“Apparently, you did.”
“No, I meant sooner. I should’ve gotten you out before they could mess with you.” Kai searched his friend’s face for any sign that he’d caused offense.
Pete dodged the unspoken questions in Kai’s comment. “Speaking of messes, that’s quite a mess you made downstairs.”
Between his frown and his grin Kai couldn’t tell if he was impressed or disgusted. Kai slapped the couch, “Honestly. If one more person says that was my fault, I’m going to lose it.”
Pete waved a dismissive hand and dropped into an open chair. “No worries. What now?”
“And again, you’re asking me. Why me?”
“Aren’t you in charge of this lot?” Pete waved a hand up and around.
The weight of responsibility crashed down on Kai. Pete might as well be referring to the universe.
“There’s talk amongst the rabble of you starting a school or something. Try and get our heads right and save our souls.” His fingers drew invisible quotes in the air, sarcasm thinly veiled.
“Oh, please. For a moment I thought that might be a good idea. Replace the dark Affinity school with one that can show a better way. Sounds fantastic, don’t you think?” Kai didn’t look up to see if Pete was listening. “Now, I just want to go back and see if there is any chance my friend might still be alive.”
“That’s noble.”
“Geez, why the sarcasm? What have they done to you? I don’t remember you being like this.”
“Ah, don’t mind me. Let’s just say that you were right. Coming here has been...hard.” Pete sat forward in the chair and sniffed the air. “Can you smell that? Smoke. Something’s burning.”
“I don’t think so. It isn’t normal smoke. Smells more like a vaporised damp forest.” He eased off the couch, careful not to disturb sleepy Runt. “There’s something coming in under the door, look.”
Tendrils of green vapour curled up from the floor. Wisps trailed down from the air vent on the wall near the ceiling and rapidly spread toward the passage outside the office.
Pete stood. “Man, I don’t like this. I know this smell.”
Kai was mesmerised by the curls of soft green drifting toward him. His brain slowed and thinking became difficult. Pete smacked him on the shoulder. Focussing on his face took effort.
“Kai, we’ve got to get out of here. I know what this is, and it’s not good. Don’t breathe it in. We have to go.” He scanned the room. “The window!”
Thick billows of green covered the floor to knee height. Kai fought the fog enveloping his mind. “Won’t work, too high. We’ll have to use the passage.” He felt his way across the room, using his fingers like a blind man. Halfway across the desk he picked up the harness with the contraption. He hung onto it and moved toward the couch, where Runt lay sleeping.
“Just don’t breathe it in.” Pete coughed and sneezed.
Kai strapped the harness around his body to free up his hands. It fit neatly under the necklace Runt had given him. He scooped up Runt off the bed and threw the blanket over her face to keep the fog away.
Pete tugged at the door handle. “It’s locked from the outside!” The whites of his eyes were showing, tinged green by the rising vapour.
“Who would do this?” Kai choked. The green mist had risen to chest height. He could taste it in his mouth, “I don’t feel right. What is this stuff?”
Pete stumbled across the room and worked on the window catch. “Affinity enhancer. An adapted version of what they’ve been injecting into us. I worked as a trainee in the lab and watched them develop it. Well, a version of it anyway. This, though, is slightly different.” He ran a hand through the vapour, “I don’t know what changes they’ve made.”
“I don’t plan on hanging around long enough to find out.”
Pete smacked his fist into the window frame. “Window’s jammed. We’re trapped.”
Kai’s muscles strained under Runt’s weight. “Throw something. Break it.”
Pete shook his head. “They smash-proofed the windows long ago when drunk people started throwing things.”
The vapour now filled the room, blocking morning light from the widow. It billowed thick enough that they couldn’t see the floor. The floorboards under Kai’s feet begin to slide, and the walls grew hazy. The circle of his vision tunnelled in closer, darkening around the edges. Runt was slipping. Don’t drop her. He fell to his knees and eased her to the floor. His mind floated free from his leaden body. He keeled over sideways and felt the jolt through his shoulder as he landed.
I’m going to pass out. Any moment now.
