Alight

by Scott Sigler

  Past the coffins is a raised platform with five white pedestals. To our left, a tall black “X” mounted into the floor. Thick shackles dangle from the top of each arm. A bar runs between the tops of those arms—hanging from that bar, some kind of ornate, black crown. On the wall just behind the X, a colorful, carved mural: an old man shackled to that same X, wearing that same crown, a young man in red robes before him, driving a knife into the old man’s chest. To our right, deep shadows filled with racks of bins similar to what we saw in the food warehouse, except these bins all look empty and many are scattered about.

  In the room’s center, there is a hole about as wide as I am tall. A waist-high, red metal wall surrounds it. A flexible black tube—as thick as my arm—runs from inside that hole, over the wall and under the pedestal platform.

  Visca and Bishop move through the room, flashlights in one hand, weapons in the other. We give them a few minutes, then everyone starts exploring.

  I walk to the red wall. Engraved in the metal is a large black symbol. It’s like the one from the plateau on top of this building, but slightly different. Two rings, four dots on the outer ring, two in the middle ring, but there is also a thick dot in the middle—right where the stone pillar was.

  “Aramovsky, take a look at this.”

  Maybe with the center dot, he’ll recognize it.

  He stands at my side, staring at it. He shakes his head—he doesn’t know what it is. At least now he admits it.

  Spingate joins us. Her eyes squint, like a memory is working its way up from the depths.

  “I…I think it’s a representation of something,” she says. “An atom. It’s…I think this represents a carbon atom.”

  She points to the six dots on the rungs, one at a time.

  “These are electrons, I think. And that dot in the middle, that’s the nucleus.”

  I look around the room, my flashlight beam seeking out this symbol on the ceiling, the walls, the coffins. I don’t find it.

  “All right,” I say, “so what does it mean?” I ask her.

  She shrugs. “I have no idea.”

  Another useless symbol of the Grownups.

  Aramovsky walks to the black X. He seems mesmerized by it.

  I look down into the hole. The shaft’s round wall is nothing but dirt, packed with stones that show white cracks and scrapes from when this hole was dug. Far below, I think I see the bottom: something metal. A machine, perhaps. The black cable runs into the center of it.

  Spingate steps onto the pedestal platform. The moment she does, I hear a hum. It’s coming from the black cable.

  The five pedestals begin to glow.

  “Welcome, Grandmaster Spingate.”

  The voice comes from nowhere, from everywhere. Just like in the shuttle’s pilothouse, lights suddenly play off Spingate’s skin. Her face glows like that of a goddess. She smiles wide: a new puzzle for her, a new problem to solve. Her frustration, fear and anger are gone—or at least temporarily forgotten.

  “Do you have a name?” she asks.

  “Much of my memory has been erased. I believe I was referred to as Ometeotl.”

  “Good enough,” she says. “Can you show me a diagram of this building?”

  Lights flash. In the space above the hole, a glowing version of the Observatory appears. The building spins slowly, giving us a look at all four sides.

  “Thank you,” Spingate says. “This place is called the Observatory, is that correct?”

  “Yes, Grandmaster.”

  Spingate nods. That title, Grandmaster, doesn’t surprise her. Maybe her lab referred to her by that name, just like the Deck Three pedestals called O’Malley Chancellor.

  “Observatories are for telescopes,” Spingate says. “Is there a telescope?”

  The fake ziggurat flashes. The sloping sides become transparent. We see hundreds of rooms and intersecting corridors, but the main feature is a long cylinder that starts at the building’s base and rises up at an angle to end just inside one of the sloping walls.

  The cylinder glows brightly. It is enormous. So big, in fact, I can only come to one conclusion—this Observatory was built specifically to house it.

  Spingate steps off the platform and walks to the glowing ziggurat. She continues to shine, lit up so brightly our flashlights are almost useless. She leans on the red metal wall, her eyes tracing the cylinder’s length.

  “I’ve seen an image like this before,” she says. “It’s hard to remember but…someone I knew was trained to use this telescope. Someone I went to school with.”

