by Hilary Duff
Sending Clea to the CV was good, but it wasn’t enough. I had to do more. I had to strengthen her faith in Sage, so much that Mother couldn’t drive the two of them apart.
I had to bring Clea and Sage together.
If Mother found out, she’d destroy me. I couldn’t even try unless I found the perfect moment, when I could do it without her knowing.
It wouldn’t be easy, but I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t at least try.
nine
* * *
BEN AND I DIDN’T TALK on the drive to . . . wherever we were going. He turned up the radio the second we were in the car and tapped out the beat with his fingers on the wheel. He was ignoring me on purpose—his way of telling me he wasn’t going to tell me more than he had to. It was his signal that he was still keeping our destination a secret.
I didn’t press it. I’d know soon enough.
I considered trying to fall asleep. Maybe Petra would appear with another vision of Sage. But with no idea how much time I had, it seemed like a bad idea.
After an hour I saw the signs for Bradley International Airport. Wherever we were headed, it wasn’t close.
We parked, and I followed Ben to the kiosk to check us in.
“You might as well tell me where we’re going now,” I asked. “I’ll find out at the gate anyway. You’re just stressing me out.”
“Cincinnati, Ohio.”
“Cincinnati?”
“Also known as ‘Porkopolis,’ thanks to its history as the hog-packing capital of the country.”
“You found this online?” I asked.
“I did.” Ben started pressing buttons on the check-in machine, which soon delivered our boarding passes. I followed as he strode off toward the gates.
“Isn’t it a bit of a leap from ‘Porkopolis’ to ‘beneath the flying pig’?”
“In 1988 Cincinnati celebrated its bicentennial with a new park. The park’s entrance was marked by four smokestacks, topped by four flying-pig statues, to honor all the little swine who gave their lives so the city could thrive.”
“How did you find that? I didn’t find any of that.”
“I knew the Cincinnati part right away. One of my students ran a marathon there last year—the Cincinnati Flying Pig Marathon.”
“So why didn’t we come here right from Dalt’s?”
“I had to be sure. I had to find out what was beneath.”
I was done with Ben talking in cryptic circles. I waited until we got through security and made it to our gate. We had two hours before our flight—more than enough time to do research. I found a seat by myself, pulled out my phone, and Googled “beneath Cincinnati Ohio.”
“Pretty amazing, huh?”
I turned to see Ben in the seat behind me, on his knees and twisted around so he could look over my shoulder. He was grinning like someone who knew he’d just delivered the greatest surprise Christmas present ever.
“It’s incredible, but . . . you think the CV’s there?”
I was staring at images from the 1920s, massive tunnels of cement and steel. A subway system, unfinished and unused. Buried under the streets of Cincinnati since 1925, sealed off for decades.
“I do,” Ben said. “It has two miles of tunnels, plus three full station platforms, and it’s hidden from the public. There’s even electricity down there, from when they tried to use it as a bomb shelter in the sixties. I don’t know. . . . If I were running a covert paramilitary operation, it’s where I’d want to be.”
“But it’s not where I saw Sage. The room I saw was frilly and airy and open. It looked like an inn, not an abandoned subway.”
“I thought about that. I see three options. One is that Petra lied to you. She didn’t show the real Sage, just an image of him.”
I shook my head. “She specifically said it wasn’t an image. He was there.”
“And you believe her?”
I imagined being there with Sage in the room, how real it all felt. I nodded.
“I do. Not because I trust her . . . it just felt right. He was there. I know he was.”
“And you think he was there at that moment? She wasn’t showing something from the past?”
“No. He was there. I’m sure of it.”
“Okay,” Ben said. “Two more possibilities then. Either they’re moving Sage down there and he found out about it; or he’s not there at all, but that’s where we’ll find out how to get him.”
“Find out how? Ask someone?”
It wasn’t a real question. The CV weren’t exactly friendly. It was highly unlikely one of them would offer up the information we needed. I had to have faith that if Sage was sending us there, it was because he knew we could find it on our own . . . somehow.
