by Jacob Whaler
Mercer can’t suppress a smile. “Yes. We did, as a matter of fact.”
“Tell me about it.” Qaara doesn’t have to fake interest.
“It was a gift from the past. A voice crying from the dust. They solved the mystery of the Cloud, decoded its DNA, but knew it was too late for them. And they knew it would come back.” Mercer takes a seat on the sofa next to Qaara.
“Let me guess.” She gently slides the jax under her thigh. “They were able to communicate with it?”
“Not so much communicate, but they were able to detect information. Words. Thoughts, perhaps. Movement of energy within the Cloud in nonrandom patterns. It was speaking to them.”
“And what did the Cloud say?”
“That remained a mystery. They and their supercomputers were never able to decipher it.” Mercer forms his fingers into a steeple. “Not enough time before it consumed their world. And there’s more. Much more. I’d like to share it all with you, Qaara. But you’ll have to come with me to find out the rest."
The same buzzing sound floats outside the building, this time closer.
Qaara pushes off the sofa and stands. “It’s no good, Mercer. Your project suffers from a fatal flaw.” She walks to the windows that wrap around the room, hoping Mercer will follow.
He does. “What flaw?”
“You.” Qaara poises her thumb over the end of the jax. “Assuming your domes will survive the destructive effects of the killer molecule's acid, the civilization you build and pass on will be a nightmare. Worse than simply allowing evolution to start over.”
“You really think so?”
“Like I said, you’re a monster.”
Mercer steps behind her, only a few feet from the window.
The sound outside is closer now.
Qaara taps the end of her jax. A faint, high-pitched whine rises from her hand.
Mercer stops to listen. “What is—”
The black glass liquefies into dust. Light and empty space fill the room. Mercer reaches hands up to cover his eyes. An old-fashioned army helicopter hovers only a couple of body lengths away.
Jedd and Ricky are on board, hanging out a window, both brandishing machine guns. From the looks on their faces, they are as surprised as Mercer.
Without taking time to think, Qaara executes the remainder of her plan. Lunging at Mercer, she pushes him to the open window.
In the instant before they both go over the edge into empty space, she smiles at Jedd.
“No!” Jedd yells.
Qaara and Mercer fall toward the pavement.
58
OUT OF THE GROUND
A rush of movement.
Luca’s eyes snap open.
“What are these things?” Suri points at the ground around them.
In an instant, Luca finds the voice of Alice in the multitude of voices inside the domes. Then she drops her gaze to the grass.
It’s littered with little balls the size of tiny marbles, hard to the touch, as if made of black glass. But they are everywhere, even clinging to the girls’ clothing.
By now, all the girls are awake, brushing the little balls off. Suri bends down and picks up a handful.
“Don’t touch them,” Luca says. “Keep them away from your skin."
Suri pulls her hand up. “What are they? Insect eggs?”
“I don’t think so. They must be from the ash.” As Luca’s eyes grow accustomed to the light, she sees that the little balls are attached to everything, flowers, bushes, grass, rocks. Except for the domes. Their outside walls are completely clean, glistening in the pale orange glow. She looks up.
The sky.
The deep red color has faded to a muted orange.
She wonders about the Voice.
Slowly, she opens her mind to it, to the same place in her mind where she last heard it as a massive chaos of swirling sound.
At first, she can’t find it.
Then she realizes it’s everywhere, like static in the background against which she hears all other voices. Concentrating on making a connection, she pulls in a breath and goes as deeply as she can, past all the other voices. Past the voice of Alice and all the people in the domes. Past the voices of the other girls in the group. She leaves everything behind and goes into the space between the voices.
I am Luca. Who are you? What are you looking for?
No response.
She has an idea. Focusing on the tiny balls on the ground she projects her mind into them, as if they were a colony of insects.
The Voice is there. Scattered throughout the balls.
But no matter how hard she listens or speaks to the Voice, it doesn’t respond. As if it can no longer hear her. Or has no interest.
