“Move,” he growled. “Please.”
Eyes wide, the woman took two sideways steps.
Shade strode past her and over the scattered papers into the hallway. Alyssa followed right behind, but as she passed the lady, she faked tripping and stumbled sideways into the stack of files. Half of them slid out of her arms and tumbled to the floor in a fresh spray of type-covered chaos.
“Oops,” said Alyssa with a thin smile. “I hope you’re not looking for an apology.”
The woman spouted some choice obscenities before shouting after them, “I’m calling security!”
“You do that!” called Alyssa over her shoulder. “And tell them to arrest that hideous sweater for crimes against fashion!”
As they jogged down the hallway, Shade flashed her a mischievous grin. “Can you arrest a sweater?”
She smiled back. “Hashtag lifegoals.”
“Down there!”
They heard the fuchsia sweater lady far behind them. Alyssa turned and saw her back in the hallway, pointing toward them and looking at someone they couldn’t see. Two white-shirted security guards rounded the corner at a trot. These were not older beach-ball types. They were young, lean, and carrying rifles. They spotted Alyssa and Shade and broke into a run.
“Go, go, go!” urged Shade. Alyssa didn’t need to be told twice.
The hallway ended at another T. As they ran up to it, Shade asked, “Split up?”
Alyssa was on the verge of saying yes, but she spotted a sign on the wall to her left: Control Room.
They weren’t going to make it another minute. There were too many security guards alerted to them, and they didn’t know Hanford’s layout. Alyssa wasn’t a strong runner, and Shade was even slower, especially carrying that ridiculously heavy pack.
“No, this way!” she called.
Shade followed her to the left, and they burst through the double doors to the Control Room.
The space looked like something out of an ancient submarine movie. The room couldn’t have been more than ten or twelve paces in each direction, and every wall surface stood blanketed in pewter-gray instrument panels. It was all hopelessly analog — nothing but dials, gauges, levers, buttons, and scrolling paper printouts. Near the center of the far wall squatted a crescent-shaped desk, which hosted a tall, sloping work surface also covered in readouts and buttons. A uniformed, gray-haired man sat in its chair, back to Alyssa. To the immediate right stood a small metal desk before which sat another uniformed man, hands raised to a small blue typewriter. As this man jumped with surprise, Alyssa noticed beyond him the right-hand wall, which was covered in row upon row of numbered gauges and black knobs. In the middle of these was a sign that read “CAUTION — BEFORE PULLING SPLINES BYPASS CRITICAL RADIATION ALARM.”
Alyssa grabbed Shade’s arm. Just as the nearby man at the typewriter began to ask “Can I help—?” Alyssa rushed past him, Shade in tow. The man at the desk turned from his desk panel, trying to see what all the commotion was. He opened his mouth just as the kids passed him. He jumped to his feet, finger pointing at them. All he managed to get out was “You can’t—!” before Alyssa cut him off.
“Can and will!” she countered.
The sign meant that pulling splines, which she guessed were the many black knobs before her, was a bad thing. Right under her hand was a button labeled START. She pointed Shade toward another that read PRESSURE CUTOFF.
“Call whoever you want,” she said, “but if you take one step toward me, we’re gonna pull and press everything within reach. Do you want us to do that to your reactor?”
The man froze. Both hands came up in a defensive pose, urging Alyssa not to do anything.
When the two armed guards rushed into the room a second later, the man at the desk turned on them, hands raised even higher. “Stop! If they touch those controls, it’ll shut down the reactor!”
The guards appeared confused, but that didn’t stop them from leveling their weapons at Shade and Alyssa.
Alyssa had one thumb on the start button and the fingers on her other hand hooked behind three splines. Shade was similarly positioned.
“If you shoot,” he said, “we go down screwing up your reactor.”
“So don’t shoot,” Alyssa said. “Let’s all just talk this out, OK? Nice and slow.”
32
Dive Into Death
By the time he was ten feet down, Winston was fairly certain that the radiation was destroying his soft tissues. If his eyes felt like hot coals in their sockets, then his stomach felt like someone was holding a blowtorch to its insides. He desperately wanted to return to the surface, but he knew that Bledsoe would kill his mother without hesitation. Something in the stances of Bernie and his father indicated that they either wouldn’t or couldn’t interfere, and Bledsoe had shown with his grenade-lobbing fury that he had no issues at this point of killing anyone in his way. Winston’s only chance was to grab the piece, get out, and hope that he would be allowed to heal.
The right side of Winston’s face, particularly around his recent cuts, felt as if it was filled with molten iron. It pulsed and burned incessantly, and no amount of willing the QVs to help seemed to matter anymore. He pulled downward with his hands, every motion an agony. He wanted to hurry, felt the flames of depleting oxygen in his lungs begging him to hurry, but there seemed to be an increasing disconnect between his mind and his body. He demanded speed, yet his actions kept growing…
Slower and slower. Just like in the video.
With one more pull, Winston managed to reach the nearest strap on his backpack. He tugged on it, lowering himself until his knees and feet rested atop the hot canisters. Their heat baked into his skin, and it felt as if the bones in his legs were filled with static electricity, sparking and causing microscopic spasms all through his muscles. With each second his strength boiled away, leaving only roaring pain in its place.
