Cadence

by Wilson, Dianne J. ;

  What he found on the other side couldn’t have been more ordinary. It was like walking through a grocery store. There was a whole section devoted to cleaning products, clothing, medical supplies. They walked past shelves of toys, DVD’s, games. Home goods. Blankets, bedding, towels and linen. It made no sense. Workers moved between the shelves, rearranging, packing stacks of different products onto moving conveyor belts.

  “Are they stockpiling this lot?” Kai tried to keep his face in maintenance worker mode, but he couldn’t help frowning. This was a bizarre collection of things for a place that was primarily offices and a laboratory.

  Elden shrugged. “This room was empty when I was last here.”

  Kai blinked and when he opened his eyes, a green glow shone faintly around everything. The stuff wasn’t quite right. A stamped release note was stuck on a stack of energy drinks that stood bigger than the shack that Bree used to live in. The sign stated that the batch was ready to go.

  Two workmen stopped and stared at the four of them, heads together, whispering behind their hands. One of the two slipped out of the room, leaving the other staring at them awkwardly. His hands were busy with products, but his attention was all on them.

  Elden picked up the pace. “I don’t like the look of those two. Let’s move.”

  The friends walked fast, maintenance-worker-fast, not I’m running-for-my-life fast. The workman kept pace, barely worrying about keeping up the appearance of working.

  Elden dodged between two roof-high piles of cake flour, and the others followed. The workman had wedged himself in a dead end. He swore and doubled back. That bought them enough time to make a dash for the exit.

  No longer caring about appearances, they ran. Alarm bells went off and they ran faster. Elden’s fingerprint did the trick and they threw themselves through the open door that slammed shut behind them.

  “Don’t stop. They’ll get through now.” There was real fear in Elden’s voice. “This way.”

  They ducked underneath an enormous metal pipe and shimmied along the wall in the tiny gap between the pipe and the wall.

  The shriek of the alarm sliced through Kai’s brain. It made thinking hard.

  They came to a small maintenance door, and Elden used his thumb to open it. They heard footsteps coming closer just as they slipped through the door and shut it behind themselves.

  Kai’s chest heaved at the effort of breathing. “Why did you run? We’re cleared to be here.”

  Elden rolled his shoulders back and twisted his head from side to side as a boxer would warming up for a fight. “We don’t have time for their questions. Do you want to lose half the day being interrogated by management? Or do you want to get what we came for and get out of here?”

  Zap nodded sagely. “I like the second option.”

  Ruaan clucked his tongue. “It was a rhetorical question, you nit.”

  “Don’t you prefer the second option?” Zap held out his hands but Ruaan swatted them aside.

  “Guys, let’s do what we came here to do. Elden is right about that, we don’t have much time.” They led off down the passage, leaving Zap trailing at the end.

  14

  Elden pressed his face up against a wall of one-way glass, blocking out the light with his hands. “That’s the room we need to be in. I could probably get us in, but I don’t know if we’d be able to get out.”

  Kai leaned close, trying to see through his own reflection. This place was suffocating, worse than being in a small cave despite high ceilings and lots of space. “I thought you said we needed the vault?” The word itself hinted at dark metal and un-crackable locks. All he could see was a cavernous open space that seemed to stretch on forever. His Affinity had been zoning in and out since arriving here. He sent out a test thought to Zap. Can you hear me, buddy?

  Zap was staring up and down the passage, looking a bit green and bouncing on his toes.

  “Are you OK?”

  Zap kept on bouncing. “I don’t like this place.”

  Elden laughed, a cold hard snort. “We’re deep in the other side’s turf. I’d be worried if you did.”

  Unlike the others, Ruaan wasn’t hunched over, trying to see beyond the glass. He stood as casually as a bored boyfriend while waiting for his girlfriend to finish shoe shopping. His grey eyes glowed faintly, visible even though it wasn’t dark.

  Kai frowned at him. “Hey, no fair! Why is your Affinity working here?”

  “Some of us are more special than others, I guess.” He picked at his nail but then froze. “We’d better look busy. There’s a group coming.”

