AER (The Elements Series Book 3)

by Tracy Korn

  CHAPTER 17

  Sinking Feelings

  Liddick

  No one moves or even seems to breathe for the first few seconds after Jack's announcement about the antlion in the sand. Zoe's face is white with fear, and I feel useless just standing here like an idiot.

  "So, pull her out!" I shout.

  "Can't—those things are drawn to the struggle. See the funnel forming around her waist? If she moves at all, it will just pull her down," Dell says, gripping the back of his neck and scanning the area. Cal starts talking to Zoe in Vishan again, and this time, she nods in reply. The color starts to come back to her face.

  "On my count, though, wise?" she answers.

  "What are you doing?" Dell shouts, his eyes flashing to Cal, who lets go of the walking stick he's extended. "She'll sink!"

  "Zoe!" Azeris takes two huge steps forward, but Jack grips his arm.

  "Wait! Let her do it…this will work."

  "Your blade…get ready to—" Cal starts, but Zoe interrupts him, already pulling her machete from its sheath on her back.

  "I got this," Zoe answers, making the diamond pattern scarring between Cal's eyes wrinkle with worry.

  She takes the sharp end of the walking stick and pushes it into the sand until only about a foot of it is still visible.

  "Tell me when you're ready," Cal says, pulling a short line of rope from his satchel and tying a small loop at each end, then securing one of them around his wrist.

  "Almost…all right." Zoe extends her hand to catch the other side of the looped rope, then slides it over her wrist and grips the lead. She lets go of the stick, but doesn't take her eyes off it.

  "Grab hold of my waist—make a line. Everyone pull when she says pull," Cal announces.

  Pull…just like they did in the Bale field with the zephyrs, I think out of nowhere, and realize this must be what the rest of us who were there are thinking too. I line up behind Dell and get ready to pull Zoe out whenever she gives the word. The stick starts to move, and we get the signal.

  "Now! Pull!" Zoe shouts and grips the rope with her free hand. All of us pull back as hard as we can, and after a few seconds, Zoe scrambles to her feet.

  "Run! Let's go!" Cal yells as the small funnel that surrounded Zoe's waist starts to spread out, expanding in a perfect circle like liquid dripped onto a napkin. "Go! Go!" Cal yells again. Over my shoulder, the funnel races for our heels.

  We can't outrun that, I think. I'm not dying out here—not like this. Not eaten by some monster bug. What if this were a virtuo-cine…if it weren't real…if dying just meant I'd wake up?

  I stop running and pull the machete from the sheath on my back as I turn to face the approaching spread of sinking sand. I yell at the top of my lungs like I have some kind of magical, funnel freezing voice powers, then I yell again.

  "Liddick!" Dez calls from somewhere behind me, but I barely register her voice above my own. The funnel gets closer and closer, rushing at my feet, but crite, if I'm going to die, I'd rather die fighting than running. I shout again, and to my amazement, the funnel stops spreading. It just…stops. I cough and laugh at the same time in disbelief. That shouldn't have worked. Why did that work?

  "Did you just yell at that antlion under there? You yelled at it?" Dell calls out behind me. He starts to laugh with the others, which starts in a scatter, then everyone is laughing hard all at the same time.

  My heart is about to jump through my ribs and straight out of my chest. I swallow a few times, then notice I'm holding the machete so tightly that my hand is shaking. Or maybe it's just shaking because I'm about to roarf like the known universe has never seen a person roarf before.

  "Liddick! Are you OK?" Dez says, crashing into me from behind. I stumble forward, then get my feet under me.

  "I'm all right," I say, but my voice sounds a thousand miles away. I find Azeris, who looks at me wide-eyed with his mouth open like I'm the stupidest person with godlike powers he's ever seen in his life.

  "You're split. You're the splittest person in the world," he says, then shakes his head and laughs until he starts coughing.

  "That was brass," Dell says, sticking out his bottom lip, impressed. "Stupid, but brass." He slaps me on the back.

  My heart is pounding even harder now as the adrenaline hits, and I sheathe my machete so I can shove my shaking hands into my pockets. I glance over at Tieg, who looks at me like I could catch fire and explode any second, and then I see the flames in the corner of my eye.

