Above World

by Jenn Reese

  “Oh, does my mermaid pet know this little intruder?” Fathom said.

  Aluna struggled to her feet. Fathom walked closer, moving gracefully on his bizarre extended legs. He punched more buttons on the artifact attached to his arm.

  “Aaaah,” he said, staring at the device. “I thought I recognized you, girl. One of my recon sharks got a scan of you a few months ago.”

  Aluna thought back to her days at the colony, to the day before the ceremony. The day she’d found Makina dead in the kelp, Great White had cast a glowing green net out of its eyes. The shark had been taking her picture.

  “Is that how you found my”— she stopped herself before she said sister. Fathom didn’t need any more weapons —“that mermaid?”

  “Why, yes!” he said jovially. “I thought at first you were merely a silly Human child, but the way you swam and the way your breathing device glowed, I knew I had finally found the elusive Kampii! I knew sabotaging your breathing necklaces would drive you out of hiding when they eventually started to fail. I did not predict that my first catch would be such an incredible beauty. How fortunate that she was traveling with only one guard!”

  Fathom put his hand on Daphine’s cage. “Sadly the male escaped, but I cannot regret letting him go. Not when we came home with this prize,” he said. Then, quietly he added, “I will enjoy fixing her many flaws and weaknesses. Then, when she is truly perfect, she will take me to the fabled City of Shifting Tides, so that I may improve all of her people. Yes, yes. My own army of mermaid-Meks!”

  Daphine retreated to the corner farthest away from him, a wild look in her eye.

  “Now, now, my pretty,” he said to her. “No need to fear.” But all Aluna could see was terror on her sister’s face. All she could hear were Daphine’s whimpers in her ears.

  “Please, let her go,” Aluna said. She pushed herself up against the cage, aware that Fathom and his Upgraders could kill her within seconds. “Take me instead.”

  Fathom stared at her. Aluna’s heart thundered in her chest, wave after wave crashing against her ribs.

  “Take you?” he said with a harsh laugh. “Why would I want to take you, little girl? You don’t even have a tail! You have no beauty upon which to build.”

  Tides’ teeth! Of course Fathom wouldn’t want her. She wasn’t even good enough to be a slave.

  Unless . . .

  She fumbled with the pouch hanging from her neck. Her fingers felt stupidly thick. The Upgraders raised their weapons, but Fathom waved them off. Finally, she managed to untie the drawstring. Two items dropped to the ground: her mother’s ring and the Ocean Seed. Aluna shoved the ring back into her pouch as fast as she could, then lifted the seed and held it out for him to see.

  “The seed of transformation,” Aluna said quickly, holding up the dull-brown Ocean Seed. It was cool and soft between her fingertips. “If I eat it, I’ll grow a tail.”

  She thought about swallowing the seed, about losing her legs forever. She would lose the Above World, too — from Skyfeather’s Landing to the distant desert where Dash’s people lived. She’d lose the trees and the campfires and the feel of wind running past her face.

  And she’d be Fathom’s slave — his possession — so she’d lose the ocean, too.

  She gritted her teeth and said, “I’ll get a tail, and you can watch it grow.”

  LIU LED Hoku and Dash and Zorro on a wild run through a dozen white corridors. Hoku would have sworn they were all identical if not for the different patterns etched into the surfaces: starfish, dolphin, Big Blue, sunfish, kelp, wave. When they reached the section marked with the City of Shifting Tides’ seahorse design, he knew they were getting close.

  The control room door stood out from the others. Instead of a little pad of numbers next to the handle, there was a huge artifact mounted on the wall. The door itself was ink black and imposing and looked thoroughly impenetrable.

  Liu scuttled up to the device and stuck her face against it.

  “Retinal scanner,” she said simply, as if Hoku would understand. But he almost did understand. The machine was scanning her eyes! There must have been some form of identification hidden in them.

  The red light over the door turned green with a loud buzz, and a mechanism inside the door shifted.

  “Come on,” Liu said. She grabbed the door and swung it out. “Gentlemen first!” she said, motioning to Dash.

  Hoku couldn’t tell if Dash was blushing under his sand-colored skin. Liu had been going on and on about the kiss since it had happened. How could she skitter so fast and talk at the same time?

