For a moment, Geoffrey wanted to murder the old man. He grabbed a letter opener off a nearby desk, ready to plunge it into the man’s neck.
“Really?” laughed the old man. “So you’re going to kill me, then?”
But almost instantly, the homicidal thought disappeared, and Geoffrey desired to kill himself instead. To end the pain, to end the evil line once and for all. “But my parents,” Geoffrey whispered hoarsely. “What about them?”
“Fakes. All of it. I don’t even know who those people really are; I bought those pictures and albums at an auction, twenty years ago. To set the stage for you.” He smiled to himself. “I didn’t count on my clone disagreeing with my plan, though.”
Reality seemed to be crumbling from beneath Geoffrey’s feet. So none of it had been real. And this explained why he had always been so sickly, so weak; he had come from cells that were nearly a century old. It was sickening—almost too much to for the soul to bear. The cold blade of the letter opener seemed more tempting than ever: his pain would end in a matter of moments if he just slid that blade across his own throat. It would be wondrous to see the old man’s look of horror as, with one swipe, Geoffrey ended all those decades of evil and drained the life from his own vein, as the old man had so cruelly drained from many others.
But just as he gripped the knife, ready to plunge it into his neck, he stopped. He looked directly into the old man’s eyes. “No,” he said softly, his eyes stinging with tears of rage. “I am not you.”
“Don’t be absurd. You are me. Our genetics are identical.” The old man grabbed a photo off the mantelpiece, and thrust the image in Geoffrey’s face. “I even looked exactly like you when I was your age!”
“No.” Geoffrey flung the letter opener across the room. It struck the wall with a thud. “I am not you. I will never be you.”
“You are me!” the old man roared. He leaped from his chair and grabbed Geoffrey’s shoulders. “You were taken from my cells! You were grown in a dish in a lab, you pathetic heap of flesh!”
“That’s all I am. A pathetic mass of your cells. But I have something that you didn’t count on: my soul. My self.” Geoffrey pushed the old man’s hands from his shoulders. “You made a body. But did you honestly think you could create a soul? Did you think honestly think you were God?”
The old man stumbled backward, his chest heaving.
“You stole their minds!” Geoffrey cried. “You stole their souls! All so you could live forever? You’re a devil, a devil in human form! But not me! I am not a monster.”
~
“Well, Miss Lucy,” Dr. Lucusta said pleasantly. “This is a fine surprise. I had no idea you were permitted into Pangaea’s most confidential headquarters.”
Lucy glared at him.
“And I see you’re taking a souvenir,” Dr. Lucusta continued, eyeing the unconscious Clara in Lucy’s arms.
“What are you doing here?” Lucy sputtered angrily. “You’re just a professor!”
“Just a professor, Miss Lucy? That’s very demeaning of you, you know. I worked very hard for my degree in economics—and in psychology.”
Lucy pressed one of the elevator buttons, but it did not light up. She pressed another, and another, but none of them worked.
“The buttons don’t like you!” Dr. Lucusta laughed. He pressed a button. With an eager beep, it lit green. “They only like people who belong here, like me. You see, I built this place from the ground up. It was nothing more than a one-room warehouse when I came here: just old Dr. Canidia, and his lab full of bubbles and gases.”
Anger and panic filled Lucy’s heart. Escape was impossible at this point. But why did Dr. Lucusta have to make it so much worse, by talking about everything he had done, and what he planned to do?
The elevator door slid open. They had reached a long hallway without windows, filled with closed metal doors.
“Well?” Dr. Lucusta asked expectantly. “Aren’t you going to try to escape?” He gave Lucy a slight push forward. “Go on. It’s what you intended to do, wasn’t it? To run back to the Outsider, and tell them we’re monsters.”
She stepped forward. At least she might try to escape—
“But before you leave,” Dr. Lucusta called, “let me ask you this: when the monster is everywhere, where can you run? Everyone loves the monster. Everyone wants to become like him, to become a part of him. Even the Outsiders want to become part of us! There is no room for the Outsider anymore. No place for the deviants.”
