“You sound sentimental,” Althea said. The slide, limned in blue against the light, gleamed like ice.
“Really?” He straightened. “I don’t mean to. If they did think it would save them, I guess I’m the one who’s going to make sure it doesn’t.”
“But they’re human. You could bring them back, start your own community with your own people.”
Jonah propped his booted foot on the table and leaned back. “The Great De-Extinction? To build what, a world of people like me? It didn’t go so great last time. No, I don’t want that.”
“Then what?” she said. “You want to start over and reproduce like the humans did . . . sexually?”
Jonah’s forehead lined as his eyebrows rose. “That’s an idea.” Smooth as a cat, he was beside her again, his fingers wrapped in the ends of her hair. She gazed at him, unflinching. His glance darted from her hair to her lips and then her eyes. She remembered his mouth on hers in the banana grove. “It could be interesting,” he said, pretending to consider. “Are you my rib, then? We go forth and replenish? You can do it if you like, I hear. It’s the little boys that can’t plant the seed, so to speak. Or wait, are you and Jack already sowing that particular field?”
He talked in riddles, but she knew enough to know he was insulting her. She pushed away from his unyielding body.
“No, little snake charmer,” he said, dropping the strands of her hair. “The world’s hard enough without a bunch of brats running around.”
“So tell me what you want.”
“What I want is to be left alone. No more humans, no more clones. We’ve had our hour.” He cocked his head then and, without warning, spun away from her. He pressed his ear to the door and waited, listening. Althea strained to hear what he did, but heard nothing.
“Someone’s coming?” she said. “Jonah, what are you planning?”
A trace of a smile still playing on his lips, he took hold of Althea’s arm. “Sink the ship, drown them all. Easy,” he said. “So, Althea.” She looked him in the eyes. “It’s been three hundred years. Are you ready to fulfill your destiny?”
Which was when she knew he had read the journal, and she knew how he meant for this to end.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Jack
The mouth of the cave that led to the Tunnels dangled with vines. The ceiling yawned high above, alive with chirping bats. Jack and Sam approached a metal door that slid open with a smooth hydraulic inhalation when Sam pressed his hand to a glass panel. They walked down the narrow stone hallway beyond. The silence that descended within the rock walls made Jack aware of the noises that had surrounded them outside: the swaying trees, nattering insects, and howling monkeys. It was quiet within the confines of the cavern, with only the echo of their footsteps and their rustling breath that fogged in the cold air.
The main cavern was immense. The beehive ceiling arched above, and row upon row of shelves lined the open space. Jack had never been in the Tunnels, he’d seen only what Inga or Sam brought back to him. Shelf after shelf was cluttered with a haphazard array of photographs and paintings, sculptures, pottery, porcelain, and figurines. Incalculable numbers of books and crates of discs sat on shelves that soared up to the ceiling, the farthest ones accessible only from metal walkways and a rolling ladder. Behind it all, the veined granite walls of the cave, treated with a polymer for climate control, glowed with milky light.
The Tunnels contained all that was left of human effort and knowledge, and included cultural objects and relics that went back to the beginning of recorded time. Here was all the poetry and stories, statues and drawings, and the texts on language, science, history, and philosophy. It felt strange to be surrounded by such things. Even if Vispera cared little for them, these were human creations, relics of a time that would have found Jack entirely familiar.
Jack peered around the cave, but could see nothing beyond the constrained rings of light under the faint bulbs ensconced in the stone walls.
“Jack,” Sam said, his voice hushed in the dim space, “if Jonah’s here, what do you intend to do about it? We should tell the Council Althea’s missing. They would help.”
“No,” Jack said. “Jonah won’t end up dead because of me. All I want is Althea back. That’s all.”
“You can’t be sure she’s here, or even know what you’re getting into.”
Jack stopped walking. “Everyone keeps saying Jonah and I are the same. They think everything he does, I’m capable of too. And maybe I am. But it also means I know what he’s not capable of. He won’t hurt her.”
“He killed one of the Gen-300 Altheas in the boat explosion just tonight. What makes you think Althea-310 is any different to him?”
Jack looked at his feet. “I know he doesn’t care about her. But he won’t hurt me, not like that.”
“You believe that?”
“We’re brothers, and that means something to him. He won’t hurt me by hurting her.”
Jack sounded more confident than he felt. He didn’t think Jonah would hurt him, but Jonah hated the clones. And even if Jack was somehow right and Althea’s life wasn’t in danger, Jack didn’t know if he could say the same for Sam.
They continued on to the far side of the cave, where a clear wall separated a section of the Tunnels that held the Sample Room, or the Ark, as Jonah and the Originals called it. The room was pitch-black inside. The shelves in front of the door were cluttered with more sculptures and figurines piled on top of each other. If the humans had a system of organizing the relics, Jack couldn’t figure it out.
A clattering came from behind a painting of a horse.
“Did you hear that?” Sam said.
Jack listened. The cavern didn’t feel empty anymore. He felt eyes watching, but couldn’t tell from where.
