Nexus

by Scott Westerfeld

  ‘I’m not sure this line of questioning is—’ Cynthia Rodriguez began.

  ‘It was Chizara,’ Nate blurted out. Something had to fill the yawning gap of the girl’s questions.

  ‘Whose bedroom was full of wiring diagrams of the Petri Dish,’ Agent Phan added. ‘And who purchased five thousand dollars’ worth of electronics last year.’

  Nate almost swore. He’d been fighting so hard, and they’d already known. They were only testing him, calibrating the girl’s power.

  Well, it was time to push back. But to marshal himself, he needed a moment of relief.

  Maybe if they thought they’d won…

  ‘It’s all in my notes. Chizara is Crash. It must have been her in Eureka. That’s what she does.’

  As he said the words, relief hit Nate, the hunger for the truth lifting from him. And in the moment’s respite he stretched out his fingers to pull at those glittering beams from next door.

  He bound them, focused them back on the girl.

  ‘You don’t want to do this to me,’ he said, putting all his certainty into it.

  Her stare didn’t falter. ‘Yes, I do.’

  ‘But I’m like you,’ Nate said.

  She smiled. ‘People like us are assholes. Especially people like you.’

  Nate opened his mouth to argue, to persuade, to dominate – but the words wouldn’t come.

  She’d met a Bellwether before.

  ‘We were trying to help people,’ was all he could manage.

  ‘You actually believe that,’ Agent Phan said softly. ‘Remind me. Isn’t your crew the one that blew up a police station, hijacked a mall opening and a funeral, and killed a cop?’

  ‘Only the police station was us,’ Nate said, sweet relief still sweeping through him. Being honest felt so good.

  As his interrogators exchanged a glance, he realized something – if they knew he was telling the truth, he could clear the Zeroes’ record.

  ‘There were other powers at the mall,’ Nate said quickly. ‘We intervened. We saved people. We’re the good guys!’

  ‘Seriously?’ Phan asked.

  The girl nodded. ‘He’s not even breaking a sweat.’

  Phan didn’t look convinced. ‘You’d be amazed what people believe about themselves. But one thing’s true, Nate. Your crew isn’t the biggest threat out there. Not anymore.’

  ‘We never were,’ Nate said. Since meeting Glitch, Coin, and Swarm, he knew all about bad people with powers. And if the FBI was recruiting Zeroes, the problem had to be growing every day.

  And here he was, stuck in prison, unable even to follow it on the news.

  But this was his chance to find out something about the outside world. He focused himself on both of them, pushing the full force of the crowd into his words.

  ‘I can help you better if you tell me what’s happening out there. Just give me a clue, and I’ll give you everything I can.’

  When Phan didn’t answer, Nate focused the force of his persuasion on the girl. ‘Please. Talk to me.’

  She resisted, but the force of Nate’s will drew an answer from her lips.

  ‘Something’s going to happen soon, in New Orleans. Something big. Have you ever heard of Piper?’

  Nate wanted to lie, to keep her talking, but all he could do was tell the truth. ‘No.’

  Phan leaned forward. ‘Did they hit Eureka because they’re coming for you?’

  This was the question Nate had been dreading. He pulled the chain on his wrist shackles taut, hoping the pain would cut through his need to tell them.

  But then the lights started to flicker overhead, the fluorescent buzzing sputtering, and he couldn’t stop himself.

  ‘It must have been Crash, filling herself with the power of a city!’ he cried out. ‘Of course they’re coming to rescue me!’

  ‘ARE YOU OKAY?’ FLICKER’S GRIP TIGHTENED ON CHIZARA’S ELBOW. ‘I’ve got lights going crazy all over this place!’

  ‘No, I got it!’ Chizara said, and the bulbs overhead steadied. But yes, she’d almost lost control there for a moment – and not just of the lights.

  All around her, Dungeness State Prison was a sprawl of live tech. This pile of concrete and steel was wired up good, every junction guarded and multilocked, every cell and corridor surveilled.

  It was killing Chizara to keep it all from spinning down into darkness. Only the buzz from crashing the town of Eureka, the awesome feeling of doing so much bad, stopped her from collapsing under the complications. But how long could she keep all these plates in the air?