Lucy spun around and faced Dr. Lucusta, her eyes burning with raw rage. “I am not a deviant!” Lucy shrieked. “You’re the deviants!”
“It doesn’t matter what you think,” Dr. Lucusta interrupted. “We are the majority now. And the majority decides what is normal.”
At the end of the hall a door opened—whether a person or the wind had pushed it, Lucy could not tell—and natural daylight poured into the hall. The warm air brushed across Lucy’s cheeks, and the smell of honeysuckle tickled her nostrils. She could hear the faint sound of the birds singing in the distance. It was so close; she could make it if she tried, even with the heavy child in her arms.
“Go on,” Dr. Lucusta pressed. His hand closed over her shoulder, and he guided her forward.
A chill ran down Lucy’s spine. His grip felt as though an enormous spider had perched on her arm, ready to sink its teeth into her flesh.
“Escape,” he whispered. “It’s only a few feet away! You could strike me across my brow and make it out that door in less than a minute. It’s just right over there! But don’t forget…so am I. No matter how far, or for how long you run.”
Lucy collapsed to the floor, sobbing.
15.
The chains had begun to cut into Lucy’s wrists, locked to the wall above her head, but she no longer cared. The fight was over; the people had made their choice, and she could do nothing to stop it. Now it was simply a question of what Pangaea intended to do to her, “the Last Deviant.”
The door opened, and Dr. Lucusta entered. In his hand he held a syringe, filled with dark purple liquid. “I suppose we had better get started,” he said, smiling.
Lucy did not flinch. “Before you prick me with that,” she began, “at least have the decency to tell me: is that lethal, or just torture?”
Dr. Lucusta laughed raucously. “Lethal? Torture? What kind of barbaric monster do you take me for, Miss Lucy? It’s neither death nor pain that I plan to give you here. No. This is a blessing in a needle.”
A blessing? This explanation only confused Lucy further; but of one thing she was quite certain: if Dr. Lucusta called something a blessing, it was more likely a curse of the worst kind. “Tell me,” Lucy said aloud, “what did you do with Morris? Did you find him? Please! The least you can do is tell me!”
“Yes. We found him. And we are going to put him where he belonged in the first place.”
“I…I don’t understand.”
“A few months ago, we invited Morris to Pangaea, on the promise he would become a musician. But at the last moment, he refused. Now, because he is in our custody, we can place him where we intended all along.”
“So you made him a musician?”
“Morris is not just a ‘musician.’ He has a one of a kind musical gift—the sort of talent that only appears once in a generation, like Beethoven or Mozart. A mind that thinks unlike everyone around him. A mind that no one can fully understand, because it is so different! That kind of thinking can be very dangerous to Pangaea, Miss Lucy. Once you start thinking outside the box, outside that comfortable little ration box that we assign, problems arise.”
A chill ran down her spine. “What are you saying?” she whispered.
“I am saying that his different mind will be cured.” He held up his syringe. “And so will yours.”
“You still didn’t tell me what is in that syringe!” Lucy cried.
“An eraser,” Dr. Lucusta said coolly. “We call it Nepenthe. It wipes the mind. All thoughts, all memories�
��gone in an instant.”
Her eyes widened in horror. “No—please!” she gasped. “Please don’t!”
“Why not?” he demanded. “You should be thanking me! Every sadness and fear you have ever known will die. All the pain will be forgotten. You start with a blank slate.”
“No! Please no!” cried Lucy. She tried to pull away from the syringe, but her chains held her fast. Beneath her collar, her puzzle piece thumped against her heart. “I don’t want your happiness!” she shouted. “I want me. I want the pain, and the sadness—every memory I’ve ever known! I want all of it—”
“—And why?” Dr. Lucusta interrupted. “So you can continue in opposition to the rest of humanity’s needs? It’s because of deviants like you that we can’t progress. It’s our duty to the rest of the world to eliminate primitive minds like yours, minds that insist on clinging to absurd outdated ideologies…like this.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small black book.
Lucy’s book.