Kai lay on his back watching the swirling emerald cloud pressing down on him. The ground shifted, rippled. His arms stretched out. He’d never been bucked off a floor before, but this might be the first time. The carpet beneath his fingers grew prickly, soft fibres morphing into sharp blades that bent at his touch. Grass.
A breeze picked up beneath his feet, billowing through the gas until the edges grew ragged, torn. Beyond the haze, there should have been walls, a ceiling, a window, a desk. Kai squinted through heavy eyelids, forcing them not to close. His eyeballs rolled back in his head. Do. Not. Give. In.
A small part of his brain was aware of Runt as she lay curled inside the arch of his outstretched arm. Where were the walls?
Wind blew harder, blowing over him and through him, clearing the fog in tattered strips. A midnight sky curved away above him.
2
Grass and sky.
Midnight.
He knew this place. Something in the fog had transported him to the spiritual. Almost like the recruiters’ injections, yet the effect of those seemed like a cheap party trick in comparison to this.
This felt dark. Thick and heavy.
A scream ripped through the silence. Pete! Kai folded himself in half, forcing his heavy limbs to bend, and rolled onto all fours. Standing seemed impossible. He crawled in the direction of the sound, feeling his way forward with his hands. This was too weird. His hand came down on someone small, probably Runt.
Kai navigated around her, following the rough sound of Pete’s bellowing. “Pete! Stop screaming like a girl, and tell me where you are.”
Pete let out another terrified yell and bellowed words fast, making no sense.
“Stop yelling!” This wasn’t working. Kai sat on his rear and tried to get his bearings. It would appear they’d arrived in the spiritual realm without needing a doorway, but Kai didn’t recognize anything around him. He lifted a hand, waiting for LifeLight to flood through him and push back the darkness, but his skin remained opaque.
“Kai is that you? I’m in a hole. I can’t get out. It’s too high. I can’t see.”
“I’m coming to find you. Just stay put.”
“Oh sure. I’m not planning on moving from here. Just hanging around.” Panic laced Pete’s words.
Kai picked up speed, crawling blind, aiming at where he thought Pete’s voice might be coming from. The ground in front of him shifted with a low groan, and he bit his fist to stop the squeak that bubbled up from his belly. He reached out, flinching. His fingers found soft, long hair. It felt like Zee’s. She sat up as he touched her.
“Where are we?” It was Zee, dazed and sleepy. “Whoa! Who turned out the lights? Is this the testing lawn? No man, this is a bad joke.” She flopped sideways, wriggling to get comfy on the prickly grass. “I’m going back to sleep.”
Pete’s voice came from the left. “Great, there are two of you. Can one of you come get me out of this hole?”
Kai stopped crawling. “OK, this is ridiculous. Who else is here? So far we have Pete, who is stuck in a hole, Zee, Runt and me, obviously. Zee, why are you whispering to yourself? Please don’t tell me you’ve lost it.”
Zee clicked her tongue in annoyance. “This is my dream, so you can’t be rude to me. I’m talking to Peta. She’s here, too.”
A different voice spoke from the darkness on the other side of Pete’s hole. “Um, I thin
k I might be losing it? Where the flip are we? It’s morning time. Who stole the sun?”
Kai tilted his head, someone familiar but he couldn’t figure out who. “Who are you?”
“Who wants to know?”
Who could pack so much bad attitude into four words? Kai had had a run-in with that attitude not too long ago. Right before dinner in fact.
“Let me guess. Ruaan.” What couldn’t get worse, just had. “How did you get hauled into this?”
Pete snorted from below ground level. “How did any of us? Oh, and by the way? I’m still stuck in this hole.”
“Sorry, Pete. Coming. Ruaan, help me get him out.” Kai crawled along in the dark. Somewhere close by there was shuffling, and Kai hoped it was Ruaan moving in to help. By now some night vision should have kicked in, but it was still as dark as if his eyes had been plucked out.
He bumped into something warm and solid. Ruaan. They’d missed Pete’s hole. “Pete, where are you?”
“Right here, man. This hole ain’t budging.”
Alongside Ruaan, Kai shuffled in the direction of Pete’s voice. His deprived senses scrambled for anything real to latch onto. Even Ruaan’s arm brushing his was welcome. Then Ruaan’s arm smacked his chest. Kai let out a grunt and dropped. A loud crack rang out from below, followed by a hollow thud.
