by Elle Scott
‘I see it,’ I say, my eyes still closed.
‘Me too!’
I open my eyes to see the dark blue shield circling my body. I did it. I finally did it.
And now? Now I cry. I fall to my knees and sob like a baby. Not any normal baby though, I cry like a wild animal—mouth wide, limbs shaking. Miles can’t reach me in the shield, so he stands here opposite me like a statue stunned by my awkwardness. A space smaller than a wall separates us but we couldn’t be further apart.
I don’t even know why I cry. Maybe I do. The steadfast patience, that comforting hold. Why can’t Xander be more like Miles? Why would Viv lie to us? Why didn’t my mother love me?
TWENTY-SEVEN
Viv
I'm finding it hard to sleep. As I lay under the roof of the enemy, I can't help but feel like all eyes are on me—like I have a massive red arrow hanging above my head flashing in neon lights, she's here, she's here, take your gun and end her opposing plot now. I know I'm not doing anything to harm people, but the thought of betraying all my co-workers leaves an unwanted taste in my mouth. David keeps telling me, they are not my concern—that once the truth comes out they will understand and forgive my actions. But as I imagine all the scientists hovering over their projects with passion and delight, and as I imagine all the researchers’ hearts explode with every new piece of information to add to their collection, I can't help but feel afflicted with how I'll soon be the reason their life's work will suddenly be ripped out from under them. It's not their fault, they weren't the ones who chose to react violently when threatened, they weren't the ones who agreed to sell all their discoveries and research to the military. Just as it wouldn't be their fault, when they watch on the news about the hostile deaths of those who oppose our government—hostile deaths which will come at the hands of their creations. That's the only piece of knowledge that gives me peace about the whole situation, that by stopping these weapons from becoming public—I'm saving more lives. Jobs lost seems incomparable to that, right? Nora would agree with me, I'm sure. She would also agree with me that the vile actions of Ladlow since she's been gone have been unforgivable. If I only had the chance to speak to her before she left with Miles, I could make her see that the apple doesn't fall far from the tree. That his silence and compliance is as bad as doing the action himself.
I breathe in the air from this stale room and close my eyes in hopes for sleep, but I'm fearful of the same nightmare that takes control during my restful state.
I'm walking down a path outlined by trees that reach up as high as I can see. At the end of the path I see his figure, Seth's figure, he's calling for me. I try to run but my legs won't move, my feet feel like they are glued to the ground and with every step I try to take, I sink further down into the dirt. Underneath me isn't gravel or cement or even grass, it's a shallow endless river of blood.
‘Viv?’ he's yelling now, he sounds so distressed.
I can't get to him, I can't move! I feel darkness descend around me as the trees hunch over on themselves hiding the sky from my view.
I won't let this happen, I can't let this happen. I move, slowly, but I move.
Every step sends thunderous shudders up through my feet into my thighs, but the pain in my legs is nothing compared to the ache in my heart. I urge on through, closer towards him. I'm running now, I'm finally running. I can see his face—his eyes, so bright, so unafraid. Will I reach him this time? Will this dream finally be different to the rest? I'm only metres from him when Miles steps out from behind a tree and points a gun at his head.
‘NO!’ I scream. ‘Not yet no!’
I close my eyes and as I hear the penetrating sound echo through the forest I fall to the ground and surrender.
It's the same feeling every time, a hole in my stomach replaced with devastating resentment. I stay here, knelt on the ground with my hands and knees pressed onto the blood-filled path.
A hand gently touches my shoulder and I gasp in fright.
This is not right; I've never dreamt past here before.
I look up and see a smile, a wide toothy reassuring smile that only belongs to one person I know. Adam kneels in front of me and takes my head in his hands. He's still smiling as he pulls me towards him so close that I can feel his breath on my lips. Without saying a word, he closes his eyes and I close mine. His soft cool lips press up against mine and they move together in unison. I collapse onto his chest and grasp at his shirt in hopefulness. Hope, that someone is here in my nightmare understanding my pain. Hope too, that someone is here to take me out of this hellish loop.