“This,” Dr. Lucusta continued, holding the book before Lucy’s face, “this is what holds us back. This spilled the blood of thousands who dared disagree with it. This held scientific progression back for hundreds of years. This divides us from each other, and cuts off humanity from serving each other’s needs.”
Lucy’s eyes flashed angrily, her chest heaving with anger. “You don’t serve the human needs! You serve only the Benefactors! You believe man is inherently evil, and would never be good of our own free will. It’s why you enslave us and force us to submit to your will. But not me. I believe in the human spirit. Most of us do want good; and if you set us free, we would choose to do right. I will never serve Pangaea. I serve only God.”
“We will see about that.” He placed he needle into his coat pocket and gripped the black book with both hands.
Her heart froze.
“You honestly believe I can’t change your mind, Miss Lucy?” he opened the book and gripped half the pages in each hand. “I’ve been changing minds for years. It’s actually very simple. All you need is the right form of trauma, then wipe the brain—and the patient accepts us. In this manner, the patient unconsciously becomes dependent on us as the only people who keep them safe from harm. The question is, what will traumatize the patient? That depends on the person.” He ripped the book in two. Hundreds of pages fluttered to the floor, like a flock of frightened birds.
“You can’t frighten me,” Lucy snapped. “No matter what you do to me.”
Dr. Lucusta nodded. “I realize that. It’s not what we’re going to do to you; it’s what we are going to do to someone else.”
The door of the cell opened, and Morris toppled through the doorway, as though someone had pushed him from behind.
“Morris!” Lucy exclaimed.
Morris stumbled to his feet. “Lucy!” he cried. “How did you get here? Did they hurt you?”
“Enough talk,” Dr. Lucusta interrupted. He shoved Morris against the wall. The blow struck Morris unconscious and he slumped senseless to the floor.
Dr. Lucusta uncapped the syringe, and rolled up the ripped sleeve of Morris’s shirt.
Lucy knew what was coming. She could not watch. She shut her eyes and turned away. It was worse than death—even worse than to watch someone be murdered. This was murdering of the soul!
“What!” Dr. Lucusta’s voice exclaimed. “Who turned off the lights?”
Her eyes opened. The room had gone suddenly dark, and it took her eyes a moment to adjust to the blackness. But soon she could discern Morris’s shape against the far wall, and the syringe in Dr. Lucusta’s hand: it was still filled with liquid. She heaved a gasp of relief.
Dr. Lucusta had turned away from Morris and was now staring up at the ceiling, his eyes intensified with scrutiny. He stepped away from Morris, and pointed the syringe upward. ““I know you’re there. I heard the rustling sound. You’re in the air vent. Show yourself.”
Nothing appeared.
“I said show yourself!” screamed Dr. Lucusta. He swung his syringe over to Lucy’s face. “Or I will plunge this into her eye!”
Suddenly a blaring white light lit the air vent, directly bored into Dr. Lucusta’s eyes. Lucy quickly shut her eyes and turned away from the light, but she could hear Dr. Lucusta screaming in pain. A thud sounded beside her. She opened her eyes again, and glanced at where Dr. Lucusta had been.
He had collapsed to the floor, groaning in pain and rubbing his eyes. Over his prostrate figure stood a young sickly boy, with fair hair and an ashen face. His gaunt white fingers gripped a massive flashlight.
The boy tossed the flashlight aside and limped over to Lucy. “How many of you are here?” he demanded, unlocking Lucy’s handcuffs.
“I-I don’t know!” she gasped, rubbing her bruised wrists. “I came here to find Timmy. I’ve only been here for a few hours!”
“Where’s Clara?” he asked.
“I don’t know!” Lucy cried hysterically. “They took her blood, and then they separated us—she could be anywhere!”
The boy pushed Lucy toward the cell door. “The only thing we can do now is get out. As fast as we can. ”
“But Morris!” Lucy cried. She knelt beside him, and shook his shoulders. “Morris! Morris, wake up!”
Morris’s eyes fluttered open. “What happened…”
Lucy pulled him to his feet. “No time to explain now. We have to get out of here right now. Come on. You too, young man—”
“—My name’s Geoffrey,” the boy interrupted. He grabbed Morris’s other arm and guided him towards the door.
