Dead Time

by D. L. Orton

  I do a quick guesstimate and start digging.

  Thirty minutes later, I’m joined by three camo biosuits. One of them shines a flashlight into the pit I’m digging and then points the beam up into my eyes, blinding me.

  It’s Custer, of course. “What are you doing, Crusoe?”

  I tap the shovel tip against the tungsten ball, steam still rising off the hot metal sphere. “Retrieving my mail.”

  “Your mail, my ass,” he says and turns to the other two. “Load that thing onto the trailer and get it back to the dome.” Custer motions for me to step away.

  I just spent the last ten minutes trying to pry up the sphere—and couldn’t get it to budge even a millimeter. There’s no way three guys in biosuits are going to have any better luck.

  “Be my guest,” I say and sit down on the ground.

  This is going to be good.

  I watch them flail around in the muck for fifteen minutes and then suggest we open the sphere where it lies.

  “Open it?” Custer asks. “What if it’s a bomb?”

  “I could be mistaken,” I say, “but I think it’s a message. For me.”

  He drops the broken shovel he’s been waving around. “Let me check with the boss.”

  “Take your time.”

  He turns away, and I lie back in the weeds, staring up at the stars and hoping that the message inside that sphere really is for me.

  After a couple of minutes, Custer walks over. “Boss wants to know how you’re planning to get it open?”

  “Good question,” I say. “Last time one of these showed up, we crushed it in a vise, but it took an awful lot of pressure.”

  He conveys that information to the boss.

  “Mr. Kirk suggests we shoot it,” he says, “see if it’ll shatter. You got an opinion on that?”

  I shrug. “Good a plan as any.” With the sphere still stuck at the bottom of the pit, I figure the bullet will ricochet off into the muddy ground—but it’s hard to say how far the shards might fly when the metal shatters.

  Custer takes his handgun out of its holster and points it down into the hole.

  “Assuming it’s not a bomb,” I add.

  He lowers the gun and takes a step back.

  “It’s going to explode into a million pieces,” I say. “I don’t think I’d want to be standing next to it in a biosuit when all of those shards come flying out. You?”

  I reach out for the gun.

  Custer considers it for a moment and then hands it over.

  “Try not to shoot your foot off,” he says.

  I wait for all of them to move a safe distance away and then lie on my stomach, keeping my head down, and fire a bullet into the hole.

  Nothing happens.

  I try again, lifting my head up high enough to aim. The sphere shatters on the third shot. I lean over the pit and use the broken shovel to lift out the white contents.

  It’s a sock—muddy now—with something stuffed inside it.

  Custer tries to snatch it out of my hand, but I step away. “I’m pretty sure this is for me.”

  “Give me the gun,” Custer says.

  I ignore him and step around to the other side of the hole.

  “Grab him,” Custer says, and the suits lumber toward me like redshirts in some bad sci-fi flick.

  It’s been a long day, and the whole scene strikes me as absurd.

  I laugh and point the gun at Custer. “Tell them to stay where they are. All I want to do is see what’s inside.”

  He hesitates—talking on his radio, I think—and a second later, the men stand down.

  Custer inclines his helmeted head. “My apologies, Mr. Crusoe. Mr. Kirk says to be our guest.”

  “Tell him I said thank you.” I turn so the sock is in my shadow, keeping the gun trained on Custer, and reach inside. There’s a folded piece of paper—and a seashell.

  I discretely stick the shell in my pocket and then hold the note up in the headlights and read the typed message:

  * * *

  Locate the Mountain. Use the machine. Find her.

  Below it, handwritten in a hurried script I recognize as my own, are the words:

  * * *

  You have 15 days until it ’s too late.

  20

  Release the Kraken

  Shannon

  With Peter looking on, I press the curved plastic faceplate into the black bead of sealant around the edge of the mask. I hold it tight, my hands resting on a small table Peter nabbed from the unused choir room.

  “Will these masks work to keep out smoke?” he asks.

  “I’m not certain,” I say, “but I think so. Can you bring over the bar clamps, please?”

  He glances up at me, his eyebrows squished together. “The what?”

  Over the past two weeks, Peter’s father has mostly left us alone, and Peter and I have fallen into a routine. During the day, I follow him around with my head bowed and my eyes averted, careful to act the part of the dutiful wife. Every morning I’m given a job, and he’s supposed to make sure I do it properly. After I finish, he can order me to do whatever he wants, but instead of making me do his laundry or clean his apartment, he’s been using it as an excuse to show me around the biodome.

  At first I hated the long, bulky robe I had to wear in public, but it turned out to be perfect for hiding tools and supplies—including six old rebreather masks and two tubes of sealant. If other people are around when we need to take something back to our workshop, Peter announces that it’s time for me to submit. I stifle a frightened cry and give him a fearful look, and then he orders me back to the Room of Release.

  So far, it’s been working like a charm.

