Borderline (Hive Mind Book 4)

by Janet Edwards

  “Our hydroponics area grows all the fresh fruit and flowers for my unit,” added Mira proudly. “We send supplies to the rest of the Hive as well.”

  I hesitated. “Don’t your family find it odd that a hydroponics worker has a luxurious apartment?”

  Mira gurgled with laughter. “I usually visit my parents on Level 63, but I have a little apartment in my unit for when they visit me. Everyone in my unit dresses up in low level clothes when my parents are coming, so they can pretend they work in the hydroponics area too. It’s great fun.”

  “I see.” I focused on the issue of Gregas again. “Where was my brother trespassing when you arrested him?”

  “In a Level 52 crawl way in Blue Zone,” said Mira briskly. “I’d just linked to my target, and didn’t know anyone else was in the maintenance area. Some of my Strike team met Gregas and Wesley when they were going through the crawl way.”

  “Wesley,” I said the name bitterly. “That explains everything. Wesley and my brother were best friends before they went to Teen Level. The two of them were allocated rooms on corridors in different areas, but they still kept in touch. If there was a Teen Game running in Blue Zone, Wesley was bound to get involved out of pure curiosity. He must have talked Gregas into playing it too.”

  I groaned. “Where are Gregas and Wesley now?”

  “My Tactical Commander told my Strike team to arrest the boys and take them to our holding cells. Roden sent a psychologist to talk to them about what happened when they met my target, but they wouldn’t tell her anything.”

  I abruptly swapped from being annoyed with Gregas to being worried about him. “Gregas and Wesley didn’t just get in the way of your Strike team then? They’d actually met your target?”

  “Yes. They were running away from him.”

  I remembered what had happened to the game group on today’s emergency run. One had been injured, and another left traumatized. “My brother wasn’t physically hurt?” I asked urgently.

  “Neither of the boys was hurt.”

  “What about mental trauma? Distress?”

  Mira waved her hands in a helpless gesture. “Roden said he’d need me to read the boys’ minds and find out if they needed help, but I had to wait until I’d rested to do that.”

  I was getting a bad feeling about this. A really bad feeling. “I understand you needed the standard twenty-four hour recovery period after your emergency run. Are you saying that you read Gregas’s mind after that?”

  “Yes, but I stopped as soon as I found out he was your brother,” said Mira. “Roden is worried about me reading your brother’s mind. He says it could cause a lot of trouble.”

  I tugged at my hair. I was feeling ridiculously annoyed about this. No, annoyed wasn’t quite the right word. I couldn’t pin down the emotion I was feeling. I’d been so careful not to read Gregas’s mind myself, and now another telepath had done it.

  “It was bad manners for me to read your brother’s mind without asking you first,” said Mira. “I called you to explain it wasn’t my fault.”

  I tried to be rational about this. It wouldn’t be fair for me to blame Mira for what had happened. I could certainly blame her unit staff though.

  “Why didn’t anyone tell you that Gregas was my brother?”

  “They didn’t know,” said Mira. “Someone had asked the boys for their names and identity codes, but Gregas gave the details of another boy on his corridor on Teen Level, and Wesley just kept calling him Killer Rabbit.”

  “Killer Rabbit?” I repeated in disbelief. “Why would Wesley call my brother Killer Rabbit?”

  “Killer Rabbit is Gregas’s game name,” explained Mira helpfully. “Teen Game players use game names instead of their real ones, and some of them are really strange. Wesley’s game name is Coconut Crunch Cake.”

  “Gregas must have lied about his name and identity code because he didn’t want me to find out about him being arrested. In that case, I should be the one apologizing to you.”

  Mira beamed at me. “I knew there was no need for Roden to fuss. You were bound to be helpful about this. Everyone says that you’re a good and helpful telepath.”

  I wondered if Mira’s reference to everyone meant the other telepaths or the people in her unit.

  “Well, everyone except Keith,” added Mira, “and we all know why he’s being so mean about you.”

  I was tempted to ask what Keith had been saying about me, but decided that would be a bad idea.