  The stolen schematics didn’t do this place justice. Scam’s heart-to-hearts in the local bars had been helpful, but the prison guards’ knowledge was patchy and nontechnical. Dungeness was a seething theme park of interlocked temptations.

  ‘The guards are confused about the lockdown,’ Kelsie said. ‘But not getting twitchy yet.’

  Her voice was loud and nervous. She had headphones on, trance music pumping. With her new dyed-black hair, she looked like an angry goth kid.

  ‘But the prisoners know it’s not a drill,’ she went on. ‘The excitement’s turning them into a crowd.’

  Chizara reached out and squeezed her shoulder. Bringing Kelsie inside had always been the shakiest part of the plan. If Chizara lost control and opened all the locks, a Mob feedback loop could start a deadly riot.

  ‘Focus on calming the guards,’ Flicker said. ‘You ready for this next gate, Scam?’

  Ethan nodded, nervously retucking his overlarge tan shirt into his forest-green pants. Between the uniform and his dyed-blond hair, he looked ridiculous. But so far the prison staff had found him convincing.

  The voice made a pretty intimidating prison guard. Or maybe with all the doors locked down and the comms malfunctioning, the guards were happy for someone to come along and give them orders.

  Getting inside had been a piece of cake – electronic doors were easy. They’d had to lock a couple of guards in the gatehouse, along with the woman in the front office who’d pressed every alarm button on her desk. That had taken some speedy intervention, balking circuits and killing phones and cameras.

  But Chizara had run through the plan a thousand times, all its pinch points and contingencies. She’d skulked in the woods nearby, watching the guards’ handsets to trace the layout of the place. Memorized the routines, even studied helicopter schematics in case they needed to take one down during the escape.

  After all her prep, it was thrilling to walk in the bright grid now, moving the Zeroes through this awful place in a bubble of precision malfunctions and repairs.

  She hardly felt human, her head was so full of glowing, intricate circuits. Her bones free of ache after crashing the city of Eureka, her whole mind wrapped around this maze. She felt so powerful. This felt so right.

  ‘I can see Nate,’ Flicker said. ‘He’s in some kind of interrogation room. Just two more gates to bluff our way through.’

  Ethan went ahead, Flicker just behind him, her fingers brushing the concrete wall for guidance. Mob bounced along, her trance mood spreading out to the other Zeroes and hopefully the whole prison.

  Chizara cleared their way ahead and closed it off behind. There was so much to do.

  Like downing all cameras along these halls, all the sirens trying to wail.

  Like opening select doors to guide the wardens off the Zeroes’ route.

  Like locking the control booth they were passing, ignoring the man pounding on the glass. Countering all the button pushing inside. Crashing that walkie-talkie so he couldn’t report what he was seeing: four unarmed kids passing unchallenged through the halls of the state’s most notorious penitentiary. One of them dancing along in headphones, the others various degrees of crazy-looking.

  She checked her work as she went, like her old boss, Bob, always told her to. The prisoners here were murderers, the worst of the worst. What would they do if all the cell doors suddenly sprang open?

  If she left even one door unlocked…
r />   Chizara veered her mind away from that horror, from her memories of the police station in Cambria, where she’d lost control.

  Just concentrate on the here and now.

  She focused on the layout of the prison, letting the guilty part of her enjoy being so juiced up. The stolen power of Eureka gave her such great range, such intoxicating detail of Dungeness’s electronic symphony of light and sensation. Her usual pain dissolved into exquisite pleasures, even as she coldly, rationally, woke or shut down one door after another.

  She was Crash, and she’d been put on earth to play this music.

  She reached into the next gate’s electronic lock and uncinched it. Scam followed up with the bulky manual key. That had been fun, watching the voice talk the guard into handing it over.

  Ethan dragged the heavy door aside.

  Mob pulled off one headphone. ‘Mini crowd ahead. Twitchy.’

  Flicker nodded. ‘I see them. Four guards.’

  Chizara reached her mind in, feeling to see if they’d been issued weapons. The fizzy buzz of stun guns was absent. The guards didn’t carry real guns at Dungeness, except for the perimeter patrols.