  Inside, the control room was large, vaulted, and packed with gleaming artifacts. Machines hummed from every wall. Lights flashed. Portions of the wall displayed graphs and charts that moved and beeped and monitored. He turned in place, trying to make sense of the chaos.

  “Quickly, I will show you what to do,” Liu said. She headed for the station with the biggest set of moving pictures above it. “This is the main computer.” Her two front claws started pressing buttons while her human hands pressed letters at an alarming speed. Words started appearing on one of the screens. “We need to restore power to the Kampii generators before —” she started to say, then froze, her hands and claws hovering over the computer, her mouth half open.

  “Before what?” Hoku asked.

  “Before she is put back to sleep,” Dash said, frowning. He walked over and waved his good arm in front of Liu’s face. She didn’t even twitch. He turned to Hoku. “It is your room now.”

  “But, I don’t —”

  “Hoku, it is your room now,” Dash said. And all of a sudden, the horse-boy was a leader again. How did he turn that on and off? “Use it to save Aluna and your people,” Dash said.

  Hoku took a deep breath. Save Aluna. Save Daphine. Save the Kampii. Maybe even save himself. He took another breath for good luck.

  “Okay, let’s do this.” He headed over to Liu and gently pushed her aside. Her crab legs scraped across the floor. “Zorro, connect to this . . . computer.”

  The raccoon hopped onto the desk and poked his tail at a socket Hoku hadn’t even seen. The animal’s eyes flashed green.

  “There’s a flashing red light here,” Hoku said. “Should I push it?”

  “I do not know,” Dash answered. “What will that do?”

  Hoku shrugged. “There’s one easy way to find out.”

  “Wait. What if —?”

  Hoku pushed the button.

  The air exploded with alarms. Red lights flashed. The noise — the noise! Hoku covered his ears with his hands and saw Dash do the same.

  “Zorro! Turn off the alarm!” Hoku yelled. The creature’s eyes flashed green again and the noise stopped as suddenly as it had started. Hoku lowered his hands, but his head was still filled with shrieking echoes.

  “That didn’t work,” Hoku said. He looked over to see if Dash was okay and found the boy flat on his stomach, his ear to the floor.

  “They come,” Dash said. “At least six, maybe more. I do not know how many legs they have.”

  Barnacles! They didn’t have much time.

  “Zorro, uh . . . restore all power to the Kampii,” he said. Zorro’s eyes glowed yellow and he tilted his head. “Zorro, deactivate . . . uh . . . whatever Fathom did?” More yellow glow.

  Dash pulled the huge black door closed.

  “It will not latch,” Dash said.

  Hoku saw another eye-scanning device on this side of the door. “Push Liu to the scanner,” he said. “Her eye is the key!”

  Dash did as he was told but couldn’t maneuver Liu’s eye close enough to the device. She’d been hunched over the keyboard when she stopped moving, and her eyes were in the wrong place.

  “Zorro, lock the door,” Hoku said.

  The raccoon’s eyes flashed red, meaning he understood but couldn’t obey the command.

  “It is no matter,” Dash said. He pulled his sword from his satchel and expanded the blade. After moving Liu to the far
end of the room, he positioned himself by the door. “I will give you the time you need. Just . . .”

  “What?” Hoku could hear footsteps thundering through the corridors.

  “Work quickly,” Dash said.

  Hoku nodded grimly and stared back at the array of blinking lights and knobs and strange glowing letters and pictures. Grandma Nani’s words echoed in his ear: Hoku, my boy, it’s time you had an adventure.

  ALUNA HELD the Ocean Seed in front of her and steadied her wobbling legs against Daphine’s cage. This wasn’t supposed to be how it happened. The rescue, the transformation — any of it. She’d followed her gut coming here by herself, and this time, her gut had failed her. Just as she’d failed everyone else.

  “I’ve never seen a Kampii grow its tail,” Fathom said, his voice crackling with glee. “As pretty as this one is, I would trade her, yes. Take the pill and I will free my pet, release her back into the ocean. She can go braid her hair and play with the dolphins all day.”

