Autumn in the City of Lights (17 page)

“Did I wake you?” I whispered.

“It’s okay. I need to slip back to my room anyway and change before the Summit. Will you be okay?”

“Yeah,” I said but snuggled myself back under his arm.

“Maybe I should get my stuff and bring it here. I don’t like leaving you alone with Karl just down the hall.”

“I think that might be a good idea,” I said. I didn’t want to be alone either. When other people were around, at least Karl had to pretend to be a regular guy instead of an alien bent on destruction. Here, he knew where I was, and could just project into my room and take me away any time he wanted with no witnesses. Besides, I wanted to spend as much time as possible with Grey if he was going to start shutting away his emotions as soon as we returned home.

We both got ready for the Summit in our own rooms, and then Grey came back to wait with me. Before long, a neatly dressed liaison arrived and escorted us into a magnificent room called the Hall of Mirrors. I remembered the room from the tour I took with my dad. As a child, I was struck by the golden hue and sparkly surfaces, and it made no less of an impression now. Large windows allowed the evening light to spill in and reflect in the mirrors, making every gold accent shine and the glossy wooden floors glow.

“Look up,” Grey whispered.

Overhead were lavish murals that reminded me of the ones in the Sistine Chapel. “Is that supposed to be God?” I whispered back, nodding to the main figure overhead. I saw the same figure represented on a few of the other murals overhead as well.

Grey chuckled. “No, that’s supposed to be King Louis XIV. Most of the murals around this time depicted gods, but Louis decided to show off himself and his military prowess instead.”

I looked at Grey with my eyebrows raised. “Men,” I said. “A woman would never do this.”

A large rectangular table sat in front of an equally large fireplace. The chairs around it were almost full of delegates, many of whom I hadn’t met yet. All in all, it looked like nearly a hundred settlements were represented. Extra chairs lined the walls of the room, and I realized Grey, Daniel and Shad would have to sit in those, several feet away from me. Grey gave my hand a squeeze, and I walked the rest of the way to the main table alone. I pulled out an empty chair and sat down, feeling small.

Despite so many people being in it, the room became very quiet. I took Ben’s journal, a ballpoint pen, and another blank notebook out of my backpack and stacked them on my lap. I felt like I was back in school, waiting for a new class to begin. A class in which the teacher would put me on the spot immediately. I swallowed and fidgeted, and then the pen slipped through my sweaty palms and clattered to the polished wooden floor. A few pairs of eyes glanced toward me, and I tried to smile. I eased my chair back, trying to minimize the inevitable
skronk
of the chair legs scooting across the floor. I ducked under the table and fished out my pen, then straightened and smoothed my hair.

The sharp clip clop of heels on wood echoed suddenly through the hall, and we all turned gratefully toward Margery.

“Ladies and gentlemen, my apologies,” she said as she approached the table in another perfectly tailored suit. “The Summit will not be starting as planned this evening. The delegates from Japan, Brazil and Queensland have not yet arrived. As a courtesy, we are pushing the schedule to allow them a little more time to travel to us.”

I let out a slow breath, trying not to show how relieved I was.

“I hope you will forgive us for the delay,” Margery continued. “As I’m sure you are all aware, travel can be perilous these days. Be assured, we will not delay indefinitely. If we have no word by tomorrow morning, we will begin without them.” She smiled graciously and gestured through the window to the sprawling gardens lit by twilight. “I invite you to enjoy the gardens or tour the palace this evening.”

My thoughts immediately went to the other delegates. I knew some would be crossing oceans and wondered if they had planes like we did, or if they’d had to set sail. Some would have had to start toward Paris weeks or even months ahead of time to make it to the Summit. And getting home would be just as complicated for them. I was suddenly grateful for how easy and short my own trip had been. And getting home would be just as easy, I hoped — as long as Paris kept their word and refueled our jet.

“Thank you for the update, Ms. Durand,” Karl said. “Will we be sending aid, should the delegates not check in soon?”

“That is the plan, yes. Though it may take some time to track them down if we don’t hear from them.”

“I offer my assistance, should the need arise,” Karl said.

“I am grateful for your offer. I hope it won’t be necessary.”

