Unanswerable questions swirled through his drunken mind as Michael left the canteen, empty bottle in hand, and searched for a way to escape. How long would Forsythe be able to contain this? Once the news spread, all the old suspicions of collaboration with James Bouchet would rise to the surface. Would his team trust him? Would Forsythe recall him to Praxis? Deny him a place in the invasion of Hiebimini?
Michael avoided his bunk, knowing escapes were limited in this three-tiered facility. He didn’t want to step outside and encounter George and Carver on disposal duty. Three right-angle turns and a fifty-meter corridor at two abreast led him to an intersection. To his right: the lift to Level 3 residences. To his left: the steep, narrow stairwell to the viewing platform. Not hard to choose.
The temperature dropped precipitously as he started down the stairwell, carved out of a snaking hollow more than a century ago. Stone steps and yellow lights bored into the ceiling guided his way. The echoes were as distinct as the reduction in gravity. By the time he finished his descent, Michael felt fifty pounds lighter and held the guide bar as he stepped out to view a scientific impossibility.
The platform, fashioned from a horizontal crevasse four meters high, stretched to the edge of reality. A solid barricade two meters high protected humans from falling into the Void.
Michael came here more than anyone he knew over the past several weeks, always to remind himself these promised miracles might not be fantasy after all. He reached the barricade and grabbed hold just as the dizziness overwhelmed him. Planetary gravity fell thirty percent this close to the Void. No one explained why.
The Void shimmered, its density and color patterns varying based upon one’s perspective. Looking up, Michael saw the aurora visible above the mountain range, flickering and shapeshifting like all those videos of the Northern Lights he saw on first Earth. At eye level, the Void was an unimpressive green haze, the intensity varying in subtle patterns. Beneath Michael, the Void never ended. It drove into the planet in dramatic sunrise hues.
He heard all the legends about this illogical beast. About how people had leaped to their deaths but disappeared when they jumped through the Void’s energy epidermis. Those who came up short lost whatever limbs might have crossed the barrier, while the rest of them tumbled into oblivion, falling in slow motion as gravity diminished. As Michael stood here and contemplated the end of every dream of saving Sam, he reached out his empty hand and felt a tug. He stood ten feet from the edge of the Void.
He side-armed the jubriska bottle into the green haze. It vanished. Michael wondered whether it simply disintegrated or reappeared somewhere else in the universe. The Chancellor experts insisted the latter to be the case. The bottle would reappear instantaneously wherever the Void’s quantum signatures delivered it. Almost certainly, open space. And this, they said, held the key to humanity’s interstellar future.
“Fucking insane,” he muttered.
He detected motion to his right and wasn’t shocked to see Maya at the guardrail, too.
“You followed me?”
“Oh,” she said with a wry smile. “So, you did see me waving to you in the canteen? Tell me, Michael. What is ‘fucking insane?’ The Void? The Anchors? Or what you are doing to yourself?”
“What am I doing, Maya? Tell me.”
“For one? Losing hope.”
“Got good reason.”
“No, Michael. You have reason to doubt, but not to give up.”
He coughed. “If I’d given up …” He bent his arms to indicate a dive into the abyss. “Man overboard.”
“How much have you had to drink?”
“Not enough. My body holds liquor better than it used to.”
She started toward him, keeping one hand on the rail.
“I would think so. You have a spectacular physique now. Enormous muscles, all those Guard synthetics. What was that competition you said you would win back on first Earth?”
“Mr. Universe. Ironic, huh?”
“Yes. As I recall, you said the men who entered those competitions did it all for ego. They built their bodies simply to show off and win medals. But your motivation was different. You told me, Michael. Do you remember?”
Goddammit. He knew where Maya was leading him.
“I did this so I would have the skills to rescue Sam and kill the motherfucker who took her.”
“Yes. You changed yourself inside and outside to meet your circumstance. That takes enormous courage. Do you not think Samantha is built of similar courage?”
He did not expect this curveball.
