by Beth Goobie
“Ride the light,” she whispered, touching the tiny blue cat on the inside of her left wrist.
She came through into a room luminescent with white. Not the off-white of the Detta complex, a smeared, uncertain, brownish kind of white, but a radiance that made the place appear lit from within. Cupboards and medical equipment lined the walls and odd-looking machinery stood in the corners. Against the far wall loomed a floor-to-ceiling statue of the Goddess. Several men in white lab coats were bustling about, but what immediately drew Nellie’s eyes was a row of cubicles that stood in the middle of the room. Peaked in a dome of tinted plastic, each rose to the height of her chest and was the length of an average adult body. The cubicles had been grouped into two sections of five, with a gap of several feet between the central ones which had been placed end to end. It was toward this opening that the lead cadet was now walking. Behind her, the group continued to chant, “Ride the light, ride the light.”
Reaching the opening, the lead cadet paused, and the line came to a halt. At a standstill beside one of the cubicles, Nellie gave it a curious glance and saw a child lying beneath the tinted dome. Perhaps four years old, the boy appeared to be drugged or asleep, and was wearing a helmet similar to the one she’d worn in the Relaxer. Otherwise, he was naked. Tubes and a tangle of wires ran in and out of various places in his skin. Horrified, Nellie’s eyes darted to the other cubicles, but the tinted domes hid their occupants from casual observation. She turned back to the boy, a sick feeling rushing her legs. It was obvious tonight’s events had something to do with the experiments going on in K Block, only this time they weren’t just using the kids in the cubicles, they were using Advanced cadets. All of them.
But the Goddess brought us here, Nellie thought wildly. And the stars approved.
Panicking, she glanced around the room, seeking Col. Jolsen or Lt. Neem. Instead she saw two lab-coated men, the first seated at a computer on the other side of the cubicles and the second standing just beyond the gap between the central cubicles, holding a small device. Deep within Nellie’s mind something shifted, and she slitted her eyes at the handheld device. It looked familiar, like a TV remote control.
“Greetings, my child,” the man with the device said to the lead girl as she paused before the gap. “Are you ready to ride the light?”
The girl hesitated, one breath there and gone. Then her eyes fixed on the statue of the Goddess at the far end of the room. In a clear voice she said, “Yes.”
“Step forward,” said the man.
The girl stepped into the gap.
“Fire one,” said the man. Pointing the device at the girl, he pressed a button. At the same moment the man at the computer flicked a switch. A quiet click sounded from the computer and a wave of energy coursed through the room, so intense it lifted the hairs on the back of Nellie’s neck. Abruptly the room was consumed in heat, her eyes blurring with sweat. Straining to see, she squinted at the gap, but it was empty, the lead girl no longer there. Already a second girl was stepping into the opening. “Ride the light, ride the light,” chanted the rest of the cadets, their eyes fixed on the statue of the Goddess.
“Are you ready to ride the light?” the man with the device asked again.
“I’m ready,” said the second girl.
“Fire two,” said the man and pointed the device at her. Again Nellie heard the computer’s quiet click and felt heat surge through the room. Then, as she stared, the second girl disappeared. Acid sweat poured down Nellie’s face and her knees wobbled dangerously. Forcing herself to get a grip, she began scanning the room’s vibrations for whatever she could pick up, but panic pushed her mind past its usual barriers and the room dissolved into a landscape of energy. Instantly the cadets and lab-coated men were transformed into figures of multicolored light, and the domed cubicles were lit from within by the children trapped inside. Against the far wall the statue of the Goddess loomed, a thick gray blob.
“Fire three,” said the now burgundy-and-navy blue figure of the man with the handheld device, and the computer emitted another quiet click. Then, to Nellie’s utter astonishment, a wave of prismatic light burst out of the two central cubicles and converged upon the cadet standing between them. Simultaneously, a beam of bluish white light shot from the device in the man’s hand toward the girl’s forehead. Instantly her vibrations quickened, changing from indigo and orange to bluish white. She disappeared.
