[22]
* * *
CLAIR RECOILED. CASHILE-2 had been struck with sufficient force to tear his body to rags scattered a surprising distance down the path.
The box flashed again. This time the incredible force struck the ground to Clair’s left, missing both of the remaining dupes and gouging a crater a foot deep and several yards long. Cashile-1 ran away. The third dupe raised his pistol. He fired at Devin the same instant the box flashed a third time.
Clair was moving by then too. She felt rather than saw the third dupe go down much like Cashile-2 had, but less definitively, with half his body still intact. She was running in a long arc for the lighthouse steps, avoiding a direct line between her and whatever it was that Devin was using to blow the dupes away. She glanced once over her shoulder and saw only the two bodies on the path below. Cashile-1 was nowhere to be seen.
Devin staggered and fell as she came up the steps. The box he was holding—an ordinary fabber, with its mirrored door removed and gleaming power cable leading into the lighthouse—fell with a thud to the ground. She ran to him, saw a gaping wound under his armpit that hadn’t been there before.
“Got me before I could get him,” he said. “Damned dirty dupe.”
She slipped her arms under his armpits and dragged him inside, leaving a red path behind them.
“The fabber!” He flapped an arm at the fallen box.
She returned for it, keeping low in case Cashile-1 had already returned with sharpshooting friends.
“Jerry-rigged d-mat gun,” he panted when she returned. “Can make atoms with any velocity. Just a matter—get it?—of giving them all the same velocity, in the same direction. Boom.”
He looked bright-eyed and feverish, and there was far too much blood, much more than before, but at least he was still talking.
“You won’t use guns but you’ll use this?”
“I like a challenge,” he said. “Anyway, guns didn’t help you. Watch the windows. See who gets here first. Help’s on its way.”
Clair propped him up in one corner of the room so he could cover some of the view while she ran to check the rest. The building was too large for just two people to defend it. Maybe if they went up into the lighthouse itself . . . that way they could see for miles around without obstruction. But they could also be seen and would therefore be vulnerable. Barricading the doors behind her was the only option.
There were two tables in the room, plus a cupboard and heavy chest of drawers, which she slid hastily into place as best she could.
The lighthouse’s single d-mat booth, a small affair, barely large enough for two, was a burned-out ruin two rooms down. It looked as though it had imploded.
“What happened back there?” she asked when she returned.
“Was cycling someone,” Devin said. “Couldn’t tell who. Didn’t want to take any chances.”
“You cut off our escape route.”
“Seemed sensible at the time. Tried to bump you, but you were off the Air. Very antisocial.”
She nodded. “Seemed sensible at the time.”
He smiled. There was blood on his teeth.
“They ignored me . . . at their peril.”
“Don’t try to talk.”
She saw movement on the hillside below, and she reached for the modified fabber to shoot anything that looked remotely threatening.
“How does this work?”
“Point and click. Power switch on the back. Suggest opening window first. Glass dust . . . very nasty.”
“You’ve done this before?’
“Vivid imagination.”
She waited, fabber at the ready, but the movement wasn’t repeated.
“Nothing?” Devin asked.
“Just a rabbit,” she said.
“Sure?”
“No.”
“Why are you still off the Air?”
She shifted to another window, glad it wasn’t nighttime. A thousand dupes could have crept up on them unseen if it were.
“Too distracting,” she said in answer to his question, which was honest enough, as far as it went, but wasn’t the whole story. It was simpler this way. One problem, one solution. She wished everything was like that.
“Jesse and Forest are okay,” he said. “They’re being looked after.”
She nodded. That was welcome news, but it wasn’t what she needed to concentrate on right now.
There was a long silence during which she watched intently for any sign of the dupes, until she realized that silence from Devin probably wasn’t a good thing.
His head had slumped forward so his chin pressed hard on his chest. His eyes were shut. She hurried back to his side and checked his pulse. He was alive, but he didn’t look well at all. He was sitting in a deep puddle of his own blood and his breathing was ragged.
I saw a planet running out of days, said the whispers as soon as she was next to him. It sounded like an old trick poem she’d read once, but with different words.
“Is that you?” His eyelids fluttered and half opened. “It’s not you. What do you want, Mother?”
“I’m Clair,” she said. “Don’t go to sleep. You need to stay awake.”
. . . I saw a computer in a fine silken dress. . . .
“It is you,” he said, batting at her with a limp hand. “You inherited her bedside manner. She always loved you best.”
“Tell me all about it, Devin,” she said, going along with him even as she tried to keep an eye out for dupes. “Or tell me about the whispers. Tell me anything. Just don’t you die on me as well.”
. . . I saw a pop star with the heart of a pig. . . .
“That old poem,” he said. “She never let us forget, did she? Never take anything for granted, never ever ever. How could we do that when she was always changing things? Nothing was good enough for her. I never was, anyway.”
Distantly, through Devin’s angsty raving, Clair heard gunfire. She jerked around to peer anxiously through the windows on the other side of the room but couldn’t see clearly. Was it the help Devin had promised her or more dupes closing in? Without leaving his side to check properly, she could only imagine what was going on out there.