The air in the Tunnels tasted stale and metallic, but Jack caught a scent underneath of earth and tamped fire. Facing Sam, Jack could see at his back rows of framed pictures jutting from the walls. The faint light repeated against the glass throughout the length of the dome, creating a mottled pattern on the floor. The pattern danced, then broke into a long shadow that emerged from behind a row of pictures.
“I know you don’t want to hurt her,” Jack said, his voice carrying loudly through the cavern.
He waited, hearing only Sam’s soft breaths.
Jonah spoke from the darkness. “Sometimes we do things we don’t want to,” he said. “You know that, Jack.”
Jack still couldn’t see him, but then a form slipped from between the pictures and, catlike, Jonah climbed the balustrade to the stacks above them. Jack strained to see through the blanket of gloom. A light flickered on, illuminating Jonah’s face in yellow. Jack didn’t see Althea. Jonah crouched on the low metal walkway. He wore a black jacket and a black cap, hiding his pale hair in the darkness. He pushed a rolling ladder to the side.
“Where’s Althea?” Jack said.
“There are nine more in the dorms. Why not get one of those instead?” His face twisted into a wry smile. “Oh, wait. They don’t like you much, do they?”
Jack said nothing. Sam stood next to him, his gaze traveling back and forth between the brothers. Sam had never seen Jonah before, Jack realized.
“What do you figure it means, by the way, that her sisters hate you so much? She’s the same person as them in every way that matters. But she likes you, and they don’t. How’s that work?”
“Tell me where she is, and we’ll leave,” Jack said. “I don’t really care what you do with the Sample Room.”
Jonah ignored him. “On the other hand, I don’t think she likes me very much, and I’m just another version of you. Go figure. This might not bode well for your relationship.”
“I didn’t come here to talk.”
“Fine.” Jonah shrugged. “The lights work in the Ark. Turn them on.”
Sam approached the glass scanner and placed his palm on the surface. The room beyond hummed to life, and fluorescent brightness filled the Ark, seeping out
through the clear walls into the main cave, which was still lit only by faint bulbs. The stark whiteness of the Ark was blinding at first. Jack squinted, making out the tiered samples lining the walls. Then, in the center of the room, trapped behind the glass and standing with her hands at her sides, Althea.
Jack pushed past Sam. “Open the door!” he said, unsure who he was talking to.
“Jack!” Althea’s voice was muted by the Ark’s glass wall. “He disabled the door panel. It won’t open.”
Jack pressed his palm against the glass panel. The door didn’t move. He slammed his hand into the wall.
Althea placed her own hand next to Jack’s, against the thin barrier separating them. Her eyes met his, trying to tell him something. She was wearing what looked like the belts the male clones wore during a Pairing Ceremony. They crisscrossed her shoulders and wrapped her middle in inelegant twists. Looped through the belt, from her shoulder to her waist, was a string of white boxes connected by wires. In the center of each, a red blinking light. Explosives. Jack saw then the device she held in one hand. It was shiny and black, a sort of tube. Her thumb, white with pressure, was on a black button at the end, holding it down.
“Is that a trigger?” Jack said, feeling cold.
“If I let go of the button . . .” she said, her voice fading. “Jonah wants to destroy the Ark.”
“But,” Jack said, “you’re in the Ark.” Her eyes were clear, her gaze steady. Her lips, serious and flat, cut a thin, determined line on her face. Jack shook his head. “No,” he said. “We’ll get you out, we’ll figure it out. It’s a trick. He won’t let you die.”
“He will, Jack.”
Hot rage smoldered in Jack’s stomach.
“It’ll be okay.” Her mouth tilted up in a pallid smile. “There are other Altheas.”
His breath caught in his throat. “No,” he said.
He turned from her to where Jonah sat watching them, his eyes narrow, contemplating Jack as if he were piecing together a puzzle.
“You won’t,” Jack said. “You’re just trying to prove something to me. This isn’t the way to do it.”
“The clones are going to kill her anyway, in one of their ceremonies. You’ve seen the Bonding, seen what they’re capable of. It made you sick. They caused all this, not me.”
“I won’t go anywhere with you if you kill her.”
“That button’s already pressed. It’ll go off when she lets go, and she has to let go sometime. She’s already dead. Just like the clones are already dead. You know they are. They can’t change, and they can’t survive. It’s too late for them.”
“If that’s true, then just leave! What you’re doing is crazy.”
“Can you stand by and watch them make more humans like us, humans they’ll kill after they’ve stolen what they want from their genes? If the Ark is what they need to survive, I’m taking it from them.”
“I’ve been protecting you, Jonah, but if she dies, I swear I’ll kill you myself.”
“Maybe.” Jonah uncurled and leaned his arms on the balustrade. “But I don’t think you have it in you.”
“You don’t know what’s in me.”
“You’re just like me . . . if I’d been made weak by the clones.”
“I don’t want to hurt anyone. That’s weakness to you?”
Sounding almost casual, Jonah said, “I’m sorry about this, Jack, but you’ll see I’m right. You want to say goodbye or anything?”
