I stared at it, uncomprehending. A gun.
It was black and cold and solid-looking, cradled in Daddy’s hand. Where did he get it from? Had he always had it, this whole time? It didn’t seem real. Guns weren’t something that people just had, lying around. Guns were on television. In movies. Not in real life.
But this, the Institute, Daddy. None of it was real life.
‘Monkey,’ said Daddy, addressing Fox as if he were a puppy in need of training. ‘Come here.’
I heard Fox whimper in fear. I reached behind me and grabbed his hand, squeezing it tight.
‘Monkey,’ said Daddy again, his voice firm.
‘It’s okay,’ I said to Fox, over my shoulder. ‘You don’t have to do what he says.’
Daddy glanced at me, his expression smug. He held out a hand to Fox. ‘Come along, Monkey. Come to Daddy.’
Fox’s hand fell away from mine, and my heart broke as he crept out from behind me and shuffled over to Daddy, bent almost double at the waist, hunching and scraping with fear and subservience.
Daddy patted him gently on the head, then raised his other hand, the one holding the gun, and struck Fox, hard, across the face. Fox cried out in pain and sank to the floor, moaning softly like a broken wild animal.
‘You see?’ said Daddy to me. ‘They all come back to me in the end. Where else could he go? I’m his Daddy. Just like I’m yours. You’ll understand soon.’
My mind was whirling, trying desperately to think of a way out. But my eyes kept coming back to the gun. Daddy held it so casually, as if it were something totally insignificant. But I knew he would use it. He’d never let us leave alive.
‘Ruby,’ said Daddy, his eyes burning into mine. ‘You’re confused. You know you are. It’s because you’re the Scintilla. All this … this is your meat body rebelling against the boundless actuality, the ruby soul. Give in to it. Let it consume you.’
And I realised that I had a spark of power after all. Daddy was just crazy enough to believe in his own lies. Although he had engineered and orchestrated it all, part of him truly thought I was the Scintilla, that I held the key to his immortality. I swallowed. I had to keep him talking until I could figure out how to use my advantage.
‘If I’m the Scintilla,’ I said, ‘shouldn’t you do what I say?’
‘Nice try,’ said Daddy with a knowing smile. ‘Your toxicant brain is still in control. You must surrender it to the Scintilla.’
‘When will that happen?’
Daddy’s lip curled in a smile. ‘Tonight. It all happens tonight. Tonight your body will be consumed by the fire of the Scintilla, and your spark will set us all alight. Tomorrow morning we will be born anew, the Boundless Family.’
With a noise that was half moan, half howl, Fox suddenly raised himself from the floor and launched himself at Daddy, who staggered back against the bench into the rack of test tubes, sending them scattering into glittering shards. The gun was knocked from Daddy’s hand and went skittering over the floor towards the corner where Fox had been bound to the wall. Daddy snarled and grabbed Fox by the neck, squeezing and pushing as Fox clawed and bit and scratched. Finally Daddy managed to wrench him away and heaved him bodily against the refrigerator. Fox fell awkwardly, and I saw his leg twist and give way, and heard a snapping noise, followed by a howl of pain.
‘This is getting boring,’ said Daddy, brushing broken glass from his tunic. ‘I’ve had enough of your games. You will go back to your cell, and tomorrow you will burn.’
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Fox reaching out his good leg to where the gun lay.
‘The Boundless Family,’ I said, trying to draw Daddy’s attention. ‘I figured it out. You plan to sterilise people, right? It’s what you wanted to do when you were a scientist. Make a perfect race of people. That’s why you’re handing out the water bottles. There’s something in the water.’
Daddy smiled. ‘I always said you were extraordinary.’
I talked faster. ‘But how does that play out? Are you going to sterilise the entire human race? You know you can never do that, right? You can’t go and hand out seven billion bottles of free water all over the world.’
Daddy stretched the fingers of his right hand, as if they had been cramping up holding the gun. ‘Today is a pilot technic. Plans are in place. I have operatives poised all over the world, awaiting my instructions. Do you think it is just you? Just this pitiful handful of acolytes? No. I have chapters everywhere. The Institute of the Boundless Sublime covers the whole planet, hidden in secret, waiting for my word. People don’t only drink water from bottles, you know.’
