"What does that matter?"
"Maybe you could let me sit up and breathe for a bit?"
"You stalked an enforcer to her home and entered her cube without permission. That's more than enough to keep you pinned to the floor."
"As long as you're enjoying yourself. I just have to wonder how long you intend to hold me like this. Without functioning augments, it's not like you can call for backup."
He has a point there. I glance at the console on my dinner table.
"Want to borrow my phone?" He gives it yet another wiggle.
"I wouldn't know how to use that old thing."
"Let me call for you—"
I squeeze his throat, turning his voice into a pathetic wheeze. "Tell me what you're doing here."
"Investigating," he rasps.
"What?"
"Who." His chuckle sounds like it belongs to an old man. "You, Enforcer Chen. I take it you don't remember. My face has changed a little, but I was still hoping you'd know me." We took a long trip together before we were born...
I pull away from him at the unwelcome telepathic projection, inadvertently loosening my hold on his neck. He twists with the speed and agility of a trained athlete, gripping both my wrists and rolling me onto my back. The antique phone clatters across the floor.
"I won't hurt you," he says, staring down at me. Straddling me now.
"Wish I could say the same." I bring up a knee, ramming it squarely into his left kidney. As he lurches upward in a combination of wide-eyed surprise and grimacing pain, I bring up my other knee just as hard, aimed strategically for his groin.
With a loud groan, he lets go of me and collapses onto his side, cradling his crotch with both hands.
"Stay the hell out of my head." I'm on my feet, backpedaling toward the kitchen and the one large knife I keep on hand for infrequent culinary adventures. The blade is dusty but sharp. I hold it out toward the bruised intruder and lean toward my console on the table. Swiping a hand across the screen to power it up, I glance at the keys as I type in the number for HQ.
"You won't get through," he says, curled up with his eyes closed. Yet he seems to know exactly what I'm doing. "In an emergency situation like this, every citizen in the dome will be calling law enforcement. Thinking they're helping. Claiming they've seen terrorists on the move in their buildings, on their streets."
"Are you one of them? A patriot?"
He shakes his head. "Doesn't matter what I say. You'll think what you want. You've always been stubborn." Wincing, he sits up, leaning against the wall. He turns his head and looks at me. Oddly enough, there's a hint of amusement in his eyes. "So you don't remember Tucker? That long trek through the desert?"
I scowl at that. There are no deserts, not in Eurasia.
"What about Margo?" he prods. "You two seemed to get along real well, from what I remember. Always talking to each other, back and forth. Telepathically."
I have the number dialed. I just have to connect. "You've got me confused with someone else."
He shakes his head slowly, eyes locked with mine. "I've done my research. Believe me, it's taken some effort. The way they've got us separated across the Domes in different social castes, working opposite shifts. Could they be more obvious?"
Could he be more obtuse? Unless… "You're talking about the Twenty."
"We've got that big banquet coming up. Like that's going to iron out years of their abusive power. Let's celebrate! What exactly? Oh, right. Years of filling sperm and egg banks. Making babies for upper-class citizens." His brow creases as he watches my expression. "Wait. You didn't know." He curses under his breath. "Sorry. I've been looking forward to talking to you, but everything's spilling out like sewage here." He mimes vomiting. As if I couldn't find him more unattractive.
"Let me get this straight." My hand hovers over the console keyboard. "You expect me to believe you're one of the Twenty. That you don't snort dust but have bizarre abilities anyway. And that you remember me from when we were kids."
"Before, actually. We first met while we were fetuses." He shrugs. "Weird, huh?"
"You think we're siblings."
"You ran the DNA search. You tell me."
I narrow my gaze, studying his facial features. No, his face didn't show up in the results.
"Right." He grins. "You and I have something in common: we each have nine siblings exactly the same age we are. What are the odds?"
Not good. Nothing about this makes any sense. Time to shift gears. "You say you've been looking for me. What was last night all about? Why not make your first impression on my doorstep?"
