A Crack in the Sky

by Mark Peter Hughes

  When backward is forward, Alice looks through a mirror. What does she see?

  By then the savages were closing in on him, so he made a dash toward the far wall, squeezing through a passage in the jungle of bulky equipment in hopes it would buy him some time. His thoughts raced. The first part of the riddle surely referred to when Alice was in the looking-glass world, but he’d already guessed that, so now he ran through the things he remembered her seeing there. In the very first room, he recalled, there were pictures that moved, a clock with a human face, chess pieces that talked, and a book of nonsense poetry. After that she came to a staircase, a winding path that didn’t lead anywhere, and—oh, it was no use! The list was too long, and the savages were almost on him. Plus, Eli realized, Alice wasn’t looking through a mirror to see any of these things, because she herself was inside the mirror!

  But then he caught himself.

  No, that was wrong. In a flash he remembered there was one thing she’d seen through a mirror, even in the looking-glass world.

  He reached the far wall, where the curved metal girders that shaped the dome’s exterior met with the shimmering electromagnetic field that was the dome’s outermost layer of protection. In the gloom it looked like a grid of glowing rectangles, a concave wall of high, tinted windows that curved inward as they went up. He could almost feel the rain pounding and the wind blasting on the other side. But there was nowhere left to run. Heart in his throat, he spun around and saw the two freakish boys rushing at him, squeezing their large frames through the narrow rows of blinking generators and vibrating neurofiber systems. Seeing Eli trapped, the savage with the missing ear slowed just a little. He licked his lips. In the tank behind them, Spider’s giant head grinned.

  And that’s when the answer came to Eli at last.

  It was the book of poetry. Since everything in the looking-glass world was reversed, all the words Alice saw in the book were printed backward, which meant she had to hold it up to a second mirror to read it. What she saw was a poem—a backward image of a backward image. The riddle wasn’t a riddle at all. It was simply directions to a particular passage in the story. As it happened, the poem Alice found was one of Eli’s favorite parts of the whole book. He knew it by heart. But was it the Master Key?

  There was only one way to find out.

  “Wait!” he called, holding up his hand just as taloned fingers reached out at him. For the briefest of moments, the Outsiders stopped. Perhaps the tone of Eli’s voice startled them. Perhaps they were just curious. In any case, Eli began calling out the first verse of the poem:

  “’Twas brillig, and the slithy toves!

  Did gyre and gimble in the wabe!

  All mimsy were the borogoves!

  And the mome raths outgrabe!”

  The lights started to blink. The head in the tank began to dim. Even the Outsiders took notice. They turned to watch.

  Spider’s eyes grew furious. “What’s happening? Stop him!”

  But Eli didn’t miss a beat. He called out the next verse as fast and loud as he could:

  “Beware the Jabberwock, my son!

  The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!

  Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun!

  The frumious Bandersnatch!”

  There was a thunderous groan like the sound of a giant engine winding down. The lights flickered, and Eli heard a series of sharp, echoing bursts—crack! crack! crack!—that seemed to grow closer as the tower powered down one floor at a time. Even in the dim light, he could feel the energy of the spheres diminish. The Outsiders must have felt the change too. Their eyes went wide, and they looked around in terror. One of them had a hold on Eli’s uniform, but now he loosened his grip.

  With one final crack! everything went dark.

  Spider howled with rage, but after a few seconds his voice faded to nothing. In the relative quiet that followed, Eli felt a rush of wind and water on his back.

  He turned. The electromagnetic outer shell of the dome wall had disappeared, and only the structural girders of the tower’s dome stood between him and a twenty-four-story drop into the sea. The view was terrifying. It was night, but he could make out the raging water below, a vast field of enormous, angry waves as far as he could see.

  He grabbed on to the nearest girder and held tight.

  There was a roar so loud, it felt like the whole world shook. With an earsplitting creak the tower lurched backward. If Eli hadn’t been clinging to the girder, he would have slipped. The Outsiders tumbled down the floor, but they caught themselves, grabbing on to nearby equipment. This time the tower didn’t right itself. It settled at an angle, like a low table that had lost two of its legs, and it stayed that way. But the savages still weren’t finished. Within seconds they were climbing up the floor.