A few minutes later, Grey and I were strolling through the lavish gardens. It was a feast for the eyes, but I couldn’t see it through the worry in my heart. My stomach grew tight again at the prospect of the Summit starting tomorrow morning.

“I was so relieved when Margery came in and said they were postponing, but I also hate coming all this way to sit around and wait,” I confessed. “Karl is too close, and I just want this all to be over with, whatever the outcome.”

Grey took my hand in his. “Try not to let your emotions get the better of you here. The more time we have before the talks, the longer you have to acquaint yourself with the delegates and consider your political options. I think this is actually a good thing.”

I sighed. “How were you ever able to disconnect yourself from feeling? I mean, philosophically, I get it. But it feels involuntary to experience the dread and, well... nausea inside me right now.”

Grey smiled, and I could tell he held back a laugh. “Well, first off, don’t throw up. Second, I can help you manage your emotions, if you really want me to, but it’s not something that can be mastered in a day. It took me years of training.”

“Well, I wouldn’t want to master it altogether,” I confessed. “I don’t want to be like Lydia.”

“No, of course not. And I wouldn’t want you to be either.”

Grey stopped as we passed one of the many fountains, and we sat down on a nearby bench.

“Let’s start with something simple. Breathing. Did you know that if you can learn to control your breathing, you can actually lower or raise your blood pressure at will?”

My eyes widened. “You can teach me to do that?”

“Well, over time, yes. But for now, let’s try a simple breathing technique. Close your eyes,” he instructed. “Now I want you to try and forget about everything going on right now, where you are, what you need to do, and only think about breathing in and out.”

I tried to do what he said but had a hard time letting go of everything going on.

“If you feel your mind wandering, focus on a single word and repeat it over and over again,” he said.

The word
home
suddenly occurred to me. So I said it over and over again... and then I starting thinking about Dorothy in
The Wizard of Oz
, and how there was no place like home.

“Open your eyes,” Grey whispered. “Do you feel calmer?”

“Well, I’m not sure if it worked the way it was supposed to, but I do feel calmer, for sure.”  I smiled, deciding not to tell him how my mind had wandered.

We stayed in the garden until it was full dark. Daniel and Shad were there when we returned, and they joined us in my room. I passed around Ben’s notebook, and we began discussing all the little details we’d picked up about the other delegates so far.

“I knew you guys talked on the radio, but I didn’t realize Ben was being so thorough,” Daniel said, leafing through the notebook.

“I think we should re-read the information on the people Ben has given a threat assessment level of seven or higher,” Grey said. “We can all try to interact more with the higher threats to suss out their motives and affiliations with Karl.”

I poked Shad, who was sprawled out next to me on the rug. “Speaking of Ben, you did remember to send a signal out to be relayed to him that we arrived safely?”

Shad looked offended. “
Pfft
. Of course. Did it the moment we landed. The New Yorkers verified they got it and promised to pass it along.”

Then he brightened. “Hey, can’t we just put everyone on the West Coast, minus Franklin of course, in the suspicious pile, and everyone else in the world in the ‘maybe they’re cool’ pile?” Shad asked. “I mean, think about it. Karl’s been in LA. How on earth could he have gotten to all these other people? Do you know how long it’d take him just to get to New York?” Shad pointed at the page Daniel had paused on. “Or Canada? And there’s absolutely no way he reached any of the overseas people not in Ben’s files.”

“The kid’s got a point,” Daniel said, considering.

“Remember, right after The Plague first appeared, planes still worked,” I said. “All he needed was a pilot willing to take him anywhere he wanted to go.”

“It’s still highly unlikely that he found these specific people, Autumn,” Daniel said, handing Ben’s notebook back to me. “I think most of them are here altruistically.”

I looked at Grey, pleading with him to step in and help rationalize
why
we needed to look at the other delegates with such a suspicious eye. But he gave a nearly imperceptible shrug. I guess that meant he and I would have to do the homework on the rest of them alone.

I flipped through the pages and stopped short when I saw Cheri Tyson, the older woman from Washington’s Grand Coulee Dam settlement. Ben had given her a threat assessment level of eight.

“Grey, look at this,” I said, handing him the notebook. “Ben rated Cheri really high. I didn’t notice this before.”

