Authors: Craig Saunders
By
the time they sat opposite each other on plastic chairs, a table between them, both
George and Francis shook from the strain. George on atrophied legs, Francis on
healing bones. George, short of breath and pale, held his hand out for Francis
to take.
'Take
a minute, George,' she told him. 'Let's catch our breath, at least.'
But
the boy shook his head, his ragged hair flicking away from his eyes.
He
grabbed her, his expression serious.
We
haven't got time. We might not get another chance, Francis.
She
sighed, but relaxed and held him back, palm to palm, as though they were going
to shake on it. She knew the deal they were shaking on, too. She was the
highway. George one end, O'Dell the other. Like she'd been laid by...
Francis!
She
stopped that train of though.
He's nine,
she reminded herself. It was
easy to forget the kid's age, and even easier to forget how deftly he could
pick what he chose from her thoughts.
'Do
it.'
She
felt him squeeze her hand tighter...and then she was gone.
*
George
didn't understand his talent at all. It was autonomic, like a person's beating
heart, like digestion.
He
was aware of Francis' hand in his. Her smooth, warm skin. Aware, too, of his
heart beat - just a steady, slow thud somewhere deep inside.
Follow
her heart...follow the highway.
He
concentrated that part of him that usually ticked alone. Sometimes, before this
- before the man with fire in his eyes, he had known things he never wanted to.
Even as young as four or five. Perhaps younger, too, but too young then think
it in anyway remarkable.
He
feared he would see things inside the man's mind that no one should see - boy
or adult.
Francis,
he thought.
Think of her heart...the beat.
The
beat inside Francis was calm. He let her heartbeat inside that wonderful place
in his head, where all the highways he'd ever known remained. Most of those
highways led to death; his father, his mother, teachers, childhood friends, his
grandmother. Those roads were crumbled and disused and forgotten. But other
highways he'd once touched remained, though distant and unreachable. The twins
on his street, Jamie and Anna. Anna still lived. He didn't take her highway,
because tonight wasn't about friends. Maybe she'd be thinking about cartoons.
Teen Titans, The Simpsons. She'd loved cartoons.
Darker
highways were there, still. The awful man whose mind felt and tasted like foil
from a chocolate bar, something bitter and unexpected between your teeth.
Wayland
Redman
.
And
the worst of all: The one he must travel.
George
turned his mind from the hundred dead roads in his head, from those few still
brightly lit, and sank deeper into Francis' unconscious mind. The road he
needed was the strongest he'd ever seen, and it ran from Francis' mind into the
distance. This one had cats' eyes along the edges and between the lanes. One
lane out, one lane in. George might have even been able to add street lights,
had he wanted, but he could have found his way along a dark country road now.
His power grew as he healed. Something about this new world - the distractions
and bright lights of life were winking out, and so the darkness was becoming
easier to see by.
Everyone
had highways. Those made of memories, or emotions. Road that lead to people who
touched their minds. O'Dell never touched George. Their connection was too
weak. But he and Francis were close. Dangerously close, because O'Dell had been
inside Francis' thoughts, and for George to travel there was a great risk.
The
road, from Francis to O'Dell, looked bright enough. Inviting, even. George
understood though that
brigh
t did not mean
safe
. There would be
mines along that path, and potholes, traps, blind bends.
But
I have to go. Because it isn't over. Now he's killed the world, what is there
left but to remake it?
And
a man like O'Dell? What would his creation be?
George
forgot his body entirely. Francis' heartbeat became just a distant memory, like
(
rain on tin...
) and he placed his left foot upon the road to O'Dell.
His right foot followed and he moved, not walking, but so fast that the
darkness growing either side of the road would not see him, could not find him.
Dead
hands along the road reached and clawed as he sped past, faster, and then
faster still. Wind rose behind him in cloud of dust until even he could not see
himself. All he could see was O'Dell, and O'Dell rushed toward him.
*
XVI.
1962
Kurt
William O'Dell was nineteen years old in 1962, it was a warm June, and he had
just finished his degree at Oxford University two years early. Smart and
driven, far beyond the capabilities of even his brightly shining peers, and
even as a young man O'Dell's mind was never at rest.
Three
days after his last exam O'Dell sat alone in a pub named The Eagle and Child,
where C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien once drank. Workmen hammered outside,
knocking some part of the old pub around, but O'Dell wasn't bothered by the
noise, not so much. He waited, nursing a pint of dark, thick and almost sickly
ruby ale, for a rather well spoken man from the Government. A strange place for
an interview, but at nineteen, O'Dell was full of confidence in the world and
his abilities, and his great worth.
Like
plenty of pubs with old, unsure tables, there was a beer coaster beneath a
table leg. This one read 'Courage'. The table was dark and scuffed, the beer
inexpensive. Smoke was in the air, dry tobacco and wet, sweet pipe smoke. The
pub hummed with gentle conversation. O'Dell was happy.
