by Sean Platt
“He won’t hear the motor,” Papa said, looking between the tree-filled island and Ephraim’s conflicted visage, “but there’s nothing we can do about cameras if he has them.”
Papa didn’t say the next thing, but that was even more obvious: you don’t build a madman’s island hideout without sticking a few cameras in trees, and some perimeter surveillance that’s a lot more advanced than that, too. Neven would see them coming if he wanted to.
“I don’t think it matters,” Ephraim said.
Papa nodded. His face said, I guess not, because we have to try anyway. But Ephraim only meant that it didn’t matter because they’d be allowed to approach regardless of surveillance. He was getting a creeping feeling as they approached the shore that Neven knew they were coming and had known for a while. For some unknown reason, he wanted them to come.
They covered the remaining sea without incident and anchored without any issue. Ephraim wanted to use a ramshackle dock, but Papa considered stealth a weapon. There was a small raft, already inflated. They took it to shore and got out barefoot, managing to remain mostly dry. Ephraim had a small backpack with water, emergency food, a small crowbar, a handgun in a case, and a few extra boxes of ammo. Papa shouldered a larger one, packed with things unknown.
Papa looked up at the trees, and Ephraim knew he doubted himself. The trees were thick, and the beach and rocks were covered with an undisturbed patina of bird shit. There seemed to be nothing here.
A path, made more by natural gaps between trees than people on foot.
But once under the tall pines, they could see the way ahead. In a few minutes, a man-made became visible. Another fifty feet past a field of never-mown grass, and they saw it in all its glory: grand, sleek, and multi-chambered. To Ephraim, it looked more alien than human, a structure built by giant insects.
“How did he build this with nobody finding out? While on Eden?”
“He must have had a point person,” Papa said. “Maybe Mercer.”
“And all the workers it must have taken? All the supplies?”
“Money has a way of talking. Or a way of keeping people from talking.”
Ephraim absorbed his surroundings until Papa stepped forward. He saw the Domain’s enormous breadth and height as a double-exposure in time. He could picture this place undisturbed, naturally clear-cut, populated by only aggressive brush. He could picture it as construction began. As it proceeded. As the Domain was half-finished, then completed.
“Come on,” Papa said.
They crossed the field. The grass was tall but not unmanageable. From the looks of things, nobody had passed the area in years, if ever. Maybe Neven and Mercer (don’t forget Hershel, Ephraim’s mind insisted, another piece falling into place), had come from the other side of the island. Or by air, landing on the roof.
The Domain’s base appeared to have no foundation, ending on the ground as if the building had been dropped. There were no visible doors or windows, so they walked to one side, eventually arriving at what looked like a fire escape.
Ephraim was in the lead. He looked back. Papa shrugged, then Ephraim climbed.
The ladder ended at the top of the cube. To the left, a second cube had begun halfway up the ladder, its height the same but offset, just like the horizontal cube ahead. The whole thing seemed haphazard. Even the offsets were inconsistent. It looked like a tower built by a child who didn’t yet understand gravity enough to stack blocks properly. But here, gravity didn’t apply, and the odd stacks held.
“Where now?” Ephraim asked when Papa joined him atop the cube. There were another two ladders ahead, climbing different cube walls. They could also go to the right and make a small jump down, to the roof of a neighboring cube that seemed either short or partially underground.
“Your guess is as good as mine.”
Ephraim chose a ladder. Climbed. Found himself on another identical roof, this one with more ladders and descending steps. Too many choices.
“My turn, I guess.” Papa moved to the left this time, up again, and then for the third time, they were on a roof. The field looked far down now, but the trees were tall. They couldn’t see the water.
“I feel like I’m in a labyrinth,” Ephraim said.
“I was just thinking that. We need a trail of breadcrumbs, or we’ll get lost.”
Up. Left. Down a half-cube. Up again, this time only a short wall to clamber atop like a kid over a fence. At one point, there was a hollow space jutting into the hive’s center that was about the size of a single cube, diced to fit. They walked into it, needing to duck low, and saw a new space leading down between more central cubes. It looked like a spelunker’s pit; the kind of thing you descend into by rappelling, wearing a headlamp.