“Ride the light,” chanted the line of cadets. Lost in the pulsing landscape of energy that surrounded her, Nellie didn’t notice the group had taken a step forward, and she received a shove from the cadet behind her. Immediately the landscape of energy disappeared and she found herself once again standing in solid reality. Her eyes darted to the nearest cubicle. What was happening to the kids in those machines? The wave of energy that had lifted from the cubicles seemed to be coming from their bodies. Were they alive, or was that energy the last bit of their souls leaving their bodies?
She was now standing four feet back from the gap, beside one of the two central cubicles. Giving it a quick glance, she felt her knees waver under a new deluge of shock. The girl in the cubicle was familiar, about twelve or thirteen, with long black hair. Racking her brains, Nellie ran her eyes frantically over the naked body. Where did she know this girl from? Why could she feel the grin hidden within that expressionless slack-jawed face?
Then she saw the stub at the girl’s left wrist. Lierin. The name came to Nellie just as another click sounded from the computer. Before her eyes, the girl’s naked body lifted slightly and convulsed. Once again terror pushed Nellie’s mind past its usual barriers, solid reality dissolved, and she saw a wave of iridescent energy rise directly from the girl lying in the cubicle and flow toward the cadet standing in the gap. The cadet’s vibrations quickened to bluish white and she disappeared.
The room returned to solid form, and Nellie stared at the girl in the cubicle. Lierin. She was certain she’d never heard the name and yet she seemed to know it like her own breath.
“Fire seven,” said the man holding the device. As the computer gave another quiet click, a surge of fear hit Nellie, dissolving solid reality yet again, and she watched a wave of light lift from the girl in the cubicle.
“Are you ready to ride the light?” came the inevitable command.
Two feet from the man standing beyond the gap, Nellie froze, but a sharp shove from behind sent her stumbling forward. “Are you ready—?” the man began to repeat, lifting the handheld device. As the computer’s quiet click sounded, Nellie turned helplessly toward the cubicle with the black-haired girl.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I didn’t know, I’m sor —”
A wave of brilliant energy hit her from both sides, a rush of vibrations that passed violently into her skin. And in that moment she knew absolutely who Lierin was, knew every second of the girl’s life just as she knew every thought, word and deed of the seven-year-old boy lying in the cubicle on her other side. Then the man holding the device pressed a button, and a beam of bluish white light leapt at her forehead. The beam surrounded and penetrated her body, and Nellie felt her vibrations quicken into a high-singing choir of sound as Lierin, the line of softly chanting cadets, and the horror of the high white room faded out around her.
Part Two
Eleven
THE CHUTE OPENED and Nellie flew down the ramp into the maze, a cold remorseless wind blowing out of nowhere toward nothing. Narrowed to speed and silence, she veered around blind corners and raced through passageways glowing with stars and planets. Black blood pounded in her ears and electronic sound cues pierced her brain as she pivoted, whirled, and ducked every drone, trapdoor and virtual-reality catastrophe the maze threw at her.
Five traps down and she hadn’t used her adrenalin capsule yet. So far her time wasn’t bad, in spite of the fact the last trap had been a suction pocket. Eyes slitted, Nellie blew on down the central passageway. Today she was really tuned, the maze’s many corridors vibrating madly in
every direction, and the through route was exceptionally clear — three more turns, all to the left, then a double-back, the last trap and the exit.
Abruptly she picked up something new around the next corner — two figures moving cautiously, side by side through a small chamber. Slowing her pace, Nellie scanned carefully. The chamber was pitch dark, but even so it was obvious the figures weren’t drones; no robot with a half-decent program would be out in the open like that, and besides, their vibes were definitely human. They must have just entered the maze through a door in a wall, or she would have picked up on them earlier.
Could be a tricky holograph, Nellie reminded herself, one hand moving toward the pulse gun in her belt. And anyway, humans weren’t necessarily safer than drones.
Creeping toward the chamber’s entrance, she probed the area beyond it with her mind. The figures seemed to be a girl and a boy, probably Outbackers and without weapons, but she wasn’t able to pick up anything more. With a quiet grunt, she increased the intensity of her probe. The girl’s vibes were going fast and furious, as if she was deliberately running some kind of interference. Nellie had never encountered anything like it. Pressed to the wall, she scanned again but the girl wasn’t just difficult to read, she was impossible. A scowl crossed Nellie’s face, and then suddenly she grinned. It looked as if she didn’t need to scan after all. Unbelievable as it seemed, the idiots were actually talking.
