by Peter Telep
Nomads pour into the tunnel.
The solider leaps out and ambushes them with point-blank fire. He takes out the first three, but there’s more, many more, five, six, ten...
“They’re coming!” Julie cries, glancing over her shoulder. “Run!”
“There’s another hatch at the end, right side!” Hollis yells, drifting behind us.
He drops to one knee and open fire, emptying his entire magazine. He stands. Pulls something from his gear patch. Tosses it.
Hello, Mr. Grenade.
He charges back as the thunderclap strikes and a pressure wave nearly knocks us over. The explosion’s incredibly loud, despite our ear protection.
We reach the next hatch. Hollis gives it a go. Once more, the wheel is stuck. All four of us tug on it, but the damned thing won’t budge. Not an inch.
“Come on!” Julie screams at the wheel, as though she can threaten it into opening.
I steal a look over my shoulder and wish I hadn’t.
The first few nomads pierce a wall of smoke.
They’re like eerie shadows behind light beams that swipe across the floor.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Here’s a recent if not sad observation:
Flora is a planet where good people die. A lot.
Keane’s parents. His sisters. Ms. Martha. And Hollis’s two men, whose names I never learned.
Of course, this brief list is from my sheltered little world. Keane would remind me of how many were lost when the bombs went off.
And how many are being killed now.
I would remind him that we may join them—
Because the tunnel ahead is blocked by a valve system with louvered vents. We’ve literally reached a dead end.
And here come the nomads.
“You sure we got the right hatch?” I whisper to Hollis. “If they knew about these, they would’ve used them a few times, right? It shouldn’t be rusted shut.”
“Everybody let go,” he orders. “Now Keane, jump in your persona.”
Keane nods, and as his persona glimmers to life beside us, so does Hollis’s.
“What now?” Keane asks.
“Take my hand,” Hollis says, and they vanish.
After a second, Hollis’s person turns to us. “We’re going to pull now from both sides.”
“We can help, too,” I say.
“Just stay here and pull,” Hollis says.
We get better leverage now, and the wheel creaks and finally gives way. We open it fast and pass through. The personas on the other side fade out.
Hollis reaches to close the hatch, just as he’s caught by a nomad’s light. “Keane, you take this tunnel all the way to the end. Like fifteen minutes to run it. There’s another vent and another exit, just like this one. After that, find the last hatch in the ceiling. That’ll get you onto the detention level.”
“You’re not staying here,” I tell Hollis.
“No. Just buying you time.”
“Good, because we don’t know how to get out of here!”
“Relax, Doc. I don’t plan on dying.” His face tightens as he holds back the wheel.
Nomads on the other side apply more pressure.
Hollis jolts as though he’s being shot.
His eyes crease. His mouth twists.
“Doc, come on!” Keane shouts.
I ignore him. “What’re you doing, Hollis?”
“What do you think?” he says, panting. “Fighting them on the other side... now go!”
“We’ll meet you there!”
I sprint off to join Julie and Keane—
And even though I’ve just met Hollis, my eyes burn for him. He can’t die. Not another good guy. Please...
We jog in silence for a few minutes, but then Keane says, “So your friend Tommy… I hope he’s worth it.”
I wish I had the time and the breath to describe how much Tommy means to us.
Or better, I wish I had the skill to connect with Keane and show him my memories.
I’d start with how Tommy used to babysit for me. Used to take me to McDonald’s. I’d eat my burger and then go wild in the playplace while grumpy Tommy would get harassed by little kids wiping boogers on his pants.
In the afternoons, we’d watch Disney movies. He hated them because they were “too sentimental,” even though I caught him whistling the theme to Pocahontas like a million times after he saw it.
Then when I got older, he’d come over to play Call of Duty. He’d own me (spelled pwn in gamer lore) most of the time. That sucked, but he made me a better player.
I’d show Keane the weekend we went camping. Tommy taught me how to start a fire without matches, make a bow, and pitch a tent, things my father had no clue about.
At night, good ole Tommy would tell me stories about survival school in the Marine Corps, how he barely got any sleep and ate bugs and hiked through a steaming jungle for days. His expressions were so funny and his voice twanged like a guitar.
He’d tell me stories about his old hunting dog who was in love with a cat.
Stories about how his father made moonshine and sold it to the local sheriff.
Stories about how his mother had a secret comic book collection that she hid from his father because she spent a fortune on it.
He’d always ask, “You understand me, son?”
And he taught me to reply, “Solid copy. Roger that.”
I’d go on to show Keane that night at the hospital when I visited Tommy after his heart attack. “Is your family here?” I asked him.
“Of course they are. You’re my family... you... and the Marine Corps.”
We knew he didn’t have a wife or kids (divorced he told us) and his parents were too old to travel. We were the only ones who came to see him.
Still, there was no regret in his eyes. He was on fire. Good to go, twenty-four/seven. He joked that no woman could ever break his heart. It was the barbecue pork sandwiches that had done that. He wouldn’t give them up, though. No, sir. That was real food for a real man.
