Prophet of the Badlands (The Awakened Book 1) (64 page)

Neither sadness nor anger followed her down; she felt nothing except the cold metal on her feet, and the tenebrous presence of the structure engulfing her. The walls grew narrower, and then wider as she sank deeper into a place filled with the mournful wails of the captive wind. She knew Shepherd was dead despite being too far away to feel it, and yet she had to see him one last time to apologize for what she had done.

A lattice of metal spread out behind her as she neared the bottom, warm enough to feel from several meters away. The ladder continued through it toward a network of pipes further down. Her fallen protector lay out upon the grid, at the center of a crater of smashed metal slats and leaking water. She stretched one leg out, hooking her toes on the platform before pushing herself off the ladder. Althea caught her balance with a wave of her arms before walking a pipe, maneuvering like an acrobat until she reached where Shepherd’s impact had flowered the steel tubing.

Blood no longer gushed from his mangled shoulders, and his stare did not find her. The red glow from within the lens had faded to an almost imperceptible electronic ember. Althea stepped over a bent pipe holding her arms out for balance, and climbed up to sit against his side.

“I’m sorry.” Grief came down the ladder, and she bawled. “You didn’t have to do that.” She sniffled, collapsing over his chest. “It’s my fault.”

Sob after sob fell out of her; she lost the ability to see as well as breathe. She witnessed people die many times, but for this one, she felt responsible―as if she had killed him herself.

A glimmer of light raised her head. A mass of writhing ribbons of pure white surrounded her like wings. Stretching out and rising into the air to either side, the ethereal trails drowned the darkness with light so pure it tinged blue. Her sniveling breaths calmed, and a pass of her hand rid her cheek of tears. Scintillating energy wreathed her arms, wafting like vapor into the air. Too sad to care what was happening to her, she leaned forward, and embraced the giant’s neck. After kissing him on the forehead, she fell onto his chest.

“Thank you.”

Regret and contrition surged. The radiance grew blinding, and Althea felt all the strength drawn from her body. She hugged tight to her fallen guardian and closed her eyes.

A creak of metal.

“I think she’s in here… What the hell is that?” The weak trace of a man’s voice intruded upon her state of calm.

“What the…” The first voice drifted to a whisper.

A different voice. “Fuuuuuuck this, I’m outta here.”

Time hung in a cloud of non-space; Shepherd’s chest hair tickled her cheek.

Pain crawled through her; a sensation as though she had run herself to the point of vomiting. Time held no meaning.

“Deal with that. I’ll go after those idiots,” said a familiar female voice.

Althea lifted her head to look; blue-white light was all she saw. “Anita…?”

A wave of energy pulled out of her and a warm breath burst upon the top of her head.

The glow became all-consuming.

Whirling winds and the touch of a hand on her back faded to soft warmth that enveloped her. A strange smell came to her senses, the scent of clean. Struggling to breathe, she inhaled the sweet air and her fingers tensed to find a squishy bed.

Resignation sapped the will to move from her heart. They caught her with Shepherd’s body; Archon’s people had found her and taken her back to her room. For a time, she lay without moving or opening her eyes; too afraid to feel the presence of Archon’s promise around her wrists. She did not want to try to get up and find she could not. A sound shuffled past the door, followed by indistinct and unfamiliar voices: a woman talking, and far in the distance, a small child laughing. Something was not right. There were no kids that little at the power plant.

When her eyelids parted, pure white surrounded her on all sides. She leaned up, holding an arm over her eyes until they adjusted to an unreal place that seemed nothing like the evil city, or her home. A blanket the color of green tea covered up to her chest. She spent minutes staring at the tents her feet made. He had threatened to handcuff her for a month if she tried to run again. Since her arms lay above the blanket, obviously free, she feared what she would feel if she moved her legs. A small silver cylinder clung to her right forearm by virtue of a sticky strip. A thin rubber tube ran from it to a pad on the back of her hand. The presence of a tiny plastic needle under the pad, inserted into her skin, intruded on her senses.

