by Sean Platt
“Yeah, I’ve heard — ”
“I know you’re a realist.” He said it like booger. “But you don’t get to win this argument with me. It might be our last one.”
Mara sighed, nodded, and finally said, “You know, if you’d been as sage, as immature, and as stupidly irreverent around Peers Basara and Jeanine Coffey as you are around me in private, maybe they wouldn’t have beaten you up.”
“I try to bury my personality and maintain a professional front. My boss is a realist.”
Mara looked away, blinking. She wasn’t usually emotional, but this was all so sad. Too tragic. None of it fair.
“Look, Mara, it’s the fate you’ve been handed. Maybe it’d have been easier on you if the vessel had been open seating like you’d originally thought, and everyone had just fought and killed each other to get on and stay there. But from where I’m sitting, the Astrals made it better for everyone else while making it harder for you. They’ve got your back whether you want it or not. Nobody’s boarding that ship without your code and permission. So, yeah, you have to conduct a lottery, and maybe that makes you feel like you’re playing God. But boo-fucking-hoo for Mara Jabari. In a few hours at most, I’ll be drinking gallons of water.”
“Kamal, that’s not — ”
“I’ve been watching the feeds from here. It’s dry and cozy. The sump pumps you installed must be top-notch. I’m good until the seals fail or water reaches the vents. This is how I get to save my own share of starfish, but in order for me to do what I must, you’ve got to do your part without bumming me out. So fuck you for wanting to deprive me of my duty now.”
Mara nodded. “Okay.”
“Now that the Astral patrols are back to assist the lottery process and have stopped shooting everyone willy-nilly, the city is more or less behaving. People seem to understand that if there’s pushing and shoving they’ll be shot or eaten by the nearest Reptar. The rioting and killing has stopped. If the city records they gave you to select your fellow travelers were accurate when you got them, they’re probably still accurate now.”
“I’ll try getting them to let me stay. We can hang out together, you and me.”
Kamal’s face became serious. “Mara, no. You might know more about the Astrals than anyone alive. Your Initiate … ” He stopped, seeming to remember their conversation probably wasn’t secure, then tiptoed around the viceroys’ covert plans. “Knew a lot and did a lot of figuring things out. Not to sound like a cliché, but humanity needs you.”
She considered protesting then decided she couldn’t win and let it go.
“Just do your best to choose the best and brightest. They’re going to destroy the planet, Mara. The big ship is already at the southern ice cap, so it’s only a matter of time before Egypt gets flooded from both ends. Soon we’ll be a big swimming pool, just like Kevin Costner predicted years ago.”
“Who?”
“Didn’t you ever see that old movie Waterworld?”
“No.”
“Good. Don’t. It’s terrible.”
Mara almost laughed. She was going to miss Kamal.
“They said all the capitals would get vessels. You told me yourself they never totally sent us into extinction before. They erase the old societies but leave a seed to try the human experiment again once the world has been washed clean. You’ll live, and so will those you select. And the people on the other vessels will live. I guess maybe the flood will eventually recede as it did for Noah, and you can begin anew. But it’s still not a lot of people, Mara. Choose carefully. You’re a scientist. So I need you to promise that you won’t flinch from this. Okay? It’s a poor aide’s dying wish.”
“Kamal … ”
“The shape of humanity to come, Mara. It’s up to you.”
The screen went blank.
And there were footsteps behind Mara. She turned, angry to have been cut off from Kamal, presumably forever. A shout was on her lips. But it was Divinity behind her, and she’d already learned that with Divinity, shouting never did any good.
“The time to choose survivors is now,” Divinity said. “The end of this epoch has come.”
CHAPTER 33
“He’s stuck somehow!”
Kindred watched Piper’s mood flip from alarm to relief to babbling incoherence then back to alarm (bleeding into red, dripping panic) in seconds. He saw every nuance of each fascinating change.
“Go help him, Kindred!”
But the body pushing past Piper to find the rising river water was Lila’s, not Kindred’s. He stood there like a slack-jawed bystander as she struck his side in a run, dove headfirst, and vanished in the brown flow before surfacing with one hand barely grasping the rope Meyer had dragged behind for the rest of them to cross. He’d tied it off on his end, both to secure it and to protect himself lest something snag it in the middle and not drag Meyer away. But according to Piper he’d somehow managed to get trapped anyway, and just watching her was its own feast of emotion. She was by the Nile bank with her chest heaving, mouth open in the rain, hand on her breast, now equally terrified for Lila and Meyer.
“GO! THEY’RE BOTH GOING TO DROWN!”
Piper shoved him. Something stirred as he watched her, still fascinated. Kindred didn’t precisely feel a sense of concern — more like a memory of the emotion. He remembered the moment Nathan Andreus had told him Trevor was gone. He remembered learning that Heather had gone. And he seemed to remember the time he himself had gone, shot in the chest by Raj Gupta. But that hadn’t happened, had it? Because he was still right here, very much alive. So why was there a ghost of death still inside him? The ghost of loss, of regret?
