He rejoins the other. They stand solemnly at the feet of our beds, waiting in silence.
A minute later, we hear the door open, then locked. I instantly recognize the broad-shouldered man as he pushes through a part in the curtains. He does not look particularly upset or in a rush. More bemused, almost apologetic. He’s since put on a velvet frock coat decorated with Palace regalia. Judging from the number of crests and badges, Sissy’s right. He’s highly ranked.
“What’s the matter?” he begins to ask, then sees the ripped-out transfusion cords. “Oh. Oh, I see.” He strokes his left eyebrow with his right thumb, once, twice.
“Obviously,” he says, “by now you realize we’re your friends. We’re on the same side.”
I tug at the restraints, making them clang nosily. “You have a pretty low bar for friendship.”
The men scratch their wrists. “He has a sense of humor, this one,” one of them says, monotone and deadpan.
“Where are David and Epap?” Sissy demands.
The highly ranked man ignores Sissy’s question and places his hand on my shin. I try to pull away, but the restraints prevent movement. He strokes my leg, his palm sickly smooth and cold to the touch. Like chilled plastic. “Seventeen years you lived among them, yet how quickly you revert to heper ways. You’ve let your leg hair grow out. Stubs and prickles of hair everywhere,” he whispers with naked disdain. “On your arms, in your armpits, even a stubble on your face.”
The other men, fascinated and disgusted in equal parts, also touch my leg with their fingertips, probing, rubbing the short stubs of leg hair, trailing their fingers down my ankle.
“Stop touching me.”
Their fingers pause. They look at their leader. He nods, and they remove their hands. He regards me for a long time.
“Do you remember the first time we spoke?” he says. “Back in the Heper Institute, in the restroom?” His hands move to the bag of blood on the side of my bed. He expertly seals the bag, careful not to spill a drop, and hands the bloated bag to one of the men. “It was the eve of the Heper Hunt. I was, if you recall, giving you invaluable advice. To let the Heper Hunt take its course, then use the FLUNS on the other hunters. But you were too smart for your own good, weren’t you?” He titters. “That would have made things so much easier.”
He moves over to Sissy’s bed, checks her bag. “And yet, despite it all, here you are. Both of you. Both halves of the Origin, safely tucked away in the Palace. That’s just one example of your father’s genius. Even when things fall apart, it all somehow seems to work out in the end.”
At the mention of my father, everything in the room seems to still. Everything except my heart, beating fasting now, harder.
“He was the mastermind behind it all, you know. Our leader.” The man glances at me, scratches his wrist. “I can see by your obscenely readable face that you don’t believe me. Well, doesn’t surprise me. You thought your father only a janitor. But he was so much more. Obviously, he had to keep you in the dark out of concern for your safety.”
I turn my eyes to the floor. I suspected, but never fully knew, the passions hidden in the maze of my father's heart. Not for the first time in the last few weeks, I wonder if I ever really knew him at all. “Tell me about him,” I whisper. “Tell me everything you know.”
The man studies me with unnerving concentration. He sees the urgency in my eyes, senses my need to know, and draws out the silence. Clearly, he is enjoying this. “There’s a lot to know. And we have a lot of time. Later—”
“No,” I say. “Now.”
The man stares back, rakes deep scratches into his wrist. “Very well. To show that we truly are on the same side, that we are comrades in arms, I’ll tell you what you want to know. In bite-size portions for now.” He places his hand on the bed railing. “Your father and I grew up together. Up there in the mountains. The Mission was our home, the only home we’d ever known.”
His eyes roam across my face. “You look so much like him when he was younger. Your studied gaze, your thoughtful eyes. But I doubt you’re nearly as smart. The kid was a genius. While the rest of us were romping around the mountains, he preferred his textbooks. He was constantly studying into the wee hours of the night. By the time he was—why, probably your age—he’d come to believe that a cure for the duskers was possible.”
“The Origin,” I say.
