The Lost Code (13 page)

Come home, Lük.

‘What—?’ I started to ask.

But suddenly my vision exploded with light and it was like the inky dark of the lake had been washed away by white. I lost track of everything, and was greeted by a vision that I couldn’t explain and yet felt like I knew, almost like it was a memory:

There was a massive city built of stone, copper, and gold. It sat high in a steep-sided valley, with a great curving wall at its end, meeting the sea. Sailing ships moved to and from giant stone docks. More ships in the air, too, somehow. Mountains rose behind the city, jagged peaks topped with snow and cradling glaciers. The sky was dark gray, red sunlight edging the horizon.

At the center of the city was a giant structure, a pyramid like something out of ancient Egypt but with a flat top that was bordered by strange round globes, glowing like fire, but with white intensity.

Atop the pyramid stood a cluster of people, adults in crimson robes adorned with turquoise, and in the center, three teens, dressed in virgin white, on their knees on soft pillows, staring straight ahead. Things blurred. . . .

And I was one of the three. Before me was an object of brilliant crystal, sparkling translucent white. There was one in front of each of us. They glowed brighter than they should have, given the dim, smoky sky. I now noticed the weightless snow that was falling on me—gray snow, dead, leaving streaks on my white robe. I glanced to my right. Beside me was a girl: black hair, a round face, coal-black eyes. She looked back at me. I didn’t know her, or did I? Tears were leaking slowly down her cheeks. Beyond her was another boy, but his face was obscured in shaggy hair. But this girl . . . who was she?

She nodded slightly then turned back to face the giant crystal before her. I did too, and I looked into the pale light, the crystal object the size of my head. On its surface I saw a distorted reflection of a face that wasn’t quite my own, yet the features were similar, almost like we were related.

Behind the crystals, the priests and priestesses moved their hands in slow circles, performing final rites. One of them cried, but we all knew this was what had to be done.

I watched that one woman’s gaze flick over my shoulder, and, though I could not see them, I understood that behind us stood men, men with daggers, men who were stepping forward and placing those perfect blades to our necks.

And then the crystal’s glow increased, overwhelming everything and blinding me of every other thought. The blade pressed in and I felt searing pain and my eyes widened and I saw that the crystal before me had been perfectly carved into the shape of a human skull.

Its hollow eye sockets gleamed at me and I stared at it and I was so afraid but sure this was right, that all would be right. The giant skull, smiling a skinless grin of perfectly etched teeth. I believed. I believed. . . .

The pain of the blade was like the burning of forming gills only worse, and deeper, until there was nothing but the mineral light of the crystal skull, growing brighter, and I was gone within it, of it, in an oblivion of pure white.

GREEN
.

My eyes blinked open to a view down into sun-streaked water. A few feet below me, among the angling sunbeams, a giant puke-colored zombie koi hovered, watching me like it was waiting to be sure I was dead. Its gills billowed slowly in and out. Its eyes flicked around almost as if it was embarrassed that I’d noticed it.

I waved my arms, and the movement made the big, bloated fish turn and wander off.

My head hurt—dull, throbbing pain—and my back felt hot, exposed. Everything sore. Only my gills were humming along at normal speed. I rolled over. The lake surface was a couple feet above me, the TrueSky pale blue, with the occasional puffy SimCloud floating by. I righted myself and swam up, sticking my head out of the water and opening my throat to gulp in air.

The Aquinara was to my right. The city was another half mile up the shore, humming with activity. A couple sailboats and yachts were cruising nearby. And there was another buzzing sound, closer: a motor.

“Owen!”

I looked toward the Aquinara and saw a small boat headed right for me. The camp motorboat. Paul was standing at the wheel. Leech was with him.

I thought about diving under, but I felt too exhausted. And they were already pulling up, Paul turning off the motor, the boat drifting close to me, bringing a tingling electrostatic smell from its hydrogen-cell engine.

He gazed down at me from the shade of his black hat and sunglasses. He had on a short-sleeved button-down shirt, but still wore a tie tight against his neck. “Well, look what we found.”

“Hey,” I mumbled, not knowing what else to say. My thoughts were racing, trying to figure out how I was going to explain what I was doing out here. . . .

“Looks like someone got up early for the polar bear swim,” said Paul.

“Oh,” I said, “yeah.”

“I think, technically, the rules are that you stay in the camp swimming area.” Paul looked around as if to point out how far away that was. “You needed a little more exercise, I take it.” He looked back down at me.

“I guess,” I said.

He knew something, I felt sure of it, except, as usual, I couldn’t make out his expression.

“Well,” said Paul, “why don’t you climb in.” It didn’t sound like a question.

I grabbed the edge of the boat and dragged myself over the side. I thought it would be hard, but maybe the last couple nights of swimming had given me some added strength. I slid onto the floor and then sat up on one of the bench seats, on a slippery white vinyl cushion.