He raises an eyebrow. Going for dashing now. "I had my reasons. One being the opportunity to knock out your augments. They get in the way." He leans toward me and stage whispers, "Of your abilities."
I've had enough of this. I connect to HQ. A message flashes on the screen about expected response times taking longer than usual, and that my call will be answered in the order it was received. Fabulous.
"Okay, you think I'm nuts. How about this: read my mind. Gather all the intel you want. I give you permission to ransack the place." He taps his temple. "Go on. I dare you."
Compared to how I spent the wee hours of the morning, tossing and turning and screaming to make the voices stop, I'm doing pretty well holding myself together. Somehow I managed to quiet the thoughts pouring in from my neighbors, and I'm not about to risk opening those floodgates by digging into this guy's mind. I don't care what he's got going on in there, whether I'll find out if he's actually a terrorist or a dust freak or if we were friends as kids. If he, of all people, was invited to the Revelation Banquet, then that's another reason for me not to go.
But who am I kidding? I've always dreamt of being more than a curfew enforcer. And if this newfound telepathic ability is my key to becoming an interrogator—
"I don't know how," I blurt out, surprised to be admitting such a thing to this stranger. I glance at the console and see the wait time now at twenty minutes. When I look back at him, he's smiling.
"I could teach you." Another casual shrug. "I've been augment-free for a while. Plenty of time to practice."
"They let you do that?"
"Who?"
"Your parents. Superiors." Whoever the government put in charge of him before he joined his terrorist cell.
"I wasn't fortunate enough to grow up in Dome 1."
Time for his sob story. I take a seat at my table, figuring I'd better settle in. "Let me guess: Dome 10?" Sewage treatment would suit him well.
He laughs. "Close. Dome 9."
"You were a farmer." Surprising.
"Until I earned enough to take the maglev to the big city. Made a handful of connections, met the right people. All very fortuitous. They seemed to think my face would be tolerable in VR and Linkstream ads."
"Oh, so you're a model." I feign a disgusting mix of astonishment and awe.
"I prefer actor. Pays the bills. Gives me time for my research." He winks at me.
"Stalking."
"You want in here or not?" Another temple-tap. "I can lead you through it. But it'll work best if we communicate telepathically throughout the process."
"I have a feeling I'm not your first."
He smirks. "Listen, I'm not going to force you to do anything. You tell me to beat it, I'm out of here. We'll catch up at the banquet." With a grimace, he moves to rise.
"You're not going anywhere." I point the knife at him.
"She's got me right where she wants me," he murmurs.
I give the console another glance; I still have fifteen minutes to wait. Then another ten before the retriever's aerocar arrives to cart this guy's ass to HQ for holding. So I have some time to kill.
"Fine." I exhale, but I don't relax my grip on the knife. "Show me."
"It works best if you close your eyes—"
"Not happening."
He nods as if to say he figured as much. You've managed to quiet the other voices—neighbors, people flying by you
r window. Otherwise, you'd be a basket case right now. So that's good. What you'll need to do is focus on my thoughts. We're sharing a telepathic link at the moment. I'm sending, you're receiving. But in order to read thoughts that I'm not sharing, you'll have to trace this signal to its source. Pull back the curtain—
You're a big fan of metaphors, I think at him without realizing what I'm doing.
He grins. There you go. You've taken your first step. Another metaphor, I assume, since I'm not moving. Now maintain that trajectory, and let's see what you can read on your own. I'm not going to send anything your way for a few seconds.
The quiet is welcome.
Followed by a blast of moving images and dissonant sounds, another maelstrom similar to what I experienced from my neighbors, but this time the storm emanates from only one source: the young man sitting on my floor. I try not to flinch as scenes from his life hurtle past me and crowd my vision. Not my actual vision—I can still see everything in my cube. I haven't closed my eyes. This is some kind of hyperreality, overlaid on top of what's really real. Moving and breathing ghosts from this guy's past.
