by Beth Goobie
“I got kind of hot after a while,” said Nellie, “but it was okay.”
“I’ll give you something to drink,” said Furnan. “It’ll replenish your body fluids.” He crossed to a small fridge, removed two cans of nevva juice and handed them to the girls. “Now,” he continued, as Nellie let the cold juice sluice down her throat. “You have about an hour until lunch, and you’re expected in the gym. I’ll see you again tomorrow at this time.”
“But ... ,” stammered Nellie. No questions, no explanations? In Advanced there would have been a lecture and written exercises to explain what had just taken place. And there was always a prayer or dedication to the Goddess to complete a session. But as she opened her mouth to protest further, the expression on Furnan’s face changed to one of contained fury.
“I will see you tomorrow,” he said icily, stressing each syllable before turning away.
Fear buzzed Nellie’s ears. Backing toward the door, she opened it to find a drone in Detta uniform standing in the hall, waiting to escort them to the gym.
Fifteen
IT WAS EVENING. Two supper trays lay on the floor, waiting to be picked up, and the monitoring screen was showing a horror movie. Nellie lay on her bed, watching the film, ignoring her twin who lay on the opposite bed. The rest of the day hadn’t gone well. The afternoon had been spent with Lt. Neem in the gym, but Nell had refused to participate in the weapons training exercises. Electrodes had been taped to her arms and legs, and Nell had poured sweat as she’d been repeatedly zapped, but still she’d refused. Nellie had watched Lt. Neem pump up the voltage, and though electrodes were nothing like the Black Box, she’d been impressed with her twin’s stamina. So had Lt. Neem — Nellie had seen respect struggling with anger on his face. Eventually he’d had Nell stand aside while he put Nellie through the rest of the exercises. Though she’d glanced frequently in her twin’s direction, Nellie hadn’t once caught her watching, and since their return from the gym Nell had remained quiet, refusing all of Nellie’s attempts at conversation.
Nellie was fuming. Her performance that afternoon on the shooting range had been impressive, even Lt. Neem had said so. Nell could have at least noticed. Nellie hated her. What right did her twin have to barge into another person’s life without being asked? And then to sit around refusing to participate, and making Nellie feel guilty ... about what? Being able to handle a gun? Being absolutely excellent at gut and chin kicks? Crossing her arms, Nellie glowered at the movie on the monitoring screen. Absolutely every other person in Detta was blown away by her achievements. Not that she cared what Nell thought, but what right did her twin have to come here and be so different?
To make matters worse, Nellie was dying to ask Nell why she’d torn out of the room that morning, and about sarpas and the double she’d seen during Furnan’s experiment, but she didn’t know how to make a mind link. And though they’d been in this room for over an hour and Nell must have known she wanted to talk, her twin had done nothing but sit slumped against the wall. Disgruntled, Nellie dug deeper into her resentment. What kind of thing was that to do to someone — let them see another level of reality, then refuse to talk about it? If this was her way of getting back at Nellie for something, Nellie could play that game too. What if she simply opened her mouth and started talking about levels and doubles and sarpas out loud? The monitoring screen would immediately pick up on it, and everyone in K Block would know what Nell had been up to. Well, why not? Nellie was supposed to report on her twin, so why not start now?
But just as she opened her mouth to speak, her twin began to rock. Cross-legged and hunched, with her arms wrapped tightly around her chest, Nell propelled herself back and forth on the bed. Her eyes were shut, her face contorted, and her lips moved sound-lessly. Startled, Nellie gaped at her. What was wrong with the kid? Had she come completely unglued? She’d better watch it — K Block was notorious for claiming crazies for their terminal experiments. Uneasily Nellie fixed her eyes on the monitoring screen and tried to focus on the movie, but the squeaking bedsprings made it impossible to concentrate.
“Shut up, will you?” she finally demanded, but the rocking figure didn’t pause. A half snarl curled Nellie’s upper lip and she shot to her knees. “I said SHUT UP!” she bellowed.
“I’m not bothering you,” said Nell, continuing to rock.
“Yes, you are,” Nellie hissed.
