Page 62 of Sawyer’s Mistake

Ray’s smile dimmed. “I’m sorry,” he said. “They’re all gone.”

“Gone?”

“This isn’t the real Pangea Colony. Not anymore. It’s a decoy.”

Ray raised his hand in a placating manner. “They moved on a few months ago.”

Saoirse felt her legs give in. She sat on the floor to avoid falling. Sawyer knelt beside her. He pushed her head forward gently.

“Breathe, Saoirse. It’s going to be okay.”

She felt her eyes fill with tears. Then she looked at Eva. The woman was pale, holding on to her middle.

Storme punched the wall.

“Let’s talk about it over dinner,” the old man said, looking dismayed at their unhappiness.

Storme reached out quietly. “We need to investigate every corner, make sure he’s telling the truth. Not you, Sawyer. You stay here with Eva, Saoirse, and Alix.”

The men all disappeared into the different corridors.

“Oh, you want to have a look around first?” Ray asked jovially. “That’s no problem.”

“Are you here alone?” Sawyer asked. For a moment, Ray looked right through them, as if Sawyer hadn’t spoken. Saoirse sighed. He was looking more and more like Don Quixote.

Finally, he nodded. “I’m old,” he added as sole explanation.

“So what do you do here?” she asked.

This time, the old man replied immediately. “I read books. Once a week, I send out a message. When people come, which happens less and less frequently, I send people in the right direction. If,” he added meaningfully, “it looks like they’re still human.”

Saoirse nodded. The old man might not be all there, but he was certainly right about this. A lot of survivors had had to put aside their very humanity in order to survive. She thought of Sawyer, Eva, and the rest of the team and felt nothing but gratitude that they’d all managed to hold on to their humanity. For now.

One by one, the men started coming back.

“There’s a couple large barrack-style bedrooms this way,” Prado reported, frowning.

“The kitchen’s empty,” Zander reported.

Storme ran a hand through his short hair. Saoirse didn’t know if it was a trick of the light or if some gray was starting to creep in at the temples. “There’s a bathroom this way but no people.”

“Didn’t I already say that?” Ray asked. “Now, if you’ll follow me to the kitchen, I’ll prepare dinner while you tell me why you’re looking for the Pangea Colony.”

#

Jake

The kitchen wasn’t a kitchen at all, more like a large storeroom with a large steel table in the middle that could comfortably seat a dozen people. The light here was also warm, giving the space a romantic, archaic feel. A series of mismatched appliances lined one wall of the room, including an enormous grill. Two large refrigerators were propped open and filled with cans.

“Ah, yes,” Ray said, sounding embarrassed. “The power’s not reliable enough for the refrigerators to work, unfortunately, but they’re great for storing goods. Now, what would you like? I was planning on having beans and toast, with some speculoos biscuits for desert. I have lots of speculoos. But if you’d prefer something else …”

Sawyer’s mouth watered. He was having a Pavlovian reaction to the mere mention of food.

“That sounds fine,” Storme said, speaking for all of them.

“Beans and toast it is. I bake the bread on Mondays, so it might be a bit stale.”

Sawyer looked at him incredulously.