I stared at him. Was there a chance he was telling the truth? Did he really have a massive network of crazed followers waiting for the go-ahead to flood public water supplies with sterilising drugs? Or was this another of Daddy’s ridiculous stories?
With a soft breathy moan, Fox stretched out his unbroken leg to where the gun lay on the floor, and kicked it over to me. I bent swiftly and picked it up, pointing it at Daddy.
Daddy chuckled. ‘Silly girl,’ he said. ‘What do you think is going to happen now? Are you going to kill me?’
It was heavier than I’d expected. A lump of cold, dark metal, frighteningly real.
He was right. I couldn’t kill him. I wouldn’t. I wasn’t like him.
I remembered the burning taste of cigarette smoke, as my phone rang and rang in my bag and my little brother took his last breath.
I remembered the black tide, its suffocating comfort.
I remembered the resistance of cartilage and bone as I cut off Pippa’s finger.
And I realised I could do it.
I wasn’t like Daddy, but there was a darkness inside me. I’d been fighting it so long. Trying to put it aside. To deny it, escape it. But it was always there, a part of me. I’d thought it was just grief, but it was more than that. It was grief and guilt and rage. Anton’s death had let it in, and everything I’d done since then had only fed it. It had seeped into me the way I’d imagined toxins and contamination seeping into my blood and bone. I couldn’t be rid of it any more than I could be rid of my own flesh.
I met Daddy’s eyes, and I raised the gun. I saw a flicker of fear, but it was quickly replaced by a mocking smile.
‘Do it,’ he said, his voice quiet. ‘You are the Scintilla. You are here to liberate my sublime body from this flesh case. I welcome it.’
Did he really believe that? Or was it all an elaborate bluff, a confidence trick? I had no idea, and I knew that Daddy didn’t know either. He’d been playing out his games for so long that truth and fantasy had become so muddied, so intertwined that for him it was impossible to separate them.
I’d never held a gun before, but I’d seen enough TV shows to know how to use it. I used my thumb to disable the safety switch.
‘Can you do it?’ asked Daddy. ‘Or are you still too closely anchored to your own flesh? Your aphotic mortality cripples your actions, choking your actuality.’
I felt my hands tremble.
‘You can’t, can you?’ he said. ‘You’re weak. Just like Magnus was. She couldn’t kill me either. She had the knife in her hand, and she couldn’t do it. She was a waste of air. A waste of a life. She deserved to die. I did her a favour.’
I thought of the jade pendant in the drawer, along with Fox’s book and the assortment of other keepsakes. How many others had he killed?
The darkness rose up inside me, the old familiar black tide. But this time it wasn’t suffocating; it was powerful. It flowed through my veins, hungry and raw. My hands stopped trembling. I felt utterly in control of my body.
I squeezed the trigger.
Click.
Blood rushed into my ears and my heart began pounding at a million miles an hour. Daddy’s mouth hung open in a panicked gape, his hands flung up protectively in front of his face in what looked like an entirely instinctive reaction.
I pulled the trigger again, and again.
Click. Click. Click.
There were no bullets. The gun wasn’t loaded. It had all been a bluff. I let it slip from my fingers and it fell to the floor with a heavy thunk. I cast my glance around the tiny room, looking for a weapon, an escape route.
Daddy’s face twisted. ‘You fucking little bitch,’ he said. ‘After everything I’ve done for you.’
He looked unravelled, with no trace of his benign smile or charismatic twinkle. His eyes were wide, his pupils mere pinpricks. His mouth was contorted into an ugly slash of hatred. I saw him for who he truly was – a sick, sadistic old man, choking to death on his own lies.
‘I’m going to kill you,’ he hissed through clenched teeth. ‘But first, I’m going to make you watch me kill him.’
He surged towards Fox, reaching out. With his gaze away from mine, I groped behind me until my fingers wrapped around the handle of the boltcutters on the bench where I’d left them. My breathing steadied as I stepped forward, raised them high above my head and, with every bit of my strength, brought them down on the back of Daddy’s skull.
24
Daddy lay on the floor, unmoving. I didn’t wait to see if he was okay. I didn’t wait to see if he was going to live or die. I grabbed Fox’s arm, and half-carried, half-dragged him away.