I have to remind myself to breathe as I learn more about him than I ever cared to know. This is an investigation, nothing more. He doesn't know me. We share no blurry past. He's a dust addict, and my augments are just wonky, giving me these superhuman mental abilities.
His name is Erik. Scenes play out from when he was a boy, live-action footage that's blurry around the edges. We were at the same boarding school before they split us up—Camp Hope. Playing hide and seek in the dormitory, chasing each other up and down those faux-mahogany stairs, three flights of madness, laughter, then some tears as I slipped and fell, splitting open my left knee. Erik was there at my side when I landed in a crumpled heap. He had his sweater off and bunched up, pressed against the bleeding, his brow knitted with concern. He blamed himself, but I was the klutz who'd tripped on the braided rug. He was always too fast for me to catch.
Absently, I rub my knee beneath the stiff material of my black uniform. The scar remains to this day.
I glance at him. Erik. Resting with his eyes closed and his hands folded across his flat abdomen. He is one of the Twenty, and I do remember him. But why haven't I until this moment?
Never looking back...we live only now…
A chill shivers down my neck even though I'm sitting in sunlight.
Next item to investigate: dust usage. Like running a search on the Linkstream, I scan Erik's memories for any illicit deals with dust smugglers or moments alone with a line or two of the stuff ready to snort. There's nothing. Not a single longing glance at a snuff box.
So he's not a dust freak. But I can't wrap my mind around any alternative explanation for his abilities. Is he some kind of superhuman? An above-average VR model living a few rungs higher on the evolutionary ladder?
Erik is two for two, as far as telling the truth. Next up: his involvement with terrorists and the attack on Hawthorne Tower. Will he be three for three? Has he been straight with me this whole time?
A knock at my door causes the scenes and sounds from Erik's mind to dissipate like steam. I glance at the console. My call was received five minutes ago, and a retriever was dispatched to my location. That's who must be outside.
How did I lose track of time?
Shutting down the console, I return my kitchen knife to its resting place and step over Erik on my way to the door. He looks sound asleep. Must be exhausting to have someone sift through your memories.
I wave my hand in front of the door, and it slides aside. Two of the Chancellor's security clones stand in the hallway, shoulder to shoulder. Their white armor shines, pristine, as do their black face shields. No way to tell what they look like underneath. No reason to. They all look the same, from what I hear.
"Sera Chen, you will come with us," they say in unison, in the same gender-neutral robotic voice. Even though they're flesh and blood, these things always behave more like automatons than people.
"What's going on?" I keep my body between them and Erik. No idea why. Subconsciously, do I think of him now as the impish boy I often had to protect from our headmaster? I was good at talking us out of difficult situations. Our teachers had no patience for childish pranks; they expected us to behave like miniature adults. "I'm supposed to report for duty—"
"By order of the Chancellor, under Emergency Stipulation 5.6, Subsection 2, in the event of a threat against law and order, all members of the Twenty are to be sequestered until that threat has been neutralized."
I nod slowly. The Tower attack must be even worse than it sounded. "The Chancellor authorized this?"
"The Chancellor is missing."
I glance from one face shield to the other, seeing my own startled expression reflected back at me.
"So, you're rounding up the Twenty?" Erik stands behind me in the reflection, hands in his pockets. Nonchalant as ever.
I keep my back to him.
The clones' heads twitch a degree to the side as if they've both received the same information on their heads-up displays.
"Erik Paine," they say, "you will also come with us."
"No thanks." He reaches around me, like he's going to hug me from behind. But thankfully that's not what he's up to.
It's something worse.
He tosses two discs at the clones, each device only a few centimeters in diameter, and they affix to the white chest plates. Before either security clone can react, blue lightning radiates outward from each disc, and the clones shudder in place. Their power-suits act as a conduit for this massive shock to their systems, sending them toppling to the hallway floor where they continue to twitch with residual spasms well after the lightning show ends.
Erik presses past me to retrieve the clones' assault rifles. He tucks one under each arm and points the muzzles at the floor. Then he gives me a dashing smile.
