Bloom

by Kenneth Oppel

  THE HELICOPTER MADE a sudden sideways dip, and Seth felt Petra tense beside him. She looked a bit green. He hoped she wasn’t going to throw up. Next to her sat Anaya, who didn’t seem bothered by the turbulence. He knew her mom was a pilot, so she was probably used to this.

  Opposite them were Dr. Weber and Carlene Lee. Over the years, Seth had met lots of social workers and was good at sizing them up fast. Carlene was one of those super-efficient ones. Her smile was frequent but a bit chilly. She’d had her job long enough to keep herself at a good distance.

  They bumped again, but Seth didn’t mind. He’d never been in a helicopter—never been on an airplane either—and he loved it. The way it had just lifted straight off the pad like an elevator, then nosed forward. It reminded him of his dreams, the way he sometimes soared through the sky.

  Invasion.

  When Dr. Weber had said that word, it was like the temperature in the room plunged. He’d seen the shock on everyone’s face. It sounded like a war. He wondered why he didn’t feel more frightened. Nothing seemed real since he’d found Mrs. Antos, cocooned by vines. Definitely he would’ve been more scared without Anaya and Petra here. He felt calmer just being with them—and Dr. Weber.

  At the meeting, he’d liked the way she talked directly to him and the girls instead of to the mothers. He liked all her facts. He’d only known her a couple of hours but he already trusted her.

  Seth gazed out the window. Below, the Vancouver airport looked normal enough, until he noticed the sinkholes in the runways. A jet jutted out of a huge crater, its left wing snapped against the tarmac. Over neighborhoods, Seth saw streets turned into canyons by the tall black grass. Roadblocks were everywhere, pit-plant holes in the parks and golf courses. Charred sinkholes in the asphalt and sidewalks. Hardly anyone outside. Even from up here, he could see pollen glittering in the air.

  As they passed over downtown, the streets were nearly deserted. Some of the tall buildings looked like they had cracks in them—until Seth realized they were vines, crawling their way up the glass and steel.

  Stanley Park bristled with black grass. Its open fields were cordoned off with yellow tape. A lone bicyclist in neon-green racing gear pedaled madly around the seawall, head to his handlebars.

  The helicopter made a smooth turn, and Seth got his first glimpse of Deadman’s Island. Jutting into the harbor, the military base was connected to the park by a skinny road that was gated, and guarded by two armed soldiers.

  As the helicopter descended, Seth saw teams of masked personnel cutting down the black grass along the base’s fenced perimeter. In a cratered field, a bulldozer was dragging something dark purple and boulder-sized out of the ground. In the center of the base were some wooden barracks, several old brick buildings, and a bigger, more modern one.

  The helicopter settled on the pad, and the co-pilot got out and opened the doors. Dr. Weber guided them to the modern building. Even on the short walk across the tarmac, the doctor and Carlene Lee started sneezing. Inside, it smelled like a hospital.

  “The entire building’s climate-controlled, so it’s pollen-free,” Dr. Weber said as they made their way down a corridor with lots of windowless doors.

  “I’ll show you where we’re staying,” Carlene said. “It’s a small apartment. It’s really nice.”

  “Do we have our own bedrooms?” Petra asked hopefully.

  “Seth does, and me. You and Anaya are sharing.”

  Seth caught the dismay in Petra’s expression.

  “What?” Anaya asked.

  “You’re so messy. Do you still snore?”

  Anaya shrugged. “Guess we’ll find out.”

  They turned a corner, and up ahead, Seth glimpsed a tall man with buzzed gray hair. His uniform had lots of colored bars on it.

  “Ah,” said Dr. Weber quietly, “you’re about to meet Colonel Pearson.”

  The colonel stood peering through a long observation window at a shooting range. Inside, soldiers milled about, buckling on body armor, handling various lethal-looking weapons.

  As the colonel turned to greet them, the deep lines in his gaunt face seemed to tug down the sides of his mouth.

  “So. These must be the Miracle Three.”

