Romy's Last Stand: Book III of the 2250 Saga

by Stone, Nirina

  “Yes,” I say. “Did you know her?”

  Of course she did. Wouldn’t the Metrills all know each other? I’m still not certain how many there are in the world, but with their advanced ability to communicate, their advanced tech, I shouldn’t be surprised.

  “I did—” she says, “and I do. Because you found her, Romy Mason. She is me and I am her.”

  Is this some bizarre way the Metrills speak, I wonder? Like a “we’re all one and the same” sort of belief?

  She nods her head. “I am the same Metrill you saw getting taken away.”

  “But that can’t be,” I say. “You can’t have aged, what, three decades, in just a matter of weeks!”

  “Oh can’t I?” she says. “I’ve been through this—torture—several times now.” Then she huffs. “Anyone in their right mind would age fast in here. It’s not only the nanites that suffer you know.”

  Something doesn’t quite make sense, but I let her continue talking.

  “This place,” she says. “It isn’t designed to make people want to—well, live. Now that Apex is shut down and more and more people come this way, the warden only has a certain number to maintain before she loses control of the populace.”

  “You said you’ve been in here many times,” I say, then I dip my chin to whisper, “How do you get out?”

  She laughs. “Oh,” she says. “I’m hardly a threat. Once they think I’m done in here, they let me out again. I’m due in about a day or so. They need me more out there than in here because I help heal people. I’m a doctor.”

  Of course she is, I think, still wondering why she’d bitten my cheek. When I ask her, she says, “For that I am truly sorry. I believed I’d lost my mind for real. I thought you were a nightmare. I knew your face, my Metrill brothers and sisters from the north shared your features with all of us.”

  “Wait—” I say, “you weren’t in the north with them?”

  “No,” is her reply. “I was one of the fifty two stationed underneath the Tasman. So, closer to your home in Apex.”

  Of course. I remember what I’d learnt about the Metrills two years ago. My conclusion was that they must be stationed all over the world, not just in the mountain in the north.

  “We’ve been keeping an eye out for you. We knew you’d surface at some point. And here you are.”

  “Why didn’t you contact me?”

  I already know the answer as she says, “They broke the part of your brain we finally could connect with. There was just no way. It was already hard enough before. Now it’s gone. Your father’s holo though, he was still able to send messages wasn’t he? I mean that’s why you’re here, isn’t it?”

  “I felt—compelled is the best word I can think. I haven’t heard his voice since we’d left the north, but I don’t know, maybe somehow he’s managed to hone in on my instincts and help me get—here. I guess.”

  It’s what I’d thought before, but it makes more sense now.

  Then she says, “Well, I only have another day or so before they let me out. Then you’re on your own in here. So, shall we meditate?”

  I know I need to get over my sudden fear of the dark, but in order to meditate properly, I’ll have to shut my eyes.

  So I practice—close them for a couple of seconds, then for a minute, then half an hour, until the anxiety only becomes a manageable pain in my chest.

  I have to bear it, I know. I have to go through with it because this must be done.

  So I close my eyes and do the top part of the Metrill dance with her—just our arms curling and pushing air to our faces.

  My breathing steadies, my heartbeats slow, and despite the warmth in the chamber, my face and neck get even warmer. It’s like I’m lying down in a hot bath. My fingers and toes and all my muscles relax until they feel like water, they burst open and seep into the hot water around me.

  And when I breathe in, I smell something slightly musky, earthy. It reminds me of my old home in Citizen City, an entire lifetime ago.

  When I open my eyes again, I know immediately I’m in a dream.

  The same dream I had over and over again in the north. I sit on the narrow bed, my hands digging into the mattress, and stare into the eyes of the Metrill that used to ‘speak’ with me only through a glasscomm. I look down and there it is.

  I pick it up and say, “We don’t have much time. Please bring Rojhay’s—daughter in here before it’s too late. Or she’ll die.”