He wasn’t afraid for Lila, or for Meyer. It was more that he knew he should be, and wanted to be, but came up empty.
Then there was a shift. Looking into Piper’s fear and worry, the same emotions rose from slumber inside him.
“Lila!”
But of course she couldn’t hear him, or turn back even if she could. Nobody had seen Meyer across the river in the rain, but they’d all seen the section of sheet metal roofing and felt the crunch as it crashed into the submerged dock. If Meyer was trapped anywhere, it was either between metal and dock — or, worse: underwater. Either way didn’t give him much time, and Lila knew it. If the northern ice cap had truly melted, it was only a matter of time before the rising water made its way to the planet’s middle.
Kindred doffed his shoes and jacket then dove in after Lila, half swimming and half clambering hand over hand along the strung rope. It seemed to be taking forever. Lila was still several body lengths ahead, and even she hadn’t entered the water until whatever had gone wrong had been happening for at least ten or fifteen seconds, followed by another twenty seconds of indecision and swimming, maybe more. How long could a man hold his breath?
“LILA!”
She held her lead easily, passion outstripping Kindred’s superior strength. Kindred could practically see need radiating from the girl like heat from a coal. She’d reach him because she had to, not from duty. Not because Piper had ordered it.
The sheet metal shook in the current, straining as the river pushed it on and the dock held fast. The noise of buckling aluminum was like blasts from a shotgun.
Lila was gone. Just … gone.
Kindred looked back to the shore where he’d left Piper and Peers. He could only see silhouettes. He glanced toward the dock, seeing now that there was no way to go around the huge obstruction. Lila had crossed as far as she could on the tied-off rope, but then it vanished beneath the section of roofing. She’d faced a choice: crawl hand over hand around its outer edge until she came back to the dock, or swim for it.
Swim underwater.
Kindred looked at the place where Lila had vanished, feeling uncertain. With the bulk of metal above, it’d be nearly impossible to see down into the already murky water. How would she find him, if he really was there — something that, now that Kindred could see the alternatives, seemed almost for sure? And how, if
he tried, would he find Lila?
She’d have had nothing to hold, only blindly swimming, trying to find Meyer and free him. He’d been under water for almost a minute by now. Would he be unconscious? If the chances of Lila making it were slim, the odds of her making it out while dragging a 180-pound man were nil.
You’re supposed to go under. This is where you save the day.
But the voice of conscience was merely a whisper. He should, but what was the logical point? He wouldn’t be able to see them, or hold his place against the undertow with nothing to cling to. And if one or both of them were somehow hung up, he probably wouldn’t be able to free them. There was a knife in the pack, but it was still in the car, where Lila had left it. Kindred had only his hands.
Going for them was stupid. It would mean trading two casualties for three. He’d die too, then Piper and Peers would be alone.
You’re supposed to go under.
His mind showed him Trevor, Heather, and a dozen others lost along the way.
Maybe one minute gone. Then a minute and ten seconds.
He broke the surface, clawing for purchase under the large flap of metal. To Kindred’s surprise, he found that Meyer’s guideline was not only unbroken beneath it but simple to grab and hold. He kicked his feet in the current, using the line to move hand over hand along the large thing’s underside. It was dark, but once Kindred’s eyes were open and mostly adjusted to the water’s assault, he could see enough to navigate, his own breath assiduously held.
There was the dock.
The floatation barrels, two with big gashes in the sides, flooded.
One of the submersibles, still in its slip, banging against the dock, obviously battered.
And there was —
Something hit him. Hard. Kindred’s head spun, and his hand slipped from the line. Semiconscious and losing air, he scrabbled for a handhold, but beyond the rope it was all slippery metal. He dragged his fingers along it, feeling the slower, near-shore current tug him toward the dock’s bent structure, beneath it.
The water became darker.
Darker.
He stopped caring about the water. Stopped caring about the fear. It was easier to let it go.
Instead of two people dead, now there’d be three.
But at least I did something.
The last of the light bled from Kindred’s world. He felt the water. He felt it carry him away, like flying.
And someone or something, maybe God, maybe whatever was out there, was saying, You did it. You did something. You —
— ’d better not fucking give up now! I didn’t get him just to lose you!”
And there was a slap. Hard. God wasn’t supposed to slap people.
“Move. Give me room.”
A strong hand on his wrist. The last of the flying sense became a feeling of dragging. His shirt was untucked, grit and gravel scooped into the back of his pants by the hard line of his belt.
Kindred blinked, a vision before his eyes. At first he thought he was seeing himself from above, the way those woo-woo nut jobs in Meyer’s memory said you saw yourself when you died. Then he saw that the man had the start of a salt-and-pepper beard, whereas Kindred was shaven. And he wasn’t looking down. Rain was still pelting his face —he was looking up at Meyer, who’d dragged him to shore.