. . . I saw a soldier in a tube made of glass. . . .
Devin shivered and his eyes drooped closed. She shook him as violently as she dared.
“Hey, wake up. Just a little longer. Help’s on its way, remember?”
“She never wanted children,” Devin said in a warbling voice. “Guinea pigs, that’s what we were to her.”
. . . I saw the mind that thought this thought.
“She loved you best . . . ,” he said, eyelids shutting again, “. . . but she was most proud of me.”
Clair stood up at a noise from the ground floor of the lighthouse building. It sounded like a door being kicked in. Stepping sideways so her back wasn’t facing the window, she clutched the fabber in both hands and waited, debating whether to fire first or ask questions of anyone who tried to enter. She didn’t want to shoot someone coming to help them, but she didn’t want to give the dupes a chance to overpower her either.
Heavy footsteps, growing nearer.
“Stay out there.” Clair was sure now that someone was outside the one door she hadn’t been able to barricade. She placed herself protectively between that door and Devin. “Don’t try to come in until you tell me who you are, or you’ll regret it.”
“It’s okay, Clair,” came an unexpected voice. “Don’t panic. It’s me. I found you.”
Clair knew that voice, even though it was impossible.
“No,” she said.
“I’m going to open the door. Don’t do to me whatever it was you did to the dupes out there.”
“Wait.”
“I’m coming inside now.”
“Don’t!”
The door opened, and PK Sargent stepped through.
[23]
* * *
SARGENT WAS BLOODY but very much alive.
“It can’
t be,” said Clair. “I saw you.”
“Did you really think I’d leave you like that?”
“But you died . . . didn’t you?”
“Does it look like it? I’m not going anywhere in a hurry.”
Clair didn’t know what to believe. It looked like this Sargent was a copy made to replace the one who had died, a copy that had fought her way to Clair from another booth, bloodying herself in the process. But Clair didn’t understand how this fit with what Forest had said about reactivation, and how keenly Sargent had interrogated her about the possibility that Zep might have come back from the dead. If the PKs could already break the law, why Sargent’s anxiety? Or was this a new thing?
Besides, it wasn’t impossible that Sargent was still alive. Clair hadn’t checked for a pulse, after all. Sargent could have woken up, removed the glassy shards, and got moving again. It just didn’t seem very likely . . . or, as more gunshots sounded, the most important thing in the world at that moment.
They both turned to look out the window.
“The island is thick with dupes,” Sargent said. “Took me forever to get through them. I’m sorry.”
“Why are you apologizing?” said Clair. “Devin and I left you for dead.”
Sargent seemed to notice Clair’s companion for the first time. Her eyebrows came together in concern. “He looks terrible.”
Clair checked his pulse. Still there, but only weakly. The whispers were silent. “We have to get him to a hospital.”
“We just need to hold out a few more minutes, if we can.”
Clair was still holding the souped-up fabber. “Devin made this.”
Sargent examined it. “Did he? He’s a smart boy, and a very dangerous one. Be glad he’s on your side, for now.”
The slight young man slumped over on the couch didn’t look especially threatening at that moment.
“On my side for now, or be glad for now?” Clair asked.
A window shattered to their right, followed a split second later by the sound of the gunshot. Plaster puffed on the other side of the room. They ducked.
“I’m not sure what I meant,” said Sargent, which was a strange thing to say, but not half as disturbing as what she said next. “If we left him here, we’d increase our chances . . .”
“We’re not leaving him,” Clair said. She felt as though she was being tested. This time she wasn’t leaving anyone behind, not while she was sure they were still alive. She had barely known Devin a day and already he had saved her life more times than she could count. None of the ominous things the dupes and PKs said to her would change that.
“All right,” said Sargent, accepting her reservations without rancor. “You take that way. I’ll watch over here.”
From the shattered window Clair could see two dupes creeping up the hill. One was in Cashile’s mother’s body; the other was someone Clair had never seen before, a man with broad shoulders and a lumpy bald head, like a potato. She raised herself, took aim quickly, and fired the fabber.
There was no recoil and very little sound. Just a burst of heat and light—and suddenly the dupes were scattering from a smoking gash in the hillside. Clair fired after the one she didn’t know. She wasn’t trying to hit him, just discourage him from coming any closer. He ducked and complied.
Behind Clair, Sargent fired twice in quick succession, prompting a bark of pain from someone Clair couldn’t see. A flurry of shots peppered the lighthouse, smashing glass but hitting no one. More gunfire answered from outside the building, then three figures in dark-gray armor ran into Clair’s line of sight.
“Don’t shoot at them,” said Sargent. “They’re our way out of here.”
Indeed, the new arrivals were firing at the two dupes Clair had scared away earlier. More of them were coming from across the hill and hurrying up the path. So many of them, Clair thought. Where had they all come from?
Boots stamped on wooden floorboards. Sargent dismantled one of Clair’s barricades to allow the new arrivals into the room.