  Spingate rubs at her face. We all watch, we all wait, because we all know what she’s going through—bits of memories are pushing their way to the surface.

  She stops rubbing. Hands still pressed against her face, she slides her fingers apart slightly. One eye looks at me.

  “Em, our school. We were all being trained to live and work on the Xolotl.” She points at the image of the telescope. “Some people were trained specifically for that. The girl…she was a gear…what was her name?”

  Spingate makes fists, grinds them into her temples.

  She stops—she has it.

  “Okadigbo,” she says. “One of the dead kids in our original coffin room on the Xolotl.”

  I also know that name, because Brewer mentioned her: Where is Okadigbo? Is she still alive, or did you kill her again?

  “She trained for years,” Spingate says. “I can’t remember what her classes were, exactly, but it was all she worked on.”

  The few memories any of us have end at the age of twelve. If Okadigbo had been studying for years, when did she start?

  The Observatory, built to house a telescope.

  This city, built to support the Observatory?

  If these things are true, everything we’ve seen is dedicated to one thing: the telescope. Why? What does it mean? What does it do?

  Spingate reaches out with shaking hands. Her fingertips sink into the glowing ziggurat. She turns it this way, then that, tilting, looking.

  “The telescope has a name,” she says. “I can’t quite…dammit, what was it called?”

  O’Malley walks to stand next to her. He reaches a fingertip out, traces it down the length of the cylinder.

  “It’s called…,” he says, searching for the word, “…it’s called…is it the Goffspear?”

  That word is a hammer smashing into my brain. A word of power. Beyond power. It might be the most important word there is. Looking at the faces of my friends, I know it hits them just as hard.

  “Chancellor, is Adept Okadigbo present?”

  “She’s not,” I say, answering before O’Malley can. I don’t know what an adept is. Right now I don’t care. This building, or system or computer, or whatever it is, is expecting Okadigbo. If it knows she’s dead, it might shut down.

  The image of the Observatory blinks out. So do Spingate’s lights, leaving her again in the darkness.

  She’s staring at me. So are the others.

  Something on my right hand, the hand that holds the spear. Tiny, brightly glowing dots, red and blue and yellow, coating my skin.

  “Welcome, Empress Savage.”

  My friends exchange glances, gawk at me. O’Malley stands quietly, saying nothing.

  Spingate’s eyes narrow. Her expression clouds over with the same distrust she showed when we were at the statue.

  I don’t have time to worry about her. Ometeotl hasn’t asked for my access code. Maybe we can finally get answers. First, though, I need to see what dangers lie in this very room.

  “I am the Empress, so you have to do what I say?”

  “Of course, Empress Savage.”

  “Good. Who is in these coffins?”

  “This servant does not understand the query,” Ometeotl says. “There are no coffins here.”

  I think of Brewer again, and a word pops into my head.

  “The four husks in this room,” I say. “Who is in them?”

  “No one, Empress.”
>
  “Open them. Now.”

  Four coffin lids open simultaneously, splitting vertically down the middle, the halves sliding neatly to the sides.

  All empty.

  The white fabric inside looks perfect, like it has never been touched.

  Goosebumps, cascading up my arms, down my body: something about this place is wrong. I look to Bishop to see if he notices anything, but he doesn’t seem alarmed.

  I push the feeling away. I have so many questions.

  “What is this place? What is this city?”

  “This is the city of Uchmal. Built for the free peoples of the rebellion.”

  That word again, rebellion. I think of Brewer’s warning, that we can make a new future if we don’t know the past. This world is ours to do with as we wish.

  But only if we survive, and to survive, we have to eat.

  “How do we kill the red mold?”

  A pause.

  “Empress Savage, this servant has no information on red mold.”

  It has to know. We can’t have come this far for nothing.

  “We found a warehouse,” I say. “Full of food that was contaminated with a toxin. How did the people who came before us deal with it? What did they eat? And where did those people go?”

  “As you commanded, there have been no people before you, Empress. You are the first to set foot on Omeyocan.”