I’m coming.
This time, it’s Alice’s voice that startles Luca.
Instinctively, Luca jumps to Alice’s mind. She’s walking down a long hall, alone, in the dark, engaged in deep thought. Alice is thinking about another part of the dome structure and what other people are doing there right now.
She’s hoping the guards will be gone when she gets to the door.
Luca scans the minds inside the dome. Most of them are in their rooms, asleep. A group of five has separated themselves from Alice and is quickly moving to another part of the building. They are thinking of what Alice will do. All of them have a plan. All of them are working together.
The five are going to start a fire. They are hoping the guards lingering near the door to the outside will leave.
Alice wants to open the door and bring the girls inside the dome.
“Everyone get ready!” Luca says. “Alice is about to open a door.”
“Who’s Alice?” Suri brushes her short black hair out of her eyes.
“A woman on the inside.” Luca scans the open field for anything that moves. “She wants to help us.”
Going back into Alice’s mind, Luca finds her eyes and looks out.
As Alice walks down a hall, red lights begin to flash. Uniformed guards rush past. She hurries in the opposite direction, making her way around multiple corners and up a flight of stairs. Coming into a large room, Alice is alone. She rushes to a glass screen on a wall and touches its surface.
It lights up.
Alice recalls a scene in her mind when she saw one of the guards touch a sequence of shapes on the screen. Her hands touch the same shapes in the same order. The screen flashes blue, then green. A door opens up in the wall, and Alice rushes in. She looks up at a square to see numbers flash by.
Luca doesn’t understand. Alice’s heart is beating faster. Her mind is racing.
“Look! Over there!” Suri says. “Something is coming out of the ground!”
Luca pulls back from Alice’s mind enough to open her own eyes. A cylinder-like shape rises up to the height of a person.
“Everyone, run to it!” Luca disengages from Alice and sprints across the open field under the pale orange sky. Thousands of the small balls move under her feet.
Alice walks out of the cylinder and looks in their direction. She yells something in a language that Luca can’t understand, but Luca does comprehend Alice’s thoughts.
Come quickly!
It’s clear from her waving arms that she’s inviting the girls to enter the cylinder.
All of them run past her and fill the inside of the cylinder. Alice is the last one in. As she presses a button, the door closes behind her. Luca feels a strange sensation of weightlessness. They head down.
Alice looks at them, smiles and talks again in the foreign language. This time, Luca ignores the sound of the words coming out of Alice’s mouth and focuses on Alice’s thoughts.
You must be tired and hungry. I’m not going to let you starve outside. I don’t care what the rules say!
Luca smiles and bows, saying thank you but doubting that Alice understands.
You must all be quiet and quick. Alice points to the door. Follow me back to my room. No stopping or staring.
The door slides
open.
A man in black armor stands at the entrance, a long gun in his hands, waiting.
He raises the gun at Alice and says something to her in the foreign words.
Luca jumps into the man’s mind.
You know the rules. What were you doing outside?
Alice points to the girls and raises her palms. The man raises the gun again, unwilling to let any of them leave through the open doors. It turns into a standoff, with Alice yelling at the man and the man yelling back.
From the thoughts inside the man’s mind, he is about to force all of them, Alice and the girls, back to the outside, where the man knows that they will die soon.
The girls scream. Alice yells words at the man.
Luca jumps back into Alice’s mind. And begins to talk. Loudly.
I can help.
Alice stops yelling and scans the inside of the little room they are standing in, as if looking for the source of the voice in her head.
It’s me. Next to you. My name is Luca. Please trust me.
Luca gently touches Alice’s arm, staring into her eyes.
Alice stares back, mouth open. Her lips move.
Luca hears the words in Alice’s head.
Did you just talk to me, in my mind?
Yes, Luca says. I can help. With the man. She looks up and away from Alice, peering at the guard, taking Alice’s gaze with her.