He nods, examines his fingernails. “Fast-forward a couple of major setbacks and not a few frustrating years and your father was ready to lead a team into the metropolis. To collect samples of dusker fluid, gallons of it, and bring it back to the Mission. It was crucial for his research and experiments. But it was a dangerous operation. Didn’t think he’d get even a single volunteer. As it turned out, he had to turn away dozens. He had that way with people.”
I nod. So far everything is consistent with what Krugman had told us.
“How large was the team?” Sissy asks.
“About thirty of us. Made up of mostly young men hardy—or foolhardy—enough for the dangerous mission. Women wanted to go, of course, but it was too risky for most of them. The operation was supposed to take anywhere between a fortnight and a month, and menstrual bleeding was going to be an issue. Imagine having your period in the middle of the metropolis populated by millions of them.”
“But my mother went,” I say.
He nods. “Along with five other women. They were all in the early stages of pregnancy—two, maybe three months along. That was the one condition. You had to be pregnant, but not too pregnant, if you know what I mean.”
“My mother,” I whisper. “She was pregnant with me then.”
For the first time his eyes soften. “She was. They’d recently married, your father and her, and he didn’t want her to go. But she insisted and … well, she got her way.”
“And my mother, too,” Sissy says. “She was part of this group?”
He nods.
“What happened next?” Sissy asks.
“The operation was a total catastrophe. We were so naive and idealistic! We had no idea of the dangers. Everything fell apart, and quickly. Many of us perished that first awful night. Those who survived—we hunkered down, afraid to come out even in the daytime. That first week, we were just trying to find a way to escape the metropolis and return to the Mission.”
His voice quivers slightly, the first time his monotone voice has shown a hint of emotion. He grabs the railing tighter. When he speaks again, he’s regained control.
“And perhaps we may have escaped. But it was your father who galvanized us. He warned us that fleeing back to the mountains would lead the duskers straight to the Mission. That history would judge us for such a cowardly and selfish act.”
A heavy pause.
“And then he asked us to believe in him, in the cause. Put your eyes on me, he’d said. Listen to me. How his eyes had burned! How his words pierced into us. He told us there was no higher purpose than to heal the sick, to purify the impure. That there was no nobler calling than to save the duskers. And with the same kind of charisma and passion that convinced us to leave the Mission in the first place, he persuaded us to stay in the metropolis. And so we did. And so we did. We merged into dusker society and over the years became masters of blending in. And every day that passed, every month, every year, every decade, we got closer and closer to finding a cure.”
“What about the women?” I ask, thinking of my mother. “You said they were pregnant when they left the Mission.”
“They survived the first wave of attack. And the births were six, seven months away, distant enough to prepare in advance, to build a triage out in the desert. Afterward, the women nursed their babies for as many years as they could, as much to feed their babies as to ward off their own menstrual bleeding. And when their breasts ran dry, a year, two, even three years later, and bleeding again became a problem, they made sure to get pregnant again, and quickly. Later, we were able to develop a medical procedure—”
“T
hat’s why we had siblings,” I say in horror. “That’s why the women kept bringing babies into this fallen, forsaken place. It was only to protect themselves.”
“It was to protect you!” he retorts. “Because if a mother had been discovered, it would have led quickly to not only her death, but her whole family’s.”
Another silence, weightier this time.
The man blinks rapidly, as surprised by his outburst as we are. He touches his throat with his fingertips.
“We were discussing your father,” he finally says after a moment, his voice recaptured, keen to get back on topic. “As I was saying, he was our leader. Getting his position as janitor at the Domain Building was instrumental to the cause. It gave your father access to the labs, the computer mainframe, the highly classified files. Even placed him close to the top-secret fifty-ninth floor, although he was never able to break in. Later, he rigged the system and had some of us transferred here to the Palace. To have eyes on the Ruler, and, eventually, to have his ear.” He puffs his chest out, the insignia on the breast of his frock coat jutting out. “That would be my role. Chief advisor, in case you were wondering.”
