“Mae, we need to decide what to do. Unlike you I was listening! I am too petrified to be anything less than fully alert! Mrs Alder has accessed the master drive with the help of Julia. During those last few days on The Nest she created a software virus designed to rehabilitate The Grid girls. Of course she isn’t convinced that it will work but it is worth a chance.”
My mind is running at a rate likely to cause a complete Grid blow out. Firstly, Mrs Alder is in the ‘Spa’, this surely means that others made it too. This in turn makes that sacrifice made earlier with the Jeep, by Willem, worth it. Also a realisation hits me that this could be the beginning of the end for this inhumane practise. We may even be lucky enough to get these girls back.
“We have a job to do Mae, one last push forward and then we have been told to stay in our chairs and wait for the cavalry! We need to switch on the chairs housing the Acer girls in the level below us. They all need to receive the virus simultaneously. Mrs Alder, Nurse Spendlove and the medic will be able to judge how it is working if they can see all of the results at the same time. It also means that we can wake the girls up at the same time in order to take them to safety.”
*
With hindsight we should have first investigated the chance of there being an alarm system. The idea of such should not have been too far from our minds as we had lived with movement sensors our whole life. However we were in a way working under orders, not ready to question and not trained for army manoeuvres. The climb down the service ladders from our chairs would most likely have triggered a warning signal in the guard’s room. But during our descent we heard nothing unusual. I even congratulated Lily on her gymnastic prowess!
We both decided to look at one particular chair. It was on the end so was easily accessible. We thought that if we could engage this chair into action, the others may follow in sequence. At the very least we would have worked out how to do it.
Inside the chair, cocooned in fur and the space suit was the smallest girl I have ever seen. Her skin appeared to be opaque, blue veins clearly visible directly underneath. The skin lay tight over her bones making the once deep, dark, curled eyelashes on her eyelids appear twice the size necessary. Her black hair stuck greasy and lank to the fur cushion around her face. This Acer looked already too ill for us to save. She had been here for too long, experiencing that Ascension terror too many times. She couldn’t possibly be able to make the golden light shine. We didn’t want to be the ones to switch this poor girl’s screen back on when she looked at least peaceful.
Lily decided to look at the chair next to the end but sadly this was the same story. The girl this time was blonde, beautiful, lithe, but withered and aged. She could not have been more than seventeen because that is the age when we are chosen to ascend; yet she could have been fifty. She had a feeding tube connected to her through her nose. She lay in opposition to the girl on the end. Where the first girl had been still and peaceful this girl twitched endlessly. Lily burst into tears fuelled with outrage, for this girl we recognised as one of our own. This girl had been harvested from Alpha Nest. I think it’s possible that we watched her achieve her golden light not eighteen months ago.
I found myself searching my memory for her name to make her seem more like a person, one we related to personally. Lily remembered first, it was Stephanie. Stephanie had been such a lively, kind, strong person. She had once helped Lily and me with a project in nature studies. This realisation horrified the both of us. We both decided that we should save these girls, who were not the ones being cold and heartless. Switching these girls back onto the Ascension process one last time may save them.
We searched those chairs for a switch or a code, maybe a button on the back of the screen however we came to the conclusion that the system was activated remotely and this we believe was the final trigger in the warning system. Lily stepped outside the chair Grid onto some metal flooring. At the exact moment that her weight became borne by the flooring, harsh, blaring horns initiated along with a sudden immobilising brightness caused by enormous searchlights.
Is this what happened to our mother? Did she attempt an escape this way?
In the moments I had before the guards arrived, I tried to take in the room, now illuminated. The chairs were set in a cuboid formation. Around the perimeter following the lines of the metal flooring were cameras and huge wires. Bright yellow signs with a thunderbolt, warn the workers of a high voltage and therefore electrocution. The egg shaped chairs had both identification numbers relating to the Acer inside and a date, presumably the date of entry. It became obvious that the chairs on the floor were no longer connected to the same wires as the rest. Then I spotted it. The death sentence… the words FOR DISPOSAL.
It is those shocking, factory processing words that hold my attention now as I am being marched, I know not where, by some of the tallest men I have ever seen, through the same clinical white corridors used in The Nest. They flooded through sliding doors housed at the end of the room; they shot at us with guns that stung. I hit the floor first trying to protect Lily. She fought hard against the numbing of her legs but they eventually caught her as she ran out of options under Stephanie’s chair.
Lily is shouting at them, clearly her plan is to cause as much physical damage as she possibly can, being manhandled as a result. I have decided to glean as much information from these robots as possible. We are on our way to The Headquarters. Ironically, Natura is the only one keeping us safe! Apparently she has made it quite clear that not even the beginnings of a bruise should be evident when they present us to her. If this is not the case they will be sent to the tunnel, evidently a place for the chronically unlucky. Having already met two examples of what the tunnels can do, I am sure that we are relatively safe during our journey. I have already communicated to Willem. No response, so we will be on our own.
Ahead there is a travelator, and just beyond this, coming more obviously in to view are the golden entrance doors of Natura’s Palace. I know this because she adores grandeur, and there is a plaque stating that the doors are the entrance to the Garden of Eden. She really has been pampered and indulged to the edge of sanity.