I sit up in bed and clutch the blankets on either side of me, what was that?
~~~
I look at my watch, it's eight fifty-five in the morning. I'm in the central lounge area, to the left of the food hall, with Xander. We sip on hot chocolates as Xander holds a tablet and scrolls through news events of the last five years.
‘This is news?’ He holds the tablet in my direction and shows me a picture of a celebrity couple with a dramatic tear line between them.
I shrug, sip and look behind him into the food hall. Most tables are filled with empty bowls and plates; a few late risers still take their time eating breakfast. Abner's apprentice normally cleans up after meals but now she is standing behind the counter overwhelmed with the sudden responsibility of managing the kitchen.
Sam and Marcus stand up from their table, purposefully ignoring me looking at them and head towards the elevator. My foot shakes.
‘Viv? Viv?’ Xander waves his hand in front of my face.
‘Yeah, I know—shock divorce, people love it, blah blah!’ I respond to his earlier query.
‘Huh?’ I look at him as he holds up an article about a deal between the government and a radical science sector. The supposed deal to produce breakthrough technology which has been in the works for over a decade and is now ready for public distribution.
Hot chocolate gets caught in my throat.
‘It says, they signed the deal five years ago!’ But there’s no talk of weapons, it's just talking about technological advancement. Key-lines, shields, portal elevators, harmless things we use here!’
I whip the tablet out of his hands.
‘That's what they want us to believe!’ I say, putting the tablet into his backpack between us.
I stand up, grab my own backpack, and nod—it's time.
We walk calmly to the elevator clutching our backpacks, we step in unison breathing as though we’ve run a marathon. As I’m about to place my hand on the elevator portal orb to take us downstairs, Nell, one of the physicians runs in.
The door closes and the three of us stand together, I can feel Nell’s eyes climbing all over us. ‘Are you going down?’ Which is weird to ask considering that’s the only way to go, unless you are going to the roof. She looks at my backpack.
‘Oh, no, yes, we are going to the roof, helicopter ride!’ Xander lies.
I stare at him. Idiot. Like we have time to waste.
We hold the portal orb and we exit on the roof. The doors begin to shut and I breathe out, a loud rush of air escapes through my flared nostrils.
She stops the doors. ‘Is everything alright?’
‘Yes, perfect. We’re doing a little gathering of Kate’s belongings for when she arrives in a couple of days.’ I motion to Ladlow’s helicopter behind us.
‘Right, well Xander when you return can you come and see me? We still haven’t had that physical yet,’ she winks and the doors shut.
I look at Xander, and with an arrogant frown he says; ‘What?’
When we finally get back into the elevator and step out into the foyer I can hear Marcus yelling down the hallway, ‘WHERE'S LADLOW? I NEED TO SPEAK WITH HIM ABOUT SOMETHING URGENT!’
That wasn’t part of the plan for distraction but whatever works. Xander and I step outside as quietly as we can and detour our path, up to the tree line. We run between trees and follow the perimeter’s shield until we reach the back of the Corri
dor.
Jennifer is hiding behind a tree next to the glass case. At her feet lays the broken security camera that normally scans the entrance.
‘We've only got a few minutes before someone realises there's no surveillance for this area. Any last orders once you've gone?’ She speaks with pride and conviction.
I wrap my arms around her, ‘Thank you so much Jen, you've made this so much easier… bearable! Lay low, make sure Ladlow stays here when we need him to. Meet us at the Uprising bunker in a couple of days.’
‘Bye,’ she says as she creeps back in the direction we arrived from.
I type in the password and we enter the restricted area. We stand face to face with the Corridor once more. I look at my watch.
‘She should be here in one minute, are you ready to see your sister?’ I give a lazy smile and flip my backpack around to retrieve a portal orb.
I hear Xander take a deep breath, ‘I'm ready!’