“No, I don’t need help,” Morris grumbled. He pushed them both away.
They headed into the hallway together. “But what about Timmy?” Lucy cried. “What about the other children? I can’t let them stay here! They’re trapped on the upper floors! I can’t access them without a keycard or fingerprint—”
They entered an elevator. “Which floor?” Geoffrey demanded.
“I don’t know! It might be any one of them—”
Geoffrey pressed a number. A moment later the door opened to a hallway, filled with dozens of shut doors and a large glass window at the end. The hallway lights had been darkened in the power outage, and doors were flung open. “What is happening?” someone yelled.
“The power! It’s been cut off!”
“No, it’s the fuse box! Check the fuse box!”
Lucy let go of Morris’s arm. “I’ve got to find Timmy. Geoffrey, you find Clara. I’ll try to get back here with Timmy before the lights come back, but if I don’t come, go on without me.” She ran towards the stairwell.
Meanwhile, the girls had exited the offices, but no one seemed in any hurry to escape. They looked at each other confusedly. “What happened?” “Who turned off the power?” “What happened to the lights?”
The stairwell door flung open, but the girls did not run towards it. They just stared at it confusedly.
“Go on!” Geoffrey cried. “What are you waiting for? Escape! The door is open!”
But none of the girls responded. Some of them sat down in the hallway and closed their eyes tiredly, while others headed back towards to the offices.
“What’s wrong with you?” Geoffrey yelled. “Why are you going back? I’ve opened the doors! You can escape!”
~
“Timmy! Timmy!” Lucy called. He might be in any one of these buildings, but Lucy did not have time to search every one. With a whispered prayer, she darted towards the brick building beside the main hall. The second building looked similar enough that it might have been a second dormitory of some kind.
The door had been opened in the power outage, and Lucy ran inside. The hallway was crowded with boys, sitting against the walls and talking to each other. Like the girls, the boys did not seem in any great rush to escape. Lucy approached a group of boys and asked, “Excuse me, do you know where I could find Timmy?”
They looked at her blankly. “Timmy?” one boy repeated confusedly. “There
are at least ten different Timmys here, miss.”
“I mean Timmy Holmes.”
“Sorry, miss. No one here has a last name. I don’t know any Timmy Holmes.”
“Excuse me,” a voice came from behind Lucy, “you’re looking for someone named Timmy?”
Lucy turned around, and gave a cry of relief. It was Timmy.
~
As the girls wandered past, Geoffrey scanned the faces for Clara, but he could not find her. With a sigh of exhaustion, he paused beside a small window at the end of the hall that overlooked the grounds. The sky had darkened with clouds, and already the window had become streaked with the first drops of the storm. Geoffrey leaned against the glass and stared out at the complex of brick buildings. There must be at least twenty, he thought miserably. How am I supposed to find her in all this? She might be in any of those houses! Suddenly he gasped. There, in the grass below, he noticed a crumpled form. It had been partly hidden beneath the bushes.
“Clara!” Geoffrey cried.
“Where?” Morris demanded.
But Geoffrey did not even answer. He flung open the stairwell door and ran down the flights of stairs, as fast as his injured leg would allow. When he reached the ground floor, he opened the exit door.
Raindrops pelted against his face, but he did not even notice them as he fell to his knees beside Clara and rolled the prostrate body over. He instantly recoiled in horror. The face had Clara’s features, but the skin had turned the horrible grey of death. The mouth was blue. The eyes had shut.
Morris put his fingers on Clara’s wrist for a moment, but then shook his head. “There’s no pulse.”
“No!” Geoffrey shouted. He shoved Morris away from Clara. “No! Don’t say that! Don’t say things like that! She might hear you!”
~
Lucy hugged Timmy tightly. “Oh, thank God you’re safe!” she cried. She took his hand. “Come, we’re going home. Your mother has been worried sick about you.”
Timmy shook away her grasp, and stepped backward, his face horrified. “What are you saying, miss?” he asked, bewildered. “I don’t have any mother. This is my only home.”
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