by Emma Pullar
‘We’d better go,’ he says, nervousness back in his voice, ‘we’re running out of time.’
Another whooshing sound echoes down the tube and we again flatten our backs to the clear wall. Two more young Morbs whizz past. This time they see Bunce. The one in front slows, his dayglo orange shirt hard to look at, it’s ‘stare at the sun’ bright. The Morb’s dark green, messy locks come to rest on his shoulders. He wears an air of confidence not in keeping with the fact he resembles a carrot.
‘Hey Bunce! Nice link!’ he throws his head back and laughs.
The carrot then pumps his legs up the side of the tube, lights flashing on the bottom of his orange boots, he skates sideways, shirt flapping around his waist.
‘Weirdo!’ Shouts the girl behind him in stripy, pink knee-high socks and blue tutu, which bounces as she rushes past us.
They disappear round a bend, their spiteful laughs echo off the tubular walls, fading as they get further away. Bunce glances down at our linked fingers. He says nothing and pulls me into a jog. I totter after him.
‘Maybe you shouldn’t hold my hand …’
‘They were poking fun at me, Skyla.’ Bunce’s voice wobbles as we hurry faster down the tube. ‘They’d believe we’re plotting to change life as we know it before any notion that we might be together.’
He drops my hand and I feel a tiny pinch of rejection. Strange. He walks off and I follow. I hate following. I’m not a follower. But he knows the complex and I don’t so I allow myself to be led. The tube expands into an elaborate foyer, wall sculpted in flowers. I drink in the decorative, high ceilings and see through the oval windows that dusk has fallen. Sun well and truly set, bulbs on several miniature chandeliers blossom gold. The light from the chandeliers pushes shadows out from beneath the marble columns which circle around to gem encrusted double doors. The word ‘MALL’ is written in shimmering letters above the entrance. I squint and skim-read a sign which states the mall closed at 6.00 p.m. and would re-open at 8.00 p.m. for late night shoppers.
We cross the vast glittering floor, which looks as if an explosion of stars is trapped beneath the surface. I find myself wondering how it stays clean. Then I remember, hover-chairs and shoes that never tread on the dirty streets outside are the reasons, and with people using Air-Soles it’s a wonder Morbs bother using their feet at all. A few more strides and I feel an urge to cut through the silence.
‘Let’s go over things one last time.’
Bunce takes a deep breath.
‘Okay … we do our interview with Kally’s grandfather as planned. He thinks it’s about illness and immunisation. We work in some questions about the serum and try to get as much information out of him as possible.’ Bunce rubs the back of his head again, he’s doing this more frequently, clearly stressed, ‘It might take a few months to get him to talk but …’
‘A few months?’ I say, alarmed. ‘Bunce, I’m days away from implantation.’
Bunce shakes his head.
‘Did you think it would happen overnight? We walk in there and he hands us the file marked ‘cure’?’
We enter an even darker tube on the other side of the foyer. A path of glowing dots, triggered by the onset of night, lights the way.
‘No,’ I say, struggling to keep up as Bunce strides onward, ‘I thought the plan was that you keep him busy asking questions while I poke around the lab!’
‘Don’t you think he’ll notice you poking around?’ Bunce says over his shoulder.
‘Not unless his head swivels three hundred and sixty degrees. I pocket the serum, job done.’
I nod to myself. I’m sure I could find it. It’s probably in a fridge labelled, ‘The Cure.’ Morbs are highly intelligent, but they have no common sense.
‘I can’t even begin to tell you how impossible that would be. He’ll expect you to sit and take notes for me.’
‘Most Skels don’t even know how to read, let alone write, why would he expect that of me?’
Through the tube glass, the city streets, (not my city, theirs) are lit up by pools of lamplight; palm trees swaying in the gentle breeze. A breeze I wish I could feel. Everything is uniform here, nothing left to chance, a predictable life; safety and comfort paramount. No one takes risks, except those Air-Sole Morbs who insulted Bunce just now. The closest I’ve come to feeling the wind in my hair was when that handful of rebels rushed past. Rebels. I smile to myself. That’s as rebellious as Morbs get, I suppose. What Bunce is doing with me right now must be difficult for him. Way more rebellious than racing around corridors and tubes. This is so far out of Bunce’s comfort zone. Kian is my comfort zone. I miss him. I wonder what he’s doing. Marching around. Learning how to use weapons and fight in close combat. On patrol, observing fully fledged guards arresting Runners and wacked-out users. Bunce slows down to walk beside me, blocking my view. Irritating.
