Doomed (45 page)

“I plotted the coordinates and already found our course,” Theo answers soothingly. “As for the rest, I guess we’ll figure it out when we get there.”

Which is so not the reassurance I’m looking for. Overwhelmed, I lean my head back against the seat and close my eyes.

Somehow I make it through the next hour and a half without losing my mind, though I’m honest enough to admit that it’s a close one. I remember hearing once that prolonged exposure to violence makes it easier to accept, more commonplace—that you go into a kind of amnesiac fugue. If so, there must be something wrong with me, because every day of this just makes me feel worse.

“Okay, I’m going to need your help.” Theo’s voice jolts me out of my reverie, and I flail upright, looking around wildly.

“What’s wrong?”

“We have to find someplace to land this thing.”

“We’re there already?”

“As close as we’re going to get, since the coordinates are actually in the middle of nowhere.” He points to the wide expanse of forest below us.

“Are you sure you did this right?” Eli demands. “Shouldn’t we be in a city or something?”

“No. Remember the atlas?” I say. Earlier, when we’d had access to an SUV, all that wide-open space had looked fascinating. Now it was just terrifying.

“There’s the road,” Eli says, pointing to what I suppose roughly qualifies as a road.

“That’s not going to cut it,” I tell him. “You can’t land a plane on a dirt road. We’ll all
die
.”

“Yeah, but it connects up to something bigger. Look.”

I do and realize he’s correct. Theo must, too, because suddenly we take a sharp right to align ourselves with the road.

“Are you ready?” Theo asks.

“Are
you
?” Eli demands. “I don’t think we’re the ones you should be worrying about right now.”

I tend to agree. Nervous, freezing, freaking out but doing my best to hold it together, I place a hand on Theo’s shoulder, rub a little. Try to lend him whatever moral support I can.

He reaches up, clutches at my fingers for a second, and for the first time I realize he’s as nervous as I am. So how does he do this? How does he just plow through every obstacle, even when he’s worried? I feel like my fear is crippling me, making me useless, and he just steps up to the plate again and again and again.

I look over at Eli and realize he’s watching our exchange. I think about pulling my hand away, but I can’t. The last thing I want to do is hurt Eli, but Theo needs me, too, and as long as he does, I can’t make myself let go of him.

Then Theo takes a deep breath, straightens his shoulders. When he looks back at me, the nervousness is gone and in its place is the familiar resolve that tells me everything is going to be okay. Theo won’t let it be any other way.

We drop altitude fast, moving lower and lower until we’re about level with the treetops. Then even that’s too high, and we’re moving lower, lower, lower … The wheels touch down and Theo slams on the brakes, hard.

It’s a bumpy road, definitely not your average runway, and we skip and jump across it as he does his best to get us
stopped. It takes a little longer than I expect—I guess small, private airplanes don’t have the same braking systems as 747s. But eventually we roll to a stop. Impulsively, I lean over and hug both Theo and Eli. “We’re alive!”

I’m out of the plane before Theo even takes off his seat belt, stretching my legs and considering kissing the ground for good measure. Eli clambers after me, picking me up and swinging me around as he laughs and laughs.

“I can’t believe you did it, bro!” he tells Theo. “I mean, I know you’re a wonder and all, but still. You flew the frickin’ plane!” There’s no trace of animosity in his voice, just pure joy. Despite everything, I’m shocked at how far we’ve come.

Theo’s shoulders are a little slumped, relief written in every exhausted line on his face. “Yeah. I’ve never actually done that before.”

“What?”

Eli and I both turn to him, slack jawed with astonishment. “I thought you and your dad built an airplane,” I say.

“We did. But he always flew it. Obviously, he taught me what to do, but I’ve never actually soloed before.”

“Well, then, you did even better than expected,” I tell him, but my heart is beating triple time. I can’t imagine how terrified he must have been.

He nods, starts gathering our backpacks out of the plane. “We’d better get going.”

I shoulder my bag, nod. “Which way does your compass say?”

He looks at his watch. “That way.”