  Dr. Weber introduced them all by name and then said, “The colonel was kind enough to offer my team a home here on his base.”

  “I wanted more weapons, but they sent me a scientist instead,” the colonel said drily.

  “And if my work’s successful, Colonel, you’ll have soldiers who are immune to the plants they’re fighting.”

  The colonel just grunted and spoke into the intercom on the wall: “Go ahead.”

  At the back of the shooting range, a thick plastic curtain parted, and Seth saw a row of three pit plants, tipped against the wall like giant rotting potatoes. He’d never seen them from the outside before—only the inside. Their flesh was wrinkly, and from the bottom of each sprouted a thick black vine that had been hacked very short.

  “Where’d you get them?” Petra asked.

  “There’s no shortage. We’re still bulldozing them out of our fields,” the colonel said. “Don’t worry, Dr. Weber, we’ve saved enough for your science experiments.”

  “I appreciate that,” she replied.

  As Seth watched, a soldier opened fire with a machine gun. The pit plant swallowed every bullet. When the shooting ceased, another soldier went over and poked the top of the plant with a stick. The fleshy lips sprang open, still very much alive and ready to eat.

  “I’m not sure you can kill them with bullets,” said Anaya.

  “Maybe not,” agreed the colonel. “But we’ll find a way.”

  The soldiers crouched behind a low wall of sandbags. One of them pulled the pin from a hand grenade.

  “Those things are full of acid!” Petra warned the colonel.

  With excellent aim, the soldier lobbed the grenade right inside the open pit plant, then ducked behind the sandbags. The pit plant snapped shut its lips, then exploded. Bits of plant splattered everywhere, including the glass observation window, right in front of Seth’s face.

  “I call that dead,” Pearson said, looking at the pulpy mess where the pit plant once rested.

  Right away Seth saw the acid fuming on the walls and floor. Even the glass was smoking. One of the soldiers stood and hurriedly pulled off his helmet. The top was smoldering. He held it up to the window for the colonel to see. The acid had burned a small hole clean through.

  Pearson said calmly into the intercom, “Everyone out of there until we get the hazmat crew to clean up. Then we’re going to try the flamethrowers.”

  “Be careful,” Seth said. “The smoke might be toxic. Just like the black grass.”

  “We’ll take precautions,” the colonel said, walking away.

  “He doesn’t seem very happy we’re here,” Seth said quietly, when the colonel was out of earshot.

  “Don’t worry about the colonel,” said Dr. Weber. “He’s a good man, and he wants to kill these things as quickly as possible. We’re both trying to save lives, but I’m not sure he sees the value in what I’m doing. So, are you three ready to begin?”

  WITH ALL HER ALLERGIES, Anaya was used to getting pricked with needles.

  “What’re you going to do with all this?” she asked, looking at the vials of her blood on the lab counter. It was enough to feed Dracula and everyone in his castle.

  Dr. Weber smiled. “It always looks like a lot. First order of business is your genome.”

  “My DNA,” said Anaya.

  “Right. A complete map. It could really open some doors for treatments.”

  Anaya knew this was important, but it felt wrong to be here when Dad was out there, with murderous alien plants. Cryptogenic plants. If Dr. Weber thought that word was any less scary, she was wrong.

  “
Can you try and call my father soon?”

  If she couldn’t look for him herself, at the very least, she needed to make sure he was safe.

  “I already sent in the request. They said they’ll keep trying until they get through.”

  That was something. “Thanks.”

  Next, Dr. Weber dripped two beads of pit-plant acid onto the underside of her wrist. Anaya had absolutely no reaction. They fitted a mask over her face and sprayed in the perfumed mist from the pit plant and vines. She didn’t fall asleep, or get dopey. When Dr. Weber swabbed the inside of her nose with a liquefied version of the smoke from the black grass, she didn’t even sneeze.

  Dr. Weber shook her head. “It’s incredible that someone with so many allergies isn’t allergic to these plants. Let’s do a quick physical.”

  Anaya changed into a gown, and Dr. Weber listened to her heart and lungs, checked her blood pressure, probed her stomach.