‘If that’s the case, why would he expect you to be there at all?’ Bunce says, equally as irritated with me, ‘This is never going to work.’
I ignore Bunce. He thinks everything is too difficult.
‘If I can’t find it, we’ll have to decide whether or not we have time to use blackmail.’
‘Blackmail!’ Bunce spits, ‘That’s insane! I can’t agree to that.’
I scowl at him, Morbs are insane. Why shouldn’t that work?
‘Look,’ I say sweetly, ‘I need to get out of here and I can’t go back to my job, so I have one option left. Change. Once we’ve cured a large amount of the Morbihan population there’ll be no going back. I’m getting that cure! And anyway, you need it as much as I do, you could explode into a mountain of blubber at any moment!’
‘It doesn’t work that way.’ He shakes his head.
‘Whatever, are we doing this or not?’
We stop outside the entrance to the science labs. Bunce hesitates, I push past him and the frosted glass doors swish open. Inside, the ceiling is low and hanging lights dangle; any taller and I’d have to stoop so as not to bang my head on one. At the elaborate front desk – a great wave of mahogany – sits a High-Host receptionist. My heart skips a beat. She’ll ask questions, what if she sees through us? Bunce’s posture has changed, he stands tall, confident. It’s like he’s stepped onto the stage and into character.
‘Jennavive, how are you?’
He knows everyone.
‘Bunce, how nice to see you. I’m well, and yourself?’
Bunce leans over the desk and bats his blond eyelashes, flirtatious.
‘All the better for seeing you.’
I raise an eyebrow. What’s he doing? Who is this guy and where is Bunce? The woman, in her forties, touches her beehive hairdo, coyly.
‘Such a charmer.’
‘I try.’
Bunce props himself up on his elbow and rests his chin in his palm, he gazes up at Jennavive like she’s his long-lost lover.
‘What brings you here this evening?’ she asks, lapping up the attention.
‘Science homework. Can you point me in the direction of Lab B? Don’t bother buzzing me though, they know we’re coming.’
Jennavive looks me up and down.
‘Is there a reason you have a host with you?’ she asks, eyes loaded with suspicion.
Bunce casually pushes his fingers through his sandy hair, he seems to be enjoying all this truth-stretching, he’s quite the actor.
‘Ms Skyla came up with the idea of interviewing a scientist. My sister said she could tag along.’
‘She did, huh?’
The receptionist narrows her heavily painted eyes at me. Bunce clears his throat so she has no choice but to look at him again.
‘She’s a bit star-stuck being here,’ he nods in my direction. ‘About to become a wonderful success like yourself.’
‘Oh stop,’ the receptionist giggles like a school girl, the composes herself, ‘I thought you might have come down to find Cara.’
Jennavive taps at her monitor; long, rainbow-painted nails making a clicking sound on the
screen.
‘Cara?’ Bunce frowns.
‘Yes, she was just here, sent down by Master Vable. When I saw you, I thought she might have forgotten something.’
‘Coincidence, I guess,’ Bunce brings his withering smile back to full bloom. ‘Just don’t tell my sister that Cara was down here. She hates it when my brother-in-link sends the maid to run errands that aren’t in her job description.’
‘My lips are sealed,’ she says, passing her rainbow-painted finger and thumb nails across her lips like she’s zipping them shut. ‘Lab B is right through there.’
Jennavive points to the first door on the right. We head there. The door to Lab B is white, clinically clean, not a smudge or smear on it. I can see my painted face in it. There’s a palm-pad. I raise my hand and then think better of it, this palm-pad could map my hand and tell Central I was here, Bunce should press it. It’s then I notice the door is bowed. That’s odd. I back away, and bump into Bunce.
‘What is it?’