To prepare for what lay ahead, we spent the rest of the time before the plane took off poring over the web, scouring it for every scrap of information we could find about the abandoned subway. The images were eerily post apocalyptic: massive vaulted caverns, abandoned tunnels, and wide staircases leading no longer to the world above but to cemented dead ends.
Decades after it was abandoned for good, the ghostly subway welcomed small groups of the wealthy and the curious, who ponied up thousands of dollars for the privilege of wandering its secret passageways. But the last of those tours had been thirty years ago, and the entrances were then sealed shut. Since then, the few people who somehow found their way down to explore reported new barricades, stopping them from going more than twenty feet. Conspiracy theorists claimed the tunnels had been blocked for a reason: alien dissections, perhaps; or secret research on chemical weapons.
“Think the Elixir counts as a chemical weapon?” Ben asked.
He said it playfully, but to me it wasn’t funny.
“It did for Sage,” I said.
It was true. Even as the Elixir saved Sage’s life, it poisoned him, and poisoned the lives of everyone who came into contact with him. Not even my dad had been spared.
“Ben . . . do you believe in reincarnation?”
It was an odd question from someone who knew for a fact she was on her fifth life, but I had a feeling Ben would know what I meant.
“You mean normally?”
I nodded.
“Yes and no,” he said. “I think souls are meant to move on. To heaven or hell, depending on how they lived. I don’t know if either of those places is like it is in stories, but I do think they exist: eternal reward or condemnation . . . maybe with a chance to redeem yourself, maybe not. Reincarnation happens, but it happens when something goes wrong, like if your iPod was stuck on repeat, and the same song kept playing over and over.”
“So if Sage hadn’t been forced to drink the Elixir . . .”
“After the attack on the Society? If Sage had been killed like the others? Can’t say for sure, but my guess is your soul and his would have gone to heaven. Mine . . . not so much.”
Ben’s eyes had darkened, and he stared down at his hands. With one finger, he traced the lines of his jeans.
“Ben . . . you don’t think . . . if the cycle did end at some point and our souls moved on . . . do you honestly believe? . . .”
“My soul doesn’t exactly have the greatest track record, does it? Even then, that first time. I was the one who blabbed about the Society. All those people killed . . . it was my fault. And it’s not like I learned. I’ve always had blood on my hands.” He pursed his lips a moment, and when he spoke again, his voice was soft and raspy. “I can’t imagine there’s any kind of huge reward waiting for me. Maybe that’s why I keep the cycle going, even when I think I’m not. Maybe on some level I know what’s coming, and I’m afraid of it.”
“Ben . . .”
I reached out for him, but the PA system announced our boarding call, and he leaped to his feet. He wouldn’t look at me as we stood in line—just kept his eyes focused on a single spot ahead, blinking quickly, as if trying to hold back tears.
By the time we slid into our seats, he was clear-eyed. The flight to
Cincinnati would take two hours, but since there was Wi-Fi and seat-back computers on the plane, we’d be able to keep researching possible entrances to the hidden subway system. I figured we’d spend the entire flight doing that, but I didn’t count on how oddly comfortable and cushy the seats felt . . . or how lulling the white noise of the engine would be . . . or how heavy my eyelids would get. . . .
I wasn’t in the airplane anymore. I was standing, but I was in blackness. Not just blackness, exactly . . . I wasn’t floating. It was like I was standing in a room painted in black: black floor, black walls, black ceiling. No windows, no lights, no door . . . and yet it wasn’t dark. I could see perfectly—my hands in front of my face, my body. . . . I could see as clearly as if I were standing outside on a summer day.
“Clea? Oh my God, Clea?!”
“Sage!”
He was right behind me. Tears welled in my eyes as I felt his arms wrap around me. I felt his heartbeat, his lips against my hair, the warmth of his body. He pulled me so tightly I could finally breathe. His touch was my air. I wanted him to pull me even closer, to pull me into him so I could disappear in his arms, safe and happy and protected.
