by Teri Terry
“No one is watching.”
Then how did he know I hesitated?
I change into the clothes awkwardly under the sheet on my bed. Underwear, jeans, and a plain T-shirt, but they fit more or less, and they feel wonderful.
Now what?
As if in answer to my silent question, one of the walls starts to move. There’s a door? Despite hunting again and again in odd lucid moments, I could never find it—the walls around me always felt completely smooth.
Now I just push it open and step through.
There’s a short hall, and I walk to the end, then go through another door. And there he is.
My eyes open wide. “It’s you!” I say, words that are half question, half exclamation. Before me stands Dr. Alex Cross—Kai’s stepfather, at least until his mum divorced the guy, and Callie’s dad. And my dad too. Not that he knows anything about me being his daughter.
He smiles warmly and holds out a hand. “Hi, Shay. I’m very happy to see you again,” he says.
And without knowing how he fits into all of this or whether I should believe him or why he is here, my hand reaches out and is in his, holding on to it—physical contact with another human, for the first time in how long? His eyes are searching mine and I turn away, let go.
“Dr. Cross—” I say.
“Call me Alex.”
“Okay, Alex. So…”
“So what the hell is going on, and why am I here?”
“Pretty much, yeah. I figured you must have died in Edinburgh.”
“Alas, no—it turns out I’m immune.” He holds up his left hand and there, on the back of it, is a faint silvery I.
“Lucky.”
“Indeed. Come, have a seat, and I’ll tell you what I can.”
That’s when I see there’s a small table and two chairs in the corner of the room. We go there and sit down.
“You know I was a professor in physics?”
My thoughts are slow and muddy, but I remember—the model of the atom in his office. The particles it contained that were outside the standard model. “Yes. No matter what they’ve done to me here, my brain still seems to be working.”
“Glad to hear it. They’ve asked me to get involved in…ah…studying you. I was appalled when I got here to learn how they’ve been treating you, keeping you and the others in isolation from each other.”
“The others?”
“The other survivors. There are currently twenty-three of you in this facility, gathered from all over the country.”
“I’m not the only one?”
“No, and you’ll get to meet them all soon. And things are going to be different from now on—better. I promise you that.”
Kai wouldn’t believe his promises, and I’m not sure I should either. But here I am, out of my room, not in a hospital gown, talking to somebody besides myself—so no matter what I may or may not think of the choice of conversationalist, it’s already a vast improvement.
* * *
Later I’m in an internal courtyard, blinking in the sun. The courtyard is surrounded on all sides by this building—there’s no way out—but at least there is actual fresh air. Insects. A few plants in pots in the corners. Since becoming a survivor I’d begun to take for granted the constant presence of other life around me—the way I can feel the aura of living things, and how I can reach out and join with them. The complete absence of other life forms in that sterile place has almost been harder to take than not having any people around me.
A bird flies by overhead, and without even thinking about it, I reach out to her.
I feel the bird as she soars higher in the sky. My mind touches hers and I join her in flight as she drifts lazily in a warm updraft, high above me. From her eyes’ view, I’m shocked how little there is to see of this place. Our buildings are camouflaged, built into the landscape; without her sharp eyes, I doubt I’d see it at all.
A bleak, open terrain of rocky hills and moorland. No roads or other buildings are in sight.
I’m torn from her and brought back to myself by the sounds of a door. One by one, others emerge like I did—like bears out of hibernation—male and female, all ages from my sixteen up to seventy or so, and a few younger ones too. We’re all shapes, sizes, races, as if someone picked out a random population sample of the UK and plunked us here. There is nothing we have in common apart from one overriding, all-encompassing fact: we’re survivors. And as each one steps outside, they blink and squint against the sun like I did: how long has it been since we’ve felt its rays on our skin?
We say hello, introduce ourselves, but names are forgotten almost as soon as they’re said. Conversations start and stutter, trail off. Unused to this much human contact, it feels odd and unnatural, but that isn’t the real reason; at least, not for me. There’s just so much energy emanating from everyone. The waves of sound and color in each person’s aura—or Vox, as Dr. 1 called it—are all blinding and different; they crowd into each other, and it’s too much to take in. It’s like nothing I’ve seen before—survivors’ auras are more vibrant, beautiful, and just plain loud than anyone else’s.
But that’s not all. There is so much feeling. It starts low, like our emotions have had to wake up as much as our bodies did, but it is growing, swelling.
Confusion.
Fear.
Anger.
But most of all, pain—not the physical sort, but that which comes from what we have lost; who we have lost.
As I become more aware, it is as if my mother is dying next to me all over again. As if I’m saying goodbye to Kai as he sleeps, right now; looking at his face for the last time. His eyes are closed, never to open and see me again.
It’s a massive understatement to say that the physical pain from being sick was pretty bad, but nothing could be worse than this.
We’re drowning in a tidal wave of pain that pushes us apart and keeps us silent.
