Across the Universe (19 page)

42

ELDER

ORION TOLD ME THAT THE ONLY WAY TO GET AROUND ELDEST was to be sneaky. I have never had a reason to be sneaky before now.

But it’s not like I don’t know how.

As soon as the elevator doors close, taking Amy, Harley, and Doc back to the Hospital, I turn the floppy over in my hand.

First I check the biometric scan logs. The elevator opened to Harley’s biometric scan last night, and he spent all night here on this floor. Doc was down here and back up again early in the day, just before the solar lamp turned on, and he was only here for a few minutes. But another name is logged between his name and mine.

ELDEST/ELDER, 0724 HOURS

I wasn’t down here at 7:24 a.m. That just leaves Eldest.

Now to find out where he is.

It’s a simple enough thing to do. Override the access with my thumb scan and upload the wi-com receiver locations.

I zoom in on the screen. There’s Doc, in his office. Bartie and Victria are in the Ward common room, close together. Harley’s going down the path toward the fields—from his speed, I guess he’s running. Wonder why. Amy’s not on the screen—she doesn’t have a wi-com.

“Find Eldest,” I command. One of the dots starts blinking blue.

He’s here. On this level. Past the aisles of frozens, behind the door on the far wall. Doc’s “other” lab.

The door is closed, and I’m not sure Eldest would let me in if I knocked. Orion had told me that the rules don’t apply to Eldest, that he doesn’t follow the rules. So why should I?

A sterile disinfectant smell greets me as I enter the cramped room. Rows and rows of refrigeration tubes line one side of the wall. Inside the clear tubes, I see more cryo liquid with bubbles of goo and solid masses floating inside. Although I know I should be looking for Eldest, I cannot help but get a closer look at the gelatinous material. The chunky stuff inside each of the bubbles looks like curled up, malformed beans.

“They’re embryos.”

Eldest has found me. But he isn’t glowering at me. He actually looks a bit pleased to see me. If anything, that just puts me more on edge.

“When we land, we’ll artificially birth them.”

“Embryos of what?” I ask. I slip the floppy into my pocket. No reason for Eldest to know I was looking for him, not when he found me first.

“Animals. You’re looking at the cat tube. Cougars, I think, maybe bob-cats. I’d have to look it up.”

I struggle to remember what a cougar is. I think it’s something like a lion, but the pictures I’ve seen on the floppies in the Recorder Hall all run together.

“What are they here for?”

“When we land. We don’t know what animals from Sol-Earth we’ll need. There may be animals on the planet that are detrimental, and we’ll need predators to eliminate them. We’ll introduce ones from Sol-Earth. Or there may be animals that are good, but require new traits to make them useful to us. We’ll attempt crossbreeding or genetic splicing.”

I’m not interested in big lion-cats. I want to know why Eldest was the last one in the cryo chamber room, just before another frozen person drowned.

Before I can speak, Eldest strides past me to a table on the other side of the room. There is only one glass tube on this side, halfway empty. The embryos float in the cryo liquid like bubbles in gel, scattered throughout the tube. I lean in closer to look at one, examining the little bean-shaped fetus inside the amniotic sac. When I look up, I see Eldest watching me intently, a furrow of concern creasing his brow. His gaze doesn’t waiver when our eyes meet.

“What have you come here for?” he asks finally. “I didn’t think you even knew about this lab. Did Doc tell you?”

I shrug, unwilling to scamp out either Doc or myself.

“It doesn’t matter. I should have brought you here sooner. You’ll only have this one Season to prepare, then you’ll have to teach the Elder after you what to do.”

“What to do?” I ask.

Eldest picks up a big needle from the table beside the refrigeration tube. The actual metal part of the needle is nearly a foot long, and there’s at least twenty ounces of liquid inside the cylinder.

“You know that one of the biggest concerns on a generation ship is incest.” Eldest puts the needle down in a basket, picks up another one, and places it in the basket next to the first. “It is inevitable that, with a limited population of people, eventually the bloodlines will become too intermingled.”

He selects a needle from another stack this time. There is a tiny black-and-yellow label near the plunger of each needle. The one in Eldest’s hand now states simply “visual art.”

“I know all this,” I say. “It’s why the Plague Eldest developed the Season. So that you—we—could monitor reproduction.”

“Yes, that’s part of it.” Eldest is distracted as he selects more needles to put into the basket. “But another problem isn’t just preventing mental and physical handicaps from incest. Another problem is that this ship’s mission is so important, we cannot afford a generation that has no genius or talent.”

