Humberto Flores was the courier for the bottom half of the building, and his good friend Chad White covered the top half. They worked the afternoon shift, from 3 pm until midnight, running errands, picking up coffee, delivering documents to the courthouse just a few blocks away, and whatever other task. Almost every day, around 7 pm, Humberto and Chad would sit together in the little cafe in the lobby of the building and sip a cortadito while splitting a Cuban sandwich. Humberto's English was good, not perfect, but good enough to carry on a conversation. Chad didn't speak a lick of Spanish, even though he fancied himself nearly fluent. Like most native speakers listening to someone make attempts at his language, Humberto didn't have the heart to tell Chad that his “nearly fluent” was completely incomprehensible. Humberto would just smile and nod, tell Chad that he was really coming along with his Spanish, and then politely direct the conversation to English.
Humberto was nearly two decades older than Chad. He'd come to Southern Florida as a child on a boat from Cuba, and made his home there. He'd been married three times and had four children, all of whom were either grown or lived with their mothers. He attended Mass every Saturday night and enjoyed catching a movie each Monday morning on his day off. He'd experienced much of what life had to offer, and to him, life was sweet and spicy and filled with beautiful things.
Humberto enjoyed listening to Chad talk about his own life, which was so much different than his own. Where Humberto's life had been filled with hard work, extreme poverty, and the constant daily struggle to rise above his birthright, Chad's life was one of convenience, ease, and pleasure. Chad had been raised by a Cuban nanny on Brickell Key, while his father and mother had both worked demanding jobs. Their work had paid off, to a certain extent, and Chad was able to have anything and everything he'd ever wanted. Chad had finished high school several years before, and although he tried out the local community college for a few weeks, he found that any education beyond what was absolutely required was something in which he was simply not interested. Finally, his father, tired of Chad riding his financial coat tails, had forced Chad to get a job. Now he worked at the building where his father worked, as a courier.
Humberto would often try to impart some of the life lessons he'd learned to Chad, but the younger man was like a sponge: quick to soak up advice and suggestion, but just as quick to squeeze it out.
On the other hand, Chad's stories gave Humberto a glimpse at a life that he would never have, and one that was so far removed from his own experience, it was like a movie. Sometimes, listening to Chad talk about the girls he'd met, the drugs he'd tried, and the trouble he got himself into was more interesting than any movie Humberto had ever seen.
They complemented each other, Humberto and Chad, and their unlikely friendship had grown to the point where each looked forward to their evening breaks, in which they would swap stories and share in each other’s experiences.
A little less than ten minutes before their building exploded, they were sitting at the little round table talking about a new club that had opened up on Miami Beach, full of incredibly beautiful Russian models, according to Chad. (Humberto would never be caught dead in a club on the beach, and he didn't think anyone would have cared to see him there either.)
Chad was taking the tomatoes off his Cuban and giving them to Humberto, who was placing them on his own sandwich. It was something they did every day. Humberto's pager beeped. He glanced at it and sighed.
“I've got an emergency run from Eight,” he said.
“Go on then, I'll keep your sammie fresco,” Chad said before taking a large bite of his own sandwich. Humberto hesitated, then stood up.
“It won't be more than a minute.” He smiled. “I'm anxious to hear about this girl Petra you speak so highly of.”
“You betch-ya,” Chad said through a mouthful of his food. He took a sip of his cortadito and waved Humberto along. “Get out of here old man and do your job.”
Humberto smiled as he walked away from the little cafe and hopped on the elevator. He pressed the button marked “8,” the elevator doors closed, and he began his silent ascent.
As the elevator rose to the fifth floor, he heard shouts and commotion. The sounds grew louder as he passed the sixth floor, some of the yells sounding as if they'd come from just beyond the elevator doors. The sounds faded again as he rose higher, and the elevator finally stopped at the eighth floor.
That's odd, he thought as he went to the reception desk for the Private Equity group that leased the entire floor. There lay a packet of documents in a manila envelope with an address written across the top, and the name of the woman to whom the documents were to be delivered.
“I'm so sorry to push this on you so late in the day,” the receptionist said sweetly, “but these documents do need to be delivered as soon as possible, preferably within the hour.”
“You got it, miss,” Humberto said. He took out his company-issued smart phone, typed in the job description and had her sign the screen with her finger. With a tap of a button, the job and the receptionist's signature were transmitted to his supervisor's computer. It never ceased to amaze Humberto how much things had changed in his lifetime.
He climbed aboard the elevator, giving a little nod to the woman at the desk, and the doors slid shut. Again, the commotion from a few floors down caught his attention. Instead of going to the lobby, he pressed the button marked “6.”
He figured he would just pop in to see if everything was all right. Who knew? Maybe he'd walk away with a good yarn for Chad.
Chapter Six
Mae gasped for air, choking on the tubes that ran into her body. Two men held her down, and a nurse was approaching with a syringe. She shook her head violently, but her whole body was shaking, her muscles tightening and releasing, her limbs jerking.
Her senses were exploding, the light so bright that she couldn't see, the sounds so loud and chaotic that it sounded like white noise, and the smells. She could smell the sweat and adrenaline on the two men holding her down, and faintly, she smelled her mother's perfume. Mae wanted to call out to her mom, to scream for help, but the tubes wouldn’t let her.
