by Eliza Green
Serena nodded. ‘We can try. I’ll ask Arianna to draw up a list of users. She’s feeling anxious since she lost her empath ability.’
‘Most of the district is missing something. I want to make sure the ones who’ve lost the most get to use it first.’
‘Or,’ said Serena, ‘we could let the ones who haven’t go in first, give the Nexus more time to heal by using their stronger energies.’
It was a good idea, but that meant delaying his recovery. He just wished he could know what method would be the most successful. The Nexus was not one of his scientific experiments. He could not predict its reaction using numbers and permutations alone. It was a living, breathing entity with a playful attitude—and a spiteful one.
‘Whatever we do, it’s going to be traumatic.’ He mulled the problem over. ‘What if we present one of each: one Indigene with abilities, one without?’
Serena nodded slowly. ‘That might work. It would allow the Nexus to get familiar again with the different energies here.’
It was settled. ‘Have Arianna put that list together straight away. We start as soon as possible.’
He set the DPad down on the floor. Bill was not his concern at the moment. He would charge the device in a few days and check for messages then, when things had calmed down.
Serena paused. ‘Actually, I think you should be one of the first to use it. You don’t have to do it alone.’
Stephen blinked at her. ‘Me? Why, when there are others who need it more?’
It would please him immensely to have his abilities back, but a leader must see to the wellbeing of his charges first.
‘They look up to you. You must be strong enough to handle what comes next.’
The beat of his heart became erratic again. ‘And what do you think is coming next?’
He hated Serena’s forewarnings.
‘I don’t know, but the most obvious would be an attack on this district. We’ve just survived a walkout. We don’t know what the collective mood of those dissenters might be, where they will go, what they might do.’
Stephen knew exactly where they’d gone. ‘They followed Emile and Marie to District One. They already made it clear they preferred Emile’s teaching style to mine. Let them see for themselves that his undisciplined style is not without problems.’
Serena fell quiet. He wished he could hear her thoughts, feel her in his usual way. Without his skills, he was stripped naked and vulnerable. Like the humans.
‘Well?’ she prompted.
‘Well what?’
‘Are you going to be the first to use the Nexus besides me?’
‘Only if you come with me.’
‘Actually, I have someone else in mind.’
Stephen stared at her. ‘Who?’
The Nexus is fragile right now, and while I agree with using a stronger energy, I think it might be too much on the first real visit.’
☼
Stephen hid his excitement and trepidation as he stood outside the same tranquillity cave that had been the site of Tanya Li’s point of entry into the Nexus. He’d entered later after receiving the vaccine, to help purge the virus she’d created from the system.
His legs shook with fear at the notion of returning to it, and with a second Indigene who had also lost their skills. When Stephen had entered after receiving the vaccine, he’d done so without thinking, without considering that the Nexus might perceive him to be a threat. But now, having had time to think, the Nexus made him nervous. It was different to before, more feral since Tanya’s presence had created a virus there. While he understood the Nexus had only been defending itself, it still made it a dangerous place to visit.
Serena waited with Arianna behind him, at the entrance to the tunnel that led to the tranquillity cave’s entrance. A leader should test the waters first. But he would do it only if one other person joined him.
Anton stood next to him at the entrance, his gaze fixed on the floor. He wasn’t worried or scared. But he didn’t look thrilled about being a test subject at Serena’s behest, either.
‘What happened exactly when you used it last?’ Anton asked her.
‘It attacked me.’
‘But it’s not attacking now?’ Anton twisted his hands together.
‘It’s better,’ said Serena.
Anton glanced back at the pair.
Arianna stepped forward and grabbed his arm. ‘You don’t have to do this if you don’t want to.’
Anton smiled at her. ‘And let this idiot have all the fun?’
She let him go with an exasperated huff. ‘You two, you’re worse than a couple of Evolvers.’
Serena said to her, ‘It will be okay.’
She relented with another huff.
Stephen entered the cave first. It had two dozen units laid out in a grid-like pattern on the floor. There were no other users that day, but Stephen had a unit he preferred over the others: one nearest the back wall. The gamma rock and its amplifying properties was the strongest there.
He stood over one unit; Anton stood at the one next to him.
‘Should we get in?’ Anton asked.
‘I suppose so.’
It was the least confident they’d been using the Nexus, but there was only one way to get over the fear.
Stephen climbed into the hole using the stone steps. It felt like his first time, back when he’d been an Evolver on the cusp of becoming an adult. His mind had developed enough to make a connection with the Nexus.
As he sat on the floor, the butterflies in his stomach refused to settle.
He heard Anton climb into the hole next to him. A sigh escaped Stephen’s lips.
Serena peered into the top of his unit. ‘You okay?’
He nodded up at her. ‘I just need a moment to get into the right head space.’
He needed to be calm when entering the Nexus. Although, that had been the old space. Who knew if that rule applied anymore?
She said, ‘The Nexus, it might look a little different to how you remember it.’
He stared at her. ‘Different how?’
‘You’ll see. Don’t worry.’