  They were still coming for him.

  With nowhere else to run, Eli swung himself around the girder and started climbing. The sour milk smell was almost overpowering. He was Outside, hundreds of feet high, clinging to the outer skeleton of what remained of the tower’s dome. The wind whipped through his hair, and the storm roared all around him. Within seconds he was soaked through. Rain dripped from every part of him and weighed down his uniform. But he couldn’t stop. He didn’t see the Outsiders anymore, but they must have been back there somewhere, still following. He silently called out to Marilyn, still in his pocket. She didn’t answer. His only consolation was that he could sense her signal. It was weak, but she was still alive.

  By the time he reached the top, the gust had slowed a little. Through the pounding rain ahead of him, he saw what looked like a small, empty transport pod. But could it be? Yes, that’s what it was. He felt a rush of adrenaline. But whose was it, and why was it here? It might belong to the Guardians, he decided, or whoever ran the Brain Room. Perhaps moments ago there had been more pods besides this one, pods that had fallen into the sea as the tower shifted. There was no way to know, and in any case it didn’t matter. Here it was, one last chance of escape! Still clinging to the girder, he scrambled for it.

  Just as he got close, though, a bright light appeared in the sky overhead. He craned his neck. A black transport pod was descending from the clouds. Within seconds it landed across the girders beside him. It was long and low, with red illuminators and dark tail fins like the wings of a demon.

  It was from the Department of Loyalty.

  The doors lifted open. Eli tried to climb away, but before he knew what was happening, he felt a stabbing pain down his spine. He could barely move. Faceless employees dressed in black took him by the arms, dragged him to the transport, and stuffed him into the rear compartment. It all happened so fast that Eli hardly had time to think. Then the pod started to rise, slow and steady, despite the wind. Exhausted, Eli could only peer through the window as the tower began to drop away. How had everything gone so wrong, so fast? Tabitha had let herself get captured, Marilyn was limp in his pocket and desperately hurt, and now he was back in the hands of the Department of Loyalty! After everything the three of them had gone through, nothing good had come of it.

  He felt like throwing up.

  But as the pod continued to glide, he had a view of what was going on at the base of the tower, and what he saw surprised him: other pods, dozens of them, were rising into the air. In fact, the whole area around the giant oil rig was beginning to swarm with escaping transports. As the waves crashed and fell, he even caught brief glimpses of the chaos on the slanted deck. Under the bright lights of the docking area, people were running—Waywards, by their orange uniforms, and even some white-clad Guardians, mixed in with them. Free from the influence of the CloudNet, crowds were pouring onto the lowest level and into the tankers and pods. Eli was stunned. Now he could only hope that the awakened Waywards would all find their way to safety.

  And that Tabitha would be among them.

  His shoulder slumped against the wall, Eli rested his head on the cool glass. He was so tired. His whole body hurt. Below him the tower continued to shrink, f
inally disappearing behind a curtain of mist.

  The black Department of Loyalty pod ascended through the clouds and above the storm. For a long time it traveled. Eli’s compartment was dark, and the heat grew oppressive. He wondered where they were going and what the black-uniformed employees were planning to do with him. After a while he noticed, at the front of the cabin, a digital face beginning to form on an overhead screen. He was breathing quickly again, sure he was about to confront his cousin one last time. He readied himself for the stare, the listless gray eyes and pale, sickly gape of the one person who had caused him so much trouble. There was nothing Eli could do to save himself now. Spider had him under his control.

  But the head that materialized wasn’t Spider’s. It had dark features, long black hair, and a sloping nose—a face not so unlike his own. Eli’s heart leapt.

  “Sebastian!” he cried.

  “I hope you realize how much I just stuck my neck out to save your sorry butt,” his brother said, his voice strangely cool. “I’ll catch a world of crap for this.”