Now the needles he’s selecting are from another stack, one labeled “mathematics.” He takes five of these needles for the basket.

“The founders of the ship never intended us to be just idle farmers while we waited to land. We need inventors, artists, scientists. We need people who can think and process and develop whole new things for the ship and the new world.”

Three “audio arts” go into the basket, followed by ten “science: biological.”

“We have gained so much during our centuries of travel. Wi-coms were developed here. So were floppies. We modified the gravtube when I was younger than you.”

Eldest grabs a handful of “science: physical,” and puts five or six into the basket. He thinks for a moment, then takes two out of the basket and places them back on the table with the rest of the stack.

“Okay, so we need smart people on the ship. What’s that got to do with anything?” I ask.

Eldest holds up a needle labeled “analytical.”

“In each of these needles,” he says, waggling the one he’s holding at my face, “there is a special compound that combines DNA and RNA, a chimera. It makes a bond with the DNA of the fetus in an impregnated woman and ensures that the child born has certain desirable characteristics.”

I open my mouth to speak, but Eldest interrupts. “When you are Eldest, you must analyze the needs of your ship. Does your generation lack scientists? Make more. Do you need more artists? Ensure that more are born. It is your responsibility to make the people of this ship not only survive, but
thrive
.”

My stomach squirms. I’m not sure if I agree with Eldest or not—I don’t like to think of a ship full of inbred idiots, but I also don’t like how Eldest thinks he can just engineer genius.

Eldest places the last needle in the basket and looks up at me. His face is very serious, but he looks tired, too, as if he is made of wax and slowly melting. “I don’t say this enough. But I believe in you. I think you’ll be a good leader. One day.”

I want to smile and thank him—I don’t even remember the last time Eldest complimented me like this—but at the same time, I cannot help but wonder if the reason Eldest is so sure I’ll be an okay leader is because I was injected with some “leadership” goo before I was born.

And if I have been, I wonder if it was enough.

43

AMY

I AM CURLED ON MY BED, MY LEGS TUCKED UNDER MY CHIN, MY arms wrapped around my knees. My teddy bear, Amber, is tucked between my chest and my knees. Her button eyes and nose dig into my ribs, but I don’t care.

Harley hands me a glass of cool water.

“I’m sorry,” Harley says. An angry purple-red bruise the size of my pinky finger underscores his left eye.

He touches my hand, and I flinch. I want to cry, I want to scream, I want to hide, but all I can do is flinch because a man came close enough to touch me.

“I’m sorry,” Harley says again. He backs up and sits at the desk chair, all the way on the other side of the room. He sits on the edge of his seat, as if ready to jump up and protect me again. But he holds himself back. His hands grip the armrest, making sure he doesn’t touch me again.

I raise my head. “No... I mean... Thank you. You saved me.”

Harley shakes his head. “I left you. That was stupid. I knew the Season was full on. I’ve seen it getting worse since yesterday. And I left you alone.”

“Why were they like that?” I ask. In my mind’s eye, I can still see the glazed look of the couple having sex beside me, of how they turned away from my screams. I press Amber closer into me, relishing the feeling of her buttons grinding into my ribcage, wondering how the bruises she makes will compare to the ones already blossoming on my wrists.

Harley shrugs. “That’s just the way the Season is. Wasn’t Sol-Earth like that? People are animals. No matter how civilized we are, when our mating season arrives, we mate.”

“Not you. Not Elder. Not everyone’s acting like they’re insane with lust.”

Harley’s brows knit together, a ridge of flesh forming between his eyes. It reminds me of the deep, heavy brow of the man who was on top of me, who held me down, who ground his hips against mine. I bury my face into Amber’s fake brown fur, and I breathe in her musty smell. My arms tense around my knees, and my hands grip my legs, and I’m glad, because if I wasn’t holding on to myself, I think my body would all fall apart like a puzzle lifted at the corners.

Harley has not noticed that I’m quivering under my hard exterior. “Actually, a lot of the people in the Ward are fine. Some are using the Season as an excuse to act... recklessly... but most of the Ward patients aren’t quite so...”

“Crazy?” My voice cracks.

“Ironic, huh? The crazy people are less affected by all this than any of the others. Maybe it’s our mental meds. They’re called ‘Inhibitors.’ They’re supposed to inhibit the crazy, but maybe they inhibit lust as well.”