  That makes no sense. I look at O’Malley. He doesn’t understand, either. Of course there were people here before us—this city didn’t build itself.

  “The rebellion,” Spingate says to the ceiling. “The slaughter on the Xolotl”—she turns her head to stare at me, her gaze malevolent—“why were those people murdered?”

  I freeze. They died because Matilda led an uprising, but only O’Malley and I know she was a slave, that all the circles are slaves. I should have told everyone right away, I knew it. Now it’s going to come out.

  O’Malley is staring at Spingate, mouth hanging open. His eyes flick to me, and all he does is blink—the whisperer has no idea what to do now.

  “I have limited information on the Xolotl,” Ometeotl says. “Empress Savage’s valiant efforts stopped a horrible slaughter. She led a rebellion that saved thousands of lives, then she took control of the Xolotl and created Uchmal.”

  The answer leaves Spingate speechless; that wasn’t what she was expecting. I’m at a loss for words, too, but for different reasons—was my creator actually protecting people?

  I shake my head, try to focus. Even if Matilda was protecting people, it doesn’t justify the carvings on the Observatory walls, and it doesn’t come close to justifying the slaughter up on the Xolotl. We saw dead circles, not dead halves and gears.

  Wait…we’re being told this story by the same source that says we are the first ones here, ever, when we are standing in a building it must have taken thousands of people to create.

  And then it hits me, a knife through my heart. Ometeotl just said that Matilda created this city. If that’s true, then she created this building—which means she created Ometeotl.

  My father’s voice, echoing: History is written by the victors. The “history” I’m hearing now…was that written about Matilda, or by her?

  Frustration claws at me. I can’t trust anything Ometeotl says. This computer, or whatever it is, it lies. Everyone lies. This place held our only hope to find out the truth, and now that hope is gone.

  More goosebumps; that odd feeling returns, and I suddenly know what it is—I feel like I’m being watched.

  Visca’s focus snaps to a shadowy corner, then another. He feels it, too.

  “Something’s wrong,” he says.

  Bishop’s brow furrows as if he agrees but he can’t define why.

  I smell something, a faint wisp that seems familiar.

  The slightest rattle of plastic: five flashlight beams sweep to the racks. The same bins, clearly empty, but one is rocking, just a little.

  Something is down here with us, something lurking in the deep shadows. The bin stops rocking—beams dance across the racks, but there is no movement to be seen.

  The smell connects: burned toast, the same thing I smelled at the fire pit, and at the tunnel beneath the wall. We’re not alone—the people from the jungle are here.

  I hesitate. We can confront them, but they could be violent and Spingate is with us. If anything happens to her, we have no hope of beating the mold. Attack, attack, always attack. My father’s voice again, but this time he’s wrong. We don’t know how many enemies we face…and we don’t know what weapons they have.

  “Bishop,” I say, keeping my voice low, “get us out of here.”

  He moves halfway to the racks, putting himself between us and the unknown danger. He crouches, axe in one hand, flashlight in the other.

  Visca at my side, his voice calm but insistent: “Em, get in the elevator.”

  I do as I’m told, watching the shadows all the way, waiting for someone to come rushing out of them. I enter the elevator as quietly as I can. Aramovsky, O’Malley and Spingate follow. I can feel their fear.

  Visca silently walks up to Bishop, taps his big shoulder. Without either of them looking away from the racks, they walk backward right into the elevator.

  Bishop shuts the door.

  The cage rises.

  “All I saw was that bin,” Spingate says. “Did anyone see anything else move?”

  “I didn’t,” Bishop says. “But it seems like this cage is the only way in and out.” He glances up. “Whoever was down there, if they weren’t alone, they could have friends waiting for us to step out—everyone be ready to fight. We need to stay together, get off this building and then back to the shuttle as fast as we can.”

  Aramovsky shakes his head. “We can’t leave. We have to go back down, finally learn who we are. This building, this temple…we need to bring everyone here. We need to live here.”

