by Lane, Styna
Lily didn’t try to stop us, but I glanced cautiously at Lakin, who was already halfway to the door. I felt an undeniable loyalty to Al, having spent so much time with him in The Facility, and feeling that I owed him so much for my escape… but I sensed that Lily was one of those people whose bad side you would not want to get on. And, well… the bacon smelled really good.
“But,” I griped, looking mournfully at the stove as Lakin dragged me by the hand from the house, “bacon...”
Chapter Eight
Tiny Evil Devil
Lakin and I followed silently behind Al, passing cottage after cottage. The underwater town reminded me of something from a fairytale that Eddie had read to me when I was younger, something that couldn’t have possibly existed in real life. Now and then, a familiar face would pop up in one of the windows, grinning as we passed. Finally, Al came to a stop at a house that looked fairly similar to all the others.
“Do you have your gems?” he asked, face still hard with anger.
I nodded, retrieving the cool stones from deep within my pocket. I had forgotten how beautiful they were, turning them over in my fingers as the light danced from their blue and orange facets.
He knocked on the old wooden door of the house in front of us. The disgruntled-looking man, whom I hadn’t recognized earlier, propped open the door just enough to peak through with one dull, gray eye. Up close, he looked much more frail and elderly than he had before, and there was something different about him from the rest of the Elementums; he was not happy. He looked irritated at the sight of visitors, and his age suggested he was from a generation that had already recycled. I wondered if he felt the same as I did when I was in The Facility, surrounded by people so different from himself.
“What?” the old man asked sharply.
“Curtis, we have some stones for you.”
He eyed us with suspicion, before nodding his head and opening the door wide enough for us to scrape by. The outside of Curtis’ house may have been like all the others in the Eden, but the inside was quite different from Al’s. With the curtains closed and only one small lamp in the living room, dark and miserable shadows lingered in every corner. The tools on the kitchen table reminded me of the things they used for manicures at the spa in The Facility. I smirked at the thought of an angry Al, taking us to have our nails done by a crabby old man.
The blanket and pillow on the couch caught my eyes. As I began to realize there were no signs of a second person living in the house, I understood Curtis’ bitterness; his bond was gone. Maybe she hadn’t retained her memories after being recycled, maybe she had died of old age. He was left powerless and alone in a place full of wonder and love. My heart burned as I looked at Lakin, unintentionally imagining life without him. I couldn’t comprehend how this fragile old man was able to survive that kind of pain.
“Angie,” Al began, startling me out of my state of mild depression, “your stones?”
I didn’t want to give them over, like I needed to protect them, but I nodded and reluctantly handed them to Curtis. It felt like we were intruding on something private as he rolled the stones over in his palms, delicately inspecting them with what was surely less-than-perfect vision.
“Hmph,” the old man grunted, taking a seat at the table. He held a dull, brass loupe to his face, squishing up his wrinkly eye to hold it in place.
I felt awkward, standing silently in the home of a man to whom we hadn’t even been introduced. Lakin and I exchanged nervous glances, while Al focused his attention on Curtis’ curiously twitching face.
“Spera Lapis,” the old man announced, returning his loupe to the table. He looked at us with eyebrows raised, as if expecting some sort of response. With a sigh of exasperation, he proceeded with an explanation. “The Hope Stone. I am assuming one of you is an Oracle?”
“Supposedly,” I grumbled.
Curtis glared at me as if I were mocking his religion. I was surprisingly intimidated by him, and couldn’t hold his creepy, lop-sided gaze for long.
“Yes, well… it’s incredibly rare. It is also rare to see bonds form matching stones. If this is an accurate representation of the rest of your generation, I am confident in saying you are going to bring big changes—not just to our kind, but to the world.” Curtis’ words did not contain much emotion, but I had a feeling he wasn’t the kind of person to get all choked up at family reunions. He was the type of person to say what he meant to say, and to say it with a purpose. Probably not a hugger, either.
