Chapter 2
Tristian was right, of course; there was no relaxing in Expansion.
No security and no privacy. The Expansion and Sanitation Sectors were notoriously dirty and overcrowded, crimes easily hidden in the masses.
They were the sectors reserved for the leftovers, people deemed worthless to the other sectors due to past ailments.
No one cared about your health in Expansion, only your ability to work.
I weaved through the earth-covered people.
No one talked to me, thankfully. Not a soul had approached me outside of giving me my crew assignment.
My former mentor, Dr. Kumar, had seen to that, sending Owen, another member of the Ward, here to ask around for Death’s Angel, spooking everyone.
When he finally found me, he told me Kumar demanded I come back.
I hadn’t. I couldn’t, not after losing Lily.
I entered the oversize sleeping porch—a long, rectangular room with low ceilings, filled with rows of cots that stretched from wall to wall.
I had lucked into a corner one. The occupant before me had died from a tunnel wall collapse.
I grabbed my bag from under my cot and headed toward the communal shower.
Big enough for ten people, the square shower was occupied by three other women.
My usual showerhead remained empty. It had the best water pressure, but that wasn’t why I used it.
I disrobed and shoved the clothes into my bag, stashing it in the corner, then covered it with a tattered scrap of a medical tarp I had stolen and placed my remaining knife on top of it.
I turned the water on, locking on the mirror that was nailed to the wall, cracking the tile and the mirror itself.
Once I might have thought someone had placed it here for vanity.
I didn’t now. It was angled so the person could see the entire shower, eliminating the vulnerability of showering with your back to the entrance.
I set to unbraiding my auburn hair. Slowly, it tumbled down almost to my waist, surrounding my sharp, angular face that hadn’t filled out since the last lockdown.
One of the women shut off her water and left.
My rich brown eyes watched her before taking in my pale skin.
It had been sun-kissed and tan once when I lived above the surface.
My father had always told me I was beautiful like a flower.
My mother had bought me skirts and dresses—anything to accentuate my femininity, countering my rigid demeanor.
Now, no softness remained. Everything was honed from the years of survival.
I started the water, unfazed by the frigid temperature, grabbing a bar of soap wedged behind the mirror. Two more women entered, not looking my way. I rinsed the soap from my hair and scrubbed my body like I could erase the greasy feel of the three men circling me in the tunnel.
When my skin started to prune, I turned off the water and grabbed the sweater I had been wearing, flipped it inside out, and dried myself off.
I donned my only other clothing: a thick blue wool sweater, a bra, a pair of brown pants several sizes too big, and a pair of cotton underwear.
I strapped on my pistol and knife, then set to washing my dirty set of clothes in the bathroom sink.
I could have sent them to Sanitation, but I had no desire to fight through the massive piles of clothing they returned monthly. This was easier.
Finally, I tumbled onto my cot. But all I could picture when I shut my eyes was a searing emerald gaze.
I had met Tristian Hayes three years ago.
He had been brought to the Ward after picking up something from above.
A living inferno to the touch, he had been drenched in sweat, incoherently muttering.
The other medical workers avoided him, terrified they would fall ill.
The Ward had its fair share of educated doctors, but most of us were just assigned there, learning on the go.
Dr. Uri, the Ward leader, had done a quick assessment before shaking his head.
“You can give him some penicillin, but the rest is up to you, Death’s Angel.” Dr. Uri walked away, dismissing him. I gritted my teeth at the nickname, mocking my immune system’s refusal to contract the diseases that claimed so many. I hated it.
The tunnels had been thoroughly stocked.
No one seemed certain who exactly was responsible for them.
As droves of people raced here, no one cared who put out the message that granted us safety, only that there was hope.
I accepted it at the time, but sometimes I wondered who had predicted we’d destroy ourselves into needing Haven.
The Ward had a plethora of antibiotics, common medications, and other necessities as long as your health score was high enough to receive care.
All care was predicated on health scores.
If a patient’s health score was low enough, and the odds were against their surviving, medical care moved to the next person.
If you miraculously survived, your score dropped more.
Drop low enough and you were discarded to Sanitation and forgotten.
