And I can’t help but feel happy for her – this future adult Gabby who finally does it. Who finally frees herself from the nasty thoughts and angry images her Shadow has forced on her all her life.
‘Which is why,’ Leonard goes on, ‘your Shadow’s trying to get back to you. He needs to get his hands on you so he can re-establish the link. But the only way to get back to where you are, in the past, is by using someone else’s Mover to bring you here. Her Mover. My Mover. Didn’t matter, so long as they lived in this time.’
‘Wait, you’re saying—’ No, I don’t understand. ‘What are you saying?’
‘I’m saying, Pat, that your little sister Moved your friend’s Shadow to now. I’m saying that she’s the first Mover in history to Move two people.’
‘That – that – that doesn’t make sense.’
‘Look, you saw her pungits, didn’t you? The way they were flying around all speedy and messy right now? They were like that after she Moved Joji. But over time the pungits lose some of that energy, slowing down and getting lazy.’ He turns the ray on Rani and she flinches back, annoyed, but we can see what he means. There are a lot of pungits, like Maggie has, but they aren’t moving as fast. They look tired, sluggish in comparison. ‘See that? Rani Moved me five years ago. Old Move, slow pungits. Your sister’s pungits are excited because she Moved someone recently. And that someone is Vargas’s Shadow, because he’s the one who stole Oscar Joji’s pungits!’
Gabby’s watching Leonard carefully. ‘Steal the connection? You mean, you’ve seen him do it? In the future, where you come from? You saw it happen?’
He lets his chin drop to his chest and he taps his toes. Finally he nods.
‘The world changes a lot,’ Leonard says, ‘when the Vargas girl discovers pungits. Becomes more … hostile, I guess would be the word. When BMAC introduces pungit testing, and more and more studies are published, it doesn’t take long before pungit rays can be bought pretty much anywhere. Soon anyone who wants to know what you are just has to shine a light at your face and that’s it – no hiding. People start deciding how many pungits is too many to come over to dinner or work in their offices. How many pungits is too many pungits to be friends with a person, marry a person, even live next door to a person. By the time I was born, the lines between Movers and Nowbies were pretty thickly drawn. And when the lines are drawn, that’s when the fighting starts.’
‘The war,’ says Gabby.
‘The war,’ Leonard agrees.
‘Leonard signed up for the Shade Unit,’ says Rani.
‘Shade Unit?’
‘The army,’ says Leonard quietly. ‘Made up of Movers and Shadows who were fed up of answering to BMAC. And led by Commander Bram Roth.’ He throws open his arms, in mock reverence. ‘Liberator of Movers and Shadows from the oppressors. A true hero!’ Leonard shakes his head. ‘God, was I ever an idiot to have believed that.’
‘What did you do for them?’
Leonard sniffs, as if he can’t decide how to answer. Finally he busies himself with the duffle bags instead.
‘A hacker,’ Rani answers for him. ‘Leonard’s job was to crack into the Nowbies’ weapons and defence systems and shut them down.’
Leonard rubs the bridge of his nose again and I watch him wince, like the memories are hurting his brain. He worked for this Roth man. A hero for Movers, he called him. What kind of hero does the things he did to Gabby?
He lets out a long sigh before he speaks again. ‘Anyway, Roth made this pungit test mandatory for all personnel. And so I went. They hit me with the ray and wrote some stuff down and that was it. Till I got a call that I had to report to Commander Roth himself. Wasn’t till I got there that I found out the pungit tests were created by Roth to measure how far back their Movers were. He was looking for Shadows with Movers in the years 2070 to 2098.’
‘Shadows like you,’ I say, making sure I’m following.
He nods. ‘Turns out there were three of us. Myself, a woman named Misha Stern—’ He stops, and I can tell from the way his forehead wrinkles, it’s not a good memory. Then he points to Maggie. ‘And finally some brand-new recruit. This poor twenty-something kid who went by the name Oscar Joji.’