"Want to get out of here, Enforcer Chen?"
Part II
Reunion
6 Bishop
19 Months After All-Clear
Countless charred bodies cover the ground for a hundred meters in every direction. Black bones, black gaping skulls. Without any skin on them, it's difficult to tell Eden's collared mutants from Cain's superhumans. Fire raining from the sky will do that.
This is how the UW deals with problems: overkill in the extreme.
The carnage is motivation enough for Luther's people to hand over all twenty of their children. Milton had to fly out west to the caves to retrieve the two that were there; the rest came from Eden's sublevels. All carried by hand to the waiting UW troops, all accounted for.
The incubation units have been loaded onto the hoverplanes and strapped securely into place. We're ready to ship out.
"Sergeant." One of the marines aboard the lead plane beckons for me to join him inside. A short walk up the loading ramp, and I'll be parked alongside the unborn children I was sent to collect. Taken back to the Argonaus and Captain Mutegi.
Then home to my family. My wife, Emma. My children, Mara and Emmanuel. My heart swells at the thought of it.
Tears sting my eyes as I look back at Luther, Samson, and the others. They haven't moved from where they stood minutes ago, when they gave us their children. They watch us now, their black goggles fixed on our planes, their faces covered by strips of cloth. Are they broken inside? Is that why they don't move—because they can't?
I want to thank them for their sacrifice. By giving up these fetuses, they're giving the civilized world a future. They won't be forgotten. And who's to say they won't be able to have other children someday?
Not that anyone should do such a foolish thing on this quarantined continent.
"Sergeant Bishop!" the marine shouts. "Time to go!"
I give him a nod and fight my unwieldy hazard suit to raise a hand in farewell. Only one of the superhumans responds in like manner. I recognized his voice earlier when he spoke to the UW troops: the man named Luther.
More than anything els
e, he wanted these twenty unborn children to be safe. He didn't want the superhumans from the coast or that madman Willard to destroy them. I'm sure Luther wanted to keep them and raise them in his happy cave cult, but this is what I came here to do. Fulfill my mission objective and get the hell out. Make sure these babies grow up in Eurasia where they'll be safe from cannibal mutants, gene-altering dust, and deadly sunshine. In the Domes, they'll be able to live a normal life—and then some.
I haul myself up the ramp and take a seat in the cargo section. One of the marines straps me in, fastening the buckles over my chest plate and lap. I watch the lights on the incubation chambers blink with a steady rhythm, and I think of Granger, Sinclair, and Harris. It's wrong to be making this trip without them. They were supposed to be here beside me.
They will be soon. We're stopping to retrieve their remains outside of Luther's Homeplace. Then it'll be a direct flight to the Argonaus and her sister ships in the naval blockade. The Integrity will take her place while Captain Mutegi sets course for Eurasia with the incubators safe below decks.
"You're lookin' a little worse for wear, Sarge," says the marine, fastening his own buckles in the jump seat across from me.
The ramp rises automatically, shutting out any view of the scorched slaughter or the survivors who stand like a row of forgotten statues.
"Been a rough couple days." I reach to remove my helmet once the ramp locks into place with a loud reverberation along the interior hull. The hiss of fresh O2 fills the compartment.
"You'll want to keep that on," the marine says. He taps his gloved knuckles against his own helmet. "Until we pass through decon aboard the Argonaus, all protective gear remains in place."
Decon. "Right." I leave it alone.
"So what was it like out there?"
"Hell." I stare him down.
His smile disintegrates. He finds somewhere else to look.
I lean back and close my eyes. Time to compartmentalize. What's in the past stays in the past. No good dwelling on it. Learn from mistakes and move on. Focus on what's next: picking up my team. They'll be loaded into the hoverplane flying at the rear of this aerial procession. We'll provide air support, incinerators at the ready, in case any hungry mutants show up while our men are on the ground.
Spirits of the Earth: The Complete Series: (A Post-Apocalyptic Series Box Set: Books 1-3) Page 86