?”

George frowned before nodding slowly. “Okay.” She put her own hands up, mirroring my defensive position. “I’m sorry. I spoke too hastily. We’ll consider your proposal.”

“Why don’t I believe you?” asked the doctor. He glared at President Ryman. “I knew this was a terrible plan from the start. We should have arranged for an outbreak in their hometown as soon as the campaign was over. Wynne was soft on them, the old fool. Leaving them alone was his idea, not mine.”

“That sounds less like ‘soft on us’ and more like sensible resource management,” said Becks, pulling the doctor’s attention back to her. I winced, but didn’t try to stop her. She was keeping him from focusing on any one person. That was valuable. I just hoped it wouldn’t get her shot.

“Put down the pen,” said Steve. His tone was clipped, indicating that he, too, knew exactly what it was.

“No, I don’t think so,” said the doctor. “The agreement was simple: I would allow the president to bring his little covey of pet journalists here, and try to sway them to the side of reason. If it failed, they would be mine to dispose of. As I expected, it has failed.”

“Who says she speaks for the rest of us?” The words sounded alien even as they left my mouth. George, please, forgive me, I thought. “I mean, come on, man. It was nice of you to let the science dudes grow me a replacement, but you could have just sent a card. She’s a clone. She’s not a real person. She doesn’t get to be the one who gets the real people dead.”

The man from the CDC paused, an uncertain look crossing his face.

I decided to press what little advantage I had. “I’m not going to pretend we’re happy about this bullshit. I mean, dude, you killed Alaric’s parents. That’s pretty crappy, and it doesn’t make us feel like playing nice. But that doesn’t mean she speaks for the rest of us. You know she’s not a perfect copy of my sister. You built a broken Georgia. Maybe you could’ve done a better job if she hadn’t managed to get away from you—that happens a lot, doesn’t it? Clones, mosquitoes, reporters. You’ve been running the country for like twenty years. Shouldn’t you be better at this by now?”

“That’s quite enough, son,” said President Ryman. Turning to the man from the CDC, he said, “Put the pen down. They’re willing to listen to what we have to say. Isn’t that what we brought them here for? To sway them to the right way of thinking?”

I could see George out of the corner of my eye. She had her face turned toward me, jaw slack in the way that told me she was staring behind the dark lenses of her sunglasses. I was briefly, terribly grateful she’d chosen to keep wearing them. I wouldn’t have been able to keep smiling if I’d been able to see her eyes.