by Amber Stuart
Here there was nobody to give her that respite, and she had not taken the care necessary to give it to herself. She leaned forward, her forehead pressing against the glass, and every nerve of hers seemed to sigh with cool relief. Sleep. She needed to sleep.
“...almost ready.”
She heard a muttering from the corner of the lab and realized with a start that there was somebody else there. The metal door in the back corner of the lab was ajar. The room with the bodies.
Chal stood up and walked slowly toward the door, then stopped in her tracks as she heard whose voice it was. Curiosity propelled her forward.
“She’s done fine,” Dr. Fielding said from inside the room. Chal strained to hear him, vaguely uneasy that she was listening to something she ought not to listen to. They must have been talking about her. There was no other woman underground, anyway.
“The prototype seems stable enough,” Fielding said. His voice was louder, and Chal stayed where she was, breathing shallowly. Perhaps he was talking with Lieutenant Johnner.
“He’s displayed a remarkable degree of emotional connection. There’s definitely value here.” Dr. Fielding coughed, then waited.
“No, she won’t be a problem. Have you got someone waiting for us on the outside?”
Chal’s eyes widened. It couldn’t be.
“The earlier the better. It needs to be woken up at regular intervals. If it takes too long to extricate, there could be problems.”
Chal backed away, trying to be silent. What she had heard wasn’t possible. It was downright treason. Dr. Fielding wanted to take Alan. Her heart was pounding, and she bumped into a shelf, knocking down an empty box. She gasped.
Dr. Fielding’s voice stopped, and she cast about in her mind for an idea as she heard the footsteps come closer to the doorway.
“Hello?” she said. “Dr. Fielding, are you in here? Dr.--”
She forced herself to walk bravely around the corner of the shelves, meeting Dr. Fielding at the opening. He was frowning.
“Dr. Fielding, I’ve been looking for you,” she said, not bothering to let him speak. Her heart was racing and she was trying hard not to let her true emotions show. If she stopped talking, she was sure that her lips would begin to tremble with fear. “We need to talk about the last session. I think it’s necessary to let Alan rest for longer before the next questioning, because of his self-awareness, but I wanted to check with you first.” She paused, waiting to see if he would believe her.
Dr. Fielding’s eyes narrowed, and Chal put her hand in her pocket. The serum was there, a comfort in the small glass vial, and she breathed a bit more easily. She met Dr. Fielding’s gaze head on, and did not waver.
“If you think it’s alright, I’d like to keep him sedated for an extra two hours,” she said, blinking calmly. God, her eyelids felt like they were made of lead.
“That’s fine,” Dr. Fielding said, sweeping her concerns away along with his. “If you don’t mind, I’m busy at the moment.” He motioned impatiently into the room with the bodies.
“Do you need any help?” Chal asked.
Dr. Fielding shook his head. “You’ve been a great help already,” he said, and smiled coldly at her.
“It’s impressive, isn’t it?” Chal asked. She might have been pressing her luck, but didn’t want to give the impression that she was in a hurry to leave. She fought the urge to yawn. “How far he’s come.”
“Quite impressive,” Dr. Fielding said, but his mind was elsewhere.
“Well, I’ll be in my quarters if you need me,” Chal said, and turned on her heel. Her fingers cradled the vial of serum as she walked through the door and down the hall.
Dr. Fielding was going to steal Alan.
Chal sat down on the edge of her bed. Her mind was fuzzy. She felt helpless to do anything. Lieutenant Johnner was gone, and she didn’t know how to get a hold of him. What would she tell him if she did? That there was some vague plot to take Alan from the laboratory?
She leaned back against the wall, closing her eyes to think.
Think, Chal, think.
Her exhaustion was too much, and the adrenaline of her sudden discovery was soon wearing off. The thoughts in her mind began to sliver off into tangents and run in circles around each other, and her chin nodded down to her chest. Her mind fought to stay awake, to think of a solution, but her body was completely spent. She was like a rat caught in a maze, and she had no idea where she was running, just that she needed to get out. Just before she lost consciousness and sank into sleep, one thought ran through her mind.