There’s a twitch in the corner of his mouth, like he’s fighting to keep it from frowning. He licks his lips and goes on. ‘The first day, Roth brought us to this secret lab the Shade Unit had been operating – researching weapons, chemicals, serums, anything that would help in the fight against the Nowbies. But mostly what he was having them experiment with was pungits. He brought us there: me, Misha and Oscar Joji. Said it was our objective to learn how to manipulate pungits to our benefit. If Roth could strengthen all the Phase 1s and 2s to Phase 3s by manipulating their pungits, all the Movers in our time could Move their Shadows to our time and double the size of our army. He also wanted to learn how to reverse the flow of pungits of the Shadows we had in the army, people like me, like Joji and Misha, so we could Move our Movers. Imagine that. If we could do that, we’d outnumber the Nowbies four to one.’ He shrugs. ‘Sounded all right to me.’
It should sound all right. But I can’t help but feel nauseous. What Gabby told me about Roth, about his anger. What he did to those agents. With him in charge of an army that big, who knew what kind of damage he could do?
‘I asked Roth once why his Mover didn’t know how to do it,’ says Leonard, ‘since she discovered ’em and all. He told me to shut up and mind my own business. I should have known something was off then. But Roth was my hero – I didn’t want to upset him – so I stopped asking questions and just did what he wanted. I never guessed his Mover had cut him off.’
‘So how did you figure it out?’
He gets a faraway look in his eyes, and whatever he’s seeing in his head looks like it’s hurting him. ‘This one day,’ he says, ‘Roth brings us to the lab and it’s empty. Typically there’d be assistants and nurses, other scientists. But that day – that day, no one. There was an operating table, and he ordered Misha onto it. She did as she was told, and then he asked me and Joji to secure the straps that were hanging by her arms. And I saw in his hands he had this crown – a silver band that he placed around her head. He looked at me and asked me to strap her ankles, so I did.’ Leonard rubs his face and his breathing has got heavier. ‘I had no idea what he was about to do to her.’
Leonard leans forward in his chair, hunched for a moment, and all we can hear is the sound of him breathing. Finally he takes a deep breath and looks up. He holds out his hands. ‘The Commander had these metallic circles strapped to his palms. And he stood by Misha’s head, holding them on either side of the crown. Poor Mish, she started wriggling all of a sudden, and whimpering, and I didn’t know, I couldn’t know. Then the pungits started showing. They fanned out from her head, charged with this electric blue glow. I’d never seen them look like that. Suddenly she started screaming and thrashing, fighting hard against my hands and the restraints, but I held her down. I held her down and I watched as the pungits reversed direction. They weren’t moving out from her head, they started moving in. It was like her brain was sucking them all back, and the crown around her head started to glow the same blue as the pungits. And then, when the pungits were all gone, she was shrieking. The Commander, he didn’t even flinch; it was like she wasn’t making a sound.’ He looks at his hands as though he doesn’t even recognise them. ‘And then she stopped fighting. She just lay still and quiet. The band around her head was so bright. And the circles in the Commander’s palms – they glowed just the same. And when they were just as bright as the crown, I saw the pungits again. Flowing from the crown into the circles. He was taking them. He was stealing her pungits from her.’
Maggie hugs my arm tight as we watch Leonard together. I don’t know how much she’s understood, how much I understand what he’s just said. What would something like that do to a person? What would it feel like to have your connection stolen from you?
‘And she died,’ finishes Leonard, his voice shaking. ‘Right t
here in front of us.’
We all wait in silence, watching Leonard, whose eyes are blank, unfocused, lost in the memory.
‘What …’ says Maggie quietly, ‘what did the Commander do with her pungits?’
Leonard shakes his head. ‘Not a thing. They burned out right there in his palms. The experiment was a failure.’
Leonard sighs. ‘After Misha, he had a meltdown. Trashed the lab and vowed that he’d make the Move, no matter what. Vowed to go back and find his Mover. That’s when I realised what all these experiments were about. It wasn’t just for the Shade Unit, for fighting the Nowbies. He wanted to go back in time and get his Mover back. Wanted to re-establish the connection. He was the leader of the Shade Unit. How was he supposed to lead an army of Movers and Shadows if he wasn’t one any more? If any of his generals found out, well, it wouldn’t be long before they overthrew him.’
‘So what happened?’ I ask. ‘How’d you end up here?’
‘Well, I told the Commander,’ says Leonard, ‘told him that I wouldn’t let him do to me what he did to Misha. He couldn’t have my pungits, couldn’t have Joji’s. And you can guess Commander Roth didn’t like that much, so he called in a goon squad to haul me and Joji off to some cage where he could keep us prisoner until he was ready to try his experiment again. What made it worse though was the goons that carted us away – they were Shade Unit. So much for “all for one”, huh?’