  The second night in the Room, I noticed that if you shut the bathroom door, it’s nearly impossible to see it, and I asked Peter if he knew about any other concealed doors—besides the bathroom and the cabinet with water. He shook his head, and we spent the evening tapping on walls, examining cracks, and checking behind all the paintings. We managed to find three other hidden doors, two concealing drawers full of strange things: impractical women’s underwear, weird rubber body parts that wiggle and vibrate, and creepy stuff you’d expect to find in a torture chamber—handcuffs, blindfolds, and whips. Neither of us had any idea what they were for so we just put everything back. But behind the third door, we found a secret passageway to another room, and that’s where we are now: in our private workshop.

  Peter says they’ll give us forty days and nights together—a sort of honeymoon before they force me to live and work in the Women’s Quarter. We’ve been taking full advantage of what little time we have.

  “The bar clamps.” I say again, motioning with my head. “The long metal things with the orange handles. You’re going to need both of them.”

  He gets the clamps and stands across from me, holding them out.

  “Good,” I say and suppress a yawn. I had to scrub pans in the kitchen after dinner tonight and didn’t get back to the Room until late. “Squeeze the handle to adjust the plates,” I say. “We’re going to need them both about ten centimeters apart.”

  He gives me the squishy eyebrows again, and I remember that he uses some ancient system of measurement based on a king’s body parts.

  “Ten centimeters is about the width of your hand.”

  “Right.” He takes a moment to adjust them. “Now what?”

  “Make sure you’re holding them so that gravity causes the plates to close when you pull the release, and then come stand behind me, one in each hand.”

  He tests to make sure they are in the correct orientation and then resets them to the proper width. “Ready,” he says and moves behind me, our bodies almost touching.

  “Put your arms around me and position the clamps across from each other, the lower pads resting on the bottom edge of the mask. When I give the word, tighten them up—firm but gentle.”

  He nods. “Firm but gentle.”

  “Yep. Try to keep the pressure the same on both
sides. When you’re ready, go ahead.”

  He leans his chest lightly against my back and reaches around me, his chin against my temple. “O-kay,” he says, his voice cracking. It’s the first time we’ve been this close, and I can feel his heart pounding.

  “You’re doing fine, Peter,” I say and watch a smile flit across his lips. “Go ahead and tighten the clamps, but don’t let go until I say so.”

  When he’s done, I slide my hands on top of his, checking that the vises are on properly. “They look good,” I say and verify that the mask is still balanced on the stool. “Tomorrow night, we can make another one for you.”

  He pulls his hands out from underneath mine and backs away. “You don’t have to do that, you know. Pretend that you like me.”

  I turn and look at him. “What do you mean ‘pretend’?”

  He looks down at his hands. “I mean, you don’t have to act like you want to be with me or anything…”

  “But I do like to be with you, Peter.” I start cleaning up our makeshift tools. “Especially here in the lab where we can both be ourselves.”

  “You do?” His voice cracks.

  “Sure. You’re kind and helpful—and smart too.” I twist the cap on the sealant and then shut off the makeup lamp we borrowed from the bathroom.

  He follows me back into the Room of Release. “You’re not just saying that to be nice?” He reseals the door and moves the footstool back in front of it.

  “Nope.” I plop down on the bed, exhausted. “You tracked down the box of rebreather masks, you managed to get in and out of the Chemical Room without being noticed, and you helped me get all our tools here without raising any suspicions.” I look over at him standing there next to a naked woman riding a centaur. “And on top of that, you’re a good listener. My mom says those are all great things to look for in a man.”

  His eyes get big.

  “I know it’s not your fault I’m stuck here, Peter. And I don’t blame you for what’s happened.” I fall back into the pillows, too tired to take a hot shower—even though they’re the one good thing in this horrible biodome. “As soon as we finish with the masks—one for each and four spares—we’ll put together a plan and bust this Popsicle box.” I roll over on my side, facing him. “And if you want, we’ll go to C-Bay together. Both of us, okay?”

  He nods and then turns away.

  “What’s wrong, Peter? Don’t you want to leave this awful place?”

  He shrugs.

  “Well?”

  “I don’t know how to read and write as good as you do,” he says. “They’ll make fun of me there. Tease me for being stupid.” He slumps down onto the footstool.

  “You don’t know how to read and write?” I say like some half-wit lolo.

  He crosses his arms and drops his gaze. “Not very well.”

  “I mean, I didn’t know. I just assumed…”

  “When you asked me to look for the box of masks, I had you write down all the letters, remember? That way I could compare your words to the writing on the boxes until I found the one that matched.”

  “Oh my God, that must have taken hours!”

  “And in order to get the tubes of sealant you needed, I had to go through hundreds tonight—while you were working in the kitchen. If you hadn’t told me what color the tubes are, I never would have found them.”

  “Oh, Peter, I’m sorry! You must think I’m some sort of show Venice pig.”

  “No, I don’t.” He looks up at me, his eyebrows scrunched. “What’s a Venice pig, anyway? All the pigs we have around here are plain ones—and most of them are pretty smart.”

  I laugh. “To tell you the truth, I’m not sure. I heard my mom say it once, and it sounded bad.”

  He cracks a smile for the first time, and something in my chest is set to fluttering in a way I’ve never felt before.

  The feeling is wonderful—and a little scary.