“Can’t help it then,” said Nell, without opening her eyes. “I’m remembering. I have to remember or I’ll go crazy in this place.”
“Remember what?” demanded Nellie.
“Just things.” Across the room the hunched figure continued to rock and the bedsprings to squeak frenetically.
“Do you think you could remember,” Nellie asked with what she considered to be enormous patience, “without rocking every two seconds?”
Her twin didn’t answer. Instead, she began to whisper, her words coming to Nellie as clear as if they’d been spoken directly into her mind. “Blessed Ivana, Mother of all mothers,” she murmured, “hear my prayer. I’m lost in this place, lonely, and there’s a hurt in my chest where my heart used to be. Because my heart’s gone. I don’t know where it went, but it isn’t in me anymore, and I can’t love her. I know You want me to love her and I thought I could, but my heart left me when she killed Deller, and it won’t come back. I’ve tried, Ivana, but everyone I love is dead, and my heart doesn’t want to live in a world where there’s no love for me.”
Riveted, Nellie knelt on her bed and listened. Never in her life had she expected to hear such words, she hadn’t known these kinds of thoughts existed. And yet she felt them as if they were lifting straight out of her own gut.
“I want Mom,” Nell whispered, and her rocking grew more intense. “I want her, I want her. I know she’s been dead for almost two years and I’m supposed to let her go so she can rest, but I can’t because there’s a giant scream sitting in the middle of my stomach. Deller helped. When he was around the scream got quieter, but then You took him away. You took away everyone I loved, Goddess. How am I supposed to live without any love? Give me my mom, just for a second. Show her to me and I’ll live on that little bit of love, I’ll even do my best to love that bitch who’s supposed to be my twin.”
Abruptly Nell stopped rocking, lifted her face and stared straight ahead. Then one of her hands reached eerily forward. A shudder ran through Nellie, and she looked away, then back again. This was giving her the creepy-crawlies, it really was. About to turn back to the movie, she felt a sudden shift in her brain and the now-familiar sensation of pressure lifting. Instantly the room dissolved into a field of energy, and two figures appeared on the other side of the room — the multicolored silhouette of her twin, and a second one that hovered midair. As Nellie watched, the two figures reached toward each other and touched, and then Nell fell back with a loud cry.
Abruptly the room solidified and Nellie found herself on her knees, staring openmouthed at the opposite bed. Cautiously she probed the air above Nell’s sprawled body but found only the faintest of vibrations, nothing she could read clearly. Crossing the room, she leaned over Nell. Splayed on her back, her twin didn’t stir. Slowly Nellie touched her face.
“Get lost,” said Nell, turning away.
Nellie’s relief and anger reared simultaneously. “Fine with me,” she snapped. “I just wanted to see if you were dead. Would’ve been good riddance.”
Her twin snorted softly. “I told you,” she said. “I was remembering.”
“Remembering what?” Nellie asked cautiously.
“Never mind,” Nell replied.
About to turn away in disgust, Nellie felt a surge of quick high vibrations enter her mind, and then her twin spoke inside her head. Go lie down on the bed and pretend to watch the movie.
Swamped with relief, Nellie returned to her bed. When she’d settled, her twin’s voice came again. It was Mom, Nell said quietly. When I get loneliest, I try to remember her and sometimes the Goddess lets her visit me.
&nbs
p; That was our mother by your bed? Suddenly Nellie was sweating, her heart doing bodyslams. But isn’t she a ghost?
What does that matter? said her twin. She still loves me.
Unexpected anguish twisted through Nellie and she asked, Why didn’t she visit me?
You didn’t call her, said Nell.
I didn’t know I could, screamed Nellie. You should’ve told me, you should’ve—
Abruptly she got a grip and fixed her gaze fiercely on the monitoring screen. The enemy, she reminded herself. She’s messing with your head. Even if it had been their mother’s ghost that had showed up over Nell’s bed, it was a traitor ghost. No wonder it hadn’t bothered to talk to Nellie — it must have felt her devotion to the Empire, her true untwisted loyalty.
“Um,” Nellie said slowly, tasting grim satisfaction. Nell wasn’t going to take this well, but someone had to straighten her out. “There’s something you should know about our mother.”
