Entanglement (YA Dystopian Romance) (34 page)

***

 “Amber, don’t come
down here!” Aaron tried to shout, but she didn’t hear.

She bounded down the
stairs in front of Clive, streaked across the dungeon, and knelt in front of
him. Her golden hair shimmered under the lights.

“Aaron, he
didn’t
,
did he?”

“He’s doing . . . the operation
on you,” said Aaron, struggling to push himself off the floor. “Get out of
here.”

Amber
tugged him into an embrace, squeezing herself against him.
“As if I’d leave you,”
she whispered, and for a moment, the tension in her body thawed. “I lied. I
do
want to be your half.”

Clive just watched her
from the stairs, the corners of his mouth held firm. Only his eyes betrayed his
torment.

“Amber, there’s no
deal,”
said Aaron, feeling stronger now
that they were touching. “He betrayed us.”

“He
betrayed
everybody
,” she said.

Then Casler rose up
behind her, blotting out the lights. His eyes gleamed as he snapped another
pair of latex gloves into place and slid the mask over his mouth.

Aaron tried to push her
off, but it was too late. Casler’s shadow swooped forward. He
grabbed Amber around the waist, swung her onto the
operating table, and held her down with one hand as he strapped her in. She
shrieked and kicked him in the nose, wriggled free. He dragged her back, yanked
straps tight across her
stomach, her chest, her legs. Then he adjusted
her body until her head lay directly at the focal point of the machine’s metal
spike.

When it was done,
Casler wheeled over his chair and sat beside her. He stroked her cheek and
brushed the hair out of her eyes. “It’ll all be over soon,” he said. “I
promise.”

Amber glared at him.
“Take whatever you want,” she said, “but leave Aaron alone.”

“It’s too late for
him,” said Casler.

“No it
isn’t!
”
Amber strained against the straps, but nothing gave. Her body tensed, and then
she collapsed, out of breath. “It isn’t too late for him,” she moaned.

Casler gave a sad
smile, kissed her cheek, then pulled out another syringe. He rolled his chair
behind the machine, where panels were missing, and extracted a loop of tubing
coated with a sticky lubricant—
mucous.

“Be gentle with this
one,” he said soothingly to the machine, “She’s the potentate’s favorite.” Then
he injected the syringe into the tubing. The tube pulsed vein-like between his
gloved fingers before slithering back inside the machine.

Casler
wheeled himself to the laptop, which flashed with
an
endless stream of green numbers.
“Is
everyone ready?” he said.

The
machine wobbled, staticky, more like a projection than a solid object. Amber
watched the quivering mass above her, too scared to look away.

And
from out of the shadows, Clive was watching her. Aaron gathered one thing from
the flicker in his pale eyes. He knew how much of his half would be missing
when it was done. Clive averted his gaze, though, quickly wiped his eyes, and
resumed his position beside the machine. “Go ahead, Father.”

Casler
typed a command, then hit enter. “There—”

The
entire cavern lurched. The machine groaned, as if suddenly encountering
resistance. And Aaron knew why.

It
was drilling into Amber’s clairvoyant channel.

He
tried to climb onto the operating table, to Amber. But his fingers slipped.
Again, the icy floor slapped his cheek.

Casler
leaned back in his chair. “Keep it stable, Clive. Ninety seconds until we reach
clairvoyance.”

***

Aaron’s three minutes
were up. The resistance at the back of his head waned to a sliver, then
nothing. Just the cold of empty space. By now, he should have been somewhere
else. The golden fields of paradise, Elysium—the Abyss.

Somewhere else.

Not here in this
dungeon with his cheek glued to frostbitten bedrock. Yet, by sheer willpower,
his clairvoyance held. Miraculously, though it felt like a vacuum cleaner had
been plugged into the back of his brain and turned on high, it held.

 And if he could just
hold it for another ninety seconds, he could fight. Aaron closed his eyes.
First one arm, then the other. Then his leg. He dragged himself to his feet.
His muscles wobbled, but they too held. He could hold anything for ninety
seconds.

He could hold his
breath for ninety seconds.

Fury constricted his
pupils, and blood tingled in his fingertips. He wheezed, clenched his fists,
and staggered forward, willing the strength back into his muscles.

 “Counter-clockwise—three
and a half degrees,” said Casler. “Eighty seconds.”

Aaron hooked his
fingers over the backrest of a chair, grabbed the seat, and hoisted it over his
head.

“Back it off, Clive.
You’re drifting—two degrees clockwise.” The machine groaned behind him. “Keep
it stable.”

“Father,
watch out!”

The steel leg struck
Casler above the eye. The impact knocked him off his chair. He dropped like a
felled sequoia, and Aaron was on him before he hit the ground.

Seventy-five seconds.

Aaron landed with all
his weight, sank his knee into the man’s back. He grabbed the first thing in
reach. An old monitor. Fifty pounds of CRT, glass, and plastic. Cables snapped
like roots as he dragged it off the desk and thrust it down on Casler’s head.

The concussion gave a
meaty thud, and Casler’s face plowed into jagged stone. The monitor rolled off
him, and a deep gouge oozed in its wake, right behind his ear.

Seventy seconds.

“Aaron—behind you!”
Amber yelled from the operating table.

The fight was two to
one—he’d forgotten.

Aaron glanced up as
Clive swung. He jerked his head back, and the serrated end of a rusty pipe
grazed his cheek. Clive’s pale eyes gleamed. He swung again. Aaron backed his
head into the desk. Nowhere else to go.

The blow deafened him,
right on his ear. Slammed his head sideways. The pain made the cavern flicker.
He scurried away, but the pipe clipped his shoulder. His left arm buckled, and
he crunched into the floor, banged his lip. Salty blood gushed into his mouth.

Sixty-five seconds.

