Second Wave Read Online Free Page B

the tall lanky boy with the pale hair asked.
    Jalonzo told him, ending with, “No harm done, really.”
    “Not this time,” Hap said darkly, “but who would do something like this? A cure for the plague will benefit everybody.”
    “I can’t imagine who would be so destructive,” Khorii agreed.
    Sesseli stuck out her lower lip, and said, “I can.”
    Khorii knew who she had in mind. “No, Sesseli, I don’t think Marl can leave Dinero Grande, especially with no cure for the plague. That house where I left him was full of it except for the areas I cleared. I feel kind of badly about it, really.”
    “He’d have done the same to you,” Hap said bluntly. “To all of us. He was going to blow us up, remember?”
    “I know. Still, I wonder if we should not return with help and put him under more conventional restraints somewhere safer.”
    “It won’t be safe once Marl’s there,” Hap said.
    “This guy must have been a real winner,” Jalonzo commented. Khorii had dealt with Marl before the Mana landed in Corazon.
    “You don’t want to know,” Hap said. “This is just the kind of trick he’d pull.”
    “But how would he know about it?” Jalonzo asked. “Or even get in? I lock up when we’re not here, and the door was still locked when Elviiz and I arrived.”
    “The guy’s a born crook. He’d know how to do that if anybody would,” Hap insisted. “He’d do something like that just to mess with our minds.”
    “Maybe,” Khorii said. “But I think you give him too much credit. This gives us even more reason to return and check on his whereabouts. If he is not still in the house on Dinero Grande, then we can worry about Marl. If he is, then we must secure him somewhere away from the disease. It is ka -Linyaari—against our ways—to kill, but it is also frowned upon to leave anyone, even an enemy, to die when we could save him. And then we can worry about our real danger.”
    “What? The plague?”
    “No, finding who or what did this,” she said, indicating the damage. “And how they gained access.”

Chapter 3

    Y ou need more rest, Khorii,” Jaya said. “You’ve been working much too hard if you think I am ever going to let that thug back on my ship.”
    “We need him where we can keep an eye on him,” Khorii replied.
    “And this time we can take restraints from the police station. Jalonzo wants to go, too, along with a couple of his larger gaming friends. Marl will have an entire jail to himself here.”
    Captain Bates hadn’t said anything as Khorii outlined her plan to Jaya. Khorii, Jaya, Captain Bates, and Sesseli sat around one of the round tables in the common room while Abuelita clinked dishes in the kitchen. Each of them had a fragrant and steaming cup of chocolate in front of her, and Jaya, Captain Bates, and Sesseli each had a cinnamon pastry. The scent from the large batch Abuelita had baked earlier still filled the common room. She made dozens of batches at a time actually, something easily accomplished in the cafeteria’s industrial kitchen. Later, people would come and pick up the rolls and other foods Abuelita prepared and take them around to places where survivors gathered. At midmorning, additional people, mostly women and girls but some of the boys and a couple of men as well, arrived to assist Abuelita in cooking food that would sustain anyone who came to the cafeteria from midday until darkness fell. Some of this cooking would also be distributed among those who could not easily walk. There were other kitchens in the area, in former restaurants, schools, and churches. Soon the people helping Abuelita would leave to staff those feeding stations, but for now, with everyone still so frightened and grieving, it was comforting to come to one place to find a meal and so many other survivors. The Linyaari rescue teams had suggested this sort of arrangement be adopted on other worlds, in other cities and towns.
    Khorii used the roof garden for her own grazing, sure that