The Fourth Sage (The Circularity Saga)

by Stefan Bolz

  "And what are those... basic traits?"

  "Ruthless, highly motivated, physically fit, impervious to pain, things like that."

  "Great. So, the guards are also responsible for maintenance?"

  "Not all of the guards are in maintenance. But whoever does maintenance is always trained as a guard."

  "Let's hope we won't run into either of them."

  "There's a good chance we won't."

  "What if we do?"

  "I have no idea. I guess we'll have to think of something when it comes to it."

  They reach a ladder that is built into a narrow shaft, going down. As they descend, Aries becomes aware of the pain in her chest where Ty performed CPR. She can't remember anything before the moment she opened her eyes and saw Ty trying to revive her. But what she remembers the most is the horrifying feeling that her breath would never come, as hard as Ty tried.

  She concentrates on the ladder in front of her, tries to lock away the memory as much as she can. But there are others—images mostly—that relentlessly penetrate her mind. There is Kiire as he sits on his futon in his room, his thick, curly hair escaping from under the hood of his sweater, his face illuminated by the screen of his pad. There is Seth and his look of horror when she talked to him in the study room. And there is C.J. and her ever-smiling face as they worked together on their jobs when they shared their shifts. I haven't forgotten you, she thinks. I haven't forgotten any of you. And with that, she wishes she could be with them, see their faces, hear their voices and have them close by—

  "Hold on," Ty whispers, and stops climbing. Preoccupied with her thoughts, Aries doesn't realize they are almost at the bottom. She stops, listens intently into the silence below her. Then Ty continues downward until he reaches the bottom. Aries steps off the ladder and onto the landing. Ty points into another hallway and they walk down and around a corner. There, they come to another ladder, this time only reaching down one floor. When they arrive at the bottom, Aries is the first to hear the low humming sound; it’s accompanied by a slight vibration. She gestures at Ty to listen.

  "That's the fan of the primary air duct," he says.

  They continue along another corridor. At the end of it, Ty kneels, takes out his multifunction tool, and begins to open the bolts around an air vent cover.

  "We'll have to go through here and down the main air duct for about ten floors," he says quietly. "The remainder, maybe another five or so, will be on the other side of the core and closer to the guard's section."

  "Ty, I just thought of something. We have no way of knowing when the next duct sterilizing will be."

  "I know. I was thinking the same. We can only hope that the last cleaning just happened or the next one will be hours from now."

  Aries realizes that there is no choice other than to either wait until the next cleaning is over or risk it now. We made it this far... she thinks, trying to push away the fear that lurks behind her thoughts.

  Ty moves into the air duct; Aries follows. She can feel the breeze of air on her skin. The low humming sound increases with every foot of distance. At an intersection, they turn left and into a larger duct. Here, they can at least be on all fours. After about twenty feet, they come to another intersection. From here, they enter into what Aries assumes, based on its size, is one of the primary air ducts; they can easily stand up.

  "Where does this lead?"

  "Right now, we’re technically in Tier Three," Ty replies.

  "The prison reaches that far into the building?"

  "Yes. We're close to one of the vertical primaries."

  "I thought the one we're in is the primary."

  "Yes and no. The one we're in is the biggest horizontal air duct. The one we're going toward is vertical. It reaches all the way up to the top of the building. It's a little bigger."

  The strength of the wind increases with the noise until, after several fifteen-degree bends in the shaft, an opening becomes visible at the end. Ty says something that Aries can't understand until she realizes that the sound of the wind is louder than Ty's words.

  "You'll have to hold on to the ladder," he says. "Depending on the fan speed, the wind can get up to forty-five knots."

  "How fast is that?" Aries asks.

  "It's fast. Hold on to my hand."

  She takes his hand as they cross the last ten feet to the edge. The vertical circular tube is at least thirty feet wide, and built of near-seamless stainless steel plates. She looks up and sees nothing but the tube's self-reflecting mirror image multiplying into a seemingly endless shaft far up into the building.

