Thunderhead

by Neal Shusterman

  “I know the things the Tonists believe are ridiculous,” Citra said, “but I suppose to some people, there’s something compelling about them.”

  “That’s what turkeys think about the rain,” Marie pointed out. “They raise their eyes heavenward, open up their beaks, and drown.”

  “Not the turkeys the Thunderhead grows,” said Citra.

  Marie nodded. “My point exactly.”

  * * *

  There are few left who truly worship anything. Faith is an unfortunate casualty of immortality. Our world has become both uninspired, and untortured.  A place where miracles and magic have no mystery. With the smoke blown away, and mirrors aligned, it is all revealed as manifestations of nature and technology. For anyone who wishes to know how the magic works, all they need to do is ask me.

  Only the tone cults carry on the tradition of faith.  The absurdity of what Tonists believe is both charming and, at times, disturbing. There is no organization among the different sects, so practices vary, but they do share several things in common. They all loathe scythes. And they all believe in the Great Resonance—a living vibration audible to human ears that will unify the world like a biblical messiah.

  I have yet to come across a living vibration, but if I do, I will certainly have many things to ask it.  Although I expect its responses may be, well, monotonous.

  —The Thunderhead

  * * *

  25

  Specter of the Truth

  Rowan awoke in a bed he did not know, in a room he had never seen. Right away, he sensed he wasn’t in MidMerica anymore. He tried to move, but his arms were tied to the bedposts. Not just tied but buckled with leather straps. There was a dull ache in his back, and although he wasn’t gagged anymore, his mouth felt funny.

  “About time you woke up! Welcome to San Antonio!”

  He turned, and to his surprise, he saw none other than Tyger Salazar sitting there.

  “Tyger?”

  “I remember how you used to always be there at the revival center when I woke up after splatting. I figured I’d do the same for you.”

  “Was I deadish? Is that what this is? A revival center?” Even as he said it, he knew it wasn’t.

  “Naah, you weren’t dead,” Tyger said. “Just knocked out.”

  Rowan’s head was foggy, but he hadn’t forgotten the circumstances in Scythe Brahms’s home that had rendered him unconscious. He ran his tongue over his teeth and realized that they weren’t right. They were uneven, and much shorter than they were supposed to be. Smooth, but shorter.

  Tyger caught what he was doing. “Some of your teeth got knocked out, but they’re already growing back. Probably a day or two and they’ll be back to normal—which reminds me . . .”

  He reached over to a nightstand and held out a glass of milk to him. “For the calcium. Otherwise your healing nanites’ll steal it from your bones.”  Then he remembered that Rowan was tied to the bedposts. “Oh, right. Duh.” He bent the straw toward Rowan’s mouth so he could drink—and although Rowan had a thousand questions, he drank because more than anything he was thirsty.

  “Did you really have to fight them when they came to get you?”  Tyger said. “If you had just gone along with it, you wouldn’t have been hurt, and they wouldn’t have had to tie you down.”

  “What the hell are you talking about, Tyger?”

  “You’re here because I needed a sparring partner!” he said brightly. “I asked for you.”

  Rowan wasn’t sure he’d heard him right. “Sparring partner?”

  “The guys who went to recruit you said you were a grade A jerk. You laid into them, and they had no choice but to fight back—do you blame them?”

  Rowan could only shake his head in disbelief. What was going on here?

  Then the door opened, and if the moment was already strange, now it became downright surreal.

  Because standing before Rowan was a dead woman.

  “Hello, Rowan,” said Scythe Rand. “So good to see you.”

  Tyger furrowed his brow.  “Wait, you know each other?”  Then he thought for a moment. “Oh, right—you were both at that party—the one where I saved the High Blade from drowning!”

  Rowan felt the milk coming back, and he coughed, gagging on it. He had to swallow again, forcing it to stay down. How was this possible? He had ended her! He had ended them all—Goddard, Chomsky, and Rand—they had burned to ash. But here she was, a bright green phoenix back from the ashes.