He dragged the pack, scooting it a foot closer to the WC AM5 lid. It was close enough. With fingers that could almost no longer tell the feel of metal from buzzing agony, he shoved the lid aside.
Winston positioned himself directly over the canister so that he wouldn’t have to reach. The glow from the spent fuel rods and his own skin melded in his vision so that he could barely tell one from the other. But he could see that there was an object within the canister that had been hidden by the lid: a photograph encased in glass. Smart move. Unlike acrylic, glass would block radiation and preserve the image.
A clue? he wondered. Why another one?
The photo was smaller than a three-by-five. Even in its glass sheath, the object easily fit in Winston’s palm. He brought it closer to his face, because his eyes were having trouble focusing through the hazy film of red that kept covering them. He blinked repeatedly and saw it clearly for a couple of seconds.
It was a black-and-white picture of his mom and his dad sitting on a blanket. A very young Winston, the same one in the picture taped up in his locker, stood in the small gap between them. A picnic basket lay to one side. Amanda had her head on Claude’s shoulder, and Claude had his arms wrapped around them both. In the background, rising from behind a row of poplar trees, Winston made out a large, rounded object that extended beyond the edges of the photo. A water tower.
This was the three of them at Council Crest.
A new wave of agony ripped through his belly, making Winston clench and writhe in the water. He tasted blood filling his mouth, and his body grew ever more reluctant to obey him.
Why this picture? Why here? Winston could only form one possible answer: Once upon a time, he’d had the family he’d always craved. He couldn’t remember it, but it had existed, had always been a part of him. Perhaps this was a message about being grateful for what was, and by extension what is, and being less dependent on striving for what may never be. The past was a part of him. Maybe that would have to be enough.
Winston tried to put the photo in his pants pocket and couldn’t. His fingers couldn’t feel where the folds
were in the fabric. Instead, he shoved his hand under the top flap of his backpack and tried to open his hand, hoping that the object would stay there.
He let his body turn over and could move his head just enough to spy the catwalk above rippling beyond the pool’s surface. He could still make out three forms at the railing, staring down at him.
There would be no happy picnics at Council Crest, no family, no promises kept or dreams realized. Alyssa and Shade were probably captives already, and Colonel Bauman got nothing but grenade shrapnel and death as payment for his help.
Everything had been for nothing.
What had his mom said? It had been ages ago, up on the catwalk, her forehead pressed to his, the scent of her breath that had been with him all his life warm on his face.
Never, she had said. Never.
Never going to work. Never going to matter.
Winston wept blood as cramps wracked him. He doubled over again, nearly losing hold of the pack straps.
Never, never, never.
Give up.
He should give up. There was no hope.
Never.
Never…give up.
That had been it. Never give up. Because he was Winston. Her son. Their son.
Those were her last words to him.
Never, never give up.
Winston opened his eyes and found he was facing down at the canisters, hand still clenched on his backpack. Before him, something silver gleamed in that sea of otherworldly blue. A crescent that had been hidden under the photo. It rested on the ends of three spent fuel rods, and if he wasn’t careful, the artifact might slip off and fall into a gap between the rods…where it would likely stay for centuries.
As Winston’s eyes began to cloud over again, he reached for it. His hand fell atop the metal, which was hot but not scalding. He closed his hand around the piece.
Black splotches intruded into Winston’s sight, pushing back the red.
He could no longer tell which way was up, and consciousness threatened to slip away with each passing second. The hand holding the backpack seemed impossibly far away. Winston pulled the crescent to his chest, but was it really there? He couldn’t feel or see it. His only sensation was of his body melting in an ocean of magma.
With the last of his vision, he did the only thing he could think of. He pushed the crescent against his left bicep and saw his arm barely slip through the gap in the artifact’s form.
Ha, he thought. First time scrawny arms came in handy.
Now for the surface. And handing the piece to Bledsoe.
No, not boiling in magma. Winston felt like he must be at the center of a nuclear blast, with heat and radiation blasting away every tissue in his body. That was what Bledsoe wanted, right? A nuclear disaster. And here Winston was, with one raging inside his body.
He would not give that to Bledsoe. Bernie and the Omega Mesh be damned. They were wrong. They had to be. Bledsoe could win and the world might burn, but he wouldn’t be the one to light the match.
Now he understood. And he knew why the Winston in his father’s memory had unsuccessfully reached for something inside the spent fuel canister.
Winston opened his eyes one last time, saw a large enough gap between the spent fuel rods, and thrust his exposed, glowing blue arm as far as he could reach down it.
His arm felt as if it were roasting in a furnace. His face and chest seared as radiant turquoise penetrated his eyelids, his blood, his nerves, and filled him with excruciation.
Winston opened his mouth, intending to scream. Only bubbles emerged.
Then, thankfully, the pain ebbed.
And ebbed.
And never before had the slow slide into night felt so achingly sweet.
33
Decision of Divergence
“I see it!” Bledsoe cried. “He put it on his arm!”