He pauses expectantly, waiting for Sissy or me to say something. He clears his throat. “And then, of course, the miraculous day. Your father found some archaic data embedded in forgotten files in the computer mainframe. He wasn’t sure what he was looking at, but from those cryptic equations he was able to patch together a formula. For the Origin. Eventually, he converted the Origin formula into an actual serum. The process wasn’t perfect—it was extremely complicated, in fact. The Origin had to be separated into two halves, injected into two different carriers, and only after the gestation period—over a decade, mind you—was completed could they be later conjoined by mixing the blood of the two carriers.”
“Sissy and me,” I whisper. “We’re the carriers.”
He nods.
“But something happened,” Sissy says, “before the gestation period was complete. What went wrong?”
He exhales silently through his nose, the waft of air grazing my face. “One of us got careless. Whole families were captured, imprisoned in the dome at the Heper Institute. Including you,” he says to Sissy. “Right from our midst.”
A flash of anger crosses his body, barely contained. “Together the two of you were a weapon. Apart, useless. You were a gun without a bullet; she was a bullet without a gun. And there was nothing we could do about it. We couldn’t simply steal her away without her absence being noted. The dome was under video surveillance twenty-four/seven. If she vanished, they would simply play back the videotapes, and see everything! Questions would be asked, suspicions raised, investigations launched. And the trail would lead right to us, the Originators. And from there, the trail might have led them right to the Mission itself. No, stealing her away wouldn’t have been worth the risk.”
The room spins. It’s all the blood being drained from me. It’s making me light-headed, woozy. “You’ve taken too much blood from me.”
But he only continues speaking, his words coming out faster, with less precision.
“So we did what we had to. Which was simply to keep you both alive until you were both past the gestation period. Your father protected you, Gene, trained you. Indoctrinated into you the need to stay in the metropolis, that escape into the Vast was never an option. And you, Sissy, were with other adults in the dome, so you were fine.”
He rested his aqueous brown eyes on her. “But then, of course … the Heper Hunt ten years ago. It caught us by surprise. As you well know, all the adults in the dome were hunted down, killed. Leaving you alone in the dome. With a bunch of useless babies. You needed help. And that’s why your father left you, Gene. He went to her, to the Heper Institute.”
“Why him?” My voice, though fatigued, is tinged with anger. “Why didn’t someone else go? Why not you?”
He scratches his wrist. “You think it’s so easy, don’t you? You think it’s a little chess game and you can simply move pieces where you want, when you want. But it’s not like that at all. Your father was the only one who had the knowledge to convincingly play the part of a scientist.”
He stops, pauses, forces himself to breathe slower. “Besides, he knew he’d trained you well enough by that point. Even if you were still a little pipsqueak. But he was worried about Sis. Thought she mightn’t have the necessary survivor skills. Turns out he was wrong, of course. She’s every bit as tenacious as you, isn’t she?”
“But why did he have to fake his death?” I ask. “Why not just tell me the reason he was leaving?” I ask.
“Because unless you believed him dead, you’d have gone after him.” He turns his eyes to me and for the first time I detect a kindling of warmth. “Isn’t that the truth, Gene?”
My eyes drop.
“It was a tortured decision, okay?” the chief advisor says. “Your father was against it initially. Does that make you feel better? Only when he realized there was no other choice did he go along. It was the only way his brainchild would work.”
“What brainchild?”
“A plan to make the two of you disappear without any suspicions raised. That was key. And the Heper Hunt was the keyhole. Because out there in the Vast during the Hunt, hepers are devoured. Nobody is taking inventory or recording the kills. It’s a bloodbath. If we were able to extricate Sissy during the Hunt, no one would give her disappearance a second thought. Nor would anyone question your disappearance, either, Gene. Everyone knows the Hunt is violent, with hunters turning on one another, hunters left to melt away in the sunlight. What happens out there stays out there, no questions asked. Ever. It was the perfect plan to extract you two without suspicion.”