We haven’t been walking very long when we see a building in the distance. I start to walk faster, driven by
an urgency I don’t quite understand. Suddenly Theo and Eli are the ones struggling to keep up with me.

The closer we get, the easier it is to tell that we’re going to a house, not a business. There’s smoke curling out of the chimney, and a small woodpile sitting to the right of the front door.

And there’s a man standing on the porch, watching us approach. As I get my first good look at him, everything inside me goes still.

Because the man I’m looking at isn’t some stranger, like I first supposed.

He’s my father.

As the realization slams through me, my feet stop moving of their own accord.

“Pandora?” Theo asks, reaching for me. I clamp on to his hand, weave my fingers tightly through his, and wait for the shock to stop ricocheting through me. It takes longer than I expect.

“What’s wrong?” he asks.

Before I can answer, my father starts down the steps. “Pandora?” he calls as soon as he’s close enough to really see my face.

Theo stiffens. He’s figured it out, too.

“Are you all right? You look awful.” My father runs up to me, reaches a hand out as if to touch me. I can’t stop myself from physically recoiling.

“How could you?” I whisper, horror and anger and fear roiling around inside me until I think I’m going to explode. “You sick bastard! How the hell could you do this?” I’m
screaming now. I can’t help it. Now that I’m here, in front of him, I can’t hold it in any longer.

“Oh, sweetheart, I’m sorry.” He glances at Eli and Theo. “Who are you?”

“Pandora’s friends.” Theo’s eyes are narrowed, his tone more unfriendly than usual.

“They saved my life,
a lot
, these last few days.” I throw the words at him, a definite challenge.

His shoulders slump. “Come on into the house. We need to get the three of you cleaned up.”

“What we need is for you to turn off this damn game.”

“It’s not that simple, Pandora.”

“Sure it is. You upload the kill code and then we can get the hell out of here.”

“Come inside.” His tone is firmer now. “We’ll talk.”

When none of us make a move forward, he sighs. Then he turns around and walks back up the stairs and into the house. He leaves the door open, the choice up to us.

I’m pissed that he’s still calling all the shots, but standing out here isn’t going to do anyone any good. The guys must reach the same conclusion because we start forward as one.

As we cross the threshold, I’m a little shocked by how comfortable his log cabin is. It’s warm and cozy, despite the chill in the air. There’s electricity, the smell of coffee percolating. It’s a far cry from the Unabomber cabin I was imagining.

“The bathroom’s down the hall to the left,” he says from the kitchen, where he’s cutting thick slabs of bread to assemble sandwiches.

“This isn’t a social visit, Mitchell.” I can’t bring myself to call him Dad. Not now, after everything that’s happened.

He lays the serrated knife he’s using on the counter, turns to me. “I know. I just thought you’d be more comfortable after you clean up.”

“That’s what we’ve been doing for the last five days. Cleaning up the mess you started.” My voice breaks and I stop, try to pull myself together. I hate that I showed him even that small weakness. “Why would you do this?”

“Because I’ve tried everything else. This was the only way.”

“Killing people? Destroying the world?” I gesture to myself, to Theo and Eli, both of whom look like they’ve been to hell and back. “This isn’t a game. These are people’s lives you’re messing with.”

“Do you think I like seeing you like this?” he counters, reaching for the coffeepot and filling four mugs. As he pours, I realize his hands are shaking. What does he have to be nervous about?

“I don’t know what to think. What kind of man does this? What kind of father?”

Something in his eyes softens. “I’m sorry, Pandora. I didn’t know what else to do. I’ve tried every way there is to get people’s attention. Nothing else has worked.”

“This isn’t working, either. How can you not see that? People are terrified. They’re dying in the streets.”

“People die in the streets all the time—from famine, disease, war. This is no different, except that now it’s here, where you can see it.”

“That’s your defense? A lot of the world’s in bad shape,
so why not bring the whole thing to the brink of nuclear annihilation?”

He slams two mugs down on the table so hard that I think they’re going to break. “Let’s get one thing straight. The politicians brought us to this point, not me. With their lobbyists and campaign money and agendas that have nothing to do with their constituents or solving real problems. They’ve been warned, the world over, again and again and again, that they couldn’t continue to do what they’re doing. There are consequences to their actions.”

