My eyes widen as I shake my head. “You’re calling off your best defense against the Vojin?”
“We,” she states with emphasis, glaring down at me, “are putting forth a peace offering. In the future, we will breed smaller numbers of Creations and bring them up with more care of the planet and citizens. They will be kinder and more relatable instead of robotic.” She makes a crooked smile and drops her hand on my shoulder. “This is why I believe you will be a benefit to us. I’ve been watching you.” She whispers. “Your feelings and emotions do not seem as dormant as in most Creations. And even more interesting, you pull these same feelings from others you expose to them. We would usually execute a Creation that displays the kind of affection and kindness you have, but you, Kylie Alexander, should be studied.” Her right eyebrow rises, creating an even deeper arch. A tight smirk lifts her cheekbones, and in an impassive tone, she says, “Excuse me, that was the wrong word. Favored is what I intended to say. Not studied.” Arletta chuckles low in her throat.
Stone-faced, I stare at her honeyed smile and glossy eyes, awaiting the ‘just kidding’ that should follow this dubious speech that’s come out of nowhere.
“I’m quite interested in discovering what traits lie within your heart.” Arletta presses her index finger beneath my chin and slightly tilts my head. “Relax, Kylie.”
I clench my fists to hold myself back from throat-punching her. If she wasn’t the Guidance, this conversation would go so differently—starting with me snapping her finger. I step back and turn my head to break eye contact.
“You’ll be used to the change in duties soon enough. Carden will keep you company as you go through this transition.” She gives my shoulder a squeeze before her hand falls away, and she and Carden walk away to three other members of the Guidance standing near the door.
My brow jumps as I acknowledge her statement, but I disagree with every word.
Yeah. I have to get the hell out of here.
I’m questioning exactly what I’ve walked into. I thought I would be using them, but she’s using me. And she knows quite a lot about me.
The door has sealed again, and so far, it’s the only exit I see.
The lights dim and calming instrumental music fades in. The Guidance’s tactic to keep the Normals at ease though they have a reason to be flustered and panicked. When they’d call us in for Citizen Management, this slow whine of a stringed instrument along with the keys of a piano would play through the speakers of the light posts. Creations would fall out the back of a bus, boots hitting the pavement like thunder, charging for homes, alleys, or underpasses. I suspect the Normals didn’t find the tune soothing, but a warning: Get in your last hug or kiss, brace yourself for the worst, pray for a mercy that Creations are not designed to give.
The Normals in Highrum, however, favor the soft music. I watch the room; people find open cots and sit with their families. Mothers and fathers tuck their toddlers beneath quilts or hold them in their arms. Single Normals lie on their backs or sides quietly. They all easily find rest in their moment of panic.
Carden returns with a package of freeze-dried bananas. “We should try to get some rest.” He stretches his arms over his head and sits. He yawns and through his yawn adds, “You’re due for some rest. Dark circles are forming under your eyes. And you should consider covering yourself. People are staring at your Creation additions, and you should feel embarrassed.”
I look away from him as he reclines on the cot beside me. Asshole. There has to be a way out of here. I scan the walls. The hall that leads to the restrooms is as dark as the hall that leads to the kitchen. Maybe there’s a way out through the kitchen. It doesn’t hurt to check. I just have to make sure I’m not seen.
“Oh.” The sound escapes from Carden like the caw of a crow. “Mother informed me to not reveal this news, but I think it will give you relief knowing your associates made it out of the crash alive. One or two of them didn’t make it, but most of them are okay. They made it to the labs and tried to get sealed away from those living dead monsters.” His shoulders shudder.
His betrayal to his mother gives me a bit of hope that he’ll possibly side with me and help me out of here. “Can you tell me the exact location of the labs?”
“Oh, no,” he says, sitting up. “Mother also said giving you the details may prompt you to try to escape safety, which I think is absurd. No one in their right mind would leave a safe place to put their life in danger.”
I face him and take his hands in mine. Knitting my brows, I soften my tone. “I need to check on my friends, Carden. You must understand what I’m going through. After losing my brother, they are the next closest thing to family.” It’s not something a Creation would say, but I try to be relatable, hopefully pulling on his heartstrings for the thing he’s been granted from birth to death: a real family.
Lying back down, Carden looks away from me. “I’m sorry, Kylie. I cannot help you. It’s quiet time now. Get some rest.”
Chapter Eighteen
I glance at my watch. Four a.m. The room has settled. Snores flow through the open space, joining the music that continues to lullaby them to rest. Carden, lying on his stomach on the cot beside me, has the cover pulled over his head. He was out shortly after the music began playing.
I slowly rise from the cot and look over the others to see if I’ve caught anyone’s eye. The Creations guarding the door spot me, but they look away without a hint of concern for my actions.
I’ll likely not make it past them without alerting the Guidance leaders.
I look in the direction of the kitchen’s hall. That has to be my way out of here.
I head in the direction of the restroom, stepping over people’s bags and their sleeping bodies lying on low cots. The kitchen’s hall is to the left, and it isn’t far from the restroom’s hall on the right. A five-foot wall separates the two. Not many cots crowd this side of the bunker, and I cross the stone ground on my tiptoes.