“Careful, Deller,” the girl hissed. “There might be another trapdoor in the floor.”
“We should get down on our hands and knees,” the boy replied. “Feel our way. You can’t see anything in this place.”
“But then we can’t run,” objected the girl. “What if something attacks us?”
“I guess,” said the boy. “That’s why they shoved us in here, right? Some kind of test? Doesn’t seem to be anyone around, though.”
“It’s only been two minutes,” said the girl.
Hesitating at the entrance, Nellie kept one hand hovering over her pulse gun. Could these two be a trap — without weapons and stupid enough to be talking out loud? It was possible they were an elaborate ploy to get her to lay down her gun so a horde of drones could jump her. Holding her breath, Nellie slipped silently through the entrance and along the wall to her left.
“Wait a sec,” the girl in the chamber whispered immediately. “Someone just came in.”
“Where?” asked the boy.
“Over there,” said the girl. “I felt her. A girl.”
Without warning the chamber walls exploded into a burst of stars. Shrill sounds pierced the air as the stars whirled, then slowed and formed into several familiar constellations. To Nellie’s left glowed the Cat, to her right the Red Planet. Squinting in the dim light, she focused on the outlines of the girl and boy standing on the other side of the chamber. A vague unease stirred in her and she scowled. The two figures felt familiar, but how was that possible? She scowled again, tensing against a wave of dizziness as something shifted inside her head and a filing cabinet surfaced. Drawer three opened and file seven fell out. She remembered.
“You!” she gasped, shock riding her like a tidal wave. This time recognition was absolute. There was no doubt about it — across the room stood the shorn-headed girl of her dreams, and to her left was the green-eyed boy. As Nellie stared, gaping, the boy stepped in front of the girl.
“It’s all right, Deller,” said the girl. “She knows us.”
“So what?” said the boy. “She’s part of this place.”
“She’s part of me,” said the girl.
The boy paused as if remembering something, then nodded slightly. “Okay, so put the gun down,” he said, pointing at the weapon in Nellie’s hand. Her eyes slitted and she stared at him silently, remembering the way he’d held the shorn-headed girl while she slept. Slowly she lowered the gun.
Suddenly the wall to her left filled with the image of Lt. Neem’s face, twisted with rage. “Code 999, cadet!” he shouted, the chamber filling with his voice. “Shoot the boy! Shoot to kill!”
Without hesitation, Nellie’s hand whipped into position and she fired. The small room exploded with the sound of the shot, and the boy crumpled to the floor, a dark stain at his throat.
“Deller!” screamed the shorn-headed girl, dropping to her knees beside him. “Oh no, Deller, no no. Please, sweet blessed Goddess, hear my prayer because even if Deller doesn’t know he believes in You, he really does. Please, Deller, no no no ... “
Gun in hand, Nellie stood waiting for her next command, but Lt. Neem’s face had faded from the wall, leaving only distant starpricks of light. Body tensed, her blood still roaring with the after-kill adrenalin rush, she shifted uneasily on her feet. What was the matter with the shorn-headed girl? Couldn’t she see the boy was dead, his head at that odd angle due to the force of the shot? No functional cadet would miss at such close range, it was unheard of. So why did she keep patting his face and trying to open his eyes?
Oh, sweet Goddess, now she was kissing him. Gripping her gun, Nellie scowled uneasily. She felt ... strange, as if she was watching the scene before her through a wall of glass. She’d just made a kill for the Goddess, but it felt wrong, out of kilter. If only Lt. Neem would show up again and tell her what to do next. Was she supposed to leave the shorn-headed girl for the drones to deal with, or escort her to the exit?
“Look,” she said finally, pushing her voice up the thick tunnel of her throat. “We’ve got to get moving. Don’t worry about him. The drones’ll dump his body through a trapdoor.”
Still hunched over the boy’s body, the shorn-headed girl stiffened. Slowly she lifted her head, then turned it slightly toward Nellie. “Murderer,” she whispered, stretching the word as if tasting it. Then she was on her feet and launching herself, silent and so quick that Nellie was knocked to the floor, pulse gun spinning out of her hand before she’d realized what was happening.