I asked why he thought the Marine Corps was his family, and why he loved it so much. A gleam came into his eyes.
“Son, the Marine Corps represents honor, courage, and commitment. Semper Fi. Always faithful. You’ve got to stand for something—otherwise you’ll fall for anything.”
He spoke like a preacher, and I’ve never met anyone—my father included—who is more passionate about who he is and what he does for a living.
So how do I communicate that to Keane?
I mean to him, Tommy’s just some Joe Blow soldier from Earth.
And all I can do now is bite my lip and keep running.
Julie has a flashlight given to her by one of Hollis’s men. She extends her arm and lights our path.
I want so badly to look over my shoulder, to see if Hollis is coming, but I don’t. I’m afraid. For him.
A pair of explosions shake the tunnel and force us into a sprint, full on, the kind where your heart is ready to burst from your chest. Red zone.
The air gets even staler, and by the time we reach the hatch, we’re making eww faces and straining for breath.
Julie tries the hatch wheel. Jammed. “Really?”
“Yes,” Keane says with a snicker. “Because there are no gods. Only death.”
Me and Mr. Smiley Face join Julie on the wheel. This one feels even tighter than the last one.
“Let’s do like Hollis did,” I tell Keane.
“Yeah,” Julie agrees. “We jump in our personas. Three on one side, three on the other.”
“Wait!” Keane hollers.
But I’m already in my persona and projecting myself on the other side of the hatch.
What I don’t realize, and what I’m about to learn, is that when you’re a noob, you should’ve visited your destination at least once in your real body.
If you recall, we successfully projected ourselves to the end of the cave in the bike park. We had been there before.
B
ut it was Keane who took us to the Community and into the Hood.
And it was Julie who got distracted and lost.
Apparently, the wreath “remembers” where you’ve been, and it creates a map inside itself.
However, it’s not perfect. Sometimes the links from place to place fail through being distracted or stressed out.
And if you don’t have experience accessing the map in the first place, you will get lost. Keane and Hollis knew this and didn’t want us taking the risk.
Hell yeah, it would’ve been nice if they had clarified this beforehand, but I’ll cut them some slack, since we’re running for our lives and don’t have much time for persona training and long monologues.
So... that’s why I’m not standing on the other side of the hatch.
Actually, I’m in Ms. Martha’s office, walled in by hundreds of burning books.
Black smoke rushes into my face. Flames climb across the ceiling. I can’t breathe.
Panicking, I close my eyes and will myself out of there.
But I should’ve decided where I wanted to go—like back to Julie and Keane—because my next leap is totally random.
And you won’t believe where I wind up.
I’ll give you one clue:
The worst place ever.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
I snap open my eyes, completely disoriented—until my senses kick in. What have I done?
I’m underwater. I cough bubbles and look around:
Darkness. Eyes adjusting. Arms glowing.
And oh, no, there are dead people everywhere.
Limbs banging into my head, my neck.
Bloated faces. Hair jutting in all directions. Eyes locked open in terror.
Men, women, children. A baby.
I scream and shiver violently.
There’s no one listening. I kick toward the surface.
No surface. This is a tunnel. I’m in the aqueduct.
An earthquake... no... wait... those are explosions...
With a whoosh, I’m swept into a powerful, unstoppable current, blasting though the tunnel with hundreds of bodies. It’s like we’re being flushed down an enormous drain.
All these people... they were using the exact same tunnels we were to escape, but then someone opened the floodgates and drowned them all... and if that’s the case, then all this water—
Could be heading straight for Julie and Keane.
If I could control my body and my persona at the same time I could easily warn them—but I don’t know how. I don’t know how to save them.
Wait. Just get back there. Focus. Close your eyes and see the tunnel with Julie and Keane. You know that place. You won’t get lost.
I see it. I’m confident. I can do it.
And with the strangest sensation I’ve ever felt—going from completely soaked to absolutely dry—I’m back at the hatch with my friends—
Just as the hatch wheel gives way.
“We did it!” Julie cries.
Keane tugs open the hatch but stops.
He’s caught in a blinding light. We all are.
“Don’t move!”
That’s a voice I don’t recognize, and a tone that leaves no room for argument.
Julie raises her hands. “I’m only eighteen. I wanted to meet a guy, have a big wedding. I wanted to be a Bridezilla.”
I squint through the light.
Five nomads. Mirrored goggles. Rifles.
I guess they still want to look badass with those goggles, even in the dark.
I lower my voice. “Guys? We need to go.”
“I agree,” says Keane. “But can you outrun a bullet?”
“That’s not what I mean.”
The nomads advance.
But then one stops. Glances back over his shoulder—
At the sound of rushing water.
And someone’s turning up the volume.
Here it comes.
“Julie? Keane? Ready in three, two, one, go!”
With the nomads distracted, we rush through the hatch, screaming for each other to hurry.
The first wave breaks with a deafening crash, sweeping the nomads up and into the ceiling.
The second wave roars just behind, churning into white foam filled with corpses.
As the tunnel rumbles, a third wave blasts through the still open hatch.