  The Metrill’s eyes grow wide then her brows furrow and she asks me to explain myself. But I run up to the glass and repeat my request, begging her to bring the girl in.

  She finally moves away and a few minutes later, the girl I once tried to save and failed to save a thousand times stands ten feet away, in front of the block of glass.

  I know I only have mere seconds but speak as loud as I can, hoping she can hear me through the glass. “You’re going to die. Today. Unless you listen to me.”

  She gives me the same look she’s given me dozens of times before, then moves to have the glass wall disappear through the floor.

  “Rojhay’s fine,” I say to her, before she can ask her questions.

  The surprise on her face is genuine, for a moment I wonder if it’s still a dream.

  Then the first bomb hits and I fall on the floor the same moment she runs to have the glass drawn back up to the ceiling.

  But I’m running, I’m up and over the glass, and I jump to grab her shoulder but of course, she’s too fast for me.

  She runs around the corner, and though I’m on her heels at first, I soon lose track of her.

  Five minutes later, she’s in the hallway, half of her side burnt to a crisp.

  “No!” I yell. “No!”

  But someone’s shaking my shoulders and I jump out of my dream, into the black hellhole that I share with Annicka. “Shhhh,” she says. “It’s okay. Shhhhhh.”

  “I failed,” I whimper. “I can’t believe it. After all this time—I mean, what do I need to do? She won’t listen to me—she just runs, she’s too fast. I can’t stop her! I can’t save her!”

  All the despair I had from the days I kept trying in the dreams fall hard on me and I’m crying again.

  I wipe furiously at my eyes. This is ridiculous. This is my mission. I have to do this, but what can I do?

  Then Annicka palms my cheek in her small hand, and asks me to relay everything that happens in the dream. She tells me to describe the comm, the glass wall that retracts into the floor, and the smooth curves of the hallway.

  “We’ll figure it out,” she says. “We’ll work through it together.”

  Every little thing counts, she says—what I smell, what I hear. No detail is insignificant. I go through the details but then have to stop suddenly when a shadow moves across from us, and only stops when it stands in front of our tiny candle. I swallow and hold back yet another scream as I look up.

  Meditation

  I look up slowly, taking in the stance, the potato sack that is the standard uniform of EPrison, then the shadow of a smile as the candle flickers and sharp blue eyes smile down at me.

  “Blair!” I struggle to my feet. He’s the last person I expected to see and I can’t help the pure joy of knowing he’s here. As I stand and he holds me gently in his arms, I look behind him to see Frankie and Sanaa.

  “How did you get in this place?” I ask, knowing full well they’ve been in here before. They’d know their way around EPrison.

  “We figured when we didn’t see you around for a while, that you were sent to—the vault—” Blair throws his arms out as if to encompass the entire place.

  Such a place deserves a decidedly more evil name, I think, but I don’t say a thing. I’m just happy my team’s here, now. Together, I’m certain we can figure this out.

  I introduce them to Annicka, as they look at each other surprised before looking back at her.

  “But—” Franklin starts.

  “Yeah, she’s not crazy,” I confirm.

>   “Well that’s entirely debatable of course,” Annicka laughs. “But I assure you that, right now, for as long as you need me to, I’m here to help you.”

  None of us clarify that what she means is she’s here to use me for the benefit of the Metrills.

  Right now, she needs us and we need her equally. So, work together we must.

  “Tell me everything,” Annicka repeats, taking up where she left off before we were interrupted. The other three plant themselves in a loose semicircle with the candle between us.

  Then I close my eyes and meditate until I’m back in the dream again.

  Hours later, and I’m still failing so hard at the task that finally, Franklin gives up and lies down, slightly to Blair’s left and mostly in shadow.

  Her action makes me shiver. I can’t imagine relaxing like that, in the darkness of this place. The darkness brings whispers and screams.

  Then Annicka says, “Describe the mattress to me.” She’s already asked me about everything else, the feeling of the floor under my feet, the air on my face, everything. What’s yet another thing?