  Eli wasn’t sure what to say. He didn’t understand his brother’s chilly tone, but at the same time he couldn’t help feeling elated—and shocked to see him. Until this moment he’d assumed that on the same night the Outsiders had kidnapped him from Providence, the company had also taken Sebastian. He’d worried for so long. “I’m glad it’s you!” he said. “You have no idea how relieved I am!”

  Sebastian narrowed his eyes. “You didn’t think you were going to make it out of the tower alive on your own, did you? You wouldn’t have. Even if you’d reached the pod on the roof and managed to get it into the air, Spider had already sent out orders to track you down. You’re lucky my people got to you first.”

  Eli’s chest swelled. In a gush of emotion, all the terrible things he’d learned, the appalling secrets about the company and the warming climate, came pouring out: The true nature of the reeducation facilities, and how he’d been held prisoner, like so many other misused employees. How Grandfather wasn’t in charge anymore, and how Spider and Uncle Hector had been secretly running things for years. How the Cooldown was a big lie, and how the overheating atmosphere was making the storms grow so destructive, they would eventually destroy the domes. “The company knew all along,” he told him, “and Mother and Father were trying to expose the truth when they got caught. Now you and I need to alert everybody so they can make their own choices while there’s still time! Maybe it’s not too late to reverse the damage to the planet! There has to be a way!”

  For a long moment Sebastian eyed him. Finally he shook his head and said, “Eli, I’ve known about the climate since my first days in the Program. Don’t look so surprised. What, did you think that my mentor, Spider, wasn’t going to tell me? Sure, it was a shock at first, but what’s the point of kicking and screaming when there’s nothing anybody can do? As far as Uncle Hector and Spider, I already know about that too. But it’s the best way, the only way, because Grandfather has been feebleminded for years. His time is over.”

  Eli couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “But … what about Mother and Father? Don’t tell me you’re okay with what happened to them.”

  Sebastian’s face reddened. “Mother and Father were trying to ruin all the good that Uncle Hector and Spider have been doing. Don’t you get it? It’s not just our family that benefits. It’s all the employees. Instead of suffering and dying in the desert, they get to live without worrying about the future. But I guess you’ve been too blinded by Foggers to understand that.”

  “And Spider? He kidnapped me. He held me prisoner!”

  “I’m not surprised you see yourself as the victim. You always have. And yet the night you forced Spider to cleanse you from the Providence dome, he was only doing what he had to, for the sake of the company. He could’ve had you killed right then and there, but he didn’t. That’s loyalty, Eli. But you wouldn’t know anything about that, would you?” He curled his lip. “I’m so disappointed in you. I never thought you’d turn out to be a traitor—just like Mother and Father.”

  Eli felt like all the air had been sucked from his chest. He tried to protest, but no sound would come. It was clear his brother wasn’t going to hear him anyway. When he managed to talk, his voice was weak and shaking.

  “What are you going to do to me, Sebastian?”

  He didn’t reply, but even as Eli asked the question, he could feel the pressure growing in his ears. The pod was descending. Within seconds the cabin shook, and there was the familiar whoosh of landing. Then the rear door lifted open. From the front cabin, one of the black-uniformed Department of Loyalty agents appeared and grabbed him by the shoulders, and the next thing he knew, he felt himself being dragged through the door and landing face-first in warm mud.

  He lifted his head.

  Before the heat hit him, he felt the bugs. They swarmed his ears and flew into his nose. He coughed and sputtered them out as he raised himself to his knees. He looked around. It was still nighttime. They had flown out of the storm, but he could see another one raging in the distance—or perhaps it was the same one. The horizon flashed with lightning and crackled with distant thunder. The heat washed through him in waves. As hot as it had been inside the pod, out here it felt like he was being cooked alive. The pod had landed in the middle of a vast field of nothing but mud.

  He knew right away where he was. He didn’t have to ask.

  This was Deep Outside.

  The middle of nowhere.

  Next to the pod Eli noticed a growing cloud of glimmering light—another holographic image. Soon Sebastian’s angry face was glowering down at him again. “Only because you’re my brother, I’m taking this risk for you,” he said, his voice flat. “But this is the last time. Don’t expect me to stick my neck out for you ever again.”