  When she looks down, she gasps at the sheer size of the massive fan blades twenty stories below. She has never seen anything even remotely like it. The blades cut through the air, pushing it upward with such power that Aries has to actively resist the urge to retreat into the safety of the duct they are in. Ty points at the ladder below them. It's mounted into the wall leading straight down and seemingly right into the blades.

  "Hold on tight!" Ty screams over the noise.

  Aries gives him a thumbs-up as he sits down, his feet dangling downward, and his boots finding the first rung of the ladder. He moves forward, holds on to the metal bars and turns around. Aries waits until he is about six feet below her before she moves toward the edge. When she sits there, her boots finding the first rung, her stomach turns upside down. She pauses. Don't be silly, she thinks. You can do this.

  She sits frozen, unable to move even an inch in either direction. As she watches Ty climb down one rung at a time, she begins to think that she'll never make it down there. When Ty looks up, she knows that he sees the fear in her eyes. He nods slightly, as if to say, "I know you're afraid. I'm terrified too. But there's no other way to do this. Just no other way."

  Slowly she inches forward, her hand finding the metal bar, her boot finding the second rung of the ladder. She stretches her leg and finds one more step. Now she grabs the bars on either side of the ladder, turns her body and moves downward. One more rung. Then she is turned, facing the ladder. The wind is so strong she’s sure that if she were to let go she would actually float upward. Better not risk it. She concentrates on each step. Let one foot find the rung, then let one hand go, grab the bar below, then the other side. After a few steps, a certain rhythm sets in and Aries feels slightly less nauseous.

  The power of the wind makes it hard to breathe. The sound of it is deafening and all she can do is concentrate on one single task—to reach the next rung. Once in a while she looks down to see where Ty is. She can't determine whether she’s matching his speed or he’s simply waiting for her. Then she watches as he pulls himself into the air duct. When she reaches it, Ty pulls her in. Her legs are wobbly rubber poles.

  They make their way toward another, smaller, air duct. From there they move on all fours into an even smaller one that they now crawl through. The lack of noise that settles in is almost as disconcerting as the loud wind had been only a few minutes ago. She realizes that the noise from before lay like pressure on her body. Without it now she feels lighter, her heart rate and breath calming significantly. She doesn't realize at first that they have reached the end of the duct. She bumps her head on Ty's boots, who’s stopped abruptly.

  "What is it?" she asks. "Ty?"

  She has never heard him curse before. Never has she heard him use words that he didn't want her to use. Ever. The occasional "Dammit" was as far as he went in her presence. But now it’s as if he’s opened the floodgates for a whole litany of words, some of which she has never even heard of. He does it in a pressed voice, very quietly. She can't help but smile, even though part of her is aware that its cause is probably something serious.

  "What is it?" she says, after a pause in his ranting.

  "We can't get out."

  "What do you mean?"

  "I mean, I didn't think about exiting through this opening. I was so preoccupied with getting us down here that I forgot about it. Completely forgot about it."

  It dawns on
her the moment he says it.

  "The vent cover can only be opened from inside the hallway."

  Both lie there for a while, neither of them able to speak. In her mind, Aries retraces her steps back up the ladder and to the beginning, twenty stories up. She is the first to break the silence. "We'll have to find another way through the prison, find a different way down."

  "There is no other way. At least not that I know of," Ty whispers. "All the others would lead us too close to the guards’ quarters. We could try to kick the cover in but that'll make a lot of noise."

  "Then what are we going to do?"

  "I haven’t the slightest idea," Ty answers. "Not the faintest clue—"

  "Can I help you?"

  The deep voice from directly outside the air vent cover makes them both jolt. Aries lets out a small scream that she stops with her hand on her mouth.

  "Come again?" Ty whispers. And while Aries wonders why Ty is answering this ridiculous question, a head appears in front of the cover. The face is deep black, the white of his eyes in stark contrast to his dark skin.

  "Can I help you?"

  What do you even say to that? Aries thinks. The thought that this is the end of their journey doesn't register. It's just a thought, hanging in front of her, dangling down from a thin thread, teasing her with its finality. He must have seen her twin expressions of utter terror, for after a few moments his whole face begins to grin. White teeth behind lips that form two words whose meaning eludes Aries at that moment.