  Live in a building covered in images of human sacrifice? Get answers from a machine voice that is either wrong or lying? And then there’s the obvious—someone was down there, someone who was watching us.

  The fire-builders.

  Aramovsky is almost right. We might have to come back, but not for the reasons he thinks. We have five days of rations left. If we don’t find food soon, if Spingate can’t beat the mold, then we will capture the people in the Observatory and force them to tell us what they know. I will come back here with all the circle-stars.

  “We return to the shuttle,” I say. “The Observatory isn’t safe.”

  Aramovsky starts to protest, but I thonk the spear down on the cage floor.

  “No one is allowed to come here,” I say. “No one.”

  Heads nod. Even Aramovsky’s.

  The cage’s rise slows. I feel lighter. Then it stops. The doors open. We see the stairs leading up.

  Wind roars down the wide streets, channeled by the buildings on either side. Rain blasts us from all directions, but we dare not stop.

  We are being hunted.

  Visca carries Spingate in his arms. O’Malley stumbles more than runs, the last of his energy long since spent.

  Up ahead, Bishop waves madly for us to come his way. He’s at the street corner, half-hidden by the base layer of a small ziggurat. He can’t call to us, because the spider is so close it might hear even over the wind-driven rustle of a million leaves.

  Visca reaches him first, Aramovsky right on his heels. O’Malley falls hard. I drag him to his feet, shove him on. Then Bishop is there, tosses O’Malley over one big shoulder, grabs my hand and yanks me around the corner.

  I’m thrown to the ground next to Spingate, who silently sobs, her elbow clutched to her chest. Before I can get up, O’Malley lands hard next to me. Visca covers us with a thick sheet of vines.

  “Stay still,” Bishop hisses. “Be silent.”

  Seconds pass. I stare through the vines out to the dark street. Clouds transform Omeyocan’s twin moons into hazy, glowing spots of blue and maroon. The few
trees growing up from ziggurat plateaus bend beneath the stiff wind. Our coveralls keep our bodies mostly dry, but the rain runs down our faces and under our collars.

  No one was waiting for us atop the Observatory. It was pitch-black, the stars blocked by heavy clouds. Halfway down, the skies opened up. Steep steps were treacherous enough before rain made the vines slick, before high winds blasted us. We only had two layers left when Spingate fell and cracked her elbow on the stone. She thinks it’s broken.

  We followed Visca’s route back from the Observatory, but this time we weren’t alone. Over the wind, we heard a whine—the sound of the spider that almost caught us at the city gate. It’s looking for us, and it’s getting closer.

  The whine is much louder now.

  “What are we doing?” Aramovsky whispers from behind me. “We need to get to the shuttle!”

  Bishop’s hand shoots through the vines, grabs him by the throat.

  “Be…quiet.”

  We’ve changed directions so many times I have no idea where we are, but Visca says we’re not far from the shuttle. If we can lose the spider, we’ll soon be safe.

  The deluge pours down, unstoppable. I stare out at the dark intersection as the whine grows louder still, and wonder if maybe—just this once—I should pray to Aramovsky’s gods.

  A flash of movement: the spider is visible for only a moment as it rushes down the street we were just on, and then is gone from sight.

  Seconds pass. We wait for it to come back and kill us.

  The seconds become minutes.

  Bishop finally releases Aramovsky, then steps to the corner and peeks out. I’m watching him, but as soon as he stops moving, his camouflage soaks him into the night’s shadows like water vanishing into a sponge.

  He waves us forward.

  —

  We crest the vine wall, look down at our shuttle. We made it. Circle-stars rush out to help. Gaston beats them to us, goes straight to Spingate. Someone carries O’Malley. Hands help me, I’m not sure whose.

  The shuttle’s warmth welcomes me. Someone lays me down in my coffin. Then Smith is there, asking me questions in a harsh, clipped tone. I answer as best I can: no, I’m not hurt; you’re holding up three fingers, now two; yes, I just want to sleep. Then she’s gone, saying she has to operate on Spingate’s elbow.