by Mark Lingane
She swept his hair back over his head and felt his forehead. He was freezing. “What happened?”
“I lost a friend.” He looked at her. “It’s sad. I don’t have that many to lose.”
“It was a machine. It wasn’t alive. It was a pet at best. You were projecting your humanity onto it.”
“No, it was different. It was like it was attuned to my mind. It lived on the harmonics of my own consciousness.”
She gave him a skeptical look.
“That’s what Albert told me. He’d done some research through some of Nikola’s more obscure books from his library.”
“Come here.” She pulled him close and put her arm around him. He rested his head on her shoulder. She had been told to stay away, for her own health, but surely one final day wouldn’t hurt. “How are you feeling?” she asked.
“Sad.”
“How about in your body?”
“Broken.”
She sighed. “Are you capable of walking rather than just indulging in melodramatics?”
“I guess so.”
“Well, it’s time for us to move on. I have to get to Gavin.”
She stood up, but Sebastian was slow to follow. She leaned over and heaved him up. When she looked into his face, she could see more was wrong than simply losing a “friend.” He looked so pale, like a ghost had sucked all of the life out of him.
“Actually, I’m not in that much of a hurry,” she said. “Is there anything you want to do?”
“Could we go back to your place and sit on the terrace? I’d like to look out.”
“Yeah, one last time.”
They didn’t make it. Sebastian said he was dizzy. She dropped him off at the medical center and was told to remove herself from the facility by nurse Florence after she started swearing when asked if she was his mother.
She found Gavin talking to Oliver near the church. Everyone had gathered there, so everyone else gathered there. The two strolled off to find a place to be alone, with Melanie lost in her thoughts and Gavin generally just lost—but in Melanie’s view looking fabulous while doing it.
Eventually they ended up back at her place. She sat on her bed and admired Gavin looking glamorous reclining in an old chaise she had found. Then she gazed out the window and watched the light fade, her face a mask of concern.
“What’s the matter?” she said.
“What?”
“That’s what you’re supposed to ask me.”
“Er, what’s the matter?”
“Sebastian took a real tough hit today, and it’s affected him badly. I haven’t seen him this down. Even after we came back from the Hive and left his mother behind. He normally bounces back and is soon annoying everyone, but this time … he was so pale.”
The vampire book was on her desk, cover down. She ran her thumb over the pages, making them buzz as she flicked through them. She leaned down on an elbow and turned the book over so she could see the cover. “Expectation is a funny thing,” she said. “Why does everyone expect you to behave in a certain way and like certain things just like all the other stupid people?”
“Dunno. We’ve all got to get along.”
“Not by being stupid, though.”
“Take this book. All the other girls love it and so they expect me to love it and they get cranky and flustered when I don’t.”
“What’s wrong with it?”
She smiled. “Not enough zombies.”
She held her hand over her mouth as she laughed. The day was beginning to weigh on her. She rolled over onto her front and looked at him. She extended her hand and wiggled the fingers until he noticed and held it.
“Anyway, did Isaac send my message?”
“He kissed me,” Gavin said.
Melanie laughed. “I told him to do that but I didn't think he'd actually do it.”
“The message he gave me was bearable, but when he kissed me and closed his eyes it just got weird. Then he was chasing after me trying to hug me like some deranged No Bearing fan. It wasn’t funny. And stop laughing.”
“Come on, it is funny.”
“It's degrading. He's just some stupid kid. He's dumb and a terrible tesla, more of a pain than a help to anyone.”
“He's not that bad. If worse comes to worst he’s always useful as cannon fodder.”
“Yeah, I see what you mean. The sacrificial anode. The world would hardly be worse off if Isaac were dead.”
“Joshuz, Gavin, I was joking.” She dropped his hand and lay down with her head on her arms.
Melanie knew that Sebastian was right about Gavin, to a certain degree. Gavin was an idiot a lot of the time. He barely had enough power to be considered better than the other teslas. But he was so good-looking, and that counted for an awful lot. Anyway, eligible men were getting few and far between these days. She knew that most wouldn’t be interested in a young girl with so much attitude you could misspell it.
When she woke up it was dark. She was still in the same position, but Gavin had gone. He hadn't put a blanket on her the way Isaac and Sebastian had done in the past. She rolled under her covers and drifted off to sleep with many questions frolicking in the pasture of her mind.
15
TOMORROW CAME SHOUTING loudly through the window, and Melanie woke with a determination to collect answers, preferably under duress. She put on her city clothes, tied her hair back, and prepared to be assertive.
She made her way over to the administration building. Even after all the conflicts, it still stood tall and unscathed. Many people had been sacrificed to keep it protected, and no one really knew why. She climbed the stairs to the fourth floor, kicked open the door and walked in.
“I have a door handle that’s quite serviceable.”
“What’s on the sixth floor, Granddad?” She stood in her authority pose, which she generally reserved for new team members to her detail.
Nikola looked up over his glasses and put down the book he was leafing through. “I’m fine, thank you for asking, tubby. And how are you?”