  “You’re very healthy,” she pronounced.

  Anaya laughed. “I think you’re the first doctor to say that to me. It’s weird, but since the plants came, I’ve felt way better.”

  “Your other allergies have eased up.”

  “Yeah. My asthma, too. And”—she blushed because it suddenly seemed so frivolous—“my acne’s really cleared up. And I feel stronger. Especially my legs.”

  “I was going to ask if you were a runner. Your toenails are pretty beat up.”

  Surprised, Anaya looked down. How could she not have noticed this? Some of her toenails were black, like she’d dropped something heavy on them.

  “Must’ve happened on the field,” she mumbled, frowning.

  “They’re quite sharp,” said Dr. Weber. “If you didn’t bring nail clippers with you, I can find you some.”

  Anaya stared down in embarrassment. The nails of her big toes were jagged and longer than the others. They looked like claws.

  * * *

  “YOUR AQUAGENIC URTICARIA,” Dr. Weber said as she probed Petra’s stomach through her gown. “Have you noticed any changes over the years?”

  Petra didn’t feel like talking about her water allergy right now. She was weary of tests and questions. She’d been stabbed and dabbed and misted. And the whole time, Carlene Lee was hovering, taking notes and asking her if she felt comfortable. She just wanted to go back to the apartment and crash.

  “Not really. Except for that rainwater, you know, from that big rain before the plants appeared—I didn’t get any reaction from that. I washed with it.”

  Dr. Weber was writing on the pad. “That’s very interesting. If the seeds were in the rain, they might’ve changed the chemistry of the water. You can sit up now.”

  “Can you make me some?” Petra asked.

  For a moment, Dr. Weber looked surprised. Then she nodded. “Ah, the water. Well, if we know the exact makeup of a solution, we might be able to synthesize it. We’ll look into it.”

  “Thanks,” said Petra, breathing out in relief. “It would just be so good to wash properly.”

  “I can believe it.” The doctor looked at her legs and frowned. “How long have you had that rash?”

  “Where?” Petra asked in surprise.

  “There’s quite a bit of scaling on the back of your thighs.”

  Anxiously Petra reached down and touched her skin. Both legs were extremely rough. She twisted around and flexed her leg so she could see.

  “Oh my gosh!” she cried. Over the years, she’d had all kinds of rashes from getting wet, but none quite like this. It was really red and scabby.

  “Is it itchy?” asked Dr. Weber.

  “No.” It looked hideous. “I can’t believe I didn’t notice this.”

  “I can get a dermatologist to consult with us.”

  “Do you think it’s the rainwater? Because I’ve been washing with it?”

  Dr. Weber shook her head. “You just washed your face, yes? And no reaction there. So no, I don’t think this could be some delayed reaction.”

  Dr. Weber bent to look, then pulled on blue gloves. Petra thought this was a bad sign. When people put on gloves, it was because they thought they were going to touch something really gross.

  “You know, I don’t think it’s a rash at all. It’s more like a membrane….” Dr. Weber took a pair of tweezers from a tray. “It pulls away quite easily and…”

  “What?” Petra said, alarmed by the pause.

  “The skin is smooth underneath. Remarkably smooth.”

  Petra touched the spot, and let out a sigh of relief. It did feel amazingly smooth. Then she looked at the long patch of skin dangling from the doctor’s tweezers, and shivered. It looked like something a snake had just sloughed off.

  * * *

  “DO YOU REMEMBER having them?” Dr. Weber asked Seth, nodding at the scars on his arms.

  He wasn’t used to people asking about them. “I was just little, but yeah.”

  “Your records say the growths—”

  “Feathers,” Seth interrupted. The other doctors always referred to them as growths, and he’d never argued because he didn’t want people to think he was weirder than he already was. But he felt like he could tell the truth to Dr. Weber.

  He held his arm out. “I looked at pictures of bird’s wings. They have around ten primary flight feathers.” He touched the scars on his forearm. “And then up to twenty secondary feathers.” He pointed at the scars on his upper arm, which were closer together. “The pattern’s the same.”