Stephen closed his eyes and relaxed his mind as best he could. The wall before him changed into its usual shimmering, golden lattice. The usual white tendril—duller in brightness than he remembered—poked through the web. So far so normal. But the tendril drifted aimlessly around his arm, refusing to take his energy. Then it retreated lazily, listlessly, back through the lattice.
Okay, that was new.
Stephen picked his energy up and pushed it through the lattice, breaking the barrier between waking and subconscious.
His energy followed the tendril through to the other side. A bright light turned everything inside the Nexus white. Stephen blinked on the outside, feeling it pinch at his eyes as if he were looking at the light directly. The dazzle lessened and he saw the change that Serena had mentioned.
The Nexus wall was an off-white colour—different to the usual golden colour Stephen knew it could be—matching the colour of the tendrils jutting out from the wall. They were as listless as the one that had come for him. Stephen floated into the centre with caution. One of the listless tendrils touched him and drew back, not quite retreating inside the wall.
Anton’s energy joined him. His presence caused a deeper ripple of activity in the tendrils. As though they sensed their floating presence, each one jerked back violently from the pair.
Stephen came to a stop over the centre point where users’ bright energies would normally gather.
Unable to use his telepathy, he spoke aloud in his unit on the outside. ‘This is different.’
His voice sounded far away.
‘Why is the wall so white?’ asked Anton.
He imagined it was Indigene energy that had given it its previous colour. ‘The Nexus purged us from its system. It’s starting over. Serena’s energy has helped to clean the black virus from its s
ystem. Now it needs us.’
That was the best explanation he could give.
He floated over to the wall. It no longer pulsed with the spare energy of other users. The fat tendrils didn’t react to him.
He tried to press himself to the wall, but the wall refused to take him. He tried and failed again, with a huff. ‘I don’t know how to make a connection.’
Anton’s bright, golden energy weaved in and out of the sea of tendrils. They shrivelled up smaller the closer he came.
‘They don’t want to take us,’ said Stephen, huffing again.
‘Well, maybe we need to make them.’
Anton chased one tendril back to the wall, where it disappeared. One by one, the fat tendrils retreated, their tips still visible in the wall, but not much else. The farther Anton moved away from them, the farther out from the wall they extended.
Anton hovered near a spot in the wall where there were no visible tendrils. One peeked out cautiously in a curious way. It attached itself to his energy. The length of it pulsed as it began to feed. Then another tendril and another came, until his energy became consumed by a brighter tendril light. The scene alarmed Stephen.
‘Anton!’
He floated over to where his friend’s energy looked like it had become part of the wall. The second he did, one of the tendrils latched onto him and began to feed. Without other users present, the exchange felt more one-sided than usual. He allowed the Nexus to drink deeply. His worry lifted when the wall brightened momentarily to a pale yellow.
And that’s when he saw the problem. The Nexus was starving.
It needed energies—lots of them. But to introduce them too fast could overload the Nexus, or risk it taking too much too fast. It needed a little nutrition at a time. Until the Nexus was satiated, there would be no healing in this space.
He’d been looking at the problem backwards. First the Nexus needed to heal, then the Indigenes.
With great difficulty, he detached his energy from the wall. Then he helped to free Anton from the Nexus’ clutches.
‘What are you doing?’
‘We can’t do this alone, Anton. We need to bring more to the wall. We need to give back what we took from it.’
8
Marcus stood to the rear of the swell surrounding Harvey Buchanan and the Indigenes. He recognised some of the tall freaks from their joint efforts to keep watch over the Elite, not that long ago. Marcus had been of use then. But now?
The farther away from Harvey he stood, the less he felt a meaningful part of anything.
‘This won’t work for me,’ Marcus muttered.
He muscled part of the way in before men stronger than him shoved him back, too easily. He blamed his physical weakness on having been starved and beaten in jail. Okay, maybe not either, but he might as well have been. With a few free weights, it wouldn’t take him long to regain his strength.
Harvey chatted with a close-knit group in the middle, some from the human side, some from the Indigene side. So far away, he couldn’t hear what they were saying.
He tried a second time to muscle in closer to their discussions. He caught the words “power down” and “uprising” from Harvey.
Marcus grunted at the useless information. He’d figured that shit out on the car ride over here.
Buchanan finished up his little chat and addressed the group of men and women. ‘We have locked down the cities. There’s no in or out. The power outage gives us control over everything that happens within the city borders.’
‘What then?’ one of the brawnier men asked.
Harvey turned his cold, hard glare on the man. ‘Then we push the ITF out of their role and take over as the ruling class. What do you think we’re doing this for?’
The man shrugged. ‘Dunno. What if the people don’t want us in power?’
‘You’d be surprised what a lack of light and heat will make people do.’
With that description, he could have been talking about Earth—an Earth Marcus had helped to maintain. So why was he standing on the periphery of this discussion?
He made another attempt to get closer, managing to get a few layers deeper before the numbers locked him in position.
Harvey continued. ‘Trust me, the people are open to a change in command. They just don’t know it yet. I’ve seen it happen on Earth.’