Even from across the room, she could hear her twin’s breathing slow. Nellie smiled a tiny smile. Nell couldn’t fake this one. She might have her eyes squeezed shut, but it was more than obvious she was dying to find out what Nellie was about to say. Triumphantly Nellie announced, “Our mother was a traitor, a traitor to the Empire. That’s why she died. You should forget her. The Goddess commands us to forget such vermin.”
Bedsprings squeaked as Nell shot to her knees. “Vermin?” she shouted. “Do you know why she was a traitor to the” — her face twisted and she spat out the next word —”empire? Because she rescued me. She grabbed me and took off into the Outbacks so I wouldn’t end up like you. And you know why she did that? Because she loved me, the way mothers are supposed to love their children. But what would you know about that? You’ve been stuck here in nowhereland. You know nothing. Nothing,” Nell repeated, her eerie gray eyes locked with Nellie’s.
“I do too,” hollered Nellie, rising to her knees. “I’m an expert at fighting and killing. I know all the moves and all the weapons. And I know my stars, how they align and who they bless. And they don’t bless traitors. They never never bless traitors.”
“Stars?” Nell howled back. “How in the Goddess’s name could you know anything about stars? You never see them down here. You’re underground.”
“I do too see them,” screamed Nellie, pointing at the star chart on the wall. “They’re on that chart, every star and alignment I need to know so I can follow the Goddess’s will.”
“What — that?” With a snort, Nell got off her bed and stalked to the chart. For a long, heart-thundering moment she studied it, then turned to face Nellie. “That’s not how the stars look,” she said flatly.
“What are you talking about?” Nellie snapped. “Of course that’s how they look.”
“Uh-uh,” said Nell. “I lived in the bush for a year and a half, and I saw the stars every night. That isn’t how they look.”
“But that’s impossible,” shouted Nellie. Leaping from her bed, she joined her twin at the chart. “See, here’s the way they align for Lulunar,” she snapped, jamming her finger against the heavy paper for emphasis. “The Twin Moons are together and the Susurra constellation is in the dominant position. The Weeping Tree is over to the left, and you can see a bit of the Scales of Justice on the horizon.”
“Uh-uh,” Nell said again. “Scales was gone a while back. In the Outbacks we call them ‘the Milk Jugs.’ Just for a joke,” she added defensively, noting Nellie’s scandalized expression. “Anyway, the Weeping Tree is further over this way, and most of the Warrior is showing. Part of the Hammer is up now too, and there’s a whole bunch that aren’t shown — the Wickawoo and the Barking Dog and the Five Children and the Big and Little Houses.”
“Never heard of them,” Nellie said loudly, stepping back. “The Big and Little Houses? The Five Children? There’s no Five Children constellation.”
“The five children were the Goddess’s other children,” said Nell, turning toward her. “After the twins, she had four girls and another boy.”
“The Goddess had other children?” Nellie took another step back. This was too much. The Goddess was holy, a high priestess who’d once had relations with a God and bore two sons. And the sons were holy too. They represented hope in the afterlife, where what had been lost would be found again and everything understood. You didn’t mess with that kind of holiness by adding five extra kids. Unless you were an Outbacker. A pagan.
“You’re making it up,” Nellie accused, her breath coming quick and short. “To twist my mind so I’ll lose faith and become like you.”
“But there are millions of stars in the sky,” her twin insisted, stomping her foot. “Billions and zillions. This chart shows just a few, and it shows them wrong.”
Nellie’s arms crossed defiantly and she snapped, “Then you’ve got different stars in the Outbacks, that’s all.” Stomping to her bed, she flopped down onto it and glued her eyes to the monitoring screen.
“Same sky,” shrieked Nell from across the room. “Same stars.” Dropping heavily onto the other bed, she rolled to face the wall. In the long pause that followed, both girls lay motionless, their breathing harsh and raw in their throats. Finally Nell said dully, “What would you know about the stars or Mom or the Outbacks? You live in your own little world down here. They could’ve told you anything and you would’ve believed it.”