Didn’t seem to inhibit Luthe’s lust. He knew what he was doing. But the Feeders hadn’t, not really. I wonder if it’s because the Feeders are so brainless. Whatever’s making them want to screw, the Feeders just do it, like how that girl with the rabbits just believed what Eldest had told her, even when she read the truth. People like Harley and Luthe, who aren’t mindless idiots, have more control over themselves. They can choose to be kind, like Harley.

Or they can choose to be like Luthe.

Harley’s still talking, trying to distract me from everything. He talks like talking will make everything okay again, but it isn’t, it can’t be, it won’t be. I just want him to go.

Harley stands up. “Let me get you some more water.”

“No.” I want to be alone. I want him to go and let me shrink into myself.

“But I think—”

“NO!” I scream. My hands slip down my sweaty arms. My fingers scrabble back up to my elbows, and my fingernails dig into my flesh so I can’t lose my grip on myself again. “No,” I whisper. “Please. Just leave me alone. Let me be alone.”

“But—”

“Please,” I whisper into Amber’s fur.

Harley goes.

I lie curled on the bed for a long time, my eyes shut but my vision still achingly clear.

My arms grow tighter and tighter, pulling my knees so hard against my chest that it hurts. It doesn’t help. I am tired of hugging myself. I want my daddy to hug me and tell me he’ll kill anyone who hurts me. I want my momma to kiss me and stroke my hair and tell me everything will be okay. Because the only way I can believe anything will ever be okay again is if I hear one of them say it.

I let my knuckles relax. They are white on the edges, and my fingertips tingle as the blood returns to them. The insides of my elbows are slick with sweat. Creaking, popping sounds escape my knees as I stretch my legs fully out.

For a moment, I lie flat on the bed, but that reminds me of lying flat on the grass in the field, and I jump up so quickly that I make myself dizzy.

I cross the room to the door in three long strides, but when I reach for the button to open it, my hands are shaking.

They’re still out there.

With their sweating, pulsing bodies, with the up-and-down rhythm, with their hungry eyes and clutching hands.

I have to
, I whisper to myself.

But my hands won’t stop shaking.

I let my head fall against the cool wall. I am panting from the effort of standing close to the barrier between me and them. I want to call Harley or Elder to me, but I don’t have that ear button they use to communicate. And besides, Harley can’t save me every time.

I punch the button. The door zips open. Before it has cleared the doorway, I punch the button again, and the door slams back shut just as quickly.

I plan the route in my mind. I imagine myself running, running, running so fast no one can catch me. I can see the path so clear before me that I think I could run it without opening my eyes at all.

My hand slips over the button, and the door flies open. The hall is, thankfully, free of people. I rip open the glass common room door, and hold my breath as I race past the people who are too distracted to notice me streaking by them. My neck screams at me for the number of times I whip it around, looking for danger over my shoulder. I slip inside the empty elevator. And for the first time since I left my room, I allow myself to breathe again as I push the button for the fourth floor.

That hallway is deserted, too, and I send a silent prayer up for that. Still, I run past the locked doors, part of me fearful that they will swing open and reveal rooms full of eager men hungry for something other than food. I don’t relax until I’m in the other elevator, sinking down below the madness of the ship, into the deathly quiet of the cryo level.

I want to see where they are. That’s all. I tell myself, that’s all.

I run, first. But as I get closer and closer, my steps drop off to a walk, then a slow, rhythmic
thud
...
thud
...
thud
of each individual step on the hard floor.

I come to a complete stop at the row. I stare at their numbered doors: 40 and 41.

And then I run to the doors. I fall to my knees, and my hands are uplifted, one on each door. And I’m sure it looks as if I’m in rapturous praise of something holy, but all that’s inside me is a scream ricocheting around my hollow body.

For a long while, I stay on my knees like that, with my arms up and my head down.

I just want to see them.
That’s all
, I tell myself,
that’s all
.

I stand. I wrap my hands around the handle of the door labeled 40, and I shut my eyes and grip the handle and pull it open. Without looking at the block of ice exposed, I spin on my heels and jerk open number 41, too.

There they are.

My parents.

Or... well, at least their bodies are there. Under the blue-flecked ice.

The room is cold, so cold, and I shiver. My arms prickle with goose bumps. The glass coffins are cold and dry. My fingertips skid across the top as I run my hands over my mother’s face.

“I need you,” I whisper. My breath fogs the glass. I wipe it away, a sheen of wet sparkling on my palm.

I squat, my face parallel to hers. “I need you!” I say. “It’s so... strange here, and I don’t understand any of them, and—and I’m scared. I need you. I need you!”