I look out along the tree line and see Jennifer running in the open field to the side of the building. She sneaks around the front but just when she is about to step inside, the entrance doors slide open. Sam runs out and pulls her around the side again, urging her to keep running with him out the back. He holds her elbow as she tries to keep up with him.
The next person out the entrance door is Marcus being held by Stevens, next to them is Ladlow himself. They all look this way. Ladlow calls out behind him and the rest of his entourage joins them, they bound down the path towards us.
‘Marcus? Traitor!’ I say under my breath.
‘How long, Viv?’ Xander stresses as he locks the glass zone door.
I look at my watch, she should be here by now!
‘I don't know!’ I grasp Xander’s shoulder and hold the portal orb.
The men are about twenty metres away, guns in hand as they impend upon us.
Xander unhinges my grasp from his arm, ‘I'm not leaving without Kate!’
The guards reach the zone door before Ladlow, and once they realise they can't unlock the door without the code they start shooting at the glass. The bullets don’t even make a scratch as they ricochet back into the company of their own handlers.
I turn to Xander and push him against the wall, ‘I've seen what these men do, Xander. I'm not leaving you here!’
‘1503—the code is 1503,’ Ladlow shrieks running up the path. ‘It's Miles' birthday!’
‘Are you ready to meet your fiancé, Vivian Dhawan?’ Stevens hisses as he presses the code with the tip of his gun.
One.
Each keypad tone sounds like a nail in my own grave.
Five.
The resounding boom of the floor to ceiling door unlocking shakes through the room and it clicks open.
Zero.
Xander wraps his fingers around the handle and grunts in desperation to pull the door wider.
Three.
TWENTY-EIGHT
Nora
I rub the sleep out of my eyes and sit up on the futon. I look to the dining table where Miles last was, the laptop still open. He must have gone to sleep on the bed.
With every day that I have the orb I feel different again, somehow my motivation and determination is accelerated. I knew in my heart that I couldn't do anything productive until I learnt the depths of where the orb could take me. So after Miles gave me the space to reset my emotions—in others words cry like I was being tortured by the devil himself—we took turns reading as much as we could. Miles watched me speechless as I silently plugged the USB into my laptop and opened the containing files. I bypassed the creation of the orb document, I know nothing of science anyway, and went straight for the file labelled “Orb use.” If only I studied this way when I was at University. When Miles cooked me dinner, I ate it without taking my eyes off the screen. I was solidified in my spot, gazing into the words—sometimes without reading them. I began floating with my mind on what I was learning, imagining the things I could do, making sense of it all. When my eyes and brain started hurting, we swapped spots. Day became night, and I watched him as I lay on the futon; the glow from the laptop casting a dull light on his face. Every now and then, he'd look across to me and smile. I fell asleep marvelling at his intent, as if his life depended on it.
Thing is, it isn't just his life that depends on it. It's everyone's life.
I stand up and look out the window, the sun nowhere near rising—yet here I am about to run out on the sand bank and practice shooting static thrusts out of my orb.
I make my way outside and shuffle down the path.
~~~
The sun rise was beautiful, from what I could see out of the corner of my eye anyway. I think there was pink and yellow, maybe blue and green but I’m pretty sure they were from my orb.
‘Look at you go! When did you wake up?’ Miles calls out behind me.
I look over my shoulder and smile. I feel great, as good as I did since before the Corridor, better even. I'm positive, focused, resilient.
‘I'll sleep tonight!’ I reassure him.
‘Oh, okay then!’ He teases. He reaches the sand bank with a sparkle in his eyes that reaches far beyond any other I've ever known. ‘It's nice to have the 'old Nora' back!’
I hold my hand up to stop him from getting closer. ‘Stay there!’ I need to show him what I've been practising all these hours.
I bend my legs outwards in a type of warrior pose—my feet dig deep into the sand for stability. I hold the orb in my right hand and close my eyes. I can feel my chest rise and fall. I take large breaths in through my nose and with each breath out, I let the air escape brushing through my lips.
Inhale and exhale. Inhale and exhale.