  “Don’t leave me here, Sebastian! I’ll die!”

  Sebastian bared his teeth. “Go away and don’t ever come back. These guys in the pod are on my team, and we’re loyal to each other, but this is the absolute limit of what they’ll do for me. They agreed to give you five minutes before they report that you escaped on your own, and then they’re going to look for you as hard as anybody else. And understand, they’ll shoot to kill. So run, hide, and don’t ever be seen again, brother. This is goodbye.”

  The pod rose into the air. In the dark distance another jagged flash of lightning split the sky. The edge of the storm was moving swiftly, heading his way. Eli checked his pocket and felt Marilyn, still unconscious. He was sweaty and thirsty, and his heart felt like it might pound through his chest. He had five minutes.

  He started to run.

  26

  wasteland

  Eli scrambled across the mud. He soon realized he’d been wrong about the terrain. In addition to bare earth, he found himself moving over stretches of rock and low brambles. In the darkness he’d missed them, but now he had to watch his step. The storm was closing in fast. Even as he searched the sky for any sign of the black pod, he was aware of how fast the wind was rising around him, blowing up dust from the few dry patches. His sides hurt, and he gasped for breath. But he couldn’t stop.

  When the rain reached him, it was as if somebody had thrown a switch. The sky shook, and then—with sudden, violent force—the full strength of the gale let loose all around him. Almost instantly he had to slog his way through widening pools of water. The earth grew soft, so soft his feet sank with each step. Twice he slipped, and as he fell he had to twist his body to avoid crushing Marilyn when he smacked into the mud.

  It wasn’t long before he realized he couldn’t go much farther.

  Struggling to the top of a rise, he found a patch of brambles tucked in a low space between two large rocks. It wouldn’t provide much shelter, but it was better than nothing. And it was a place to hide. He crawled inside and curled around Marilyn to shield her as best he could. Then he lay shivering. He closed his eyes, bracing himself against the downpour and the howling wind.

  It was
a long time before exhaustion finally claimed him.

  When Eli regained consciousness he was still shivering. He remembered waking several times during the night, but now, as he opened his eyes, the sun shone bright, even through the patchy clouds. The rain had stopped. Tiny insects buzzed near his ears again.

  The storm had passed, it seemed. At least for now.

  He pulled himself from the brambles. He was covered in dried mud. His whole body ached. Before stepping away from the rocks, he checked the sky for the black pod. He saw nothing. In the distance there was another flash of lightning.

  Marilyn? Are you still with me?

  There was a long pause. Then her signal, fragile and unsteady. Still here, my love.

  The muscles in his neck relaxed just a little. They were alive, both of them. They had made it together to another day. He was grateful, at least, for that.

  He squinted into the hazy distance. Miles and miles of nothing, as far as he could see. All right, he thought. Now what? They needed food and shelter. If he didn’t find help for Marilyn soon, he wasn’t sure she was going to make it. And yet he had no idea where they were or how far it was to civilization. He was famished, his throat was dry, and already he felt like he was melting under the hot sun. With no environment suit to protect him, how long could he expect to last?

  But there weren’t many options. He knew what he had to do.

  He found a nearby puddle and knelt beside it. Hoping it was clean, he cupped his hand and spooned it to his mouth. It tasted okay. He took Marilyn gently from his pocket, lowered her to the water, and let her drink. Only when she was finished did he take more for himself, swallowing in thirsty gulps until he was satisfied. Then he stood again. After another glance around, he chose a direction at random.

  He started walking.

  Hours later Eli was still walking. Now it was sometime in the afternoon. He knew this because his shadow had grown small and was now stretching longer again behind him. There was no way to gauge how far he’d gone. Mile after mile the landscape stayed more or less the same: Rocks. Patchy brush. Red earth, hardening under the sun. The ground didn’t even slope much anymore. It seemed to have settled into an endless, level plain of nothing. Every now and then he caught a faint whiff in the air, a burned smell.