I can see the hurt is still fresh in his face. These people were supposed to be on his team. Until they weren’t.
Leonard steals a quick glance at Rani, and when her eyes drop to the floor he looks away. ‘So I begged. I’m not proud of it. But I begged my innocent Mover girl to open a door and bring me back so Roth couldn’t do to me what he did to Misha. I begged her to risk arrest. I begged her to choose a life on the run from BMAC. I begged her to save my life.’
Rani reaches out and squeezes Leonard’s hand, but Leonard can’t even look at her. That’s the first time I see it, the closeness between them. More than family. It’s the kind of closeness that can only come from being in each other’s head. The closeness between a Mover and a Shadow.
‘What about Oscar?’ I ask.
‘Once I’d been Moved, there wasn’t a lot I could do for him, was there?’ says Leonard. ‘When it had been just the two of us, alone in that cage, I told him he had to try, that a Move was the only way to save his skin, but he had such a hard time connecting to his Mover. I mean, he couldn’t make heads or tails of what was being transmitted on his Mover’s end. Wasn’t till I met your mother and little Maggie that I finally understood what the issue was.’
I nod, understanding. ‘She was just a baby.’
‘Exactly. Anyhow, after the Move I kept looking for Joji. If he Moved, I knew from the measurements of his pungits he would have arrived a year before me. It didn’t take long to find articles about what happened to him, and to your family. Way I figure it, whatever experiments Roth did on Joji to fix what went wrong with Misha ended up strengthening Joji’s connection to Maggie – supercharged the pungits somehow. That’s probably why her Moves are so big. They’re not natural.’
I look down at my sister, who’s chewing on a strand of her own hair. Not natural.
‘Then when Commander Roth had Joji on the table and was trying to steal his pungits,’ says Leonard, ‘the baby must’ve felt how frightened Joji was and opened a door without knowing what she was doing. Poor girl just wanted to make the fear stop.’
‘So Roth failed then,’ I say. ‘Joji died, just like Misha.’
‘No, not just like Misha,’ says Leonard. ‘Joji Moved. He didn’t die until he came here. So I think that when Maggie opened the door for Joji, it was right in the middle of Roth’s experiment. Roth must have managed to take some of Joji’s pungits before Maggie made the Move. She closed the door behind him, leaving Roth in the future, but still, Roth had her pungits. It’s the only way he could have stayed connected to Maggie all this time.’
‘But still, I don’t get it,’ I say. ‘Maggie’s Phase 1.’
‘Well, she was just a baby. Not a lot of communicating a baby can do. The connection atrophied and she showed the symptoms of a Phase 1 Mover. Till now. Roth had to wait until she was strong enough before he could make the Move again.’
Strange behaviours. She looks up at me, hair still in her mouth.
‘That’s how you knew how to fix the water tank,’ I realise, remembering the concern on Mom’s face. ‘Your Shadow told you how to do it.’
She nods, her eyes glossy, and I can see she’s worried she’s in trouble.
I hate the idea that this crazy Roth man has been inside my little sister’s head. Hate that he wanted to use her to bring him here. And I think of the Move, the storm above me and Maggie and the man on the stairs as the crows swirled around him. ‘Wait … no,’ I say. ‘I don’t understand. The Move happened at school, my school! Maggie wasn’t even there!’
‘She was,’ Gabby says. ‘She told us she was there, remember?’
Gabby’s right. It was when she was in my arms, sobbing on the floor of our bathroom back home. She said she came to Romsey looking for me. She was there, making it happen. ‘Mom knew,’ I groan, my hands on my knees. ‘Mom knew this would happen.’
‘Well,’ says Leonard, ‘she knew it could happen. We both did.’
Why didn’t she say anything? Why didn’t she tell me that Dad – oh, Dad! You need to take care of her. All this time that he’s been sleeping. All this time he wasn’t with us. He gave it up for Maggie.
Everybody’s quiet then, and Leonard gets to his feet, finishing up packing whatever trinkets from the junk pile he’s decided are important enough to save.
My sister watches me, hands still on my knees, and I don’t know how to stand back up. She Moved him. She Moved Gabby’s Shadow. What am I supposed to do now?
