Page 136 of Grave Matter

“He’s in the other lab recovering,” Everly says through grinding teeth, her impatience coming through.

“Did you kill him?”

Michael snorts. “Define kill.”

“I saw you shoot him.”

“Because he escaped from the lab.”

Everly sighs, despondent. “Wes, seriously. Either help with the surgery or get the fuck out of here. You’re distracting me.”

“So you’re using the mycelia to rewrite Sydney’s brain. Then what? The students will know she’s not the same. She won’t remember them.”

“Well, maybe we can put her back to a couple of days ago,” Everly muses. “Then she’ll still know them, and she won’t remember the last few weeks. Anyway, your students are a bunch of idiots. Honestly, they could all use some rewiring.”

I don’t know if it’s my super mycelia hearing, but I swear I hear Munawar in the distance yelling, “Idiots!?”

And from the way Everly and Michael snap to attention, I think they hear it too.

“What was that?” I hear David ask.

“What was that?” Wes repeats. “Oh. That? Sorry, I should have disclosed this. You see, once I woke up on the boat, I tookMithrandirback to the dock. Then instead of coming right here, I grabbed my phone, my iPad, and came straight to the main lodge, where I proceeded to wake up every single student and got a hold of Janet and Gabriel.”

Hope rises inside me, tries to bloom.

“I gave one of them an iPad just in case we were separated. Enabled Bluetooth. I kept my phone on me. I led them down here. Made sure the phone was recording before I put it in my pocket. So while you’ve been blabbing away, they’ve been hearing everything you’ve been saying. They’re all in the stairwell right now. They insisted on being witnesses, just in case you did something else stupid.”

I can hear him grin as he adds, “You can’t kill them all.”

And that’s when somehow, I find the strength to turn my head.

I look toward the door and see Wes standing there, his nose bloodied and bruised where I kicked him in the face, but he’s smiling at me. His eyes hold mine, telling me I’m going to be okay.

Telling me to trust him.

I manage to nod.

I trust you.

Then everything turns black.

CHAPTER 32

“Someone’s cut the power!”David yells as the operating room is plunged into darkness. Everly screams. Students in the stairwell scream. I hear people running, and someone crashes into something, enough to make my table spin to the side, and I roll off, right onto the floor in a broken heap that knocks the wind out of me.

“Help, Wes,” I try to call out, trying to roll away, my limbs still useless.

Someone steps on my hand as they run, and I scream.

There’s a commotion, people clamoring, fighting.

Suddenly, a gun goes off.

One blast, two blasts that briefly light up the room and blow out my ears.

More screaming follows, muffled now.

My heartbeat is so loud in my head it drowns out everything.

---