Michael says it doesn’t matter, that it is an abomination and must be destroyed. Michael says they have put off doing so long enough.
Logan looks at the camp, assessing its defenses and its sheer size, and shakes his head slowly. This is suicide, he thinks.
But Michael has decided, and once he has done so, that is the end of the matter. Even Grayling, who isn’t afraid of anything, won’t cross Michael Poole.
Michael is a legend. He is a living talisman; nothing can kill him.
He has survived against impossible odds. He has led his men on successful attacks again and again. He has never failed.
No one thinks he will fail tonight, either.
Still, Michael is not the same man since Fresh died. It took something out of him when he lost Fresh, and while most had not noticed, Logan could tell. It was an accident, a truck’s hand brake giving out, and the truck rolling slowly downhill, gathering speed, and finally crushing Fresh against a wall. There was blood everywhere. Fresh had taken two days to die. There was nothing anyone could do; the injuries were too extensive. Michael had kept vigil the entire time, even when Fresh lapsed into a coma and no longer knew who he was.
Michael told the driver of the truck afterward that it wasn’t his fault.
Accidents happen. He told the driver he bore him no grudge and thought no less of him. Logan was there and heard what he said and how he said it. Another wouldn’t have recognized the rage Michael was hiding. But no one knows Michael better than he does. Michael is so tightly controlled that he never lets anything show that might reveal or compromise him. Still, he gives himself away through small gestures and an emphasis on certain words. He saw the telltale signs during Michael’s conversation with the driver and knew instinctively what it meant. The driver was a dead man. Logan almost told him as much, and then decided it was too dangerous.
A week later, the driver disappeared while foraging and was never seen again.
Fresh might have tried to do something about it. But Logan is not Fresh.
He is not Michael’s equal. He is Michael’s adopted child. Even though he has just turned eighteen years old and is technically a man, that is the position to which Michael has relegated him. It is odd to feel so close to someone and at the same time so distant. They share so much that no one else shares, and yet there are boundaries that Logan knows he cannot cross.
Questioning the wisdom of tonight’s assault is one. He knows he should say something because on the face of things the attack is foolish and because it is clear to him that Michael has changed. He thinks the change began before the death of Fresh, but it has evolved into something dangerous since.
Michael has grown reckless in his efforts to destroy the once-men and their camps. He seems increasingly heedless of the dangers into which he leads them.
His leadership decisions are uncomfortably spontaneous and made with less and less consideration for the consequences. So far, he has gotten away with it. So far, his aura of invincibility and his luck have carried him over the rough spots.
But Logan knows that sooner or later even these will fail. If that happens before Michael recovers himself, the consequences will be disastrous.
But what is he to do? No one will listen to a boy barely turned a man. No one wants to believe that Michael is no longer invincible.
Nor will he be the one to run from what the rest of them go willingly to face. Michael saved his life. Michael gave him everything he has.
He will never abandon Michael, even if it means his death.
He tries to push such thoughts out of his mind as he stares at the compound and waits for Michael to give the order to attack. But the thoughts will not be banished; the thoughts persist.
“Logan,” Michael says to him suddenly, turning around so that he can see the other’s face. Michael’s expression is chilling, alive with a terrifying wildness. “I want you to lead the assault on the right wing, on the first building. If you can’t handle it, tell me now.”
Logan would never tell him that, and Michael knows it. He nods without speaking.
“Just remember what you’ve been taught. Wilson, you take the left.
Grayling, you stay with me. The center building will be the most heavily guarded. The experiments are carried out there.”
On the children, Logan thinks. On the old and sick and helpless.
There are demons in residence here, two of them at least. But Michael’s information tells them that the demons are absent this night, gone on a hunt that will keep them away until the end of the week. Michael’s information has never been wrong. Logan hopes it is right tonight. Once, he would not have thought to question it. But Michael is not the same, and Logan can no longer be certain that anything he does is well considered.