  Peter is not all mature and confident like Diego, and he’s not like any of the buff guys in Mindy’s magazines or the men in the movies, but he’s…

  Honest and trustworthy and real.

  I stare at his face, more grateful than I could ever say for his kindness and decency—and for the risks he’s taking to help me. Ever since the first night, he’s been sleeping on blankets in the corner and letting me have the huge bed to myself. And every morning when I’m in the bathroom, he messes up the bed to make it look like he’s slept with me. But the only time he’s gotten that close to me was tonight—when he put his arms around me to fix the mask—and it made me feel all warm and squishy inside.

  “I like it when I make you laugh,” he says, breaking my train of thought. “I wish I could figure out how to make you do it more often.”

  And then I get this great idea.

  “I’ll teach you to read and write, Peter. So when we get to C-Bay you won’t have to be embarrassed, and everyone will be able to see how smart you are. Mindy and I help the D-2s with their reading all the time. It’s not hard if you have someone to teach you the alphabet and show you how to sound out the difficult letters. But you would have to practice—at least a little.”

  He looks a bit skeptical—which is surprising given what a great idea it is.

  “Well, what do you say?” I ask.

  “I don’t know, Shannon. We don’t have many books here, and…” He swallows. “And I’d get in a lot of trouble if someone finds out I’m practicing evil habits.”

  “Evil habits?” I say, unable to keep the disbelief out of my voice. “Good grief, Peter, we’re supposed to be making babies at night, not masks, and you’re worried about a few words in a book?”

  He doesn’t respond.

  “Wait a sec. What about the Bible? Aren’t you allowed to read it?”

  “Yeah, sure. But lots of the words don’t make sense—and it’s full of men getting smited and fathers killing their sons and people being turned to pillars of salt.”

  “Really?” I say, grimacing. “I didn’t know that.”

  He smiles again. “Yeah.”

  “Well then, we’ll just read the nice parts.”

  “Okay. But I think I have something better. I got it while you were working in the kitchen tonight, but I wasn’t sure when to give it to you.” He gets up and takes a book out of the bottom drawer of the red chest. “It’s only a book of poems.”

  “That sounds wonderful, Peter. Thank you.” I scoot up on the bed, leaning my back against the headboard. “We’ll sit here where the light is good and practice every night.” I pat the spot next to me.

  He hesitates.

  “Just while we’re reading, I mean. So we can both see the words.”

  He sits on the other side of the huge bed and then pushes the collection of poetry over to me.

  I give him an incredulous look. “If you want to learn to read, Peter, you’re going to have to come closer. I promise not to call you a Venice pig, no matter what.”

  He looks unconvinced, but he scoots over until our shoulders are almost touching.

  I open the book and set it on his lap, turning the pages until I come to “The Road Not Taken.” I pick up his hand and touch his fingertip to the first line.

  “Two roads diverged,” I read, moving his hand along with the words, “in a yellow wood...”

  When I finish the second stanza, I stop reading and let go of his hand. “Did you follow along with that?”

  He nods—and then reads the next few lines by himself, stumbling on some of the bigger words, but not many.

  “So you can read.”

  “Yeah,” he says, not taking his hand out from underneath mine. “And write a little too. Grizzly taught me after my mother died. But I haven’t read a whole book in years, and I can’t remember big words—like the name of the masks and the ingredients in the sealant.”

  He’s quiet for a moment, his hand perfectly still beneath mine.

  “But I like reading with you,” he says. “So maybe we can keep practicing?”


  “Sure.” I glance down at my hand on top of his. “You can sleep here on the bed, Peter—if you want. It was selfish of me not to offer sooner.” I bite my lip. “I’m sure the floor must be cold and hard—and you’d sleep much better up here on the bed. I mean if you want to…”

  He shakes his head, his eyes downcast. “No.”

  “Oh.” I can’t keep the disappointment out of my voice. “We could both stay on our own sides, of course. It wouldn’t be difficult in a bed this big.”

  He shakes his head again.

  “Is it because you don’t really want to, you know, be close to me?”

  His head jerks up. “No, of course not. What makes you say that?”

  “Well, um… you.” I shrug. “Every time I suggest you come closer, you act like it’s something horrible.”

  He stares at me, one of his eyes twitching. “It’s not you that’s horrible, it’s me. There’s a monster inside me that takes over after I fall asleep. When I wake up in the morning, I remember what it wants to do to you—what it did do with my body while I was asleep.” He looks away. “And I don’t know if I can control it.”

  “A monster?” I ask, somewhat shocked by his revelation. “What does it want to do to me?”

  He exhales. “I’m not my father.”

  “I know you’re not, Peter. You’re nothing like him, nothing. You’re the gentlest, kindest, sweetest boy I’ve ever known—and I love the book of poems.”

  He gets up, takes a pillow and blanket off the bed, and drops them in the corner.

  “Peter?”

  He crosses the room and shuts off the lights. I hear his footsteps in the dark, a minute or two of rustling in the corner, and then silence.

  “Good night, Peter,” I say, but there’s no response.

  21

  Lock Him Up

  Diego

  The minute I step across the inner portal, I see Bella pushing through the crowd.

  “Diego!” she calls out. “Are you okay?”