Pure (40 page)

And then, in an instant, there’s a small rising cloud, just a foot high, rolling toward them.

“How many do you think there are?” Pressia asks.

“Too many to count,” Bradwell says. The storm of small Dusts coming at them is accompanied by a high-pitched tone—not one squeal but many, all ringing out together.

The wind starts up again. Soon they’re all leaning into the gusts. Pressia pulls two knives from her jacket. Partridge has a knife and a meat hook. His stumped finger throbs, but he’s still got his grip. Bradwell has a stun gun and a small sharp knife. The ground is vibrating. The air smells thick and putrid.

“What are we going to do? Plan?” Partridge shouts.

“Stay here with Pressia!” Bradwell says, and with that he lifts his weapons and lets out a barbaric yawp. He charges the storm of small Dusts.

The Dusts, with their beady quick black eyes and partially exposed skeletons, move in a pack. Some are locked together, rib-cage-to-rib-cage, jawbone-to-jawbone. Some have fused skulls. Others are stacked on top of one another. And all of them are tied to the earth. It comes with them as they overtake Bradwell. They don’t exist alone. They are Groupies that are also Dusts bound to the earth. With scrambling claws, they run up Bradwell’s body, bringing with them what seems to be a hem of the earth, a dirt blanket that they could use to smother him.

It happens quickly. Bradwell is cutting the blanket of earth and small bodies with quick slices of his knife. The Dusts fall, but there are more, always more. He’s covered in them, like he’s trapped in a coat of small roving ashy beasts.

Pressia starts to run toward him, but Partridge shoves her so hard, she falls back. “I’ll go.”

Pressia shouts, “What the hell is wrong with you?” Her mouth covered with a scarf, her hair whipping around her head, she’s holding her knife, and her doll-head fist is ready to throw a punch. That’s his little sister. It hits him with such force that he’s momentarily stunned. His little sister. “Stay here!” he says.

“No!” she shouts. “I’m fighting.”

There’s no stopping her. As soon as Partridge starts running, she’s after him. They charge to Bradwell and start whacking at the creatures with their knives and hooks. Partridge’s body feels deeply strong and fast. The coding must be getting closer to full effect. But still there are too many of the small Dusts. He can’t keep up. Bradwell staggers forward, then loses his footing. The blanket of earth covers his legs, immobilizing him. He twists his upper body, like a hooked fish, but it’s no use.

The Dusts are on Partridge and Pressia now too. They have claws and sharp teeth. He can see the small dots of blood blooming on his shirt—Pressia’s too—and the small Dusts have moved up Bradwell’s back, attacking the birds beneath his shirt.

Bradwell cries out to Partridge and Pressia, “No, go back!”

But they keep fighting. They kick and flail, slicing the Dusts, shoving them off Bradwell.

But now the next wave of Dusts is rolling at them, chest-high. And behind the wave, there are pillars of Dusts rising. They seem to have heads, horns, spiked backs. Partridge is sure that this is the end. He’ll never get any closer to his mother than this.

But then Pressia shouts above the high-pitched keening of the beasts. “He’s coming! I hear him!”

“Who?” Bradwell says.

Partridge hears another strange sound too, a bass rumble running below the squealing—a growling motor and then a blasting horn.

A car, a miraculous black car, comes barreling through the waves of Dusts, plowing through them. There’s a spray of ribs, teeth, shining eyes. The car skids to a sideways stop right in front of them. Partridge can barely see through the new gust of ash torn loose by the black car, but he hears a voice shouting at them from the car. “Get in, goddamn it! Get in!”

He isn’t sure whether to trust the voice or not, but he’s in no position to be choosy. He turns and sees Pressia help Bradwell to his feet. “Open the door!” Bradwell shouts at him.

Partridge runs for the door, opens it. Bradwell and Pressia jump in, then Partridge beside her. The car takes off before the door slams.

The driver sits close to the steering wheel because of something he’s wearing on his back. He looks over his shoulder at Partridge, his face marred and burned. “That him, Pressia?” he shouts. “That the Pure?”

“Yes!” Pressia shouts. She knows the driver. “And this is Bradwell.”

