Shepherd by KH LeMoyne Read Free Book Online Page B

of land for miles. The tart smell of the woods lingered in your nostrils for weeks. I can still smell it if I close my eyes.” He didn’t mention the miles he’d canvassed in search of infected survivors or the hundreds of people the Regents had sacrificed in the name of containing the risk of a new virus outbreak.
    “I have never seen anything to rival the size and depth of those colors until we passed over the continental divide. Radar picked the easiest routes because of my injuries. Even so, we had to climb, sometimes hand over hand in fifty-foot crevices to pass through those mountains. Because there were fewer populations in those areas, we were able to skirt civilization for hundreds of miles, but it took months.”
    The scan was reversing, mid-calf now, and moving back toward her head. With a frown, he paused the process, reversed it, and then reengaged the scan for a second pass. Her fingers moved an inch on the screen, not enough to disrupt the scan. Enough to signal he’d been silent too long.
    “The view from the summits of those mountains, the deep maroon and purple of sunrise, the fiery orange of sunset—they surpass even my memories of the forests. God-awful beautiful and huge. The image smacked me in the face with proof of how infinitesimally small we are in the grand scheme of creation. I know Radar picked the route to give my mind time to catch up with my body, to give me back perspective.”
    A pulse of white flickered, and movement ceased on the screen. Ignoring the output, he typed two commands, sending the results to his main consoles upstairs. “You can move, Esme. Count to ten, and I’ll be there to open the door.”
    It took him only to the count of five. He didn’t give her a chance to muster her courage as the door swung open. Instead, he pulled her against his chest, his shirt wadded in her fists between them. “You did great, Sugar.”
    “What did it show?”
    Her voice, muffled with her head still buried against him, reflected her focus. He held her tight, reluctant to let her go until the tiny shivers ceased. “We’ll go upstairs and look at it together.”
    She forced her way free and stared at him, her eyes probing for answers she seemed certain he was withholding.
    Two minutes later, they sat together, reviewing the silver images. Each twist and turn of the dissected segments confirmed his suspicion. A small transponder, active technology, glowed in red halfway between her right anklebone and her knee.
    “Mark image for overlay.” With his focus concentrated on the exact location, he almost missed her lunge for the welding laser.
    Surprised by her action and the resistance she put up against him, he lost balance, landing them both on the floor. He gripped her wrist over her head until she dropped the laser. Her wince and look of betrayal, mixed with a glistening pool of tears in her golden eyes, struck him hard.
    “It has to come out,” she yelled. “If you don’t let me get it out, I’ll just claw with my fingernails until I find it.”
    Beneath him, her body, tense and rigid, left no doubt of her determination. “Sugar, there are easier and less painful ways to get it out.”
    “Quick is all that matters. They could—”
    He held her, waiting for the recognition to hit. As it did, she crumpled, tension and fight replaced by agony. “It’s been in there for weeks, and they haven’t come. Are they just waiting to torment me?”
    She’d released the laser and now lay pliant, if despondent, beneath him. He rolled off her and scooped her up in his arms. “Perhaps they don’t have what they want yet. There’s always the chance something is blocking the transmission, like with the crystal in the scanning chamber.”
    He hoped she would work on the puzzled and stay distracted as he shoved tools aside and set her on the table at the edge of the console room. From the abuse her lower lip was taking between her teeth, he figured he had several minutes before she resumed