There were three of them, two big and bulky, one small and slight, not wearing full armor like the other two. All three faces were obscured by helmets. They looked like peacekeepers, but with more attitude. Clair was reminded of soldiers in old movies.
“We have the perimeter secured,” said one of the big ones. “Anyone else here?”
Sargent was equally brisk in response. “Just us. We’re ready to move out.”
The skinniest and smallest of the new arrivals was already bending over Devin. “Give me a moment.”
When the helmet came off, Clair saw bright-red hair and a familiar face.
“You’ve got to be kidding,” she said, backing warily away. Was everyone copying themselves now?
“What?” said the second Devin.
“The dupes told me you were like them. I should’ve listened. What happened to being morally opposed to duping?”
“I’m not a copy,” he said.
“Come on. I have eyes.”
“Don’t be stupid. He and I are completely different. I’m Devin’s twin, Trevin.”
The teen stooped over Devin’s still form, measuring his vital signs and administering patches and fluid-replacement blisters.
Twin, thought Clair. He certainly looked like Devin, with the same gender ambiguity and taste in pretentious Nehru collars. It was entirely possible that they were twins, but she had seen so many dupes lately that that was the obvious assumption.
“Prove it,” she said.
“How?”
“No time for chatter,” said one of Trevin’s two burly companions. “Hurry up, sir.”
Trevin waved him silent. “I’m not having him die en route.”
“We should move while we still have une route.”
More gunfire came from outside, followed by a distant explosion caused by something that might have been a grenade.
“How many are there?” asked Sargent.
“Thirty, and that number is growing exponentially. The south booth is open and they have control.”
“An army of dupes,” said Clair, remembering what the Cashiles had told her.
“Why not?” said Trevin. “This is war. A real war, not an ideological one.”
She stared at him for an instant, shocked. There hadn’t been a major conflict since the Water Wars and the creation of the peacekeepers. There weren’t even countries anymore. It was supposed to be impossible.
“Seriously?”
“You’re not on the school playground, Clair, not now that the dupes are in the VIA network.”
Clair bristled at his tone but was cut off by Sargent.
“We’ll have to fight them for the booth,” said the PK.
“We came in from the north. The booth up there is still ours.”
“But that could change if they get the drop on you.” Sargent turned to Trevin. “Is there anything I can do to help?”
“No. Almost done.” Another patch to Devin’s shoulder, another patch to his throat. “There.” Trevin stepped back and wiped his bloody hands on his armor.
The two burly soldiers or whatever they were eased Devin from his slumped position and gently lifted him into the cradle of their linked arms. Trevin put his helmet back on as they led the way from the room.
Clair hesitated, then put the fabber down on the floor. The cable barely reached as far as the steps. Without power it was just a box.
“If this is war,” she asked Sargent, “what does that make me?”
“That’s up to you. What do you want to be?”
There was that question again.
“I’ll decide when I’m out of here,” she said.
“We’d better get moving, then,” Sargent said, indicating the door through which the RADICAL soldiers had vanished. “This island is getting more crowded by the minute.”
Sargent went after Clair, scanning the terrain ahead. Trevin wasn’t waiting around. He and the two soldiers carrying his twin were already vanishing over the nearest
hill, moving northward at a steady clip.
Briefly, Clair considered suggesting a detour to see what lay in the chapel, but decided in the end that that was one sleeping dog she should let lie. For now.
[24]
* * *
AT AN ABANDONED cottage pockmarked with weapons fire and climbing roses, they found a squadron of RADICAL soldiers guarding a series of booths that folded out of each other like matryoshka dolls. Each was busy bringing more soldiers to the island, or more booths, or a combination of the two. Presumably in the south of the island, the dupes were doing the same.
“You, with Devin,” said Trevin to Sargent. To Clair he said, “With me.”
She instinctively rebelled against his bossy tone. He was even worse than Devin. “Where are we going?”
“To the seastead. You’ll be—”
“What, safe?”
“No. I was going to say ‘brought up to speed.’ You’ll never be safe anywhere until this threat is dealt with.”
“So what’s the point of going anywhere with you?”
“If you’re going to fight a war, you need an army. We’re volunteering.”
“Why?”
“Does it matter? Beggars can’t be choosers.”
“If you think I’ll tell you anything about Q—”
“I’m certain you don’t know anything about Q,” he said with a dismissive flick of one hand.
Surprised, Clair grabbed his shoulder as he went to step into a booth. “So why has Devin been asking me all this time?”
“I’m not the optimist my brother is. We gave the entity many opportunities to help you and it took none of them. This leaves us with just two conclusions: one, it was destroyed in the crash, or two, it no longer feels any kinship with you. The latter makes me nervous, frankly: until it emerges again, we have no way of knowing what it wants now. But it’s okay if you can’t help with that. We require you for other qualities you possess.”
Q is a she, not an it, she wanted to say, a person, not an entity, but she figured it would make no difference to anyone in RADICAL.
“What qualities?”
Crashland Page 13