  She felt Mob’s tranced mood spilling toward the guards – she had to fight it to stay sharp herself.

  ‘Ready to do your thing, Scam?’ Flicker asked.

  ‘You betcha, boss,’ he said.

  That wasn’t his real voice, of course. Ethan never sounded that confident, that determined.

  Scam went forward to the mesh-surrounded steel door.

  ‘Coming in!’ he shouted.

  ‘Finally!’ a woman’s voice came through. ‘No one’s updated us! What the hell’s going on?’

  Scam snapped an order into his dead radio, as if talking to the control booth. Crash threw the electronic lock on cue, and Scam slid in the stolen key.

  The door beeped like a reversing truck as it slid aside.

  Straight-backed and ready to bellow orders, Scam went through.

  KELSIE FLIPPED HER HEADPHONES OFF HER EARS, TRYING TO RELAX.

  Four guards. Four Zeroes. What could go wrong?

  ‘Winters, Young!’ Ethan shouted in the next room. ‘Captain Rogers wants you over in Cell Block B.’

  The voice sure sounded like Ethan was in charge. Which was good. If the guards were unconvinced by his bluster, it was a short walk to the nearest cell for all of them.

  As an insurance policy, Kelsie spoon-fed the guards some of her tranced-out bliss. Hooked them straight into the certainty that seemed to flow out of Ethan’s throat.

  It was working. There was a flood of relief from the next room, cutting through their confusion and fear. They craved order, someone to make sense of the alarms and locked doors. Even if Ethan did look like a nervous blond toothpick wearing a prison guard uniform.

  ‘And you two,’ Ethan’s voice shouted. ‘Secure the weapons lockers. Pronto! Don’t let anyone touch them!’

  Okay, bad move – the mention of weapons, like maybe this wasn’t a drill. She felt their panic kick in, razor sharp. Tried to shove it down, to get back to their relief and trust.

  No dice. She felt like the walls were closing in.

  Kelsie hoisted the headphones back onto her ears. Let herself bliss out, eyes closed, rocking to the beat.

  The prison had been almost silent from outside, all those souls in isolated cells, dots of rage and despair. But the moment the first alarm had sounded, the prisoners had unified into a crowd. Here in its corridors, smelling the bleach and damp, the cold steel and cement all around her, Kelsie was becoming part of it.

  So many trapped men. So many wasted lives.

  But she couldn’t let the stink of desperation stop her. She had a job to do. Make the staff willing to obey Ethan’s voice. Keep the other Zeroes focused on their jobs: Flicker on leadership. Scam on controlling his desires, so the voice didn’t screw this up. Crash on not opening all the electronic doors and letting the prisoners run riot.

  They had to rescue Bellwether. It was Nate who’d shot Swarm, saving all their lives. Saving her from turning into something angry and murderous.

  For him, Kelsie could take the heat of a thousand prisoners’ hopelessness.

  After a minute of music flowing through her head, Chizara pulled her forward. Kelsie opened her eyes to find that the guards had followed Scam’s orders, moving away down the passages Chizara had opened for them.

  The Zeroes headed along an empty corridor.

  ‘How much longer?’ Kelsie said, barely able to hear her own voice over the beats.

  Ahead of her, Flicker held up a hand. Five fingers – five minutes till they reached Nate.

  Kelsie smiled. She could handle five more minutes. The big, noise-canceling headphones were a reassuring weight on her ears. Her rose sunglasses put halos around the harsh fluorescent lights. The walls jiggled with the motion of her bopping chin. She had three hours of upbeat trance ready on her phone.

  She could pretend this was a dance party in some old abandoned factory. With a surly crowd that just needed another song and a few more beers to wake them up…

  How strange, comparing this inhuman place to a party. But for Kelsie, the isolated cabins the Zeroes had been hiding in were almost as bad. Like living in a coffin. At least there were people here. Angry, broken people, but human beings.

  She breathed in more of the antiseptic air.

  Chizara was a reassuring presence to her right. She was so in control, lit up like a goddess from crashing the city of Eureka. Kelsie kept dipping into that ecstatic energy to keep herself steady.