  Mira dropped her voice to a confiding whisper. “Roden mustn’t know about me calling you. Telepaths calling each other has to stay the biggest of secrets. I just told Roden that he mustn’t do anything at all about Gregas until I’d had a little think.”

  She raised her voice to its normal volume again. “Do you want us to let Gregas go, or send him to your unit? Roden is worried about us letting Gregas go without treatment, but it’s your decision what we do with your brother.”

  “What was the incident in that area?”

  “A man went to a party when he knew he wasn’t wanted. People told him to go away, so he hit some of them. Then he smashed lots of things, poured something over them, and set them on fire. It was a big mess.”

  Mira stretched her arms wide to indicate the scale of the mess. “Then the man ran away, and some hasties called for help. When my team arrived, it took me a long time to find the man. He’d gone four levels higher up and got lost in the maintenance crawl ways.”

  “So this man was violent,” I muttered. “Did you see him thinking about meeting Gregas and Wesley?”

  “No, but he was soup.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Mind full of broken bits of thought,” said Mira. “Like vegetable soup. Then he found out he was being chased. He went into panic loop, just thinking about getting away. You know what that’s like.”

  “I know exactly what that’s like,” I said gloomily.

  Mira shrugged. “And then Roden called the strike. My target was caught and taken away. So what do you want us to do with Gregas?”

  I stared down at my hands. Learning Mira had read my brother’s mind, however briefly, had made me feel deeply uncomfortable. The thought of Mira’s staff treating Gregas, and possibly resetting his memory, was even more disturbing.

  If something terrible had happened to Gregas and Wesley … Well, it might be best if their chains of memories were unravelled back to a point before they met the wild bee, so their lives wouldn’t be overshadowed by dark memories. I couldn’t let that happen unless I was sure it was necessary though.

  I groaned. I’d been carefully avoiding reading the minds of my parents and brother, because I didn’t want to encounter their thoughts about me or nosies. Now I had no choice about reading Gregas’s mind, unless … If Gregas and Wesley had been together the whole time, then there was a chance I could learn all I needed from Wesley’s mind.

  I lifted my head again. “Would you be able to send both Gregas and Wesley to my unit?”

  Mira nodded. “I’ll get Roden to call your unit about them being arrested. You can tell him what to do.”

  Sapphire and Morton had both kept their conversations with me as short as they could. Now we’d finished discussing the Gregas situation, I expected Mira to say goodbye and end the call. Instead, she moved to a nearby chair, settled herself into its luxurious cushions, and started talking about a totally different subject.

  “Roden told me that you’re married to your Tactical Commander.”

  I wasn’t in the right mood for a light-hearted chat with Mira, but I couldn’t risk offending her when she had Gregas in her unit’s holding cells. “Well, Lucas and I aren’t actually married, but we are sharing my apartment.”

  Mira made a clicking sound with her tongue. “It’s the same thing, but you should have a wedding as soon as you can. Weddings are joyful. My husband and I get married every Valentine festival.”

  I blinked. “I’m not sure that Lucas wants us to have a wedding yet. He
hasn’t said anything to me about it.”

  Mira gave me a confused look. “Why would he say anything to you? It’s always the higher level person who suggests weddings.”

  I blinked again. People in the Hive lived and socialized on their own level, and were expected to marry someone of exactly the same level as them. Even people assigned to Law Enforcement, who almost all lived and worked on its private Level 20, had an apartment in a housing warren appropriate for their true personal level, and usually obeyed the social conventions on marriage. In the rare cases where a relationship bridged a level gap, tradition insisted the higher level person was the one to propose marriage.

  I’d known that, but I hadn’t thought how it applied to Lucas and me. I kept thinking of us as both being Level 1 and equal. The reality was that Lucas was far more valuable to the Hive than an ordinary Level 1 citizen, but I was literally priceless. Mira was right. Lucas would expect any mention of marriage or other plans for the future to come from me rather than him.

  Mira was still happily chatting away. “I’m glad that you’re married. Morton, Sapphire, and Keith are very lonely people. It makes it hard to talk to them.”