“Let’s stick to daylight,” Papa said, turning the other direction.
It may as well have been hours. Despite being able to see the trees and mark their location, Ephraim felt like they were moving in circles. No noise other than nature. No activity. No access points.
Until, after walking to the edge of one roof more out of curiosity than anything else, Ephraim saw signs of civilization just one-third cube below.
“Papa.”
“Timothy.” The word was nervous. Said more for effect than anything else, because this place had gotten under Papa’s skin. That much was plain on his face.
Ephraim beckoned, his hand impatient. “Timothy, then. Come here.”
Papa Friesh came over.
“It almost looks like a …” Papa looked at Ephraim. They were within inches of each other. “A patio?”
“One of a few, I guess.” Ephraim pointed. Now that they were near the edge of the cube, they could see past an obscuring wall that had blocked their view before. On top of the cube was a full rooftop deck. The cube itself was the highest of its neighbors — the highest, perhaps, in the complex. The deck had a few chairs, an end table, and what looked like ottomans. An ideal spot for a sunset.
At the head of the patio, at the foot of the cube with the rooftop deck, was a plain metal door.
“Seems like a logical place for the Lord of the Manor to hang out,” Papa said, looking around this highest of cubes.
They hopped down. Regarded the door.
Papa removed his backpack, unzipped it, and fiddled inside. He took out his handgun case and opened it. Then he took the weapon, checked its clip, and slipped the thing into the back of his pants. Ephraim had done the same already.
“What are you looking for?” Ephraim asked Papa after he’d been rifling through the bag for a while.
“Lock pick kit. And if that fails, I have some small directional explosives.”
Ephraim regarded the backpack. “Don’t you at least want to try the door first?”
“He’s not going to leave the place open for anyone,” Papa said.
But Ephraim tried anyway.
And yes, Neven had done exactly that.
Chapter 53
Among the Humming Machinery
The second door was much less utilitarian, more official-looking. Something like an office. Number 13, the large silver numbers attached to the door informed them. Behind the door, they heard the hum of running equipment.
Ephraim put out his hand for the knob, but Papa said, “Wait.”
Ephraim looked back. They were in a hallway. It seemed overly narrow, but that was probably because it was so tall. The cubes were about one and a half times the height of a building’s single story and equally wide — all except this one, which they’d realized was much larger the second they entered. Looking up in the relative dim (there were a few sconces, deceptively domestic), Ephraim could barely see the ceiling. Taller than an auditorium and apparently just as wide.
“This has to be the control room,” Ephraim whispered. “If Neven is anywhere, he’s in there.”
“Agreed. Which is why I’d like to look around first. See what we’re facing.”
Papa meant clones. Maybe they weren’t fully formed until seven days had p
assed, but they might be mobile. As aggressive as the not-quite-there ‘evil Altruance’ clones that Ephraim and the original Sophie had faced in Eden.
Ephraim shivered. Part of his mind had thought of the clones, too, but it hadn’t bothered to inform the part of him that did the conscious thinking. He considered it now, remembering Papa’s count. No more than 300 clones at a time. But 300 was more than enough to dispatch one old man and his crazy henchman.
They found a simple door of the hallway that led into a second corridor with a much lower ceiling. It was short, with a single door, presumably leading into the rest of the cube. If the dimensions were what they seemed to be from the outside, the next room would be small indeed.
The door had a silver 14 on its front. And like the others, it wasn’t locked.
The chamber was about the size of a low-rent college dorm room; enough space, had its occupant been a student, to house a desk, a twin bed, a dresser, and little else. Ephraim saw tubes, dark computer screens, and a pill-shaped chamber, large enough for an adult man, standing on end. The front was transparent. Its door was ajar. And empty.
Papa touched computer panels, but they all looked dark. He looked confused.