  Aluna brought the seed closer to her mouth. “The transformation takes many days. Remove her collar now and free her.”

  “Oh, don’t be silly,” Fathom said. “You might be holding a piece of candy, not a genetic resequencer. But I will make you a bargain: I will remove her obedience collar, then you will swallow the pill. When I am satisfied that it is working, I will release the mermaid.”

  It was more of an offer than she thought she’d get.

  “If you don’t free her, I’ll escape. Or kill myself. And then you’ll never get to see my tail. Do you understand?” Aluna said. He could grab her and force the seed down her throat right now, but he didn’t. He seemed delighted by their negotiation.

  Sea Master Fathom nodded, pressed a few buttons on his device, then pointed it at Daphine. The thick metal collar around her neck clicked open and sank to the bottom of her tank. Both of Daphine’s hands went to her neck, and Aluna saw her sister take in a huge breath.

  “My father will be so pleased when I tell him about this,” Fathom said, clapping two of his three hands together happily. “He has always hated the Kampii.”

  “Who is your father?” Aluna asked.

  “Before the modern age, he was known as Karl Strand,” Fathom said.

  Aluna sputtered, “Karl Strand is still alive? It’s been hundreds of years — how is that possible? And if he is truly your father, why do you look just like him?”

  Fathom laughed. “Oh, no,” he said. “I am merely a clone of the great and mighty Karl Strand. I was created from his genetic code, from his very flesh — when he still had some. He tasked me with bringing the ocean realms under our control. How could he trust such an important task to anyone other than his own genetic child?”

  Clones! Fathom was a copy of Karl Strand!

  “Was Sky Master Tempest a clone, too?” Aluna asked. She wanted answers, and unlike the Kampii Elders, Fathom seemed inclined to actually give her some. And why not? She would be his slave soon enough.

  “Ah, my brother Tempest, may his memory fade to dust,” Fathom said, resting two of his hands over his heart. “Yes, he was a clone, but an inferior one. You see, the process is imperfect. We all share an illustrious genetic heritage . . . but not all of us are our father’s equal.

  “Tempest was greedy,” Fathom said. “He was given the title of Sky Master and ordered to destroy the Aviars if he could not tame them, but that wasn’t good enough for him. He wanted to rule them. To turn them into his own personal army. But the Aviars are savages. Unlike more civilized people, they chose to fight to the death rather than to submit to his will. They battled like devils against him. Technically the Aviar leader struck the killing blow, but it was my brother’s hubris, his unbelievable arrogance, that destroyed him.”

  Aluna stood up straighter and raised her chin. She was proud to call the Aviars and President Iolanthe her allies.

  “Tempest was foolish to disobey our father. You see, Karl Strand has a plan,” Fathom said. “He will unite all the people of this land — be they birds or fish, horses or snakes. He will collect us, bring us together, make us strong. Under his rule, we will conquer life, death, and the very earth herself.”

  Aluna shuddered. She wanted the Kampii to be less afraid of their own tails, to come out of the water, to be a part of the world. But not if that world was ruled by Karl Strand and his crazy clones.

  “Don’t look so disgusted, mermaid. It will be a world of incredible beauty,” Fathom said, motioning to the Upgraders surrounding them. “A new civilization of advanced Humans. Faster, stronger, and more durable. The best parts from all the races and splinters!”

  Fathom bent over in a flash, his head was just half a meter from Aluna’s. Up close, she could see his Human brown eyes more clearly, could see the lines around his mouth, the wrinkles near his eyes.

  “You see, not all of us are weaker than our father,” he said quietly. “Some of us, like me, are his betters. Do you not marvel at the improvements I have made?” He stood up and spread his arms wide, displaying all his fleshy add-ons and oddly integrated parts. “When the time comes, we shall see who sits upon the throne of the new age. Yes? We shall see.”

  He stood there for a moment, grinning. Was he waiting for her to cheer? To clap? To proclaim her allegiance? All she could think about was running, and all she could focus on was keeping her legs from doing just that.

  “Enough chitchat,” Fathom said. “I have removed the mermaid’s collar. Now take the pill. Take it now, or I will destroy you both and collect more samples from your precious coral city.”