“Help me close it!” Keane shouts.
It takes all three of us to fight off the current.
For a few seconds, we’re losing our breaths and putting our shoulders on the hatch as water sprays into our faces.
But then there’s a break, a little gap in the flow, and with all three of us howling like weightlifters shattering records, we seal it off.
And then we stand there, soaked and catching our breaths. I catch Julie’s attention, and we start laughing over how insane our lives have become:
Chased. Abducted. Alien planet. Weird abilities. The Palladium under attack.
“You think this is funny?” Keane asks me.
“It’s just the adrenaline. We can’t help it.”
He grins sarcastically. “You should try harder to help it. Ha ha ha.”
I look at Julie, whose smile has already faded. She wipes water from her eyes. “I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“For not helping you on the other side. I listened to Keane. I was too afraid to jump in my persona.”
I wince. “Actually, I didn’t help.”
“But I saw you go.”
“Oh, he did,” Keane says. “And he got lost.”
I shrug. “My bad.”
“Don’t do it again. You’re a noob.”
“You sound like you care. I thought you hated me.”
“I might need you as a shield.” With that, he walks off.
Julie mouths the word, “Ouch.”
I glance at the hatch, which seems to bulge from all the pressure on the other side. “Hollis was back there.”
She glances away. “I know.”
“Wait a minute. If Tommy’s locked up, how do we get him out now? I thought Hollis would take care of that.”
She sighs through a curse. “So all of this is for nothing.”
“Unless Keane knows what to do. Hang on. Yeah, there might be a way. He could find someone in the Community who works in detention. He could talk to them.”
“That could work,” she agrees. “That could also take a lot of time.”
“I know. Come on.”
The tunnel funnels into a narrower one, and we run our palms along the ceiling. Keane spots the hatch above us, and the wheel spins easily. It’s about time we caught a break.
There’s no ladder built into this hatch. We need to use the wheel, swing up, hook a foot on one of the hinges, and then hoist ourselves onto the next level.
Keane and Julie make it on their first try.
I lose my grip, fall off, and land on my butt.
They yell at me in whispers, but what do they expect from a Karate school dropout? Ninja climbing abilities? Freaking Spider-Man? I bang my head, my knee, and my elbow but finally join them up top.
Keane acts like he knows his way around, but I get the feeling he doesn’t. We jog through a maze of corridors with heavy doors and rectangular windows to view the detainees inside each cell. All of them are empty. And if there were guards stationed here, they’re gone, caught up in the attack.
Booming and more gunfire echo from somewhere outside. Sounds like the fight is headed our way. I think my heart just skipped a beat.
“How many cells are there?” Julie asks.
“A lot,” Keane answers.
“You’re not a numbers guy, are you, Keane?” I ask.
“Shut up!”
“And every hall looks the same,” I go on. “We’ll be here for the rest of our lives.”
“Is there a security station?” Julie asks.
“What do you think I’m looking for?” Keane answers. “We can find him on the monitors inste
ad of wandering around.”
“But first we’ll wander around, looking for the security station,” I say, deserving a punch to the throat.
He gives me a look. “Hate you.”
“Love you,” I sing back.
We reach a T-shaped intersection, where Keane whirls to level a finger on me. He’s preparing an epic rant, one so fiery it’ll singe my eyebrows and bring me to my knees.
His mouth opens. And so does mine.
But I can’t talk.
Because there’s a nomad standing right behind him.
Julie raises her hands, and I follow.
Keane frowns. “Well, uh, yeah, you should be giving up. I know what I’m doing. Let me handle this!”
I gesture for him to turn around.
He glances over his shoulder and curses.
“Oh, yeah,” the nomad says, as if remembering something. The head wrap and scarf come off, as do the goggles.
I lower my head and breathe a massive sigh of relief. “You made it!”
Hollis smiles, nods—
And then collapses toward us.
We catch him before he hits the ground. His shirt and pants are soaked with blood, and there’s a small puddle where he was standing.
“Oh, no,” Julie gasps.
He winks at her. “You got a Band-Aid?”
“How’d you beat us here?” Keane asks.
“Does it matter?” Julie asks. “He’s hurt! He needs help!”
“It’s okay,” Hollis says, “I actually sent you the long way. Thought it’d be safer. Now turn me around. Tommy’s cell is just over there.”
“Can you get it open?” I ask.
“Yeah. I got the code from Martha.”
“Awesome. And thanks. I mean, really, thanks.”
He shudders in pain and clutches my arm even tighter as we walk. “Hey, Doc, before we get out of here, we need to have that talk.”
“Definitely. But we gotta help you first.”
We cross the next corridor and reach Tommy’s cell. I rush to the door’s window and peer inside.
There he is, pacing around the room and cursing the fact that he’s not in the fight.
Looks like they gave him a haircut. High and tight the way Marines prefer it. Oorah. He seems a bit thinner, too. Maybe they don’t have beer on Flora, and if they don’t, I’m sure there’s been Hell to pay.
He’s wearing those blue pajamas they like around here. I’m sure he hates them.