“I guess this one is out of order,” Ephraim said.
Out the door. Down the short hallway to a few stairs leading down. They had to jag right, and the door was in front of them. Ephraim felt naked without any breadcrumbs.
He looked back, the door behind them now closing on its pneumatic hinge. He hadn’t noticed the identical door to the other door’s right — this one at the new hall’s end rather than along its wall.
Papa was about to open a door with a 27 on it, instead of 15 which might’ve been logical. The numbering was either random, or it unfolded in a direction they failed to take.
“Door on the left,” Ephraim said. “We need to go back through the door on the left.”
Papa opened 27. Ephraim followed.
The room was like the last one, down to the empty tube with the open door.
Papa pushed past Ephraim and back into the hallway. He went through the right-side door, at the end of the hallway.
Ephraim held the door’s other handle. “This is the one we came through.”
Papa didn’t seem to hear. He was in the next chamber, down three-quarters of a full cube’s height and around not one corner, but two.
Through door 28. Also empty.
“Papa. Timothy!”
But he was out again. Around another corner, this one on the same level. No stairs and into room 217.
Nothing.
Room 18 and then Room 23.
Empty.
And room 237.
Same as the others: dark monitors, one large pill-shaped tube with its top popped and nothing inside.
“I don’t understand,” Papa said.
“What?”
“Where are the clones? There aren’t any clones here.”
“That’s a good thing, right?”
Papa looked frazzled. “Not if I don’t know what he’s up to. This is his plan, to make more and more clones. To infiltrate and replace people one by one, so he can pull levers and get what he wants from the world. He should have a full batch, halfway done. But he doesn’t. He went to all the trouble to steal those records. My people inside GEM confirmed that the database is somehow encrypting itself. It’s only useful to the person with the key. Neven. But he doesn’t have any clones here. The computers seem shut-down. The entire place is dead! Why, Ephraim?”
“Maybe the police or someone was onto him. He had to leave in a hurry.”
Papa was pacing. Something wasn’t computing.
Neven obviously must have decided the jig was up and ran off. But Papa wasn’t buying it, and neither was Ephraim. If he wanted to destroy all the evidence, why wouldn’t Neven burn the Domain, same as Eden?
Papa pushed past Ephraim, then retraced their steps.
They passed cubes 237, 23, 18, 217, 28, 27, and 14.
He didn’t make any wrong turns, striding with purpose, as if he’d been here a hundred times before.
He stopped facing the door to Cube 13, where equipment hummed. He stopped long enough for Ephraim to catch him. Then they both stood waiting, breathing from exertion.
Ephraim reached back. Removed his gun.
Papa did the same, but his eyes said, I don’t think you’re going to need that, and although Ephraim kept the weapon, he couldn’t help but agree.
Papa pulled the handle, and the door opened.
Neven’s tableau, quiet and dark among the humming machinery, greeted them.
Chapter 54
The Way of the Future
The room was huge, but empty.
It looked like something out of a military thriller, or the nerve center of someone-or-other’s defenses, like NORAD Command inside Cheyenne Mountain. Several giant monitors lined the opposite wall around a titanic screen. A few workstations dotted the room, but they were covered in a sweater of dust. Only one seemed recently used, and it was front-and-center. Ephraim wasn’t sure what this room was, though the many stations made it clear that Neven had intended it to be used by many people, yet had never brought more than a few — maybe one — into the place. Perhaps a later stage of the plan.
The room’s most striking feature was the countdown displayed on every monitor, with numbers on the central monitor twelve feet high.
It read 00:01:06:51:23.
A second passed, and it became 00:01:06:51:22.
“What is this?” Ephraim asked.
Papa marched forward. A red fire truck topped the console, like a child’s toy, its ladder raised. Something hung from the ladder.
“Maybe you should …”
“It’s okay,” Papa said, moving forward. “He knew we were coming, Ephraim.”
“That’s what I said. If there are no clone tubes here …”
“He didn’t know that anyone was coming,” Papa clarified. “He knew we were coming. Specifically, us. Or me, at least.”
