by A. L. Davroe
“Ugly, isn’t it,” I mutter, not really knowing what else to say to someone who is perfect.
His eyes slide up to meet mine. “I wasn’t thinking that.”
I press my back hard against the pod’s interior, wishing I could just become one with the plastic, synthetic leather, and metal; blend in like that chameleon creature Dad once told me about. I feel so exposed with Quentin, so fearful of his judgment, and I don’t understand why.
He looks back to the prosthetic, lifts his other hand to trace the burned silicone around the wound. Even with the damage, I can feel that touch all the way up my spine.
“I was thinking,” he whispers, his breath tickling my skin, “that I’m glad you have prosthetics and not a new set of engineered legs. Because this wound? It probably would have killed you. Would have hit a main artery. You’d be dead. Gone. So, in a way, I love this supposedly ugly leg for saving your life.”
I hold my breath, try to stop my heart from beating. “It wouldn’t have killed me,” I reason. “Laser strike. Would have cauterized the artery shut.”
“You would have lost your new leg. So, be thankful you’ve got this instead.”
“Damaged and ugly as it is.”
He glances back up at me. “They aren’t as bad as you seem to think they are. These are really good prosthetics. I mean”—he traces a shape on my leg—“you can feel that, can’t you? Even with the damage?”
I lick my lips. “A little.” I refuse to accept he just drew a heart on the inside of my thigh. There must be some nerve damage.
He lifts one leg, plants it between mine so that he’s straddling my knee. “I’m going to need a little help. My wound is healed, but my nerves aren’t healed enough for some of the finer motor movements I’ll need for this.”
I squirm a little, trying to sit up as straight as I can, so I can both lean over and escape how close his knee is to an area I’m not sure I want him anywhere near. Yet the idea fascinates me, and part of my need to escape is fear of that fascination. “Just tell me what I need to do.”
He shifts to the side, his muscular legs squeezing mine, and opens the tool box. “I can do that.” He pulls out a slap-patch and holds it up to me. “This is a local anesthetic,” he says as he unwraps it and slips it under the edge of my dress. His fingers slide along my skin—my real skin—attaching it at my hip. They linger too long, wrapped along my upper thigh, and he holds my eyes. “You’re going to want it. I don’t want to hurt you.”
Swallowing, I nod and look away. “Just get it over with.”
“As you wish,” he says, voice quiet.
It’s all business from there, Quentin endeavoring to fuse a small splint against the bent piston with the set of small hand tools he took from my home when we fled the city. I don’t feel any of it. Not the pain, not his fingers on my skin. And I’m glad of it. It’s hard enough to focus with him sitting so close to me that I can taste him on my tongue and feel his breath on my neck. He’s more human now—his nanos are dying so his constant cloud of pheromone is gone, yet his breath still smells faintly of mint, which I like. He keeps making low requests for me to hold something a certain way or pass him something. His voice vibrates in every hair of my body, and I can’t stop staring at his throat. Once, he grasps my hand with his, adjusts how I’m holding something, and his fingers linger on my wrist, my pulse pounding against his strong fingers.
When he’s done, I push my dress down and he backs out of the pod and helps me to stand. My leg is still a bit unstable—I still have a limp—but at least I can walk.
“I’d like to keep an eye on it until the slap-patch wears off. I want to make sure there’s not too much pain from the pressure. Let’s sit and wait. It shouldn’t be much longer.”
As much as I want to get out of the stink of the dump field, I do as I’m told, because I don’t want to make a rash decision that results in unnecessary pain or damage. So I let him help me sit down and settle back into the pod. “Thank you. You didn’t need to do this for me.”
He smiles to himself as he disassembles a small fusion torch. “It’s the least I can do. Perhaps when we get to Cadence I’ll be able to replace the whole part instead of just patching it. Ideally, a 3D printer would have that fixed in a matter of hours, but I have no idea what to expect there, so perhaps we’ll have to get something made, if I can’t do it myself.”
“Still,” I say, “you have no reason to help me.”
“I have plenty of reason to help you, Elle. I’m glad I had the opportunity today.” He doesn’t look up as he packs his tools back into the box.