She snaked one of her arms free from the two men and yanked on the tube, ripping it from her mouth. She felt something tear inside her, but it didn't matter. Air, cool on her lips and tongue and throat filled her lungs, so fresh and clean. She took a breath and then another.
“Hold her on her side,” the nurse said, kneeling beside Mae and the two men.
“No!” Mae shouted, squirming to free herself of the powerful grip that held her steady.
“Stop! Please stop!” It was a woman's voice, and Mae recognized it immediately. She kicked harder, writhing.
“Mom!” she shouted.
“Oh Mae!” Her mom was crying now. She sounded helpless and hopeless, the despair so distinct in her mom's voice that Mae wanted to cry.
That buzz was in her head, the one that she'd felt on the beach, and the warm currents of air rushed against her skin. Those closest to her felt it too, and for a moment the men loosened their grip on her arms and shoulders.
“She's piquing!” the nurse shouted.
A man's voice responded, urgently, “Inject the neural sedative now!”
Mae turned to see the needle pressing into her skin, pushing deep into the muscle of her shoulder, and the mounting energy around her suddenly pushed back. The nurse and the two men holding her were flung away, as easily as wind blowing fallen autumn leaves along a sidewalk. One of the men crashed into the tank of clear fluid, and the thick glass cracked but did not shatter. The other man toppled through a bank of monitors and medical equipment, while the nurse smashed into the far wall and crumpled to the floor in a heap.
All the noise and commotion died suddenly as a shocked silence set in. Mae sat up, and Lilly broke free from the grip of her husband and rushed to her daughter, gathering Mae up in her arms.
“Mom?” Mae asked, reaching up to touch her face, an awed expression on her face.
“Mom, something's wrong.”
The buzz was growing in intensity, and the currents of air whipped around their bodies in little cyclones. The plastic tubing that had been stuck in her throat suddenly lifted off the ground and hovered in the air, like charmed snakes. Everyone in the room froze, watching the writhing tubes and holding their breath.
The equipment and monitors stirred, jerking a few centimeters to the side before lifting off the ground.
“It's incredible,” Whaler said, backing away from the rising computer screens and cables. His voice reflected the awe that they all felt, and hinted at the terror of the unknown. Whaler bent closer to the floating monitors, as if to verify that they were off the ground, that his senses were not playing tricks on him.
“The entanglement of particles, spread to this degree ...” Whaler muttered. The computer screens were now a full six inches off the ground. “The superposition of the particles in wave form, more powerful than we could have ever imagined ...”
His voice trailed off, and the silence in the room was complete, except for the sound of restrained breathing. The corner of one of the heavy metal desks began lifting into the air, the rounded metal leg squeaking along the ground as it shifted, and then the desk was hovering. Computer monitors and other equipment on the desk slid sideways on the slanted surface, then fell to the floor with a shattering crash. The other end of the desk also lifted, a few inches, rising above the floor, while all those in the room held their breath and watched.
Mae's eyes were shut tightly, tears leaking down her face, and her head pounding too fiercely to notice that the attention in the room was no longer focused on her, but on the desk by the wall. Lilly saw it though, watched the desk rising. She held her daughter's shoulders tightly and kissed the side of her head, whispering, asking if she was okay, but Mae couldn't hear above the buzzing, pounding ache in her head and the whooshing sound of the building energy around her.
The doctor and nurses in the room stared, shocked at what they were seeing. Mae’s father pushed through the crowd and was reaching down to help his daughter and wife to their feet, when the second wave of energy exploded outward. The tank where Mae had been housed shattered in an instant, the thick fluid spraying the room. The bank of monitors was pulled higher into the air, and flipped end over end, smashing through the wall.
Another shock wave, and the walls buckled and splintered. Screams and shouts of alarm erupted as people fled. Those who were not already knocked to the ground were thrust away from Mae by the wave of energy, some skidding along the ground, others crashing into walls. Doctor Whaler sunk to his knees, his thin strands of hair wild and askew. His arms were raised, as if praying.
“Mae, hurry,” Lilly said, pulling her daughter along. Mae was in a near catatonic state now, as her parents half carried, half dragged her from the room.
“Mom, something isn't right,” Mae said again. “I don't feel—”
The third shock wave was the most powerful thus far, and sent her father crashing into the debris. The building shifted, and part of the sixth floor collapsed, creaking and groaning under its own weight.
“Mae, honey,” Lilly said, “we have to go, now!”
“Dad!” she screamed, but Lilly was pulling her to the door. In the hallway, cables that had run through the ceiling had spilled out through the flimsy tiles. Some had been cut, and they swung in the air, tiny sparks emitting from the ends.
Mae, still in a daze, the buzz in her head louder than ever, ran toward the elevator. A man stood there, an older Hispanic man, his face frozen with terror.
The next shock wave destroyed the entire sixth floor of the building.
Chapter Seven
Humberto stepped out of the elevator just as the door and walls exploded in a shower of splinters and medical equipment. He watched, frozen in place, as people scrambled from the room, covered in dust and grime, too shocked to scream, the focus only to survive.
