by Eliza Green
The woman’s brow arched. ‘You’re both in charge?’
Dom nodded.
She didn’t look convinced. ‘Okay, follow me. The rest of you can wait here.’
She climbed the stairs. Dom followed with Anya behind him. Their collection of military boots hitting steel sent a clanging noise through the space. Anya counted fifty steps to the next level. They stepped onto a steel-weave platform next to a prefab. There, the woman knocked on the door.
‘Enter!’
She opened it. Dom stepped in first. Anya’s eyes grazed every inch of the space. She didn’t want to forget anything.
The female soldier waited outside and closed the door, instantly shutting out the noise below. Anya looked around the room. It was like an office. Two guest chairs sat opposite a desk. The walls were decorated with images of scenery she’d never seen before.
One image showed tall buildings with the words San Francisco underneath.
A dark-skinned woman aged around fifty years old sat behind the desk, watching them. Her outfit wasn’t as formal as the soldiers’ black uniforms. She wore a navy-blue suit with a white blouse.
She stood and came around to the other side of the desk, proffering her hand. Dom shook it, then Anya. The leader’s skin felt warm and a little clammy, as though she were nervous.
She smiled at them. ‘My name’s Agatha. We’re delighted to receive new guests to the Beyond. Please sit.’ She gestured to the seats. ‘And you two are?’
Dom hesitated before answering. ‘Dom and Anya.’ He looked around. ‘Where are we? What is the Beyond?’
Anya sat in a chair. When Dom refused to sit, she pulled him down. He relented with a sigh.
Agatha returned to her seat. ‘It’s a holding area for refugees from the Region.’
Anya frowned. ‘Region?’
She nodded. ‘The place you came from.’
Anya had no name for where they’d come from. Why?
Her gaze went to the image behind Agatha’s head. ‘Is this San Francisco?’
The woman laughed. ‘No. It’s an old photo. Bygone times.’
Dom leaned forward. ‘Please. We got separated from our friends. We need you to open the door and let them in.’
Agatha shook her head. ‘It’s not possible. The door locks automatically for twenty-four hours. We won’t be able to open it until the time has expired.’
‘So they’re stuck there?’
She nodded. ‘A non-human life form attempted to pass through the door. It triggered the lockdown.’
‘You mean a Copy?’
‘I believe that’s your term for the lower life forms the Collective has created.’ She clasped her hands on the table. ‘We’ve had others make it here before. They’ve filled us in on the evolution of events there.’
Anya thought of Janet, of Warren’s parents—of other rebels who may have made it.
‘Are they here? Can we speak to them?’
Agatha shook her head. ‘Moved to another location. Sorry.’ She leaned forward. ‘What I’d like to know is why a Copy was attempting to cross the barrier. Were you being attacked?’
‘No, Carissa was helping us,’ said Anya.
‘Carissa?’
‘It’s her name.’
Agatha sat back, eyes wide. ‘Copies with feelings? I didn’t think their evolution would get that far so fast.’
‘Neither did we,’ said Dom. ‘Carissa is the exception.’
Agatha leaned forward again. ‘So you would like me—us—to rescue her?’
‘She deserves a chance to be free.’
Agatha clasped her hands tighter, turning her dark skin paler in places. ‘What about the Collective? Is she still connected to it?’
‘No. With her help, we successfully escaped Praesidium a few days ago,’ said Anya. ‘After, she broke her connection to the city.’
She left out the part about Quintus still talking to her.
Agatha nodded and waved one hand. ‘Well, it doesn’t matter right now. The door won’t open.’ She stood. ‘Well, Dom and Anya, I expect you to keep your team in line while you’re here. We also insist all refugees go through a physical. For your peace of mind as well as ours. We find those who arrive here unannounced are malnourished.’
Anya stood up fast. ‘Is that it?’
Dom grabbed her hand, as if to calm her.
Agatha stared at her. ‘What did you expect?’
She snapped her hand out of his grip. ‘I don’t know... a better explanation of where we are?’