“Where are the others?”
“I sent Violet and Bastian back to the main camp. The Dolls need to be told the main power failed in the city.”
“You think that’s what it is? That the whole city is shutting down?”
“Most likely.”
“Any idea why?”
He shakes his head. “The Main Frame must be shutting things down for a reason. Or the virus is telling it to. I can’t be certain what’s happening.”
The frustration in his voice resonates with my own. I try to focus on the things we can control. “What about food and water?”
He sits back, his fingers fidgeting on the seat of the pod’s interior. “The water in the cave is drinkable. I’m having them move everyone to the cave. There’s a large underground lake down there. That should at least get them some water. Once they’re settled in, Violet and Bastian will rejoin us and we’ll find food.”
“You think it’s wise to move them all down there?”
He shrugs. “Violet and I found a lot of caves and tunnels. I wanted the Dolls to investigate, find the one connecting to the rest of the Undertunnel so we can get to Cadence as soon as we have proper supplies. They can’t do that where we left them.”
“No,” I agree.
Smoggy daylight fades to black, and still the nanites fall. Quentin keeps sliding out of the pod, investigating the surrounding area, and every time he does the ground crunches under his feet.
“Do you see anything?” I ask, not for the first time.
As he slips back in and pulls the door mostly closed, he says, “No. Nothing at all.”
I try not to let it worry me too much. “It took a while for just the four of us to climb down. I’m sure it will take far longer to get everyone else down. I doubt some will come willingly.”
“True.” He works things over in his mind for a few minutes, his eyes pinched, then he gives me a look. “There’s not much light out there.”
“That’s good,” I say, watching as my breath comes out in a cloud. It’s getting cold. “Means no one will see us. We’re hidden.”
“Yes, but it also means we can’t see anyone coming at us. Makes me nervous, but I don’t want to use the light-stick. We’d be a beacon in the night.”
I turn and squint through the smudged window. I can see enough of the outline of Kairos against the sky to tell there are no lights in any of the windows, no fires in the barrels down on street level. There never was a lot of light at night. The Disfavored don’t have much in the way of resources to burn or to fuel artificial light sources. They live as the sun and the dome provides for them. But I remember seeing some on the nights I’d sit up and stare out my prison window. There should be some and there aren’t.
“It’s too quiet,” I note. “There should be more activity. Someone should have come to comb this dump site by now.”
It’s getting hard to see Quentin now, the last vestiges of sundown have disappeared behind the trash, leaving us in inky gray. He takes a deep breath, lets it out. The mint scent of it is a comfort in the stink of the Outer Block. “If the net is indeed failing, I doubt they’re thinking about trash right now.”
“How much of the biospores do you think are still out there?”
“Enough,” he says quietly. He squirms, making the synthetic fabric squeak under him. A moment later, I feel a sleeping bag spread over me. “You’re shivering.”
I curl under the sleeping bag, thankful for the warmth of it. “I read that deserts got cold at night.”
“Like Garibal,” he says.
I stare at him in the inky blackness. “It unnerves me how much you know about Guster’s game, how much he must have told you.”
Quentin doesn’t respond, instead he changes the subject. “If Bastian and Violet aren’t here by morning, we’ll have to resort to Plan B. We can’t afford to wait long. Not with all those people back in the Undertunnel waiting on us, not if it becomes even more dangerous to walk around out here.”
“Do you have a Plan B?”
“The dome does intermittent relief drops of food and potable water on a weekly basis. If we’re lucky, there has been a recent one and we’ll be able to find a distribution center that still has a reasonable stock left. Perhaps the fall of the nano-net has created a hiccup in daily activities and we’ll be able to grab some of it.”
I nod, though I know he can’t see it. “Seems wrong to steal from these people.”
“I hate to say it, but they’re dead anyway.”
I swallow hard, hating how right he is.
He says, “We should get some sleep.”
I nod again and silence falls for a long time. I don’t sleep, though; my mind is turning over and over. I’m so tired. So scared and uncertain. And, while I’m trying my very hardest, I just feel so overwhelmed. Before I know what’s happening, I’m suddenly curled into a ball and sobbing.