Marcus had heard enough. He shouted towards the front. ‘I have experience with keeping people under control.’
All eyes turned to him. Most disregarded him with a fuck-off look. He wished he had his old, life-hardened face back, including the neck scar that would show the men and women he’d been through hell and survived. And that they could not intimidate him. But Harvey had given him the face of a goddamn librarian.
Buchanan said to the group, ‘Marcus used to work for the criminals on Earth.’
One man said, ‘Yeah? How did that work out for ya?’
Pretty well, he wanted to say, but it hadn’t. If it had, he wouldn’t be here with a completely different face. He wondered if Harvey would be up for reversing the work done to his face. Marcus saw no point in pretending to be someone else. Taggart knew who he was. And he was on the right side of society once more.
Even if that society included the Indigene freaks.
Harvey said, ‘On Exilon 5 we’ll be doing things differently, adopting a more inclusive approach than the criminal gangs did on Earth. Oppression only gets you so far.’ He flicked his gaze to Marcus, then away. ‘As I was saying, our priority is to keep control of the cities and stop the ITF from gaining access to any of the base stations. We have control of those too. Without them the ITF is as vulnerable to attack as anyone else.’
‘So why don’t we attack the ITF offices?’ suggested one woman.
‘Because it’s not where the real work is being done. The ITF is online. By removing its access to the network, we can choke their hold on this city, change the message that is being delivered.’ Harvey pointed to different people in the room. ‘I’m dividing you all into teams. Each team will support the efforts of our people in the cities who are controlling matters there.’
Before long, Buchanan had created a dozen groups made up of people and Indigenes. The teams headed out.
That left Marcus and half a dozen men. Harvey said to the men, ‘Watch this place. Nobody in or out. Got it?’
They nodded and took up positions around the docking station.
Marcus had been more than patient through Harvey’s little speech. Maybe Buchanan was saving the best position for last.
‘What about me?’ he asked.
Harvey looked him over. ‘You’re watching the kid.’
‘What? Babysit him? I’ve better skills than sitting on my arse, Harvey.’
‘And I’ve yet to see them.’
The thought of looking after that little shit made him tense. ‘Why don’t we kill him? He’s of no use to anyone.’
Harvey rounded on him. ‘Because he’s collateral. Bill Taggart wants him. We have him.’ He poked Marcus in the chest. ‘And you are too stupid to realise it. That’s why you stay and others lead.’
Harvey headed for the exit and left. The second Marcus was sure he was off the premises, he yelled into the space. The men shouted at him to ‘shut the hell up.’
Gritting his teeth, he stomped over to the room where he’d left Ben tied up. They might not be on Earth, but the kid was still fucking up his life.
He walked inside the room and over to the chair. He kicked it. Hard.
Ben squeezed his eyes shut. After a second, he opened them and smiled. ‘What’s the matter, Marcus, did the new Agostini just put you in your place?’
Marcus saw red. He slapped the boy across the face. Blood leaked from Ben’s lip.
But the teen still smiled through it. ‘Bill Taggart will come for me, and when he does you’re going to wish you weren’t here.’
A heavy pressure built up in his chest and mad
e it hard to breathe. He kicked the chair again, sending it sliding back a little. ‘I don’t give two fucks about who you know. You’re the prisoner here. You’re not going anywhere.’
‘Yet, Harvey won’t let you leave this place. That’s the same as being a prisoner, right?’
Marcus studied the black-haired boy—well, more of a young man now. For all his brave talk, he was also shaking. He’d sensed the same fear from him when he’d visited Marcus in the prison box not that long ago. Now, the shoe was on the other foot, and he wasn’t against using it to kick him.
‘Taggart locked me up. Now I’m free,’ he said. Clearly, the teen needed a reminder. ‘Harvey needs me. He needs you alive... and the second he doesn’t, I’ll be there to make sure you die like your granddaddy and fake brother did.’
Ben tensed up and clenched his fists. Yeah, talking about that pair was how Marcus would keep the runt in line.
‘Now shut your mouth or I’ll put a gag on you.’
Ben lifted his chin. His smile had been replaced by a sneer. ‘You’d better do it then because I have plenty more to say.’
Marcus looked around the room for something to gag him with. Except for the chair, the room was empty. But the rope he’d used to tie Ben’s limbs had extra length. Marcus picked up the ends, tied a knot halfway up one and stuffed it into the kid’s mouth, tying it at the back.
The kid mumbled something.
Marcus worked the knot down. ‘What?’
Ben licked his lips. ‘I said you’re a glorified babysitter.’
Marcus shoved the knot in his mouth, rougher than before.
He kicked the chair one last time and stomped out of the room.
Outside, the men scattered around the space—some were up on the balcony—were all watching him.
‘You used to work for the criminals on Earth, yeah?’ one said.
Marcus lifted his chin. Finally, some respect.
‘Yeah.’
The guard cast him a long, cool look. ‘Can’t say I’m surprised they lost the war there. I heard they were defeated by a bunch of kids and an elderly man.’