  Rowan pulled against his bonds, wishing they would break, but knowing they wouldn’t.

  “So get this,” said Tyger, all smiles. “I’m an apprentice, just like you were. Only difference is, I’m gonna get to be a scythe!”

  And Rand smiled. “He’s been such a fine pupil.”

  Rowan tried to get his panic under control and focused in on Tyger, trying to force Scythe Rand out of his mind, because he could only handle one thing at a time.

  “Tyger,” he said, looking his friend in the eye, “whatever you think is going on here, you’re wrong. You’re horribly wrong! You need to get out of here.  You need to run!”

  But Tyger laughed. “Dude!” he said. “Calm down. Not everything is some big-ass conspiracy!”

  “It is!” Rowan insisted. “It is! And you have to get out before it’s too late!” But the more Rowan said, the more deranged he knew he sounded.

  “Tyger, why don’t you go make Rowan a sandwich? I’m sure he’s hungry.”

  “Right!” Tyger said, and then winked at Rowan. “And I’ll hold the lettuce.”

  The moment Tyger was gone, Scythe Rand closed the door. And locked it.

  “I was burned over 50 percent of my body, and my back was broken,” Scythe Rand said. “You left me for dead, but it’ll take a whole lot more than you to end me.”

  She didn’t have to tell Rowan for him to figure out what had happened next. She had dragged herself out of the flames, thrown herself into a publicar, and had it take her to Texas—a region where she could get medical attention at a healing center with no questions asked. Then she had lain low. Waiting. Waiting for him.

  “What are you doing with Tyger?”

  Rand smirked as she slunk toward him. “Weren’t you listening? I’m turning him into a scythe.”

  “You’re lying.”

  “No, I’m not.” Then she smirked again. “Well, maybe just a little.”

  “It can’t be both. Either it’s the truth or a lie.”

  “That’s the problem with you, Rowan.  You can’t see any of the shades in between.”

  And then he realized something. “Scythe Brahms! He was working for you!”

  “Just figured that out, did you?” She sat on the bed. “We knew if he gleaned your father, you’d go after him eventually. He’s really an awful scythe—but he was loyal to Goddard. He actually cried real tears of joy when he found out I was alive. And after you so thoroughly humiliated him, he was more than happy to be the bait to lure you in.”

  “Tyger thinks bringing me here was his idea.”

  Rand wrinkled her nose in an almost flirtatious way. “That was the easy part. I told him we’d have to find him a sparring partner, someone about his size and age. ‘What about Rowan Damisch?’ he said. ‘Oh, what a fantastic idea,’ I said right back. He’s certainly not the sharpest machete on the mantle, but he’s very sincere. It’s almost charming.”

  “If you hurt him, I swear—”

  “You swear what? Considering your current situation, you can’t do anything but swear.”

  Then she pulled out a dagger from her robe. The handle was green marble, and the blade was shiny black. “It would be fun-and-a-half to carve out your heart right now,” she said, but instead she dragged the tip of the blade along the arch of his foot. Not hard enough to draw blood, but with just enough pressure to make his toes curl. “But cutting your heart out will have to wait . . . because there’s so much more in store for you!”

  • • •

 
For hours, Rowan could do nothing but think about his predicament, alone on a bed that must have been comfortable, but when you were tied to it, it might as well have been a bed of nails.

  So he was in Texas. What did he know about the Texas region? Not much that could help him. Learning about it had not been part of his training, and Charter Regions were not taught in school unless one chose to study them. All Rowan really knew was common knowledge and hearsay.

  Texan homes had no Thunderhead cameras.

  Texan cars didn’t drive themselves unless they had to.

  And the only law in Texas was the law of one’s own conscience.

  He’d once known a kid who had moved from Texas. He wore big boots and a big hat, and a belt buckle that could stop a mortar shell.

  “It’s a lot less boring there,” the kid had said. “We can have crazy-exotic pets, and dangerous dog breeds that are outlawed other places. And weapons! Guns and knives and stuff that only scythes get to have everywhere else, we can have. Of course, people aren’t supposed to actually use ’em, but sometimes they do.”  Which explained why the Texas region had the highest rate of accidental shootings and pet-bear maulings in the world.