He scanned the page. “I’m surprised she ranked so high, but not that he was keeping an eye on her.”

“Really? She seems so kind,” I said.

Shad snorted. “You remember how Karl was the first time you met him?”

My heart sank. "Did any of you get the impression she was acting?”

Daniel shrugged. “We were mostly in the cockpit.”

“She seemed so genuine,” I said, feeling suddenly unsure of everything and everyone.

Grey touched my hand. “We’ll just keep an eye on her and Joe. Maybe Ben was wrong.”

When Daniel and Shad went back to their rooms for the night, I sat on my bed and kept thumbing through the high risk delegates over and over. Vincent and Ms. Whitmore were among them, too. That was less shocking to me. Grey came and laid a hand on mine, as if to remind me it was okay to take a break.

“I wish Ben could be here,” I said, looking up at him. “It would be so helpful to pick his brain now that we’ve met all these people in person.”

“How about the foreign delegates Ben didn’t get to speak with? Do your instincts tell you we can trust any of them?”

I considered it for a moment. “No, not really. And even if they did, I’d be wary.”

“At least we’re no worse off than we were before we came. We’ll just have to let this play out,” Grey said, his voice deflated.

“I can’t help but think Karl is one step ahead,” I said, flopping back on the bed and examining the sweeping roof of the canopy over me.

“He is,” Grey said. I perched up on my elbow and stared at him. “I know you don’t want to hear that, but the truth is, he is ahead of us. He knows more than we do. But that doesn’t mean he’ll win. We just have to be cautious and smart.”

I flopped back down on my back. “I think I need to try that breathing technique of yours again,” I whispered, closing my eyes.

*     *     *

The next morning, after a breakfast of fresh-squeezed orange juice, strong black coffee and warm croissants, we were escorted back to the Hall of Mirrors. I noticed immediately that the enormous table in front of the fireplace was gone, replaced by at least twenty rows of cushioned seats. A podium stood at the front of the room.

I hesitated, unsure of where to go, but then I saw the elected delegates were now sitting with their friends instead of isolated with the other delegates. Immensely relieved at the change, I found four seats together a few rows back from the front, and Daniel, Shad, Grey, and I sat down together. Franklin touched his cowboy hat in greeting and sat down next to us.

“I guess protein is an unheard of commodity for breakfast around here,” he muttered, rubbing his large belly. “Lunch better not be too far off, eh?”

Shad leaned down and dug through his bag for a moment, then unearthed a bag of Funyuns. “It’s not protein, but will this do?”

Franklin laughed loudly, startling the row of delegates seated in front of us. He clapped Shad heartily on the back as he took the bag and pulled it open with a loud crinkling noise as the room began to quiet.

“Good morning. Thank you all for coming,” Margery said from behind the podium. “I’m afraid the Japanese party has yet to arrive. We’ve sent a rescue team along their route. But, for now, we’ll have to proceed without them. We’re very pleased that the groups from Queensland and Brazil have made it to us safely, though.” I looked over to the group of newcomers across from where we sat. There were no fewer than twenty in the Brazilian party and five in the Queensland party.

“Let’s begin,” Margery said and gestured to a small staff lining one wall, who began handing out packets of paper. “This is our agenda for today. At the end of today’s proceedings, we can open the floor for topics to put on tomorrow’s agenda.”

When I got my packet, I saw it was one sheet of information, duplicated in several languages and bound together. The front page was English, and the first topic was “The Newborn Crisis.”

A hand shot up. It was the Canadian Prime Minister, Ms. Whitmore.

“Yes?” Margery said.

“I see we’re beginning with newborns. Shouldn’t our first order of business be the reconstitution of global communications? We won’t know what kind of resources are available to us until we find everyone and begin a dialogue.”

“That’s an excellent point, Madam Prime Minister,” began Margery.

“There won’t be anyone left to have a dialogue with if we don’t start saving babies,” Roslyn interjected without raising her hand.

“Perhaps if we pool the resources we have at our disposal now, it could be an ongoing effort, and as we rebuild communications, we can, of course, continue supporting the Newborn Crisis,” Ms. Whitmore reasoned.