I open my mouth to answer with I don’t know but the words don’t come. I stand slack jawed and wide-eyed as the lab door warps and depresses in the middle, like a vacuum is stuck to the other side, sucking the door into it. I narrow my eyes. What’s doing that? On the other side of the stressed door, macabre voices murmur, glass shatters, beside me Bunce flinches and then there’s a subtle click. A trigger?
‘Quick!’ I yell, and grab the front of Bunce’s spangled shirt, dragging him backwards; he stubbles over his surprised feet, we need to get to the reception desk …
A blast as loud as thunder sends a shock wave of dust, metal, and debris through the reception area and the force knocks us down like skittles.
I lie still for a moment, head pounding but thankful I’m still conscious. I slowly roll onto my back, smoke collects in my throat and I start to cough, then choke, when water fills up my open mouth. I spit and splutter. Ceiling sprinklers triggered, water showers over me in a relentless downpour. I push my elbows backwards, arms sliding across shallow surface water. I force my aching body up into a sitting position, lean my ear to my shoulder and three cracks rip though the back of my neck. I shiver, jittery; my dress is soaked, a sheet of ice against my skin. Eyes unglued, droplets of water hang from my eyelashes, weighing them down and making the destroyed reception look as if it’s under a black feathered fringe. I rip off the false lashes and wipe away grit and stinging eye makeup, with the back of my hands. I blink my vision clear.
Bunce lies a few feet from me, face down, motionless, water splashing against his back. I kick off my heels, roll over onto all fours and scramble towards Bunce, my hands and knees slapping through the water.
‘Bunce?’ I shake his shoulders. No response. His head is turned towards me, his skin paler than usual.
Water pools around his body and I catch my refection in it. Pretty hair I spent hours on, now a tangled, dripping mess, I look like I have two black eyes, and my dress is a dirty dishcloth. What a pretty dolly for my masters. I pick at the frayed trim on my sopping yellow dress. Why am I even worried about what I look like when Bunce looks as if he’s dead? What’s wrong with me, brainwashed after just ten days trapped inside this nightmare.
‘You okay?’ I yell and poke Bunce in the side with one finger.
Bunce lifts his head and then turns to look the other way. A few seconds pass and he rolls over; his heavy arm splashing down in the surface water.
‘I’m okay, you?’ he says, droplets startling his eyelids, squeezed shut.
I stand up, soles of my feet wrinkled against the water-logged floor.
‘Fine. Take my hand.’
Bunce opens one eye and grabs my hand. I tug hard but I can’t pull him up, my feet hop forwards as I try to resist falling. He turns sideways and heaves himself up onto one knee. A buzzing noise draws our faces to the ceiling. A battered black drone hovers above us, struggling to stay in the air, it shudders towards the reception doors, which are blown wide open, frosted glass fractured in the pattern of a spider’s web. Like a large mechanical bee, lost on its way back to the hive, the drone buzzes along above our heads and disappears into the tube. Bunce frowns, he’s as confused as I am and that’s not good. I skid across the floor in a hydroplane and lean over the reception desk, the wet, silk dress causing me to slip back down off the rolled wood. Jennavive is unconscious, slumped against the wall, beehive hair squashed into a pear shape, her right leg at an impossible angle.
‘What was that?’ Bunce asks, as he joins me at the desk, gold shirt glossy, hugging his curves, plaid pants a shade darker.
‘A drone.’
I drag myself over and drop down behind the desk. I crouch beside Jennavive and search through her jacket pockets, she might have something useful I can swipe, security ID or something that will get us out of here. Nothing. I pop back up and I’m met with Bunce’s twisted white face, blond hair dripping water into his eyes. He doesn’t approve of me robbing an unconscious woman.
‘I know it’s a drone,’ he says, ignoring my actions with his words while judging me with his eyes, ‘what caused that explosion?’
I don’t answer that stupid question. Who knows what caused it? I climb back over the desk, my dress snags on a protruding nail and as I jump down, the material rips up the side. I sigh and stride past Bunce.
‘Where are you going?’
‘Lab B.’
‘Skyla, wait! We have to get out of here.’
His heavy sloshing steps lumber after me. The door to Lab B hangs open, scorch marks around the frame, smoke drifting out like someone opened the oven door after burning dinner. A sharp smell of burnt flesh, singed hair, and chemicals wrinkles my nose. The cooked meat smell takes me back to a memory I’d rather forget; when they burned the bodies after The Day of the Bird. A huge flaming mountain. The guards only put the fire out once the bones were black, fretful that the birds might have transferred some kind of disease to the bodies.