She was supposed to find answers here, to turn her parents’ and Jason’s deaths from senseless into a cause worth fighting for. So far, she wasn’t seeing it.
Agatha smiled and gestured to the door. ‘All in good time, Anya.’
Dom stood up and walked swiftly to the door.
She stayed put, not ready to leave. ‘We have more questions.’
‘And I promise to answer them soon. But for now, we have our rules. If you want to stay here, you must abide by them.’
Agatha opened the door. Outside, the soldier with the gun stood to attention.
‘Take them to the infirmaries,’ Agatha said to her. ‘I want to make sure they’re healthy.’
The soldier nodded, then signalled to the soldiers below.
Anya stepped out onto the high platform. A cross walk connected the prefab to a door on the same level. From the rock face opposite her, it looked like they were deep underground. The soldier led them back down to the level below. Anya saw other soldiers leading Sheila, June and the others down a new corridor leading farther into the heart of the Beyond.
At the bottom, a male soldier waited.
‘Take him to the infirmary,’ said the woman, nodding at Dom. ‘I’ll escort this one.’
Dom gave Anya a quick nod and whispered, ‘I’ll see you soon.’
Fear and anxiety set her hands shaking. It reminded her too much of the medical facility. And it felt too much like she was about to be experimented upon.
But with their weapons under the Beyond’s control and with the way back locked down, she didn’t see another choice but to comply.
21
Dom
The male soldier led Dom down a right-hand corridor that led to an area with a circle of doors. The soldier opened one room and told him to enter. Dom eyed the layout of steel benches. There was equipment he’d never seen before and too many cutting instruments for him to settle.
He hesitated by the door. The soldier gave him a gentle push inside.
‘You have to complete a physical if you want to stay in the Beyond,’ he said. ‘It’s for your own good.’
Dom understood the rules, but the layout of the room gave him pause. No way would he let them open him up again.
He shuffled inside. A man in a lab coat looked up from a microscope.
He took his glasses off and pocketed them. ‘And you are?’
Dom cleared his throat. He was a leader. He needed to act like one.
‘Dominic Pavesi. And you?’
‘Not essential.’
The doctor, he presumed, picked up a small screen. He gestured to a reclining chair that reminded Dom too much of the ones in Arcis—except this one was black leather, not cream. Dom and the others had been forced to sit in front of screens on the seventh floor and answer questions. Their answers had determined their success moving on.
‘I’ll stand if that’s all the same to you.’
‘It’s not. Sit or I’ll make you.’
The soldier poked him on.
Dom slid into the chair, hands tightly clasped. ‘What do you do here?’
The doctor waved his hand at him without looking up from the screen. ‘Medical stuff.’
He pulled up a second chair next to Dom’s and sat in it. ‘I have some routine questions that I need you to answer. Okay?’
Dom nodded. At least he’d asked first.
‘How old are you?’
‘Nineteen.’
‘A
nd how long have you lived in the Region?’
‘All my life.’
The doctor recorded something on screen. He looked up. ‘Are you in good health?’
‘Reasonably.’
‘Explain.’
Dom shrugged. ‘As well as can be expected.’
The doctor nodded. ‘Have you been ill at all?’
He’d been operated on, given new tech and brought to the brink of death. But none of it had been naturally occurring.
He answered honestly. ‘No.’
The doctor recorded something, then turned to Dom. ‘Roll up your sleeve.’
He did, presenting the arm without tech in it. The doctor placed a blood pressure cuff on him. Pressure built up, then lessened.
He took it off. ‘One twenty over eighty. Normal.’
Dom rolled his sleeve down.
Two new doctors dressed in white coats wheeled in a black machine big enough to stand in.
Panic flared in Dom’s chest. He hopped up from the chair and back, instantly recognising the design. ‘What the hell’s that doing here?’
The lead doctor looked intrigued. ‘What do you think it is?’
Dom eyed the machine again. ‘A copying machine.’