“Doesn’t make sense,” Sissy mumbles, deep in thought.
“What doesn’t?” The chief advisor stares down his nose at her.
“If this was the Scientist’s plan,” Sissy asks, “his life’s goal, why did he disappear from the Institute mere months before it was executed? Before the Heper Hunt was to take place?”
A flicker of uncertainty in the chief advisor’s eyes.
“You don’t know, do you?” she says.
His voice comes out strained. “I’ll admit it. I don’t. When he disappeared, we were flummoxed. Why he would suddenly leave at that point, so close to seeing his life’s work come to fruition … I don’t know.” He falls into a sullen silence.
I frown. Sissy’s right: my father’s disappearance defies logic. And it makes his subsequent disappearance from the Mission—so shortly before we were supposed to arrive—all the more inexplicable. My eyes swim uncertainly around me, at my feet, my wrists, at the bags filling with my blood.
“But all that is academic now, isn’t it?” the chief advisor says. “Why he disappeared doesn’t matter. What does matter is the fact that his dream has been realized. Look around you. At the Origin weapons. At the Origin blood! At the Origin together and intact at last!” he says. “His dream come true!”
I stare at the curtains sectioning me off from the rest of the room, from the rest of the world. At the handcuffs chafing my wrists. At the bags, dark and full with my blood. This is the destination my father’s grand plan brought me? This is why he raised me, why he protected me all those years? This is the life he envisioned for me? This is all I meant to him?
“There are children beneath us,” Sissy whispers as if to herself, but her eyes are trained on the chief advisor. “Living in horrifying conditions, waiting for a gruesome and certain death. How can you call this a dream come true?”
The chief advisor stares at her without answering. He sniffs.
She turns to look at me, and her large eyes reflect shock and horror. Her face, wan and drained, frighteningly sapped of color. They’ve pumped too much blood from her.
“Sissy,” I say quietly. “Are you okay?”
She shakes her head. Something is erupting in her eyes, and it takes a moment for me to realize it is fury.
“I would
n’t worry about her,” the chief advisor says, noting my concern. “It might feel like we’re draining life out of you both, but trust me, we aren’t. And over time, we’ll calibrate our transfusions more efficiently and maximally. Can’t kill the hand that feeds—”
“We never agreed to this,” Sissy whispers in a voice much softer than his, almost inaudible under his loud tone. But somehow that whisper cuts him off, silences him. She meets his cold stare, doesn’t blink. “And we never will. Not while there are young boys and girls in the catacombs.”
The chief advisor stares at her for a long time. Not quite with a glare, but with a clinical look bereft of any warmth.
What he does next takes Sissy and me by surprise. He removes a key from his pocket and unlocks our cuffs. Sissy and I sit up, rubbing our wrists and ankles, wary.
“This younger generation,” he says, scratching his wrist, “unable to think of anyone but themselves.” He walks to the curtain, pulls it wide-open. “Coming?” he asks.
Sissy and I stare at each other.
He and the other Originators walk away from our beds. They know we will follow.
And after a few seconds of indecision, we do.
14
ON THE OTHER side of the curtains we step into a pool of darkness, the size of which we’re not fully aware of until—
“Lights coming on in three, two, one,” the chief advisor says in a surprisingly tender voice.
White light washes over us.
We’re in a large room with two distinct halves. On one side is what appears to be a laboratory. Test tubes, vials, burners, incubators, microscopes, blenders, dry block heaters, compressors, centrifuges are placed in orderly fashion atop workbenches and inside glass storage cabinets. On a shelf that runs the entire length of the wall test tubes filled with blood sit in racks. A soft hum emanates from several machines, gently shaking flasks half-filled with our blood.
On the other side of the room are shelves of artillery and weapons. There are rows of guns, all in varying shapes and sizes, pistols and revolvers, as well as double-barreled and long-cylindered weapons gleaming in the light. Boxes of cartridges and shells and bullets sit on the bottom shelf.
The Trap (The Hunt Trilogy) Page 5