  Kai listened hard but heard nothing. “Are you sure?”

  “About thirty of them. The word harvester is in my head.”

  Elden pulled away from the glass as if it had suddenly become hot. “Harvesters! That’s not good. Quickly, this way.”

  They followed Elden down the sterile passage, hunting for a hideaway.

  Ruaan mumbled as they went.

  Zap tackled him in a fierce whisper, “Is that your stomach, or are you griping again?”

  “I’m just saying, we’re wasting our time. There’s another group coming from this side.”

  A flash of heat passed through Kai. “So you’re saying we are about to become the jelly in a Harvester sandwich.”

  “Weird analogy, but basically yes.”

  Elden stopped scurrying, and his forehead creased. “New plan. Hide the maintenance badges. We’re going undercover as Harvesters. Follow my lead and shut your mouths.”

  The first group rounded the corner from the left. They jogged in time, moving quickly down the passage towards where the guys waited. Kai felt like a pimple on prom night.

  The Harvesters halted as they reached them. The one in front stepped out from the bunch, his chest popping out slightly. “What are you all doing here?”

  Elden towered over the guy by at least a head. As he spoke, he softened his spine and seemed to fold himself down until he was closer to the guy’s height. “Apologies. One of my squad dropped his catch. We waited while he gathered it all up, but our squad had moved on. We were waiting here for the next passcard holder.”

  The man sighed as if their incompetence was a personal insult. “Fall in. You can present your Harvest with our squad. You realize that your haul will be credited to us.”

  Elden nodded but kept his eyes on the floor. Kai tried to copy his demeanour. Humble but productive. Invisible.

  They fell in step with the group and soon lined up outside the doorway into the vault. The squad leader stuck his thumb over the fingerprint reader and two huge panes of glass slid back. Cold washed over them, turning their breath to mist. The room was kept a few degrees below comfortable, and Kai wished he’d bought a hoodie.

  “Once you’ve secured your take, you are free to leave until your next shift.” The leader checked his watch and waved them inside, looking bored. He handed out gadgets as the people passed him, skipping over five before giving out the next one.

  As the group entered, they split up, covering only a fraction of the large expanse.

  Kai shuffled into the vault with the others. A honeycomb pattern covered the floor that made his eyes swim.

  Elden flicked his head to the right and the three followed him.

  The squad seemed to work in groups of six. The bunch closest to Kai had their heads together over their gadget. One of them typed numbers into it. As he pressed a button in the middle, a single honeycomb hexagon a few steps away from them lit up. They hurried over to it and plugged their gadget into a hollow recess in the centre of the hexagon on the floor. As it clicked into place, a six-sided column rose up, a smooth shaft seemingly formed from a single piece of obsidian.

  They circled the pillar, each one facing a flat side. For a moment, nothing seemed to be happening. But then a spark of green spiraled up the column. The lava glass lit up and glowed from within, turning transparent. The top layer of obsidian seemed to melt away, showing deep recesses behind. Each of the
six reached into their bags and drew out a bunch of amulets dangling off a cord, just like the one Runt had claimed as her own. Working quickly, they hung the amulets in the recesses. The obsidian was slowly becoming opaque once more, and a curtain of liquid obsidian dripped down from the ceiling, solidifying as it touched the floor and growing to cover the opening.

  A redhead closest to Kai fumbled and dropped her pendant on the floor. Her friend next to her hissed as she bent down to help her pick them up.

  “Quickly! Get that amulet in. It’s closing!”

  The fumbling girl muttered under her breath, her hands shaking as she hung the amulets while dodging falling drops. One fat blob skimmed her skin, and she cried out.

  Elden led the three further away from the door, around a corner off to one side. “I need the GPS coordinates for the OS.”

  Zap wiggled his eyebrows at Ruaan, who glared at him. Ruaan reached for the device in Elden’s hand. “Let me type it in. Easier than trying to say it.” He entered the digits, pressed the middle button, and waited. The device lit up emerald, the light pulsing slowly.