“I don’t … yes, she is. But there’s a difference. I made a choice. You don’t really believe James is letting her choose?”
“Probably not. But what if her courage takes a different form? What if she came to understand a fundamental truth? Sometimes, an enemy is best defeated from within. Do you think she might be strong enough to calculate a strategy of compliance and patience?” She grabbed him by the hand. “What if her greatest strength is the faith that, in time, you will come for her?”
He wiped away the tears.
“I want to believe, Maya. I do. But …”
“But what?”
“She met the Chancellors with an unarmed escort. That’s what Forsythe said. She could have flipped sides, and who would have stopped her? Why didn’t she leave when she had the chance?”
“You’ll ask her one day. She’ll have a smart answer.”
Michael looked away. “I been holding out hope for so long, but I should’ve known. We’ll never see each other again.”
She rapped Michael in the arm, although he barely felt it beneath the body armor.
“Oh, please. You two damn well better! You’re not the only one with stakes in this mission. I followed you here, Michael, because I believed in you. I saw how much you grew as a man back on Earth. I don’t agree with every choice you’ve made since then, but you’ve come too far to back down. You closed the door on your past and chose to be something you used to despise. You …”
“What does that mean?”
She curled her lips as if she didn’t really need to say it. But Michael wanted to hear the words.
“Michael, you told me stories about the child you were on first Earth. Wild, undisciplined, happy-go-lucky. You said the last thing you ever imagined you would do was kill a man. And what did you do on second Earth? You murdered Chancellor civilians. Like me, of course. But also like me, you justified it. In defense of the Solomon cause. Payback for their attempts on your life and Sam’s. Yes? Then we leave Earth, and you train to become a master at killing people. To wear the uniform of those who slaughtered millions over the centuries.”
Her tone darkened, her voice less comforting.
“How many did you kill this morning? Or the last time? Or the time before that? Do the numbers even register anymore? You haven’t just grown bigger and become a warrior. Michael, you have embraced something sinister and bloody for the sake of saving her life. This is your final card, and you know it.”
Michael pushed away. Maya cut too deep, and as usual hit him spot-on. The best therapist in the world wouldn’t have read him as well as Maya. At times, he hated her for the insight; at times, he needed that same wisdom. Now, her words were undeniable.
“You’re right.” He walked to the rear of the platform and felt ten pounds heavier. “I got nothing left to play. I kill people now, and I don’t give a shit. Those Mongols … those rogues … I don’t know them, and I don’t care. They come here begging to be slaughtered. Every time I shoot one, I think of James. I see his face. All I want to do is kill anyone between me and him. I know what I am, Maya. I know what I gave up.”
“Ah. And what is your plan when you rescue Samantha? Introduce her to the coldblooded killing machine you have become? Or will you rediscover that secret door in your heart where the Michael she once knew is hidden?”
“I don’t have a plan.” He couldn’t look at her. “Every time I try, I stare into a black hole.”
“That’s vengeance talking. Oh, yes. I know it well. You remember what I told you about Marseilles? What those men did to me? I spent the better part of eight months focusing solely on revenge. After the deed was done, I was lost. I took years rebuilding my life, and I still didn’t find purpose until I met Rikard and he asked me to join the Solomon movement. I was lucky, Michael. I still had the heart of the woman I was before I chose to kill.”
“I’m happy for you, Maya. I am. I know how far you’ll go when you’re cornered, but you’re still so beautiful inside. Me? I threw away Michael Cooper when I boarded Praxis. When I wrote that letter to my folks, I wasn’t just saying goodbye to them. I know what I gave up.”
Maya motioned for him to join her. He complied.
“There’s every reason to think Samantha will understand,” she said. “After all, she won’t be the same woman. Whatever she’s endured on Hiebimini will scar her deeply. Perhaps your changes will be too profound for love to keep you together. Or perhaps you’ll discover you are once again made for each other. But you know what’s amazing about this story, Michael?”
She wrapped her arms around him and held him close.
“You two will be reunited. There is no force that will come between you, even though many will try.”