I feel Quentin’s arms come around me, pull me up and into him in comfort. “I’ve got you, Elle. It’s gonna be okay.” I grasp at him, bury my face in his neck and cry harder. He’s real. He’s human. He’s warmth and comfort. He smoothes my hair, holds me tight. He’s crying, too. I can feel the wetness of his tears. He rocks me, shushes me. Even though he’s in pain, too. Even though he’s broken, too.
“I’m scared,” I admit. Why to him, I don’t know. Maybe because he’s the only one here. Maybe for a different reason.
“Me, too,” he admits into my curls.
Making a fist around the chips in my pocket, I say, “I-I miss Meems,” and my voice breaks, squeaks.
He’s quiet for a long moment. “I understand your grief. I wish there was something I could do to make it go away for you. For both of us. Sometimes I can turn it off, block it out, but sometimes it feels like I’m drowning, like I can’t get back up for air.”
I whimper, terrified of the truth of his words. Pressing my cheek against the cool certainty of the blood pulsing in his neck, I reach up and touch my forehead.
His fingers continue to stroke my back. “We’ll continue to deal with it. Us, the other Aristocrats. I can’t imagine a goodly number won’t come out of this scarred for life. PTSD, depression. Have you read about those?”
I shake my head.
“We don’t have those anymore. We live happy lives. And if we’re unhappy, there are drugs and new Designer bags and virtual reality games to solve it. But we don’t have those solutions without the city, and the longer those people stay in the tunnel the more likely they’ll develop light deprivation and mass hysteria. We’ll be walking back to a mob mentality, I’m sure. That’s why I’m concerned about moving them to safety as quickly as possible.”
I know I should care more than I currently do. I know he’s currently being better than me—thinking of the others before himself—but he’s been trained to do that. I haven’t. Right now, all I wanna do is find a safe, comfortable place for me. “You’re better than I am,” I whimper.
“No,” he says quietly. “I’m no good at all.”
The fabric of his shirt crumples as I make a fist around it. How does he not see what I see?
“I wish I’d had a different life,” he admits.
“Yeah.” Then I smile at the thought. “Like maybe what I had in Nexis. I could be with Gus then. For real. Without all this confusion and uncertainty, no smoke and mirrors.”
He lets out a long breath, almost like a sigh. “That’s a good dream,” he whispers, his words faint. His face presses into my hair and I feel his lips move as he adds, “The truth.”
chapter thirteen
Post-American Date: 7/6/232
Longitudinal Timestamp: 6:03 a.m.
Location: Kairos
The sound of movement outside wakes me. I make to sit up, but realize I’m being held down. For an instant, blind panic takes over and I rip at the sleeping bag, pulling it away from my face so I can see and breathe more clearly, but then I go still as the body wrapped around me moves and a familiar male groan lets out at the base of my neck. I shiver in delight as it slips and skitters down my spine, the back of my legs, then bounces back to curl along my ribs and settle hot and heavy in my chest—content and at home.
Gus. I find instant comfort in the arm wrapped around me, in the body cupped around my back, in the leg resting between mine, in the face that’s buried in my hair, and I let my body relax and take pleasure in the moment. This reminds me so much of Gus. Quentin reminds me so much of Gus. I love it as much as I hate it—knowing that the boy who was the other half of my soul has been torn away from me, yet feeling like he’s not actually gone. It’s awful and wonderful and confusing.
I hear another noise outside. Rustling, crunching movement among the debris. My hackles go up and cautiously, I grasp the wrist underneath my hand and pick my head up, careful to stay low.
I feel Quent’s breath catch, his body move as he comes awake, and his voice is low and gruff from sleep. “What is it?”
“Someone’s outside,” I whisper.
His arm tenses protectively around me as he raises himself on one elbow and squints against the light breaking in through the gap between the board and the pod.
He snaps his fingers and I know, from months of training alongside Gus in Nexis, what this means. I reach for the gun among the bags on the floor. I’ve just gotten my hand around it when the corrugated plastic across the missing roof slides away in a cascade of nanite bodies and light floods in. I level the weapon at the silhouette, blinking in the harsh light.