  “It’s like any other mattress I’ve ever touched, Annicka. I don’t understand what you’re trying to figure out here.”

  “Remember,” she says, “nothing in this dream is insignificant. Think of it this way—”

  Then her eyes stare up at the ceiling as she continues speaking. “You were a Robotics Engineer, is that right?”

  I nod. I haven’t used my skills that much recently, not since I’d left the north. But that was my job for a long time.

  “Tell me,” she says, “tell me about the circuitry of a small comm, something you’ve fixed recently.”

  My thought goes straight to the tiny MirrorComms I fashioned for myself and Sanaa and Frankie so we could stay in touch while I lived in the Prospo Towers and they lived in the city.

  I mutter about the hundreds of wires, circuit boards, scanners, and blockers to prevent Soren monitoring.

  As I speak, the others stay silent. Frank’s got her hand over her forehead as if to block sunlight, but she watches my face intently. Blair looks fascinated, Sanaa smiles, and Annicka nods at me like I hit the jackpot.

  “See?” she says. “You understand fully.”

  But I don’t understand a thing. How is this ‘dream’ anything like one of my creations? This is—well it’s nothing but air really. I put together parts of bots and other machinery to create the things I have.

  Then it hits me.

  “The mattress,” I say, “isn’t a mattress at all, is it? The room I’m in, it’s not a room. Nothing in there is as it seems.”

  Blair says, “I wonder Rome, have you ever had a waking dream? You know, where you know it’s a dream and you can actively—change things?”

  Can’t say that I have, but I do think I understand what he means. I’ve never tried to change anything in my dreams. I just tend to see where they take me. But then, I haven’t dreamed in years, or if I have, I never remember any of them. Still, I say, “I’ll try,” and meditate myself back into the dream.

  When I open my eyes in the dream, the Metrill stands behind the glass.

  Not glass, I remind myself. Not real. As she watches me, I look down to the mattress, hold a large part of it in my hands, then—I will it to stop being a mattress.

  The moment the thought runs across my head, it transforms. The material elongates in my hand, solidifies into a long metal rod.

  At the other end of it I spy a fierce red glow, and know it’s exactly what I need right now. That glass won’t shatter, no matter how much I manipulate this dream.

  But it will melt.

  I press the hot end of the metal to the glass as the Metrill stares at me, fear in her eyes.

  The glass burns and melts away, then the tiny hole it forms turns bigger and bigger until I will it to fall from the ceiling like rain.

  She stands still, staring at me, and I can’t help but laugh. “It’s just a dream,” I tell her. Then I run.

  I’m out the door, running to the right, and I skid to a stop when I see her, the girl I chased.

  It looks like she was about to come into the room and I just caught her in time.

  “What—” she says as she stops in her tracks. I raise my hands, indicating I won’t hurt her.

  “You need to help me,” I say. “Please. I’m looking for—something.”

  Her brows furrow as she stares at my hands.

  “How did you get out of your cell?” she whispers. “Where’s—”

  “Oh,” I say, “she’s fine. I didn’t hurt her! I just need to find something. Will you help me?”

  Of course, she doesn’t listen. She rushes past me into the room, and I follow her through.

  This feels like such a waste, but at least I know the dreams take up a shorter time in the real world.

  Still, my impatience rises as the Metrills stare at each other, doing whatever it is they do to communicate. Then finally, the girl looks over at me.

  “What are you looking for?” she finally asks.

  Could it be this easy? Do I just need to ask and get it? Of course now that we’ve come to this, I haven’t a clue just what to ask for.

  I run with the fact that I have some sort of control over this dream. “It’s a secret package—or object—containing a map, or unlock codes. It would have been left with you in—2050.” The year of the Great Omni.

  I don’t know what I’m on about, but I’m going with it. Maybe Father’s holo still has some influence on my instincts right now. I know better than to resist that.