Once I’m swallowed by the shadows near the bathroom, I duck into the hall leading to the kitchen.
“Excuse me. Please don’t visit the kitchen at this time.” Someone is rushing down the hallway from the direction I’m headed. Her loud voice echoes off the stone walls. “It is closed,” she says. “Breakfast will be served in three hours. We will bring the food to you.”
Someone is bound to hear her. I ball my fist, hastening my steps, ready to knock her out. Her steps are drawing nearer me. I suck in a breath and draw back my elbow.
“I have it,” someone states from behind me, diverting my attack.
The darkness makes it hard to see either of them, but the woman’s voice coming from the direction of the kitchen is firm and aged. The one coming from behind me sounds more like mine.
“Okay then,” the woman says. The soles of her shoes scrape the stone as her steps recede.
I’m tapped on the shoulder. “This way,” the girl whispers, finding my hand in the dark and placing it on her shoulder. My steps are small as I follow behind her. Hers are soundless, and I do my best to match her in these flimsy slip-ons they gave me. There’s a click, followed by a gust of air being released. After three steps, there’s another click and the sound of a door sealing.
The girl knocks my hand from her shoulder. “Sorry about the weirdness.” The dim glow of a glow stick is revealed. It’s cracked and quickly lights the slim corridor we stand in. It shines across the rounded jawline and slender nose of Carla. The Creation from earlier. She shakes the glow stick. “I know these halls like the back of my hand.”
I glance at the back of my hand, unsure how anyone could know their body part so well. I don’t even recognize the scar on my knuckle or where it came from. “Well. Thanks for your help, I guess,” I say with an uncertain edge, surveying Carla from the side of my eyes.
She chuckles. “Don’t thank me yet, Kylie.” The green glow shines on her freckled skin and glimmers in her black eyes. “I suspect you’re trying to sneak out of here to make it to you
r team.”
“Something like that,” I say with a nod.
“I heard something about them being held in a lab that was surrounded by those dead-alive things.” Carla hands me the prepared glow stick and breaks another one. “Why are you here alone? Where’s your brother?” The green glow makes her hopeful expression even brighter.
I drag the sole-less flat shoes against the stone ground, feeling every ridge and crevice. “We were on a suicide mission. It’s a miracle I made it back.”
Carla frowns. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked.”
I give her tight a smile and half a shrug. “It’s okay. It won’t be the last time I have to say it.” I nod, adding, “My brother deserves to be mentioned as often as possible.”
She waves me forward and starts down the narrow cavernous hall. “It’s an honor to meet you. We’ve waited so long to have a voice at the table. Someone who will take charge and speak up for Creations.”
“We?”
“I use the term lightly. Us Creations here in Highrum. Where you’re from, you probably feel differently. You all get to see the America, some of you get to see the world,” she says with admiration, looking over her shoulder at me and back to the path. “But us here, no way. We’re like their pets. Do this, do that. Clean this, clean that,” she nags. “They don’t even call us in for the dirty work like when there’s an attack on Highrum.”
“I know. They call us.” Highrum Creations have it easy. They have shifts for their Creation duties as if their role in the America stops when their shift is over, like the farmers. They work during the day, and their work is over when the sun goes down.
We, however, don’t get to take off our hats when the day is over. If we’re snatched out of bed in the middle of the night, we must adhere to any order. We must train day in and day out to be the absolute best. Or, I should say, this was our purpose. Now they intend to wipe us out, and I doubt many Creations are going to take lightly to this.
Carla continues, “The Guidance have been talking about you and Lukahn for months. They were excited to get you here so that you two could help them engineer a new Creation.”
My brows furrow. “They wanted Luke too?”
Carla stops and faces me. “You mean, you don’t know?”
I abruptly stop so I don’t walk into her. I shake my head, saying, “How about you enlighten me, Carla.” Arletta briefly mentioned something similar, but I was under the impression this was a thought that had occurred to her in the moment. Not something she’s been plotting. My trigger finger twitches at the thought of her deception.
Carla’s eyes flash with interest, and she turns back around and continues down the hall. “I only know this from being on guard. On guard duty, we’re privy to so much because we stand around like flies on the wall.” She glances at the watch strapped around her right wrist. “Speaking of, I need to head back. We have a shift swap in ten minutes, and if I’m not at my post, we’re going to be in a lot of trouble. They’ll know you snuck out.”
“When they wake, Carla, they’ll see that I’m gone. Don’t worry about me. You should get back so they don’t think you had anything to do with it.” I throw up my hand. “But before you go, can you tell me what you know?”
She backs up and takes the spot in front of me. Her gaze lifts to the ceiling as she turns on her heels and starts down the dark hall again. “I may as well show you to the exit as I explain.” She waves me forward, and I follow behind her. “The Guidance has been under the surveillance of an extraterrestrial being that’s been set on taking over our planet as its own. The Guidance has declared Creations should be exterminated to keep the aliens happy, but they are really creating a new breed. This new breed of Creations will be made differently, of three parts.” She throws up a finger as she announces each portion. “The first, Creation. The Guidance love Creations, but they see the flaws in their, well, creation. Primarily, they will forgo the ability to easily overcome fear and make them devoted to the Guidance. Second, Vojin. This means they are going to need Creations who’ve been made implants by this alien. They are intrigued by the Vojin’s molecular structure, how they latch onto the brain stem and make it easy to control the mindset of someone. This will make the Creations easier to control. And finally,” she lifts her ring finger to accompany her index and middle fingers. “There’s an alien species that has flown under the radar for quite some time. Itteix.”