I must save him.
***
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
When Chal woke up, the world was moving. A rumbling noise, like the shaking of windows before a space shuttle takeoff, permeated the air. At first she thought the laboratory was under attack, but it was only a half-second before she realized what was happening.
It was an earthquake.
Alan.
He was the first thing that came to her mind, and as she pushed herself upright in bed her thoughts raced a million miles an hour. Was he in danger? Then she remembered what she had learned in the past few hours, and she was at her feet instantly, her body flooded with adrenaline.
She stumbled to the doorway, feeling the floor tremble and shake underneath her. It would be over soon, she thought. Looking out into the hallway, she saw Dr. Fielding running down toward Alan’s room. The ground stopped moving, and she blinked the sleep out of her eyes. Alan.
Without hesitation, she took out the syringe, quickly filling it with the interferon serum. It was the only weapon she had, and she hoped she would not have to use it. She held it tightly, her hand stuck in her pocket, and walked out into the hallway.
There was another loud rumble that began and kept on going. The hallway leapt sideways, and Chal felt her legs being knocked out from under her. She stumbled, catching herself against the wall. If she ended up stabbing herself with the syringe, she thought, it would be the most idiotic death imaginable.
The previous earthquakes had been small, over in only a few seconds, but this one didn’t stop. As she held herself from falling, she heard a loud crack from another part of the lab. An alarm began to sound. The impossibly loud rumbling was eclipsed by the buzzing of the alarm. The lights went out overhead as the hall shook again, and Chal decided that walking was too dangerous. Emergency lights came on, the red arrows pointing toward the emergency exit behind her. The floor was shaking under her feet, and she crawled on her hands and knees toward Alan’s room, in the opposite direction of the arrows.
Technicians ran past her and she ignored them, finally reaching Alan’s room. Clutching at the keypad, she swiped her ID and pulled herself into the room.
Dr. Fielding was standing over Alan’s bed and green liquid was dripping into his IV. The handcuffs were already off of Alan’s feet, and Dr. Fielding was in the process of unlocking the cuffs on his wrists. Another tremor rolled through the structure, and Chal was almost knocked down again.
“Get out!” Dr. Fielding cried. He waved toward the door, and she saw irritation in his face.
“I won’t leave him,” Chal said. The ground was steadier now, but the alarm was still wailing, the lights flashing red. She stood at the foot of the bed. She thought that perhaps playing dumb would work. “We need to get him somewhere safe--”
“I’m waking him now,” Dr. Fielding said. “He will evacuate with me.” His eyes narrowed at her in suspicion, and she tried to keep an expression of earnestness.
“I’ll help,” Chal said. “I can—”
Dr. Fielding took a gun out of his pocket and leveled it at Chal’s face. She blanched. So much for that ruse.
“You’ve become quite unnecessary, Dr. Davidson,” he said. “If I were you I would leave right now. Evacuate upstairs with the others.” A small tremor shook the room, and Chal saw the ceiling crack above Alan. Alan. His eyelids fluttered as specks of plaster raine
d down from the ceiling.
“Did you do this?” Chal asked. She focused her gaze at the barrel of the gun. Her hand hovered just over her pocket where the syringe waited. It was little defense, but it was all she had.
“An earthquake?” Dr. Fielding laughed. “You overestimate me. No, I’m just seizing an opportunity.” Behind him, Alan was starting to shift, waking up. The alarm continued to buzz loudly through the room. She glanced toward the door. Where were the guards?
“Everybody has already gone,” Dr. Fielding said, as though reading her thoughts. “Protocol. You should have left too. You should have never come.”
“I can’t let you take him,” Chal said.
