After I Fully Prepared for the Apocalypse, the Ungrateful Cried with Regret novel · Chapter 20 of 24

Chapter 20: The Director

The Director walked up my lane at first light with his hands raised.

He was a thin man of about sixty, in a white lab coat and a pair of good shoes that the ash from the lane had turned grey.

Two men with rifles stayed back by the open outer gate and let him come alone.

He stopped on the other side of the bars and looked at me.

He looked at the fused latch, and the ring of survivors standing behind me, and he smiled.

"Miss Hartigan," he said. "You have your father's chin."

I heard Chelsea behind me draw a breath.

"You knew him," I said.

"I hired him. He was the best chemist I ever had, and the most stubborn."

"You can say what you came to say. They can hear you."

I did not need to tell him who they were. There were fifty-two people at my back, and not one of them had made a sound.

"I came under a flag of truce," the Director said. "I'll honor it until the sun clears your silos."

"Why would I trust a truce from you?"

"Because I'm a man who values results." He folded his hands. "Your blood does something the rest of my research could not. It stops the Bloom. I'd like to put that into every person it will save."

"By drawing it out of me until I'm empty."

"By setting you up in a clean, comfortable wing with a staff of fifty, for as long as it takes." He spread one hand toward the yard. "In exchange, every person here travels with you. They'd be fed and sheltered by us. I'm not asking for sacrifice, Miss Hartigan. I'm asking for a partnership."

It was a good speech, and I could see it working on a few faces.

I turned my head.

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