The driver yanks the wheel, hitting a Dust head-on, creating a cloud of ash that rains dirt and debris on the car. Wiry and lean, he moves like someone charged by a temper. Partridge grips the seat. In the Dome, they all rely on the rails. He barely remembers cars, and he’s never been in a speeding car, driven by a maniac.

“I thought you two were dead,” Pressia says.

“So did we!”

“This is El Capitan!” Pressia says.

Bradwell points to the windshield. “A herd of them! Jesus!” They hit a series of Dusts, each exploding against the car.

“Do we know where we’re going to find the Pure’s mother?” El Capitan says.

Partridge grabs the seat in front of him and pulls himself forward. “What do you know about my mother?”

And then as if from nowhere a head appears on the driver’s back. A face—small, pale, and pruned with scars. He opens the small dark hole of his mouth and says, “Mother.”

“Whoa!” Partridge says and rears back, slamming into the backseat.

The driver laughs, pulls the wheel so hard that Partridge bangs his head against the window.

“And that’s Helmud,” Pressia says. “His brother.”

In addition to all the bites and scratches on Bradwell’s body, one of the two seams running up the back of his shirt has split. Through the rip, Partridge sees one of the birds in Bradwell’s back—gray shifting wings, some tinged with blood. There might be only three birds. Partridge had expected more what with all of their motion. Two shift restlessly. The calmest one, the one he sees clearly, has a beak drilled into Bradwell’s muscle and skin, scarred with old burns. His skin puckers around its red beak. Its shiny dark eye is masked in black feathers. For a moment it seems as if the bird is looking at Partridge, startled—its eye beady and still—as if it wants to ask a question. It looks sickly and limp.

“One of the birds,” Partridge says, his mouth pasty with ash. “It’s injured.”

“Your mother will have medicine,” El Capitan says. “That’s what the Dome wanted us to protect if we find her. I bet she’ll have something that’ll work on your injuries.”

“Meds?” Bradwell says, looking at Pressia.

“If we ever do find her, they don’t want anything in her possession damaged,” she says.

It dawns on Partridge that he doesn’t really know these people. He’s stepped into the middle of their lives, and they’re strangers to him. He doesn’t understand them or this world they live in. Will his mother be a stranger to him too?

He looks out the window. They’re moving fast. The flat blackened landscape is a blur. Is his mother alive in those hills? Did she tell him the story so that he would remember it all these years later? When was the last time he felt like he knew what he was doing? He stares at the cracked swan pendant hanging from the necklace around Pressia’s neck. It sways with the rhythm of the jostling car, tapping Pressia’s blood-flecked, soot-streaked collarbones. Its blue eye is small and fragile. What’s it good for? What does it mean?

AFTER
SHE
STEPS
OUT
of the last compartment and the door slides shut behind her, there’s the thunk of a heavy lock. But no one from Special Forces is there to meet her, as the guard told her there would be.

She looks out at the dark landscape, the swirls of ashy dust and, far off, twisted woodlands, and a city—toppled buildings, small but distinct smoke trails lifting into the sky. She’s alone, holding the pale blue box in her hands.

She turns back to the Dome, gazes up at its massive sides. She knocks politely on the door, knowing that there isn’t anyone on the other side. She hears a strange far-off howl from the woods. She doesn’t turn around. She pounds with her fist. “No one’s here!” she shouts. “No one’s here to escort me!” She almost starts to cry and stops herself. She lets her fist slide down the door.

She turns then and notices the wheel ruts. They stop abruptly in front of the Dome, and she can make out the large rectangular seam of what might be the door to the loading dock, the one the guard had mentioned. Maybe he shouldn’t have said something like that to her. Now she knows that the Dome isn’t completely shut off. They’re in communication with the outside. This goes against everything she’s been taught. She shouldn’t be allowed to know about the loading dock. But maybe the guard knew it didn’t matter what she did and didn’t know now—not if she was never coming back.

She takes a few steps forward. Her shoes slip in the grit. She’s used to the tiled halls of the girls’ academy, the stone paths through the turf, unmoving under her feet, and the rubbery grip of the rehab center’s flooring. She’s on a downward slope and so her pace naturally picks up, and she realizes that she is truly alone, under the eye of the real sun, under a bank of clouds that are limitlessly connected to the sky, the universe, and she starts to run. The girls’ academy doesn’t have any athletic teams although they do calisthenics every morning in the gymnasium for a full hour in matching one-piece jumpers—shorts and striped short-sleeved tops that zip up the front. She hates the jumpers and the calisthenics. When was the last time she sprinted like this? She’s a fast runner. Her legs feel strong beneath her.