A half second later, I focus in on wide, vibrant blue eyes staring at me from the cherubic, too perfect face of a little girl half hidden behind the plastic masks the Disfavored wear to protect their lungs. I stare at her, awestruck, and she at me, terrified as a rabbit against a wolf.
Quentin’s hand folds around the gun, lowers it. His body relaxes against mine.
I hear, “Ani, what is it?”
The little girl looks away from me, toward where the voice came. I jerk my hand up, ready to fire, but by then there are more bodies, more shadows and silhouettes appearing. We’re surrounded.
They’re young. Most younger than me, some about the same age or a little older. One of the older ones turns, says “Go wake Claire,” and another scampers off to comply. Quentin’s grasp on me tightens as his gaze swings around the circle, taking in the masked Disfavored.
“You think they came out with the dump?” one of the kids asks, gazing up at the wall.
The older one who spoke narrows his eyes at us; they’re just as blue as the little girl’s. He’s tall, broad shouldered, and his black hair is cropped close to his skull. He’s uncharacteristically symmetrical looking for a Disfavored. Then he smirks, “That would be providence, wouldn’t it?” His gaze pointedly fixes on Quentin. “A Cyr going out with the trash.”
Despite the derogatory words, Quentin relaxes once more. Perhaps knowing this Disfavored man recognizes the white outfit—something only the Cyrs are allowed to wear—he expects that he’ll be treated accordingly. But because the Disfavored just killed so many Aristocrats, I think the sentiment insane. I cock the gun.
I’m met with five other bullets sliding into chambers from five other guns that have suddenly been drawn around the circle.
The blue-eyed man grins. “Is this one of your Dolls, Cyr?”
“Something like that,” Quentin says, voice self-satisfied. “Now, Delaney, i
f you wouldn’t mind taking me to your leader, I would be much obliged.”
Delaney’s blue eyes go wide, mirroring the shock I suddenly feel at Quentin’s recognition of this Disfavored. “It’s not every day I come across a Domite who knows me.”
As Quentin moves to stand I grasp at him, frightened this Delaney will attack him. The guns raise, but Delaney calls them off, allowing Quentin to step out of the pod. Here, the light falls on him completely, making him look ominous and frightening. Tall, broad-shouldered Quentin with his angel features, white clothes, and a cocky grin that lets everyone know they don’t scare him a bit. “Do you know who I am?”
Delaney scrutinizes him and then a light enters his eye, but his expression seems confused and troubled. “You’re Quentin. The heir.”
Quentin lifts his hands. “In the flesh.”
“And, who are you?”
Grinning wider, Quentin says, “This is Ellani Drexel.”
“The Ellani Drexel?” Delaney looks down at me again.
Confused at how I would be recognized, I say, “The only one that I’m aware of. But how do you know me?”
“Everyone knows that name.” He grins. “And now a pretty face to a name that warms my heart. Tell me you’re single.”
Abashed at his forward comment, I open my mouth, but Quentin says, “She’s not.”
“Damn,” Delaney breathes. He crouches down, leans into the pod, and offers a hand. “Enchanted to meet you anyway.”
Feeling a blush creeping up my cheeks, I shrink back, cautious.
“It’s okay. I don’t bite. Hard, anyway,” Delaney says, holding his hand out farther.
Steeling myself, I reach out and shake his massive, callused hand.
“Well,” Delaney says, standing once more. “I’m sure you guys are hungry and could use a rest. Mac and Claire will want to see you.”
Quentin perks up at this. “Mac and Claire?”
Delaney smiles. “You’re aware of who they are?”
He nods, I shake my head.
“Good.” Looking up, Delaney addresses another one of the Disfavored, who looks similar to Delaney with his olive skin tone, average build, and dark hair. But his face is less symmetrical and instead of blue he’s got vibrant, almost grass-green eyes. They stand out even more because he’s got a large scar over one of them. “Aaron, continue making the rounds with the crew.”