I study the scene. Did an experiment go wrong? I step over the threshold and unwittingly onto shattered glass. A piece embeds in my toe; I suck in air through my teeth at the spike of pain. I step away from the glass, reach down, and yank out the shard, blood pooling on the tip of my big toe. The room is blackened and, judging by the overturned equipment and furniture, which looks to have been shunted towards the back of the lab, I’d guess the blast came from near the door. Chemicals drip off the furthest bench, oozing from a beaker turned on its side. Not a scientist in sight. Dread brushes over my head and shivers through my hair.
Bunce is right. We have to go. Something strange is going on. People were working in here, I heard them before the blast, so where are the bodies? Then, I see a body – a Skel. The charred remains of a lab assistant lie face down in the corner – a skeletal body, skin flayed from the bones. If batches of the serum 574 was in there, it’s gone now. Everything is destroyed.
‘This is bad.’ Bunce says, large head peeking into the room as far as his courage will allow.
I turn around and stare past him at the sprinkler rain showering over reception. Droplets ping off the mahogany desk and plink onto the marble floor. Beside the sprinkler heads, the dangling lights swing gently, no longer lit. Emergency wall lighting keeps the place from total darkness. I check the other lab doors. No one has come out. Not one Morb has moved from their lab to see what happened. Unlike Skels, they’ll stay put and wait for assistance. No curiosity or desire to help others. Self-preservation top of the list. Anger flushes my cheeks. They only care about themselves. Time for me to do something selfish. I motion to Bunce, and point at the exit.
‘Let’s go.’
9
Lockdown
I grab Bunce’s arm and yank him to come with me; water rushes around our ankles as we slosh towards the way out, the sprinklers show no sign of slowing. Glass flakes out of the frosted doors as I use both hands to try and tug them apart. Bunce kicks the fractured glass and it caves in, dropping through to the other side. He ducks through first and brushe
s away the shards scattered across the floor with the side of his sneaker. I carefully climb through, dress catching, glass scratching, bare feet again treading on sharpness.
We take off back down the dark tube, stopping every so often so I can pull nuggets of glass from the bottom of my foot. My hands shoot over my ears when they’re shot with the high pitch wail of the siren; it screeches down the transparent tunnel like a bird squawking over missing chicks, stolen by rats. The alarm has been raised and the ominous sound of boots marching adds to the din. A drumbeat of guards heads our way, we must hide. We arrive in the Mall foyer before the guards do and hide behind a column. A squad stamps past. We keep quiet and still and wait for the tan and red uniforms to disappear into the tube leading to the labs.
We’re out of sight and out of mind, for now, but they’ll come for us soon enough. They’ll question us both and something tells me Bunce won’t be as good at lying to the authorities as he is to his family. If they force the truth from him, we’re both screwed. Crouched beside me, Bunce is hyperventilating. I sigh, giant baby. I pinch his arm and he takes the hint, concentrates and slows his breathing.
‘What do we do now?’ he pants.
‘I dunno,’ I hold out my tattered dress, can’t explain this away, ‘we’re screwed.’
‘That’s not helpful.’ he stands and taps my bare shoulder with his damp fingers, I flinch. I hate being tapped. He whispers hot breath into my ear. ‘What’s our next step?’
‘You Morbs are meant to be super fucking smart,’ I say, irritated. I hold the two ripped sides of my dress together. It’s ruined, no way it can be sewn back together. I drop the silk, ‘what do you think we should do?’
His eyes widen at something behind me.
‘You should get the hell out of here.’
Strong fingers squeeze my shoulders. I whirl around.
‘Kian!’
I throw my arms around my friend and nestle into his firm chest, he holds me for a moment before I pull back, a little embarrassed at my surge of affection. I’ve never been so glad to see anyone. I smile up at him, he doesn’t smile back. He has that arduous look in his green eyes, the same one he gave me when I told him I didn’t want to be a host. My gaze drops to the stripe on his shoulder. I reach up to touch it, and as my fingers meet the material, the siren cuts out.