  Kai checked the ground around where they stood, nothing. A block lit up, and a squad rushed over to claim it. The colour was wrong for the device in Ruaan’s hand.

  “Keep hunting, guys. It’s got to be here somewhere.” The lines on Elden’s forehead deepened as he frowned.

  They spread out, hunting for flashing light the same shade as their device, dodging other searchers. A vague sense of unease crept over Kai as they moved further and further from the doorway. The longer they looked, the more time he spent checking to make sure he could still see the others.

  Zap froze, frowning at the ground, head tilted to the side like a bird. “Guys, I think this is our flashy thingy.”

  ~*~

  “Surely we can talk to them. They’ll understand.” Evazee held Zulu’s thick wrist in her hands. His pulse was racing.

  “You saw. You saw the boy die. They have no mercy. We must run.”

  “There are at least a hundred kids in this house. Some of them are young. How would we run? Besides, wouldn’t they just keep following us?”

  Zulu’s head dropped to his chest. “We are done for.”

  Evazee’s heart pounded in her throat. A headache was settling in to the base of her skull, one of those that got worse until one threw up.

  “We can’t run, so we wait them out. Zulu, pull your boys off guard duty. Send them to round up all the kids and take them down to the basement. There is only one entrance – through a trapdoor. It’s impossible to find unless you know what you’re looking for. If we hide out there and we all stay really quiet, they might not find us.”

  Zulu didn’t look convinced.

  Evazee drew herself up as tall as she could and stuck a hand on her hip. “Do you have a better plan? Because if you do, please speak now.”

  Zulu’s face hardened, but he stuck two fingers between his lips and whistled so loudly, Evazee covered her ears.

  Within minutes, all Zulu’s boys were gathered around him. He hunched over and spoke to them in an urgent tone, they listened intently with their brown eyes gleaming in the gloomy light. All the boys nodded, Zulu straightened up and clapped his hands once. The boys dispersed, running at top speed in different directions.

  “Friend-Evazee, the boys will bring everybody here. Then we are yours.” He tipped his head in a gesture that was raw power, yet yielded to her.

  Evazee wanted to throw up. “Good. That’s good.” A wave of dizziness washed over her and she shook it off, schooling her features to look like she knew what she was doing. Saving kids from blood-thirsty priests. Nothing weird going on here.

  A full ten minutes later, all of Zulu’s boys were back with groups of OS kids in tow. They reported back their headcount, and Evazee tallied it all up, satisfied that they seemed to have everybody. Zulu’s boys each stood at the front of their groups, looking strong and proud—so different from the broken boys they’d pulled off the bus. Their eyes were trained on Zulu, waiting for his next command. They may be young, but there was more to these boys than Evazee had first thought.

  Evazee fidgeted in front of the group, reluctant to open her mouth. Zulu checked the clock on the wall, and she thought she saw his face pale.

  “Everyone, this is not a drill. Some men from Zulu’s village are coming. We are going to move down to the basement to hide from them until they’ve calmed down. Stay in your groups, and listen to the boy who fetched you. I don’t want any of you getting lost. Raise your hand if you understand.”

  A ripple of raised hands crossed the room. It was enough. “Follow me.”

  Evazee led the group downstairs trying not to think too deeply. Bree caught up and yanked on her arm.

  “I don’t want to cause trouble, but isn’t the trapdoor the only way in and out of the basement?”

  “There’s a storm water drain.” Evazee shrugged.

  Bree’s nose wrinkled. “With the way it’s been raining, that is likely to be flooded. I don’t think you can count that as an option.”

  “We just need a place to hide. We don’t need to get out.”

  Bree had her head sideways, eyeing Evazee as if she were a science experiment gone funky. “Doesn’t that sound a bit too much like a trap to you?”

  “We’ll just hide out until they give up and leave. It’s not a big deal.”

  The expression on Bree’s face contradicted every scrap of not-big-deal that Evazee had forced into her voice.

  “C’mon. Let’s get them all down.”