Leech sat across from me, silent. His short hair was this-way-and-that, like he’d rolled out of bed early again. He had his black pole case beside him, and that little black notebook in his lap, closed, but he had a pen in his hand like he’d been sketching before I showed up. The bandage was off his other hand.

Paul keyed the engine to life and the boat lurched forward, accelerating across the lake.

“Guess your neck really is feeling better,” said Paul.

“Oh, yeah,” I said.

“The cramps too, I take it.” This didn’t sound like a question either, but more like he was checking off things in his mind. “Did you realize you’d gone over two kilometers from camp?”

“Nah, not really, I was just going along,” I said, gazing at my puffy, waterlogged hands. “And I, um, lost track of where I was.”

Leech made a slight coughing sound at this, but when I looked over he was squinting out at the water.

I glanced up at Paul, wondering what question would come next, but he just looked ahead, guiding the boat along.
He doesn’t need to ask anything else because he knows
, Lilly would probably say.
He knows what’s happening.
Then I wondered:
Does he know about the siren?
How could he?

“You guys been fishing again?” I asked Paul.

“Yes indeed,” said Paul, his glasses reflecting the water. “Some of the deepest water in the lake is down here by the Aquinara, right, Carey?”

Leech didn’t respond.

“This is where all the gill breathers like it best,” said Paul. No smile. No head movement. But that comment . . .

I tried to act like everything was normal. “Did you catch anything?” I asked, looking around the boat for a bucket of fish or something, but other than Paul’s fishing pole, there was nothing. Not even, like, a box for bait or whatever they’d need.

“They weren’t biting today,” said Paul. “You know how fickle fish can be.”

“I saw some big koi down there,” I said.

“Did you?” Paul looked at me. “Well, do me a favor, Owen, and let’s just keep that between us. People over in town get all worked up about the
environment
, as if they have anything to complain about. We keep the koi contained, just like everything else, so they can enjoy their day.” Paul waved a hand toward a sailboat in the distance.

It surprised me to hear that note of disdain, as if Paul looked down on the people in EdenWest.

“Heads up,” he said, and I looked up to see him tossing me a dark-green towel. “You look cold.”

“Thanks.” I wrapped it around my shivering shoulders, and squinted through the glare of sun and water, watching the leafy coastline slide by. The motor and the wind created a drone that made it easy to just sit there and get lost in your thoughts.

I remembered the dream. . . . What had that been? It was already fuzzy in my memory. Lük, the siren had said. Was that the name of the boy in that scene, the boy I had become? And what was that skull made of crystal? It seemed like, in the vision, I’d known what was happening to me, like I was expecting to die, maybe even thought it was necessary, and now I sort of felt like it was something that had really happened to me, almost like it was a memory, but . . . None of that made sense. Then again, neither did the siren. And were these things connected to my gills?

Maybe I had just gotten so tired that I passed out, and it had all been a dream or something. Except the whole thing had felt real, and big, too. Like I hadn’t just been seeing that vision, I’d also been in it, and connected to something huge.

We started to turn, and I saw the little beach at the edge of the inlet, where Lilly and I had come ashore for the flashlight. It had only been a few hours ago, but it seemed like days. We passed the blue trampoline raft, the swimming dock. I looked at the raft—empty, no sign of its nighttime occupants—and then I wondered if Lilly had been mad that I left her. I couldn’t believe I had, especially in that moment. All that was almost as unbelievable as the vision. . . . Lilly had actually been hitting on me, and I left! What had I been thinking? But at the time it had seemed like something I had to do. I wondered why she hadn’t caught up, but maybe she hadn’t understood what she was seeing. Or hadn’t seen it at all.

I had that feeling again, and found Leech looking at me. His eyes were narrowed, studying me in that king-of-the-lion-pride kind of way. Or maybe it was just the brightness of the sun. Either way, it reminded me of the day before, of being pushed into the lake.

“Problem?” The word had popped out of my mouth before I even knew I was thinking it.

Now Leech definitely sneered. “Yeah. You.”

“Now, now, gentlemen,” said Paul.

I turned away from Leech, drying off my hair.

Paul eased the motorboat up to one of the boathouse docks. Leech hopped out, grabbing a rope to tie the bow. I went to do the same with a rope at the stern, but had to watch him out of the corner of my eye to see how to loop the thick, scratchy rope through the cleat, and hated how I needed him for things like that.

I stood up and started folding the towel, gazing at the tied-up sailboats as I did. I felt the light breeze that was always on in the morning. I turned, looking back at the narrow bay.
Wind from the southeast . . . maybe five knots. . . .
More thoughts followed along.
You’d have to tack east-west to get to the bay mouth; from there, a northwesterly course unless the wind shifted with the open water—

“You’d better hurry back to your cabin, Owen.” The words snapped me out of a trance. I turned to find Paul already on shore. Leech was nowhere to be seen. “Flagpole is in thirty minutes.” said Paul. “I could walk you back—”

His watch started beeping. Paul looked down at it. “Well, rain check on that.”

“What is it?” I thought to ask, not figuring he’d tell me.