“What makes you think that?” Al inquired. The skin on Curtis’ neck wobbled as he chuckled at the question, and it was reassuring to see that he was not made of stone—maybe just a soft metal.
“Alvin, if you ask any of the Oracles, they’ll tell you the last Elems to form Spera Lapis, let alone matching stones, were the first body-born generation,” he said, leaning back in his chair with a look of satisfaction on his face.
“What does that mean, exactly?” Lakin asked.
“Well, son, the first body-born Elementums were the most powerful in our history,” Curtis explained. “That’s not to say they were the brightest… Quite the opposite, really. They had a lot to learn, what with being the first to grow up with fleshy appendages, and all. But if they had known everything we know now? The world wouldn’t be the giant mess it’s turned into. We certainly wouldn’t be hiding under a lake. Probably ought to wait and see what stones the other bonds in your gen form, though. Don’t want to be jumping to conclusions.”
The old man had a glint of certainty in his eyes, and he fully believed in what he was telling us. We stared blankly as the information soaked in. Was that what everyone was hoping for? Were we supposed to be some sort of saviors? Saving a planet sounded like an awful lot of effort. I didn’t like it.
“Will you work on the stones for them?” Al seemed preoccupied, staring into space.
“Like I have anything better to do with my time,” Curtis muttered, reaching for one of the small grinding tools. “It’ll be about an hour, or so.”
“What’re you going to do to them?” I asked, possessively staring at our gems on the table.
“Hard to say, really. They’ll become whatever you need them to become.”
I didn’t find any comfort in Curtis’ words, but it felt like I didn’t have much of a choice as Al waved us toward the door.
“He seems… nice,” Lakin said, after we had cleared the hearing-range of the house.
“Curtis is a good man, but… well, he’s seen a lot,” Al explained, leading us further toward the far end of the Eden. He still seemed preoccupied, but most of the anger had dissolved from his face.
“Al?” I asked quietly, watching my feet as we walked. “What happened earlier, between you and Lily?”
He looked at me with the kind eyes I had seen so many times in The Facility. A smile pulled at the corners of my mouth as he sighed.
“I was just worried about my sister. I’m sorry you had to see me act like that. I’m… I’m very protective of the people I love,” he said, raising an eyebrow at me.
My mind wandered back to the quake I had caused at The Facility, when Mr. Gray was saying something about how I should be brutally murdered, or something. Al had fought for me with the same intensity I’d seen in his eyes when Cora rushed toward possible danger. He nodded at me with the ghost of a smile, warming my heart. I already knew I had a brother, but it suddenly felt like I had a second one.
We walked the rest of the path in silence, ending at three houses. There didn’t seem to be any lights coming from the windows, and cobwebs laced the corners of the doorways. The warm feeling in my heart faded into a sinking chill. Surely, Lakin already knew the answer to the question he felt the need to ask.
“What’re we doing here?”
“These are your parents’ houses.”
My eyes shifted from house to house, wondering which one Bryant and I should have grown up in. Which one we should have learned to walk in. Which one we should have fallen asleep in, lis
tening to our parents tell stories.
“Angie…” Al pointed to the middle house, and my breath caught in my chest as I nodded. “Lakin,” he continued, pointing to the house on the right.
Lakin and I gripped each other’s hands tightly, curiosity flooding through our bodies. I wondered which house to enter first, or if we should split up, but my thought was answered soon enough as Lakin released my hand and walked toward his door. I did the same, resting my hand on the cool handle of the door that should have protected my childhood memories.
With the creak of the hinges, the musky smell of abandonment instantly reached my nose. I could barely see through the darkness—through the shadows of my alternate past.
I jumped at the click of Al’s lighter, as he sent flames to the small lanterns throughout the house. The rooms were dimly illuminated, and the thick layer of dust gave everything an eerie, muted glow. It felt surreal, like I was looking through a stereoscope, but there wasn’t some old gadget I could remove from my face to escape back to reality—this was my reality.