“Death isn’t a consequence! This isn’t a game. These are people’s
lives
.”

“I know that,” he replies fiercely. “Believe me, I know. They’ve been monkeying around with people’s lives for decades. Filling the earth with chemicals, poisoning our land, our water, our food, the very air that we breathe, because turning their backs on the issues gives them a better chance of being reelected, and being reelected brings them more power and money. And you stand there and accuse me of murder?”

“How is what you’ve done any better? Have you been listening to the radio? It really is the end of the world out there. A nuclear power plant in England has already blown up. There’s anarchy in every major city in the country, in the world.” I take a step back, gesture to myself. “Look at us! Do you know how close I’ve come to dying these last few days? How many different times and different ways I’ve nearly been killed?”

“I can’t stand the idea of your being hurt, Pandora.” He
slumps down at the table, looking years older than he did when we first saw him. “I never wanted that.”

“Never wanted?
You
did this.
You
created this worm,
you
sent it to me so I could set it loose. Don’t tell me you didn’t want exactly this to happen.”

“I wanted you to see, to understand. I wanted a better life for you than the one you have now. A life where cancer isn’t an everyday thing, where you have the chance to be happy and healthy and whole.”

“Do I look happy? Do I look healthy? I know I’m not whole, not after everything I’ve seen and done these last few days to get here. None of us are.” Theo reaches out, rubs a hand between my shoulder blades, and it’s all I can do not to crumple right here. “There are some lines you can’t cross. Some things you can’t come back from.”

“That’s exactly my point!” He shoves back from the table, begins to pace. “We’re at a crossroads. Not just you and me, but this entire planet. It’s reached crisis stage. We can either go on the way we have and kill this planet once and for all, or we can start over and do things right this time.”

“Do things right? Poisoning the planet with nuclear radiation is doing things
right
?”

He waves his hand. “That was never going to happen. I wouldn’t have let it. Besides, I knew you’d make it in time.”

“But I didn’t, Mitchell. All those people died in England, and I couldn’t do anything to stop it. The earth will be poisoned there for decades.”

“That was a mistake. It shouldn’t have happened. If they’d taken better precautions—”

“Are you listening to yourself? ‘It shouldn’t have happened. That wouldn’t have happened. It’s the politicians’ fault.’ ” The words burst out of me. “Well, it is happening. And what about you? What are you responsible for? You can’t really think you’re innocent in all those people’s deaths?”

“I know my sins very well, Pandora. I know the evils I’ve unleashed.”

“Then stop them!” I plead with him. “Turn off the game before things get any worse.”

“I can’t do that.”

“You mean you
won’t
do it.”

“I mean I
can’t
. I’m not a monster. After what happened in England, I tried to stop it. But it’s too late. It’s taken on a mind of its own.”

“What does that mean exactly?” Theo jumps into the conversation for the first time.

“It means that the fail-safes I built in aren’t working. The back door I was planning on using to shut it all down has been corrupted.” He pauses, takes a deep, shuddering breath. “I’m locked out of my own matrix.”

I’ve imagined this confrontation countless times in the last few days, thought about it from every angle and every possible outcome. But I’m not prepared for those words. Not prepared for the idea that my father
wants
to stop things, but can’t.

“Can I see what you’ve done?” Theo asks.

“Who are you exactly?” my father asks.

“He’s my friend.”

My father studies him for a minute, then shrugs. He crosses the room, pushes a button that slides the entire paneled wall to the side, and reveals a computer system that looks like it belongs in NASA instead of a log cabin in the middle of Wyoming.

Despite everything, Theo’s eyes light up at the sight of it. Eli and I smile at each other—boy genius is very definitely in his element.

Theo sits down in my father’s chair, his hands flying
across the keyboard. All kinds of code scrawls across the screen, lines and lines of symbols that I have no hope of understanding. My father stands behind him, watching the screen as intently as Theo. Every once in a while one or the other throws out a comment, but it might as well be Greek to Eli and me.