The Monkey was waiting for us outside the laboratory, her eyes wide.
‘Did you kill him?’ she asked. ‘Did you kill Daddy?’
‘Come on,’ I said, grabbing her with my spare hand.
The doors at the front of the big storage room were open, and I hauled Fox and the Monkey out into the daylight.
The Institute was deserted. We staggered past the building where I’d been imprisoned. Through the courtyard where I’d cut off Pippa’s finger. Past Daddy’s Inner Sanctum. The roller door was open, and we stumbled under it and onto the road. Fox faltered and slipped from my grasp, crumpling on the footpath. The Monkey looked around with wide eyes, her fingers gripping mine so tightly I thought they might break.
I saw a car turn the corner into the street, and let out an involuntary moan of fear. What if it was someone from the Institute? I glanced down at Fox, who had turned ashen. I couldn’t carry him. I had to take the chance.
I held out my arm and flagged down the car.
It wasn’t someone from the Institute. It was just a passer-by, who looked confused as I stammered an explanation, but willingly phoned the police when he saw the scrawny, terrified Monkey, and Fox, bruised and semi-conscious on the pavement.
A police car arrived within minutes, and this time I didn’t hesitate. I blurted out the truth about Daddy, about what had happened to Fox and Maggie. I made them swear they’d get the Monkeys out straight away.
An ambulance came for Fox, the Monkey and me. A paramedic helped Fox onto a narrow stretcher. The Monkey crouched in the gutter, baring her teeth at anyone who approached.
‘Come on,’ I said. ‘It’s going to be okay.’
‘What if they boil our bones?’
‘They won’t,’ I promised.
The Monkey reached out to me, and I bent and picked her up, shocked at how little she weighed. Her skinny arms wrapped tightly around my neck, and I felt her trembling. We clambered into the ambulance, and the Monkey whimpered as the engine rumbled to life. When had she last been outside the Institute? How many years?
I reached out and held Fox’s hand. He was drifting in and out of consciousness. The paramedics worked quickly, slipping an oxygen mask over his head and inserting an IV line into the back of his hand which they hooked up to a saline bag.
‘Is he okay?’ I asked.
One of the paramedics looked up. ‘He’s pretty banged up,’ he said. ‘Dehydrated, fluid loss, prolonged pain. His leg is bad so we’re going to give him some ketamine before we splint it.’
He inserted a syringe into the base of the saline bag.
With a moan, Fox opened his eyes. I leaned over him and whispered his name. Did I see a glimmer of recognition in his eyes?
‘Daddy …’ he murmured, and his eyes rolled back in his head again.
I swallowed my tears and tried to smile bravely at the Monkey.
At the hospital, Fox was whisked away, and the Monkey and I were taken to a room where a doctor came and looked over us. Once they were satisfied we weren’t in any immediate danger, we were brought sandwiches and soup, and the police came in. I told them the full story, in as much detail as I could. The Monkey didn’t speak at all, just demolished sandwich after sandwich.
Then we waited. The Monkey fell asleep, and I fidgeted, hoping every passing footstep was someone arriving with news of Fox, of the Monkeys, of Mum.
I turned on the television and looked at the news, but there were only the usual reports from election day – politicians voting with their husbands and wives, smiling and waving. What if the police hadn’t believed me? What if, all over the country, people were drinking their free water, unaware that they were being chemically sterilised?
Eventually a police officer returned to talk to me. She explained that the police had entered the Institute and removed the Monkeys, and the still-unconscious Daddy. I glanced nervously at the door, but the police officer reassured me he’d been taken to a different hospital, and was being kept under police guard. They’d then spread out and rounded up as many Institute members as they could find.
‘But the water,’ I asked. ‘What about the people who drank the water?’
‘It’s just water,’ the police officer reassured me. ‘We had it tested. It isn’t harmful at all.’
I didn’t believe her. ‘Test it again.’
But the police officer was certain.
Later investigations revealed that there was no evidence of Daddy’s grand plan ever existing. No secret hidden chapters of the Institute waiting for Daddy’s word to poison the world’s water supplies and sterilise the human race. No Quintus Septum. He made it all up. I still don’t know if he believed it himself. I think he must have, a little.