Forty-four
Opulent, overindulged, crass and utterly evil. These were just a few of the thoughts appearing immediately in the mind of my sister and me on entering the palace reception. Historical ‘finds’ from the world before the Evo-shift were on display everywhere around the room. This family had been hoarding these artefacts for as long as they had been in charge. I recognised a couple of the oil paintings as those I had learnt about during our Art History sessions. I am absolutely certain that we had been informed about their loss to the world, not as it seems here, that they were languishing inside the Palace of Intentionality. These paintings were not however found in museums around this region. I can read almost all of the foreign languages in front of me using my Evo-gene; these pieces originate from hundreds if not thousands of miles away. Which begs the question, how have they arrived here?
The elegant internal doors began to open, slowly and with a whoosh as they moved across the luxury carpet, also I have no doubt ‘found’ in the rubble. The next view was nothing short of disturbing. There, being wheeled into position was the mastermind of horror. Natura was not as I recalled. She appeared to be smaller, weaker, withered and ultimately ancient. How on earth has she been able to visit The Harvest so recently looking like a beauty queen, if in fact that is what she has become? Behind her wheeled throne came an entourage of medics, military officers and various other maids.
She raised a spindly finger and twirled it clockwise. The maid pushed the chair around us in a circle that came to a gentle stop directly in front of Lily and I. Natura observed us like we were a science experiment. Her piercing eyes were intrusive, uncomfortable, most people look away for a short time when they see us, as we are so alike and then look again, but Natura stared at every centimetre of us from top to toe, her eyes flicking rapidly across the space we filled.
�
��Yes, Doctor you have certainly achieved success with the cloning. You must be congratulated. It was your first attempt, was it not?”
I looked then at my sister to see if she too had heard the word ‘clone’, meaning ‘the same’, quite literally an ‘exact’ copy. Was this just her over officious word for twin? Or did she actually mean that we have been formed from a genetic mould of someone else? Dare I ask? She looked like she had the power to turn people into dust when we saw her on The Nest, but this withered old creature doesn’t look capable of turning her own head let alone anything else!
“Mae, did she mean twin?” Lily communicated
“I would very much like to think so Lily but with everything that I now know about this manipulative scheming old woman, I certainly wouldn’t dream of assuming that she has made a less than accurate word selection. I think she knows exactly what she is saying. This is her opportunity to gloat. After all she has succeeded in bringing us to Intentionality unharmed and uninformed, yet still somehow prepared for a game plan that she has devised, but not necessarily shared with others.”
Then the cackle began, she literally sounded like that mad witch in the story about Dorothy and the yellow brick road. Ever such a little bit deranged and magnificently theatrical. However the cackle soon turned into a rasping cough, leaving us both confused.
“You are the first copy of a feisty, powerful young Acer, the likes of which we have never witnessed before or since. She fought hard against my process. Some would say that she won. However I know better. I allowed her to escape The Grid. Her power was mesmerising. At first I intended to watch her strength blossom for a few months and then bring her back to complete her round of Ascension cycles. Unfortunately she met and married another Acer whilst working in Intentionality, which made it very difficult for me to pick her out of the crowd without anyone noticing. They are so very innocent over there you know. Like wasteful toddlers, wanting more and never once wondering where it comes from.”
“Ma’am, please excuse my unprompted interruption. However the physician suggested that you should not become agitated in your frail state. Your power reading is almost critical,” whispered a short, pale, young woman standing to Natura’s left.
It was true; Natura did appear to be fading even as she spoke. Her rasping had become louder, her breaths shallow as she fought to finish words.
“22.52.05.14 not only demonstrated a supreme knowledge of communication previously unrecorded. She could, when put under extreme stress radiate a force from her body, which moved objects. This is how she escaped from the chair. That sort of power was a valuable asset for Intentionality. I was not going to allow it to pour through my fingers like sand. Not when our beautiful city was in danger of imploding. I waited until she went into hospital to have her first child then I ordered her capture. The child was sent away (I know not where, such a small snippet of information was inconsequential to my plans). He wouldn’t have developed into an Acer with an Evo-gene; males rarely do, even now. Orphans are sought after, but only females, as they hold the worth a family needs to progress up the social ladder. An Acer with an Evo-skill gets you noticed. In addition, may I add, I pay the family a good wage for the girls’ ‘services’. Of course they never return home but we send yearly postcards from varying destinations around the globe, glorifying the importance of a lifetime of service in ‘The Grid Guard’! I have even commissioned a literary department for this procedural, drivel.
“22.52.05.14’s innocent husband was informed of both the baby’s demise and his wife’s grave health. We offered to care for her in our state of the art hospital facilities here in the palace. The poor man almost begged us to take her! We took cells from the inside of her mouth, samples of her blood and strands of her hair with the intention of finding the key to her power. Then I personally placed her back in The Grid. We informed the grief-ridden shell of a man, that even we couldn’t save her. I heard that he left the city not long after that.
“She should never have crossed the line.”