‘Actually, no. It’s a harmless body scanner.’ He rubbed his chin. ‘But I’m interested to hear about this other machine. What did it copy?’
Dom settled at hearing that. His pulse settled, too. But the man was too interested in his answer.
‘Nothing important.’
The lead doctor gestured to the chair again. ‘You seemed pretty rattled by it. What did it do?’
Dom sat down, not sure how much he should tell this stranger. He’d agreed to this examination as a way to see more of the place. But he still didn’t know what this place was or who these people were.
Yet, they knew about Copies.
‘It copied the Copies.’
The man lifted both brows. ‘A copy of a copy produces an inferior product.’
Didn’t he know it? Dom had been copied a few times. Each attempt had been marginally better than the first one.
He sighed, not wishing to see a repeat. ‘Are we done here?’
The lead doctor slid his glasses on. ‘No. I need to scan you. Head to toe.’ He looked over the top of his glasses. ‘Will I find anything unusual?’
Dom hesitated. ‘I have machine tech inside me.’
The man’s eyes widened briefly. He recorded something on his screen, then gestured for Dom to stand up and enter the machine.
Dom slowed his walk to it. The machine didn’t look exactly like the one he’d seen in the medical facility. For a start, this one had four open sides. Nor did it have a container of biogel needed to make an actual Copy.
He released a quiet breath and entered it by the front, then stood facing the doctor. A blue scanner started from his feet and swept up and back down. The scanner didn’t make his skin tingle. But neither had the machine in Arcis, right before his Copy had appeared.
‘You can exit now,’ said the doctor, frowning at the screen. ‘According to the scan, you have one new lung, one kidney, a new liver and adjustments to your arm.’ He looked up. ‘What would you say if I asked to see the tech?’
‘I’d say, over my dead body.’ He inched closer to the exit. ‘Are we done now?’
‘Not quite.’
The man nodded at the entrance. Dom turned to see the two spare doctors were now blocking the open door. Three soldiers appeared in the gap outside. The blockade parted suddenly and a frowning Agatha walked through.
‘Mr Pavesi,’ she said and the blockade closed again. ‘It appears you’ve been lying to us.’
‘How so?’
‘You fooled our scanners, brought unknown tech through to this side.’
‘You never asked.’
‘How many of you have this tech in you?’
‘Just me.’
Alex was human, as was Frahlia. And Jerome was more biogel than anything else. Carissa’s neuromorphic chip must have triggered the alarm, not any organs she might have received.
‘No matter. The physical exams of your followers should determine that.’ She stepped closer. ‘Your presence creates a dilemma, Dom. One I hope you can help us with.’
‘Help?’
‘Yes. We created this place to keep the machines out.’ Her hands disappeared behind her back. ‘But the fact that you fooled our systems tells us the machines have found a way to circumvent our controls. It means they pose a threat to our haven. Do you understand?’
‘Not really. Your scanner stopped the only Copy among us.’
Agatha paused. ‘The scanner we use separates humans from the Collective’s synthetic designs through a specific frequency the Copies put out. Humans emit a natural low frequency, but machines... they run on a network. Theirs is more of a vibration.’
Dom guessed Carissa’s self-repairing NMC emitted that vibration.
She brought her arms to the front and folded them. ‘We need to study the tech in you to determine why our scanners allowed you to pass.’
His blood ran cold. His pulse thundered in his veins.
Dom forced a smile. ‘Can we do this later? I’m starving.’
Agatha pursed her lips, then nodded at one of the soldiers. ‘Take him to the dining hall.’
One armed soldier led Dom out and away from the circle of doors, back down the corridor and into a wider one that ran beneath Agatha’s elevated prefab. It bothered him that he was being taken farther away from the Region, as Agatha had called it. Charlie and the others were still trapped there. He didn’t want anyone here to forget about them.
Despite his dilemma, any decision making would be sharper on a full stomach and a little sleep.