CHAPTER 3
AFTER A WHILE, A WOMAN APPEARS. She’s not a survivor—her aura is damped down, muted, in comparison to ours. Her knuckles are clenched white around a clipboard clutched to her chest. There is a faint silvery I tattooed on her hand, like Alex had: she’s immune too.
“Hi, everyone. If you could follow me? I’ll show you to your rooms.”
“You’re not putting us back there,” a man says, and there is horror and threat all through his aura; he’s poised to do something—whether fight or flight, I can’t tell, and I don’t think he knows either.
But she shakes her head no and he relaxes slightly. “You’re not going back to the hospital, where you were before.”
The youngest of our group, a girl of eight or nine, goes up to her. “Will it be nice where we’re going?” Her eyes are big and round.
The woman softens. “It is, I promise. Come and see.”
We follow her across the courtyard to a door; through it is what she calls the dormitory wing. Each bedroom sleeps three or four in single beds and has its own bathroom, and it is nice. Ish. Plain, but better than all right when you consider where we’ve been. And down at the end of the hall is a big TV room and a dining hall. Dinner is in an hour, she says.
Room assignments have been worked out. I find a door with three names—Beatriz, Amaranth, and Sharona—and I wince.
A tall girl perhaps a few years older than me is there already when I walk in.
“Don’t say anything; let me guess,” she says. “Beatriz?”
I shake my head. “Sharona. But please don’t call me that. I’m Shay.”
“I’m Ami—with an i, please—and I will if you will. Who is Beatriz?”
“Me,” a small voice says, and in the doorway stands the child who spoke before.
We’re told to go to the TV room before dinner, but the TV is switched off. I’m hoping Dr. Cross—Alex—will come. I’m anguished when I realize I d
idn’t ask him the one question I should have: if he has any news of Kai. Did he get off Shetland? Is he okay?
Instead, there is another woman in a white coat.
She smiles. She’s nervous too, but hides it better than the other woman did earlier.
“Good evening. I’m Dr. Smith and I’m a psychiatrist. I want to tell you a little about what is happening, both here and in the outside world, and then answer any questions you may have.”
A psychiatrist? Named Dr. Smith. Sure, that’s her name: her aura says otherwise.
“But first of all I thought it would be helpful if we each introduce ourselves, say where we’re from and a little about ourselves.”
I exchange glances with Ami-with-an-i. What is this, some sort of group therapy session?
“I’ll start,” Dr. Smith says. “I’m from London”—no kidding, we got that from the accent—“and I went to Oxford.” I’d expect nothing less. “I have come here to help with your rehabilitation, and—”
“Wait a minute. Where is here? Where are we?” The question is asked by a tall boy with glasses—probably Ami’s age or a little older.
“We are in a secure air force facility. Now, who would—”
“And where is this facility?” he persists.
She smiles. “Sorry, what is your name?”
“Spike.”
“I’m sorry, Spike; I can’t tell you. That information is classified.” She’s hiding something; it’s all through her aura. What is it?
Spike is locked in a kind of staring contest with her, and someone has to back him up.
“How can it be classified from us, when we’re actually here?” I say.
“I don’t have clearance to answer that question, but I’ll see if I can get it for you. All right?”
“For now,” Spike says, and he looks at me. He raises an eyebrow and seems to be asking me a question without words, but I don’t know what it is.
What? I say silently, directing it at him but not sure if he’ll hear my thought this way.
He smiles as if he were waiting for me to speak to him like this. She doesn’t know where we are any more than we do, he says, answering back the same way.
No. Really? I look back at her and probe around her aura: he’s right. It isn’t the place she is hiding, but her lack of knowledge of it.
I wonder if she was brought here unconscious too?
Either that or blindfolded.
He grins. Next question?
“Dr. Smith,” he says, “what do you mean by our rehabilitation?”
“We’ll explain more about that another day.”
“You said you were going to answer our questions,” I say. “You haven’t so far.”
Bravo, Spike says.
“What was being done to us in that hospital, or whatever it was?” Spike says. “I’ve got holes in my memory—like I was drugged the whole time. But the bits I remember aren’t good.”
“Were we being drugged and experimented on without our permission?” I say. “Isn’t that illegal?”
Her smile is still there but more and more strained. “We’ll get to the answers to your questions, but not all at once. There are a few very important things I have to tell you now, and it’s crucial for your safety that you all listen very carefully.”
She looks around the room at each of us in turn. “You must all know by now that, as survivors of the flu, you are carriers of this dreadful epidemic. Other than to the very few, like me, who are immune, you pose a grave potential threat to everyone on the planet. Despite this, we’ve been persuaded by one of our colleagues to bring you all out here together like this to see if we can help you. But if anything goes wrong, the consequences could be severe. So there is a condition. Anyone who breaches the condition will be returned to solitary confinement in a hospital room, where we can look after you but also be sure you won’t be a danger to anyone else.”
Everyone is listening and silent now.