But she is ice.

I spin to Daddy. Through the ice, I can see the stiff bristles of his beard. When I was little, he’d rub his face against my bare stomach, and I’d scream in glee. I’d give anything to feel that now. I’d give anything to feel anything but cold.

The glass is fogged and the ice isn’t crystal clear, but I can see where Daddy’s hand is. I rub my pinky against the cold glass, pretending that his finger will wrap around mine in a promise.

I don’t realize I’m crying until the tears splash on the coffin. “Daddy, I couldn’t do anything. I couldn’t get up, Daddy. They were too strong. If it wasn’t for Harley—” My voice cracks. “Daddy, you said you’d protect me! You said you’d always be there for me! I need you
now
, Daddy, I need you!”

I pound my fists against the cold hard glass surrounding the ice. My hands crack and bleed, smearing crimson across the glass.

“I NEED YOU!” I scream. I want to break through the glass, to rub life back into his bristly-bearded face.

My body falls limp. I curl up under their cold, lifeless forms, draw my knees to my chest, sob dry, empty sobs, and scrabble to fill my lungs with air that is too thin and weak.

One giant droplet of condensation slips off the glass and plops onto my cheek.

I rub it, and the warmth of my hands brings life back to me.

It doesn’t have to be like this. I may be awake, and it may be impossible to put me back inside a cryo chamber... but that doesn’t mean I can’t see my parents.

I stand. This time, I don’t look for my parents’ faces in the ice. This time, my eyes seek out the tiny black box at their heads, the one with the blinking green light. The one with the switch under the cover.

It can’t be that hard. Flip the switch. That’s all I have to do. I will stand here and wait. I will pull them from the box when it melts so that it won’t drown them. I will help them climb out of their coffins. I will wrap them with towels, and I will hug them, and they will hug me. Daddy will whisper, “Everything will be okay now,” and Mom will whisper, “We love you very much.”

They’re essential
, a small voice whispers in my mind. I see the row of flags on the bottom of the door, the symbol for the FRX, the Financial Resource Exchange. They are a part of a mission that’s greater than me.

Mom’s a genetic splicer, a biological genius. Who knows what life we’ll see on this new world? She’s needed.

But Daddy—he’s with the military, that’s all. He’s a field analyst. He’s sixth in command, let the five in front of him be essential, not him. They can take care of the new world; Daddy can take care of me.

“I’m the failsafe.” I can hear Daddy’s strong, proud voice in my mind, just like the day he told me we’d be a happy frozen family, wasn’t I excited? “That’s my mission—if anything goes wrong, I’ll be there.”

A glorified backup plan. They needed him in case something went wrong. But what if nothing went wrong?

If I leave them Mom, maybe they won’t mind that I take Daddy back. He’s not
really
needed.

My hand is already on the box over Daddy’s head. I run my finger across the biometric scanner at the top. The light blinks yellow. Access denied. I don’t have high security clearance; I’m not important enough to be able to open up the box and flip the switch and wake Daddy up.

But I can smash it. The whole idea plays out in my mind—my eyes wild and my hair swinging as I beat the box with my fists until it shatters and I can press the button and melt Daddy.

It’s such a ridiculous image that I laugh. A high-pitched hysterical laugh that breaks with a dry sob.

I can’t wake up Daddy. He’s needed. I know he is, even if I don’t want to admit it. I’m proof enough that he’s needed—they wouldn’t have let me come if he weren’t. He and Mom knew what it meant when they signed up for the ship. I remember that first day. They were both willing to say goodbye to me so they could be on this ship. Daddy had already arranged it so that I could walk away from them. When he hugged me before he was frozen, he was hugging me goodbye. He never expected to see me again. He didn’t even pack me a trunk. He gave me up so that he could wake up on another planet.

I can’t take his dream away.

If he can say goodbye to me, I can say goodbye to him.

Besides, I’m not so selfish as not to remember my status. I was the nonessential one, not them. If food won’t grow or animals won’t live, Mom will make it happen. If there’s a bunch of evil aliens already on the new planet, Daddy will take care of them.

Either way, they’re the difference between a whole planet of people living and a whole planet of people dying.

I can’t take them away from that. I can’t kill their dreams, and I can’t kill the future inhabitants of the planet I won’t reach until I’m older than them.

I can wait. I can wait fifty years until I see them again.

I slide their trays back into their cryo chambers and push the doors shut, then head silently back to the elevator and my lonely room.

I can wait.