I turn to Collins. “I—”
“—have no choice,” she says. “I know. Your new best friend—” she glances to Endo, “—told me all about it. To stop the monster, you have to understand the monster. Know your enemy. I get it.”
“It’s more than that,” I say. “We won’t just know her, we’ll understand her. What she wants.”
“Where she’s from,” Endo says.
“How to stop her,” I add, knowing that if Endo expressed this sentiment, it would be, ‘How to control her.’
But that’s not my goal. If she leaves the human race be, I’m content to leave it at that. I don’t see the need to pick a fight we might not win if we can avoid it. And I sure as hell don’t agree with using her as a weapon. Maigo tearing apart Boston in search of her murderous father, isn’t all that dissimilar from the American use of atomic bombs in World War II. Or our assaults on Iran and Afghanistan. Or Vietnam. Korea. How many innocent people have we killed to execute the villains we’ve targeted? I’m not opposed to just wars, I just don’t think our judgment is any better than Nemesis’s. The best solution is to appease her violent nature.
Or destroy her.
So as much as I’m playing along, I have no intention of trying to control her. And that’s why it’s going to work. Endo felt a backlash from Gordon that was strong enough to put him in a coma. But he was trying to control the man. I’m aiming for a dialogue. If that’s even possible. Who knows, maybe my head will explode. I just think it’s worth the risk.
“Well, then, since we’re all on board,” I say. “How do we get this done? It’s not like we can call Nemesis on the phone and invite her for dinner.”
“Actually,” Endo says, a gleam in his eye that says I’m wrong. “I think we have confirmed that there is one way to draw Nemesis out of hiding.”
Collins, Woodstock and I stand silent, waiting for his revelation, because we sure as shit don’t know what he’s talking about. But then Collins groans and turns her head to the sky. “You can’t be serious.”
“What?” I ask, feeling stupid for not figuring it out.
“You’re the bait,” she says.
“Not exactly,” Endo says. “Nemesis is not interested in harming you. Her intentions seem to be the opposite, in fact. She will come if you are in danger. In mortal danger. To save you.”
I turn away from the others. I’d rather watch Scrion’s body be dissected than look into Collins’s eyes. Not because she’s disapproving, but because I might change my mind. “I need to be in mortal danger.”
Endo nods.
“Still sounds like a worm on a hook to me,” Woodstock says.
“We can’t do that here.” Despite the charred remains of the city coast, the area is still densely populated. “And we can’t travel to a remote location without wasting a lot of time. Who knows how long it would take her to follow us, or even if she would? So there’s really only one place we can do this, right?”
I know he’s come to the same conclusion already, so it’s no surprise when Endo steps up next to me and says, “Correct.”
Looks like Boston gets to be Nemesis’s Tokyo after all. “To Boston, then.”
25
Fourteen hours later, I’m standing on top of a 325-foot-tall apartment building, not all that dissimilar from the one Maigo was murdered in—except that this building stands on the coast of Boston’s North End. Or rather, what once was Boston’s North End. While work crews have been slowly working their way toward this part of town, clearing debris, they’ve barely scratched the surface. I’ve heard estimates between five and ten years just to clear out the rubble. Needless to say, this part of town is empty. A wasteland. Although the building beneath my feet was somehow spared, the skyscrapers to my back, and the New England Aquarium to my left, look like they’ve weathered the apocalypse. Those buildings that are still standing are missing windows, their skeletons exposed and their insides rotting in the humid summer air. Straight down the middle is a stretch of molten destruction, where Nemesis self-immolated to clear a path.
So we’ve chosen this harbor-side high-rise with the hopes that Nemesis will choose the path of least resistance. She may not. She might tromp right over Logan Airport again, which has been rebuilt. But the airport has been evacuated of people and planes, so if she does take the shortcut, damage will be primarily to the runways.
Our plan was met with extreme backlash, but in matters of National Security regarding Nemesis, the FC-P pretty much has final say. And with Zoomb supporting the plan, the White House wasn’t about to decline our rather large requests.