“Why were the cyborgs so keen to get into the building?”
“I can’t tell you that.”
“You need to tell someone, because Sebastian hasn’t been the same since those cyborgs got into this building yesterday. It looked like he was dying. He felt like ice.”
“I’m sure it’s just shock and he'll soon recover.”
“Can you promise that?”
He hesitated.
“I have questions. Were the sullivans just a distraction so the cys could get into the sixth floor? How did they know to go there? Why did it affect Sebastian so badly?”
“I think the second question is the important one. The sixth floor contents are only known by a tiny group of select people. No one gets in. That means someone very senior and important in this city has been talking to the enemy. The cys knew where to go, what to do, and what the cost would be.”
“You said it was an engine—”
He raised his hand to stop her. “You know too much already. I cannot and will not elaborate. I’m sorry, but these are the rules. The cyborgs will seem like a gentle and easy enemy in comparison to what can happen if the engine gets into the wrong hands. This is another one of those trust things. Safety through obscurity.”
“In times of such uncertainty, this makes me feel cold.”
“Sometimes there’s comfort in ignorance.”
“There’s more comfort in greater fire power.”
“That reminds me, I've spoken with Albert regarding ‘greater fire power.’ He wants you to see the blacksmith and get your arm measured.”
“My arm?”
“Well done on individually emphasizing both words. Yes, you. And yes, your arm.”
Melanie shrugged aside the distraction. “But why did what happened affect Sebastian so badly yesterday?”
“I wish I could tell you, but I feel my own lack of understanding of how Sebastian and the sixth floor are linked compounds the problem. I even
believe that he is unaware of the relationship. You’re giving me that look again.”
“What look?”
“The one you give me when you’re displeased with the answer I give you and you don’t understand it.”
“Fine. Be enigmatic. Sebastian needs support. I’m going to see him.”
“Haven’t you been warned that he’s a health hazard to you?”
“Yes. But I’m still going.” She turned on her heel and stormed out of the room, slamming the door.
“You could salute your commander every now and again,” he shouted after her. “She is so much like Sebastian’s mother,” he muttered as he returned his focus to filling in the book.
His head began to swim. He opened a drawer and took a long sip of a sticky blue liquid. He wiped the sweat forming on his brow and went back to his documentation.
Sebastian shouted at Melanie because it was a school day and he was trying to sleep in.
She reminded him that there was no actual school, the tesla building was still under construction, and he should be up enjoying the early-morning sun.
He mumbled something incoherent and possibly derogatory about those who enjoy rising early.
She punched him as a counterpoint to the debate.
He sat up in bed with one eye open, his hair sticking out in every direction, and one sock half on. Each time he tried to lie back down she threw his used underwear at him. She stopped once he commenced windmilling his hands to keep them away from his face.
He was fine. He was still pale, but his fever had passed and he was acting like he normally did, like a fourteen-year-old boy. She dragged him from his bed and they made their way down to the training grounds to partake in Albert’s latest destructive endeavor.
The knock at Nikola’s office door signaled authority and urgency. He sighed. It looked like it was going to be a day of unwanted interruptions.
“Who knocks without?” he shouted.
“Without what?” came the uncertain response.
“Without the door.”
The door creaked open and Kerry and Ralph Constantine crept into his office.
“How can … what do you mean …” Kerry shook her head as if trying to dislodge an annoying bee. She drew herself up to her full height and addressed Nikola. “Are you the commander?”
“Yes.”
“And this woman?” She waved an indifferent hand in the direction of an elderly woman looking through Nikola’s shelves.
“I’m the cleaner.” The woman waved a rag as evidence but didn’t turn to face Kerry.
“The city is in turmoil,” Kerry said. “The people are scared. You are a busy man, are you not?”
“Yes.”
“Ralph is a seasoned man of public office who has experienced panic and calmed a town. You need a mayor. He is a good man for the job.”
Nikola looked at Ralph. “Does he speak?”
“Yes,” she replied.
Then, as if he had been switched on by some remote trigger, or maybe desire for the affection he wasn’t getting from his wife, Ralph Constantine changed. His posture improved as his whole carriage lifted. His face filled with warmth and an infectious generosity. He began to speak, and his words were elegant and inspirational, filling the room with hope and excitement as if by magic.
And Nikola thought this man was possibly the greatest threat he had ever faced.
But then, just as strangely as he had started, Ralph went quiet and looked vacantly out the window. The light reflected off his dead eyes and highlighted the angular features of his face that no longer looked charming or caring, but battered and defeated. Silence roared back in, sucked into the vacuum made when expectation and appreciation fail to connect.
There should have been applause, Nikola thought. Every fiber of his being said so. And the lack of it made his hands itch and his head ache.
“Well?” Kerry said. She glared ferociously at Nikola.
“Well what?”
“What did you think of Ralph’s speech?”
“You’re not a ventriloquist, are you? Because I notice the two of you don’t speak at the same time.”
