Chrysalis

by Brendan Reichs

  Machine sounds. The lights returned, but dim, with a red tinge. Four walls rose around me. The ceiling lowered to meet them, sealing me into a square room. A timer appeared on one wall. 30:00. As I watched, it began counting down.

  My breathing picked up, but nothing happened. Gravity didn’t fail, and no water rushed in. I surveyed my surroundings. Lengths of plastic tubing littered the floor. Open pipes stretched down from the ceiling, and a few reached up from the floor, but they didn’t meet. Instead their ends wheezed a soft green mist into the room.

  On my left was a board of primary colors in a square grid. Numbers ran vertically along one side while letters marched horizontally across the bottom.

  Before me were two circular glass cylinders the size of phone booths. Each had a door.

  “What is this?” I muttered.

  “Proceed to the safe zone,” a robotic voice answered.

  I chuckled without humor. “Sure. Point the way.”

  “Proceed to the safe zone.”

  “Right.” I sighed. “Got it.”

  “Proceed to the safe zone.”

  On the floor below the color board, I spotted what looked like a toolbox. I knelt and tried to open it, but the lid was secured by a strange combination lock. Six spinning color wheels. I glanced up at the grid and made the connection. “But what order opens the lock?” I whispered.

  “Proceed to the safe zone.”

  Above me, the clock had ticked down to 25:00.

  The mist from the pipes grew thicker. I began to feel light-headed.

  I stood up, thinking hard. I looked at the pipes, then at the spare lengths of tubing on the floor. It was obvious at a glance that the tubes fit the pipes, but there weren’t enough pieces to reach up and down, nor were the floor and ceiling pipe ends aligned.

  I turned in a slow rotation, spied a glass locker in the corner. Inside were various joins and elbow connectors, plus additional lengths of tubing. But the glass door was locked.

  I pressed fingers to my temples. “Okay, okay, okay. Work it out.”

  “Proceed to the safe zone.”

  “Shut up!”

  “Proceed to the safe zone.”

  I tried to think logically. The wall grid had colors, and the toolbox below it had a lock requiring them in some order. So I had to figure out which six. But how? And how would that get me into the glass locker with the extra tubes and fittings, the ones I was now sure had to connect the floor and ceiling pipes, which were seeping something nasty into the room?

  I began to sweat.

  Think think think. What else is in here?

  My eyes shot to the phone-booth cylinders. What were they for?

  I hustled over and tried the first door. It opened easily. Energized, I stepped inside, but it was empty. I backed out and tried the second tube, with the same result. Nothing inside. I nearly growled in frustration.

  Twenty minutes.

  The mist was now an inch deep along the floor.

  I gagged. Glancing up at the ceiling, I noticed a canvas bag hanging above each cylinder. But they were a dozen feet overhead and there was no way for me to climb up. I ground my teeth in frustration, then nearly coughed up a lung.

  Seventeen minutes.

  My head was spinning. My feet felt like they were floating a centimeter off the ground.

  I had to get away from the mist for a minute to think clearly. I opened the first cylinder’s door, stepped inside, and closed it, sealing myself away.

  Lights bloomed inside the tube, including a bright red circle. Heart racing, I pressed it with a shaky finger and heard something drop. I pushed open the door to find that one of the canvas bags had fallen. Unzipping it, I found six tiles with letters on them.

  The grid!

  I took the tiles over to the board and stared at it, clueless where to begin. Then I slapped my head like a dolt and returned to the second cylinder and stepped inside. I closed the door. More lights, another button. I pressed and was rewarded with a second thump. This bag contained numbers, and a smile split my face.

  Confident now, I went to the grid. Two sets of tiles. Examining them, I noticed a single dot in the top right corner of a pair of them—one letter and one number. Working quickly, I found a set with two dots, then one with three, and so on. Soon I had six pairs arranged before me.

  “Gotcha.”

  “Proceed to the safe zone.”

