Children of Eden (33 page)

He might know me, but I have no idea who he might be. “Who are you?”

He says a name I don't know. “Clayton Hill.” Then he adds, “You look so much like your mother, and your brother. I'm so sorry she was killed. It's all my fault.” Tears stream down his pudgy cheeks. “I didn't even hold out very long. I couldn't. They . . . they . . .” He holds up his hands, showing the burn marks. “Then they told me she was killed. That was worse than the torture. She was such a lovely person. Such a big, kind heart.”

Can it be? “You're . . . the Center official who was helping her?”

He holds his hands through the bars in supplication now. “Forgive me, please. Forgive me for not being strong enough.”

It wasn't Lark. It wasn't her fault. The bitterness that had consumed me at the thought that she, however inadvertently, brought about Mom's death evaporates.

I have to force myself to turn away because the guard is bringing Ash out now. His hands are bound behind his back, his pale, confused face bruised. He's staggering; the guard has to hold him up. Is he drugged? For a second his bleary eyes see nothing. Then he seems to wake up, and in a horrible moment, before I can flash him a warning gesture, before he can figure things out himself, he blurts out, “Rowan? What are you doing here?”

Bikk!
The guards flanking Ash look confused. We could probably play it off, say he was drugged, confused, or attempting a ruse, that he's never seen me before. But suspicions once roused are hard to quell, and we only have one chance at this.

We had a plan. Such a good plan. But if there's one thing I've learned in the last few days it's that plans almost always change.

Lachlan lowers his trendy green-tinted specs and looks at me over the rims with his beautiful second-child eyes. “Ready?” he mouths. My hand goes to the pearls at my throat, and I just barely nod.

As if we choreographed the move for weeks instead of talking about it for a scant few hours, Lachlan lunges at Ash's face with the pen he's been twiddling all this time. The guards, probably thinking Lachlan is trying to assassinate their prisoner, reach for the pen . . . but suddenly it isn't a pen anymore.

At the exact same time, my fingers clench around the short strand of pearls and rip them violently away from my throat. I hurl them to the hard floor and they bounce and roll all around the open room that is lined with cells. Some skip into the entranceway, where more guards are waiting. I see uniformed men and women look down at the innocent-looking little pearls . . . until suddenly they're not pearls anymore.

I pull my pen that isn't a pen from my clipboard and press it to my face, where it unrolls itself into a bioadhesive sheet similar to the one in the hazmat suit's mask. It presses itself to my face, sealing in my eyes, nose, and mouth with just a little gap so I can see and don't feel like I'm choking. A chemical reaction will give me air for about ten minutes, which should be enough. Through the slight haze of the protective film I can see that Lachlan has his mask on, too.

Then, with a subtle series of pops, the pearls detonate and release their bursts of toxic gas.

I can feel it on my skin, coldness as sharp as if I'd stepped into a freezer. But the drug itself won't be absorbed through the skin, only through the lungs and eyes. As the guards are beginning to find out.

I remember the smell so well, and I almost wish I could breathe it in one more time. With my new eyes, my new mission, I might never again see that glorious camphor tree that gives the Underground second children hope, happiness . . . and after a little bit of chemical tweaking, an aerosolized plant-based poison capable of taking out a roomful of people.

Nature gives life, and nature gives death. And what are we humans but a part of nature?

It all seems to go perfectly. Lachlan was sure we'd be able to smuggle in the cleverly disguised technology, and he was right. He was certain the camphor-based drug could disable anyone who breathed it in, and he was right. The guards are choking, vomiting, collapsing. Lachlan told me they'll recover, eventually, but looking at how quickly the guards go from health to misery to stillness, I wonder if he just told me that so I wouldn't think about having more deaths on my conscience.

In seconds, every guard in our sight is on the ground. This is our moment. We need to run, now, downstairs and out the front door, just three panicked employees fleeing a terrorist attack. We'll get into the car Lachlan's people will have stolen and left parked outside the Center, so we can get away as quickly as possible. Within an hour, Ash should be in the Underground, safe.