“Clea . . .” His voice broke on the word. “You feel so real. I’ve dreamed you so many times, but you feel so real. . . .”
He started to loosen his grip, but I squeezed my arms tighter around him.
“Don’t. Don’t let go. Promise me. If you do, I’m afraid I’ll wake up.”
“You won’t,” a voice said. “At least not right away.”
I knew that voice. It was a child’s voice. . . .
She was there. Amelia. The last time I’d seen her, she’d been the one animated person among human statues, but now she sat very still, legs crossed in front of her. She looked like she was meditating, taking deep breaths through her nose and pushing them out through her mouth.
“Hi, Clea,” she said. She smiled, but it looked strained. Like she was hurting.
“Hi,” I said.
“Clea?” Sage sounded confused. I looked up to try to explain but immediately got lost in his face. The hollows of his cheeks, the dark brows over his endlessly deep brown eyes, the tiny bulge at the top of his nose from a childhood fight . . .
. . . but the scar lines on his face were fainter. And the scruff was gone.
I reached up and ran my hand over the smooth contours of his face.
“You’re healing,” I said. “The scars are fading.”
“Yeah,” he said, raising his own hand to his face. “But . . . how did you know?”
“I’m so sorry,” said Amelia. “There’s not much time. They’re busy now, and they think I’m with them, but if they realize I’m not . . . if they find out I got you together . . . they’ll punish me. . . .”
“We’re not dreaming, are we?” I said. The words were for Amelia, but my eyes wouldn’t leave Sage. My fingers traced over the faded remnants of his scars. He stared at me with a mix of joy, hope, and disbelief. He placed one hand over mine, pressing it to his skin.
“Not entirely,” Amelia answered. “You’re both asleep . . . but this is real. Like what you saw when you were with my mother.”
“But I couldn’t touch you then,” I told Sage. “I could see you, but I couldn’t touch you. I—”
Sage interrupted me with a kiss, and everything else went away.
“Listen!” Amelia hissed.
I didn’t want to listen. I wanted Sage. I wrapped my arms around his neck, pulling him even closer. His mouth on mine, his hands on my back, then entwined in my hair . . . it was everything I wanted, right here, for all eternity.
“If you want more than this moment, you have to listen!” Amelia snapped. Her voice had a frantic edge I couldn’t ignore. It hurt to do it, but I turned away from Sage to look at her . . . though I clung to him even more tightly to make up for it.
The outburst seemed to hurt Amelia. She was coated in a sheen of sweat and winced against an unseen pain. When she spoke again, it was in gasping spurts she struggled to get out.
“I can help. . . . Don’t let Mother know. . . . She’ll destroy Sage . . . and others. . . .”
She yelped now, and red spots rose high in her cheeks as she fixed her unearthly bright blue eyes on mine. “Don’t give up, Clea.”
I felt a tug at the center of my body. Sage must have felt the same—he placed his hand on his stomach. “Clea?”
There wasn’t time to explain. I turned away from Amelia to face him.
“I love you,” I said.
“I love you.”
I tried to kiss him again, but even as our lips touched I felt my body start to pull away . . .
. . . and suddenly I jolted awake.
ten
* * *
Everything lined up perfectly when Clea was on the plane. She and Sage were both asleep, and my whole family was occupied with the Saviors. We were almost always with them now, but every week Albert brought the group together to meet with “The Elders,” as they called us. We would appear in our astrally projected bodies and answer all their questions about eternal life. We’d impress them with tricks like speaking inside their minds or moving objects. Father and Grandfather always had to vanish before they could do things like that, but Mother and I didn’t.
The whole thing was goofy to me, but the weekly meetings kept the Saviors mesmerized by us and focused on their goal of performing the ceremony so they could be just as astounding.