He lowered the gun from Amanda’s head. Truth be told, in his rapturous joy, he nearly pulled her close to kiss her.
Bledsoe watched as Winston appeared to reach into the spent fuel canister. Why would he do that? What else could be down there?
“Get up here!” he yelled at the water.
The boy had to be short on air by now. He’d been down there at least a minute and probably closer to two. His left arm let go of the backpack and floated free. His right arm remained inside the canister.
“Winston!” Bledsoe called again. “Stop screwing around! We have to go!”
Apart from slowly drifting with the water’s current, the boy did not move.
Something was wrong.
Beside him, Amanda let go of the rail and covered her face with her hands. “No,” she moaned. “No, no, no…”
Claude finally looked away from the water and scooped Amanda into his arms. She buried her face into his neck and wept. Tears ran freely down his face.
What the—?
He was dead? That made no sense at all. Bledsoe had watched that event play out in Claude’s memory, but that was a different timeline. This time, they had Bernie, and Winston knew what to watch out for. He’d been warned. No one would be stupid enough to knowingly dive to their death. They had to have a plan.
Bledsoe studied Winston’s body a moment longer, wondering if the kid might still be making some play at faking death in the hope that Bledsoe would leave and allow him to escape. Soon enough, a slow trickle of blood wending its way from Winston’s downturned face up to the surface convinced Bledsoe that this was no ruse. Somehow, the boy had actually died in the act of defying Bledsoe yet again.
And he still had the fifth piece on his arm.
Bledsoe faced Bernie, left hand raised in a fist and the right pointing his gun at Winston’s body. “What in the ever-loving hell?! Did you know this would happen?” Not caring whether or not there was an answer, Bledsoe continued by pointing at Claude. “And him! I know he’s tied into this mess. It’s his job to go down there and get the piece.”
Bernie stared at Bledsoe expressionlessly, and only the increase of indigo and pinching of patterns toward the retinas’ centers indicated that some change was afoot.
“Well, it ain’t mine, is it?” Bledsoe raged. “You promised me that Winston would serve my needs. That was our deal. My as-sis-tant!” he enunciated. “Somebody’s gotta get down there and fish that thing out!”
Amanda continued to sob in Claude’s arms. He rubbed her back with one hand and kept repeating, “It’s OK. It’s OK.” as if he were trying to soothe a baby to sleep.
God, these people! It was like a big conspiracy to slow him down and interrupt the inevitable. All of this sappy, theatrical sentimentalism. None of it mattered.
He blinked at Bledsoe repeatedly. A slight crease appeared between his brows, and Bledsoe noticed the gray skin of his knuckles turning paler as he gripped the large artifact’s crossbar.
“What?” asked Bledsoe. “What if I what?”
The alien’s eyes had gone almost entirely blue, like cobalt glass. Bledsoe couldn’t be entirely sure over the pool room’s incessant motor noise, but he thought he heard a low hum or rumbling from somewhere in Bernie’s throat.
Suddenly, Bernie glanced toward the room’s entrance and said,
“Damn it!”
Bledsoe raised his handgun and took several steps toward the entrance. He studied where the catwalk joined the far wall, wondering if he could defend their position while Claude retrieved the Alpha Machine piece. It was at least forty yards from the middle of the catwalk where they stood to the top-level balcony that overlooked the main chamber — a dicey shot for a 9 mm but no problem for trained guards with rifles. And here he was with a dying, possibly dead, and amply bloody body beside him, never mind the
other one in the pool.
Nope, time to cut his losses, grab the Alpha Machine, and get out of here for a do-over.
As Bledsoe started to turn back, he caught a bright light from the corner of his eye. Blue and white.
At first, Bledsoe didn’t understand. No one should be using the Alpha Machine but him. Then he focused on Bernie seated atop the catwalk railing, one hand holding himself for balance. His other hand gripped the large artifact, within which spun the four Alpha Machine pieces, all enmeshed in their own brilliant outbursts of energy.
“No!” cried Bledsoe as he leaped toward Bernie.
Bledsoe barely made out a slight crease at the corner of the alien’s mouth.
“No!” thundered Bledsoe as he stomped on the catwalk with his heel and pounded on the railing just vacated by the alien. “Bernie, I won’t allow it!”
Near Bledsoe, Claude pulled away slightly from Amanda. He brushed the damp locks of dark hair from her cheek. With a small smile and a sigh, he kissed her and whispered, “Slippery.”
***
Before him, Winston spied a silver crescent that had been hidden under the photo, precariously balanced atop the spent fuel rods.
As his balance and vision failed, Winston managed to slip the crescent onto his left arm.
Ha, he thought. First time scrawny arms came in handy.
His lungs screamed for air as his insides melted in fiery acid.
Winston heard the unmistakable sound of something large striking the water far above. Had the catwalk collapsed? No. Perhaps Bledsoe had thrown something else at him. Maybe an air tank? The possibility seemed too kind to be plausible.
He wanted to see what it was, but moving felt impossible, and there was no point. His vision had reduced to an infinity of blue filtered through the darkness of his own blood.
Then something touched him. Fingers slid over the back of his neck.
Winston Chase and the Omega Mesh Page 29