“How can you say that now? After everything?”
“Simple. You’ve worked too hard to save each other’s lives, right from that night on first Earth when you came so close to dying. You told me your entire story, Michael. Do you realize that almost all of it was about just you and Sam? Some paths are unshakeable.”
“But the odds are …”
“Small. Yes. And so were the odds the two of us would ever meet. My revenge in Marseilles occurred years before you crossed the fold, but had I chosen differently, even once, we never would have met. I suppose you would have been killed at Entilles Club. And Samantha would have no one to save her now.
“I believe these things, Michael. The smallest of choices form a greater math than we can understand. Call it the algorithm of life. But you two will see each other again. Whatever else happens, this must be the future.” She pulled away. “Be strong, Michael. Be ferocious. Do not waver.”
She did it again. His heart surged with renewed vitality.
“You know what, Maya? You would’ve made a fortune on first Earth. Best shrink on the planet.”
“I’m thankful I can be down here for you. That didn’t seem doable at first.”
She brought a smile to his face. After he heard about Samantha, Michael wasn’t sure he’d ever be happy again.
“You still haven’t told me how you did it,” he said.
“Did what?”
“Snag that job with Aldo Cabrise.”
“If you must know, I begged. Often. Capt. Forsythe saw no need for me down here until he’d grown tired of my persistence. Then he finally admitted Cabrise wanted an executive aide. But he also told me Aldo had a reputation as a dreadful superior. Overly demanding, disrespectful, addle-minded. I accepted on the spot.”
“Why?”
“Because, Michael, those things don’t faze me. Not since Marseilles. I smile and I listen. Aldo can be a difficult man, but mostly, he’s tired. Like you, he’s betting everything on the Anchors and reaching Hiebimini. And just like you, he has no plan for what happens after. This is where we were always supposed to be.”
Michael held her hand and bent over. As he laid down a long, moist kiss, he realized how much he missed all those long talks aboard Praxis. All the moments when Maya provided him with the curative words most needed.
“They’re testing the Anchors in two days,” he said. “They’re going to work, Maya. One damn way or the other, I’ll save her.”
Exogenesis
Albion, Alabama
First Earth
5 years ago
S AMMIE HUGGINS WAS A GOOD GIRL. Or so they said. She wasn’t entirely sure. She’d been acting the part for so long, it seemed all too natural. The long blond hair in a bouncy ponytail and the coke-bottle reading glasses she didn’t need exemplified a sweet but studious child. Dresses and blouses with floral patterns meant she was an old soul. The doll collection and canopy bed with pink ruffles symbolized her attachment to prepubescence – in other words, she was off-limits. Sammie was thirteen, an age when the local boys might make a play for her virginity (or so her parents heard).
“Not these local filth,” her father raged. “Not on this planet.”
Yet on the day Tom and Marlena Sheridan were lowered into their graves, Sammie wanted to test her father’s boundaries. She saw Jamie’s desolation – or rather, sensed it beneath his deadened exterior. She looked for opportunities to sneak away with him for a few minutes to hold his hand, to comfort him, to tell him she still had faith when many did not. And if, during their quiet moments, he might try to lean in and kiss her … well, what would be the harm?
He didn’t speak to her after the funeral, nor did he return her redundant stream of texts. She reassured herself he was giving everyone the cold shoulder, perhaps even his best friend Michael. Her parents had no desire to hang around the Sheridan home, which was gutted of life. Sammie’s father Walt told Ben they would be in touch soon, but Ben nodded and turned on the TV, opening his third beer. We can’t leave them like this, Sammie thought; but once her father made up his mind, no discussion followed.
The instant the Hugginses returned home and closed the front door, her mother Grace threw her purse on the antique table in the foyer and reached for her pearl necklace.
“Disgraceful,” she said. “I will never understand this obsession with mourning in black.”
Sammie was mystified.
“What’s wrong with black, Mom? I thought it symbolized death.”