The
man he'd met the day before outside his campus ducked in, bending just at the
neck to clear the low lintel. He nodded and smiled to O'Dell, like they were
old friends, which they were not.
'Mr.
O'Dell,' said the man by way of greeting. The man wore a suit, fine cut. No
hat, no glasses. His eyes were blue and intelligent.
'Sir,'
said O'Dell, who had yet to learn the man's name.
'Another?'
'Please,'
said O'Dell. 'Just a bitter - Tetley? This is awful.'
'Of
course,' said the man. O'Dell watched for a second as the man walked to the
bar, then shrugged and drank the dregs in his glass while he waited. No sense
in sitting looking at the man's back.
He
returned with a pint of bitter for O'Dell, and a cup of tea for himself.
Unapologetic about it, too. The man shrugged. 'Beer disagrees,' he explained,
and that was that.
'Thank
you,' said O'Dell. 'Appreciate it.'
He
took the shallow head together with a healthy bite of the beer below while he
waited for the man to get to the crux of it.
'Well,
shall we?' said the man after slowly adding a cube of sugar to his tea, and
stirring. Sugar, no milk.
Odd
bird
, thought O'Dell, but he inclined his head. A job offer before he even
graduated was not to be sniffed at.
'My
name is Mr. Fenchurch. I work for a small, largely autonomous branch of her
Majesty's Government. It's a rather secretive thing, I'm afraid, and I'm far
from at liberty to divulge more than dusting of what we do. Would you be
interested in working for the Government, O'Dell? Mostly desk work, very little
footwork. Not, perhaps, for everyone...'
'I'm
not against the idea, Sir,' said O'Dell.
'Good
lad,' said Fenchurch. 'Remarkable aptitude for mathematics, haven't you?' He
didn't wait for O'Dell to agree or disagree
. 'The potential for growth in man's
intellectual endeavours is exponential when the burden of analysis and storage
is removed. Consider current systems, libraries, other, older and less efficient
repositories of knowledge. The modern mainframe could serve in this capacity,
and more, and as technology advances so too would the efficacy of computing.'
You wrote that, O'Dell?'
'My
University application? Sir? Is this to do with my studies?'
'Your
field, O'Dell. Fairly broad, but our research encompasses technology, yes. Artificial
Intelligence, O'Dell...outlandish concept, but then so was space flight.
Adelson-Velsky, a very clever bastard, Russian, or Israeli, something like that,
published some new method of organising data in March...people are looking at
leaps in storage capacity, new algorithms, programming languages...the cusp of
a new era. But I'm getting ahead.'
'AVL
tree? I read the paper.'
'In
Russian?'
'Sir.'
'Well,
then one-nil to you young, my friend. Let's just say it's a job doing clever
stuff. I think I'm outgunned,' said Fenchurch. He took his tea in a fist,
ignoring the small handle, rather than drinking with a pinky sticking out like
a toff. 'Nothing sordid, mind you. Nothing like that.'
'Sir?'
'MI6
and the like, O'Dell. We are not the cloak and dagger type.'
'Sir,'
said O'Dell, now halfway through his pint, 'I'm not entirely sure I understand
what the job
is.
'
'Good,'
said Fenchurch with a smile. 'I shouldn't think so. The thing is, there is a
small...cadre? Yes, cadre. Gifted, Mr. O'Dell. A number of men just like
yourself will be attending a short interview. A test, of sorts. Tomorrow at ten
in the morning. We have a modest office near Marble Arch. I'm am simply
offering the opportunity to apply for the job. The test is a step along the
path to a new career. Shall I put you down for it?'
'Sir?
I'm still slightly unclear as to the nature of the job I would be applying, or
testing, for.'
'I
am aware of that, and please understand that an element of wooliness is quite
essential at this early stage of affairs.'
The
man passed over a ticket for the train, from Oxford station to London, along
with several notes. 'Travel expenses,' he explained. 'For a sandwich or a cup
of tea or something,' said Fenchurch. He placed a type written note, folded,
alongside the money and the ticket.
'Directions.
Easy enough to find.'
O'Dell
picked up the paper and glanced. A hand drawn map beneath a simple set of typed
directions and the address.
'I'll
expect you along tomorrow, Mr. O'Dell,' said Fenchurch, rising. As though
O'Dell's attendance was a foregone conclusion.
'Sir,'
said O'Dell. Fenchurch and O'Dell shook.
They
met again at precisely ten in the morning on the following day.
*
The
train ride was entirely forgettable. O'Dell reached an unassuming grey stone
building after the long ride to London, and then the short ride on the central
line to Marble Arch.
He
rang on a doorbell press beside the tall black door, but didn't hear anything.