“Murderer,” the shorn-headed girl hissed again, her oddly slanted eyes glaring with something beyond fury, beyond anything Nellie had ever seen. Hands gripped Nellie’s wrists, yanking them over her head, and no matter how she twisted, the girl rode her easily. Panic took over and Nellie jackknifed desperately, but still the shorn-headed girl was a vice keeping her down.
“Get off,” Nellie wheezed furiously. “They’ll send the drones in when my time’s up, and it’ll be everything I can do just to get myself out. I won’t be able to help you.”
“Help me,” spat the shorn-headed girl. “Like you helped Deller?”
“It was an order,” Nellie snapped. “Code 999. The Goddess required it.”
“The Goddess?” The shorn-headed girl stared, incredulous, but her grip on Nellie’s wrists didn’t loosen. “The GODDESS,” she bellowed suddenly, leaning in so her face was an inch from Nellie’s, “wouldn’t order you to kill anyone.”
“Oh yes, She would,” Nellie shouted back. “She’s always ordering someone killed. For the Star Lords and the Empire and the Great War against the heathen. She especially wants heathen killed.”
The shorn-headed girl’s eyes widened, and then, without warning, she let go of Nellie’s wrists and clamped her hands around her throat. “Deller wasn’t a heathen,” she screamed into Nellie’s face. “He was full of love, for me and his brother and his mother and the levels, and just everything. The Goddess wouldn’t kill love like that. She is love, and beauty, and ... “
Her hands tightened, sending stars whizzing through Nellie’s brain. Dizzy, she was getting dizzy, everything melting and running together. Abruptly a great pressure lifted from her brain, her mind jumped its usual invisible barrier, and she saw what appeared to be a crowd of girls pressed in behind the shorn-headed girl and peering down at her. Transparent, overlapping, they were there and not there. Each resembled the shorn-headed girl, but differed in some aspect — one had wings, another was furred like a bear. Briefly, Nellie thought she saw a gargoyle-like creature and one that seemed to be made of fire. Then, leaning over the
shorn-headed girl’s left shoulder, she saw an exact look-alike dressed in a stained, sagging, gold-brocaded dress.
“Take it easy,” said the look-alike, trying to loosen the shorn-headed girl’s fingers. “We came to rescue her, not kill her.”
“She killed Deller,” choked the shorn-headed girl, not even glancing at her look-alike. She’d begun to cry, her tears dripping onto Nellie’s face.
“You knew anything could happen,” said the look-alike.
“I didn’t know she’d kill Deller,” hissed the shorn-headed girl.
“Well, she did,” her look-alike said flatly. “And he’s gone. There’s just us now, and her. That’s all the meaning we’ve got left in this world.”
The shorn-headed girl let out a long hissing breath. Slowly her hands slackened, and stars stopped whizzing through Nellie’s brain. For a second her eyes flickered shut in relief. When she opened them again, the crowd of girls had disappeared and there was only the shorn-headed girl glaring at her as tears streamed down her face.
“I hate you,” she said in a dull voice. “I think I always will.” With a grunt she rose to her feet, crossed the chamber and knelt beside the boy’s body. Immediately Nellie rolled to her right and retrieved her pulse gun. The shorn-headed girl might be an incredible fighter but she was a fool, leaving her back exposed like that. Lifting the gun, Nellie trained it on the other girl’s head.
“What did you say they’d do to him?” the shorn-headed girl asked without turning around.
“Dump him through a trapdoor,” Nellie said coolly. “There are tunnels running under this place that hook up with the Goddess’s Redemption Cathedral. The Goddess’s dogs have the run of them. They’re trained to kill on sight and devour the remains.”
The shorn-headed girl sagged visibly. Then, leaning forward, she sucked in her breath and screamed once, straight into the dead boy’s face. For a long stretched moment the wail hovered, penetrating every corner of the maze. As it faded, Nellie heard the shorn-headed girl whisper, “Deller, I have to go now. But I’m not leaving you. I’m not leaving you.”