  ~*~

  Ruaan bent down, but before he could press the device into the hollow in the middle of the pillar, Elden swooped across and took it out of his hands.

  “Here, let me do that.”

  Ruaan backed off with his hands up like a hostage. “Fine. Have your moment in the sun.”

  “Don’t be such a baby. This thing was coded to me when Security gave it to me. Do you want to set off a bunch of alarms?”

  Ruaan mumbled under his breath.

  Zap elbowed Kai. “We should have fed him before coming.”

  Elden cleared his throat. “Are you all ready to grab? Get yourselves into position. You won’t have much time. Here we go.”

  Kai shot a quick glance around the room to make sure they weren’t being watched. The other groups were all absorbed in their own pillars. “Let’s do it.”

  The device clicked into place, and the lights merged with those in the floor in a satisfying weaving of colour. As the column started rising, it let out a loud hiss before shooting upwards in a smooth swoosh.

  Kai stood waiting at the one flat side, and his breath caught as the covering layer of lava glass melted away. Many amulets swung inside the pillar. One in particular caught his eye. It had Evazee’s unmistakable feathery imprint. The girl had been so out of it, the thought of being able to give back whatever had been stolen from her made him mushier inside than he cared to admit. He reached in before he could change his mind. The moment his fingers contacted the surface, drops of lava glass fell from the top. He grabbed the feathery amulet and pulled his hand back just in time to miss getting scorched. A breath later, it was all sealed up. Now what?

  He rapped his knuckles on the surface, already cool and solid.

  Zap was staring at him. “Did you nearly get your hand singed off?” Zap pointed to Kai’s side of the pillar.

  “Not exactly. Maybe close, but not completely.” Kai waved him back towards his side. “Get in there, Zap! There’s no time to waste.”

  Ruaan breathed in so sharply, they forgot their squabble.

  “Guys, look!” He pointed at the column. Through the lava glass they could see an amulet engraved with an open eye. “I think it’s mine.”

  “But the thing is closed. How are you going to get it?” Zap sounded as though he’d just dropped a double scoop of ice cream.

  Ruaan’s face glowed, and he stared, entranced, through the lava glass. He reached for the pendant,
and the lava glass drew back at his touch. He didn’t seem to notice, but took his pendant while holding his breath. Only when it was safely around his neck did he breathe again. He grinned at the others, face beaming.

  Zap had a smirk on his face that Kai knew well. “Pretty necklace.”

  Ruaan was so chuffed with his find that even Zap’s sarcasm couldn’t affect him. “Necklaces are for girls. This is my amulet.” He shrugged and rolled the word around on his tongue. “Yep, this is mine.”

  “How can you be so sure?” Zap was frowning more than Kai had ever seen him frown.

  “It feels familiar in the best way possible.” Ruaan’s face was positively angelic.

  “Zap, get in there. Yours is going to start closing soon.” Kai watched his friend for a split second. Then he sprang into action, grabbing amulets by the fist-full.

  The drips started from the top of the column, and Kai’s heart sank. There were still too many amulets inside, each one representing a captured life.

  In seconds, the column had closed up completely and sank back into the floor until it was level. The lights winked out, and the opportunity was over.

  Ruaan had his back to them. “Er, guys, why are we the only ones left?”

  Kai spun around. The room had emptied out without them noticing. “Where is Elden?”

  Zap paled and pointed. Elden was on the other side of the closed glass doors. They ran to him. Kai pushed on the doors to open them, but they didn’t budge. He waved at Elden, but Elden wouldn’t look at him. He left with the other two groups, eyes downcast.

  The lights in the vault switched off, plunging the vast chamber into darkness.

  “This sucks.” Ruaan’s voice echoed through the empty space.

  ~*~

  Bree stood next to Evazee with her arms folded. “Do you think we’re over-reacting?”

  They stood together at the bottom of the stairs watching groups of OS kids trooping down the steps into the basement. Each group was led by one of Zulu’s boys. None of them spoke much, but they carried themselves with a suppleness and strength that singled them out as warriors in training.