“Precisely,” Grace said. “And what is more antithetical to life than death? The survivors should celebrate their good fortune. Respect the passing, of course, but revel in the days we still possess.”
“Is that how Chancellors mourn?”
Walt stepped in. “I’ll take this, dear. That roast smells refreshingly close to finished.” He took Sammie by the hand and sat her down on the sofa. “If I could take one device back to our Earth – other than the Jewel, of course – it would be a slow cooker.”
“What about the Chancellors? Are there funerals?”
“No. Absolutely not. Nor do we ‘dress for the occasion.’ When a Chancellor passes, we take a pragmatic approach. Proper celebration for the life lived, of course, with a reading of accomplishments and testimonials. But tears? No. This ridiculous notion of our soul having gone ‘to a better place’?” He slapped his knee. “God has a plan, the preacher said. Delusions know no boundaries. The Chancellory is built on strength of descendancy. We take time to acknowledge who ascends in the family line, what social or political leverage they might hold, and so forth. There are exceptions for those who are murdered by their rivals or disgraced by scandal.”
For eight years, Samantha listened as her parents prepared her for every aspect of Chancellor life, but they avoided talk of death. In Albion, people kept close tabs on obituaries and spread the word of anyone in ill health or thought to be on a deathbed. The end was as vital a topic as the beginning.
“Daddy, we have to help the Sheridans. They might be Chancellors by birth, but they’re not handling it like Chancellors. I’m afraid of what will happen to them.”
“They’ll sort this business in time, Pumpkin. The truth is, Benjamin brought this on himself.”
“What does that mean?”
Her father shifted uneasily. “We all make choices, Pumpkin. Benjamin abandoned his Chancellor training long ago. We’ll say no more of him.”
“And Jamie? He doesn’t even know the truth.”
“Of his fate? Or that Tom and Marlena were not his parents?”
“It’s all the same, Daddy. I think it’s cruel to keep him in the dark.”
“In this case, cruelty is pragmatic. His Mentor n
ever emerged. There is no scenario where he would adapt if told the truth now. And if you ever intend …”
“No, Daddy. I promise.”
Walt kissed her on the cheek, but Sam saw a shade in his eyes.
“Stay here, Pumpkin. I’d like to show you something.”
He walked to a rolltop desk and fumbled through his keys before unlocking the bottom drawer. Sammie couldn’t see what he pulled out – until he started toward her.
It was pink with a floral design. The pages were lined silver. Her heart skipped.
“Daddy, no! You didn’t.”
He opened the diary to her last entry.
“I knew you had feelings for the Jewel, but this is unacceptable.”
“Daddy, those are my private thoughts. How could you?”
He ignored her and read from the text. “He’s in so much pain. I wish I knew how to make it all right for him. He’s not the juvenile delinquent people say he is. Jamie has a tender heart. If I could bring it out, I know he’d …” Walt paused. He turned to Sammie with a disgusted glare. “If you could bring it out? And how, Samantha, might you do such a thing? Show him the truth? Or perhaps you are suggesting something more intimate?”
Her chest burned in a brew of shame and fury.
“These are my private thoughts. They’re just for me, Daddy.”
“But you avoid my question. Fine. Perhaps we should examine two pages earlier. Ah yes, I have it dog-eared. ‘Everyone is whispering about what happened at the police station today. They’re saying Jamie lost his mind. They don’t understand. I’ll bet Jamie doesn’t either. I think the Mentor made him do it.’ ” He closed the diary. “Explain yourself, Pumpkin.”
“Daddy, it was just for me … and, and, don’t tell me you and the others didn’t think the same thing? What Jamie did, it’s not natural for anybody. I wasn’t going to tell. Besides, who would believe me?”
He grabbed her by the ponytail and tugged.
“The chance of our secret escaping – and anyone believing – might be a million to one. But it is my job to assure the one never happens. We have two enemies – the authorities here and the United Green on the other side. We are to possess no evidence of our heritage, our plans, or our technology. You put us at risk.”
The Impossible Future: Complete set Page 112