Gabby’s not listening any more, her eyes focused on one of Leonard’s monitors. ‘Those are my parents.’
NINETEEN
Rani leans over Leonard and taps the keyboard a couple of times until the sound crackles out of a tiny dusty speaker.
‘… seen here at a We Are Now rally back in July of 2071,’ says the newscaster. ‘The victims were found dead in their home this afternoon, after neighbours called BMAC to report a strange man dressed in black who allegedly blasted his way into the quiet apartment complex.’
My legs start to shake. Dead. Gabby’s parents are dead. Killed by her Shadow. He was at her house. He found out where she lived.
Gabby said it would happen. He’ll find me.
‘Witnesses tell Avin News that the weapon they saw the man use appeared at first glance to be a simple droidlet. But as you can see from the damage behind me, it was anything but.’
It looks like a bomb went off. Scorch marks and shattered walls and splintered furniture. And I know what caused it. It’s like what I saw on the stairs back at Romsey. The lightning. He went to Gabby’s house. He was there. Him and his lightning.
There’s a tingle at the base of my skull. My Shadow. The fear swelling in my head has caught his attention.
‘BMAC has told Avin News they believe the killer to be the fugitive Shadow of the victims’ own daughter, Gabriela Vargas, a Mover wanted in connection with events at the Romsey Institute earlier today. BMAC Special Agent Beadie Hartman addressed the media moments ago.’
A woman stands on a podium in front of a microphone, looking older than she probably is. Special Agent Hartman. The name is familiar and I remember it’s the name Officer Kelley said back at the apartment. You’re afraid of Hartman. Her hair is pulled back so tight she looks bald at first glance. Her scowl is deep and hard, like it’s been carved into her face. ‘Gabriela Vargas is wanted by BMAC for causing the Movement activity at the Romsey Institute for Academics earlier today. Anyone with information on her whereabouts is asked to call BMAC immediately.’
I watch Gabby, her eyes glued to the monitor. Her face is blank. Unreadable
. The splinters of her home are right there on the screen for her to see, but she’s blank.
‘See that?’ says Leonard, finger jabbing at the monitor. ‘What’d I tell you? Roth’s after you, Vargas.’
‘Shut up, Leonard,’ spits Rani, before turning a concerned gaze on Gabby.
‘Gabby?’ My hand reaches out for her shoulder, and as my fingers graze Dad’s paint-spattered shirt she flinches away from me. Her eyes never leave the screen. I stand there helplessly, while she watches the images of her destroyed apartment flick by, each one worse than the last.
‘This is because of me,’ she whispers.
‘No,’ I tell her. ‘Gabby, this isn’t your fault.’
She closes her eyes, shutting the images out. ‘It is, Pat.’
‘It’s his fault, Gabby.’ Without my realising it, my hand reaches for her again, but she pulls away and I stop. She doesn’t want to hear me. Not right now.
‘Look, I’m sorry,’ says Leonard. ‘Sad, it’s all very sad. But this thing isn’t over. And I for one don’t want to be near Vargas when Roth finds her.’
‘Why her?’ I say. ‘He’s here now. Why can’t he just leave her alone?’
‘She’s his Mover,’ he says plainly.
‘So what?’
Leonard rolls his eyes. ‘I told you. Without his Mover connected to him, he’s not a Shadow any more. Not really. The war is all about pitting people against each other. Movers and Shadows versus Nowbies. How long before his own army turns on him? Think about it. Without Vargas, Roth is nothing but a Nowbie.’
‘But he’s got me,’ says Maggie nervously.
And he used her. And I hate him for it. Because if BMAC finds out – if BMAC sees my sister’s pungits – what will they do to her? She’s Moved twice. What kind of punishment will they come up with for something like that?
‘That’s right,’ Rani agrees. ‘Why bother going to all this trouble for Vargas when he managed to get himself a new Mover anyway?’
‘What would you rather use?’ he asks. ‘Your own toothbrush, or someone else’s? Gabby is his, as far as he’s concerned. It’s not just about his status as a Shadow any more. It’s moved well past that. Gabby’s humiliated him by making him the only Shadow to be cut off by his Mover. He wants her back because she’s his. It’s an obsession. He’s not gonna give her up without a fight.’
Movers Page 13