  "Take a breath, antlion tamer," Zoe laughs. "Before you burn through your britches."

  The Vishan fire works…it's back, I think. "It works. It works again!" I shout, watching the fire running down my arms slowly receding until it disappears all together with a pop. I stand there a second more, then, like it's in slow motion, I watch Tieg lose his footing and slide down the funnel wall just a few feet in front of us.

  ***

  I don't believe it at first—not until I hear Tieg screaming for help as the sand spits from the funnel in cloud bursts with every snap of the antlion's pincers, stinging my face like a million tiny needles.

  "Tieg!" Dez falls to her knees at the side of the funnel.

  "Back up! Get back!" I shout. Suddenly everything is loud. I pull her up and walk her several feet back from the funnel. "Stay here!" I move back to the edge and look again for Tieg, but he's…gone. "Spaulding! Can you hear me!?" I shout, but don't hear anything. The sand is rippling in the center of the funnel, though…Crite…it pulled him down!

  "Where is he?" Cal says, stopping next to me.

  "I think he got pulled under. It happened just now, a few seconds ago when he slipped," I say. Cal's diamond scarred forehead wrinkles again, and we both nod, knowing there's only one thing to do now. We both reach for our machetes.

  "One…two…three!" Cal says, and on three, we both jump into the funnel, sliding quickly to the middle. The sand undulates, hitting the bottom of our feet like someone with a broom handle below. "Start digging!"

  "Spaulding! We're coming!" I shout again. In front of us, Dell slides down the funnel wall, followed by Zoe. With all of us digging, we manage to displace enough sand that we deepen the funnel, but there's still no sign of Tieg. "It just keeps getting deeper! We're not getting anywhere!" I shout.

  "There must be a tunnel underneath—it's pulling him into the tunnel—keep digging!" Cal answers. We move sand for several more minutes before Jack shouts down to us.

  "It will keep refilling until you hit the bend! You'll have to crawl in! We're coming!" he says, then turns and puts his hands on Dez's shoulders, lowering his eyes to meet hers as he talks.

  "The bend is close. Come on!" Cal says to me as he sheaths his machete, then wraps a cloth from his satchel around his nose and mouth like a mask. He takes a deep breath before pushing his arms and head into the center of the funnel, where it looks like he starts swimming. Dell and Zoe do the same, and I look up at Azeris in disbelief.

  "Everyone is going to suffocate!" I yell.

  "The sand is loose here, and it's not backfilling anymore; that means there's give below. The bend can't be far. No one will be in there long," Jack answers, then looks at Dez. "Are you all right? Close your eyes as tightly as you can. Here, tie this over your nose and mouth," he says, pulling one of the cloths he used to ice her eyes from his satchel, then ties the other one around his face too. He nods at me, then at Azeris before pushing through the sand, head first, like the others.

  "I'll get your back," Azeris says, looking at me as he ties his cloth over his nose and mouth, then turns to Dez. "Follow Liddick, all right?"

  Crite…I think, the blood pounding in my ears. I blow out several short breaths before fixing the cloth over my face, then suck in the deepest one I can until it feels like my lungs will explode. I squeeze my eyes shut and feel the sand swallow my arms, then pack in all around me. It pours into my ears, and the world disappears. No light. No sound. Just the distant rumbling of movement ahead, which at least tells me that
I'm going in the right direction. I try to take a breath, but can only get a fraction of one before the air stops in my throat, hard, like I'm suddenly trying to breathe liquid. Keep moving…I hear in my head, and I know it's her. Jazz? Jazz! I think in reply, but I don't hear anything else.

  In that instant, I realize it's moving forward that causes the small bubble of air I can breathe, so I keep pushing through the sand until hands grip my wrists and pull me hard. I start coughing, but the only thing I can make out is red light.

  "Take small breaths! Lots of small breaths! Clear the dust!" Cal says loudly, close to my ear. I pull down the cloth from my nose and mouth and suck in the biggest breath I can, then start coughing so hard I fall to the ground.

  "I got her!" Zoe says. "Help me!"

  I push to my hands and knees, then to my feet. The walls are packed earth, dry and cracked with gouges everywhere. It smells damp and the air sits heavy in my lungs, like any minute they'll fill with water.