Luca feels the anger building in the guard’s mind. He shakes his gun, tip pointing at Alice’s chest. He’s about to call for help.
Please trust me, Luca says.
Nodding, Alice relaxes her body and stops talking. Stretching her arms wide, she pulls the group of children back into the cylindrical room.
Luca stares into the guard’s eyes and surges into his mind. Afloat in a storm of emotion, she senses the man’s fear and conflict.
His thoughts repeat the same words, over and over.
I don’t want to kill them. They’re just girls. The woman was only trying to help. But orders are clear. No one leaves the Compound. No one gets in without Mr. Mercer's personal permission. Any violations are to be punished by expulsion from the Compound. Any staff disobeying orders will be immediately evicted to the outside. No exceptions.
Luca moves upstream to the source of the thoughts, encountering no resistance. Within seconds, she is staring at a shimmering ribbon of light.
The Core.
She remembers how simple it was to kill Rika. She could do it again, right now, and the man would drop dead to the floor. Silent as a butterfly. She remembers the thrill of emotion when she ripped Rika’s Core to pieces.
So easy. So . . . fun.
Her hands move and reach for the quivering Core, stroking it back and forth, feeling the life coursing through it.
Before she can rip it apart, Luca remembers Rika’s words.
I love to kill.
She stumbles back, turns and rushes away.
I won’t become like Rika. But what else can I do?
Luca remembers what she did to Zero, back at the Institution, when she put thoughts in his mind.
She tries it on the man.
Let them go.
But it doesn’t work. The man has a strong mind. Not like Zero. He pushes the words away.
And then Luca remembers another conversation with Rika about how you could force people to think what you want them to think. All you have to do is make your own mind bigger, like a balloon, make it wider and larger, and then wrap it around the other person’s mind.
Rika did it a lot, before he parents died.
It’s not right, forcing words into a person’s mind. Every person should be able to think their own thoughts, make their own decisions.
The man is shouts louder. There isn’t much time.
Luca leaves the man’s mind and hovers just outside it. Drawing her thoughts inward, she pulls them into a compact ball. The pressure builds, and she relaxes. Her thoughts expand like a blooming cloud until they envelope the man’s mind. Little by little, she tightens her grip on him and holds.
Slowly, the man settles down. His anger and rage subside.
Let them go. Don’t hurt them. Forget you saw them.
As she repeats the words in her mind, her thoughts seep into his mind and become his thoughts.
Luca pulls away.
The man lowers his weapon and walks out of the room.
59
THE FINDER
Jedd watches from the old helicopter as Qaara hangs in empty space, her arms tangled with Mercer’s.
Without thinking, Jedd lunges for her.
Fingers only inches away, he misses. She falls, the hint of a smile on her face. Ricky pulls him back from the open door.
“No—”
Within the space of two blinks, Qaara is a hundred meters down the side of the building, a lifeless body floating end-over-end in air. With Mercer by her side.
Jedd screams, voice in shreds, not conscious of what he’s yelling, wanting to jump after her.
Ricky points down.
A massive yellow wing jumps out from the building. Qaara and Mercer fall into its embrace, bouncing until they are still.
“Safety tabs.” Ricky yells above the din of the engine. “Genesis installed them a few years ago. To cut down on suicides."
The helicopter descends toward Qaara and Mercer. Jedd grabs his machine gun.
Mercer has his arm wrapped around Qaara’s neck. She struggles to get away, then goes limp. He pulls a green tube away from her neck.
The helicopter hovers ten meters above.
Standing on the soft foam, Mercer drags Qaara’s body to the edge and pushes her upper body over until her arms dangle into the abyss.
He looks up at Jedd, hollers and motions with his free arm. The meaning is clear.
If Jedd and Ricky don’t drop their guns over the edge, Mercer will drop Qaara to her death.
“Only one set of tabs.” Ricky is yelling again. “Nothing will catch her if she goes over.”
