The Gatherer Series, Book 1

by Colleen Winter

  She slapped her hand over the tear while slinging off her bag and searching through it with her free hand. After wrapping several layers of foil tape over the flap of fabric she sat back on her haunches, finally taking a full breath, her heart drumming in her ears. She needed to keep her anxiety in check. Deal with what was happening, not what she imagined.

  When she started walking, Jacob stepped in front of her, maintaining his position as guide. They paused at a T-junction at the top of a road that led into downtown. She had never seen the town in daylight, the loose grid of streets dominated by the three rock cliffs that loomed on the opposite side of the river. The streets were empty at midday, absent of the cars and people that should have been collecting supplies for the winter. She should have been relieved, as it gave her less chance of being recognized, but the underlying instability was still there and she couldn’t help but think that something was desperately wrong.

  “My dad doesn’t talk.”

  Jacob spoke so quietly it took Storm several seconds to register what he had said.

  “At all?”

  Mac was more of a man of action than words, bringing her something in her order she hadn’t asked for, or shovelling out snow when she had been too weak. But there had been words, if not many, on his last delivery.

  “How long has it been?”

  They walked close together down the centre of the street. A sidewalk ran along the side, yet there was no reason to move off the road. The air of abandonment persisted in the blank windows, and the street was quiet but for the rush of the river’s current running close beneath the surface at its end.

  “Twenty-six days.”

  Twenty-six days that he had likely marked on his calendar, waiting for the time when his dad would return to him. An eternity for the person trapped inside their head; no reason, pattern or logic to the never-ending kaleidoscope of memories and sensations.

  They passed a boarded up house, a plastic lawn chair overturned on the porch. On her worst days, hours had gone missing in the labyrinth of her thoughts, the images so consuming she had been unable to see her way clear. She paused, the flow of the river visible through buildings at the end of the street. She needed even more now to get to Mac, for a suspicion was forming in the back of her head that she only half understood. It didn’t make sense that this boy and his father might have her same illness when she had contracted her sensitivity in an experimental lab so far from here.

  “Curtis said he’ll come around.”

  They had crossed two intersections, the houses turning into open stores with no one in them, even the shop keepers staying out of view.

  “Who is Curtis?”

  It was getting harder to breathe, a pressure building in her chest. She veered to one side, the ground not where she expected it to be. Jacob watched her from the side of the street where she had started, his gaze blank in disappointment.

  A vibration rose up from her gut, streaming out into her arms and legs. She paused, Blue circling her legs. She needed to hang on until the next corner, make it down the block to Mac’s store. She leaned against the wood siding, sweat sticking the suit to her sides. The grip on her chest was so tight she struggled on each breath. Already auras were shimmering at the edges of her vision. Jacob said something to her, the hum in her ears like a high voltage line running through her head.

  When she stepped around the corner, she was hit with a full frontal blow, tendrils of pain tearing at her nerves. She clawed her way back around the corner, her arms responding with harsh painful jerks. Christ. The field was wrong. She’d become accustomed to the power of it entering her nervous system in its long alternating waves, but this one had been frenetic, the usual energies of it sharper like a chord with a single wrong note that sounded almost right but grew as it resonated, spoiling the entire chord.

  “What’s wrong with you?”

  She sat with her back against the building, her skin pulsing from the damage. She tried to stand, stumbled, and fell.

  “What was that?”

  Her voice was distorted, echoing inside her skull. There had been a white box at the end of the street, in the central square, curved and open to the sky. Her ears popped, struck by the sound of Jacob’s shoes scraping the bits of gravel and her lungs struggling for air.

  Jacob looked around the corner. He should have been thrown back the same as she had been. When he turned back to her, he was smiling, excitement chasing away the wariness in his eyes.

  “Don’t you recognize it? That’s the Gatherer. Three Rocks was the first community in the Yukon to get one.”

  A violent, reluctant understanding as the puzzle piece she had been refusing to acknowledge slammed into place. She leaned over and vomited in realization and revulsion. The Gatherer she had designed was small, compact, made to fit into a basement or a garage, and to draw energy well below the levels that would harm a human. That monstrosity in the square would be capable of drawing hundreds if not thousands of kilowatts out of the air.

  She wiped her mouth.

  “How long has it been here?”

  A slight pinch on his smooth forehead, the brightness of the sky forming a halo around his head as she looked up at him.

  “It came in the spring. Once the river was clear.”

  Six months and he was already showing symptoms. It had taken a year of testing the Gatherer before she had shown any deterioration.

  She staggered to her feet and forced her cramped muscles to move. The road sloped upwards to a refuge of trees with several dozen curtained windows along the way. Her shoulders rose from the feel of their eyes on her as she passed. How many people waited behind those curtains too afraid to come out?

  “Don’t you want to see my dad?”

  An earlier rain had carved a path in the sand on the road, the branches splitting and merging until they’d had enough volume to wash the sand through town and into the river. She wished the current were strong enough to take her with it, floating her out to sea, her body cleansed and vacant by the time salt touched its skin.