“Looks like the board of directors is requesting a chat link. Well, that’s unexpected, but we wouldn’t want to keep them waiting.”

Again I looked for some sign of emotion on Paul’s face: given yesterday’s shouting chat, had the comment just now been sarcastic or sincere? But there was nothing, until he saw me studying him. Then, he seemed to lean forward with interest. “Unless you have anything pressing you want to get off your chest? I could tell the board to wait. . . .”

I turned and started off the dock, desperate to get away from that gaze. “No, I’m good. Thanks for picking me up. Sorry I was out there.”

“Like I said before, I’m here for you.” I could feel him watching me as I hurried across the sand, away from the boathouse and toward the swimming dock. My clothes weren’t there. They’d probably been found by the polar bear swimmers, ended up in Lost and Found or something.

Crossing the beach, I found myself looking at the water again. What had I been thinking back on the dock? Something about wind direction and sailing. But I’d never sailed before, never even been out in a boat until just now. I noticed the ripples on the water.
Yeah, southeasterly.
There was that thought again. Where was it coming from? And I felt weird, too, maybe had been feeling weird since I’d woken up in the lake, now that I thought about it. Not good or bad, just . . . different, like my insides were working fine except with new software, like they’d been reorganized.
Wind gusts up to about eight knots . . .

The sound of giggles snapped me out of it. I’d stopped walking without noticing, at the edge of the playing field grass. Turning, I found the Arctic Foxes emerging from the trees, on their way to flagpole, an army of ponytails and sweatshirts and flip-flops, and I remembered that I was standing there in my bathing suit, my skinny self on display for everyone. Except then I glanced down and realized that maybe I wasn’t quite as skinny as I’d been. Maybe there were curves now on my shoulders, some actual muscle on my chest. Nights of swimming, all the big camp meals, maybe it was having an effect. Though probably that was only visible to me—

“Hey, Owen.” Or maybe not. I looked back and saw that Mina and another girl were lagging behind the others, looking in my direction.

“Hi,” I said. I figured I was supposed to say something else, something more, but I didn’t know what. Mina had stopped and was now standing there shifting from one foot to the other. Wait, was she nervous about talking to
me
?

“Did you do polar bear?” Mina asked.

“Oh, yeah,” I said, and then I didn’t know what else to say so I added, “It was cold.”

“Um, you going tomorrow morning?” she asked. Her friend cracked up. Mina bit her lip.

“Maybe?” I said.

“Well, then maybe I’ll see you there?”

“Okay . . . ,” I said, meanwhile thinking,
What is happening to me?
As if gills and sirens and Lilly and thoughts about wind direction weren’t enough . . . Now I seemed to be getting asked to dawn swims by Arctic Foxes. “I gotta go and, um, put on clothes.”

“Mina doesn’t think so!” Paige shouted from the group of Foxes who were waiting halfway across the field. How did she even hear me?

Mina blushed. “Okay, see you at flagpole?”

“I’ll be there,” I said, and felt like there was no way I was going to be able to handle all this.

Mina and her friend turned and started after the rest of the Arctic Foxes and as they walked they leaned into each other’s shoulders and started whispering and laughing. I realized as I turned away that this time I did
not
assume that they were making fun of me. Instead, I considered that maybe I was someone worth waking up early for polar bear swim for. And even though it seemed crazy, I also smiled about it for a second, and then thought of Lilly, and smiled more, until I remembered that I’d left her last night.

Idiot!
What was I thinking? But the siren. That vision . . .

And now the wind.

What did it all mean?

I walked back to the cabin in a daze, all these thoughts jumbling around. I was just nearing the side door when it popped open.

“Owen.” It was Todd. He looked at me expectantly.

“I just went to the polar bear swim.”

Todd looked me over. “Okay, but you’re supposed to let me know the night before.”

“Sorry.”

He held the door for me. Inside, everybody was up and getting dressed, and Jalen greeted me with “Turtle!” but that was about it.

I threw on clothes and turned around. Beaker was a foot from me again.

“Dude, can you stop doing that?” I said.

He looked at me almost like he was expecting something.

“What?”

He glanced around, then leaned close. “I saw you leave in the night.”

I looked around, too. “Did you tell anyone?”

“No.”

“Well, don’t, okay?”

“Where were you?”

“Just . . . out. I needed to take a walk.”

“All night?”

“Yeah.”

“Can I come next time?”

“Probably not.”

Beaker was going to say something else, but Mike passed and shoved him down onto his bunk. “Don’t block the door, scrub.”

As he got up, wincing, I said, “Just forget you saw me, okay?”

“But . . .” He sighed. “All right,” he said, sounding disappointed.

We headed down to flagpole. I stumbled along, feeling like I was going to fall asleep on my feet. As we sat down, Mina waved hi to me and I waved back and then slumped in my seat and closed my eyes as Claudia began her announcements. “For everyone’s safety, we’d like all cabins to continue using NoRad on the two-hour cycle from now on. Now, we have lots of things on the schedule today. . . .”