  “And we don’t got unsavories in Texas,” the kid had bragged. “Anyone who gets out of hand, we just kick their sorry ass out.”

  There was also no penalty for rendering someone deadish—except having to face retribution from the victim after they were revived—which was a pretty good deterrent.

  It seemed to Rowan that the Texas region had embraced its roots, and had chosen to mimic the Old West the way Tonists mimicked mortal-age religions. In short, Texas had the best of both worlds—or the worst, depending on your point of view. There were benefits for both the courageous and the foolhardy, but also a great many opportunities to truly screw up one’s life.

  But, just as in every Charter Region, no one was forced to stay. “If you don’t like it, leave,” was the unofficial motto of all Charter Regions. Plenty of people left, but plenty also came, leaving a population that enjoyed things just the way they were.

  It seemed the only person in Texas unable to do as he pleased was Rowan.

  • • •

  Later that day, two guards came for him. They weren’t members of the BladeGuard—they were muscle for hire. When they untied him, Rowan considered taking them out. He could have done it in seconds, leaving them unconscious on the floor, but he decided against it. All he knew of his captivity were the dimensions of his bedroom. Better to get the lay of the land before attempting any sort of escape.

  “Where are you taking me?” he asked one of guards.

  “Where Scythe Rand told us to take you,” was all he could get out of him.

  Rowan made a mental note of everything he saw: The ceramic lamp beside his bed could be used as a weapon in a pinch. The windows did not open, and were probably made from unbreakable glass. When he had been tied to the bed, the windows afforded him no view but the sky . . . but now, as they led him from the room, he could see that they were in a high-rise.  This was an apartment—and as they made their way down a long hallway that opened up into a huge living area, he realized that it was a penthouse.

  Beyond the living room, an open-air veranda had been transformed into a gym for Bokator sparring. Waiting for him there were Scythe Rand and Tyger, who was stretching and bouncing around like a prizefighter waiting for a championship bout.

  “Hope you’re ready to be pounded,” said Tyger. “I’ve been training since I got here!”

  Rowan turned to Rand. “Are you serious? Are you really making us spar?”

  “Tyger told you that’s why you’re here,” she said with an annoying wink.

  “You’re going down!” said Tyger. Rowan would laugh if this weren’t so twisted.

  Rand sat in an oversize red leather chair that clashed with her robe. “Let’s have some fun!”

  Rowan and Tyger circled each other at a distance—the traditional opening of a Bokator match. Tyger engaged in the physical taunting that was also traditional, but Rowan didn’t reciprocate. Instead, he surreptitiously took in the surroundings. Back in the penthouse, he could see a couple of doors that were most likely a bathroom and a closet. There was an open kitchen, and a raised dining room overlooking floor-to-ceiling windows. There were double doors that were clearly the entry. On the other side would be elevators and an emergency staircase. He tried to visualize how he might escape—but realized if he did, it would mean leaving Tyger in the fly-trap clutches of Scythe Rand. He couldn’t do that. Somehow, he’d have to convince Tyger to come with him. He felt confident that he could do it; it would just take time—but Rowan had no idea how much time he had.

  Tyger made the first move, lunging for Rowan in classic Black Widow Bokator style. Rowan dodged but not fast enough—not just because his mind was not on the match, but also because his muscles were tight and reflexes slow, having been tied to a bed for who knew how long. He had to scramble to keep from getting pinned.

  “Told you I was good, bro!”

  Rowan glanced over to Rand, trying to read her expression. She was not her usual aloof self. Instead, she watched them intently, studying every move of the match.

  Rowan jammed the heel of his hand into Tyger’s sternum to knock out his wind and give Rowan leverage to regain his own balance. Then he hooked a leg around one of  Tyger’s to take him down. Tyger anticipated the move, and countered with his own kick. It connected but without enough force behind it to throw Rowan off balance.