Momentarily Natura’s retelling flow was lost in a fit of coughing, she shuddered with each gasp of air then her eyes began to roll. A nurse stepped forward from the waiting crowd, in order to press a button on the back of her chair which relayed something medicinal into Natura’s arm. She recovered enough to regain her composure and of course return to her gloating rant. This time however a stream of drool leaked from her mouth, quickly wiped away by her nurse aide. She then spent the next moments talking through a handkerchief.
“Her place was to supply Intentionality with her Evo-gene power, she had been spoilt with our resources as a child and now it was time to pay back the debt. Her power supply saved many young Acers that year…”
Natura’s voice trailed off again. This time the pulse from the chair could not bring her back, her head slumped forward; her hands flopped down from her mouth. Simultaneously an alarm sounded from the chair. Physicians came running laden down with equipment.
“Stand back, woman,” yelled one of the physicians to the maid.
“We don’t have time to transport her to The Grid terminal in her quarters. These girls are more than capable of feeding her. It is after all why they were born.”
Then into view came an object that quite literally made the hairs on the back of my neck stand in fear. My heart raced as I became all too aware of what would happen next. The voices were back, screaming for me to ESCAPE, to FIGHT with every last drop of energy. Both Lily and I had been trapped in here as part of her last feeble attempt to remain on this Earth. I could see it now as they turned her. When the maid had spoken about a power reading, it hadn’t made sense, however now it was abundantly clear. Connected to the rear of the chair and trailing up to Natura’s hairline was an electrical wire. On the opposite end of the wire was a battery pack. The object being wheeled at great speed into the reception hall was a mobile torture/travel pod. The buzzing and prolonged deafening shouting within my own skull had become debilitating, I could see Lily frozen to the spot but vigilant enough to recognise the signs. There would be no way that I would withstand an Ascension cycle adequately enough to prevent Lily from having to also go into the chair after me, neither could I summon enough communication sense to tell her to run or shout for help through Willem. We were trapped and destined to fulfil Natura’s wishes after all.
Forty-five
Through the fog of panic and negative thoughts, I could just make out the warm comfort of my sister’s voice, beckoning me out of the wilderness.
“Mae, keep calm and breathe deeply! You look like you are about to blackout on me again. This is not the Ascension test. I can protect you this time. I have contacted Willem. They know where we are, remember our tracker anklets! He is sending Craig and Luke. They will be here shortly, they were just chaperoning Mrs Alder from Skye’s lab to the medical bay, apparently it’s close by.
“While we are waiting, let’s show them a trick or two from our mother’s repertoire. That evil creature can’t order those poor people around anymore. They are just as confused as us. I think we have the upper hand. One element is completely clear in my hastily manufactured plan. I am not going into that chair. I don’t know what it does for Natura but I am not going to facilitate a return of the wicked witch of the west!” communicated Lily.
I did then take a moment to reflect, we did have the upper hand. Natura’s staff did look flustered. She is clearly in a degenerative state, beyond what they have dealt with previously. We are their only hope. She will die without our co-operation. I am not sure if I want that on my conscience for the rest of my life. They didn’t know what we could do and could have no way of expecting us to be so strong. If we could hold them off for as long as it took for The Resistance to arrive, we might be in a position to negotiate.
I had completed my novice screen of the area, three Mono maids, four Acer physicians and two guards, finalised my decision to hold our position and was just about to glance at Lily when the large wooden door swung open, re
vealing more guards prepared for nothing short of war. They were clothed in big black boots, heavy black jackets, helmets and visors. What did they expect, a fire breathing dragon or a spontaneously igniting super being? Neither of which I could see any evidence of. I began looking around for the cause of the imminent danger, before realising it was Lily and I.
We had no other option than to reveal our mother’s power. Just chatting inside our head and being able to translate what they said, was not going to get us very far. I agreed with my sister about the chair. I was not going back in that contraption.
“Lily, Willem, we need to gather our power like we did during the sub emergency. Perhaps we can create a force field to contain the guards.”
As the lead guard approached I could feel that warmth initiate in my head, it ran like warm water in a shower down the internal elements of my arm, then radiated along each digit until I could see translucent waves emanating from the tips of my fingers, splaying out my fingers made the waves wider. Lily copied, the result being a wall of waves. At first the guard carried on walking but step-by-step his speed slowed, he seemed to be pushing against a force. It was us, we were holding him away.
My concentration was momentarily disturbed by a change in pitch from the alarm attached to Natura’s chair…
There it was, our bargaining tool, a gift from above.
“If you need us to cooperate, you will order your men to stand down. I must warn you that we can overpower you if we need to and may I also remind you that at this moment Natura is unconscious, even to my untrained eye she looks to be at the edge of life and death. It seems to me that you need something from either me or my sister in order for your Queen to remain alive,” I demanded.
“Oh my goodness, Mae that speech was awesome! However I am still not getting in that chair, not even for you. Do I need to remind you of the fact that the hideous woman slumped in that wheelchair killed our mother by holding her prisoner in one of those,” she whispered and directed her head towards the torture chair.
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