I dragged my finger across the table, leaving trails through the dust in their wake. I noticed the dishes in the drying rack on the counter, and glanced at Al.
“Nobody has really touched anything since they’ve been gone. It’s exactly how they left it.”
I nodded absentmindedly and continued my path around the abandoned house. Branching off from the hall were three small bedrooms, one slightly larger than the others. The layout was nearly identical to Al and Lily’s place. The largest room contained one full-size bed covered in simple floral linens. On the mirrored-dresser sat a silver, delicate-looking hairbrush, and a rose-colored bottle of perfume. I misted the fragrance into the air and stepped beneath it, letting the scent of lavender and sunflowers drift around me.
“Gah!” I screeched at the sight of a little black spider scuttling across the dresser-top. It stopped at my scream, and appeared to be staring into my soul—probably deciding on its best plan of attack.
“What’s wrong?!” Al shouted, running to my rescue, before setting eyes on the terrifying villain and immediately bursting into laughter.
“It’s not funny,” I huffed, keeping a wary eye locked on the spider.
Al shook his head as he moved toward the tiny, evil devil. I inhaled sharply, holding my breath as he lowered his hand to let the spider crawl into his palm.
“Are you crazy?” I whispered, afraid if I spoke too loudly, the spider would attack and lead Al to his untimely death.
“Angie, there’s nothing to be scared of. We’re in tune with nature, with all living things, if we allow ourselves to be.”
“Yeah, I’d like to see you say that while holding a hungry lion in your hand,” I mumbled, cautiously stepping around him into the hallway.
The middle bedroom held only two small mattresses, propped up against one wall. Al’s laughter faded into the back of my mind as I came to a halt in the doorway of the last room, at the end of the hall. Two cribs sat side-by-side beneath the far window; clean, tidy, and still awaiting the babies who had already outgrown them. I ran my hand along the cool wood of the crib that held a pink blanket. It felt like my only options were total numbness, or to break down into a heaving puddle of sobs—I chose the numbness.
‘Angie,’ Al’s voice whispered soothingly inside my mind.
I shook my head and left the room that should have held so many memories. As I walked down the hallway, back toward the living room, my eyes fell on a picture hanging next to the door of the first bedroom. How could I have missed it before? My lungs forgot how to breathe, and my heart forgot how to beat. I was barely aware of Al’s hand on my shoulder as the cheery, sepia faces gazed back at me from their frames.
The woman was exactly how I remembered her from the memories I thought I’d fabricated. Her eyes squinted with her smile, and her hair flowed gracefully down to her elbows. Something tugged at the back of my throat as my eyes skimmed over her outfit—shiny black pants, and a gray patterned T-shirt. I touched my hand to the cool stone on my chest; perfectly identical to the one around her own neck. For a moment, in wearing the things that she’d worn, I felt closer to my mother. She wasn’t alone in the photo, though. I knew the man next to her was not my father, but I recognized his face all too well.
“Is he—?” My throat protested against the words. My body didn’t want to believe it.
“Yes,” Al said with regret.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” I choked, eyes wide and watery.
Chapter Nine
Shackles
“We have to go back!” I shouted, hurrying out of the hallway.
Al grabbed my arm before I could reach the front door.
“We can’t do that,” he said calmly, his eyes steadily locked on my own.
“Why the hell not? Nobody told me my grandfather was right in front of me, and now you’re saying I have to leave him there to rot?”
“Angie, chances are…” he began.
“Chances are what? He’s already dead? You knowingly left him there to die?”
“It’s not like that.”
“It is exactly like that!” I screamed, glaring at him with hateful eyes.
“Hey,” Lakin stared at the picture, having snuck past us unnoticed, “isn’t that that Helmsworth guy?”
My shoulders dropped at the realization that my anger with Al was uncalled for. He had done what he needed to do to ensure my safety—he had done so much—but why couldn’t he have done more? I walked over to Lakin, leaning my head against his chest as I glanced back at the picture of my grandfather, who I’d apparently known my entire life.