“Commander, we come to you at a time of need, and you make inappropriate jokes. We can assist.”
“I’ll be the judge of that. While Ralph’s speech was fine and emotive, I need people of action. Do you have any evidence to support the claims of your—I mean, his—ability?”
“I was the mayor of Carranbine.” Ralph ended his sentence as if the statement was sufficient explanation.
Nikola sighed. “I’ll be meeting with Number Two later. I’ll bring it up then. We have contacts over that way who can possibly provide some feedback.”
Nikola caught a flash of something in Kerry’s eyes. Was it concern? Or fear? Or was he simply tired and ill? He ushered them out, gifting them with his word regarding his discussion about the position.
Once she was certain they were out of earshot Kerry turned to her husband. “We need to make sure that this Number Two, whoever he may be, is on our side. There must be certainty in us from the community. And we know how to do that, don't we?”
16
MELANIE AND A drowsy Sebastian had come to the training compound and were now lying down on benches looking up at the morning sky.
Melanie had had a deep pang of sadness when she walked in. She desperately missed her mornings there. But what could you do? Doctor’s orders were exactly that.
Albert, when not teaching Sebastian about quantum mechanics, spent the rest of his time inventing creative and insane contraptions that often ended up as weapons. He had spent the last few hours setting up the equipment. “Nearly there,” he shouted.
“Are you still reading?” Sebastian asked.
“Yeah, I’m reading this really cool story about vampires,” Melanie said.
“Has it got any zombies in it?”
“No. Vampires.” She bit the intended insult out of her response.
“Dull. Ow!” He rubbed his arm.
“There’s more where that came from,” she said as she retracted her fist. “How, in your bored little mind, are vampires dull?”
“Vampires are just vampires. They never change. Zombies were once people and then they become zombies. They have the fundamental dichotomy and complex contradiction of having once been a human and then being an undead.”
She gave him a skeptical look. “What about people who are turned into vampires? And I’m not going to ask you where you heard that rubbish because I know you don’t know what half of those words mean.”
“But they are dull. Vampires used to be these menacing half-animal beasts that were really scary. Now they’re a cool kind of boyfriend. Zombies, on the other hand …”
He stood up and raised his arms, with his hands hanging down loosely, and put a blank expression on his face. He groaned in what he thought was a menacing way.
“Do you need to go to the bathroom or something?”
“I’m being a zombie.” He threw a rock at her. She caught it easily and dropped it on the ground.
“Sorry, I couldn’t see anything different to the way you normally look.”
“Ready,” Albert shouted.
When Sebastian and Melanie approached he waved his hand over the collection of assorted machinery. All of it was painted black. “This is a new concept I have been vorking on.”
“I recognize the cylinder the smith measured me up for,” Sebastian said. “But what’s the rest of the stuff?”
“It’s a new veapon. Devised by Dr. Gatling.”
Sebastian snorted. “How good is a weapon going to be that was built by a doctor?”
“I have made some adjustments,” Albert said. “I think you vill like it.”
“It looks big and cumbersome,” Melanie said. “It had better be useful. But it’s going to ruin my clothes.”
There was a square pack with a couple of straps at the end of the trestle table. Albert indicated for Sebastian to fit it to Melanie. Sh
e held out one arm and Sebastian hefted it and swung it up onto her shoulders.
“It suits you, sir,” he said.
“A little heavy,” she said as she wriggled her shoulders, “but I’m sure I’ll get used to it.”
She placed her arm in the tailored cylinder. Ten thin barrels revolved around the cylinder. They rocked back as one unit and made a mechanical and precise click. A belt of bullets fed from a backpack and over the cylinder behind the barrels. The bullet cartridges dropped individually into the barrels, and as the barrels turned a small hammer flicked back, crashing into the back of the top barrel holding the bullet. The barrel rolled past and a new barrel, with a new bullet cartridge, fell into place as the hammer flicked back and crashed into the base of the cartridge. The sound was mechanical and ominous.
Albert connected Dr. Gatling’s strange rotating components to the backpack. He tilted Melanie’s arm up and the gun component rolled back on the cylinders. They clicked loudly. He placed his hand on the mechanism and lowered her arm, pointing it at the target.
“The veapon is hot. Squeeze.”
“Squeeze what?”
“The small trig—”
The apocalypse arrived. A deafening roar from the machine ripped the sky apart. Bullets hurtled across the compound and obliterated the target.
Sebastian shouted. “Holy—” The rest of his words were demolished as Melanie squeezed the trigger again and unleashed another few seconds of thunder. He clamped his hands over his ears.
“The pack can hold three thousand one-inch rounds, vich it can fire at five per second, for a total of ten minutes. Three thousand. I think you should find that useful, Captain.”
Sebastian looked at Melanie. “You’re smiling. In a very disturbing way,” he said.
“Does it come in pink?” Melanie asked. Albert merely smiled. “I can decorate it later with flowers and things. I’ll take two.”