Dr. Fielding cocked the gun. “Then I’m sorry I have to do this.” Chal’s heart dropped in her chest. But before he could shoot, Alan’s foot kicked out from under the blanket, hitting Dr. Fielding directly in the stomach. He doubled over and another earthquake tremor, this one bigger, shook the lab. The gun clattered to the floor.
Chal dove for it, but Dr. Fielding got there faster, picking up the gun in one hand and whirling around. Chal gripped his wrist, struggling with him for control. Alan was halfway out of the bed, one wrist still handcuffed to the railing, as the doctor aimed the gun upwards toward him.
Chal did not hesitate. She thrust her free hand into her pocket and pulled out the syringe in one swift motion, swinging her arm around to stab Dr. Fielding in the neck.
He clutched his neck, dropping the gun to pull out the syringe lightning-quick. It was empty. Dr. Fielding reached out toward his weapon but his hand jerked back in a spasm as his eyes rolled back in his head.
Chal kicked the gun away from him. Dr. Fielding’s limbs splayed over the tile floor, twitching as his body began to seize up. He groaned, the noise coming from the bottom of his throat, deep and rumbling under the high buzzing of the alarm. For a moment he froze, his eyes locked on Chal’s, and she saw the fear in his eyes.
Relatively painless.
A thought raced through Chal’s brain.
“The code,” she said. She knelt next to Dr. Fielding, her mind focused on the missing piece. “Where’s the code?”
He did not speak, could not speak. His eyes darted from one corner of the room to the other.
“The code! I need the code!” If she couldn’t get it now, she might never get it. She would never know how Alan’s brain was structured. Chal clutched Dr. Fielding’s lab coat, shaking him as the earth shook her. “Where is it?”
Chal watched his eyes go blank and he crumpled up into himself, his limbs curling tightly against his body. Spit leaked from the corner of his mouth, his groans turned into whimpers. He kicked once again and then stopped moving.
Chal’s fingers were already scrabbling on the floor tile for the handcuff key, and she was at Alan’s side already, releasing him from the bed. He stared at Dr. Fielding, his mouth agape.
“Come on,” she said, wresting him out of the bed and into a standing position. The bedsheet fell down, exposing his naked body. Chal pulled at his arm, but Alan seemed to be made out of lead.
“Not supposed to harm anyone,” he said, his eyes fixed on the body crumpled on the floor.
“You didn’t,” Chal said. “It was me.” She tugged again, hard, and he took a reluctant step, looking dizzily around.
“Where are we going?” he asked. The alarm rang in Chal’s ears and the red flashing lights cast an eerie glow on the metal and white tile. She was surprised that Alan had not gone into a seizure upon being woken up. She was surprised Dr. Fielding had taken that chance.
“This way,” she said, pulling him past Dr. Fielding’s body and through the door. She looked down each hallway, but there were no guards. They must have already evacuated, she thought. Protocol.
There was another rumbling and Chal saw the movement of the hallway before she felt herself being thrown to the side. She smashed into Alan’s shoulder and fell forward only to be caught by his arm. They stumbled together toward the emergency exit, the floor rolling underneath them like a ship in a storm.
In all of her life, Chal had never experienced an earthquake like this. It had already lasted more than a minute, and the shudders didn’t seem to be abating.
This is it, she thought. The big one they always predicted. The walls of the laboratory were cracking with the strain, and although Lieutenant Johnner had assured her that it was safe, she thought that this earthquake might be the exception to the rule.
As they passed her room, a sudden tremor shattered the door, spraying them with glass. Chal covered her eyes and continued walking, aware that she had been cut in several places but not caring overmuch. She glanced over at Alan, who was continuing forward slowly with a glazed look in his eyes. The overstimulus had burned out his senses, she thought. There was blood running down a cut on his cheek, but it was not a serious wound and there was no time to stop, anyway. She hoped he would not cut his feet; they were bare, as was everything else. She looked at him.
A perfect man, escaping from chaos.