We've been attacked, Humberto thought, and the idea stuck in his brain. They were in a tall building, and though Miami was no New York or Boston, he could imagine plenty of terrorists drawn to the city and the people and the tall buildings.
Tall building. He wondered how it had happened, if a plane had flown into the building? But then the explosion would have been louder and more crushing. A bomb, smuggled past security in a briefcase? He didn't know, but he had to get out of there. A thousand images flashed through his mind, memories from that early autumn day at the beginning of the new millennium. He'd been sitting in a small cafe, similar to the cafe where Chad was now sitting, and Humberto had sat there, his eyes glued to the coverage of the attacks in New York.
Chad.
He had to warn Chad, he had to get out of there, to save as many as he could. As Humberto turned to leave, he saw a woman helping a teenage girl from the room. The girl was wet, and wearing nothing more than thin cloth around her private parts. She seemed to be in a daze, shouting that she was sorry, so sorry. Their eyes connected for a moment, and Humberto saw sorrow in the girl's eyes.
And then the world exploded. The sound was deafening, his ears filled with the crushing metal as the building crashed around him. He turned to step on to the elevator, but it was gone. Only the empty shaft remained, showers of sparks and shards of twisted metal falling to the floors below.
Humberto remained conscious long enough to realize that the entire floor was dropping out from under his feet, boulders of cement and steel reinforcement crashing all around, and something hit the old man in the head and he was falling, falling, and it was so loud.
As Humberto crumpled, his mind allowed him one last thought before all went silent black. The girl and her mother—he had no way of knowing that it was her mother, but for some reason he thought that it was so—were gone. Good, he thought, happy that she was safe.
***
Lilly took one look at the elevator shaft and knew it was a bad idea. Another shock wave, maybe one while on the elevator, would send them careening to the basement floors of the building, only to be crushed. She pulled Mae to the stairs, and Mae was crying now, screaming that it hurt, that her head was exploding, that she couldn't make it stop.
A hole opened up in the floor, helped in part by a mini van-sized chunk of concrete and metal that crashed from above, barely missing them. Part of the floor didn't break away but instead bent at a sharp diagonal slant, gouging the floor below.
“Come on!” Lilly shouted, and they were sliding the short distance to the fifth floor. Lilly remembered a short bridge leading to the parking garage, and she thought the bridge was on the third floor. They'd have to take the stairs, to get out of the building as soon as possible. For their own sake, for Mae's sake, they needed to get away from these people who had taken her daughter and kept her in a tank like a fish. Lilly had seen enough, had allowed enough, mostly at her husband's insistence. Mae needed to be protected, and the only protection they could find was with Il Contionum.
And what is Il Contionum, she'd demanded, but her husband could never, or would never, tell. Protection, he would say instead. Protection for Mae, for the family, for their way of life. But Lilly was done allowing the countless tests to be run on her daughter, allowing them to keep her trapped for months at a time.
Another wave of energy, and Lilly smashed into the wall, jerked away from Mae. Mae screeched, reaching for her mother, and they heard the twisting scream of metal, the crunching concrete and steel and glass, and the building was collapsing around them.
Lilly got up and almost fell back down. She touched her forehead and felt blood. They felt the burst of heat and then the next explosion, which knocked both Lilly and Mae from their feet. A ball of fire swept upward from below, and Mae screamed. The explosion was over as quickly as it had come, but then the smoke rose like a cloud through the building. Through the dark, grey haze, Lilly saw the glow of fire, possibly remnants from the explosion.
She got to her hands and knees and crawled to where Mae lay on the floor, cry
ing and shivering. She realized for the first time since this had all begun, that Mae was uncovered, wet and probably cold. Lilly undid the buttons on her blouse and shrugged the shirt from her shoulders. The cloth was light, but it would be better than nothing. She wrapped it around her daughter and held her tight.
For more than three months, Mae had been stuck in that tank of disgusting liquid, suspended and floating in the center, her eyes closed and the world shut off to her. Lilly was allowed to visit only once per week, for only a few minutes each visit, as Mae was studied the majority of the time. She remembered touching her hand to the thick glass and wishing that Mae would just wake up, that she would just open her eyes for a few seconds to let Lilly know that she was okay, that she was still her daughter. It was her greatest fear, that through all the tests and experiments and observations, that Mae would somehow lose herself, that she would eventually shut off from the world, even outside of the tank.
Now, with her daughter in her arms, Lilly could feel her pulse and her quick breathing, and she just wanted to stay that way, holding her and making up for all that time when Mae had been denied all contact from other human beings, to make up for all those moments when loneliness and despair were her daughter’s only companions. She clutched Mae's body against hers, both of them crying and both relishing the contact. Lilly wanted the moment to last forever.
The sound of the building swaying and buckling under its own weight was all around them, and Lilly wanted to shut her ears. Another explosion from down below, another bellow of smoke and fire. Lilly was thrown back, keeping a tight grip on Mae.
“Honey, was that you?” she asked, and couldn't believe that she was asking that. She sounded hysterical and silly, even posing the question.
The Snow Swept Trilogy Page 26