‘Why can’t we go back? Why can’t we save him?’ I questioned inside my head.
I waited for Al’s voice to respond, but was only met by silence. I furrowed my brows, turning to him for an answer. The color had drained from his face, and his eyes blank eyes were fixed somewhere on the path ahead. He was in someone else’s mind, and he was terrified by whatever was in there with him.
He rushed out the door, leaving me with nothing but confusion, before Lakin and I followed after him. Cora and Nixon ran down the path toward us, breathless and covered in black smudges. Al turned to us, face twisted with concern.
“Al?” I whispered.
“That quake we felt… there was an explosion,” he began, rubbing his forehead. “The store on top of the hill… They’re saying there was a gas leak.”
My throat felt like I had gargled with liquid-sandpaper. My cheeks flushed, and sweat beaded in my palms.
“My boss, is he—” Lakin asked.
“They haven’t found any bodies, but,” Al said, shaking his head in disbelief.
“The Facility?” I questioned.
“I don’t know… I… can’t focus in on anyone to hear.”
I wanted to drop to my knees and sob for the people I loved. Jenny and Emmy and Paula… gone. Something kept me on my feet—it felt a little like hope, but it was probably just rage. My hands balled into clammy fists and my eyes narrowed in on Al.
‘I’m going back,’ I thought, knowing he could hear me.
Al nodded and turned, walking straight through Cora and Nixon, and toward his house. I grabbed Lakin’s hand and tugged him along, ignoring his slightly-worried inquiries of ‘What are we doing?’ and ‘Angie, what’s going on?’ and ‘Ow, my hand!’
We walked with intent, which caught the attention of curious on-lookers. Word of the explosion seemed to have already reached the entire Eden, as random people joined Lakin’s trend of questioning what we were going to do. By the time we reached Al’s door, Lily was waiting on the front step. Al grasped her face and planted a massive, emotional kiss on her lips. I wondered if Lakin and I would ever reconcile like that after a fight. I hoped so.
“You’ll take Mattie and Jason,” Lily whispered, seemingly not wanting to let go of Al.
“They’re too young, too inexperienced” he responded, holding her just as tightly.
&nbs
p; “You need them. It has been decided.”
Al nodded, closing his eyes as he leaned his forehead against Lily’s for a moment longer… saying goodbye.
“Nixon, get Mattie and Jason, please? Cora, see if Curtis is done with Angie’s stone,” Al ordered to the couple, who I hadn’t realized were following us.
It felt like only seconds before Nixon returned with two children trailing behind him. They looked to be about thirteen years old. Then a quick bit of math told me they were thirteen years old, as the generations were spaced five years apart. The girl was very petite, but sharp features kept her from looking any sort of fragile—she probably could have taken me if we’d gotten into a fight. The boy, however, was quite pudgy and slightly trembly. Al dropped to his knees and placed his hands on the boy’s shoulders. I had no idea what he was saying inside the kid’s head, but it seemed to do the trick. The boy nodded with a smile, and bravely pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose.
“Angie,” Lily said, trying desperately to cover her anxiety with a calming grin, “this is Mattie and Jason, from Patrick’s generation. They have a very special gift.”
I crinkled my eyebrows as Al gave the kids a nod. I didn’t know what I was expecting—for them to transform into lemurs, perhaps—but without warning, the children I had been staring at just moments before completely disappeared. No, they hadn’t disappeared… I was just incapable of seeing them. I tried to focus my eyes on the spot I knew they had been standing in, but it seemed my attention only wanted to go anywhere else. I felt like I was going to bust a vein in my eyeballs if I tried to focus any harder. I simply couldn’t force myself to look in their direction. If I hadn’t already known they were there, I would have thought we were alone.
“What the—”
“Optical Diversion,” Al said proudly, smiling as the children returned to sight in the exact same place they had been before.
‘I see,’ was what I’d meant to say, but it only came out as an incredulous ‘Hot damn…’