  I slotted the pairs onto the grid in order, producing a row of six colored spaces. Then I dropped to my knees before the toolbox, holding my breath as I spun the combination until its colors matched the board. The lock opened with a pleasing click. I yanked it off and flipped the lid. Inside was a single key.

  Ten minutes.

  I rose quickly. The mist had risen level with my knees. My eyes began to water.

  I scrambled over to the glass locker. The key turned easily. I pulled out the longest tubes I could find and slammed connectors on their ends. Then I circled under the ceiling pipes and jammed the tubes upward. Several fit and held. I repeated the process with the floor pipes, kneeling down in the mist with my eyes closed and mouth squeezed shut.

  I ended up with a forest of stalactites and stalagmites, but they didn’t meet.

  Mist continued pouring out of the pipes.

  I stepped back, bouncing on the balls of my feet. What was wrong? I was sure I had the basic idea right, and there was nothing else inside the room.

  “The joins!” I shouted.

  The robotic voice sounded again in response, but I ignored it. The joins were connectors shaped like elbow macaroni, in varying sizes. I realized that the final trick was selecting the correct lengths, so that I could link the ceiling and floor pipes horizontally. Three connections were required.

  I glanced up, nearly moaned.

  Five minutes.

  I caught a lucky break—the first two I tried were right and fit perfectly. I linked that section, which cut down on the incoming mist. But it still poured from two more broken connections.

  The second set refused to match, and I had to scramble around for a smaller tube. When I finally linked them, only one pair remained, but mist was now billowing from the open pipes like water from a fire hose.

  Three minutes.

  I could barely breathe. See. Or think. Tears streamed down my cheeks. The last two sections refused to meet, no matter what combination I tried. The elbow joins brought the ends level, but a foot-wide gap remained between them and there was no more tubing to close it.

  I punched both thighs, nearly screamed in frustration. Then I forced myself to calm down. I was overlooking something. There had to be a way to complete the connection.

  One minute.

  A red light on the ceiling started flashing.

  Mist flowed in relentlessly. I began seeing stars. Stepping back, I shoved my mouth into the crook of my elbow, nearly tripping over something on the floor. I reached down and lifted one of the tile bags. Hefting it, I discovered there was a zipper on the bottom of it as well.

  That’s it!

  I unzipped the other end and scrambled around for the second bag. I could no longer see the floor.

  Thirty seconds.

  Another red light. The air was foggy and wet. Snot ran from my nose as I banged a shin against the now invisible toolbox. With no other plan, I hefted its lid and reached inside.

  The second tile bag was nestled in a corner.

  Hands shaking, I unzipped its bottom and fitted the first bag’s zipper there. They connected smoothly. Together the bags formed a narrow cylinder roughly two feet long.

  Twenty seconds.

  The mist had turned a darker green. It stung more harshly than before.

  Holding my breath, I ran back to the pipes and fitted one side of the connected bags over an open end. The canvas slid on smoothly.
Hands shaking, I scrunched up the other side and pulled it into place, connecting the tubes and sealing off the mist.

  My eyes darted to the counter.

  Ten seconds.

  On the far side of the room, a red circle appeared. I bolted over to it and jabbed my finger repeatedly.

  A door slid open and I collapsed outside the room.

  A second tone sounded.

  The flashing lights died, replaced by the sound of industrial fans. The ceiling rose and the wall sections slid down into the floor. In moments, all traces of the test were gone. The chamber returned to its original state.

  I hocked and spat. Pawed sweat-slick hair from my face. “That all you got?” I rasped, still hunched over on my knees.

  “Actually, they’ve got a lot worse.”

  My head shot up. Someone was standing a dozen yards away.

  When my vision finally cleared, I recognized a smirking boy dressed all in black.

  It was Toby.

  32

  NOAH

  The next morning I awoke to find other Nemesis Three kids in the compound.

  The girl Parisa who’d helped us before was huddled with Cyrus and a black girl named Jerica. They were discussing their friend Scott, and seemed very upset.