To the right, a small alcove held a toilet behind a little door next to one of those bath machines. A grinning stuffed goat stared at her from the silver table next to the bed, and the scent of food teased her and then vanished. As her eyes compensated for the brilliant glow, she noticed the light came from a window out to blue sky, tinged by smog. The floor, white and immaculate, gleamed with a perfect inverted recreation of everything above it. This did not look like the place Archon had taken her. After a tentative pause, she pulled at her right leg, shocked by the fact nothing held her down. She sat bolt upright, rubbing her legs and arms and reveling in the lack of restraints. Her dress was gone, replaced by a snug and stretchy white smock; the thin material held around her by a series of strange fastener dots down her right side.

Althea pulled the plush goat into her lap. She squeezed it, crying before she realized why. It smelled like Karina. Her brain struggled to explain why it did, but could not.

The rubber pad behind her knuckles reminded her of the Zoomer Violet had so craved, but she did not feel loopy. She peeled it and licked a droplet of blood from the back of her hand as the needle came out. The hurt was so tiny, fixing it was a reflex rather than conscious thought. Althea cringed as she peeled the cylinder from her arm; the small strip that held it in place took some peach fuzz with it as it came free.

After rubbing the spot, she was out of the bed and at the window in an instant, gawking at the ground from more than seventy stories up. The height scared the air from her chest, and she recoiled from the glass, spinning around as her surroundings overwhelmed her. With nothing else to do, she clutched the plush goat and cast a fearful glance at the window.

She abandoned it as an escape route and went for the door. Hesitant fingers hovered over the handle; she expected to be locked in. When it opened with ease, she almost cried from joy. She slid her head through the gap and peered into a busy hallway. To the right, it led past a series of other doors to a wide area with a large desk that had strange figures seated behind it. They resembled people in white uniforms and hats bearing little red crosses. Gaps in their skin revealed metal underneath, the way they moved looked unnatural, and she could sense neither thought nor emotion within them.

The other side had yet more doorways and ended in a small room with empty seats, fake plants, and many windows. An old man sat enjoying the daylight, in a chair floating above the ground on a pad of light.

She slid a leg through the barely-open door, extending her toes towards the floor outside as if an ounce too much pressure would set off alarms. Transferring her weight to the outstretched leg, she crept out of the room and in the direction of the desk, with the goat tucked under one arm. Beyond the other doors lay rooms with beds, just like the one in which she had found herself. Some empty, others had snoring figures in them. She drew near the counter, squeezing the plush toy and slowing her steps, her gaze locked upon the machine-people behind the desk. If they did not look up, she could walk right past and escape.

A sudden loud chime made her leap into a crouch atop a cushioned bench.

She flattened herself into the wall away from two silver panels that slid apart to reveal a cube-shaped room with no windows. Four men and two women walked out of it and went in different directions. She wondered how long they had been trapped in there, and did not move until the strange cage closed again. Easing herself off the bench, she managed to take one tentative step before a voice startled her from behind.

“Hey there, kid. Glad to see you’re awake; you’ve been out for three days.”

Althea jumped at the sudden speech, falling onto her back atop the bench. Mike, from the strange flying car, had come up behind her. His black uniform made him look like a hole in space against the stark whiteness everywhere. The shock of being snuck up on shifted to annoyance and then to worry as she thought about what Archon told her police would do to people like her. Whisk said the police were nice to kids, and she trusted him far more than Archon. She sat up and pulled her legs under her, placing the goat in her lap.

“Where am I?”

He smiled. “This place is called a hospital. It’s where sick people go to get better.”

“I’m not sick. Does the government want to kill me?”

She peered into his thoughts. Shock, confusion, horror.

“No, of course not. Our abilities are no different than guns. Having them isn’t a problem―it’s what you do with them that matters.”

His voice caressed her mind.
Look as much as you like, sweetie. I trust you. We have a lot to talk about.

Althea could find no deception and relaxed. With a tentative smile, she climbed off the bench and reached for his outstretched hand.

“There are some people downstairs who want to see you…”

lthea followed, holding Mike’s hand. She stepped tentatively over strange smooth hallways full of strange things, staring around at the commotion. The mixture of fear and wonder in her eyes attracted several nurses and staff who were happy to see her up and about. Few understood the nature of why she felt so frightened; none of them could know how a child of the Badlands felt here. Mike came to a stop at one of those large desks where three women with glowing eyes and odd lines on their faces worked. Not one of them had surface thoughts or emotions, and all seemed stuck wearing permanent smiles.