  They broke off, and circled once again. Clearly, Tyger had gotten stronger. Like Rowan, his physique had filled out. He had been well-trained by Rand, but Black Widow Bokator was more than physical prowess. There was a mental component, and Rowan had the advantage there.

  Rowan began to strike and parry in a very predictable way, using all the standard moves that he knew Tyger would have countermoves for. Rowan let himself be taken down—but only in such a way that he could quickly get back up before Tyger could pin him. He watched Tyger’s confidence grow. He was already full of himself—it didn’t take much to puff  Tyger’s ego into a balloon fit for popping. Then, when the moment was ripe, Rowan came down on Tyger with a combination of moves that was completely counterintuitive. They were the opposite of what Tyger would do—the antithesis of what he’d be expecting. On top of it, Rowan used moves of his own that were beyond the standard 341 Bokator sets. His attack was out of a box that Tyger didn’t even know existed.

  He took Tyger down hard, pinning him in a way that left him no possible leverage to get himself out of it—but still he refused to yield the match. Instead, Rand called it, and Tyger wailed in melodramatic agony.

  “He cheated!” insisted Tyger

  Rand stood up. “No he didn’t—he’s just better than you.”

  “But—”

  “Tyger, shut up,” she said. And he did. He obeyed her as if he were nothing but her pet. And not even a dangerous, exotic one. More like a scolded pup. “You’ll just have to keep working on your skills.”

  “Fine,” Tyger said, and left for his room in a huff, but not before a parting shot. “Next time, you’re toast!” he told Rowan.

  Once he was gone, Rowan inspected a tear in his shirt, and a bruise that was already healing. He ran his tongue across his teeth, because he had taken a glancing blow to the mouth, but no damage. In fact, his front teeth had almost grown all the way back.

  “Quite a showing,” said Rand, keeping a few feet of distance between them.

  “Maybe I should have a go at you,” Rowan taunted.

  “I would break your neck in seconds,” she said, “just as mercilessly as you broke your girlfriend’s neck last year.”

  She was trying to bait him, but he wouldn’t take it. “Don’t be so sure,” he told her.

  “Oh, I’m sure,” she said, “but I have no interest in proving it.”

  Rowan suspected she was right. He knew how good she was—and after all, she had been part of
his training. She knew all of his tricky moves, and had plenty of her own.

  “Tyger won’t ever beat me, you know that, don’t you? He might have the moves but he doesn’t have the mind. I’ll take him down every time.”

  Rand didn’t deny it. “So beat him,” she said. “Beat him every single time.”

  “What’s the point of that?”

  But she didn’t answer. Instead, she had her guards bring him back to his room. Mercifully, they didn’t tie him to the bed, but the door was triple-locked from the outside.

  • • •

  About an hour later, Tyger came to see him. Rowan thought that he might be bitter, but Tyger was not one to hold a grudge.

  “Next time I’m going to hurt you,” he said, then laughed. “Like seriously, your-nanites-are-gonna-go-crazy kind of hurt.”

  “Great,” said Rowan. “At last, something to look forward to.”

  Then Tyger moved close and whispered. “So, I’ve seen my ring,” he said. “Scythe Rand showed it to me right after you got here.”

  And then Rowan realized—“That’s my ring.”

  “What are you talking about? You never got a ring.”

  Rowan bit his lip to keep himself quiet. He wanted to tell Tyger the whole truth about Scythe Lucifer and all that he had done over the past year—but what good would it do? It certainly wouldn’t win Tyger over, and Scythe Rand could spin it against Rowan in a dozen different ways.

  “I mean . . . the ring I would have had, if I made scythe,” Rowan finally said.

  “Hey,” said Tyger sympathetically, “I know it must suck going through all that and then getting kicked to the curb—but I promise as soon as the ring is mine, I’m gonna give you immunity!”

  He never remembered Tyger being so naive. Maybe because they had both been naive together, in the days when scythes were larger-than-life figures and gleanings were stories you heard about people you didn’t actually know.