“Some of you have been documented as having certain…abilities,” she says. “This is part of what we want to learn more about, together. But if anybody uses these abilities to attempt to bend the will of others or to try to leave this facility, I’m sorry, but for the safety of all of us—and everyone outside of these walls too—that person will be returned to the hospital wing. Now, are there any questions?”
I glance around. Some of us clearly know exactly what she is talking about—Spike and Beatriz are among them—while others, like Ami, have no idea. But all remain silent.
She smiles. “Good. Now, let’s go on with introducing ourselves and learning a little about each other. Who’d like to go first?”
Nobody, as it turns out, so she starts on one side of the room. It’s halting to begin with, but soon it is like everyone is telling things, personal things, that on another day they might keep to themselves. As if we are all raw and still unable to process what is happening and unable to block anything out.
Elena’s children and grandchildren: all dead.
David’s parents and cousins and brothers died too. When he didn’t, he was chased by a mob and only escaped by jumping from a bridge.
Ali’s family—all gone.
Our stories are all variations on the same theme: We were ill. Our families and friends died. We woke up one day and found ourselves here.
And then it is little Beatriz’s turn. She’s calm, composed. Her voice is steady when she tells us her parents, brother, and two sisters all died from the flu around her. That she was alone with their bodies for days before she was found, half starving, and brought here.
After that our questions don’t seem that important anymore.
Later we have dinner in the dining hall next to the TV room. Today has been too much—way too much—and I’m desperate to be alone, or as alone as I can get with two roommates. It’s all I can do to finish dinner and stumble back to our room with Ami and Beatriz.
I’m tired, but there is so much to think about, to process, and I know I have to do this before I can switch off enough to relax and rest. My last conscious thought is: I’ll never get to sleep…
CHAPTER 4
SOMEWHERE A BELL IS RINGING, over and over. I open my eyes just as the lights in our room come on. Finally the bell stops, but the lights are still on.
Ami swears creatively. I throw a pillow at her and then gesture at Beatriz: eight-year-old ears shouldn’t be exposed to that.
“What’s that?” Beatriz points at the door. In front of it on the floor is a white sheet of paper.
I get up, yawning, and pick it up. “Ah, now let’s see: it’s our schedule for the day. It starts with six a.m. alarm and lights. Yep, think we got that part already.”
“Six a.m. is not morning!” Ami says. She pulls a pillow over her head.
“What next?” Beatriz asks.
“Showers, then seven a.m. breakfast. Then at eight a.m., it’s games!”
“What sort of games?” Beatriz says.
“I don’t know. But apparently we’re going to play games while a few of us at a time have individual sessions and tests or something.”
“Sounds just like school,” Beatriz says.
Pretty much.
“Dibs last shower,” Ami says from under her pillow.
When we get to the dining hall—a little late, dragging a protesting Ami along with us—Spike waves, and we go to sit with him.
“Sleep okay?” he asks me, out loud.
“Strangely, I did.” I frown. Despite being in a fog of exhaustion, once I’d dragged myself to bed I’d been sure I would lie awake all night with everything there was to think about. But once I closed my eyes, I was gone.
He raises an eyebrow again, like he did yesterday, like he wants to talk silently.
Yes?
I think we were drugged. Must have been in ou
r dinner. I was hoping we could talk afterward, but we all had dinner and then…bam. No one could stay awake.
My eyes widen. I was so tired myself I didn’t notice what the story was with everyone else. Why would they do that?
Why do they do anything? We need to work this out.
I nod, thinking for a while. We’re getting taken for individual sessions this morning. Maybe…
What?
Good cop, bad cop. One of us slams the questions; the other goes softly, softly. Then we compare notes after.
He nods. Good idea. But you’d better go for softly, I’m terrible at that.
Ami snaps her fingers in front of my eyes. “What’s with you, zombie girl? I thought I was the one who was half-asleep.”
After breakfast another schedule is posted up in the TV room. There are two lists—Dr. Smith and Dr. Jones. Sure. On Dr. Smith’s list, Spike is first, and I’m second.
That can’t be random, he thinks, that the two who questioned things last night are first up with her.
His thoughts trail off as he disappears behind a door with Dr. Smith.
Board games with an intense eight-year-old and a bored nineteen-year-old are not my idea of fun. Time ticks slowly by as Ami tries the buy-everything Monopoly strategy and Beatriz remains unmoved by the thrill of property ownership.
Finally Spike returns: he was in there for a while. They’re already behind schedule—I was supposed to go in twenty minutes ago.
Poor woman is having a difficult morning, he thinks, as I pass him on the way to the door.
“Sharona? Good morning,” Dr. Smith says. There are spots of bright pink in her cheeks.
I smile as sweetly and hesitantly as I can. I’m a lost girl, I need help, I’m a lost girl, I need help, I think at her.
“I’m sorry if I was rude last night,” I say. “I’m just so scared about what is going to happen to us.”
“Oh, my dear, don’t be scared. I’m here to help you.”
I make my eyes round.
I’m a lost girl, I need help, I’m a lost girl, I need help…