Behind him, Clive
coiled his arm back.

“Clive,
don’t!
”
Amber yelled.

He swung again. Aaron
heard the whistle and rolled just in time. Where his head had been, the stone
floor exploded into shards. 

The pipe buzzed from
the impact. Clive winced and clutched his wrist to keep from dropping it. He raised
the pipe again. Swung.

Sixty seconds.

Aaron curled into a
ball, cradled his head. He felt a crack, the sound of a broken rib—just below
his heart.

Then another. The pipe
stabbed into his lower back, bruised his kidney. And another. Deep into his shoulder.

“
Stop it!
” Amber
shrieked.

“Clive—that’s enough!”
yelled Casler from somewhere behind him.

One more. Payback for
the night before.

“Clive—” The blows
stopped.

Fifty-five seconds.

A shadow loomed above
him. The halogen lamps winked out. Casler, his eyes glossy and bloodshot.

Aaron tried to crawl,
but the man’s dense fingers sank into his shoulder and yanked him backward,
stood him on his feet.

“Aaron, get up.”
Casler’s eyes darted across his face, concerned—
loving
almost, as a
reddish-black stain spread on his mask.

“You’re bleeding,” said
Aaron.

Casler spun him around,
and his thick arm clamped down on Aaron’s throat, choking him. “What you did to
me was pointless,” he said.

“Yeah? Cry me a river,”
said Aaron.

Fifty seconds.

Aaron jerked his head
back, but Casler’s jaw was too high. His skull hit the man’s chest with zero
effect.

“Shhh—” Casler squeezed
Aaron tighter and stroked his forehead, smoothing back his sweaty hair. “It’s
okay,” he said. Then he carried him to Amber’s side.

“She’s going to be
fine,” he whispered. “Look—here she is.”

And there she was, in a
lake of blonde hair—all strapped in. Her eyes glittered under the halogen
lamps, the most dazzling green Aaron had ever seen.

They stared at each
other. Too afraid to look away. Amber mouthed, “I love you.” He mouthed it
back.

Forty-five seconds.

“The potentate gets to
keep the part we take out,” said Casler. “We’ll have Amber present the vial
herself, as a gift. The potentate will be so proud of her.”

Aaron tore at Casler’s
knuckles, but it was like scratching steel poles.

 “Hold her hand,” said
Casler, and he yanked Aaron’s wrist down and forced their hands together.
Through her palm, Aaron could feel her shivering.

 The machine’s whine
was quieter now, hypersonic.

“Clive, how much time?”
said Casler.

“Forty seconds.”

“Aaron—” Casler
breathed into his ear. “Stay with me for forty seconds. Look into her eyes.
Imagine how beautiful she’ll be without flaws.”

Amber squeezed his
hand, and they never broke eye contact. They couldn’t.

Thirty-five seconds.

He felt Casler’s head
turn. “Four degrees, Clive—counter-clockwise.”

“How can you tell? Let
me check the laptop.”

“Just do it,” said
Casler. “We want a nice clean hole so too much doesn’t leak out. She should be
fashionably obedient, not brain dead.”

Thirty seconds.

Then her eyes would
wink out. And that would be the last thing Aaron saw before he died.

***

But
a lot can happen in thirty seconds.

Clive
never made the adjustment he was supposed to—the four degrees bit. Amber
glanced in his direction, and her eyes widened. Aaron heard the thump.

He
and Casler turned at the same time, as Clive collapsed, unconscious. A purple
line of cuts bled above his ear, as if his scalp had been stamped.

Then
a figure appeared behind Casler, and suddenly Aaron was free. He landed on
solid ground and spun.

But
it wasn’t Dominic, and it wasn’t his parents. It wasn’t even Tina.

It
was Buff Normandy.

***

All six-four,
two hundred and forty pounds
of him. T
he white Pueblo Rugby logo glowed on his
sweatshirt as h
e pried Casler’s arms off Aaron’s throat, his eyes
fierce.

“No
more bullshit,” he said, then he slammed his fist into Casler’s jaw—b
rass knuckles and all.

Casler’s head whipped
sideways, and his surgical mask snapped free. Blood sprayed everywhere. And
only then did Aaron see the damage he had caused him earlier with the monitor.

His lips were shredded,
split open. Foaming.

But Casler moved fast,
terrifyingly fast. He dropped his shoulder and plowed Buff into the desk,
snapped it clear in half. But Buff wasn’t the best rugby player in the league
for no reason; his feet were quick. Casler went down first. Buff and Aaron
descended on him together.

Buff landed his second
blow—and winced. He must have punched wrong, because he rolled off to the side
and massaged his fingers. Casler rose from the haze of splinters, his thick
limbs swaying like battering rams. But Aaron was there. He thrust down his
elbow, nearly broke it on Casler’s skull. The man grunted.

Twenty five seconds.

“Buddy, hold his arms!”
said Buff, sliding the knuckles onto his other hand.

“Not happening—” 

Casler’s fist struck
Aaron’s chest, and he felt his feet leave the ground. He landed on his back and
gasped for air.

Casler leaned over him,
his face twisted and bloody, and actually held out his hand.

“How about we talk this
out?” he said. “Call off your friend.”

“Stop the machine,”
Aaron spat.

“Aaron, you’re
dying
,”
said Casler.

“You first,” said
Aaron.

Twenty seconds.

Casler tried to smile,
but his shredded, foaming lip twisted his face. Blood collected in his laugh
lines. “You and Amber would have been perfect together,” he said proudly. “So
obstinate
—”

The machine roared.
They looked up at the same time. Something was off.

Because Clive hadn’t
made the adjustment—the four degrees counter clockwise. The field drifted. It
was a feedback loop. Once unstable, it slipped.
Four degrees became five, then six. Then ten.