  “He didn’t come back last night.” Parisa squeezed her forehead. “With Natalie, that makes four since the testing started.”

  “This has to stop,” Cyrus whispered. “Our class is down to nine members, and the rest are with Rose in all things.”

  “How did you lose so many?” I asked.

  Cyrus grimaced. “Iris, Wyatt, Levi, and Jayden died when the lab complex flooded, and Kate, Olly, and Phom were sent to repurposement before we even began competing against your class. I haven’t seen them since. Now Harper, Reese, Natalie, and Scott are all missing.”

  “Did Scott actually go to repurposement?” Jerica hissed, dark eyes wary. “Or did he fail like that girl yesterday and . . . and . . .” She clearly didn’t want to say it.

  Cyrus took a deep breath. “So far only Nemesis One kids have been subjected to these awful individual tests. I hope Scott was merely repurposed. But what does that mean? This is getting too real.”

  I took a long pull from my bottled water. We were in the common room, having been left alone for nearly twenty-four hours. Inside, I was climbing up the walls. I needed to get back into the testing facility somehow, and find Min.

  “The others are super pissed,” Parisa said, swiping wavy black hair behind her ears as she looked at me. “I heard Xander and Adrien muttering in the corridor—they blame you guys for what’s happening.”

  “You attacked us,” I said coldly. “And we’re not the ones forcing people into these games.”

  Cyrus held up a hand. “Peace. The three of us refused to be lapdogs without knowing more about this place. Scott, too. Now that we can see what they’re doing to your class, it’s clear we were right to resist. To support station personnel any further is unconscionable. I no longer trust anyone not sitting at this table.”

  I thought of Rose, whispering in my ear. My cheeks burned. Something about her refused to leave me alone. Was she really in league with these Chrysalis psychopaths, or was she a different sort of prisoner?

  Doesn’t matter though, does it?

  “Why’d your classmates agree to be prison guards?” I asked. “Did Sophia make threats about the colony?” I’d told Cyrus and the girls about Sophia’s copies, and they’d been as shocked as me. Despite living aboard the station for months, Nemesis Three had no better understanding of crew dynamics than I did. Cyrus had assumed the staff were all regenerated clones, like we were, but none of them had known there were multiple versions of our only contact, or why.

  A plan was forming in my mind, fueled by my worry for Min. I couldn’t sit back and shoot pool while she and my classmates fought for their lives. The testing had clearly accelerated. My friends were failing as I watched, helpless to do anything. Last night Piper Lockwood lost track of a pattern in a smoke-filled maze. She never saw the arrow that took her in the back.

  “Rose and the others will do anything to get to the colony,” Jerica spat. “That’s how they survived in the Program when better kids didn’t. Burn them all and be done with it, I say.”

  I frowned. “Maybe they can help us.”

  “Help?” Parisa snorted, twirling a lock of black hair. “How many times has Rose kicked your face in? Use that pretty little head, dude. The rest of my class is brainwashed. They’re not going to help us with anything but repurposement.”

  That word again. “Does anyone know what that means?”

  “You’re led away,” Cyrus said quietly, “and you don’t return. What more is there to know?”

  Conversation died. I glanced at the monitors and was relieved to see no one being tested. My gaze drifted to the window—and the radiant planet slowly rotating outside—as I voiced my greatest doubt. “The colony must be real though, right? Why else would they bother regenerating us? Or testing us. There has to be a reason.”

  There was a long silence. I could tell I wasn’t the first to question the existence of a colony at all.

  “According to Sophia, a manned Chrysalis station has been orbiting for decades.” Cyrus rose and walked to the thick glass. “Who knows what they’ve offloaded.”

  I joined him. “But you’ve seen things go down, right?”

  He nodded. “Circular pods, almost like probes. But we don’t know what’s inside. Could be supplies. Could be frozen bodies for all I know. We’ve never been told if there’s anyone on the surface already, or heard of any messages being transmitted back up. I think it’s just gear so far, but again, who knows?”