But escaping into what?
Chal fell onto the metal door, spinning the heavy wheel as she regained her balance. Air began to hiss around the edge of the door as the seal was broken, and Chal remembered, too late, that the lab was positively pressurized. The door would have broken her arm had she not let go at the last second, for it swung open with such force that the wall behind it rained down a fall of dust and rock. Another alarm, this one higher-pitched, began to squeal above the buzzing.
“Come on!” Chal said, but her voice was lost in the whistling of wind out of the pressurized lab. Papers blew past them in gusts and the shattered glass tinkled across the floor. Chal yanked Alan’s arm and he began to sprint alongside her as though he had just realized the danger they were in. She had to push herself to keep up with him.
They ran through the tunnel into a darkness that was broken only by occasional emergency lights set into the concrete floor. The wind howled through the exit, pelting them with debris as they ran out and up. Chal felt like a rat being chased through the sewers by some unknown force.
Dios te salve Maria,
plena eres de gracia, el
Señor está en vostra
compañia,
The old words she had prayed with when she was a child came into her mind. As they ran forward, the noise behind them grew fainter and fainter, until finally Chal could hear her own breathing again. The wind still whistled through the corners of the hallway, but more softly, the debris far behind.
She stopped then and bent over coughing, her sides aching from the effort of running so fast. The adrenaline that had sustained her was wearing off and she felt dizzy and weak. When she raised her hand to her head she felt a wetness and knew it was blood.
Beneida tu eres
entre totes les dones, y
beneit es el fruit del vostro
ventre Chesus.
She realized that she was going to pass out at the same time that she noticed she was saying the words of the prayer out loud.
She slumped against the wall, and Alan caught her before she could fall far. Her vision swam before her eyes and she clutched at his arm for support. Had she hit her head against something, or was it the glass?
A small aftershock of the earthquake trembled the floor below her, and she felt her legs turn to jelly. Alan stumbled and she slid down against the wall, smearing blood onto the rock. She couldn’t go on. It was all too much.
The lights had gone out, or had they? She blinked and there was Alan in the dimness, kneeling in front of her, his face full of concern. She tried to whisper to him to leave, to run away and get as far from this place as possible, but for some reason she could not speak. Then she blinked again and everything was dark.
Santa Maria,
mare de Dios,
suplica por nosatres
pecaors, ara, y en el hora
de nostra mort.
Asi-sig
a.
***
She woke twice more that she could remember. The first time she opened her eyes, Alan was clutching her to his chest. Pebbles fell loosely from cracks in the ceiling, and a thick air of dust whispered through the corridor. She could hear in the far distance the echo of the laboratory alarm, its incessant buzzing now as faint as a blood-seeking insect in the corner of an otherwise empty room.
They were in the tunnel that sloped up and away from the lab. She tried to estimate the length of the tunnel, but her mind couldn’t hold the numbers long enough to figure it out. She thought about what they were leaving behind. The code that she had never gotten to look at. How Alan was made. Then blood ran into her eye and she blinked again into darkness.
The second time she woke they were at the exit. Alan had shifted her in his arms so that he could open the door and the jostling woke her. She looked up as they walked through the doorway, and, despite her tiredness, she gasped in surprise. Underneath the lab she had imagined it would be daylight when they emerged, but the desert stretched out before them in an inky, moonless night.
There was a huge object off to the side of the exit doorway, but Chal couldn’t make it out. That was the last thing she remembered.
***
Sleep had always troubled Chal. Not going to sleep—she had never had to deal with any sort of insomnia, fortunately—but the philosophical implications of sleep.
John Locke had been the first one, in the 1700s, to define a person by their consciousness – specifically, the continuity of consciousness. When a person went to sleep, their continuity of consciousness was broken. Sleepwalkers who perpetrated crimes while they were asleep could not be prosecuted for their actions; they were, after all, not themselves. How far could we take this?