  "This only goes one way, so it must have taken him down there!" Dell yells from somewhere ahead of me. I can't see him in the shadow of Cal's hand flames, which cast wicked dark shapes over the arrow scars down the bridge of his nose. Azeris coughs behind me and falls to his hands and knees.

  "Dad!" Zoe says, rushing to his side. "Just take small breaths…small breaths or the dust will choke you!"

  Her advice is useless, though. How do you fight the instinct to breathe when there's suddenly air, and a minute ago, there was none?

  "I'm…all right. Where's the boy?" Azeris asks, wrenching to his feet.

  "He had to go this way; there's nowhere else. Can you walk?" Zoe asks, and Azeris nods.

  "Get your blade ready. That thing could be anywhere," Azeris says, then coughs again.

  "Is that everyone? Is this everyone?" Jack says, scanning us all in the dim light of Cal's fire.

  "Where's my brother!? Tieg!" Dez shouts.

  "No, shhh!" Cal hisses. "You'll draw more antlions to us. These tunnels are interconnected."

  "Then let's go! We need to find him!" Dez starts to cry, then presses the heels of her hands into her eyes and shrieks. "It's burning! Why is it burning?!"

  "We're going to need more light," Jack says. "A lot more."

  CHAPTER 18

  The Platform

  Jazz

  There are no pockets in these white jumpsuits. No secret compartments like our dive suits…nothing except a line of small white lights at the shoulders like the ones wired into Eco's cheekbones.

  "How are these supposed to monitor anything? They're just like our blue Gaia jumpsuits," I say, examining the sleeves for buttons or…something.

  "They sync to your neural patterns with those lights across your shoulders," Calyx says, then nods to Eco.

  "Hardwire," he adds, then makes a clicking sound with his mouth as he winks at me.

  "Great, so they tell you how we're feeling. How are we supposed to find the first Glyph and what happens when we do?" Arco asks, still edgy.

  "The code will be self-loading as long as you make physical contact with the Glyphs. Skin to skin—at least five seconds. It seems like a blink of an eye, but it's longer than you think," Calyx says. "Each of you will need to patch your own specific Glyph. It will reach out to you, don't worry."

  "And how are we supposed to know what—who they are?" Arco follows, the impatience in his voice growing.

  "We'll try our best on this end to steer you toward them, but like we said, they're designed to find you just like those messages from Jack and Liam were. Listen for anything out of place—anything that doesn't seem to fit the storyline, or that seems to speak to you particularly," Calyx answers. "You just have to be sure before you make the code transfer. If you upload your patch to the wrong Glyph, it's lost, and you'll have a harder time finding the next Glyph. We need to patch at least four to initiate the repaired code replication," Tark says, looking at me and holding up a small, metallic box.

  "Wait…" Myra says, startling me before I can react. "What happens if it doesn't replicate? What if we don't get all the patches loaded?"

  "The code will just keep evolving," Arwyn says after a pause.

  "And it won't stop until it figures out how to reach everyone. Until it tells everyone that Carboderm and Biotech Global are the heroes helping Gaia's genetic manipulation project," Eco adds. Liam starts to say something, but it just disintegrates into a growl.

  "What? What's the problem?" Tark asks, turning to face Liam.

  "He thinks this is his fault," Lyden says under his breath.

  "It is his fault!" Eco says too loudly. "And yours, and Calyx's, and Jack's!" he adds, turning back to Liam. "You put everything at risk to keep your own people out of Gaia."

  Calyx starts to reply, but Tark beats her to it. "That's enough. I'm the one who authorized this, so if you're looking for someone to blame, you just aim those ice cubes right here."

  Eco glares at Tark, and the lights that run along the edge of his cheekbones flash red.

  "Without the ability to get the message out on a mass scale, it wouldn't matter that we knew what was really happening behind closed doors. The bio-code Jack and Liam adjusted is doing exactly what we wanted it to do—it's just incomplete," Calyx says, obviously trying to calm everyone down since the people at the consoles are starting to take quick glances in our direction. Eco rolls his eyes, and the lights in his cheekbones change from red to an erratic stream of white and blue.

  "So, this seems like a you problem…can you pick it up after you jack us in? I'd rather be turning my horse into a dragon right now," Vox says, blinking a few times as everyone stops dead and stares at her. "What? This griping is more fun than a dragon? How are you baffled?"