  “Why run the Programs at all, if they already had people to send down ahead of us?” I shook my head in frustration. “Nothing they do makes any sense.”

  Behind us, a door swished open. Rose strode into the room.

  Our eyes met, and my face heated up. Rose pinned me with her green-laser stare. A moment later Gray entered.

  “Form up!” he barked. “All four of you.”

  Cyrus smiled coldly at Gray, tension simmering between the two boys. He ambled to the couch and sat with Parisa and Jerica. Uncertain how to react, I followed, retaking my seat in the lounge chair. The four of us proceeded to ignore the black-clad teens by the door.

  “Traitors.” Gray stole a glance at Rose, who shook her head. She crossed to the unoccupied couch and sat. Gray grunted in annoyance, then stormed over and posted up behind her, glowering like he wanted to be anywhere else.

  Rose regarded each of us in turn, then focused on me. “What you said earlier,” she began, “about there not actually being a colony. I want to know why you said it.”

  “Bullshit,” Gray growled, but Rose made a chopped motion without looking at him. Gray gritted his teeth but said nothing more.

  I sat forward in my chair. “I’m not an astronaut or anything, but the way Chrysalis is set up seems off. There are tons of supplies on board, but why isn’t there more staff? Something isn’t right.”

  “There are plenty of troopers,” Rose pointed out. “Dozens on board.”

  “Too many, I think, in relation to the crew size. But that’s another issue.” I bit my lower lip. “Chrysalis is so large it has a freaking human habitat at its center. I lived inside the Terrarium for six months and didn’t know it wasn’t real. So where are all the people to tend it?”

  “We lived there too,” Gray growled. “Before you.”

  “You could barely handle a screwdriver,” Jerica scoffed, causing Gray to redden.

  “But what was the point?” I forged ahead stubbornly, focusing on Rose. I knew the others were listening, and that this sit-down was out of character for her. Might be an opportunity. “The Terrarium makes little sense from an architectural standpoint. Why build
such an enormous and complex thing, except to grow food? Why put us inside it and play games?”

  “They were testing candidates,” Rose replied automatically. “For the colony.”

  “Maybe.” I sat back. “Or maybe there is no colony.”

  Something moved behind her eyes. “You don’t know anything. You’re guessing.”

  “What happens to the people who fail these tests? We’ve never seen them again.”

  She was still a moment. “Just because I haven’t seen them doesn’t guarantee something terrible happened. You said yourself how big the station is. They could all be in another wing, learning new assignments.”

  I blinked at her. “Rose, you don’t believe that. Have you seen what’s going on with my class right now?” I pointed to the monitors.

  Rose looked away. “Sophia said that not everyone would be . . . that some people aren’t a good fit for the colony,” she stammered. “When someone fails, they . . . they’re taken away for a new purpose, so . . . so they won’t distract—”

  “There are no new purposes being handed out any more,” I said harshly. “My friends are dying in these tests.”

  Rose shook her head. “I’m sure they’re revived. Given treatment. It’s just that the tests are getting harder.”

  “You’re in denial. Piper won’t get treatment for that arrow in her back!”

  “How do you know that? Maybe those feeds aren’t even real.” Rose glared at the floor. “They wouldn’t do things without a logical reason, Noah. This station is more advanced than anything in history, it’d be pointless. Like raising bugs just to stomp on them. It’s irrational to assume the worst.”

  I took a deep breath. “Sophia said those not selected had a role to play on Chrysalis. But we never see them. And now people in my class are dying if they lose games, while you kick back in your fancy suite and do nothing.”

  “This is nonsense,” Gray snarled. “He’s jealous, Rose. We earned our privileges by being selected for the colony. Because we proved ourselves trustworthy.”

  On the last word he glanced at her, and his anxiety was clear. Suddenly I was sure they weren’t supposed to be there.