Pete roared wildly, “Are you trying to kill me? You nearly split my skull in two.” He grunted and stamped his foot.
Ruaan groaned. His voice came from down below. “Your head is so hard you could tunnel your way through a mountain using nothing but your forehead.”
“Excuse me? Your head is so hard they could use you to...to...knock down buildings. Or something.”
“Ruaan? What now?” He couldn’t see anything. Kai’s belly knotted.
“I tripped and joined pit-boy here in his hole. At least he broke my fall.”
“Yeah, and you broke my skull,” Pete muttered.
“Apparently, neither of you is too hurt to whinge.” Kai reached the edge and lay on his tummy, one arm trailing down into the pit. The hole seemed freshly dug, the soil still soft and crumbly. He stretched as far as the length of his arm would go, feeling for the bottom, nearly tipping himself in. Pete was in over his head. “Pete, give me your hand. Ruaan—push.”
With Ruaan pushing from behind, Kai hauled Pete out of the trench. Together, they grabbed Ruaan’s hands and pulled him out, too.
“Why is it so dark?” Zee asked. She seemed nothing like the Zee he’d known the last time he’d been stuck here. She sounded small and scared.
It rattled Kai’s nerve to hear her sounding lost. “Can you light up, Zee?”
“I don’t know. It used to just happen. Now, nothing.”
“I’m not getting anything either. Runt?”
There was no answer. The girl could sleep through anything. A patch of warmth spread from the middle of Kai’s chest, and he reached up to find the cause. He felt the device he’d taken from Torn’s office. Snug in its harness, it was cool to the touch. Just next to it, his fingers closed on the bottle pendant Runt had given him, and he lifted it out. A small glimmer of blue appeared and seemed to float in mid-air. He unhooked the chain from his neck and held the necklace in his hand with the small glowing bottle hanging off it. It glowed brightly in the dark. The brightness built and grew until Kai could see Zee’s face in the glow.
The pool of light coming from the pendant spread. Pete stood shivering, covered in fine grey dust from the hole he’d fallen into. Kai brushed some off his hair and rubbed it between his fingers. Not soil or dust but ash.
“What is that?” Zee sat up, blinking in the light.
After the blind darkness, a small bottle of light was so beautiful, Kai nearly cried. “Something Runt gave me. I thought the bottle was empty but there must be something inside.”
Zee blinked against the brightness. The intensity increased. “Water from the Healing Stream, maybe.”
The group drew closer and huddled around the light as rescued hikers would around a fire. All but Ruaan. He hung back in Zee’s shadow, covered in ash just like Pete.
Kai hunted around for Runt. “Runt, this is brilliant. Well done you.” He shuffled over to the small lump he’d thought was Runt, but what should have been brown hair was silvery white. It was Zee’s friend, Peta. Kai scanned the area for his small girl, but she was nowhere. Runt hadn’t come back with them.
~*~
Zee hugged Peta to make sure she was OK with the strange shift. Peta stood like a statue, head turned away from the light. At least she wasn’t freaking out. Zee turned her back to the others, scanning the area to figure out what and where this place was.
As far as she could see by bottle light, the ground stretched flat all around them. There were more holes, just like the one they’d rescued Pete from. Sharp rectangles dotted the ground randomly. No orderly rows, no pattern. She shuddered. The only thing they all had in common was a slab of rock at one end. Some were hemmed in by a tall metal fence that ran along the edges, just a step away from each side of the pit. There was no doubt in Zee’s mind. They were in a graveyard.
Zee shuddered. “Kai, bring the light over here. I want to check something.”
Kai shuffled closer and held it out. Zee tried to take it, but he gripped tighter.
“What’s your problem? Give it here.”
“What do you want to see? I’ll hold it for you.”
“Really? Don’t you trust me?” Zee didn’t wait for an answer but yanked him by the arm to the stone closest to them, the one right next to the hole they’d rescued Pete from. It was a tombstone, engraving clearly visible: Pete Zappiro. “Pete, what’s your surname?”
Roused from her zombie-like state, silvery-blonde Peta answered instead. “Delmara. Oh, you were asking him.”