There was a rope around Meyer’s waist, its end frayed as if sawed. Lila was behind him, big brown eyes wide and wet, the backpack knife in her hand. Beyond them, only partially visible, was the popped top of what could only be a freed submersible. Just in time. The river was visibly rising, water surging as if shoved by an oncoming wave of titanic proportions.
Kindred’s mind spun through the past few minutes.
How he’d reacted when Piper told him to go after Meyer. How he’d reacted when Lila had gone in. The time he’d spent ruminating on Heather and Trevor rather than acting. The recollection of his death, which hadn’t actually happened. And most of all, the way he’d watched the black water, coolly deciding he’d serve them best by saving himself.
Kindred closed his eyes. Everything was spinning. Everything hurt.
“You’re okay now,” Meyer told him. “You’ll live.”
Kindred decided the second half of Meyer’s statement was true.
But the first was so obviously false.
CHAPTER 34
The Ember Flats town square was less quaint than its name implied. The city had started large by the time it officially started at all, like Heaven’s Veil. One day the Astrals came down, helped build the palace, then the walls that kept it safe, and called it the Capital of Capitals. It had since grown further, packing tighter and rising in height rather than expanding outward. Now the town square was a place where four roads crossed in a giant tic-tac-toe board, and instead of making the block between them fit for building, it became green space. But it was always packed, and by the time Clara arrived with the Lightborn, it was as if every citizen had come to the one block of land, pressing so close to the vessel’s invisible shield that the air crackled with warning static.
But there was no pushing or shoving. The Astrals were seeing to that, patrolling the crowd with weapons Clara hadn’t seen since Heaven’s Veil — and plenty of Reptars in tow.
On their way across the otherwise empty city, Clara had made a mental count of Lightborn. It had been for practice navigating their shared mental space if anything. And in that common field of thought, she’d counted thirteen distinct nodes, over and over and over again. In the mental sameness, thirteen spots with their own unique sense of self — and maybe, if her experience so far was any guide, their own secrets. Just thirteen of them. Same as the bodies in their group, with Logan at its head.
In the square, water had risen to the height of an adult knee, halfway up Clara’s thighs, surging as it rose. Clara kept thinking of what Josh had said about the ice caps: something she’d already seen inside her mind because the man in boots kept showing it to her.
She’d seen rising water claim Canadian shores. Same in Ireland and Scotland, in the Ukraine, in Sweden and Finland and Norway. She’d seen the waves crumble cliffs and obliterate fjords. And feeling the force tugging her legs now, it was hard to keep her mind off the idea that propagation only took so long, and that it was only a matter of time before the waves came here, too.
“How long, do you think?” Ella said beside her.
Clara didn’t bother to ask what Ella was talking about. She knew. They were holding minds the way some little girls held hands.
“I don’t know.”
“Are we getting on the boat?”
“I don’t know, Ella.”
There was a surge in the water from the city’s north. In seconds, it rose to Clara’s waist. She and Ella gripped each other, and in the square ahead the crowd muttered then shouted. Mothers held their children tight, lifting those who could be carried out of the water, and the liquid unknown.
A few scattered screams. A few jabbering words of panic.
But the surge stopped, the rise arresting at its new level.
“If we’re not getting on the boat, why are we here?”
But Clara didn’t feel like opening her mind the rest of the way, or pandering to Ella’s questions. She liked Ella and the others, but there was something different between Clara and the rest of them. Nick had said as much, and Ella had told her the same. Clara was brighter. A Lightborn among Lightborn, able to maintain balance without the collective, able to reach where the others could not, to keep those thoughts safe.
“Shh, Ella. Listen.”
Logan’s strong features and bold eyes were fixed on Ella.
“Yes,” he said. “Listen.”
The Astrals’ vessel lay in the heart of the square. Up close, it didn’t look like Noah’s Ark at all, except that it happened to be an enormous boat in the center of a flooding city. It was more like a miniature cruise ship without the amenities and logos, metal on the bottom, wood and steel sharing space at the deck and quart
ers.
Beside the Ark was a platform.
And on it was an Astral contingent — Titans and a woman Clara knew wasn’t as human as she appeared — next to Viceroy Jabari and a handful of human assistants. There was a microphone set up, and one of the assistants kept reading names into it, seemingly directed by Mara. Each name brought a person from the crowd, who came to a long gangplank like a tongue from the vessel’s side. A Titan by the gangplank nodded as the person passed, and with some activity on the platform a section of air shimmered and turned green long enough for the chosen to pass through. Then the whole thing would repeat, one by one by one.
With each person, the assistant read a profession or credential:
Civil engineer.
Microbiologist.
Civic leader.
Mother.
Mother.
And mother.
But Clara could hear other credentials that the viceroy and her team weren’t daring to speak aloud.
With the exception of a librarian and a physician, there were no women over the age of thirty-five. And Jabari’s logic said, Humanity needs fertility.
The ratio was skewed for gender. There were three times as many women as men. And Jabari’s logic said, Men can father as many children as there are women willing to carry them.
And Clara heard: Eadric Khouri, obstetrician. Taavi Kalb, gynecologist.