But there was one thing I didn't plan for. Beatings, drugging, stress, terror . . . Ash isn't strong at his best. Now, through the bioadhesive film over his face, I can see the panic in his eyes that heralds one of his attacks. He's starting to wheeze, his breath a muffled whistle behind the mask. He looks at me in apology for one instant . . . and then his knees buckle.

Our plan relied on a quick exit. Now one of us can't run.

Lachlan doesn't hesitate. He strips a jacket from one of the fallen guards and drapes it over Ash, hiding his cuffed hands so that at first glance he looks like a guard, not a prisoner. “Go!” Lachlan shouts, and picks up Ash as if he weighed nothing, slinging him over his shoulders.

We run, out past the fallen guards, to the spiral staircase. The camphor essence makes my exposed skin tingle. Over the railing I can see people on the first floor looking up in alarm.

“Help us!” I shout, my desperate, terrified expression not
an act at all as I gesture wildly behind us. “There's been an attack! They're all dead!”

I barrel down the stairs and toward the front door. There aren't as many people as there would be in the daytime, but there are enough to make a panicked crowd, as most run for the exit and a few head up the stairs toward the chaos.

No one seems to notice me. I must look as alarmed and confused as everyone else. But a few are looking suspiciously at Lachlan as he struggles a little bit behind me with Ash over his shoulder. I see a woman point to him, say something to a nearby man. They look around and the woman beckons urgently to someone I can't see.

Lachlan is slowed by Ash's weight, and only halfway down the stairs. We're far enough apart that anyone seeing us wouldn't think we were together. I want to look at him to call
hurry up!
But I don't dare attract more attention. I keep walking slowly across the wide-open lobby toward the door, moving almost sideways, pretending to look up at the commotion on the second floor like almost everyone else is doing.

Then I see who the woman was beckoning to. A Greenshirt appears, heading toward the couple and at the same time scanning the lobby to see what they're talking about. He has a gun on his belt, but I have no way of knowing if it is the lethal kind.

It doesn't really matter. Killed or stunned, if we're hit, we're done for.

Whatever the people say convinces him. He starts striding across the lobby toward the stairs Lachlan is laboriously trudging down. “Stop right there!” When Lachlan doesn't react, the Greenshirt starts to run straight for the stairs.

I don't know what to do. I take a step toward them, not knowing if I'm going to run to help Lachlan and Ash, or attack the Greenshirt. I hesitate too long. I realize I can't make
it to either of them in time. Lachlan is almost at the bottom of the stairs. The Greenshirt is almost on him. His hand goes for his gun.

Then I see the maintenance worker near the pool at the base of the decorative waterfall tumbling from the second to the first floor. She raises her head, meeting my eyes with a quick worried, loving look that somehow reminds me of my mom. My heart seems to dissolve within me, making me weak. I know that look. Mom wore it just before she sacrificed her life for mine.

“No!” I cry out, sure that Lark is going to do something foolishly, fatally, nobly heroic to save us all.

She is. I just underestimate her resourcefulness.

In one swift motion she pulls a heavy wrench from her tool cart and latches it onto a gear in a control panel hidden at the far side of the waterfall. With a grunt of effort, she torques it counterclockwise.

For a sickening second, nothing happens.

Then I hear a rumbling from somewhere over my head. Suddenly the water at the top of the waterfall erupts in a foamy rush, ten times the volume, flooding down in a powerful arc to the first floor. It sweeps across the lobby in a gushing river, knocking the Greenshirt off his feet and sweeping him ludicrously on his back halfway across the lobby. A dozen other people go down, foundering in the knee-high water. I'm far enough away that the water just splashes my toes.

Lachlan, still on the stairs with Ash, watches in apparent amusement as the Greenshirt floats by. Then he looks at Lark and grins. Her face is hidden by her cap, all but her curling lips. I see her smile back for an instant before she squats down and pretends to be fixing the malfunction instead of acting as a saboteur.