Exhaustion took over, and I fell asleep in my armchair, waking up to find a doctor standing over me.
‘You can see your friend now.’
He was propped up in a hospital bed, an IV snaking from his hand, his leg elevated in a fibreglass cast. Purple bruises blossomed on his cheek and forehead, but his eyes were clear.
‘Fox,’ I said, unable to keep the sob out of my voice.
He turned to me. ‘I ate jelly,’ he said, his voice a little croaky. He pointed to an empty plastic cup and spoon.
‘Did you? What flavour?’
He paused and looked uncertain. ‘Green?’
‘Green is a good one,’ I said. ‘But wait until you try red.’
‘I want to try all the colours. Every last one.’
‘Fox.’ I was terrified to know the answer, but I had to ask. ‘Do you know who I am?’
Fox gazed down at the empty jelly cup, his brows furrowed. I thought of the dreamy, sad Fox I’d known at the Red House. I thought of the rebellious Fox at the Institute, full of questions and fire. How could I have rejected him? Turned away just when he was beginning to realise who he really was. Looking back, I realised how brave he had been, despite his pain and fear. He had been brave and beautiful and burning to live, to be in the world and experience everything it had to offer. And now … was that Fox gone? Replaced with a frightened child?
Was I too late? Had I lost Fox, just like I’d lost Anton?
He looked up. His eyes focused on me, and I saw pain and grief and fear. And relief. And joy. And fire.
‘Yeah,’ he said, the faintest shadow of a smile touching the corner of his mouth. ‘I see you, Ruby.’
EPILOGUE
There’s a soft knock on my door.
‘What are you doing?’
Fox is wearing jeans and a hoodie. It makes him look so different, like a normal teenager. He elbows open my door and shuffles in, carrying his crutches in one hand.
‘Making a video,’ I tell him.
We’re living in a group hom
e – a halfway house for teenagers who have lost their way. Fox and I keep to ourselves, trying to figure out who we are now. The cast came off Fox’s broken leg a few days ago, but he’ll be on crutches for a while longer. The doctor says he’ll probably always walk with a limp.
Fox sinks onto my bed, propping his leg up on a chair. The group home assigned us separate bedrooms, but they don’t particularly seem to care that we spend most nights together.
Fox is getting better. Slowly. He’s learning how to exist in the real world. Sometimes it’s hard to know how to help him. The Institute broke me in a few short months. Fox was there his entire life. I don’t know if he’ll ever be whole again – I think he’ll always have cracks and missing pieces. We talk about it a lot – Zosimon and everything that happened.
I showed him TV for the first time the other day. He really likes nature documentaries. He likes music too, especially ‘Blackbird’ by The Beatles, and Allegri’s Miserere. He listens to them and cries, and I cry with him. It’s good to feel again, even when we’re sad. When we lie wrapped up in each other, we give ourselves over to sensation and just feel, with no guilt or shame or self-consciousness. There’s an old piano in the recreation room, and I’m teaching him how to play. Next week we’re going to the beach. I can’t wait to see his face when he sees the ocean for the first time. I’ve also promised to show him the movie of Les Miserables.
I turned eighteen two weeks ago. We had a little party with a cake. Fox liked the candles, and I taught him the song. We’ve been talking about finding a place together, once the craziness dies down. I want to finish school, go to university. Fox wants to learn to make bread and swim and build things from wood and nails. I know that as long as we’re together, we’ll make it work. Maybe we’ll even get a dog called Barker.
I lean over and brush his lips with mine. He lets out a soft, contented sigh as our fingers lace together.
‘Did you call her today?’ Fox asks.
I shake my head.
It’s been six weeks, but I still haven’t spoken to Mum. She’s in hospital. I’ve talked to her doctor, who says she is very emotionally fragile. Aunty Cath has visited her, though. She says Mum has good days and bad days. Sometimes she seems almost normal, going for walks in the hospital garden and chatting to people. Other days she can’t get out of bed, can’t do anything but stare at the wall. I don’t know how she and I are going to deal with what happened, but I hope she gets better. She’s suffered enough.
The Boundless Sublime Page 29