  I considered what I’d seen in people’s minds about Sapphire’s lovers. “I agree that Morton is lonely, but I’m not so sure about Sapphire.”

  Mira made the clicking noises again. “You don’t know Sapphire very well.”

  “It’s true that I’ve only had a couple of conversations with her.”

  “When did you meet Lucas?” asked Mira.

  “I met Lucas soon after I came out of Lottery. My Senior Administrator said he was the best candidate to be my Tactical Commander, and I had to do the standard initial check on his mind.”

  “Geo and I met on our third day on Teen Level,” said Mira proudly. “We were in the same learning support group, and we went everywhere together. I was so sad when we had to say goodbye before Lottery, but when I came to my unit I found Geo was here. So were all my other friends from the learning support group.”

  She smiled in delight. “Everyone was here except the mean girl who kept calling me names, and none of us missed her.”

  I was stunned. Over a million eighteen-year-olds went through Lottery every year. Mira’s friends couldn’t have ended up in her unit by pure chance. I imagined what must have happened back then. Lottery had found a new telepath, but one that would find the stress and demands of her role especially hard. There would have been urgent consultations, and someone made the decision that the friends who’d been in Mira’s support group on Teen Level should come to support her again in her new life as a telepath. Did Mira know that?

  “It sounds a wonderful arrangement,” I said.

  “The Hive knows best.”

  The way Mira said that showed she knew exactly what had happened back then.

  “You and I are very lucky to be married,” continued Mira earnestly. “Claire told me that it’s hard to find someone who can truly accept you as both a person and a telepath, and it grows even harder with each year that passes. She said that time factor is why the Hive makes sure we have nice people in our unit.”

  I frowned. When I first discovered Lottery had chosen my Strike team candidates to be suitable boyfriends for me, I’d been indignant and discussed the issue with Lucas. He’d pointed out the potential problems of me having a relationship with someone outside my unit, but he hadn’t said anything about a time factor.

  That probably meant Lucas didn’t know about it. There were some things that the Hive didn’t want telepaths to know, such as the reason we weren’t allowed to meet, and those things were carefully excluded from the imprints of Telepath Unit staff. I could understand the Hive not wanting telepaths to know there was some sort of time pressure on them finding partners. If I hadn’t already been in a relationship with Lucas, then the knowledge that time was running out for me would be deeply unsettling.

  “I know that I’m very lucky,” I said. “I could never find anyone else like Lucas.”

  “If Lucas is a Tactical Commander, then he must be very clever.”

  I thought of the myriad shining levels of Lucas’s mind. “Yes, he’s very clever indeed.”

  “Geo isn’t clever,” said Mira fondly, “but he’s very gifted in other ways. Most of my friends work in the hydroponics area and grow lovely flowers, but the ones Geo grows are the most beautiful of all.”

  There were multiple reasons for the hydroponics area then. Mira pretended to her family that she worked there, but her husband and friends genuinely did work there.

  “Flowers are very important to me,” added Mira. “They help me chase away the shadows.”

  “Shadows?” I asked eagerly. “You mean the lingering echoes of the target minds you read?”

  “Yes.” Mira reached out a hand to touch one of the cornflowers.

  Despite my anxiety about Gregas, this conversation was fascinating me. When I came out of Lottery, I’d desperately wanted to talk to another telepath and ask their advice. It was a long time before I was contacted though, first by Sapphire and then by Morton, and they’d both been wary of answering my questions. I was finally talking to a telepath who was friendly and willing to offer me information.

  “I cleanse myself of echoes by going Outside,” I said.

  Mira shuddered. “You need to find a better way than that. It’s dangerous going Outside. The hunter of souls and his demon pack are out there.”

  I considered explaining that the hunter of souls and his demon pack were just myths out of Halloween stories, but decided not to bother. I’d had a similar conversation with Morton and failed to change his views on Outside.

  The myths centred on the festivals of Carnival and Halloween were designed to socially condition people into believing that the only safe place in the world was inside the walls of our Hive. That social conditioning had a particularly profound impact on the subconscious minds of dutiful people like my parents. I suspected Mira was innately dutiful too.