For me, the best part of the meetings was the way they distracted my family. All of them—even Mother—were so focused on performing that I was willing to take the huge risk of bringing Clea and Sage together. I had to. I couldn’t let Mother break their bond. I couldn’t let the ceremony succeed.
I still remembered every second of the last time. It happened at the Saviors’ compound, a long-vacant bed-and-breakfast in Vermont. It was a beautiful white colonial mansion set on fifty acres of rolling fields and pastures. A river flowed through the grounds. An ancient but beautifully restored barn sat on the property, and goats, llamas, sheep, and pigs roamed freely.
It was heavenly.
I imagined we’d live there once we had our bodies back. We’d travel, of course, but this place could be home, one we’d share with our new extended family.
I couldn’t wait.
Yes, there was a sacrifice to make, and that was sad, but we would honor it with the solemnity it deserved, knowing it was for a greater good.
As we moved behind the mansion, I saw there was a party going on. Twinkle lights glistened like fairy dust in the trees, and tiki torches blazed in welcome. I saw around twenty guests, but a buffet table groaned with champagne and delicacies for ten times that number. The revelers ranged in age. The youngest seemed in their twenties; the oldest in their sixties. Music played, and several of the tuxedoed and gowned guests twirled wildly on the parquet floor covering the grass. At the side of the dance floor stood a huge digital readout mounted on a pole. It displayed the time: 11:15:29, with the seconds constantly flipping forward.
It felt like New Year’s Eve.
“What’s going on?” I asked Mother.
“Just stay with us, and follow what we do.”
Following what they’d do was fine, but staying with them wasn’t. The party felt wrong—disturbing, even, considering what I knew was going to happen.
Mother had asked me to stay with them, and part of me did . . . but I peeled off a splinter of myself and let it float around the party, listening to snippets of conversation:
“The others will wish they had listened to us. . . .”
“I can’t wait for my fiftieth high school reunion. They’ll look like shit, but me . . .”
“We can have anything. We can walk in and rob a bank. What are they gonna do, shoot us? We’ll be rich. . . .”
“Any woman. Any time. Can’t fight us off, dude. . . .”
“Don’t think small. We’ll be indestructible. You know what people would pay for that? You kno
w what countries would pay for that? . . .”
“My God, we could ask for anything. . . .”
“We’ll be like what those freaks talk about. Shadow government. We can make all kinds of shit happen.”
“. . . someone pisses us off, wouldn’t even have to do it ourselves . . .”
“. . . whole world afraid of us . . .”
“. . . everything we want . . .”
“. . . unstoppable . . .”
“. . . forever . . .”
“Amelia!”
It was Mother. She was looking at me funny, even though I’d kept the bulk of my consciousness right at her side. I snapped myself together and pretended everything was fine.
But it wasn’t.
The party guests—the Saviors of Eternal Life—weren’t what Grandfather had described at all. They wanted immortality for power . . . for revenge . . . for everything my family and I were against. And yet, we were going to help them. We were going to kill someone innocent for them. And when we did . . . when the Saviors were indeed immortal . . . they truly would be unstoppable.
“Come, Amelia,” Mother said. “It’s time.”
The large clock had stopped at 11:30:00, and the Saviors were on the move. We followed, still invisible. Champagne glasses in hand, they trooped to an area off in the trees: a clearing marked by an array of large boulders. A New England Stonehenge. Tiki torches lit the perimeter, but what sat in the middle was horrifying.
A flat rock altar . . . with a man chained to it.
He was shirtless, his muscles standing taut in the torchlight.
The chains pulled his arms wide above his head, and his feet were shackled together and bound tightly to the altar. A gag blocked all but the most guttural sounds as he struggled against his bonds. Sweat poured down his face.
Sage.
Two men flanked him, each holding a Taser. They’d let him struggle to the point of ultimate strain, then zap him unconscious.
Both men wore tuxedos. They drank champagne between shocks, clinking glasses with their newly arrived friends. No one else glanced at the tortured man on the rock.