Without giving it further thought, Jedd throws his gun over the side and does the same with Ricky’s.
Mercer motions for Jedd and Ricky to jump to the foam he’s standing on. He gathers Qaara in his arms and moves away from the edge, closer to the building. He pulls a jax from his pocket and taps its side with his fingers.
In a few seconds, another sound, deeper, drowns out the drone of the helicopter.
Jedd looks up. The underbelly of a ship hovers a few meters away. Large green letters spell out Genesis Corporation in a Gothic script.
His face red with anger, Mercer again motions for Jedd and Ricky to jump.
It’s an easy decision. Anything to be closer to Qaara.
The helicopter moves lower, hovering over the massive foam tab. Jedd jumps toward the flap. As soon as he lands, he turns to face Ricky.
But Ricky shakes his head.
“You have to!” Jedd cups his hands around his mouth. “I need you.” He motions to Qaara. “She needs you.”
The old helicopter starts to ascend.
Closing his eyes, Ricky tumbles headfirst out of the copter, but seems to change his mind as his feet separate from the edge. He twists and makes a grab to get back in, but it’s too late. Arms flailing, he drops onto the foam tab not far from Jedd.
“Why do I always listen to you?” Ricky reaches up for Jedd’s outstretched hand.
“Because we stay together.” Jedd pulls Ricky to his feet.
As the helicopter veers away with its pilot, Mercer runs his finger along the side of his jax. He grins. A burst of green lightning jumps from an outer disc on the Genesis ship to the old copter. It explodes and drops away, black smoke trailing behind flames.
“Do not approach me,” Mercer says, “lest I change my mind about the two of you.”
Using his jax, Mercer maneuvers the ship closer. A ladder unfolds from its underbelly.
“I’ll go up first.” Mercer begins to climb, squinting his eyes behind dark shades. “Then
I’ll lower a rope for Qaara. The two of you come last. If you want to live.”
“You no-good bas—”
“We’ll do it! Whatever you say!” Ricky pulls Jedd away. “Just don't hurt Qaara.”
Jedd pushes his rage into the back of his mind and nods.
Minutes later, after wrapping the rope around Qaara and seeing her pulled into the ship, Jedd climbs up after Ricky.
Mercer is waiting for Jedd with a small, antique machine gun in his arms, dark glasses over his eyes. “You’re smart to cooperate. We both want Qaara to live, right?”
“Why not just kill us?” Jedd asks.
“Leverage,” Mercer says. “Qaara is more likely to listen to me as long as I keep you alive. Now, sit down over there, in the corner. Both of you." Mercer points to an open area in the back of the ship.
“No choice,” Ricky says, looking at Jedd. “Do it.”
As soon as they sit down, Mercer approaches, hands on gun, fingers on trigger. “Hold out your arms.”
“Why?” Jedd says.
“A necessary precaution.” Mercer drapes a limp piece of metallic tape across their wrists. It comes alive like a snake and coils itself tightly around their arms, binding them together. “That’s better.”
In the cockpit, Mercer sinks into the pilot’s chair, next to the sleeping Qaara, who is tied to her seat with another metallic snake. He gently pushes the throttle forward, and the ship once more rises up the side of the Genesis building.
“Why is your ship the only one with power in the City?” Jedd says.
“You mean other than your old helicopter? That was very clever. The answer to your question is simple.” Mercer looks down through a transparent floor at the top of the building. “I knew what was coming, and I prepared for it.”
A woman in a black leather bodysuit stands on the landing area below and waves her hands above her, as though trying to get Mercer’s attention.
“Sorry, my dear.” Mercer talks into his jax. “Didn’t I tell you? You’re no longer on the list.” He lets the jax fall to the floor and dips one of the wings in a sort of salute. Then he thrusts the throttle forward.
The ship banks and climbs steeply.
“Where are you taking us?” Jedd asks.
“Away from death.” Mercer looks down.