“You were talking to me?” Pete thumbed his chest.
Kai put a hand on his friend’s arm. “Pete, from now on we’re calling you Zap. Pete and Peta are too similar. I hope that’s not a problem for you.”
Zee snorted, “And you don’t think Zap and Zee are too close? You could actually call me Evazee you know. It is, after all, my name.”
“Are you serious? Evazee is such a mouthful.”
“For real. From now on Evazee.”
Pete AKA Zap shrugged, unfussed. He leaned closer to where Evazee shone the light on the tombstone and swore. “What kind of sick joke is this? That’s my name. And my birth date.”
“It doesn’t mean anything. Look, it doesn’t even have a date of death, so it’s fine.” Evazee forced herself to sound cheerful. “It’s nothing. Don’t worry about it.” She grabbed his arm and tried to pull him away, but he yanked out of her grip and pointed. Right next to the word DIED, engraving of a date began to appear. Kai stepped in. “She’s right, it means nothing. Let’s get out of here, I don’t like this place.”
Zap stood transfixed, watching the growing line. It moved so slowly, one’s eyes could be playing tricks, but there was no doubt it was moving. “That’s it. I’m dying.”
Evazee smacked his arm, “Stop it. Just because we’re in a graveyard and there’s a grave with your name on it—”
“We’re in a graveyard. At my graveside. This is not good. Not good at all.” Zap began pacing in circles, his hands waving wildly as if he were chasing a swarm of bees.
Ruaan grabbed him by the back of his neck and lifted him a few millimetres off the ground. Zap’s arms still swatted wildly, but at least he wasn’t in danger of falling back into his own grave and killing himself by accident.
Kai had moved on to another grave, one with a metal railing all around, “I wonder what the metal railings mean? The hole is empty, just like all the rest. This one says James Kirkwood. Ring a bell for any of you?”
Ruaan dropped Zap, who fell to his knees and collapsed forward with his forehead in the dirt. Ruaan rubbed his hands on his pants, trying to get rid of the grave dust. “That’s Elden and Bree’s father. He was taken by darKounds. Do
es it have a—”
Kai squinted and turned his head sideways, “This makes no sense. There is a date deceased, but it’s in three months’ time. According to this, he isn’t dead yet.”
“Kai, you need to see this. It’s Bree’s grave, but there’s something weird going on.” Evazee blinked to focus.
Kai brought the light with him. They checked the tombstone. There was nothing written under deceased, but when he shone it into Bree’s grave, Evazee’s suspicions were confirmed. The level of dirt was slowly rising.
3
Kai had fully expected to find a grave dug for each of them, but they checked the stones closest to them and only found three: Elden’s missing father, Zap, and Bree. The pull was strong to keep looking until he’d made sure there wasn’t one with his name on it, but a deep unease in Kai’s gut warned against venturing further into the graveyard. Searching the entire cemetery could have taken hours or days, as it was impossible to judge how far it stretched. Besides, Zap’s date of death was slowly being carved, and Bree’s grave was filling right before their eyes. They had no time to waste.
Kai thought he might throw up, as if he’d eaten hope and despair for breakfast and they were fighting in his belly.
Evazee pulled him to one side, just out of earshot of the others. “We need to pray. Seriously.”
“Pray? How would that help?”
“Jesus will know what to do. We just need to ask. He’ll show us. C’mon Kai, you know how this all works now.”
“Last time you went on and on about me finding Tau. Strangely, that turned out to be good advice. Shouldn’t we track Him down instead?”
Evazee shrugged. “Tau…Jesus…different names, same person.”
“But—”
Zap cleared his throat, “Are you two done? This place is creepy.”
Kai frowned at Evazee, struggling to reconcile the cardboard Jesus he’d heard of in school with the enigmatic, unpredictable Tau he’d met. “He’s right. Let’s get out of here. Ruaan, take the rear.”
Ruaan, who’d become strangely amicable compared to their pre-dinner showdown, stamped his foot and a cloud of ashen dust billowed from his shoes, curled up, and settled on his pants. “I can’t get this stuff off. It just comes straight back.”
Resonance Page 2