  TWO

  The lights of the railway crossing flashed in the darkness as the train clattered by, before the backdrop of Maria’s reflection in the train’s window descended back into darkness. The few passengers in the dim cabin slept, yet Maria resisted the gentle rock of the train, her gaze fixed outside the windows for the occasional yard light or headlights that broke the darkness.

  The train’s whistle blew, and they clattered through another crossing, more lights appearing as they drew closer to the coast. A few screens were lit on the backs of the seats and a digital sign scrolled advertisements at the front, the car and the sleeping passengers cast in a stark, restless light.

  None of the passengers had noticed her when she’d boarded the train, and the foothills and most of the Rockies had passed while the cabin slept. Maria had been the sole witness to the few brilliant cities followed by diminishing stretches of emptiness. The larger patches of darkness would come once she turned north, the coordinates Havernal had given her placing Freeman closer to the Arctic Circle.

  Maria’s reflection was drawn and shadowed, the lights reaching only the ridge of her cheekbone and the brow above one eye, as if only part of her had boarded the train, the shadowed piece of her still back in Ottawa with Havernal. He had been weak, the hand that had held hers boney and dry like that of an old man. At one time, she could have held onto its warmth and strength forever.

  A whoosh of air as the door between the cars opened, the vibrating hum of the train punching into the car. A man of around fifty beelined for the seat facing her on the diagonal. He wore a down vest over a worn khaki shirt, and he shifted and adjusted before settling into his seat. His boots were old and his jeans had the near black blue of a new pair. A civilian, yet she changed her position so she could see his reflection in the window clearly.

  You won’t be th
e only one looking for her.

  Havernal had warned Maria as if she wouldn’t know that there would be others with a vested interest in finding Freeman. The debates she had slogged through online, looking for any piece of evidence as to Freeman’s location, had been endless. Some posts proclaimed Freeman to be a God and named the Gatherer a miracle. A few zealots claimed she was more important than Jesus. Each person had their own argument as to which group had been more devastated by the introduction of the Gatherer—oil and gas, renewables, terrorist groups—and which one was more likely to have carried out their revenge.

  A second opening of the door, and the Electricline conductor stepped in. In his mid-thirties, he was fitter and had straighter shoulders than she normally associated with what was essentially a ticket taker. He nodded to her and the man before continuing on, resting his hands on each seat back as he passed, like a school bus driver checking off his charges.

  “That’s the third time.”

  The man craned his neck towards the conductor’s retreating back.

  “The third time he’s been through the train.”

  “Is it?”

  She had noticed the same thing. At least three passes through the cabin between every stop. The lights of a car stopped at a crossing came and went, the train a hurtling ball of momentum.

  “They’re checking for terrorists.”

  Irritation tightened across her shoulders at the ignorance of civilians who latched on to rumours and conspiracy theories with no real understanding of what was going on.

  He drew in closer, his knee pressing into hers. His eyes were too wide, with a startling brightness.

  “Al Qaeda. The Russians. Maybe the Chinese. It could be any of them.”

  True to her word, Freeman had released the Gatherer around the world, free to impoverished communities. It had changed people’s lives overnight, moving from a subsistence level to starting small businesses, purifying water, and having computers and access to the internet.

  The number of terrorist attacks had dwindled to their lowest levels in decades but the general population and nutcases like this guy had been less willing to give up their fear and apprehension, always believing the next attack was around the corner. She moved her knee away as the door to the next car slammed shut behind the conductor.

  “Doesn’t look like he found any.”

  The man nodded repeatedly, missing her sarcasm, his intense gaze locked on her.

  “I’m Coulter.”

  He didn’t offer his hand. No one did that anymore.

  She nodded and didn’t offer her name.

  A single light appeared in the blackness, its pool illuminating a tiny farm yard that could have existed in any time. She watched its static simplicity as it passed out of sight behind them.

  A jolt and she was flung forward, barely catching herself on the seat in front of her. There was a powerful pull in her gut as the brakes screeched, her hands braced against the seat. Blackness surrounded the windows.

  When the force eased, she was on her feet, clambering over Coulter as he snapped forward from the recoil. Other passengers rubbed their heads in confusion after being woken. Using the backs of seats for support, she ran towards the front of the train, the windows still dark. There was nothing to explain why they were slowing down. She slid open the door between cars. The strike of cold, hard air hit before she stepped into the next car. The door didn’t slide shut behind her and she turned, irritated that Coulter had followed her.

  “Stay in your seat.”

  “I’m not a dog.”

  He pushed past her, falling against her as the train came to a sudden jarring stop. Using her as leverage, he got away sooner and, feeling ridiculous, she hurried after him. The few passengers craned their necks when they came in, their expectation turning to disappointment as they hurried past. She kept her attention on the windows for signs of light or movement as she catalogued the passengers. Not a single one was sick. A brief image flashed of when Havernal had first fallen ill. He’d been strong, measured and calm as they had discussed the phenomena.