“How do you—?”
Papa’s fingers traced the truck with reverence.
“What’s going on?” Ephraim’s heart was beating too hard.
The room, he’d already realized, only seemed abandoned. It reality, its appearance had been choreographed. What had seemed random and hurriedly left-behind minutes ago now resolved into deliberately planted elements.
There were papers left at a coffee station toward the rear of the room — the kind of nook where workers, had there been any, might take their breaks. There was a microwave, a small refrigerator, and four plush chairs around a large table atop a shag area rug. Papers were spread out in a way that wasn’t quite random. Even from here, Ephraim could see Wallace’s picture on one. It wasn’t evidence. It was something Neven had wanted them to see. Or something he meant to taunt them with.
Like the fire engine Papa was inspecting.
“I sent this to Neven,” he said without turning. “Before I’d even met him. I told you how Wallace raised Neven like an animal in a lab, but I didn’t tell you how much the loss of the other child destroyed him. He became desperately regretful. Almost repentant, like a sinner in a revival tent. I didn’t believe his change at first, but well before we formally renewed acquaintances, we became cordial again. When his son was six or seven, I decided to send him something. I didn’t know the boy, so I chose something simple and classic. A toy any boy would love.”
Papa’s hand, on the engine.
“After I met him, I learned that Neven had kept what I’d sent. Not because he loved it. He kept it because if he ever met me, he wanted to show it to me.”
“Show it to you?”
Papa didn’t look back, but a smirk touched his lips, visible in profile.
“Yes. So he could let me know how insulted he’d been. It was a toy for an idiot, he said. Not for a prodigy such as himself.”
Papa unfurled the bit of white cloth hanging from the extended ladder. It had words writt
en in thick black marker: PRESS THE BIG RED BUTTON.
Ephraim stepped up beside Papa. Amid the console’s many controls was a lone button, fire engine red.
“Don’t push it.”
Papa pushed it — a simple motion, down a couple of millimeters and up. But Papa winced as he withdrew his fingers, and Ephraim saw a tiny needle retract from the surface of the button. Papa put his index finger into his mouth.
“It extended a lancet to sample my blood,” Papa explained, nodding toward the button, “to make sure that I was the person who pressed it.”
A raised circular platform on the floor ahead flickered with life. The air flickered too. Ephraim and Papa found themselves looking at Neven in hologram.
“Mr. Friesh. So glad to meet you again.”
“Don’t forget me,” Ephraim said. “The guy who killed—”
Papa raised a hand. “It’s a recording.” Then he held up his Doodad, which showed the dashboard of an application Ephraim hadn’t seen before. “There are no signals here. I was going to leave another update for Sophie, but everything’s jammed. Nothing is broadcasting into this room or out.”
The hologram continued.
“You surprised me. I’d forgotten all about you, Timothy. Although it’s ‘Papa’ now, isn’t it?” He laughed. “The nerve you had, calling my father arrogant. I thought you’d forgotten about us, too — my dad and me. But you never did, did you?”
Papa’s face was grim. Waiting.
“I had grand plans. I’d thought of everything. I even had this wonderful new home built.” The hologram looked up and around. “I can make 243 Tomorrow Clones at a time in this facility. Twelve thousand or so per year. I’d made myself at home. It was nice, like it was with my dad before Jonathan arrived. Before you started showing up.” He gave a tiny, bitter laugh. “You were always trying so hard. Trying to keep Poor Old Fucked-Up Neven on the straight and narrow. I guess you couldn’t keep your nose out of our business. Out of my business.”
He paused, lips pursing. “How did you do it? How did you figure it all out? You obviously knew I was alive, that I’d married DataCrate and the Quarry tech to end up alive here after dying. But it was all so guarded. Did you have spies? Your little zealots with their hand tattoos were tattling, and nobody thought anything of it because The Change is everywhere? You did change the world, didn’t you, Timmy? You taught the whole damn planet to kneel and pray. To you.”