THE ENEMY WITHIN

THE ENEMY WITHIN Chapter 19

19.

Helicopter wreckage blocked the road. Bodies were charred from the fiery crashes. Max covered his mouth and nose to block out the stench and continued on foot. Plumes of smoke swirled through the air as he ran up the craggy mountainside. His lungs burned and eyes watered as he pushed on through the haze.

Between the trees he saw the red bursts rise skyward. Blood pulses spread like a virus across the blue canopy. The display was mesmerizing, but deadly. Even now, he yearned to sit down and watch the end of the world that he helped bring about.

As Max cleared the last of the trees, he saw them. Two figures on the mountaintop. Beyond them, Vincent's machine spewed Armageddon into the air.

Jamie turned. She looked relieved that Max survived and sad that she might now have to kill him.

"You look like hell," Vincent said.

"Falling off a cliff will do that," Max said.

Vincent rested a hand casually on the device. "Weird as it sounds, I'm glad you survived."

The smile that spread across Vincent's lips was genuine. Max had no doubt that he actually felt that way. Unfortunately, it didn't change anything for either of them.

"Just sit on the sidelines for this. Can you do that?" Vincent asked.

Max looked between them, the only family he'd ever known. His mind went to that first kiss on the train. His first kiss ever, maybe hers too ... or was she planting these thoughts even now? "I wish I could," Max said, hoping no one had to die, or at least he didn't.

"Why lay down your life for the same people who fear and despise you? The same people who murdered Noah," Vincent said. "Even now, they're probably imagining ways to destroy us. Why protect them?

"I wish I was more like you. That I could shut out the cries of one race so a new one, maybe even a better one, might arise. But I've seen our kind suffer and die. That drove me to the edge. I can't do that to anyone else," Max said. Even as the next words came out, he knew they wouldn't fly. "Maybe there's a way to co-exist, for one side to guide the other."

Vincent seemed to find the thought as intriguing as the rocks by his sneakers. "You know that can't happen. Don't die for them, Max. Live for us."

Max moved closer, trying to get through to Jamie. "This," he gestured at the red veil spewing from the machine, "this is poison. It has nothing to do with our survival. You were never dying. None of us were. You're releasing the first half of a global toxin. No one's going to survive except you and some embryonic alien strain. You're going to be responsible for billions of deaths."

"What's he talking about?" Jamie demanded, looking between them.

Max kept some distance from Vincent. He didn't know if it mattered, but he felt safer out of arm's length. "We were just a test run. An experiment manufactured to see if we'd survive. Nothing more. Jamie, you can see the truth. Take a look. Read my thoughts."

"I don't need to," Jamie said, joining Vincent.

"What?" He couldn't make sense of why she wasn't outraged. What was keeping her from turning on Vincent?

Jamie's voice swam through his mind. 'It doesn't change anything. If we don't do this, they'll eventually do to us what they did to Noah. Our kind dies without this – are you going to let that happen?'

There it was. One side had to die so the other could live on. There was no middle ground. If he resisted, he'd join in humanity's downfall.

'I'm one of them,' Jamie silently voiced, looking skyward. 'So are you. Even if you win, you'll kill all of them. How could you do that? They're just as much a part of you. They're not evil – they just want to live.'