  "Stay put."

  Then he's gone, his steps disappearing into the distance.

  "Stay put?" Ty says. "Stay put? Stay put until what? Until I get ten more guards to help pull you out and throw you into a holding cell? Stay put until I start the cleaning cycle manually so I don't have to worry about disposing of your bodies? Which one is it?"

  This is too much for Aries. Maybe it's the shock of having been discovered; maybe it's the finality of it all and the thought that it's over; or maybe it's because she is utterly bone-deep exhausted, but she begins to laugh. She can't stop herself. This is too ridiculous a notion to grasp. Ty joins in and both lie on their backs, helpless, while trying to make as little noise as possible. When Aries realizes this, she laughs even more. They laugh until the footsteps come back, and then both quiet down at the same time.

  Okay, it's probably not the cleaning cycle, otherwise we would be dead by now, she thinks, when the head appears again.

  "Sorry, I had to get my tools," he says. Then he starts loosening the bolts that hold the vent cover in place. When he's done, he moves the cover to the side and stretches out his hand for Ty to grab it. Ty has no choice but to take it and a few moments later, he's out.

  "Come on out, young lady. No reason for you to stay in there any longer." He extends his hand to Aries. She grabs it. While he pulls her out as if she is weightless, she becomes aware of the size of his hand. Hers disappears completely within it. Then she's out.

  "Just wait one second," he says, while moving the cover back in its place and tightening all four bolts. "There you go. Like new."

  When he stands up, or at least attempts to, Aries becomes aware of his size. He is at least a full head taller than her and an additional six inches taller than Ty. He has to bow his upper body to avoid hitting his head on the ceiling. His shoulders completely block the hallway.

  "I must apologize. My name is Samuel. Samuel Eikenboom. And you are?"

  Aries, still trying to adjust to the surreal nature of this encounter, speaks first. "Aries. Aries Egan. And this is my friend, Tybault Hennrichsen. Most people call him Ty."

  "Very nice to make your acquaintance, Aries. Ty. Most people call me Sam."

  For a moment, nobody speaks. Aries is waiting for the other shoe to drop and for Sam to smash their heads together and carry them to a holding cell. Before she can say anything, Sam turns around.

  "Follow me," he says.

  "To where?" Aries blurts out. Sam doesn't react. Already ten feet away, he keeps going. "Mister? Where are we going? Sam?"

  "Yes," he answers.

  "Where are we going?"

  He stops and turns to face them.

  "We are going to a place where I can sit down without the danger of banging my head on the ceiling."

  Sam sets off again. Aries shares a look with Ty, who hasn't stopped grinning since they met this strange fellow.

  "What do you think?" she asks, as quietly as possible.

  "He seems like a nice guy," Ty answers.

  "But where is he leading us?"

  "I have no idea, really."

  "I can hear you." Sam's deep voice echoes through the hallway.

  "Sorry," Aries says. When they come to a metal door, Sam opens it and enters. Ty and Aries follow. What at first looks like a small utility area is in actuality an access room, reaching up three stories. Several ladders, mounted to the walls, lead to narrow shafts above.

  "I like to come here," Sam says. "I can stand upright and it's quiet."

  The three of them regard each other.

  "I hope you don't mind me asking, but who are you?" Ty asks into the silence. "And why are you helping us?"

  Sam sits on a metal container, leans his back against the wall. Even now he is taller than Ty.

  "Tevis Abernethy sent me."

  "Tevis who?" Ty asks, while taking a seat on one of the other boxes.

  "Tevis Abernethy." When Ty and Aries don't say anything, Sam continues. "My jawbone was broken in four places. My skull was split into two, right here." He points at his hairline just above his forehead; a narrow scar stretches from one side to the other. "One of my eyes was out of its socket. I should have been dead. And I was."

  "What happened?" Aries asks.