I didn’t know what happened to those people; no one talked about them once they hid them away.
It was cruel, but war had made cruelty the norm.
If the patient had a history of illness since coming to Haven, was too old, or failed to recover significantly in forty-eight hours, treatment was discontinued and the people dressed in white moved on to the next person who might stand a chance.
The Ward preserved our stock and hand-selected survivors.
I hated that in renouncing our gods, we had decided to play them.
I knew the resources would eventually run out.
We needed the surface to stabilize enough to sustain life again.
Some people had made projections on how long the nuclear winter would last, but they were just predictions.
Regardless of how much they varied, the prognosis was the same.
There was a countdown on this way of life.
But the clock stopped in the presence of the man before me.
Chocolate curls stuck to the stranger’s slick forehead. His health score was excellent—minor injuries but rarely any illnesses. Things were dire if doctors were giving up on a unit commander. But at least he wouldn’t die alone.
Determined, I moved the man to the isolation area, his weight crushing mine. I stripped him of his sweat-drenched clothes to reveal several tattoos spanning his chest and left arm. I squashed my curiosity and administered the antibiotics, then waited in death’s seat.
“Hang on, Tristian,” I urged. “Stay with me.”
I remained by his side that night, repeating the words, watching for the moment his chest stopped rising. But it never came. Slowly, the color returned to his pale face.
I constantly checked on him in the following days. I wasn’t the only one; multiple members of the Force came to the Ward demanding updates. He had people who cared for him. On day five, he opened his eyes. Within seconds, he was trying to sit up, sweeping the area, taking in the isolation curtains.
“You stayed,” I whispered, barely audible.
The world fell quiet as his gaze found mine. His staggering deep green irises, the color of grass and trees—something we no longer had—stole my breath.
“You asked me to,” he said.
My stomach fluttered. I had asked him, relentlessly, to stay. I didn’t tell him he was the first to have ever listened.
“I expected Death’s Angel to be much more frightening.” An air of levity graced his face, chasing the pallor away.
I gathered my equipment to run his vitals. “How do you know I’m Death’s Angel?”
“I was dying, and I woke up to you.”
“And that means you’re with Death’s Angel?”
He surveyed me, an admiring light in his eye. “I don’t know many brave enough to stay and face death.”
“It isn’t bravery.” I cleared my throat. “I need you to sit up so I can evaluate you.”
He rose, the sheets falling to a pile in his lap, exposing his tattooed arm, muscled chest, and strong back. My eyes ran over him, my heart hammering pathetically. His body in motion—alive, I couldn’t look away.
“Looking for something?” he asked, a knowing glint in his eye.
I jolted, clearing my throat. “It’s miraculous you’re alive.” Which was true. “May I?”
“Of course.”
My hands went to his neck. The lymph nodes were swollen but not like before. He watched me as if he were studying me. I unwrapped my stethoscope, placing it on his heart, before moving it to his lungs.
“Deep breath.”
He obliged before asking, “How’d you get the name?”
“I’m sure you’ve heard the rumors.”
His face tilted up toward me. The pressure of my stethoscope dissipated as I took him in. His shoulder-length curls fell away from his stunning face. “Yes, but I’d like to hear your version,” he said. “I doubt many of your patients get to ask.”
“I can’t listen if you talk.”
He fell silent. I moved around the bed, coming up behind him.
A long scar ran along his right shoulder blade.
The injury was noted on his chart, dated over a year ago.
Knife to right trap. Required sutures. One day in Ward.
I had been shocked he’d received the injury after the war.
The Force’s only enemies were the elements and our dwindling resources.
What had warranted a knife in the back? I placed the stethoscope on his back.
“Your lungs sound better,” I said. “The Ward isn’t at capacity right now. I advise you to stay for several more days.”
“How long have I been here?”
“Five days.”
He swore. “Which bell are we at?”
“Thirteenth,” I informed him, grabbing his file for the hundredth time. A twenty-seven-year-old unit commander. It seemed too young, but the war had wiped out most of the fighting-age men, an entire generation gone.
“I’ll give you until the next morning bell. Then I need to get back.”