There was a knocker, brass - a lion's head with a thick, heavy ring hanging
from its mouth. He waited for thirty seconds or so, unwilling to seem overly
eager, but because he was English and patient and polite, too. After thirty seconds
and a simple, single knock of the heavy ring, the door opened.
A
woman answered. Her hair was worn tight against her head. She was older, maybe
forty at a guess. Her white shirt and her black skirt were both sensible.
'Mr.
O'Dell,' she said without a smile, but not quite curt. 'Please. Come in.'
'Thank
you,' he said.
'The
others are waiting. Up the stairs, the larger room on the left.'
O'Dell
needed the toilet, but he didn't feel like he should ask where the lavatory was
on arrival. He elected to wait.
'Ma'am,'
he said, and took the stairs up. She returned to whatever business she had -
whether she was a receptionist, or an aid, or a lady butler of some sort, he
had no idea. He put it from his mind and entered the larger of the two rooms on
the left. It was easy enough to find - the door stood open and he could see
three young men, around his age or a shade older. Mr. Fenchurch was seated
behind a large desk. The three men were seated facing him. There was no one
else.
The
stairs, marble banister, the old wainscoting. Red carpet, paintings of old dead
people in gold-painted frames on the walls. Everything spoke of money, of old
school charm. O'Dell did not come from money, but he had spent two years in
Oxford - he knew the smell of money.
'Good
morning, Mr. O'Dell,' said Fenchurch. He didn't rise from his chair, simply
motioned to the only free chair in the room. 'Please.'
O'Dell
nodded to the other men in the room, then took a seat furthest from the door.
The woman he met downstairs appeared at the door.
'Will
you need anything, Mr. Fenchurch?'
'No,
Elsie. Thank you. Close the door.'
No
please, no thank you. It was 1962, and the woman worked for a man who was
comfortable behind an old dark wood desk wearing a good, tailored suit.
'Well,
gentlemen. Rather an odd situation, this. A test of sorts. Those who pass will
move into the career of a lifetime. Those who fail will, I am sure, find
gainful employment elsewhere. To fail is no shame. Only the best are expected
to excel here. Each of you is gifted and intelligent. We, however, are looking
for a higher degree of excellence. Now, I will need you to sign a short
document, and then we may proceed. Our activities here are matters you will not
disclose. Your signature on this document will be your consent to this simple
term. I assume none have any objection?'
No
one did, though the other three young men did not seem entirely certain.
Fenchurch no doubt did not expect questions. He did not offer the chance, and
they did not take it.
O'Dell
signed the document that Fenchurch passed to the front of the desk, with his
own pen. Each of them had brought a pen, at least, expecting the kind of test
they were used to.
This
was not that kind of test.
'Gentlemen,'
said Fenchurch, glancing at each paper in turn. 'Shall we? Please, follow me.'
*
In
turn, each young man was led to a private room and told by Mr. Fenchurch that
someone would be along shortly to explain the next step.
O'Dell
listened to the men's names as each was dismissed, but for some reason he could
not hear their names, as though Mr. Fenchurch was somehow masking his voice as
they headed along the corridor.
It
was a strange sensation.
'Mr.
O'Dell,' said Fenchurch as they reached his room last. 'Someone will be along
shortly. Please make yourself comfortable. You will take lunch in your room
after the first test. There is a toilet adjacent to the room, should you need
it. Good luck.'
Shortly
after, O'Dell sat in a comfortable chair. A man came into the room and passed
O'Dell a stack of papers, and a plain sheet for O'Dell to write on, along with
a board so that he could rest the paper somewhere. There was no desk.
'Read
the papers. Write down your analysis and thoughts on the subject matter. You
will be given one hour to read and complete the test. I will return with
sandwiches and tea. How will you take your tea?'
'White,
please. No sugar.'
The
man nodded and passed O'Dell a handkerchief.
'Your
nose is bleeding, young man.'
O'Dell
wiped the handkerchief beneath his nose and saw that the man was telling the
truth. Bright red blood from a burst capillary inside his nose.
'Thank
you,' he said.
Strange.
O'Dell had never suffered a nosebleed before.
He
looked up, and saw that while he wondered about his bloody nose, the man had
gone and the sheet on the board was full of his own handwriting, a small drop
of blood in the bottom right corner.
I
don't remember writing any of this
, he thought, staring at his tight, neat
script. He read some, and still had no recollection of either reading the
material or writing his analysis.
He
looked up and saw the man who had originally give him the test taking the
papers from him. In place of those papers, the man gave O'Dell a tray. The tray
was silver, the cup and saucer with tea was china. There was a china plate,
too, with a sandwich. Pink salmon. To one side was a cherry tomato and a glass
of water and beside the water were three pills, each of different colours and
sizes.
'Sir?'
'Your
consent form is already signed, Mr. O'Dell. Please, enjoy your sandwich and tea
and make sure to take the medication.'
'Is
this part of the test?'