Immortally Embraced by angie fox Read Free Book Online Page A

me. So far, I’d managed to avoid telling my closest friend I could see the dead. For all he knew, my involvement was a freak accident. It sure felt that way sometimes.
    “It gets worse.” I told Rodger what had happened with Galen.
    He planted himself on the edge of his cot, elbows on his knees. “But why?” he asked, just like I had. “Why wouldn’t he let you in on this?”
    I shrugged. I’d run the question over in my mind so much, I was exhausted with it. “And in case you thought my love life wasn’t screwed up enough,” I sighed, hardly believing it, “Marc’s back.”
    His brows shot up. “No fucking way.”
    I dug my hands through my hair, as if that would help me make sense of it. “He’s still on the other side. But that didn’t keep him from tracking me down. In our camp.”
    Rodger’s eyes bugged out.
    “He thinks one of our old professors got caught up in something dangerous. He wants me to take a look.”
    “You?” my roommate repeated, as the absurdity of it sunk in. I knew the feeling.
    My head hurt just thinking about it. “He said they were working on a medicine, but with the prophecy talking about a weapon, and seeing as how we never luck out when it comes to these things…”
    “That’s nuts,” said Rodger, openly staring at me.
    “I know.” I hated to assume the worst, but—
    “You’ve got to do it.”
    “Excuse me?”
    Me saying I was going to do it and Rodger saying it were two different things. I found myself resisting, even though I knew I didn’t have much of a choice.
    “Have you even been outside camp?” I asked him. I’d bet anything he’d just gone through a portal to go stateside.
    Rodger leaned back on his elbows. “I went out once, about two years ago. Remember that case at the med evac?”
    Now that he mentioned it, yes. “Still, that was you, two other docs, and the MPs. This is me taking off across the desert toward the Great Divide. Even if I can figure out how to cross the lines, I’ll be sneaking into an enemy unit, spying on their new technology. Is any of this scaring you yet?”
    “Of course,” he said.
    This wasn’t a Star Trek episode, for God’s sake. “I could be executed.”
    “Or worse,” he said solemnly.
    Still, I couldn’t get the second half of the prophecy out of my head: A horrible new weapon is born.
    There’s no way to know what it was. Unless maybe, if I went and took a look at this thing …
    “You want me to go with you?” Rodger asked.
    “No,” I said quickly. There was no way I’d let anyone besides Marc see me talk to the dead doctor. Besides, I didn’t want to be responsible for Rodger’s life, especially when he had a family to think about.
    “Good,” he said, “because I’d probably wet my pants halfway to the Great Divide.”
    I buried my head in my hands. “I am so fucked.”
    “What else is new?”
    I looked at him. “I’d miss at least two shifts at the hospital.”
    “Not if I cover for you. I’ll take your schedule. Hell, I owe it to you anyway.” The cot dipped as he sat next to me. “I checked on the way in, I’m not even on this week’s docket.”
    It could work, but, “What if someone comes looking for me?”
    He thought for a moment. “I’ll diagnose you with a nasty case of the Imp Flu. Nobody will want to come near this place for a week. We may even get to fumigate my footlocker.”
    Lord knew, he could use it.
    I stared at the wooden floorboards of our tent. “You make it sound so easy.”
    “It’s not. But I do think we can pull it off, at least from this end.”
    “I’d be AWOL.”
    Rodger nudged me with his shoulder. “It’s always been your dream to run away.”
    I smirked. “Only this time, I have to come back.”
    “No escape is perfect.” He grew serious. “Look, Petra. I don’t know why this is happening or why you’re in the middle of it.” He stopped to consider. “You’re always in the middle of it, aren’t you?”
    “Lately,” I said, giving