The enemy, thought Nellie, swallowing and swallowing the fear that rammed itself repeatedly up her throat. The enemy, the enemy, the enemy.
Twenty-three characters died before the end of the movie. Too bad Col. Jolsen wasn’t here, Nellie reflected as she watched the credits. She could have given him a complete rundown on their deaths. And the colonel would have appreciated her ability to remember so many intricate details. She’d definitely misunderstood that comment he’d made to Furnan about keeping up the Goddess blather. He wouldn’t have said anything like that. He wasn’t a pagan.
With a grunt she rolled over to face the wall and tried to fall asleep.
“I WANT YOU TO lie back and relax, Nellie,” came the voice through the speaker in her right ear. “Just let that sailboat float off over the horizon with all your worries and concerns, and listen to the smooth calm waves of the ocean lap against your ears.”
Rigid from head to toe, Nellie lay with her eyes wide open behind the Relaxer’s blinders. Today’s session had come out of the blue. She hadn’t been expecting one while she was in K Block, and had been taken completely by surprise when this morning’s drone escort had told Nell to wait in their room, then taken Nellie to Station Seven. Biting her lower lip, she tried to get a grip. She had to remember Westcott could see and hear every thought that entered her head. Grimly she blanked her mind and let herself float on the sound of gently lapping waves. Today she had no sailboat to focus on, not even a half-submerged wreck. At the start of the session, she’d lobbed a hand grenade instead of her customary rocks, and the boat had exploded into a million pieces. For about three seconds, the scene inside her head had been very satisfactory.
“So, Nellie, how’s it going with your twin?” Westcott asked congenially in her ear.
“Crappy,” Nellie said immediately, without bothering to consider her answer. “I hate her. She’s a bitch.”
“I see,” purred Westcott. “Tell me why.”
“She lies,” Nellie burst out, her entire body convulsing with anger. “She lies about the Goddess and the holy stars and the Great Mother, and just everything.”
“What does she say about the stars?” asked the psychiatrist.
“She says they’re wrong,” shouted Nellie. “The chart has them in the wrong place and doesn’t show all of them. She says there are millions of stars. Billions and zillions.”
Static buzzed Nellie’s ear as Westcott hastily decreased the volume on her microphone. “Actually, Nellie,” he said, clearing his throat. “She’s correct on both those points.”
Aghast, Nellie stared at the inside of her blinders. The stars we
re wrong? How could that be? For years she’d been checking their alignments to keep herself on the path that led toward their will, every day she’d prayed to them and asked their blessing.
“That doesn’t mean, however,” continued the psychiatrist, “that the stars shown on your bedroom chart aren’t in the sky. They are, and they travel in the same basic alignments you see displayed on your chart. But you need to remember that the sky is a very big place, and the chart was designed to show only what is most important to your daily life. This means that when you look at it, you see the major constellations aligned in their basic positions. Not exactly as they sit in the sky, but close enough to give you the true meaning of how they align in your life.”
Nellie’s hands ached from gripping the Relaxer’s arms. “So they’re not wrong then?” she asked huskily. “The Twin Moons are actually there, and the Weeping Tree, and the Cat?”
“Yes yes,” the psychiatrist said hastily. “The Moons, the Tree, and the Cat are all real. What you have on your chart has been ... reduced, to clarify things. Make it simpler to understand. So you don’t have to bother with the unnecessary stars.”
“But why didn’t we study the rest of them in Sky Science?” Nellie asked slowly. “You’d think they would’ve told us there were other stars.”
“Well, actually, Nellie,” said Westcott. “No one ever told you there weren’t other stars.”
Startled, Nellie opened her mouth to protest, then closed it again. What the psychiatrist said was true. She couldn’t remember any of her Detta instructors saying, “The stars on your chart are the only stars that exist in the sky.” They’d simply never mentioned any others.
“But how did I forget them?” she blurted nervously. “I must’ve seen them when I was a kid, before I entered Black Core.”
“That was a long time ago,” Westcott said smoothly. “It’s easy to forget what isn’t important to your life here in Detta. Your mind simply releases what is nonessential. There are probably other things you’ve forgotten — all unimportant to your life as an Advanced cadet.”