  "Just come on," I say, walking toward the multiple colored layers that form wide, gradient bands over the miniaturized scene of horses and wagons playing out on the bottom level. I stop behind all the people seated at the encircling, brushed metal console stations, then turn to Calyx. "How are we supposed to get in there?" I ask, gesturing to the Platform level scene.

  "You'll each need to ingest one of these," Tark says, holding up the small, metallic box again. He crosses to us and takes off the lid. "Take one."

  The chips inside are no bigger than the nail on my pinky finger. They're square and silver with flashing white lights just like the ones on the shoulders of our new white jumpsuits.

  "They're blinking!" Myra almost squeals.

  "That's the bio-matter—it's how we know the chips are viable," Arwyn says, beaming proudly.

  "Did you…make these?" Arco asks, unsure for some reason. He really has no idea what his sister can do, I think, and a small ache starts in my chest.

  "Not those particular chips…I designed the prototypes for them, though," Arwyn answers. Arco starts to reply, but the words stop just short of coming out. He half laughs instead.

  "Guess your coding proclivity runs in the family," I say, leaning my shoulder into his. He glances at me and smiles for a second, but then remembers himself, and the wall of ice goes back up. This can't just be about Liddick…I think, then close my eyes in a long blink so I don't say it out loud.

  "You should have made them flavored—like that candy in Ms. Plume's fake office. The one we went to in our brains at Gaia, remember?" Vox asks, nudging me too hard in the arm as she tries not to choke. "Is there a pooler around here?" she asks, raising an eyebrow when Calyx and the others send her confused looks. "You know, some kind of water shooter? So you can get a…drink?" she coughs. "Crite, why did you even put corners on these?"

  Arwyn fights the smile pulling at her lips. "Did you swallow it whole?" she asks around a giggle.

  "I mean, we weren't supposed to snort them, right? Tark said swallow it."

  "You were supposed to bite down on it…then it would—"

  "Dissolve!" Myra almost shouts, the white lights across her shoulders now flickering blue, red, green, white, all different colors until they return to a steady stream of white again.
/>
  I can't help but laugh as Vox gags and coughs every few seconds like she has a hairball, her giant yellow-green cat eyes only making the image that much funnier.

  I put the biochip in my mouth and almost immediately, it starts to fizz. It doesn't taste like anything, except maybe slightly metallic, and I notice the lights encircling my shoulders starting to flash like Myra's just did. Calyx must read whatever my face betrays because she holds up her hands like she's trying to keep me from jumping off a ledge.

  "That's normal; don't worry. The code is just fusing to your DNA. After a minute, it will lace every cell in your body."

  "So how do we get rid of it once we upload it to the Glyphs?" Myra asks, studying the backs of her hands, then flipping them around to study her palms.

  "It will expel itself from your DNA when the transfer to the Glyph is complete. The patch will be able to sense when it's been plugged into the whole algorithm, so it won't stay in two places," Arwyn explains. "It will just self-destruct…should take about a month, but it won't hurt you in the meantime."

  "So what happens to those Glyphs if they get the patch code, but don't need it?" Ellis asks. "Will it just self-destruct in there, too?"

  "Probably nothing, but The Glyphs don't shed cells like people do, so it's hard to say what might happen," Liam says after a second. "Just don't pick the wrong one."

  I swallow hard and find Lyden. He tries to smile at me, but I can see the worry behind his eyes. He touches the side of his long, sharp nose in a kind of salute, then nods at me.

  No one is going in alone, he thinks, and I feel a sudden warmth fill my chest…one that shouldn't be this strong just because of one sentence of encouragement, given the enormity of what they're asking us to do. He must be pushing this feeling on me.

  "Is there an order to this? Does one of us have to upload the code to a Glyph first?" Fraya asks. Tark shakes his head.

  "The Glyphs will decide that—it could choose any of you in each cine. Just get in and get out as fast as you can. Stick together so you know who has transferred their patch for the virtuo-cine you're in. There's only one per cine, so as soon as the delivery is made, we'll pull you out and reset the Platform. Once you've unloaded your patch, you will just be eyes and ears for the others in the rest of the cines."