  “My unit is working on ways to help me relax inside the Hive.” I changed the subject. “You mentioned Claire telling you things. Did you know her well?”

  Mira pulled a sad face. “Yes. I miss talking to Claire. She was a wise person and helped me find my way back.”

  I was confused. “Find your way back from where?”

  “From distancing,” said Mira. “Telepaths usually start distancing within the first year after Lottery. I wasn’t distant for long because I had Geo, and you will never be distant at all.”

  “I won’t? Why not?”

  “Roden says that you feel the emotions of the people you read. Morton, Sapphire, and Keith don’t feel emotions at all, so they were very distant. Morton and Sapphire found their way back after a few years. Keith seemed to be doing the same, but then he got worse again. He’s still distant now.”

  “Oh.” I still wasn’t sure what Mira meant by distancing, but was distracted by her comment about feeling emotions. “You said that Morton, Sapphire, and Keith don’t feel emotions. You do feel them though?”

  “Sometimes. Especially when I’m with Geo.” Mira blushed. “That’s a very private secret though, so you mustn’t tell anyone.”

  “I promise I’ll never tell anyone your secrets.”

  “Claire felt emotions sometimes too,” said Mira.

  “I wish I’d met her.”

  “Claire was a Hiveist,” said Mira. “She said that her spirit would be reborn to serve the Hive, so I might meet her again in her new life. You may meet her too.”

  “Are you a Hiveist like Claire?” I asked.

  “I haven’t made my mind up yet. Claire said that meant I was still seeking my truth.”

  “In that case, I’m still seeking my truth too. I haven’t spoken to Keith yet. What’s he like?”

  “I told you Keith was still distant. That means he’s dangerous. Lucas used to work for Keith. When you came out of Lottery, Keith agreed to let Lucas go to your unit and be your Tactical Commande
r. After your Light Angel mission, Keith told Gold Commander Melisande he’d changed his mind. He tried to make her send Lucas back to his unit.”

  “What?” I realized I’d shrieked the word, and Mira was looking alarmed. “I’m sorry. I’m not angry with you, but … I didn’t know Keith had done that. I’m sure that Lucas doesn’t know about it either.”

  I fought to get myself back under control. “I know that Keith’s intermittent telepathy makes some of his emergency runs end in failure. I can understand him wanting to find a way to do better. I suppose Keith didn’t know I was in a relationship with Lucas, but why would he think that having Lucas back would help him? Keith’s Tactical Commander, Gaius, is excellent at his job.”

  Mira gave me a pitying look. “Keith knew all about you and Lucas. Keith didn’t want Lucas back because he thought it would help him do better. He wanted Lucas back to make you unhappy.”

  “You mean that Keith deliberately tried to take my partner away from me. That’s really …” I’d learned plenty of obscene words from reading Adika’s mind, and was tempted to use some of them now, but felt that I couldn’t in front of Mira. “Why would Keith want to make me unhappy?”

  “Keith is cross with other telepaths because his telepathy cuts out sometimes, but ours doesn’t,” said Mira. “Roden says Keith is extra cross with you because he doesn’t like people calling your unit Light Angel.”

  She shrugged. “Gold Commander Melisande told Keith that she wouldn’t send Lucas back. Then Keith tried causing trouble to make her do what he wanted. Morton, Sapphire, and I told him that he had to stop, or we’d cause trouble for him.”

  “Thank you for doing that.”

  “What Keith was trying to do was very, very, very bad manners.” Mira suddenly looked formidably stern. “If we’d let Keith take Lucas from you, then he’d have tried the same nasty trick on us next. I’m not letting Keith do anything to harm Geo.”

  She shook her head. “The other Tactical Commanders know what Keith did, but Gold Commander Melisande said they shouldn’t tell anyone in your unit. Morton thought Gold Commander Melisande was right about that. He said the problem was solved and telling you about Keith would just cause more trouble. If you knew Keith had been nasty to you, then you might be nasty to Keith in return.”