The soldier dropped him off at an entrance to a large room. Inside, tables and chairs were laid out in rows, with an aisle separating the rows into sections at intervals. Other Beyond soldiers looked up at him when he entered.
One pointed to a counter at the back wall.
‘Go there,’ he snapped and resumed eating.
Dom increased his step to the counter, partly to escape his armed escort, partly to see what food was on offer. He’d been living on rations for too long.
His mouth watered as he saw the display of fruit, an assortment of meats, pre-packed sandwiches and water. There were even bottles of beer. He grabbed a tray and loaded it up with a selection of food. He eyed the beer, but decided against it. Last thing he needed was a fuzzy head.
Dom sat at a table and ate his sandwich in record time. It tasted normal, not sweet like Arcis food could be. He chased it down with a long pull of water.
Anya walked in with Sheila, Imogen and Jerome. He waved at them. Anya’s gaze roamed the space, as though this were a place to fear. It might well be, but at least the food tasted good.
She neared the table, a question in her eyes.
‘Get some food and we’ll talk,’ he said.
She nodded and collected a tray. The others regarded the space quietly. They followed Anya to the counter. One by one, they returned with food and sat down at Dom’s table.
Dom eyed Anya’s selection. She had picked a sandwich, one piece of fruit and a cup of water. Similar to what she’d eaten while in Arcis.
She took a cautious bite, then sighed. Some of the tension lifted from her shoulders. ‘This is good.’
To the others, he said, ‘Eat what you can. We don’t know if this will be a regular thing.’
None of them talked. They’d all been weakened by the rations in the camp. With the threat over temporarily, they could concentrate on other things.
‘How did the medical go?’ Dom asked.
‘Passed with flying colours,’ said Anya.
Sheila and Imogen replied the same thing.
‘Jerome? What about you?’
The newborn shrugged. ‘They say I’m fine, but I don’t know if they know what I am.’
Anya leaned towards Dom. ‘What did t
hey say to you?’
He sighed. ‘They found my tech. They want to study me.’
She leaned back in her chair and looked around. Dom frowned. He’d thought she’d have something more to say on the matter.
‘We should get a good night’s sleep and ask tomorrow about bringing the others across,’ he said and drank more water.
Anya nodded, but she didn’t seem enthused by the idea.
She traded an odd look with Sheila and Jerome. A look that was reciprocated. Imogen was too busy eating to notice.
He put his bottle of water down. ‘Okay, what’s up with you?’
Anya’s eyes had widened slightly. ‘This place... it’s just odd.’
‘Odd, how?’
She studied the ceiling, the layout. ‘It reminds me of somewhere.’
‘Thank God you said it,’ muttered Sheila.
Imogen flashed her a curious look. Jerome looked as relieved as the pair.
Okay, now Dom’s curiosity was piqued. ‘Where?’
Anya leaned in closer. ‘You really don’t see it, Dom?’
‘See what?’
‘The food, the layout?’
He frowned at her.
‘The size is different and the food choices are more abundant but’—Anya shivered—‘right now, we could be sitting in any one of the dining halls in Arcis.’
22
Carissa
Carissa’s leg bounced while she watched the Inventor and Thomas work out how to get past the Copies in the Great Hall. Vanessa and Charlie stood huddled in a different corner of the workshop talking about something.
She hated the secrecy, the separation. It felt like it had when she’d severed her NMC and lost her link to the city. Not knowing if or when Quintus might contact her again made her leg shake more.
The Inventor looked up from his discussion and frowned at her. ‘Are you sure Quintus hasn’t been in contact again, miss?’
She nodded, wishing she could be more useful.
‘And it wouldn’t work to try the hack on the guards a second time?’
‘They’ve already learned from the attack. Their defences will be harder to breach. It won’t work a second time.’
One side of his mouth curled up into a smile, but the tension on his face said he was not happy with her answer. Neither was she. They were stuck in Praesidium and it was all her fault. If she hadn’t tried to enter the Beyond, the door wouldn’t have closed on them. A lump settled in her throat at the thought that her friends might perish here.