  When Dr. Weber smiled, her eyes crinkled up in a friendly way. “All right. Feathers. And yours grew to ten to fourteen millimeters in length?”

  “They seemed longer.” Maybe they’d just felt bigger to his three-year-old fingers.

  “My little boy was born with exactly the same thing.”

  Seth’s pulse quickened. “Really?”

  “When I first saw them, I said the same thing you did. Feathers. Little feathers growing from his arms.”

  Eagerly Seth asked, “What do they look like now?”

  But he saw the change in Dr. Weber’s eyes, and understood that look: something you’d lost and were never getting back.

  “He would’ve been the same age as you. But he had a lot of health problems when he was born. He only lived five months.”

  Seth felt the air leak from his lungs. “Oh.”

  “It’s a very rare condition. Doesn’t even have a name. But there are others who have it.”

  “How many?” No one had told him this before, never. The idea there were others like him—just the idea he wasn’t alone—was so exciting he could barely wait for Dr. Weber’s answers. He had so many questions.

  “Several in this country—elsewhere in the world, too, apparently. All the same age as you, more or less. Amazing thing, isn’t it?”

  Amazing thing. He’d never heard it described like this. The few times his doctors or social workers or foster parents mentioned it, they treated it like something freakish.

  “And the others, did any of them get—” He stopped himself. Had they all died, too?

  “Wings?” she asked. That kind smile again. She shook her head. “They all had their feathers removed when they were young. Like you.”

  “Oh,” Seth said.

  “Are they tender?” she asked, gently touching two of the scars with her fingertips.

  “No,” he lied instinctively, and then: “A bit.”

  “For how long?”

  “A couple of weeks. Since the big rain.”

  She sat back in her chair and looked at him. He knew she was about to speak, and he knew exactly what he wanted to hear. It was something he’d wanted for so long, but hardly dared hope for.

  She said, “Unless I’m very much mistaken, your feathers are growing back.”

  “THE HELIPAD COLLAPSED,” ANAYA�
�S mom told her over the phone. “Not long after you guys took off. There was a huge pit plant under it.”

  Anaya suppressed a shudder. “How long till they fix it?”

  She was back in their little apartment after the day’s tests, looking out the window, with her back to the others. She was trying to be brave, but she wanted Mom here. It hadn’t been easy, getting on that helicopter without her—but she’d managed it by telling herself Mom would be joining her very soon.

  “They’re looking for a new landing site,” Mom said, “maybe in the parking lot, but they’ve got to make sure it’s safe first.”

  Beyond the high fence of the base, Anaya could see across the harbor to downtown Vancouver. Thin strips of oily smoke rose between the tall buildings. Why were there fires? Broken gas lines? Shorted power lines? A few helicopters buzzed past.

  “Where are you now?” Anaya asked Mom.

  “Home. The power’s still out, but there’s water, and I can use the barbecue.”

  “How’d you get home from the hospital?” she asked, worrying about the pit plants.

  “I got a stick and slammed it into the ground before I took a step. Everyone’s doing it now.”

  “You’ve got to keep the vines off the house, Mom.”

  She caught herself looking around the window frame and floors, checking for cracks.

  “Don’t worry. I’m sleeping at the Morrisons’ tonight. I think it’s a good idea if we take shifts. They’ve also set up a shelter in the community hall for people who live alone.”

  “Have you heard anything about Tereza?”

  “She’s at Vancouver General. She’s in the burn unit, but she’s going to be okay. Fleetwood, too.”

  Anaya closed her eyes and let out a big breath. “That’s so good.” All day Tereza had been in her thoughts. “And the others?”

  There was a slight delay before her mother said, “Mr. Hilborn died, and Jen Haines is still in a coma.”

  A shadow of terror crept toward her, like something waiting at the edge of a dying campfire. She smelled the inside of the pit plant, felt its slippery flesh, the reek of burning clothing and hair. These things killed. These things were everywhere.