She runs for a while, closer and closer to the woodlands. And then she hears something buzzing, a low electric pulse. It comes from the stunted trees, but she can’t tell which direction. She stops running but is surprised by how it feels like she’s still in motion. The pounding of her feet on the earth is now the pounding in her chest. She scans the woods and then sees a large figure moving quickly, glinting.
Don’t worry
, she remembers the guard saying.
They’re creatures. They’re not human.

Was that supposed to be comforting?

“Who is it?” she shouts. “Who’s there?”

The shape glints again, as if its skin reflects light.

And then it stands tall and walks out on long, muscular legs, almost spider-like in the delicacy of its movement. She decides that it’s Special Forces because of its suit, which is formfitting and camouflaged with a dark mix of colors to blend with mud and ash. Pale arms bulky with muscle are secured with weapons, shiny black guns that she has no name for. Its hands are too large for its body, but fitted perfectly into the guns’ handles. She sees the glint of knife blades too, and they scare her more, as if it is also prepared for a more intimate killing.

Its face is thick-jawed, lean and masculine, although she can’t quite think of it as male. Its eyes are narrow slits, hooded by a forehead that juts out. It stares at her then walks up close. She doesn’t move.

“You’re here to meet me?” she asks. “You’re Special Forces?”

It sniffs the air around her and nods.

“Do you know who I am?”

It nods again. If it’s not human, what is it? How did it come to work for the Dome? Is it a wretch that they’ve rebuilt for the Dome’s protection?

“Do you know where you’re supposed to take me?”

“Yes.” The voice is human. In fact, it’s shot through with melancholy and longing. He says, “I know you.”

This is frightening. She can’t say why. “I’m your charge,” she says, hoping that this was what he meant. “Or maybe
hostage
is the better word?”

“Of course,” he says, and then he turns and crouches. “I will carry you. It’s fastest.”

She hesitates. “A piggyback ride?” She’s surprised she’s used the term. It’s been ages.

He doesn’t respond, just stays still.

She looks around. She has no other options. “I have this box,” she says. “I’m supposed to deliver it.”

He reaches up and takes the box from her. “I’ll keep it safe.”

She pauses again but then climbs onto his back. She locks her wrists around his thick neck. “Okay,” she says.

He sets off, hurtling through the woods, away from the city. His gait is fast and smooth and nearly silent. Even when he jumps large outcroppings of underbrush, he lands softly. Sometimes he stops abruptly, hides behind a stand of trees. Lyda hears the sharp yap of an errant dog, and someone singing. Singing! Here, outside the Dome, singing endures. The idea surprises her.

And now they’re running again. The cold air fills her lungs. She’s breathless. Her scarf covers her nose and mouth, but also her ears, creating loud tunnels of wind. Is this what it was like when people used to ride horses—all wind and trees and speed? She’s on the soldier’s back—her arms around his neck, her legs around his back, as if she were a child. But he’s not a soldier. He’s not wholly human. And she’s not a child. She’s an offering.

She hears the electrical buzzing sound. It’s coming from all different directions. He stops, raises his hand to his mouth, and makes some kind of call that Lyda can’t hear—maybe a sound out of her register. But she knows it’s a call because she feels the vibration through his ribs locked in her knees. He stands stock-still.

“We’ll wait,” he says and bends to his knees, letting her get down.

She stands, feeling wobbly. “You know who we’re looking for?” she says.

He looks at her sharply over his shoulder as if he’s hurt by some kind of accusation. “Of course.”

“I’m sorry,” she says.

They wait awhile longer.

“How do you know me?” she says.

He looks at her through his narrow eyes. “I was,” he says.

“You were what?” she asks.

“I was,” he says again. “And now I’m not.”

She sees clearly now that he’s not old—just about half a dozen years older than she is, perhaps. His face doesn’t resemble anything she’s ever seen before—the thick brow, the heavy jaw—and yet could he have once been someone else? “Do I know you from the academy? Did you attend?”

He stares at her as if he’s trying to remember something long lost.