I open my eyes. I’m ready.
I re-tighten my grasp on the orb and it starts to glow. My left foot lunges back into the sand, the movement creates a small mound behind my heel. I take another quick breath and puff out a few times, wobbling in my position I stretch my left arm for balance. Maybe I did need to do those tai-chi lessons. I lift my back foot out of the hole it has dug and lunge it forward while pushing my hand and the orb in the same direction. A light shines out of the orb so bright I have to squint. And as if all the energy and power it has built up can't be contained in the orb any more, a loud crack is released. Wind or energy or whatever it is that comes out of the orb, skims violently along the surface of the lake, forcing waves to separate it almost in two. The blast reaches the other side of the lake and then, calm.
‘Oh my god, Nora! That was amazing!’ Miles yells.
I relax my stance and slump my shoulders. ‘It didn't do what I wanted it to,’ I sigh.
A shattering sound echoes from the other side of the lake. My eyes widen. The temperature drops as a crushing sound bounds towards us.
‘What did you want it to do?’ Miles asks hesitantly.
Disappointment transforms into joy. My face beams as I point to the lake. ‘That!’
White sheets of ice roll forward across the lake, what once was a serene tepid lake is now being crusted over with dense crackling ice. As the sun beats down, steam begins lifting off the blanket of ice.
‘Miles! I did it!’ I laugh.
Before I give him a chance to comprehend the magnitude of what he's witnessed, I force my arms around his torso. He stumbles back from my joyous impact in shock. As he stabilises himself, I nuzzle my head into his collarbone. He places only one hand, his right hand, on my back. I turn my face so it's against his chest, my hot breath dampening his shirt. I cup his shoulder with one hand, then, ever so tentatively, I stroke his left arm—from his shoulder, to his elbow, to his wrist, to his hand. I pull at his hand until his fingers touch my waist and once I've rested them there, I return my own to his back. That's better, a proper hug. I tighten my grasp around him and turn my gaze out to the lake.
‘It has done everything I've wanted it to this morning.’
My ear rests against his chest and I can hear his heart beat, fast. He constricts his arms tighter around my body and
buries his head into my hair. After about a minute, he begins to pull away and I surrender my grasp on him.
‘Come on, I’ve got something I want to show you now,’ his mouth tilts at the edges.
He leads me down the path towards the cabin. Before we reach the front step he swings to take a right and then a left and soon the cabin is behind us, the apple trees and hammock are behind us, the lake is behind us. We are walking through rows of pine trees as high as a five storey building. It's winter but the trees are still green, still strong and alive, swaying in the cool breeze. After around fifty metres I turn around. I can still see the cabin and the lake beyond it, streaks of tree trunks impairs my view but they make it all that much more beautiful.
‘It's up here,’ Miles calls out, he's already another twenty metres in front of me.
As I walk up to him, that goofy grin is firmly planted on his handsome face. Beside him I see a clump of wood, except it's not a clump of wood it's a ladder. Miles jumps up, his arms and legs bound, stretch and bend effortlessly as he climbs. He looks like a spider monkey—a cute spider monkey. I climb the ladder; there are over twenty railings. I look up to see a wide panel of wooden slats stretching between four trees and a square hole where the ladder ends. I peak my head through the hole, Miles sits in a corner cross legged beaming. ‘Welcome to my original Fort!’
His Fort is a square and has three wooden walls boarded perfectly, not a sliver of light passes through them. There is no roof, only the shade of branches and leaves. Dark green pine needles and splinters of bark cover the floorboards. Miles begins pushing them away from the space next to him, a space for me. The pine needles and bark scatter through the hole and sprinkle their way down bouncing off the ladder to the ground. That's when I feel it, the smile on my face—my mouth open, lips rolling under themselves, teeth showing. Miles pats the cleared space beside him and I crawl to it, blissful.
‘This is amazing!’ I declare. I look up through the invisible roof and follow the tree lines until they look like they almost touch at the top, I feel like I'm in a woodland pyramid.