  Why some and not others?

  Their unit had done studies and analyzed the data they could find.

  There has to be a pattern.

  Havernal’s hand had trembled as he ran it through his hair, a symptom exhibited by around half of the sufferers. There hadn’t been a pattern they could find. No underlying activity or location that could explain why some strong healthy people deteriorated into a wasted shell while others carried on. It had none of the contagion patterns of a typical disease.

  The first glow of light shone outside the train, a low, orange flickering from flame. She pushed against the crowd at the front of the first car. Was there a fire in the engine? Was it that simple? The lights in the train were on, its systems running smoothly.

  She had almost reached the front of the car when a woman carrying a torch appeared outside the window inside the train corridor’s protective fence. She was middle-aged and stout, her gray hair cut in a bowl, a scarf tied tight around her neck. She walked with the slow casualness of a sightseer, lingering so the passengers would see her. A warning chill of fear down Maria’s back.

  “Open the emergency exit.”

  A man in short sleeves looked startled for a moment, saw the torch, nodded and pulled the first lever of the emergency exit. There was a rush of cold air as an alarm sounded. People streamed towards the exit and the pressure of the crowd eased. The woman climbed the bank of the tracks to stand within arm’s reach of the window. Her face was so still she barely seemed alive, her eyes nearly lifeless. She drew her hand from her pocket and cocked her arm.

  Maria ran, crouching against the expected rip of an explosion across her back. When it didn’t happen, she glanced back, the car empty behind her, the woman’s palm flat against the window. Maria recoiled at the woman’s thin disjointed smile, like a damaged soldier that has taken refuge in their anger. The woman turned her head, like a dog that had heard its owner, and she was gone down the slope, the bobbing erratic torch marking her retreat towards the front of the train.

  Angry shouts carried through the emergency door and Maria ran, instinctively pressing her arm against the reassuring bulk of the gun in its holster beneath her arm. Frozen, dried cornstalks crunched under her boots as her fingers touched down on cold, hard ground.

  She ran close to the towering bulk of the train, through the spill-off light from the windows and into the shadow of the engine. The shouting had stopped and she pushed through the cluster of passengers. The conductor in his gray Electricline uniform faced off in front of a crowd of thirty men and women carrying rifles and burning torches. Most were hunting rifles, though there was at least one handgun. A single bearded man stood forward from the rest with the woman from the window behind him, the strange, lifeless smile on her lips. A massive combine, parked on the tracks, loomed over all of them, its green side gleaming in the train’s powerful headlight.

  “This is as far as you go.”

  The bearded man held a hunting rifle across his chest. It looked old, though likely powerful enough to do its job.

  “The line is bought and paid for.”

  The conductor, or whatever he was, held his hands relaxed at his sides, the back of his uniform creased at the shoulders, an automatic revolver in a holster on his belt. This version of him made more sense than the amiable conductor taking tickets.

  Most of the protesters wore muddied work boots and pants with worn coats on top. A smaller group stood thirty meters down the track, beyond the combine, their faces like pale ghosts with frightened eyes staring out of hollow sockets. The passengers murmured the word ‘afflicted,’ the name given to the sick as they snapped photos on their phones. Maria moved to the side of the crowd, away from the lenses.

  “We aren’t here tonight to let you contaminate our home.”

 
“I got a schedule to meet.”

  “Get off the track!”

  The voice came from behind her.

  The bearded man spoke calmly, ignoring the outburst.

  “You’ll have to find a different route.”

  “Get your sorry asses off the track!”

  Coulter was at her elbow, jabbing his finger at the crowd on the tracks.

  “You bunch of terrorists!”

  There was a panicked murmuring behind her, the passengers stamping and shuffling like a herd of horses ready to spook.

  The crowd on the track closed ranks.

  “We’re not moving.”

  “Federal law gives me the right to keep this train moving. Regardless of what stands in my way.”

  The front of the ElectricLine train had a steel plow on it, in the case of a cow or a tree blocking the railway line. She didn’t know who would win if they tried to plow the combine off the track.

  “Is that the same government that says the Gatherer isn’t killing us?”

  It was the woman who spoke up, stubborn and belligerent, a fight in her voice. The question hung above the shining rail line, filling the space between the conductor and the protesters.

  The bearded man shook his head in reprimand and the woman clamped her mouth shut, glaring more ferociously at the train and its passengers. Some dairy farmers had reported losing their entire herds to the untreatable virus. Other bovine varieties were left untouched. It was the inconsistency that had made people so afraid. There was a movement from the group further down the tracks as a small, pale girl rushed towards them. She made only a few steps before she was pulled back. A group too frightened to leave their children at home.

  “This is a major route west. This isn’t the only train that will be coming through here.”

  The conductor’s breath floated up through the beam of the light and escaped into the night above, as calm and unhurried as the man himself.

  “We’re prepared for that.”

  “Get off the track!”