Dog Blood

opposite and holding her head in her hands. “You tell me what I’m supposed to do.”
    “Just get rid of her. She’s one of them, Lizzie. She won’t stop fighting until she’s killed us all-”
    “I know, but-”
    “She killed your boys. How can you ever stand to be anywhere near her when she took your sons from you?”
    “I can’t,” she immediately answered, pulling her knees up to her chest and bowing her head, ashamed by her own admission. “I don’t want her here either, but I don’t know what else I can do. I’m her mother and-”
    “You could turn her over to the military.”
    “You know I can’t. We’ve been through this. As soon as they’ve got her they’ll put a bullet in her head.”
    “So?”
    “I can’t let that happen,” she snapped with sudden anger evident in her increasingly desperate voice. “You’re right, Katie, I should never have brought her here, but what else could I have done? If I just let her go now, she’ll start killing, and they’ll hunt her down. Even if I could get her out of the city she wouldn’t survive. She won’t be able to find food or keep warm or look after herself or-”
    “Tough. We should just do it.”
    “How would we get her through the crowds?” Mark asked, trying hard to remain practical and focused and not let fraught emotions cloud the situation.
    “Pump her full of drugs, then. Give her everything you’ve got left. Kill her, for Christ’s sake.”
    “Katie-” Mark began to protest.
    “I can’t hurt her,” Lizzie sobbed. “She’s my daughter, my own flesh and blood. Regardless of what she’s done or what she might do, I still have to protect her.”

30
    ARE YOU MCCOYNE?”
    I sit up quick. Eyes blurred. Where am I? No chains. Dull gray light. I look around and try to make sense of my surroundings. It’s one of the upstairs rooms in the social club. I found these cushions on a sofa downstairs and-
    “Are you McCoyne?” the voice asks again from somewhere behind me. Neck’s stiff. I look back over my shoulder and see a figure standing in the open doorway.
    “Yeah, what’s the problem?”
    “No problem. Come with me.”
    He turns and disappears, and I’ve got no choice but to follow. The building is cold, and I jog across the landing to catch up with him. I recognize him now. His name’s Craven. Julia introduced me to him yesterday. I think he’s her right-hand man.
    We enter the largest upstairs room. Julia and another man are sleeping here. Craven gestures for me to sit down next to him at a table in the corner, where he fires up a laptop. I saw him using it when I first arrived.
    “Have we got power here?” I ask, noticing that there’s a power cable connected to the back of the computer. Dumb question.
    “Sort of,” he answers, sounding as tired as I feel. “There’s electricity a few streets away. We’ve just run a cord here to keep the laptop going.”
    “What, an extension cord?”
    He looks at me, dumbfounded. “Yes, a fucking extension cord.”
    He shakes his head and turns his attention to the laptop. I watch as he logs on to some kind of central database. Is this the same system that Mallon talked about? My knowledge of this kind of thing is limited, and I don’t want to piss him off any more than I already have by asking him how the hell he can connect to anything from here, or even what’s left to connect to. There are all kinds of things hanging out of the back of the machine-wires running into small black boxes and the like-I guess the secret’s there, somewhere. My mind wanders as I watch him working. I stop thinking about what it is he’s doing, and instead I just look at the bright display and listen to the sound of the keyboard clicking as he types. I used to hear that noise all day, every day at work. It takes me back…
    “Sorry about the early wake-up call,” he mumbles, still concentrating on the screen. “Access to the system’s intermittent, so we have to make the most of it when we can. They’re usually running automatic maintenance at this time of day, so the security’s easier to bypass…”
    His words fade away as the screen changes and he concentrates on entering more details.
    “There… got it.”
    “Got what?”
    He slides the laptop over to me. “We’re in. Enter your details.”
    “What details?”
    “Your name, date of birth, last known postal code.”
    I start jabbing at the keyboard with two fingers. It’s months since I typed anything.
    “Wait,”