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“I’m not disgusted with you. I’m disgusted with bad presidents. And bad military leaders. And whoever wants you to…” A wary frown. “Get the terrorists to go away?”
“I sincerely hope that they want the terrorists to go away.”
“But you don’t know?”
“I don’t know anything right now. Except that I don’t want this country to have a civil war that kills a lot of innocent people, and that seems like it might happen if nobody steps in. And I’d rather stay on this plane with you forever.”
It isn’t meant to be, because time does a time. The ocean slides away under us.
And then we’re descending, and I’m numb. We’re getting dressed, but I can’t get warm. It’s an odd and unsettling contrast from the fever. I finish putting on my jacket and find Artemis in a long coat, her hair swept back like she’s the most dangerous version of her father’s daughter.
And then we’re meeting a man with a forgettable face and clothes that look like U.S. Army castoffs at the airfield and getting into a nondescript car.
And then we’re moving over a pockmarked road in the predawn dark, Artemis holding tight to my hand.
“This is just a meeting,” she says, putting on a calm face.
“It’s just a meeting,” I agree.
It’s not just a meeting. If it was as innocent as it seemed, nobody would have felt it necessary to blackmail me into coming.
The meeting isn’t in the capital city.
Of course it’s not.
It’s on a warfront. Barbed wire. Armed guards. A trench, like there’s a possibility of fighting that way. A low, brick building with a punched-out hole in one corner. A wall made of sandbags.
And for a brief instant, through a gap in the sandbags:
Tents, with people inside, looking out. So many people. Fucking assets. None of whom are making a goddamn cent off of promethium, most of whom probably don’t even own smartphones. These are just…people. They aren’t worth anything. They just want what everyone wants—to feel safe. No one deserves to be made a pawn in someone else’s war.
So to me, they’re worth everything. And I will not be using them as bargaining chips.
Artemis gets out of the car with me, but a guard stops her at the door.
“I’m going in with him,” she says.
“No,” the guard says, in heavily accented English. “You’re not.” He looks at me. “The colonel is inside.”
I want us both out of here. I don’t want to do anything to prolong our stay.
So I squeeze her hand and look her in the eye. “It’s just a meeting. If I’m not out in fifteen minutes, you get in the car and leave.”
“I’m not leaving.”
“Fifteen minutes.”
A heavy pause.
“Okay,” Artemis says. She’s lying through her teeth, but she gets up on tiptoe to kiss my cheek like she’s telling the truth. “I love you.”
“I love you,” I answer, and I want to spit out the desperate, hopeless taste of the words, but I can’t.
I kiss her once, too fast and too light, and drop her hand.
The fever’s already starting when I step into the building. It’s the most atrocious time for an episode I could have imagined, but I won’t be here more than fifteen minutes. I won’t be here more than ten. I’m going to make this deal, the deal that will save anyone else from appearing in photos like mine, and then I’m leaving, and I’m never coming back.
One way or another.