  The Upgraders raised their guns and swords and knives and needles, and Aluna had no choice. She pressed her hand against the plastic of Daphine’s enclosure, trying to draw strength from her sister’s presence.

  “Don’t do this, Aluna,” Daphine said quietly, the scope on her left eye whirring as it focused. “He already has me. There’s still time for you to escape.”

  “The Kampii need you,” Aluna said. Her brothers, her father, the entire colony — they were all better off with Daphine than with her. No one could argue with that logic. Before she could change her mind, before she let the fear overtake her, she dropped the Ocean Seed into her mouth and swallowed.

  At first, the seed felt like a rock lodged in her throat. She wanted to choke, to cough it back up and spit it on the ground. It tasted like poison. It was poison. There was no cure for a tail. There was no reverse seed. And then it was down, an ugly lump in her stomach ready to wreak its chaos on her insides.

  “Someone get me a fresh collar,” Fathom said to his Upgraders. He turned to Aluna. “I have a new slave.”

  Two of the Upgraders left the clearing.

  Collar. Slave.

  “No, no, no,” Daphine said, shaking her head. She sank to the bottom of her tank. “No, no, no.”

  “Don’t worry, Daphine,” Aluna said. “I’ll be okay.”

  She’d never lied to Daphine, not about anything important, not until now. But her sister was still too fragile from her ordeal. Too broken. She wasn’t the same Kampii who’d raised Aluna from a youngling and kept four headstrong men in line every day. If Fathom kept his promise, Daphine would return to the City of Shifting Tides. Under the water, surrounded by her friends and family, she’d find her strength again.

  Fathom pointed to another pair of Upgraders. “You two. Get one of my medteks and bring the recording equipment. Fast. If she so much as sprouts a scale before you get back, you’ll be dragging yourself around with your elbows!”

  The Upgraders grunted and fled the area. Four gone, Aluna thought, but eight was still too many, even if she could find a way to defeat Fathom himself.

  It would be so much easier to give up. To stop looking for solutions to an unsolvable problem. Fathom was too strong, his army too big. The seed could render her helpless at any moment, and Daphine was useless in her current state. Aluna had no allies, since she’d stupidly turned away Hoku and Dash, even after they’d begged to help.

>   She was finally out of options.

  METAL CLANGED against metal. Behind Hoku, Dash fought the Upgraders at the door, keeping them outside, giving him time. Hoku didn’t look. He couldn’t. Dash’s survival depended on it.

  “Zorro, start all the power,” Hoku said. “Zorro, restore power to the Kampii city. Zorro, shut down the Upgraders!”

  None of it worked. Zorro’s head was frozen at a tilt, and his eyes alternated between red and yellow flashes.

  “Fathom is redirecting the dome’s power,” he said to himself. A gout of flame shot through the room. He could feel it singe his back. A second later, a huge piece of metal clanged to the floor and the flames stopped.

  Dash had a shield covering his broken arm while his sword flashed in his other hand.

  “Zorro, save the Kampii. Zorro, stop sending power to Karl Strand. Zorro, shoot electricity at Fathom.”

  Yellow. Yellow. Yellow.

  Hoku smashed both his fists onto the desk, mashing buttons and triggering changes in the screens. He spared a quick glance over his shoulder, expecting imminent death, but saw Dash still up and fighting. Somehow, he’d kept them bottlenecked at the door.

  His eye fell on Liu, still frozen. If only she’d stayed awake another few minutes. She could have told him what to do. Think, he told himself. Think!

  He had to restore the Kampii generators and save his people.

  He had to stop Fathom so he could never harm the Kampii again.

  He had to wake up the Dome Meks, rescue Daphine, and save Aluna.

  Behind him, Dash yelped and dropped his shield. His left arm, the one Aluna had broken, dripped red.

  But first, he had to find a way for him and Dash to survive for the next five minutes.

  Hoku looked back at the crab girl.

  “Zorro, wake Liu.”

  Yellow.

  His gaze fell to the girl’s shirt, to a number stitched along her collar. His heart was beating fast. Too fast. He only had seconds or it was all over.

  “Zorro, wake technician one-zero-zero-seven-seven-one!”