My heart races at the mention of the word. That’s what the letter said my parents were. That’s what I’m supposed to be. I curl up my lip and ask, “What’s that?”
“That’s the million-dollar question. Watch your step.” She gestures toward the ground. “This is the most interesting species I’ve ever seen. Well, I didn’t see it,” she says in a distressed tone. “I only heard about it. But this is the missing piece. They are made up of light. A light that powers the universe, like stars. I don’t know much about them. But these are the three things they plan on using to breed a better Creation.”
What do they expect for these new Creations to do? Communicate with aliens?
“Oh!” Carla’s abrupt gasp startles me. “What’s most intriguing about Itteix, the light alien, is as a human, their emotions are supercharged,” she says in a gleeful tone, speaking quickly as it seems her excitement for the topic is heightening. “I hear they are a very emotionally-driven species. And I find that intriguing since we’re not allowed to even have feelings.” She glances over her shoulder, maybe checking I’m still back here since I’ve not said anything. But I’m speechless. She continues after turning back around. “They predict the Itteix may act differently should they discover a Creation to be one, but they’ve not been able to prove this yet.”
That description hits too close to home. I’m a Creation. I was a host for the Vojin, but now their particles have aligned with my DNA. If that letter is right, I am also this light being. That’s the three pieces…
I follow behind Carla, who continues her explanation of how intrigued she is by human emotions.
For such a long time, I’ve felt so strongly about everything: sorrow for the loss of my placement parents, hatred for my aunt, anger at being forced to murder Fein, which also made me sad, affection for Marc, even being mixed with Vojin. My emotions should have lain dormant within me, like everyone else’s, but I have had to study them in order to hide them. To bury them in order to not be identified as different or broken. I wasn’t taught to feel emotions; they’ve always been right here. Has it been harder for me because of the part of me that’s Itteix?
I breathe heavily, the realization punching me in the chest. “The babies in those bubble domes?” I say. They’re the new Creations. And they need me to help them get it right. Arletta must know I’m Itteix too.
Carla nods. “But they haven’t quite got it right. They can’t get the flight of light right because they haven’t actually acquired an Itteix.”
“The flight of light?”
Carla slowly nods. “Soon, they’ll do a sweep of citizens and Creations alike. When they kill the ones made of light, just before they erupt, it’s the most beautiful visual you’ll ever see. Colors erupt from a sphere before they’re sucked back inside itself and all at once burst out like an explosion of lightning. But if you catch it just before the second eruption, you save the source, their heart. The scientists can use this to help with their new design.”
She describes the death as if it’s something to marvel at. As though her image of beauty shadows the fact that they are hunting down Itteix and killing them.
I bottle my anger. That’s why Luke’s death was so powerful. “Carla, you should really be getting back.”
“You’re right.” Carla stops and strips off her bulletproof vest and hands it to me. “You’re going to need this more than I will. There’s a fixed-blade tactical knife in the holster on the right and a combat knife on the left. Sorry I don’t have many extra bullets. We don’t usually do much shooting around here.”
I pull on the vest and zip it up. It’s a little tight. “I’ll make do. Thanks for your help.”
“Oh!” She bends over and unlaces her boots. “You are not going to make it in those.” She gestures to my shoes. “Take my boots. They’re like new. I’ve never had to run in them. I’d give you my pants, but I can’t return in my undies.” She giggles.
“Thanks a lot, Carla. But you don’t have to do this. I’ll make it just fine.”
She already has the boots in her hand, handing them to me as she straightens. Defeated, I say, “Thanks,” and take them. “Your help means a lot.”
“You’re welcome. In ten more feet, there will be a door to your left. You’ll open it to the outdoors. It opens to a sidewalk right off a side street, so be careful not to let anyone or anything in.”
“I understand.” I extend my hand. She meets it, and I say again, “Thank you for your help.”
“Any time. Make it to your friends. And if you have some time, save the rest of us Creations too.” She slips on the flats I wore and runs back down the hall from where we came. On her way, she drops the glow stick on the ground and runs into the darkness.
I stuff my feet into the boots and lace them up tight, then I familiarize myself with the compartments of the vest. Stretching my arms across my body, I quickly take the ten steps and find the door on my left.
The metal door is heavy as I shove it open. I stumble out of the darkness onto a quiet block. Smog has filled the air, darkening the light of the early morning. I tear the bottom half of my shirt off to tie it around my nose and mouth.
Carla’s boots are an inch too big. Threads hanging from the rips of my shorts tickle my thighs, and the bottom of Carla’s tight-fitting vest scrapes against my exposed stomach. The quicker I walk, the more noticeable these things become. Hopefully, I get used to them soon so they aren’t so much of a distraction.
Ominous Order Page 14