  Ethan was not so reassuring. But he was holding it together so far. She’d never seen him look so determined. Though for him it was probably less about rescuing Nate and more about getting out alive.

  We grab Bellwether and go – that was Flicker’s promise.

  So far, Flicker had delivered on her promises. She was a good leader, but this was way harder than stealing food and staying hidden. It was one thing to meticulously plan a prison breakout with three superpowered friends. It was another thing to actually do it.

  Dad had been to prison a dozen times, but Kelsie had never visited him there. It scared her how he always came back more shrunken. And this supermax was much worse than any local lockup. A place like this would’ve destroyed him. The rage and alienation was as hard as the cement floor.

  And it wasn’t one mob. It was dozens, separated by faith and race and hatred. If Chizara opened the wrong door, the Zeroes could forget making a run for freedom. The prisoners would set to killing each other, and the Zeroes would be collateral damage.

  Except her. Kelsie would be something else.

  In the angry tempest of a prison riot, she would become Swarm. A pure vessel of frustration, rage, and murder, every prisoner a puppet in her greedy hands.

  The thought shook her, made her breath catch. Sometimes she still tasted what it would’ve felt like to join Quinton Wallace, to become a predator of other Zeroes. All that perfect abandon and uninhibited greed.

  She felt the hunger of the prison around her, the rage, all the emotions that Swarm had used to dominate a crowd. She felt herself tempted. She felt the prisoners forming a crowd-beast from their isolated cells.

  It called for her.

  Kelsie hunted for another emotion. Anything else that might outweigh the thirst for blood and vengeance.

  And there it was. A feeling she’d never expected in this place.

  Pride.

  Life on the inside gave you status, but life in a supermax made you the elite of the underworld. Same for the guards. They were paid more, told better tales about the hard prisoners they’d broken. And this lockdown only piqued that pride, further proof of what total badasses they all were.

  She fed the prison its own pride, and it settled around her.

  Chizara mouthed, You okay?

  Kelsie tried to smile like everything was fine.

  The music eased into another track. Less synth, more bass. It unwound the kno
t in Kelsie’s chest. She clutched at the relaxing vibe and propelled it outward, hitting the Zeroes first.

  Flicker signaled her to take the headphones off.

  Kelsie did. ‘What’s up?’

  ‘We’re almost there,’ Flicker pointed at another closed gate. ‘Bellwether’s not alone – he’s in an interrogation room.’

  ‘How many people?’ Chizara said.

  ‘A big group,’ Flicker said. ‘Do you feel them?’

  Kelsie nodded. A real crowd was close. Not a bunch of inmates in isolation, but people shoved together into a couple of small rooms.

  They were nervous, but also professionally detached.

  ‘One room is crowded with civilians,’ Flicker said. ‘Nate’s in the other one, with his lawyer, some guy in a suit, and a girl our age. Her eyes are looking down at something…holy crap, that’s Nate’s handwriting. All those notes he took on us!’

  ‘So they know about our powers?’ Ethan squeaked. ‘What if they’re waiting for us? I told you that crashing a whole city was too freakin’ obvious!’

  His panic hit Kelsie like a stomach punch. She stumbled, but Zara grabbed her, and Kelsie felt her crashed-up certainty again.

  ‘Scam, relax,’ Flicker ordered. ‘They look just as freaked out as everybody else.’

  ‘We can’t back off now,’ Chizara said, that maniacal-goddess glow in her eyes.

  ‘But how do we get him out of there?’ Ethan asked. ‘A roomful of suits isn’t going to take orders from me!’

  ‘You’ll think of something, Scam,’ Flicker said. ‘Or the voice will.’

  They were depending on the voice again.

  Kelsie slipped her headphones back on.

  In the storm of anger and impending violence and sick pride, she needed music to remind herself who she was. Otherwise she’d get washed away. She recited Cambria club names to ground herself, moving along Ivy Street.

  The Boom Room, Starlite, Fuse, Nightowl…

  Being in this prison had stoked her ever-present homesickness. Dungeness was a nowhere place. All the walls were the same glossy gray, and it felt like she was a million miles from daylight. She couldn’t tell north from south.