Jack’s mind felt frozen.
“Jack,” Sam said. He spoke quietly. “I can fix the door.”
Jonah cocked his head, listening. “And what happens when you get inside, Sam? The bomb’s going off no matter what you do. Better one Althea than all of us. She said it herself—there are always more Altheas.”
Jack began to think Jonah would talk until Althea’s fingers gave out if he let him. He was controlling the situation, and as much as Jack didn’t want to believe it, Jonah was his enemy now. Even if he did have a reason to hate the clones, Jack had to stop him. He turned to Sam.
“Hurry,” he said.
Sam pried open the panel that controlled the lock and examined the wires inside. Althea’s brown eyes watched from behind the glass. He scrambled to connect wires, then cried out triumphantly as the door to the Ark swung open. Jack slammed it wider and held out his hand to Althea.
“Come on,” he said. “Sam will disconnect the trigger.”
“Jack, I don’t think so.”
“What?”
“It could go off, and then we all die.”
Jack desperately wanted to grab her, do whatever it took to make her safe, but as long as she held the trigger, it was too dangerous.
“Give the trigger and belt to me. I’ll hold it until you get outside.”
“And then you’d die instead of me. No, Jack.”
Jack raked a hand through his hair. A stubborn line had appeared between her eyes, and he knew he wouldn’t convince her. Jonah slid down the ladder.
“I never saw a clone do anything for a human before,” Jonah said.
“You think they’re all the same, but they’re not. Some of them are different.”
“You know what the Altheas in Copan did while we were being tortured and tested on?”
Jack shook his head, unprepared for the question.
“They took notes.” Jonah strode forward, and Jack’s stomach sank when he slammed the door to the Ark shut again. “So you see, I don’t really care if they can change. You think you need her, Jack, but you don’t. We’ll destroy the Ark, and then we can leave, together.”
“I’m not going anywhere with you.”
“It’s her!” Jonah said, his voice for the first time losing its cool composure. He pointed to Althea through the glass. “She’s the only reason you’re saying this. You’ve never seen what monsters they are. We’re brothers, Jack. Don’t choose her over your own blood.”
“If she dies,” Jack said, “we’re not brothers anymore.”
“Whatever you do here won’t matter,” Jonah said. “The Ark will still be destroyed, and Althea too.”
“Then I’ll make sure we all are.”
The cool eyes appraised Jack. “I don’t want to hurt you, Jack.” He took off his jacket and flung it to the floor. “But I will if I have to.”
Then Jack and Jonah, in twin explosions of movement, came together, each meeting the other halfway.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Althea
Samuel had unlocked the door. Althea was no longer trapped, but the explosives and the trigger were attached to her. If she left the Sample Room, she’d only put everyone else at risk along with her.
Jonah said her sisters had done the Bonding, that Jack had actually seen it, but she’d felt nothing. A few weeks ago, if Althea-318 had a headache, Althea’s head throbbed. If Althea-311 sneezed, her own nose tickled.
Fracturing felt nothing like she’d expected. She’d thought it’d be something terrible, sudden as a falling ax, but this had been gradual, and she didn’t feel much different in the end. As she examined this new feeling, she discovered she wasn’t sorry about it. She was maybe scared of what was to come, but the world looked new. It seemed clearer somehow, the colors brighter.
In that brightness, the two boys fought.
They met with no weapons, body to body, fist to fist. They reminded Althea of the dogs in the book she’d read that night in Jack’s cell, all blind rage and violence.
They both fought well. It was clear the two boys were brothers, and not just because they were mirror images of each other. They were equal in all things—height, strength, cunning, and speed. The outcome would be determined by things less obvious, it seemed to Althea.
Jack struck Jonah, and Jonah spit blood. The splotch of pink with a darker red swirling in the center hit the clear wall and dripped down. It would have hit her foot without the wall to catch it. It dribbled to the floor, thick and slow.
It was human blood. Every ounce
of their blood was human. It must be, if they could feel love for each other, as she knew they did, and yet hurt each other this way. As much as Jonah tried to hide it, he couldn’t hide from Althea that he needed Jack as much as Jack needed him. Yet still they fought.
Althea carefully switched the trigger to her other hand, being sure to keep the black button continuously pressed down. Once it was secure, she stretched out her freed fingers, her thumb aching with how hard she’d been pressing.
Althea gasped as Jonah slammed Jack into the wall, making it shudder. Jack grabbed him and spun them both, so now Jonah struggled between Jack’s fist and the barrier separating Althea from them. Jack stumbled and went down, grimacing when his broken arm hit the floor.
Jonah was reckless, and too often left himself exposed. Even now he stood with his shoulders wide, his shirt torn, leaving Jack a clear opening. Althea was sure Jack saw it too, but then Jack backed away, the opportunity gone.
That’s when she knew Jack couldn’t win. Because what did Jack have that Jonah didn’t? He had the Inga—that was the difference. The Inga’s letter had brimmed over with love for Jack. She’d died protecting him. From her, Jack had learned kindness and mercy.
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