Somehow, that quick interaction between them makes my
heart lighter. We make it to the door before we seem to attract any more notice. Everyone has their hands full with toxic gas and floods. An alarm sounds, but no one seems to know exactly what it is for. I see a guard coming down the stairs.
Bikk!
It's the man who let us in. He's choking, clutching his throat, but still standing. He must have been out of range of the worst of the camphor toxins. He points at us, shouts, but there's too much confusion and no one seems to know what he's saying. He starts to chase us himself, holding tightly to the railing as he staggers down the stairs.

The only thing in our favor now is that the guards on the prison level don't carry weapons. Otherwise he would have shot us already.

Lachlan catches up, but we've lost precious seconds. “Where's the car?” I ask.

It's nowhere to be seen.

And now we have another problem.

“Lachlan, I don't think Ash is breathing!”

I'm not completely sure. It's hard to see at this odd angle, slung over Lachlan's shoulders. But I don't see him breathing, can't see his chest rise and fall. I pull his mask off, my own, too, gasping as we make our way toward the street, searching desperately for the car. Ash's eyes are closed, he's pale. I slap his cheek but there's no response. If he's breathing at all, it is terribly shallow and weak.

“We have to get him to a doctor!” I know Lachlan has connections. He must know a safe place to take Ash. Even Flame might be able to help him. Even . . . “My father can help him!”

“No, we stick to the plan,” he gasps. “The Underground.”

“But he heeds help! This is all for him.”

“They're too close. We have to get underground fast. If we stay on the surface, they'll track the car and catch us.”

“If he dies, I won't help you!” I cry, desperate.

Lachlan grinds his teeth but doesn't answer.

We're around the side of the Center now, and there's no one near us. They're all in the front, escaping, milling.

“There it is!” Lachlan shouts, and makes his labored way to the waiting car. I can hear the guard coming after us, but I don't dare spare the extra second to turn around and check how close he is. Lachlan shoves Ash into the car and dives toward the driver's seat. He's expecting me to follow, and flips on the manual override without looking back at me.

He's right. The guard is too close, bearing down on us. If he can't stop the car, he'll call in a description and have all of Eden after us. Ash will never make it to medical help. Not to Lachlan's secret contacts, or Flame, or my father. We need to get Ash away without this guard letting the city know exactly what to look for.

“Are you in?” Lachlan shouts without turning around, gunning the engine.

“Yes!” I call back.

He hears the door slam and jets off.

But I'm not inside.

I'm running at full speed toward the guard. We crash into each other.

He's big, as solid as the trunk of the camphor tree, and any other time I know I would have just bounced off him. But he inhaled at least some of the camphor poison, and he's weak, off-balance. We both go down. For a second he's on top, and he's so heavy I think I don't have a chance. His hands close on my throat, cold from the camphor in the air, and I tuck my chin and push at him in vain. But then he starts coughing so violently that he lets me go, and I manage to shove him off me and get to my feet.

Maybe he'll pass out. Maybe I won't have to hurt one more person.

But the universe isn't that kind. The coughing fit passes. He drags himself weakly to his knees, reaching for me.

“I'm sorry,” I whisper, before I kick him in the side of the head. The sound is sickening.

He crumples flat on the ground. I don't know if he's alive or dead. The important thing, I have to tell myself, is that he can't give a description of the car. The little vehicle is long gone. That gives Lachlan a chance to get away. That gives Ash a chance to get medical care.

I've done it. I've saved my brother.

I wonder if Lachlan has even noticed I'm not there yet, or if he's too focused on driving.

I feel strangely free, as if I've done everything that is expected of me and can finally rest. I even feel—and this is something I never expected—almost relieved that Lachlan has driven away, that Lark has by now no doubt found her own stealthy way out, and I'm all alone again. It's normal for me to be alone. The status quo. I always hoped my solitude would end one day, but all this time with people has been draining. Now Lark is gone, and Ash, and Lachlan, and everyone who matters in my life.

I'm alone, and I feel strong.

I'm not alone for long, though. A moment later five or six Greenshirts round the corner, spy me and the fallen guard, and start shooting.