  She watches me as I speak, but despite my growing confidence that this is the right path, she stares at me like I’ve lost my mind.

  Still not appeased, I say, “It would have been left with your people by my great grandmother, Rosemary Mason. Or Mornie Blair. The Originals, the Legacies.”

  Then her eyes light up. “I know just what you mean,” she says. But when the first blast hits, she’s already running out the door before I can reach her.

  When I follow around the corner, it’s like time flashes forward. She’s already in front of me, burnt to a crisp on her left side.

  I fall to my knees, pushed down by the weight of my failure. This is ridiculous, I can’t do this anymore. I can manipulate portions of my dream, and still—fail?

  When I wake from my meditation, whatever’s on my face already tells the others the outcome.

  “Didn’t work,” I say. “I turned the mattress into something usable, but—”

  “She still died,” Annicka finishes.

  I nod, and notice that our candle’s lost quite a bit of wax while I was under. What’ll happen here when we’re covered in darkness? I try not to think about it, but the sense of dread has turned into a painful pressure in my chest I have a difficult time breathing through.

  “What about flying?” I say desperately. “I used to be able to fly in dreams when I was a kid. I could try that.”

  “You could,” Sanaa encourages.

  Then Frankie whispers a harsh, “Or you could just die.”

  Blair stares her down, but I know she’s just frustrated—maybe panicked—to be in here. I can’t blame her.

  And then, I wonder—

  “Don’t even think about it,” Blair says as he places a hand on my shoulder. “Something like that’s too dangerous. Isn’t it?” He’s looking at Annicka now, and she nods her head in agreement.

  “Death in there can translate to death out here,” she says, “if you don’t have the proper motivation. If you’re not trained the way we Metrills are.”

  She’s right, of course. No matter how often I’d performed the Metrill dance, no matter how far I’ve come in their ways, there’s no way I’d be ready for nirvana. But what option do we have?

  “We’ll try everything else we can first,” Blair insists. “If it really comes to that—well, we’ll deal with it. But for now, try other things.”

  So I go back into the dream. I soon
realize what I’m capable of changing in the dream are limited. Yes, I can fly, but no matter what I do, I can’t stop that girl from getting herself burnt on the surface. I have to constantly remind myself that this isn’t real. That the real girl died those many years ago—this is but a mental manifestation of my mission for the Metrills.

  She’s not really dying over and over again, no matter how real it all seems. Still, it’s exhausting. It drains me of all hope. It makes me want to stop and just sleep, a long, dreamless sleep.

  Then, on my final try before giving up completely, I fly ahead of her, stopping her right before the vedas as she’s about to step in. I place my hand on the veda doors, willing them to stick together like glue, and they don’t open.

  Then I turn to her, finally realizing why she insists on getting to the surface.

  “That’s not your father,” I say. “It’s not Rojhay. He’s still safe in Haven.”

  I’m not sure what she thought she’d find up there other than destruction. But this much I know. “He’s not up there.”

  Water pools in her eyes as she watches me.

  “He’s fine,” I assure her. “He’s fine, in Haven.”

  She crumples to the ground, her face flooded with tears. “No he’s not,” she says over and over again. “He’s not, he’s dead.”

  Well this is new. Why would she say that? I know that, after I’d seen her here, I’d visited Rojhay while he was being held by Mother and her people. He was alive, healthy. Yes he was a prisoner, but—

  Come to think of it, I don’t actually know what happened to Rojhay when Haven was destroyed.

  Was he brought back to the Metrills? Likely not, the Sorens don’t normally release prisoners, not for as long as I’ve known them.

  So, what happened to Rojhay? Is she right? Did they kill him—?

  I kneel in front of her and hold her gently in my arms. I shush her, rocking her as she cries softly in my arms. I think, This has to be it. She’s not burnt. She’s here. She’s alive. This is it.

  And when I wake from the dream, happy that I’ve done it, that I’ve succeeded in my mission, I look to my team with a wide beaming smile.