  "I... fell. Took a nasty fall from a ladder. Landed on my head. When I woke up in the hospital, I couldn't see anything for the first few days. 'We're gonna make you all right again,' she told me. Whenever she came into the room, whenever she changed my bedding or fed me, she told me, told me that I would make it, that I would be okay, that I had a bright future ahead of me and that I shouldn't give up. And she told me that the day would come when I would remember."

  "Remember what?" Aries asks quietly.

  "I don't know. I was in the hospital for two months. I got all better, just like she said I would. But my eye wasn't right. I couldn't see straight. From the impact, it shifted downward somehow. So I went to the reconstructive surgeon. I think she did that. Guards are not entitled to re-co surgery. She never told me this, but I think she convinced them I should have it. She visited me almost every day after my operation."

  "When was that?" Aries asks.

  "Must have been about ten years ago, more or less."

  While Sam continues, Aries calculates the dates of her cleft surgeries.

  "I was released about a month later. I was supposed to take my final test and exam a few days after I fell. Now I couldn't... anymore. Not that I wanted to. But I knew they did. They always thought I would. I'm a fourth generation guard. Here in the prison. My whole family is... my father and his father and grandfather were guards. For better or worse. But I didn't do well in the initial evaluations. Not like my brothers. They were... much better at it than I was. Probably because they wanted it more than I did. They wanted it. I only thought I did. But you've got a lot of time when you’re just lying there with a bandage over your eyes. You've got a lot of time. You start thinking about things you don't even want to think about. Like reasons for things and why things are the way they are.

  "And Tevis, Ms. Abernethy, always told me that I was a free man. Free to choose whatever I want to become. Free to be whoever I want to be. I don't think she knows how it works here. You don't just decide what you'll do. You can't. You sure want to, but you can't. It's all determined by the powers. The ones that decide... for you. But she didn't want to hear it. She kept telling me that it's all up to me and that I'm my own kind. As I said, she didn't know the reality of it and that you can't ju
st change things around here.”

  "What happened to—?” Ty asks.

  "It's her." Aries interrupts him.

  "Who?"

  "The woman I saw through Born-of-Night's eyes."

  "What makes you think that?"

  "The way she looked at me, and she repeated something I couldn't understand."

  "You never told me she said something."

  "I completely forgot. She said 'Jie...' I can't even repeat it. Sounded like 'Jiedj vied, viedin. Jiedj viedchin,' or something like that."

  "Jiedj Vidchkin," Sam replies. "She said, 'Jiedj Vidchkin.’" Aries is as perplexed as Sam is. "It means anomaly."

  "Anomaly?" Aries asks. "Like in abnormal?"

  "Anomaly, like something that is not normal, yes," Sam answers.

  "That's not all it means," Ty adds. "It also means something that deviates from what is standard. Something unexpected."

  "That's what she told me," Sam says. "She would put her hand on my forehead and she would whisper it, very quietly, into my ear."

  "I must have been in the hospital the same year you were," Aries says. "I've had four re-co operations for my cleft and the fourth one... Does she have red hair?"

  "Yes," Sam replies. "Like fire!"

  "I've seen her. I was six when I had my last surgery. I remember her face. What happened to her?"

  "She went crazy in her head. At least that's what they said. She told everyone that children were disappearing from her station."

  "What do you mean?" Aries asks.

  "I heard a few things. She made open accusations that several older children had disappeared. And then she came here."

  "To the prison?" Ty asks.

  "Yes. But not as a nurse. She was convicted and was here for six months. It wasn't good for her. Not good at all. It's not a place for a... nice person. People aren't nice around here. And I'm a guard only on the official papers. Not when it comes to doing what guards do. I fix things but I don't do anything around the inmates.

  "She was cleaning in a room one day and I happened to be there. She recognized me right away. She came over to me but I... I couldn't help her, couldn't do anything for her... Even though she had helped me, helped me so much. I was trying to tell my brothers that she was a good person and that she wasn't supposed to be here. But they said that she wouldn't be here if she wasn't supposed to be. I walked by her cell whenever I could but I never talked to her. We are not allowed to have any communication with the inmates, other than what is spelled out in the code. Then, one day, she was gone and I didn't see her anymore. Until I found her. Or maybe she found me, I'm not sure."